French edition of Lawrence Lessigs book Cultura Libre on Amazon and Barnes & Noble

21st May 2016

A few weeks ago the French paperback edition of Lawrence Lessigs -2004 book Cultura Libre was published. Today I noticed that the book -is now available from book stores. You can now buy it from -Amazon -($19.99), -Barnes -& Noble ($?) and as always from -Lulu.com -($19.99). The revenue is donated to the Creative Commons project. If -you buy from Lulu.com, they currently get $10.59, while if you buy -from one of the book stores most of the revenue go to the book store -and the Creative Commons project get much (not sure how much -less).

- -

I was a bit surprised to discover that there is a kindle edition -sold by Amazon Digital Services LLC on Amazon. Not quite sure how -that edition was created, but if you want to download a electronic -edition (PDF, EPUB, Mobi) generated from the same files used to create -the paperback edition, they are -available -from github.

Detecting NFS hangs on Linux without hanging yourself...

9th March 2017

Over the years, administrating thousand of NFS mounting linux +computers at the time, I often needed a way to detect if the machine +was experiencing NFS hang. If you try to use df or look at a +file or directory affected by the hang, the process (and possibly the +shell) will hang too. So you want to be able to detect this without +risking the detection process getting stuck too. It has not been +obvious how to do this. When the hang has lasted a while, it is +possible to find messages like these in dmesg:

+ +

+nfs: server nfsserver not responding, still trying +
nfs: server nfsserver OK +

+ +

It is hard to know if the hang is still going on, and it is hard to +be sure looking in dmesg is going to work. If there are lots of other +messages in dmesg the lines might have rotated out of site before they +are noticed.

+ +

While reading through the nfs client implementation in linux kernel +code, I came across some statistics that seem to give a way to detect +it. The om_timeouts sunrpc value in the kernel will increase every +time the above log entry is inserted into dmesg. And after digging a +bit further, I discovered that this value show up in +/proc/self/mountstats on Linux.

+ +

The mountstats content seem to be shared between files using the +same file system context, so it is enough to check one of the +mountstats files to get the state of the mount point for the machine. +I assume this will not show lazy umounted NFS points, nor NFS mount +points in a different process context (ie with a different filesystem +view), but that does not worry me.

+ +

The content for a NFS mount point look similar to this:

+ +

+[...]
+device /dev/mapper/Debian-var mounted on /var with fstype ext3
+device nfsserver:/mnt/nfsserver/home0 mounted on /mnt/nfsserver/home0 with fstype nfs statvers=1.1
+        opts:   rw,vers=3,rsize=65536,wsize=65536,namlen=255,acregmin=3,acregmax=60,acdirmin=30,acdirmax=60,soft,nolock,proto=tcp,timeo=600,retrans=2,sec=sys,mountaddr=129.240.3.145,mountvers=3,mountport=4048,mountproto=udp,local_lock=all
+        age:    7863311
+        caps:   caps=0x3fe7,wtmult=4096,dtsize=8192,bsize=0,namlen=255
+        sec:    flavor=1,pseudoflavor=1
+        events: 61063112 732346265 1028140 35486205 16220064 8162542 761447191 71714012 37189 3891185 45561809 110486139 4850138 420353 15449177 296502 52736725 13523379 0 52182 9016896 1231 0 0 0 0 0 
+        bytes:  166253035039 219519120027 0 0 40783504807 185466229638 11677877 45561809 
+        RPC iostats version: 1.0  p/v: 100003/3 (nfs)
+        xprt:   tcp 925 1 6810 0 0 111505412 111480497 109 2672418560317 0 248 53869103 22481820
+        per-op statistics
+                NULL: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
+             GETATTR: 61063106 61063108 0 9621383060 6839064400 453650 77291321 78926132
+             SETATTR: 463469 463470 0 92005440 66739536 63787 603235 687943
+              LOOKUP: 17021657 17021657 0 3354097764 4013442928 57216 35125459 35566511
+              ACCESS: 14281703 14290009 5 2318400592 1713803640 1709282 4865144 7130140
+            READLINK: 125 125 0 20472 18620 0 1112 1118
+                READ: 4214236 4214237 0 715608524 41328653212 89884 22622768 22806693
+               WRITE: 8479010 8494376 22 187695798568 1356087148 178264904 51506907 231671771
+              CREATE: 171708 171708 0 38084748 46702272 873 1041833 1050398
+               MKDIR: 3680 3680 0 773980 993920 26 23990 24245
+             SYMLINK: 903 903 0 233428 245488 6 5865 5917
+               MKNOD: 80 80 0 20148 21760 0 299 304
+              REMOVE: 429921 429921 0 79796004 61908192 3313 2710416 2741636
+               RMDIR: 3367 3367 0 645112 484848 22 5782 6002
+              RENAME: 466201 466201 0 130026184 121212260 7075 5935207 5961288
+                LINK: 289155 289155 0 72775556 67083960 2199 2565060 2585579
+             READDIR: 2933237 2933237 0 516506204 13973833412 10385 3190199 3297917
+         READDIRPLUS: 1652839 1652839 0 298640972 6895997744 84735 14307895 14448937
+              FSSTAT: 6144 6144 0 1010516 1032192 51 9654 10022
+              FSINFO: 2 2 0 232 328 0 1 1
+            PATHCONF: 1 1 0 116 140 0 0 0
+              COMMIT: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
+
+device binfmt_misc mounted on /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc with fstype binfmt_misc
+[...]
+

