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Hacked password list offers security insights
by Evans Kahuthu 10 Feb '09

10 Feb '09

Recently a niche programming-oriented website called phpbb.com had its user database hacked into and the passwords for 20,000 members stolen. The hacker who broke in then posted the account info and passwords online for the world to see. And while this is really bad news for those 20,000 unlucky souls, it offers an instructive lesson on password security for the rest of us. InformationWeek analyzed the hacked password list and found a number of interesting trends in the data, primarily revolving around the fact that most people do exactly what they've been told not to do since passwords were first invented. Author/analyst Robert Graham has tons of analysis on offer. I'm ordering my favorite/most enlightening data points from the piece here, starting with the most interesting. On thing to remember: These passwords are from a group of people interested in computer programming, so if anyone should know better, it's these guys. > The most popular password (3.03% of the 20,000) was "123456." It's also generally considered the most common password used today . > 4 percent used some variant of the word "password." Seriously, people, there's no excuse for this one. "password" was the 2nd most popular password used, also in keeping with historical trends. > 16 percent of passwords were a person's first name. No word on if it was their first name, but someone's. Joshua is the most commonly used first-name password, a likely reference to the movie WarGames. > Patterns abound. In addition to "123456," other pattens like "12345, "qwerty," and "abc123" were common, comprising 14 percent of the passwords used. > 35 percent of passwords were six characters long. 0.34 percent were only one character long. > For reasons no one can explain, "dragon," "master," and "killer" all crack the top 20 passwords. (On the top 500 password list linked above, "dragon" is #7.) > One thing Graham doesn't discuss is that phpbb.com is really just a message board, and many users may simply have not cared about the security of their passwords here (unlike, say, with a bank account). In other words, they may very well have intentionally chosen something simplistic here to avoid re-using a password they save for an important login, just in case this site got hacked. Which, it turns out, it did. I could go on, but Graham's post has way more detail than I can digest here and it's easy-reading too. Worth a close look for any citizen of the web. Evans Kahuthu

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[Fwd: [APC Forum] APC job vacancy: Assistant to the executive director and grant administrator]
by alice 09 Feb '09

