Tech Friday with Dave Hatter - Sponsored by Intrust IT - 6/14/2024

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Later decreasing clouds as we move onthrough the day and sunshine even by late
this afternoon and evening high of eightysix reversed that it's sixty eight right now
at fifty five KRC, the talkstation from the ucl Traffic Center. The
University of Cincinnati Cancer Center is theregion's first and only provider of specialized primary

(00:21):
care services for cancer patients and survivors. Called five one three five eighty five
UCCC. A little bit of goodnews. Northbound seventy five. The lanes
coming out of northern Kentucky and acrossthe bridge are now open left hand side
of the highway. The ramp fromeastbound Fort Washington Way and sixth Street,
those are still blocked off because ofthe earlier accident. Chuck Ingram on fifty

(00:44):
five KRC, the talk station salutingOld Glory on Flag Day twenty twenty four.

(01:23):
This was a day in seventeen seventyseven that the Continental Congress authorized the
original version of the American flag,and we celebrate the stars and stripes today
for that reason. It's six pointthirty Gary, Jeff Walker. This is
a patriotic guy. I know he'snot necessarily allowed to be patriotic all the

(01:46):
time on the radio. But he'sa patriotic guy. I know this for
a fact. And he's also ourtech expert, our guru. I call
him the Mad Hatter, which Ithink other people have now stolen from me
as a monitor moniker for him.But that's all right. He's everywhere man
on TV and on radio, andhe's here with us for a Tech Friday.

(02:08):
Dave Hatter, Good morning, GoodGary, Jeff. How are you
today? You know what I'm kicking. It's been a busy week though.
Italian Fest started last night, soI was up on stage and doing the
MC stuff that they've allowed me todo since twenty ten, and then had
to immediately cram some sausage down mythroat, go to sleep and get up

(02:30):
at three point thirty. And todayI'm working the bar after this and more
Italian Fest tonight. So it's abusy week, but it's a good one.
How are you? Yeah? Prettygood? That sounds fun. Yeah.
Plus, who doesn't like Italian food? You know? I mean,
the stuff's just good. Yes,when it's good, it's very good.
You're right. Anyway, let's getto the subject at hand, David.

(02:52):
First off, cyber attacks, aswe know, and as you point out
on a routine basis, are increasingand surging. Ransomware attacks surging they did
in twenty twenty three. In thehealthcare industry, attacks nearly doubled from twenty
twenty two. There are actually someteams from Cincinnati who might be part of

(03:13):
the solution in solving people's issues withcyber attacks. Please explain this if you
would. Yeah, you know,Gary, jeffis as we've discussed so many
times, and you touched on herebriefly with some of the stats leaning into
this, ransomware attacks in particular canbe totally devastating. There have been several

(03:34):
hospital chains that have been attacked recently. In fact, you know there's a
big chain in England that was downfor several days. And that's one of
the things I think people often overlookif they don't follow this closely or don't
work in the business. Is sadlybecause the entire world is now digital,
or at least you know, oureconomy is all digital. If you can
launch some sort of ransomware attack inparticular, just a reminder for folks,

(03:58):
ransomware is nothing more than software thatgets dropped into your environment. It kind
of surreptitiously runs in the background encryptingyour data. And you know, as
that data gets encrypted, then thesystems don't. They either don't operate correctly,
or it won't operate at all becausethe data can't be read. It
can be really devastating. You know, there's no guarantee even if you pay

(04:18):
the ransom, that you're going tobe able to decrypt your data. And
when you start to shut down realcritical, real world infrastructure like a hospital,
you know, this goes beyond Okay, well, this business lost money,
this business paid to ransom. Ithas real world impacts on the rest

(04:38):
of us, and that's why thisstuff is increasingly important. So for a
long time, if you worked inthe business, you've heard about the skills
gap, especially in cybersecurity, wherethere just aren't enough people with the right
skills to do these jobs. Andit's good to see that now rather than
just wait for students to graduate fromhigh school and then go off to college
and potentially take the courses they wouldneed to do this, there's a lot

(05:00):
of options out there and several highschools now in this particular story, they're
talking about a new program that's goingto start out at Seven Hills School,
Yes, but I know, Iknow Lakota has had a program and now
there are different programs. Lakota hashad a program for some time. I
know Mason City schools are starting aprogram like this because we've had some minor

(05:24):
involvement in just talking about what itwould look like. You know, all
the local community colleges around here haveofferings like this. But it's good to
see even at the high school levelbecause you know, one of the one
of the one of the problems withthe current educational track is, you know,
if you don't start learning about thisstuff in high school and see it
as a viable career option, Ithink a lot of people get bad advice.