+ +

The key number to look at is the third number in the per-op list. +It is the number of NFS timeouts experiences per file system +operation. Here 22 write timeouts and 5 access timeouts. If these +numbers are increasing, I believe the machine is experiencing NFS +hang. Unfortunately the timeout value do not start to increase right +away. The NFS operations need to time out first, and this can take a +while. The exact timeout value depend on the setup. For example the +defaults for TCP and UDP mount points are quite different, and the +timeout value is affected by the soft, hard, timeo and retrans NFS +mount options.

+ +

The only way I have been able to get working on Debian and RedHat +Enterprise Linux for getting the timeout count is to peek in /proc/. +But according to +Solaris +10 System Administration Guide: Network Services, the 'nfsstat -c' +command can be used to get these timeout values. But this do not work +on Linux, as far as I can tell. I +asked Debian about this, +but have not seen any replies yet.

+ +

Is there a better way to figure out if a Linux NFS client is +experiencing NFS hangs? Is there a way to detect which processes are +affected? Is there a way to get the NFS mount going quickly once the +network problem causing the NFS hang has been cleared? I would very +much welcome some clues, as we regularly run into NFS hangs.

- Tags: docbook, english, freeculture. + Tags: debian, english, sysadmin.

@@ -55,67 +135,44 @@ from github.

I want the courts to be involved before the police can hijack a news site DNS domain (#domstolkontroll)

19th May 2016

I just donated to the -NUUG defence -"fond" to fund the effort in Norway to get the seizure of the news -site popcorn-time.no tested in court. I hope everyone that agree with -me will do the same.

- -

Would you be worried if you knew the police in your country could -hijack DNS domains of news sites covering free software system without -talking to a judge first? I am. What if the free software system -combined search engine lookups, bittorrent downloads and video playout -and was called Popcorn Time? Would that affect your view? It still -make me worried.

- -

In March 2016, the Norwegian police seized (as in forced NORID to -change the IP address pointed to by it to one controlled by the -police) the DNS domain popcorn-time.no, without any supervision from -the courts. I did not know about the web site back then, and assumed -the courts had been involved, and was very surprised when I discovered -that the police had hijacked the DNS domain without asking a judge for -permission first. I was even more surprised when I had a look at -the web -site content on the Internet Archive, and only found news coverage -about Popcorn Time, not any material published without the right -holders permissions.

- -

The seizure was widely covered in the Norwegian press (see for -example Hegnar Online and -ITavisen -and -NRK), -at first due to the press release sent out by Ãkokrim, but then based -on -protests -from the law professor Olav Torvund and -lawyer -Jon Wessel-Aas. It even got some -coverage -on TorrentFreak.

- -

I - -wrote about the case a month ago, when the -Norwegian Unix User Group (NUUG), -where I am an active member, decided to ask the courts to test this seizure. -The request was denied, but NUUG and its co-requestor EFN have not -given up, and now they are rallying for support to get the seizure -legally challenged. They accept both bank and Bitcoin transfer for -those that want to support the request.

- -

If you as me believe news sites about free software should not be -censored, even if the free software have both legal and illegal -applications, and that DNS hijacking should be tested by the courts, I -suggest you show -your support by donating to NUUG. +

How does it feel to be wiretapped, when you should be doing the wiretapping...

8th March 2017

So the new president in the United States of America claim to be +surprised to discover that he was wiretapped during the election +before he was elected president. He even claim this must be illegal. +Well, doh, if it is one thing the confirmations from Snowden +documented, it is that the entire population in USA is wiretapped, one +way or another. Of course the president candidates were wiretapped, +alongside the senators, judges and the rest of the people in USA.

+ +

Next, the Federal Bureau of Investigation ask the Department of +Justice to go public rejecting the claims that Donald Trump was +wiretapped illegally. I fail to see the relevance, given that I am +sure the surveillance industry in USA believe they have all the legal +backing they need to conduct mass surveillance on the entire +world.

+ +

There is even the director of the FBI stating that he never saw an +order requesting wiretapping of Donald Trump. That is not very +surprising, given how the FISA court work, with all its activity being +secret. Perhaps he only heard about it?

+ +

What I find most sad in this story is how Norwegian journalists +present it. In a news reports the other day in the radio from the +Norwegian National broadcasting Company (NRK), I heard the journalist +claim that 'the FBI denies any wiretapping', while the reality is that +'the FBI denies any illegal wiretapping'. There is a fundamental and +important difference, and it make me sad that the journalists are +unable to grasp it.

+ +

Update 2017-03-13: Look like +The +Intercept report that US Senator Rand Paul confirm what I state above.