09 Feb '09

Please help us circulate. Thank you! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- APC job vacancy: Assistant to the executive director and grant administrator The Association for Progressive Communications (APC) is a global network of civil society organisations whose mission is to empower and support organisations, social movements and individuals in and through the use of information and communication technologies to build strategic communities and initiatives for the purpose of making meaningful contributions to equitable human development, social justice, participatory political processes and environmental sustainability. www.apc.org The APC is looking for an Assistant to the Executive Director/Grants Administrator. Application deadline: 20 February 2009 Start date: Immediately DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES Grant administration * Research and track funding opportunities * Coordination submission of proposals and following up subsequent to submission * Prepare and maintain appropriate materials that need to accompany proposals * Coordinate receipt, signing and filing of donor/client agreements * Manage the APC donor reporting calendar and notify relevant staff members of upcoming deadlines and ensure that completed reports are filed in the appropriate online spaces * Liaise with donors in submitting reports, providing updates, etc. * Ensure that donor contact information is kept up to date and is reflected on APC’s online project management space and on APC.org * Provide overall support to the management team in ensuring effective relationships with APC’s donor partners. Assistance to the Executive Director * Assistance with correspondence, scheduling, and travel arrangements, and expense reimbursements * Compile and draft reports, procedures, and other internal documents * Take minutes of board and staff meetings as needed * Provide administrative support to the board of directors’ activities * Assist in the maintenance of internal calendars in collaboration with the Network Development team * Assist with event follow-up (minutes, reports, and other documentation) Coordination of consultants’ contracts * Liaise with staff members and consultants in order to acquire all relevant contract information and finalise consultants’ contracts and distribute to relevant staff and consultants for approval * Distribute approved contracts to consultants and relevant staff members * Receive signed consultant and staff contracts by email, fax, and mail, and file them online and in paper files in the APC office * Notify relevant staff members when consultants have signed their contracts * Ensure that all relevant documents and information are present in the subcontracts database of APC’s online project management space Management of the Executive Director’s office in Johannesburg (if based there) * Answer the telephone, check voice mail, and send and receive faxes, mail, packages and email. * Maintain complete and accurate paper and online filing systems * Order office supplies and arrange payments via the online finance system * Work with APC’s Events and Logistics Coordinator in the planning and coordination of events held in South Africa * Provide other executive and administrative assistance as needed REQUIREMENTS * Higher degree in the social sciences, development studies or a related field (or at least three years professional experience) * Excellent interpersonal and communication skills * Excellent written English * Ability to organise, prioritise and complete tasks in a timely manner without supervision * Experience in information management * Able to work independently and as part of a team * Excellent wordprocessing and internet skills (e.g. online research) * Able to communicate comfortably in written French and/or Spanish ADVANTAGES * Ability to work from executive director’s office in Johannesburg, South Africa * Familiarity with working in networks * Experience working remotely * Experience in working in an international context with ICT-based civil society networks like APC * · Ability to communicate in more than two languages ORGANISATIONAL RELATIONSHIPS The successful applicant will report to the Executive Director and work closely with the Events and Logistics Coordinator, the Network Development Manager, the Finance Manager, the Finance Assistant, and other members of the management team. LOCATION AND WORK CONDITIONS The successful applicant will work in the APC office in Johannesburg, South Africa. However very strong candidates who wish to be considered for the post and work remotely from another country may still apply. Some international travel might be required. APC provides an equipment allowance but requires staff to provide their own laptops. REMUNERATION This is a full time, fixed-term (renewable) contract. Remuneration is based on the APC’s salary scale for the position. Short-listed candidates will receive specific information on the salary range. HOW TO APPLY Send a covering letter and detailed CV (in English), which include the following information: * A description of your interest in working with APC in this position * Your experience related to the job requirements listed above * Experience of working in networks and managing partnerships * People and project management skills * A rating of the languages you speak and write * A description of your computer skills * Work experience in an international context * Online work experience * Other information you think might be of importance to our assessment of your application * Three (3) references: names, relationship and their contact details. Send your application via email, as an attachment, to jobs at apc.org with “Executive Assistant and Grant Administrator” in the subject line. Please note that only short-listed candidates will be contacted. Any applications which are incomplete, do not follow the instructions here, received with viruses, or in any language other than English will be automatically disqualified. (END/2009) ======================================= APC Forum is a meeting place for the APC community - people and institutions who are or have been involved in collaboration with APC, and share the APC vision - a world in which all people have easy, equal and affordable access to the creative potential of information and communication technologies (ICTs) to improve their lives and create more democratic and egalitarian societies. _______________________________________________ apc.forum mailing list apc.forum(a)lists.apc.org http://lists.apc.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/apc.forum

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Blogging; Special Report on Business Daily, Opinion?
by Gakuru Alex 09 Feb '09

09 Feb '09

Dear all, I would be very interested in your views of Business Daily's Special Report on blogging: - 1. Blog post revolution hits corporate Kenya <http://www.bdafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12756&Ite…> 2. Blogs command attention of corporate world <http://www.bdafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12755&Ite…> 3. Blogs emerge as avenues for making money< http://www.bdafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12754&Ite…> 4. Companies use online platform to monitor views from the public <http://www.bdafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12753&Ite…> 5. Fibre optic cable to pave way for corporate blogging <http://www.bdafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12752&Ite…> 6. What is likely to compete with the mainstream media? <http://www.bdafrica.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12751&Ite…> Please,,, be generous with your opinion.... regards, Alex

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Senegalese consumers called to boycott mobile phones to protest 2% tax increase on wide range of services
by alice 07 Feb '09