(05:46):
They think you have to get afour year degree in computer science or
something to do this, and youreally don't and do these programs again,
like Lakota or Seven Hills or Mason, and I think there are some other
high schools looking to start up thesetypes of programs. You know, you
can get a little bit of ataste of what does this mean, what
would it look like to work inthis field, what kind of opportunities are
there, and more importantly, learnsome hands on skills and some of these

(06:11):
some of these programs. Again,I'm the most familiar with what they're doing
the Lakota because I've experienced some oftheir students out and about. Some of
them have showed up at some ofthe local, you know it professional type
organizations like SINPA or ISC or thatkind of thing conferences. It's pretty impressive
what they're learning, what they're capableof doing. So, you know,

(06:31):
I would encourage you know, anyonethat has kids or grandkids out there and
they might be interested in what couldbe a very you know, fast paced,
growing and lucrative career. This isyou know, something worth looking into.
And we need more of these peoplebecause, you know, the society
increasingly depends on technology and we needpeople that know how to protect it,

(06:56):
not only from foreign adversaries, butyou know, insider threats are people making
mistakes. It's amazing to me thatthere aren't more people doing this right now,
the way the technology has moved,David, And you're right there are
kids that are like eleven or twelvethat are more hip to the technology than

(07:17):
I am. So you're right aboutthat. I think part of the problem
is trying to even find the peoplewho can do to education, because I
think there's a big disconnect. Ifyou have the capability and the knowledge to
teach this stuff, you could potentiallymake a lot more money in the private
sector than you could, you know, working at a high school. And
I think that's part of the issue, is trying to figure out how to

(07:39):
get the people who have the knowledgeand the capabilities to teach it to go
teach it at this level. Butit's I'm glad to see it. I
think it's important. We need moreof it out there, and I mean,
it's an amazing opportunity for the kids. Well, I mean, I
know all uit nerds, professional nerdsand stuff are very compassionate and altruistic and
you'll just volunteer your time. You'regoing to teach Dave, Well, you

(08:01):
know, Gary, Jeff, Iactually have been a long term instructor at
Cincinnati State. I don't do itfor free, and uh, you know,
it's it's a good opportunity. Though. I'm glad to see this,
and we need more of this kindof thing. We need to get back
to more of a trade school apprenticeshiptype program, yeah, where people can
get these were other skills and getinto the workforce rather than spend an enormous

(08:26):
amount of time and money earning afour year degree. It's probably not all
that useful anyway. Yeah, really, it's a good, good step in
right direction. And you know,and that way we won't be responsible for
your college loan that you can't pay. Yeah, there you go, Soda.
Kudos to Seven Hills, Mason,Lakota, and anyone else out there
that's pursuing this path. I thinkit's definitely a great way to get kids

(08:48):
engaged in this and get them onthe path to what could be a great
and frankly a necessary and important career. Dave Hatter and a Tech Friday will
take a break and come back sixthirty seven at fifty five k RCV talk
station. I'm it will chances forsome spotty isolated showers between now and say

(09:11):
noon early afternoon. Then we clearout a high of eighty six this afternoon,
completely clear overnight tonight. Tomorrow morning'slow sixty one for Saturday, low
humidity, mostly sunny skies and eightyfive and Sunday for Father's Day, mostly
sunny, rising humidity in a highround ninety three at sixty eight. Now
it's fifty five KRCD talk station.Here's Chuck Ingram from the UCL Traffic Center.

(09:33):
The University is SINCIDENTI Cancer Center isthe region's first and only provider of
specialized primary care services for cancer patientsand survivors, called five one three five
eighty five u se CZ. Alittle bit of good news. Northbound seventy
five the lanes coming out of NorthernKentucky and across the bridge are now open
left hand side of the highway.The ramp from eastbound Fort Washington Way and

(09:56):
sixth Street, those are still blockedoff because of the earlier accident. Chuck
Ingram on fifty five KR, andsee the talk station. Rushing back into
the conversation with Dave Haddard on aFriday morning tech talk on fifty five KR.

(10:20):
See it's six forty one Gary Jeffand from Brian and Dave up next.
I have heard for years that onceit's out there, once it's in
the digital space, it's there forever. But that's not necessarily true, something
called link rot and digital decay ongovernment news other web pages, thirty eight

(10:45):
percent of web pages from twenty thirteen, eleven years ago are no longer accessible.
So what about that thing. Wewere all as told as once it's
out there, it's always out there. Well, I thought this was an
interesting bit of research from Pew,and I think you have to look at
it from two different perspectives. Onceit's out there, it certainly has the

(11:09):
potential to last forever because storage isso cheap. And when they use terms
like link rot and digital decay,my take on that is we're talking about
things just breaking through entropy. Companiesgoing out of business. You know,
one company gets sold to another andthey decide to discontinue some operation or something,