- Tags: english, nuug, offentlig innsyn, opphavsrett. + Tags: english, surveillance.

@@ -123,25 +180,33 @@ your support by donating to NUUG.

Debian now with ZFS on Linux included

12th May 2016

Today, after many years of hard work from many people, -ZFS for Linux finally entered -Debian. The package status can be seen on -the package tracker -for zfs-linux. and -the -team status page. If you want to help out, please join us. -The -source code is available via git on Alioth. It would also be -great if you could help out with -the dkms package, as -it is an important piece of the puzzle to get ZFS working.

Norwegian BokmÃ¥l translation of The Debian Administrator's Handbook complete, proofreading in progress

3rd March 2017

For almost a year now, we have been working on making a Norwegian +BokmÃ¥l edition of The Debian +Administrator's Handbook. Now, thanks to the tireless effort of +Ole-Erik, Ingrid and Andreas, the initial translation is complete, and +we are working on the proof reading to ensure consistent language and +use of correct computer science terms. The plan is to make the book +available on paper, as well as in electronic form. For that to +happen, the proof reading must be completed and all the figures need +to be translated. If you want to help out, get in touch.

+ +

A + +fresh PDF edition in A4 format (the final book will have smaller +pages) of the book created every morning is available for +proofreading. If you find any errors, please +visit +Weblate and correct the error. The +state +of the translation including figures is a useful source for those +provide Norwegian bokmÃ¥l screen shots and figures.

- Tags: debian, english. + Tags: debian, debian-handbook, english.

@@ -149,49 +214,77 @@ it is an important piece of the puzzle to get ZFS working.

What is the best multimedia player in Debian?

8th May 2016

Where I set out to figure out which multimedia player in -Debian claim support for most file formats.

- -

A few years ago, I had a look at the media support for Browser -plugins in Debian, to get an idea which plugins to include in Debian -Edu. I created a script to extract the set of supported MIME types -for each plugin, and used this to find out which multimedia browser -plugin supported most file formats / media types. -The -result can still be seen on the Debian wiki, even though it have -not been updated for a while. But browser plugins are less relevant -these days, so I thought it was time to look at standalone -players.

- -

A few days ago I was tired of VLC not being listed as a viable -player when I wanted to play videos from the Norwegian National -Broadcasting Company, and decided to investigate why. The cause is a -missing MIME type in the VLC -desktop file. In the process I wrote a script to compare the set -of MIME types announced in the desktop file and the browser plugin, -only to discover that there is quite a large difference between the -two for VLC. This discovery made me dig up the script I used to -compare browser plugins, and adjust it to compare desktop files -instead, to try to figure out which multimedia player in Debian -support most file formats.

- -

The result can be seen on the Debian Wiki, as -a -table listing all MIME types supported by one of the packages included -in the table, with the package supporting most MIME types being -listed first in the table.

- -

The best multimedia player in Debian? It is totem, followed by -parole, kplayer, mpv, vlc, smplayer mplayer-gui gnome-mpv and -kmplayer. Time for the other players to update their announced MIME -support?

Unlimited randomness with the ChaosKey?

1st March 2017

A few days ago I ordered a small batch of +the ChaosKey, a small +USB dongle for generating entropy created by Bdale Garbee and Keith +Packard. Yesterday it arrived, and I am very happy to report that it +work great! According to its designers, to get it to work out of the +box, you need the Linux kernel version 4.1 or later. I tested on a +Debian Stretch machine (kernel version 4.9), and there it worked just +fine, increasing the available entropy very quickly. I wrote a small +test oneliner to test. It first print the current entropy level, +drain /dev/random, and then print the entropy level for five seconds. +Here is the situation without the ChaosKey inserted:

+ +

+% cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
+  dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
+  for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
+     cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
+     sleep 1; \
+  done
+300
+0+1 oppfÃ¸ringer inn
+0+1 oppfÃ¸ringer ut
+28 byte kopiert, 0,000264565 s, 106 kB/s
+4
+8
+12
+17
+21
+%
+

+ +

The entropy level increases by 3-4 every second. In such case any +application requiring random bits (like a HTTPS enabled web server) +will halt and wait for more entrpy. And here is the situation with +the ChaosKey inserted:

+ +

+% cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
+  dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
+  for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
+     cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
+     sleep 1; \
+  done
+1079
+0+1 oppfÃ¸ringer inn
+0+1 oppfÃ¸ringer ut
+104 byte kopiert, 0,000487647 s, 213 kB/s
+433
+1028
+1031
+1035
+1038
+%
+

+ +

Quite the difference. :) I bought a few more than I need, in case +someone want to buy one here in Norway. :)

+ +

Update: The dongle was presented at Debconf last year. You might +find the talk +recording illuminating. It explains exactly what the source of +randomness is, if you are unable to spot it from the schema drawing +available from the ChaosKey web site linked at the start of this blog +post.

- Tags: debian, debian edu, english, multimedia, video. + Tags: debian, english.

@@ -199,29 +292,34 @@ support?

