"I fear not the man who has reblogged 10,000 posts once, but I fear the man who has reblogged one post 10,000 times." -- Bruce Lee
the racism factory has been closed for 80 years. but today smoke started coming from out of the pipes again
we all know "mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell." not sure how that phrase was burned into all of our brains. I have a few other phrases that were burned into my brain with the same rhythm, including "a process is a program in execution." for some reason, "the AT field is the light of the soul" is anther one
does "ur mom suck me good and hard thru my jorts" count?
why don't they fight bot spam by keeping track of links that users are posting? I imagine each bot system only has a small number of websites they link to, and it costs money to make more. just make a tool to ban every user posting posts with sketchy domains in them?
There was a young man from Peru
Whose limericks stopped at line two
There once was a man from Verdun
New Things to Beware on the Internet
On May 3rd, Google released 8 new top-level domains (TLDs) -- these are new values like .com, .org, .biz, domain names. These new TLDs were made available for public registration via any domain registrar on May 10th.
Usually, this should be a cool info, move on with your life and largely ignore it moment.
Except a couple of these new domain names are common file type extensions: ".zip" and ".mov".
This means typing out a file name could resolve into a link that takes you to one of these new URLs, whether it's in an email, on your tumblr blog post, a tweet, or in file explorer on your desktop.
What was previously plain text could now resolve as link and go to a malicious website where people are expecting to go to a file and therefore download malware without realizing it.
Folk monitoring these new domain registrations are already seeing some clearly malicious actors registering and setting this up. Some are squatting the domain names trying to point out what a bad idea this was. Some already trying to steal your login in credentials and personal info.
This is what we're seeing only 12 days into the domains being available. Only 5 days being publicly available.
What can you do? For now, be very careful where you type in .zip or .mov, watch what website URLs you're on, don't enable automatic downloads, be very careful when visiting any site on these new domains, and do not type in file names without spaces or other interrupters.
I'm seeing security officers for companies talking about wholesale blocking .zip and .mov domains from within the company's internet, and that's probably wise.
Be cautious out there.
I really want to reiterate how this can go wrong frequently and fast, folks.
A malicious actor sets up a page with an auto-downloader squatting on a domain name that matches a common zip file name like photos DOT zip. This website is set up to start an auto downloader upon being visited, downloading a zip file with the same name as the URL which contains malicious software (virus, worm, keylogger, etc).
Scenario.
Someone you know well sends you an email or text with promised photos attached. The email even reads something like this.
Because .zip is now a TLD, that plain text is automatically formatted into a link to malicious actor's website without them having to send you anything.
Folk with family with iPhones or iPads that are sent multiple photos in one go might be familiar with iCloud's tendency to automatically compile them into zip file for the sender and less savvy tech users have trouble NOT doing that.
These same less savvy users, or even just someone just not thinking in the moment, will click that .zip link, not realizing it isn't the the same as clicking on the promised attachment.
They download a file that matches the name they expected. They open it because they were expecting that file and it's from a trusted source. Except the file they downloaded isn't the one that was sent by their trusted source and now they have malware.
Another Scenario.
An IT person tries to send you an email with instructions on how to resolve a problem with a commonly used filename like install-repair DOT zip or to install new software like microsoft-office DOT zip.
The email may start with instructions of where to go get the legitimate file to do the install or repair, but now a line later in the instructions is also has a link to a .zip URL. A user, already frazzled by IT problems, may click it to ensure they have the right file. Again, they download malicious code from a squatting website or it prompts them with a fake login and now the squatting website has stolen their login credentials for a legitimate site. All due to an expected email from a trusted source.
Above you can see microsoft-office DOT zip is already out there with a fake Microsoft login screen waiting to steal your credentials.
These risks are already out there now because the TLD has been activated.
Plain text on old post are already being resolved into links to the new websites.
Here you can see a tweet from 2021, long before .zip was a domain name, now resolves that plan text into a clickable link. You'll start seeing this everywhere, and malicious actors do not have to lift a finger to send it to you.
Yes, a lot of users aren't going to click that, but a lot of folk will. Whomever is squatting on photos DOT zip domain name has made a one time payment to have access to anyone that ever sees that file name typed out.
In an example of an existing squatter site, clientdocs DOT zip is exactly one such pre-setup .zip domain name that initiates an automatic download. This one may be harmless, but the set ups are already out there and waiting to catch folk.
It's an unnecessary and risky can of worms that's been opened up.
Holy Unforced Errors, Batman.
some good news: most automatic hyperlinkers only work on a very small number of gTLDs anyway, and that does not include these .zip and .mov gTLDs.
At the end of the day, these malicious link email threats can be avoided by following best practices for any malicious links sent via email:
- if an email makes you scared, worried, anxious, or puzzled, it's a good idea to pause for a moment and observe some basic information about the email, including the sender information, the purpose of the message, and typos and irregularities in the email.
- if you get an odd link from an unknown source, don't click it. If you really need to know, it's smart to either inspect it yourself by hovering your mouse over it or searching it up in a malicious link database (if you know what you're doing), or have someone more tech savvy inspect it (have them look over your shoulder, avoid sending them the potentially malicious link).
- There are tools for vetting websites that you suspect might be potentially unsafe. One such tool is sitelookup.mcafee.com.
- If you're on your company/school email account, There should be an option hidden away somewhere to report the email as phishing. This is preferred over forwarding a malicious email to your IT department for vetting :)
Can't let British people have air conditioning because first they'd call it something twee like "the climate fixer" and then in 20 years they'll call it "the climb" or "the climmy"
French kids would call it "le climot", frustrating language officials who would prefer they call it "machine pour le contrôle du climat froide à l'interieure de l'édifice"
about to use a printer. wish me luck
*comes back covered in blood and ash with a thousand yard stare but I'm holding a perfectly clean stack of shipping labels*
BONUS MCMANSION HELL: liminal edition
Community Label: Mature
Christian Bale in Equilibrium (2002). I've never seen this movie before I just think this clip is hilarious
What you’re missing by not watching the movie is the scene right before this where he cuts off a guy’s face with a katana.
you can actually see it on the floor at the end of the scene
edit:
Community Label: Mature
Violence