(11:30):
so they shut things down. Nowthat doesn't mean your data is not
still there somewhere. It could bein the dark web, could be just
on a hard disk somewhere. Oneof the most interesting things that I think
people who don't work in the businessmay not be aware of is anytime you
hear in this I'm kind of I'llcome back to this topic, but anytime
you hear a business say, oh, well, we've anonymize your data,

(11:52):
and you know you can't really tellwho the original creators of that data were,
I just call bs on that.There's numerous studies out there, including
one from MIT where they've gone outand done things like dumpster dive and bought
hard disks from used computer stores oroff eBay and been able to prove that
with as little as three or fourpieces of information, they can de anonymize

(12:15):
that data and figure out, youknow, who it actually is referring to.
So when you hear it's out thereforever to to some extent, that's
true, or at least it couldbe, because storage space is so cheap
and it's so easy to get incredibleamounts of storage for little amounts of money,
and companies are often incentivized to storeas much data as possible. Not
the good news on that front,Gary Jeff is we're now up to eighteen

(12:37):
states that have passed some sort ofconsumer data privacy law, including Kentucky in
this last session, which is whichis good news. We should talk about
that sometime. It's not perfect,but it's a huge step in the right
direction. But what this is referringto is, again, you know some
company as a website, they getsold, they go out of business,
whatever, and things just sort ofdie through entropy. It's not really like

(12:58):
an worlwhell memory whole thing where it'sbeing destroyed on purpose. But it points
out an interesting problem with as oursociety becomes more digital, Like we discussed
in the last segment, you know, and you don't have paper records like
you used to, it is entirelypossible for you know, content to just
get lost because again, company goesout of business and whatever they had on

(13:24):
their blog, their website, whatever, it just eventually goes away. Now
there is an interesting website out there, and it can often be a great
resource if you do have like adigital decay situation where a company is gone
and they had content that was interestingto you and you can't find anymore.
The Internet archive a lot of timesyou can find things there because it's just
kind of crawling the Internet and capturingdata. You can often, like find

(13:48):
the previous state of a website fromten years ago or something. But it
does point out an interesting problem thatover time, you know, stuff does
get lost, and unlike in theold world, a paper something that used
to be there might be gone atsome future points simply because whoever was funding
it for whatever reason, decides notto fund it anymore. No. See,

(14:09):
I thought when I set the fireto destroy my permanent record, it
was gone and now you're telling methat it's still it may exist somewhere in
the dark web, or maybe maybeif I'm lucky, it will also disappear
from digital could be. I mean, I actually ran into this yesterday where
someone sent a link to a newsstory about the about Saudi Arabia getting out

(14:33):
of the petro dollar situation, whichI don't know why that's not getting the
coverage it deserves. To me,that's oh, it's a huge, major,
major potential issue. You want totalk about the US economy taking a
swan dive. It's not good forsure. But interestingly enough, someone posted
it on LinkedIn. I read thearticle, I wanted to share it with

(14:54):
someone. I went back to theperson that posted it on LinkedIn, click
the link, and it no longerworked. So, I mean, that's
a perfect example of what this Pewresearch is referring to. You know,
for whatever reason, and this wasn'tthe link itself, the person posted,
you know, the website that itpointed to, for whatever reason, removed

(15:15):
that content or or change something sothat the link no longer worked. And
I mean, I'm sure you andevery one of the listeners out there has
been in the situation where you tryto find something or someone emailed you something
and you go back to it.Yeah, the link no longer works.
I've had that happen numerous times.Dave Hatter. Let's take a quick break
and come back with one more segment. We're talking about devices you wear that

(15:39):
are connected to the Internet and howyour brain waves are being captured. Perhaps
six forty seven at fifty five KOCthe talk station hheartradio problem. All right,
brain now, not rain later backto even some sunshine by the time

(16:00):
we get into later this afternoon,early this evening, eighty six for a
high TEP. It's sixty eight now, and let's check traffic from the UCL
Traffic Center. The University of CincinnatiCancer Center is the region's first and only
provider of specialized primary care services forcancer patients and survivors. Called five one,
three, five eight five u SECsee northbound seventy five better through the

(16:25):
cut in the hill, but slowsout of downtown to the accident above the
seventh Street ramp that has only theleft two lanes open, and the ramp
from sixth Street to northbound seventy fiveremains blocked. Chuck Ingram on fifty five
k see the talk station Dave theMad Hatter Friday Tech Talk continues on the

(16:47):
Morning show and Dave, this storyis out of Australia, but it's applicable
for anybody who has got a fitbit or a smart watch, or maybe
as they continue to develop the technology, the neuro technology that's already out there
too as a small extent with likeheadbands and whatever that measure your brain waves.