The Pyra - handheld computer with Debian preinstalled

4th May 2016

A friend of mine made me aware of -The Pyra, a -handheld computer which will be delivered with Debian preinstalled. I -would love to get one of those for my birthday. :)

- -

The machine is a complete ARM-based PC with micro HDMI, SATA, USB -plugs and many others connectors, and include a full keyboard and a 5" -LCD touch screen. The 6000mAh battery is claimed to provide a whole -day of battery life time, but I have not seen any independent tests -confirming this. The vendor is still collecting preorders, and the -last I heard last night was that 22 more orders were needed before -production started.

- -

As far as I know, this is the first handheld preinstalled with -Debian. Please let me know if you know of any others. Is it the -first computer being sold with Debian preinstalled?

Detect OOXML files with undefined behaviour?

21st February 2017

I just noticed +the +new Norwegian proposal for archiving rules in the goverment list +ECMA-376 +/ ISO/IEC 29500 (aka OOXML) as valid formats to put in long term +storage. Luckily such files will only be accepted based on +pre-approval from the National Archive. Allowing OOXML files to be +used for long term storage might seem like a good idea as long as we +forget that there are plenty of ways for a "valid" OOXML document to +have content with no defined interpretation in the standard, which +lead to a question and an idea.

+ +

Is there any tool to detect if a OOXML document depend on such +undefined behaviour? It would be useful for the National Archive (and +anyone else interested in verifying that a document is well defined) +to have such tool available when considering to approve the use of +OOXML. I'm aware of the +officeotron OOXML +validator, but do not know how complete it is nor if it will +report use of undefined behaviour. Are there other similar tools +available? Please send me an email if you know of any such tool.

- Tags: debian, english. + Tags: english, nuug, standard.

@@ -229,23 +327,28 @@ first computer being sold with Debian preinstalled?

NUUG contests Norwegian police DNS seizure of popcorn-time.no

18th April 2016

It is days like today I am really happy to be a member of -the Norwegian Unix User group, a -member association for those of us believing in free software, open -standards and unix-like operating systems. NUUG announced today it -will -try -to bring the seizure of the DNS domain popcorn-time.no as -unlawful, to stand up for the principle that writing about a -controversial topic is not infringing copyrights, and censuring web -pages by hijacking DNS domain should be decided by the courts, not the -police. The DNS domain was seized by the Norwegian National Authority -for Investigation and Prosecution of Economic and Environmental Crime -a month ago. I hope this bring more paying members to NUUG to give -the association the financial muscle needed to bring this case as far -as it must go to stop this kind of DNS hijacking.

Ruling ignored our objections to the seizure of popcorn-time.no (#domstolkontroll)

13th February 2017

A few days ago, we received the ruling from +my +day in court. The case in question is a challenge of the seizure +of the DNS domain popcorn-time.no. The ruling simply did not mention +most of our arguments, and seemed to take everything ÃKOKRIM said at +face value, ignoring our demonstration and explanations. But it is +hard to tell for sure, as we still have not seen most of the documents +in the case and thus were unprepared and unable to contradict several +of the claims made in court by the opposition. We are considering an +appeal, but it is partly a question of funding, as it is costing us +quite a bit to pay for our lawyer. If you want to help, please +donate to the +NUUG defense fund.

+ +

The details of the case, as far as we know it, is available in +Norwegian from +the NUUG +blog. This also include +the +ruling itself.

@@ -258,50 +361,86 @@ as it must go to stop this kind of DNS hijacking.

Ny utgave (v2.2) av den frie norske stavekontrollen gitt ut

15th April 2016

I dag tok jeg mot til meg og pakket sammen en ny versjon av den -frie norske stavekontrollen, ca. tre og et halvt Ã¥r etter forrige -gang. Resultatet kan lastes ned fra -no.speling.org-prosjeksiden, bÃ¥de -som kildekodepakke og som "pack"-fil som kanskje fortsatt kan brukes -av OpenOffice.org/LibreOffice. Byggesystemet trenger oppussing, men i -denne omgang hadde jeg bare tid til Ã¥ fikse byggefeil forÃ¥rsaket av -endringer i GNU grep. De Ã¸vrige endringene var gjort tidligere i -pÃ¥vente av en ny utgave.

- -

Her er det som er nytt (fra NEWS-fila i -kildekodepakken):

- -

Release 2.2 (2016-04-15)

- -

Rewrite how scripts/speling2words handle tripple consonants, to - avoid importing duplicate words from no.speling.org, and getting - rid of the existing duplicates in norsk.words.
Remove duplicate entries with tripple consonants from norsk.words.
Update frequency for entries in norsk.words based on - (ran 'make - freq-update').
Correct nn ispell build, avoid crash in munchlist causing lots of - words to fall out of the database.
Use grep -a to convince grep it is working on text files, to work - with newer grep versions.
Remove some words disputed in the no.speling.org review process: -
- apparent (nb)
- likke (nb)
- ugjest, ugjesten, ugjestens (nb)

A day in court challenging seizure of popcorn-time.no for #domstolkontroll

3rd February 2017

+ +

On Wednesday, I spent the entire day in court in Follo Tingrett +representing the member association +NUUG, alongside the member +association EFN and the DNS registrar +IMC, challenging the seizure of the DNS name popcorn-time.no. It +was interesting to sit in a court of law for the first time in my +life. Our team can be seen in the picture above: attorney Ola +TellesbÃ¸, EFN board member Tom Fredrik Blenning, IMC CEO Morten Emil +Eriksen and NUUG board member Petter Reinholdtsen.

