Asymptomatic

Freesound is a collaborative database of Creative Commons licensed sounds.

Have you ever been sitting at a Windows computer and been informed that an update is available to your OS? And so like a good security-conscious user, you download and install the update, only to be told that you need to reboot for some reason? But then you decide that if you’ve been running without that update for years, then waiting a few hours until your current work is done shouldn’t be a big bother. Except, Windows now pops up a “Restart Now” dialog box every few minutes until you do restart.

I’m sure I’m not the only one who would like to continue running his computer without rebooting. Here’s the secret.

Anyone administrator of a web server knows that SSL (Secure Sockey Layer) certificates are an evil reality in the world of the web. SSL certificates are required on our servers to provide secure communication between the server and the web browser. But to obtain a certificate, an administrator must often pay in excess of $100 per domain. Why is this so expensive?

Fundamentally, a certificate serves two purposes. First, and most obviously, it secures the data being transmitted between the two computers in the conversation. Secondly, it can be used to verify that a server using that certificate is the server to which the certificate was issued.

The first issue is easily done with any geneic certificate. An encryption tunnel between the browser and the server prevents evesdroppers from intercepting the information that is sent between them. A certificate authority is not necessary to create this tunnel. But for obtaining the identity of the certificate provider, you need to rely on a third party to verify the identity of that server. And that's where these certificate authorities are catching on and giving us admis the shaft.

There actually is water on Mars. Now where are the Martians?

Is this the first time that Asymptomatic has been mentioned in a podcast? That’s what it seems like to me.

Is this a sign that I’ve “made it”? An unsolicited link from someone else’s podcast? Neat.