07 Feb '09

(From Balancing Act) Senegalese consumers called to boycott mobile phones to protest 2% tax increase on wide range of services African politicians see the telecoms and Internet sector as the "golden goose" in terms of being able to tax its operators. In various countries a whole raft of different taxes have turned mobile operators into Government’s most effective tax collector. But this week saw the two main Senegalese consumer organisations organise a boycott of services to protest against a 2% tax called RUTEL that falls directly on consumers. Along with all the other taxes they pay (including TVA/VAT), Senegalese consumers are now being asked to stump up an additional 2% across a wide range of telecommunications and Internet services. The tax is called Redevance d’utilisation des telecommunications (RUTEL) and it came into force on 1 February 2009. Law 2008-46 of 3 September 2008 put the tax on the statute book but its introduction has caused widespread anger. So for example, a prepaid mobile kit costs about FCFA2,120 and with TVA/VAT FCFA2,500. With the RUTEL tax on the base price it now costs FCFA2,160, giving a final price to the consumer of FCFA2,550, an increase of FCFA50. The wide range of services the tax has been slapped on includes fixed and mobile services, IP-TV services, dial-up and ADSL subscriptions, recharge cards, international roaming, leased lines and interconnection charges between operators. The latter will have the effect of charging the tax twice over to consumers, providing a real case of "double-dipping", that bears down directly on consumers. The Ministry of Commerce has pointed out that a range of essentials like food and fuel have actually come down in price but its figures have been contested in the discussions taking place on Senegalese blogs. It seems that the announced reductions in price often turn into price rises later. As with TVA/VAT, the operators have been given the responsibility of collecting the tax and as a concession to the operators they are now freed of any taxes or customs duties on the import of mobile and fixed phones. In reaction to this tax raise, Senegal’s two main consumer associations, l'Association des consommateurs du Sénégal (ASCOSEN) and l'Union nationale des consommateurs du Sénégal (UNCS) have called for a boycott of the use of mobile phones today, Friday 6 February 2009. "The Senegalese state has decided, in a unilateral manner, that is peremptory and without justification to raise by more than 2% the cost of telecommunications," the President of ASCOSEN, Momar Ndao told a press conference on Thursday. He estimated that the Government will be taking FCFA33 million a day from consumers’ pockets. The joint plan of action for a boycott has been organised by sending SMS messages to consumers telling them the boycott will take place and calling on them to stop all bill payment, opening new subscriptions, buying credit from 8am to 3pm and stop using their mobile from 1pm to 3pm. One of Senegal’s ICT sector associations, Le Rassemblement des entreprises du secteur des technologies de l'information et des télécommunications (RESTIC) issued a statement saying that it considered the boycott to be "counter-productive and unacceptable." The statement argued that:"Mobile service is not just a commodity for the majority of consumers but a necessity for most of them. This boycott will be a useless trouble to users and leave operators having to make up lost revenue." According to RESTIC, the operators and employers were not involved in the decision to introduce the new tax and operators were already paying up to 3% on turnover as a contribution to the universal service fund Fond National de Développement de Service Universel (FNDSU). Therefore it invited the Government to rethink all taxes placed on operators. There have been two consumer boycotts of mobile phones in Nigeria, the first in 2003 caused a significant dent in operators’ revenues but the second several years later had much less of an impact. There was talk of a similar boycott in South Africa but it never seemed to get off the ground. The complicated way the boycott has been structured in Senegal (with different hours to boycott different services) may also mean that the impact is not as great as its promoters might hope. A similar all inclusive tax was introduced in Ghana in mid-2008. African Governments in the main do not have a strong record of tax collection and have turned mobile operators into their chief tax collectors. The largest proportion of Government revenues comes both from TVA/VAT collected directly from consumers and also the wide range of other taxes they pay the Government. African politicians of all stripes see the telecoms and Internet sectors as a "golden goose" that produces easy money. The contradiction at the heart of this taxation policy is that there is clear evidence that the more you charge consumers for communications services, the less they will use them and the more it cuts out the marginal user who really struggles to pay for these services. President Wade has been one of Africa’s most vocal politicians in calling for the closing of the digital divide. A tax policy of this kind simply widens the divide. For as one Senegalese blogger, Souleymane Jules Diop, wrote yesterday:"It’s not the phone that’s to blame. It’s (President) Abdoulaye Wade whose to blame." Perhaps this boycott will make African politicians think again before they reach out to stroke "the golden goose" for more money.