+ +

The +case at hand is that the Norwegian National Authority for +Investigation and Prosecution of Economic and Environmental Crime (aka +Ãkokrim) decided on their own, to seize a DNS domain early last +year, without following +the +official policy of the Norwegian DNS authority which require a +court decision. The web site in question was a site covering Popcorn +Time. And Popcorn Time is the name of a technology with both legal +and illegal applications. Popcorn Time is a client combining +searching a Bittorrent directory available on the Internet with +downloading/distribute content via Bittorrent and playing the +downloaded content on screen. It can be used illegally if it is used +to distribute content against the will of the right holder, but it can +also be used legally to play a lot of content, for example the +millions of movies +available from the +Internet Archive or the collection +available from Vodo. We created +a +video demonstrating legally use of Popcorn Time and played it in +Court. It can of course be downloaded using Bittorrent.

+ +

I did not quite know what to expect from a day in court. The +government held on to their version of the story and we held on to +ours, and I hope the judge is able to make sense of it all. We will +know in two weeks time. Unfortunately I do not have high hopes, as +the Government have the upper hand here with more knowledge about the +case, better training in handling criminal law and in general higher +standing in the courts than fairly unknown DNS registrar and member +associations. It is expensive to be right also in Norway. So far the +case have cost more than NOK 70 000,-. To help fund the case, NUUG +and EFN have asked for donations, and managed to collect around NOK 25 +000,- so far. Given the presentation from the Government, I expect +the government to appeal if the case go our way. And if the case do +not go our way, I hope we have enough funding to appeal.

+ +

From the other side came two people from Ãkokrim. On the benches, +appearing to be part of the group from the government were two people +from the Simonsen Vogt Wiik lawyer office, and three others I am not +quite sure who was. Ãkokrim had proposed to present two witnesses +from The Motion Picture Association, but this was rejected because +they did not speak Norwegian and it was a bit late to bring in a +translator, but perhaps the two from MPA were present anyway. All +seven appeared to know each other. Good to see the case is take +seriously.

+ +

If you, like me, believe the courts should be involved before a DNS +domain is hijacked by the government, or you believe the Popcorn Time +technology have a lot of useful and legal applications, I suggest you +too donate to +the NUUG defense fund. Both Bitcoin and bank transfer are +available. If NUUG get more than we need for the legal action (very +unlikely), the rest will be spend promoting free software, open +standards and unix-like operating systems in Norway, so no matter what +happens the money will be put to good use.

+ +

If you want to lean more about the case, I recommend you check out +the blog +posts from NUUG covering the case. They cover the legal arguments +on both sides.

- Tags: debian edu, norsk, stavekontroll. + Tags: english, nuug, offentlig innsyn, opphavsrett.

@@ -309,37 +448,41 @@ kildekodepakken):

I.F. Stone - an inspiration for us all

13th April 2016

I first got to know I.F. Stone when I came across an article by Jon -Schwarz on The Intercept -about -his extraordinary contribution to investigative journalism in -USA. The article is about a new documentary in two parts -(part one is 12 minutes and -part two is 30 minutes), and -I found both truly fascinating. It is amazing what he was able to -find by digging up public sources and government papers. He -documented lots of government abuse and cover ups, and I find -his weekly news letters -inspiring to read even today.

- -

-All governments are run by liars and nothing they say should be believed. -
- I. F. Stone -

- -

His starting point was that reporters should not assume governments -and corporations are telling the truth, but verify all their claims as -much as possible. I wonder how many Norwegian reporters can be said -to follow the principles of I. F. Stone. They are definitely in short -supply. If you, like me half a year ago, have never heard of him, -check him out.

Nasjonalbiblioteket avslutter sin ulovlige bruk av Google Skjemaer

12th January 2017

I dag fikk jeg en skikkelig gladmelding. Bakgrunnen er at fÃ¸r jul +arrangerte Nasjonalbiblioteket +et +seminar om sitt knakende gode tiltak Â«verksregisterÂ». Eneste +mÃ¥ten Ã¥ melde seg pÃ¥ dette seminaret var Ã¥ sende personopplysninger +til Google via Google Skjemaer. Dette syntes jeg var tvilsom praksis, +da det bÃ¸r vÃ¦re mulig Ã¥ delta pÃ¥ seminarer arrangert av det offentlige +uten Ã¥ mÃ¥tte dele sine interesser, posisjon og andre +personopplysninger med Google. Jeg ba derfor om innsyn via +Mimes brÃ¸nn i +avtaler +og vurderinger Nasjonalbiblioteket hadde rundt dette. +Personopplysningsloven legger klare rammer for hva som mÃ¥ vÃ¦re pÃ¥ +plass fÃ¸r en kan be tredjeparter, spesielt i utlandet, behandle +personopplysninger pÃ¥ sine vegne, sÃ¥ det burde eksistere grundig +dokumentasjon fÃ¸r noe slikt kan bli lovlig. To jurister hos +Nasjonalbiblioteket mente fÃ¸rst dette var helt i orden, og at Googles +standardavtale kunne brukes som databehandlingsavtale. Det syntes jeg +var merkelig, men har ikke hatt kapasitet til Ã¥ fÃ¸lge opp saken fÃ¸r +for to dager siden.

