US Military Pacific Fleet blocks top traffic sites to support Japan's relief efforts, a floating ISP prioritizes traffic

CNN reports on the US Military blocking high internet traffic sites in the Pacific fleet.

U.S. military blocks websites to help Japan recovery efforts

By Mark Preston and Adam Levine, CNN

March 15, 2011 9:02 p.m. EDT

Several websites, including YouTube, have been blocked from U.S. military computers in Japan to free bandwidth for recovery efforts.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• YouTube, ESPN, eBay among popular websites blocked on military computers
• Effort is intended to free up bandwidth for use in helping Japan
• Blockage is temporary and subject to change, Strategic Command says

Washington (CNN) -- The U.S. military has blocked access to a range of popular commercial websites in order to free up bandwidth for use in Japan recovery efforts, according to an e-mail obtained by CNN and confirmed by a spokesman for U.S. Strategic Command.

CNET also reports on the same activity pointing to CNN.

With satellite communication on the US Pacific Fleet, images, video and documents can be sent from North Eastern Japan to data centers in Japan or anywhere else in the world.

You could think of the US Pacific Fleet as a mobile floating ISP, and they need to provide as much bandwidth as possible for the emergency efforts vs. the entertainment and shopping of the crew.

Are bits evacuating Japan? How geo redundant are the systems?

I’ve been talking to some friends and being risk adverse, there are some people who are working to move their bits off servers in Japan.

As DataCenterKnowledge reports, there is no immediate impact to data centers in Tokyo.

Major Tokyo Data Centers Fuel Up for Blackouts

March 14th, 2011 : Rich Miller

Major data centers in Tokyo say they are undamaged ready to continue operating, even if they lose utility power due to a program of rolling blackouts being implemented by Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO). Some forecasts say the power rationing could continue for weeks or months, placing a premium on access to diesel fuel to maintain services during outages. Some companies are voluntarily powering down non-critical data center operations, including Sony, which is turning off its Final Fantasy online games for at least a week.

GigaOm reports on possible damage to undersea cables.

In Japan, Many Undersea Cables Are Damaged

By Om Malik Mar. 14, 2011, 10:34am PT 2 Comments

The horrific earthquake and the ensuing tsunami in Japan have caused widespread damage to undersea communications, according to data collected by telecom industry sources. Initially, it was thought that the damage to the cables that connect Japan and Asia to each other and other parts of the world was limited, but new data shows the extent of the problems.

And, WSJ does a great job of summarizing efforts in the rest of Asia in addition to Japan.

About half of the existing cables running across the Pacific are damaged and "a lot of people are feeling a little bit of slowing down of Internet traffic going to the United States," said Bill Barney, chief executive of Hong Kong-based cable-network operator Pacnet. He declined to name the damaged cables operated by other companies, but said Pacnet's cable system connecting Japan to the U.S. isn't damaged so far.

But with the risk of data loss going up substantially in the operating data centers, what isn’t being discussed is are bits being moved out of Japan’s data centers to other locations.  With Fiber and Power access a risk, let alone another earthquake or Japan’s infrastructure being reprioritized, there are some who are making plans for a Japan data center going offline.  The ones who can do this are the ones with geo redundancy and spare capacity in other countries.

At this time should data centers and servers be turned off in Japan that can move to other areas?  Power and water are now critical resources in Japan along with diesel fuel.

Google launches People Finder for 2011 Japan Earthquake, Data Centers are key infrastructure to support disaster recovery

Japan had a magnitude 8.9 earthquake with some of the worse damage in Sendai.  Here are pictures on MSNBC.  I used to take regular trips to Sendai, visiting Sony’s manufacturing facility, and it is was quite sad to see the damage.

Google has launched a version of People Finder for the Japan Earthquake that is available in Japanese, English, Korean, simplified and traditional Chinese.  I am thinking of friends who are in Tokyo and hope they are well.

Nuclear Power plants are being shut down due to cooling system damage, fires, or lack of electricity to run cooling systems, but no nuclear leaks.  Here are some excerpts from MSNBC’s worldblog.

5:06 a.m. ET:  A Japanese utility reports a fire at turbine building at a nuclear power plant in northeastern Japan, the AP reports.

