Mastodawn

I'm working on several stories about some important evolutions in cybercrime, but it's been really hard to dedicate time and attention to those with the current administration creating constitutional challenges almost on a daily basis, and doing all kinds of things that will surely weaken the cybersecurity and national security of this country.

But I can't even visit LinkedIn anymore, because I just want to vomit when I see the endless stream of people in the tech industry whistling dixie and pimping their businesses like nothing's going on. Like any of that matters if you don't have a democracy anymore.

Anyway, it's frustrating because this all out, constant assault on the checks and balances to executive power has the added benefit to our adversaries of turning our attention inward, and paying far less attention to external threats.

𝙽𝚘𝚊𝚑 𝙼𝚘𝚗𝚘𝚜𝚙𝚊𝚌𝚎𝚍 Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs My wife and I were just talking about this the other day. Everyone thinks they'll be the ones marching in the streets, standing up to authoritarianism, but the reality is that most people if they can ignore things will ignore things because very few people want to be uncomfortable and right now there are a lot of uncomfortable truths that need to be accepted and faced before it's too late to do so.

Pass the Dutchie Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs
You are doing great and your feelings are valid.
At least you are doing something.
I am sick and doomscrolling. And when not sick, just going to work and being normal.
I did add pronouns to my signature. And I try to stand up for people at work. My thought is if others see me stand up to others, other ppl will be more comfortable doing the same.
I know at some point I will protest. I am a big girl and will use my body to help protestors hold the line.
✌️

aproitz Feb 10, 2025

And i firstly couldn't believe, that the #Superbowl-#Audience actually #celebrate/d this #evil #Parody of a #President like there is no tomorrow.
How #dumb and #hollow can #People be ?
This is really #unbelievable.

Possumantha Feb 10, 2025

@antonproitzelhaimer @briankrebs super bowl tickets are thousands of dollars so the stands were full of millionaires. Prime prey for face eating leopards.

@briankrebs absolutely agree, as someone in the tech industry it's disturbing to see my colleagues lick the MAGA boot. It's almost enough to want me to get out of the tech industry but I have no idea what I'd do otherwise.

Andreas K Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs
This is not exactly "cybersecurity", but the Weirdo-in-chief has withdrawn from a number of soft power conflict fields with strategic US opponents (e.g. WHO, development aid) without any necessity.

Understandable in a way. He wants to rip apart the Civil Service, so the USA will not have the bandwidth to manage these things any more. But at the same time, sadly also a sign of the times to come.

Bill Feb 10, 2025

@yacc143 @briankrebs

And the US will not have any capability to stand up to foreign threats after 47 is done destroying the country. And what will he get from those actors? Not a damned thing.

Andreas K Feb 10, 2025

@w_b
Ah they will tell him how great a President he is and how proud they are off him.

And like an elementary school kid he'll get a golden star sticker.
@briankrebs

Andreas K Feb 10, 2025

@w_b
What USA?

When they are done they will fix the small mistake that happened during the war of Northern aggression, and the USA will be what it should have been, a loose confederation of charter cities/territories ruled by benevolent billionaire oligarchs.

No irrating democracy to restrict the freedom of the billionaires. No pretending if equality before the law.

Won't it be a paradise (if you happen to have a billion or two lying around)?
@briankrebs

aproitz Feb 10, 2025

I recently saw the #Coppola - #Movie #Megalopolis. In some Way the #US reminds me a little of the old #Rome. Coppola intended that too.
And now Trump/Nero in the #CircusMaximus/#Superbowl. Horrible.

SensibleOtter Feb 10, 2025

I hear you. I cannot underscore enough how much I am truly fearful of where this takes us … and I’m not even in the US!

AnneH Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs On LI - the "bothsidesing" 🤮

" (Ace Tomato Company)Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs And if it's that hard for us on the private sector side, I can't imagine being a federal employee - navigating this. One of the things that makes me worry is the lessons from the USS Cole bombing. That happened right before (Oct 2020)
a heated transitions between administrations. Then 9/11 happened. USS Cole was listed as one of the missed opportunities to detect something bigger was coming. What external threats are the federal defenders losing focus on either by purposeful redirection to the border or worried about having a job?

@briankrebs it’s exhausting. I’m glad you care.

Mark T. Tomczak Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs I think a lot of people in tech are real bought in to the cyberpunk fiction idea that the "'net" and "corpos" are too big to fail, and even if society generally collapses, they keep going strong.