+ +

Gladnyheten i dag, som kom etter at jeg tipset Nasjonalbiblioteket +om at Datatilsynet underkjente Googles standardavtaler som +databehandleravtaler i 2011, er at Nasjonalbiblioteket har bestemt seg +for Ã¥ avslutte bruken av Googles Skjemaer/Apps og gÃ¥ i dialog med DIFI +for Ã¥ finne bedre mÃ¥ter Ã¥ hÃ¥ndtere pÃ¥meldinger i trÃ¥d med +personopplysningsloven. Det er fantastisk Ã¥ se at av og til hjelper +det Ã¥ spÃ¸rre hva i alle dager det offentlige holder pÃ¥ med.

- Tags: english, offentlig innsyn. + Tags: norsk, personvern, surveillance, web.

@@ -347,57 +490,86 @@ check him out.

A French paperback edition of the book Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig is now available

12th April 2016

I'm happy to report that -the -French paperback edition of -my -project to translate the Free -Culture book by Lawrence Lessig is now available for sale on -Lulu.com. Once I have formally verified my proof reading copy, which -should be in the mail, the paperback edition should be available in -book stores like Amazon and Barnes & Noble too.

- -

This French edition, Culture Libre, is the work of the -dblatex developer BenoÃ®t -Guillon, who created the PO file from the initial translation -available from -the Wikilivres -wiki pages and completed and corrected the translation to match -the original docbook edition my project is using, as well as -coordinated the proof reading of the final result. I believe the end -result look great, but I am biased and do not read French. In -addition to the paperback edition, the book is available in PDF, EPUB -and Mobi format from the github project page linked to above.

- -

When enabling book store distribution on Lulu.com, I had to nearly -triple the price to allow the book stores some profit. I also had to -accept that I will get some revenue when a book is sold via Lulu.com. -But because of the non-commercial clause in the book license -(CC-BY-NC), this might be a problem. To bypass the problem I -discussed how to handle the revenue with the author, and we agreed -that the revenue for these editions go to the -Creative Commons non-profit -Corporation who handle donations to the Creative Commons project. -So far they have earned around USD 70 on sales of the -English -and -Norwegian -BokmÃ¥l editions, according to Lulu.com. They will get the revenue -for the French edition too. Their revenue is higher if you buy the -book directly from Lulu.com instead of via a book store, so I -recommend you buy directly from Lulu.com.

- -

Perhaps you would like to get the book published in your language? -The translation is done using a web based translator service, so the -technical bar to enter is fairly low. Get in touch if you would like -to make this happen.

Bryter NAV sin egen personvernerklÃ¦ring?

11th January 2017

Jeg leste med interesse en nyhetssak hos +digi.no +og +NRK +om at det ikke bare er meg, men at ogsÃ¥ NAV bedriver geolokalisering +av IP-adresser, og at det gjÃ¸res analyse av IP-adressene til de som +sendes inn meldekort for Ã¥ se om meldekortet sendes inn fra +utenlandske IP-adresser. Politiadvokat i Drammen, Hans Lyder Haare, +er sitert i NRK pÃ¥ at Â«De to er jo blant annet avslÃ¸rt av +IP-adresser. At man ser at meldekortet kommer fra utlandet.Â»

+ +

Jeg synes det er fint at det blir bedre kjent at IP-adresser +knyttes til enkeltpersoner og at innsamlet informasjon brukes til Ã¥ +stedsbestemme personer ogsÃ¥ av aktÃ¸rer her i Norge. Jeg ser det som +nok et argument for Ã¥ bruke +Tor sÃ¥ mye som mulig for Ã¥ +gjÃ¸re gjÃ¸re IP-lokalisering vanskeligere, slik at en kan beskytte sin +privatsfÃ¦re og unngÃ¥ Ã¥ dele sin fysiske plassering med +uvedkommede.