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Supplement to Launch National BPO Expo Week
by Joseph Ochola 07 Feb '09

07 Feb '09

Dear Collegue, The Kenya BPO & Contact Centre Society will on 31st March 2009, run a supplement on the Launch of the National BPO Expo Week, in the Daily Nation. We would like to take this opportunity to invite you book your adverts in the supplement. This will be an excellent medium to market your products and services. Deadline for advert submission is 17 March, 2009.Expo website:www.bpoweek.co.ke Kindly contact the undersigned for further details. Kind Regards, Joseph Ochola Executive Officer Kenya BPO & Contact Centre Society. Studio House, along Argwings Kodhek road, 2nd floor E-mail: secretariat(a)kenyabposociety.or.ke Website: www.kenyabposociety.or.ke Tel. No. /020-2391301/ 0722-663176/ 0733-917518 _

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Voices of Africa for Sustainable Development is accepting resume for new board members....
by Crystal Watley 07 Feb '09

07 Feb '09

Salama! So what does it take to be a VOA board member? We need to find someone who knows and loves technology and believes that it can be used to build a better Kenya, and if we meet our organization goals, a better Africa. It is important that this board member not be shy to controversy or afraid to speak their mind. It is critical that our new board member is a believer in grassroots democracy. This is a voluntary position and does not have a pay check attached. The reward is knowing that you are contributing to a freer, more open and informed Kenya. Board members are required to make contributions to the organization as they are able and to help fund raise. Board meetings are held online once a month. We require at least a ten hour per week commitment. If you feel you are "the one" to help lead and guide our organization, please send your resume to: crystal(a)voicesofafrica.org. Asante sana. Many blessings, Crystal -- Crystal "Naliaka" Watley Voices of Africa crystal(a)voicesofafrica.org http://www.voicesofafrica.org/ "You must be the change you wish to see" - Gandhi

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India is planning to produce a laptop computer for the knockdown price of about $20
by P Gitau Githongo 06 Feb '09

06 Feb '09

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ecf1eae2-f092-11dd-972c-0000779fd2ac.html?ftcamp=P opu_story4/NL/CEFeb2009/Cluster_1_pop_4/0/ <http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ecf1eae2-f092-11dd-972c-0000779fd2ac.html?ftcamp= Popu_story4/NL/CEFeb2009/Cluster_1_pop_4/0/&nclick_check=1> &nclick_check=1

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Fwd: ICANN blows $4.6 million in the stock market
by waudo siganga 05 Feb '09

05 Feb '09

Sorry for any cross-postings: Talk of Internet Governance - ICANN has blown US$4.6 million, the equivalent of the amount of 23 million domain registrations, through speculation in the stock markets! .... [1]www.circleid.com/posts/20090203_icann_blows_46_million_stock_m arket/ References 1. file://localhost/tmp/linkstmp/www.circleid.com/posts/20090203_icann_blows_4… We are the change we've been waiting for. - Kenyan-American Barack Hussein Obama

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Kenya Data Networks to introduce advanced news gathering applications for local TV and Radio stations
by alice 05 Feb '09

05 Feb '09

(from Balancing Act) Kenya Data Networks to introduce advanced news gathering applications for local TV and Radio stations Kenya Data Networks is bringing a whole new way of news gathering and dissemination for Local TV and Radio stations that will significantly reduce their operating expenses by up to 30 percent as happened in Latin America, Far East Asia and Europe and raise their quality of service levels for their viewers. Kenya Data Networks aims to achieve this through partnership with Scopus Video Networks which supplies digital technology to the broadcasting industry in the world. The digital technology forms the basis for a new transmission infrastructure that will enable TV and Radio stations - currently using costly satellite equipment for broadcasts – to leverage the lower costs and reliability of content delivery over an IP network. “Ours is a partnership aimed at providing solutions through improved means of reaching out to your consumers in a way that will increase revenues, improve customer retention and minimize your costs’’, said Kenya Data Networks Managing Director, Kai Wulff’ while addressing a gathering of media executives on the new technology. KDN will deploy the technology using the fiber optic cable – a faster, high capacity and less expensive means of communication – to run live broadcasts, allow journalists and even people who have a story to send to do it from their homes and save media houses the trouble of using the costly Outside Broadcasting (OB) vans every other time there is a major event to be reported. The project will also see KDN provide media stations with connectivity to their remote transmitters which will enable them deliver more content on the same bandwidth hence more revenues.