... as if the entire telecom infrastructure the Internet rides atop as an application isn't one of the largest, most successful cooperative efforts of the past two-hundred years, and one that falls apart very quickly if people start actively attacking it.

No, friends... The system was built to be bomb-proof given the assumption that infrastructure operators wanted it on. We've seen a half-dozen examples of how a country can make it very hard to use (especially for commercial purposes!) if they want to.

(And for all my hubris, even I've got enough humility to know that "Full-stack engineer with a specialty in postgres and React" is a résumé that goes at the bottom of the pile at the apocalypse survivor camp).

Pseudo Nym Feb 10, 2025

@mark @briankrebs

Speaking of resumes at the bottom of the pile for the survivors camp, I offer some light hearted #humor from a kinder time. We could all use some right now.

https://archive.org/details/thenightwatch_201612

The Night Watch : James Mickens : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Humor column by James Mickens written for Usenix.Even as we speak, systems programmers are doing pointer arithmetic so that children and artists can pretend...

Internet Archive

Jolyon Ansuz Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs please keep doing what you’re doing. #respect #admiration #inspiriring

author_is_ShrikeTron🔠💉x7 Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs I feel you on this as same boat, but it really is multiple universes.

There's:
1) people that don't actually live in the US.
2) people that just want to get on with their lives -- hoping it'll quietly blow over.
3) people that completely support events and don't care.

#2 has merit when taken from a historical peon perspective. Until the local "village" is literally burning down, it's just faraway news of Aristocracy fighting their random wars.

mbbrutman Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs I'd just keep posting on LinkedIn anyway. Some of us are paying attention.

LinkedIn started off well .. a professional network for techies keeping track of each other. It devolved into "influencer culture" long ago and the signal to noise ratio has been terrible.

Worse are the trolls who think that they are worth listening to because they have been moderately successful at business, even if that business is dubious.

Keep shouting; it's not the deep chasm you think it is.

Arturnankran Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs I dont live in the US, but my sentiment is that people don't evaluate risk at all. It's all based on the idea that nothing really bad can ever happen that will affect them. Such lack of imagination.

SilentlyEating 🍕Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs I also fear that the actions taken now by DOGE will directly support external threats… putting sensitive data in Azure and into various AI companies, hooking up formerly secure locations directly to the Internet, etc… making attacks by external entities so much easier.

Michael Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs This is exactly what they want. Stay strong.

Pseudo Nym Feb 10, 2025

Normalcy bias is a helluva drug.

I'm aware, I'm freaking out, I'm fortunate enough to have some thin protection being a white cis-het married male in California with some money.

It's very tempting to "just go on as normal." There is a fine line between keeping things safe safe for your family, and ignoring the reality of what's going on.

I'll do what I can, but I guess I understand the "LinkedIn everything is fine" twilight zone.

Felt like that with start of Covid coverage.

Coach Sankhavaram ®Feb 11, 2025

@pseudonym @briankrebs https://inaniludibrio.com/2024/02/19/define-normal/

Define “normal”

Visit the post for more.

Inani Ludibrio

Bill de Worde Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs I work in #dataprivacy and find myself having similar thoughts: why am I working so hard to implement #dataminimization and #privacybydesign principles for my organization when these huge federal data stores probably containing all that information and more are being brazenly looted?

@briankrebs It also weakens any potential future sanctions on the likes of Russia as allies are given the tariff treatment. It's almost like it's on purpose.

Sérgio Machado Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs it’s not only there … in UK and EU the great hype is to lower down encryption or create backdoors??
Great criminals will always have tools to do whatever they want … guess the reason is removing tools for privacy …
The madness of today world …

fedops 💙💛Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs insider threats just got real. Anyone have "coup d'etat" in their risk matrix?

Olivier Guinart Feb 10, 2025

@briankrebs If it help, these days more than ever, I tell myself "May I have the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference".

SpaceLifeForm Feb 10, 2025

I would avoid. Probably lots of leads to Ghost Jobs, but they only exist to collect PII.

Sebastian Zdrojewski Feb 11, 2025

@briankrebs I see the same happening from abroad. It feels like people are simply disconnected from reality (maybe they all live in the Metaverse, which would explain a lot). Some never had a real grasp of what is really going on, pursuing marketing promises.

I don't know about other colleagues, but since Jan. we saw a worrying spike in threat, attack and malicious traffic... but it feels like C-levels have even less consideration about reality. It's worrying.