+ +

Men det er en ting som bekymrer meg rundt denne nyheten. Jeg ble +tipset (takk #nuug) om +NAVs +personvernerklÃ¦ring, som under punktet Â«Personvern og statistikkÂ» +lyder:

+ +

+ +
Â«NÃ¥r du besÃ¸ker nav.no, etterlater du deg elektroniske spor. Sporene +dannes fordi din nettleser automatisk sender en rekke opplysninger til +NAVs tjener (server-maskin) hver gang du ber om Ã¥ fÃ¥ vist en side. Det +er eksempelvis opplysninger om hvilken nettleser og -versjon du +bruker, og din internettadresse (ip-adresse). For hver side som vises, +lagres fÃ¸lgende opplysninger:
+ +
+
hvilken side du ser pÃ¥
+
dato og tid
+
hvilken nettleser du bruker
+
din ip-adresse
+
+ +
Ingen av opplysningene vil bli brukt til Ã¥ identifisere +enkeltpersoner. NAV bruker disse opplysningene til Ã¥ generere en +samlet statistikk som blant annet viser hvilke sider som er mest +populÃ¦re. Statistikken er et redskap til Ã¥ forbedre vÃ¥re +tjenester.Â»
+ +

+ +

Jeg klarer ikke helt Ã¥ se hvordan analyse av de besÃ¸kendes +IP-adresser for Ã¥ se hvem som sender inn meldekort via web fra en +IP-adresse i utlandet kan gjÃ¸res uten Ã¥ komme i strid med pÃ¥standen om +at Â«ingen av opplysningene vil bli brukt til Ã¥ identifisere +enkeltpersonerÂ». Det virker dermed for meg som at NAV bryter sine +egen personvernerklÃ¦ring, hvilket +Datatilsynet +fortalte meg i starten av desember antagelig er brudd pÃ¥ +personopplysningsloven. + +

I tillegg er personvernerklÃ¦ringen ganske misvisende i og med at +NAVs nettsider ikke bare forsyner NAV med personopplysninger, men i +tillegg ber brukernes nettleser kontakte fem andre nettjenere +(script.hotjar.com, static.hotjar.com, vars.hotjar.com, +www.google-analytics.com og www.googletagmanager.com), slik at +personopplysninger blir gjort tilgjengelig for selskapene Hotjar og +Google , og alle som kan lytte pÃ¥ trafikken pÃ¥ veien (som FRA, GCHQ og +NSA). Jeg klarer heller ikke se hvordan slikt spredning av +personopplysninger kan vÃ¦re i trÃ¥d med kravene i +personopplysningloven, eller i trÃ¥d med NAVs personvernerklÃ¦ring.

+ +

Kanskje NAV bÃ¸r ta en nÃ¸ye titt pÃ¥ sin personvernerklÃ¦ring? Eller +kanskje Datatilsynet bÃ¸r gjÃ¸re det?

- Tags: docbook, english, freeculture. + Tags: norsk, nuug, personvern, surveillance.

@@ -405,33 +577,164 @@ to make this happen.

Lets make a Norwegian BokmÃ¥l edition of The Debian Administrator's Handbook

10th April 2016

During this weekends -bug -squashing party and developer gathering, we decided to do our part -to make sure there are good books about Debian available in Norwegian -BokmÃ¥l, and got in touch with the people behind the -Debian Administrator's Handbook -project to get started. If you want to help out, please start -contributing using -the -hosted weblate project page, and get in touch using -the -translators mailing list. Please also check out -the instructions for -contributors.

- -

The book is already available on paper in English, French and -Japanese, and our goal is to get it available on paper in Norwegian -BokmÃ¥l too. In addition to the paper edition, there are also EPUB and -Mobi versions available. And there are incomplete translations -available for many more languages.

Where did that package go? — geolocated IP traceroute

9th January 2017

Did you ever wonder where the web trafic really flow to reach the +web servers, and who own the network equipment it is flowing through? +It is possible to get a glimpse of this from using traceroute, but it +is hard to find all the details. Many years ago, I wrote a system to +map the Norwegian Internet (trying to figure out if our plans for a +network game service would get low enough latency, and who we needed +to talk to about setting up game servers close to the users. Back +then I used traceroute output from many locations (I asked my friends +to run a script and send me their traceroute output) to create the +graph and the map. The output from traceroute typically look like +this: + +

+traceroute to www.stortinget.no (85.88.67.10), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets
+ 1  uio-gw10.uio.no (129.240.202.1)  0.447 ms  0.486 ms  0.621 ms
+ 2  uio-gw8.uio.no (129.240.24.229)  0.467 ms  0.578 ms  0.675 ms
+ 3  oslo-gw1.uninett.no (128.39.65.17)  0.385 ms  0.373 ms  0.358 ms
+ 4  te3-1-2.br1.fn3.as2116.net (193.156.90.3)  1.174 ms  1.172 ms  1.153 ms
+ 5  he16-1-1.cr1.san110.as2116.net (195.0.244.234)  2.627 ms he16-1-1.cr2.oslosda310.as2116.net (195.0.244.48)  3.172 ms he16-1-1.cr1.san110.as2116.net (195.0.244.234)  2.857 ms
+ 6  ae1.ar8.oslosda310.as2116.net (195.0.242.39)  0.662 ms  0.637 ms ae0.ar8.oslosda310.as2116.net (195.0.242.23)  0.622 ms
+ 7  89.191.10.146 (89.191.10.146)  0.931 ms  0.917 ms  0.955 ms
+ 8  * * *
+ 9  * * *
+[...]
+

+ +

This show the DNS names and IP addresses of (at least some of the) +network equipment involved in getting the data traffic from me to the +www.stortinget.no server, and how long it took in milliseconds for a +package to reach the equipment and return to me. Three packages are +sent, and some times the packages do not follow the same path. This +is shown for hop 5, where three different IP addresses replied to the +traceroute request.