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Death of a dream: Africa’s pay TV challenger GTV runs out of financial road
by alice 05 Feb '09

05 Feb '09

(From Balancing Act) Death of a dream: Africa’s pay TV challenger GTV runs out of financial road Last Friday Gateway Broadcast Services (GTV’s operating company) announced today that its Board of Directors has unanimously approved a plan to liquidate the Company. Its statement blamed “excessive demands on the business” caused by the global financial crisis that “interrupted (its) ability to secure funding on an acceptable timescale and have left us no choice but to cease operations”. Russell Southwood looks at where it all went wrong. To understand how GTV came to be launched, it’s necessary to go right back to the beginning and start with Gateway Communications. Ex-banker Julian McIntyre and his friend Ghanaian-Briton telecoms manager Peter Gbedemah launched the company over ten years ago and worked out of a modest set of offices near Warren Street in London. They were part of a very small group of people outside the continent who could see its potential and sought to provide international wholesale services to ISPs and carriers. Africa wasn’t one of its markets, it was its market. Among other things, McIntyre bought a banker’s instinct for deal and the company thrived on a combination of organic growth and acquisition. Some acquisitions like the company that became its South African subsidiary were a shining success, whilst others like Datatel in Sierra Leone less so. There were ups and downs but the company continued to grow. The turning point came in 2005 when mobile operator Celtel (now Zain) decided to sell a number of its non-core businesses prior to carrying out the IPO that led to its trade sale to MTC. In order to make the deal attractive, Celtel gave a long-term commitment to Gateway Communications as the buyer that it would use it as its wholesale carrier. In a single leap the company had gone from being an interesting challenger to being a significant player: it could now lay claim to around 20-25% of the market for international voice traffic and this would grow to 30% over three years. With the acquisition of Link Africa, the company had an assured stream of business and a positive cash flow. It had become “bankable” on a much larger scale. Faced with this happy circumstance, the question then arose: what can we do next? A number of possibilities were investigated and a decision was taken to enter the Pay-TV market in Africa that was announced publicly in February 2007. Pay-TV in Sub-Saharan Africa was dominated by two large players: Naspers-owned DStv/Multichoice in Anglophone territories and Vivendi’s Canal Plus in Francophone territories. Both had invested significantly in rights and were charging relatively high monthly rates for access to their services. The strategy was two-pronged: firstly, to provide users with lower subscription rates (US$20-35 per month) and secondly, to acquire compelling content to drive that process. Rupert Murdoch has described sports rights as the “battering ram” of successful Pay-TV and Africa is no exception. So in May 2007 GTV announced that it had bought the UK Premiership rights for 40 Sub-Saharan African countries. These countries did not include Nigeria and South Africa that were considered sufficiently large to be sold separately. Although it would not discuss the cost, Nigeria’s Hi-TV spent US$28 million on getting them for Nigeria and GTV’s rights cost US$30 million. Although the Premier League does give some “holiday” on full payment, this kind of gearing meant that GTV had to maximise its income as quickly as possible in order to show new investors some kind pattern of progress towards a cash-positive operation. So it was a sprint from the start as the company launched in 10 countries (East Africa followed by Southern Africa) and sought to establish itself as a continental brand. This sprint for growth was backed by the Swedish group Kinnevik (more of which later) with a US$40 million investment and Citigroup, Noonday Global Management and Avenue Investment Management. McIntyre was supremely confident that GTV would kick down DStv/Multichoice’s front door, get more subscribers than it outside Nigeria and South Africa and move on to compete with Canal Plus in Francophone territories. The Premiership rights almost by themselves would be sufficiently persuasive to get subscribers to switch from the incumbent and that a deeper bouquet could be built as things progressed. In the event, DStv/Multichoice after its initial shock and anger fought back with a range of tactics including a low-cost bouquet. But if competition was good for Pay-TV subscribers, it was less good for GTV’s sprint for growth: the short, sharp campaign which was to have ended in a victory declaration turned into something more like trench warfare. The longer GTV was in a territory, the better it established itself and its impact on the market was that it took more of the new market growth than its competitor: for example in Uganda, it