Heaven

Snow, sun, chocolate and family. It’s Easter, a lot of people enjoy being in the big cities or maybe a place like canary island. But we norwegians often travel to the mountains to live in small cabins with extended family, often without electricity and running water. I could never live like this, but for a week it’s great. One of the best things, even though it feels worst before going here is the limited possibility of using tech. Usually I’m in front of the computer 10-12 hours on a workday, and 3-4 hours in the weekend. Being limited both on device and the use of internet makes it easier. Well, ending this with a picture taken from the living room window.

Tech travel pack and easter thoughts

easteregg
Easter egg

So it’s time for Easter, the last part of winter. My family has a tradition to go to the cabin in the mountains, a place without water, plumbing and electricity(we have solar power for charging stuff and for lights).

Here we have fun in the snow, play board games and eat candy. Our tech use is limited, and the only internet we have is 4G based. It’s not that we don’t use tech, but we kind of use it differently. Often we play games together on them, or the kids watch together on one iPad. And the hours used on tech are much less than they would have been if we were home.

I really enjoy this vacation, the way we are stuck in the cabin and a lot few worries that I would have at home.

Tech pack list:

  • iPhone
  • iPad
  • 4g modem
  • AirPods
  • Apple Watch
  • Chargers and a battery bank

Yes, I may be an Apple guy, but I’m not a fanboy :-p
And no laptop this year, not going to work so I don’t need one.

CTF’s

security logo
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

When I started to work with infosec I tried a lot of different ways to learn new stuff. I took some courses, read books, watched videos, etc.

But to learn new things, with some help on the way I found out that playing CTFs is a great way. These websites make hacking into a game, by giving you systems to play with, and your job is to get the token(s).

It may be a website you have to get access to, a windows server with vulnerable samba, or maybe a router with a default username/password combination. Some of the sites often have walkthroughs you can look at if you are stuck, and they are great for learning. But remember, DO EVERYTHING yourself as well, that’s the way you learn. Another important thing to remember is that these techniques should only be used on testing like this, using it in the wild may be illegal.

Well enough chatting about, here is my list of some great CTF sites.

  • hackthebox The one I pay for atm, mostely because of great labs, and the Parrot OS you get access trough your webbrowser(a great way to make your self safe)
  • tryhackme Have some great intro tutorials.
  • picoctf For people from the age of 13 and up. But dont get fooled, some of them are real hard. Free

Why a blog…

blog blocks wallpaper
Photo by Miguel Á. Padriñán on Pexels.com

Well, if you read this post I guess you either know me or found this by mistake. I have tried to write a blog before and to be honest I have no idea why I do it, and I have no plan for it. But since I own this domain, and had to set up a website for a project, I ended up with a LAMP setup anyway. And by having a website I get some nice logs to do analysis on related to InfoSec.

What I will continue to write depend both on the time I have available (2 kids give me not much time to spare) and if I feel writing gives me something back. Something I plan to write about is howtos of cowrie, goaccess, lamp and more. Just the things I use for this site. But I also would like to write about InfoSec.

Well, time will tell if regular updates here…

Spark Email App

Spark

I just changed my domain provider and email hosting. After taking backup of all my old emails it felt great to start over with an empty inbox.

After doing some research I found Spark, an email client for iPhone(and soon Windows hopefully) made by a Ukraine company.
It’s fast, has a lot of great features, and supports most email providers.

My plan and goal are to keep my inbox as empty as it can be, only emails that I’m supposed to do something with should be there. Everything else should be archived or deleted. At the same time, I will unsubscribe to most of the spam/newsletter/commercial emails to help me with the empty inbox dream.

PUBG

I’ve always played video games. Still remember our Amiga, Settlers, winter games etc. After that we have always had a PC, bought my first one when I was around 14 and I’ve had a few consoles trough the years.

Well gamers often have a main game, and mine have been PUBG the last couple of years. Fps that’s not too fast ( I’m to old for the fastest ones). I play with some cool people, and this year is our 3rd og 4th time playing in Telialigaen. This is the official esport league in Norway.

The teamname is God Kok, and our main goal is having fun. We play in the 3rd division (last on), but there’s no embarrassment in that.

A couple of months every spring and autumn we play for the glory of not being last. The caster this year is vietkhjema

Junkyard Digs and more

I guess I’m not the only one that uses YouTube as one of the main entertainment sources. You start with a video and end up a few hours later watching something completely different.
Well down one of these rabbit holes I ended up watching some revival of cars. Mostly older American cars, and with hosts that had a great sense of humor and at the same time would teach you something…

If I find more people as good as these, I’ll add them to the list.