(17:12):
And the headline of the story iswearable vices can now harvest our brain
data. And this is again somethingthat I am just simply not gonna do.
If I don't need a fit bit. If I'm out and I decide
to run, I can take myforefinger and my middle finger onto my wrist
and I can get my pulse.You know, my wife has a blood

(17:33):
pressure cuff at home if I needto measure my blood pressure, and I
just I don't need it, andI don't need anything on my body attached
to any internet anywhere. Well,Gary, Jeff, I'm sure it's not
going to shock you when I say, yeah, there's not a chance.
No, it doesn't shock me atall. But I also got to give

(17:56):
the hat tip to Joe. Howabout that rock well, somebody's always watching
me home. I mean, perfect, perfect segue. That's why Jay was
the best. But you know,you and I have discussed, and Brian
and I have discussed for some timeall these so called smart devices. They're
just basically a privacy and security dumpsterfire. And when you think about the

(18:19):
business model that drives these things,and in many cases you get the device
for free or at some nominal cost, way less than it would normally cost,
because your data is what drives theirbusiness model, right, and it's
in I'll tell you I used tohave a fitbit, and once they were
bought by Google. Since I'm nota fan of Google and their surveillance capitalis

(18:40):
a business model, I stop usingthe fitbit. You know, it's fun,
it's funny. Hold on just fora second, because you talked about
not being a fan of Google.On my phone, on my iPhone,
I'll hit Safari because I'm searching forsomething and the Google thing automatically pops up.
Stay signed in with Google? Noh, I opt out every single time.

(19:02):
But anyway, please continue, Andthat's what you should do because that
cuts off the flow of data tothe But you know, when you look
at these so called smart devices,the Internet of things, and the fact
that they're capturing enormous amounts of oftenvery sensitive data, you know, in
and of itself, they're risky fora variety of reasons that again I've talked

(19:22):
about ad nauseum, but now we'regoing to take medical devices. And I
would point out to people Mozilla,the people that make the Firefox browser,
have a great website called Privacy NotIncluded, where they rate this sort of
stuff and through the lens of youknow, privacy and it's so it's a
great website. I highly recommend it. I tell people to go there all
the time and check it out.You know, I post this stuff on

(19:44):
Twitter and LinkedIn all the time.And when you look at the kind of
information that's already been released about thingslike period tracking apps for women, they've
been you know, all kinds ofdata and security problems with these things.
The idea that you're going to strapsomething on your head, and Apple recently
had a patent for ear pods thatcould reach your brain waves. That's in

(20:07):
theory, it hasn't been released.There's a patent for it out there,
you can go see it. Youknow, I'm not going to use any
device that is not you know,run by medical professionals, controlled in a
setting where that trusted medical professionals.It's why don't use things like twenty three
and meters or colow Guard or anyof that sort of stuff. Ye you
know, can you trust the companyto do the right thing with your data?

(20:30):
You know, in some instances youneed medical treatment, you go to
the local hospitality you trust. That'sone thing. But I'm not going to
give a private for profit company whois using a surveillance capitalism model to strap
some kind of thing on my headthat can read my brainways and send them
that data. It's just completely insane, and I honestly it's almost unfathomable to

(20:51):
me that anyone would think that thatis a good idea. Yeah, some
people making it or the people usingit. Well, the last time that
I had an actual EEG done atthe hospital, they found out that I
actually didn't have any brain activity atall, So I'm not as concerned about
that I might have the same problemas other things that may be involved and

(21:14):
just this internal snooping man, Andit's just can't we just have some autonomy?
Can't we just have some some thingsthat are private and less and less
seems to be the answer or not. Really, there's no privacy anymore.
We are at a place for yourprivacy is definitely decreasing. Although I will

(21:36):
say I think more and more peopleare waking up to this stuff. And
I mean it's credit to organizations likethe Plum Foundation here in Cincinnati, whose
whole purpose is to try to raiseawareness about privacy and why it's important,
on what you can do to tryto reclaim it, and organizations like EPIC
and EFF and others out there whoare trying to help raise awareness about this

(21:59):
and why it's important. And theagain, I think the message is getting
out. I think people are comingaround. You're seeing states pass these privacy
laws. So we had a longway to go, for sure, and
these sorts of devices are certainly headedin the wrong direction. But you know,
I appreciate the opportune to try tohelp people realize, yes, you
should be entitled to privacy, andall of these IoT devices, especially anything

(22:22):
medical, is headed in the wrongdirection. Dave heder asol is a pleasure,
my friend. Thank you so muchfor your time, my pleasure.
Gary, Jeff, have a greatday, all right. Six fifty six
at fifty five KRC the Talk Station, You're just minutes away from refreshing your
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