+ +

There are many ways to measure trace routes. Other good traceroute +implementations I use are traceroute (using ICMP packages) mtr (can do +both ICMP, UDP and TCP) and scapy (python library with ICMP, UDP, TCP +traceroute and a lot of other capabilities). All of them are easily +available in Debian.

+ +

This time around, I wanted to know the geographic location of +different route points, to visualize how visiting a web page spread +information about the visit to a lot of servers around the globe. The +background is that a web site today often will ask the browser to get +from many servers the parts (for example HTML, JSON, fonts, +JavaScript, CSS, video) required to display the content. This will +leak information about the visit to those controlling these servers +and anyone able to peek at the data traffic passing by (like your ISP, +the ISPs backbone provider, FRA, GCHQ, NSA and others).

+ +

Lets pick an example, the Norwegian parliament web site +www.stortinget.no. It is read daily by all members of parliament and +their staff, as well as political journalists, activits and many other +citizens of Norway. A visit to the www.stortinget.no web site will +ask your browser to contact 8 other servers: ajax.googleapis.com, +insights.hotjar.com, script.hotjar.com, static.hotjar.com, +stats.g.doubleclick.net, www.google-analytics.com, +www.googletagmanager.com and www.netigate.se. I extracted this by +asking PhantomJS to visit the +Stortinget web page and tell me all the URLs PhantomJS downloaded to +render the page (in HAR format using +their +netsniff example. I am very grateful to Gorm for showing me how +to do this). My goal is to visualize network traces to all IP +addresses behind these DNS names, do show where visitors personal +information is spread when visiting the page.

+ +

When I had a look around for options, I could not find any good +free software tools to do this, and decided I needed my own traceroute +wrapper outputting KML based on locations looked up using GeoIP. KML +is easy to work with and easy to generate, and understood by several +of the GIS tools I have available. I got good help from by NUUG +colleague Anders Einar with this, and the result can be seen in +my +kmltraceroute git repository. Unfortunately, the quality of the +free GeoIP databases I could find (and the for-pay databases my +friends had access to) is not up to the task. The IP addresses of +central Internet infrastructure would typically be placed near the +controlling companies main office, and not where the router is really +located, as you can see from the +KML file I created using the GeoLite City dataset from MaxMind. + +

+ +

I also had a look at the visual traceroute graph created by +the scrapy project, +showing IP network ownership (aka AS owner) for the IP address in +question. +The +graph display a lot of useful information about the traceroute in SVG +format, and give a good indication on who control the network +equipment involved, but it do not include geolocation. This graph +make it possible to see the information is made available at least for +UNINETT, Catchcom, Stortinget, Nordunet, Google, Amazon, Telia, Level +3 Communications and NetDNA.

+ +

In the process, I came across the +web service GeoTraceroute by +Salim Gasmi. Its methology of combining guesses based on DNS names, +various location databases and finally use latecy times to rule out +candidate locations seemed to do a very good job of guessing correct +geolocation. But it could only do one trace at the time, did not have +a sensor in Norway and did not make the geolocations easily available +for postprocessing. So I contacted the developer and asked if he +would be willing to share the code (he refused until he had time to +clean it up), but he was interested in providing the geolocations in a +machine readable format, and willing to set up a sensor in Norway. So +since yesterday, it is possible to run traces from Norway in this +service thanks to a sensor node set up by +the NUUG assosiation, and get the +trace in KML format for further processing.

+ +

Here we can see a lot of trafic passes Sweden on its way to +Denmark, Germany, Holland and Ireland. Plenty of places where the +Snowden confirmations verified the traffic is read by various actors +without your best interest as their top priority.

+ +

Combining KML files is trivial using a text editor, so I could loop +over all the hosts behind the urls imported by www.stortinget.no and +ask for the KML file from GeoTraceroute, and create a combined KML +file with all the traces (unfortunately only one of the IP addresses +behind the DNS name is traced this time. To get them all, one would +have to request traces using IP number instead of DNS names from +GeoTraceroute). That might be the next step in this project.

+ +

Armed with these tools, I find it a lot easier to figure out where +the IP traffic moves and who control the boxes involved in moving it. +And every time the link crosses for example the Swedish border, we can +be sure Swedish Signal Intelligence (FRA) is listening, as GCHQ do in +Britain and NSA in USA and cables around the globe. (Hm, what should +we tell them? :) Keep that in mind if you ever send anything +unencrypted over the Internet.

+ +

PS: KML files are drawn using +the KML viewer from Ivan +Rublev , as it was less cluttered than the local Linux application +Marble. There are heaps of other options too.

+ +

As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my +activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address +15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.

- Tags: debian, english. + Tags: debian, english, kart, nuug, personvern, stortinget, surveillance, web.

@@ -446,6 +749,17 @@ available for many more languages.