had 20,000 subscribers. However, the number of markets where it was making demonstrable progress was still relatively small in number. Nevertheless it continued to fundraise and look for ways of increasing its market share. Late in 2008 it announced that it would enter Francophone markets to compete with Canal Plus. But by this time, the financial costs of running an operation that had not yet gone into profit were beginning to bear down on the company. Its fundraising efforts were taking place in a financial climate that just got steadily worse. In order to stay upright, it made a decision to sell the “cash cow” Gateway Communications to Vodacom for US$700 million. However, this was clearly a sign of desperation as things began to unravel. On the 7th of January 2009, Kinnevik announced that it had sold its stake $23.6 million, a return 1.8 times the amount invested in May 2007. How do you sell a stake in a loss-making company and make that rate of return? (Kinnevik is owner of the MTG Group which runs Pay TV operations in 24 European countries. On 7 January 2009 it launched Viasat 1, a new Free-To-Air channel in Ghana. It was also rumoured to have expressed interest in becoming a shareholder in new South African Pay TV player, OnDigital Well reading between some of the fairly clear lines of the different players, the investment that GTV had obtained from different companies was underwritten by its ownership of the profitable Gateway Communications. Once that was sold, investors probably had agreements that allowed them to claim back their investment. A loss-making bank like Citigroup would doubtless also want to exit in order to retrieve whatever funding it could at this stage. Therefore the plan to sell to Canal Plus can be read as a last desperate throw of the dice before facing the inevitable. Why did GTV fail? Not all of the blame can be laid at the door of the current financial crisis for there are other reasons: * The “battering ram” of football rights alone was not enough to get DStv/Multichoice customers to peel off quickly enough. GTV started with 12 channels and DStv/Multichoice had 70 video channels and 40 audio channels. Customers might want the Premiership matches but other family members still missed content on its competitor’s bouquets. Indeed, there was some resentment from customers in countries where GTV had not launched about their inability to get their favourite games. * The sprint for growth strategy was not helped by the lead times needed to deliver set-top boxes. In the early stages, there was a shortage of boxes and it took three months for them to get from the manufacturer to the market. Supply problems of this kind were ironed out but there was a period when there was more demand than supply could meet. * But these reasons pale into insignificance alongside the biggest reason of all. Wherever you are globally, Pay-TV is a deep pocket business. It should not be forgotten that making a success of BSKyB almost unseated Rupert Murdoch. The extremely expensive core rights that will make a success of the business have to be repurchased every three years and thus far they have only ever gone up in value. So now that GTV is no more what will happen to the UK Premiership rights? DStv has secured the licence to show the Barclays Premier League Live Package A and will be showing these matches on SuperSport from this weekend. SuperSport already held both Live Package A & B rights for South Africa and Live Package B rights for the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa and with this deal has now secured all Premier League live rights for the remainder of the 2008/2009 season and for the whole of next season. The Nigerian rights are still held by Hi-TV. So where does this leave competition in the Pay-TV market? In the short-term, competition is not in good shape. There are regional players like TV Cabo in the Lusophone markets and Hi-TV in Nigeria. The latter claims 195,000 “activations” with some smaller number actually as paying subscribers. Others like Orange and Wananchi are reliant upon sub-licensing deals from existing rights holders which will mean that the existing large players will have considerable influence. The shame is that GTV’s presence in the market energised individual markets and attracted investor interest in the broadcast sector. It is to be hoped that the pioneers get the arrows and later settlers will get some of the land. But sadly in the short-term, GTV’s passing can only undermine the slowly building credibility of Africa’s broadcast market. CALL FOR PAPERS – 2nd AFRICAN BROADCAST, FILM AND CONVERGENCE CONFERENCE (23-25 NOVEMBER 2009), ABUJA This is an early call for papers to be presented at the 2nd African Broadcast, Film and Convergence Conference taking place 23-25 November 2009. If you wish to present a paper at this conference, please send a short outline of your proposed topic to Russell Southwood, Balancing Act who is responsible for putting the programme together: info(a)balancingact-africa.com

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