…

6:07 a.m. ET:  Government has no information on radioactive leakage, government minister says, according to NHK World.

5:44 a.m. ET:  Nuclear power plant administrator in northern Japan says process for cooling reactor is "not going as planned," adding that "nuclear emergency situation" has been declared.  Asks people nearby to stay calm, NHK World reports.  Also says that American military has offered to help.

…

6:29 a.m. ET:  Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano says the nuclear power plant in Fukushima developed a mechanical failure in the system needed to cool the reactor after it was shut down in the earthquake.  He said the measure was a precaution.

…

7:28 a.m. ET:  The International Atomic Energy Agency says it is looking for more information on the condition of Fukushima nuclear reactor buildings and cooling systems, Reuters reports. Meanwhile, Japanese authorities say that fire at Onagawa nuclear plant has been extinguished.

…

8:48 a.m. ET: The Japanese government has declared an emergency situation at one of Tokyo Electric Power company's nuclear power plants in quake-stricken Fukushima Prefecture, NHK reports. It says no radioactive materials have been leaked. But Tokyo Electric said an equipment failure has made it impossible to cool two reactors at the Fukushima Number One plant. The firm says it does not have enough electric power to cool the reactors, which automatically stopped operating when the quake struck.

CNET covers the status of data centers.

Tokyo quake puts data centers, cloud services at risk
Read more: Japan was reeling after an 8.9 magnitude earthquake and tsunami hit the Northeast coast and also impacted Tokyo. As a result, much of the Pacific Ocean is under a tsunami -arning. The disaster comes as many tech giants were setting up data centers in Tokyo to meet demand for cloud computing services.

It's unclear how data centers are holding up. TV reports indicate that mobile services are up in Tokyo, but spotty.

DataCenterDynamics has information from a Japan data center operator.

“The data center and building itself is ok and all our equipment is ok. We have been concerned about earthquakes in Japan [for some time],” Shiino said an in email to DatacenterDynamics.

“We have set an emergency room up to server our customers, if they have any trouble with their servers. Although it is Saturday tomorrow, our emergency team has to work to get our customers workloads back to normal.”

“We are all stuck in the office [with] absolutely no train service or highway (roads) in and out [of Tokyo] tonight,” Misaki said.

Do you think of what you put in your e-mail before you send? You should

Here is a lesson for many.  One benefit I have of spending so many years working at Microsoft is be very careful what you put in e-mail.  (note I left Mircosoft in 2006)  Assume anything you put in writing could be read by the DOJ.  If you want to have a private conversations don't use e-mail.  Read the following to understand the risks of thinking e-mail is private.

Wikileaks is making news disclosing for the public what people assumed were private conversations.

WikiLeaks

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

WikiLeaks is not affiliated with Wikipedia or the Wikimedia Foundation.

Julian Assange, the main spokesperson and editor-in-chief for WikiLeaks

WikiLeaks is an international non-profit organisation that publishes submissions of private, secret, and classified media from anonymousnews sources and news leaks.

Wikileaks is so popular it now has imitators.  Red Tape discusses an example.

Do WikiLeaks imitators put your e-mail at risk?

Posted: Tuesday, March 1 2011 at 06:00 am CT by Bob Sullivan

Imagine having every e-mail you've written published by hackers for the entire world to see. You don't have to stretch your imagination very far -- it's already happening to some folks.

Here an example of what has caused a huge embarrassment for security company.

Hackers who call themselves Anonymous -- the group that has gained notoriety for attacking Visa and MasterCard in defense of WikiLeaks -- broke into computers operated by a government contractor named HBGary Federal in early February.  Once inside, Anonymous members wreaked all kinds of electronic havoc, including the theft of thousands of employee e-mails. These were then published in searchable form on a Web site similar to WikLeaks, leading to a host of embarrassing disclosures for HBGary employees.  The incident drew so much attention that it was featured in a recent segment on “The Colbert Report.”

Which was so embarrassing the CEO just resigned.

Aaaron Barr, HBGary Federal CEO, resigns

The CEO of HBGary Federal, Aaron Barr, has stated that he is resigning his position. In a telephone interview with Threatpost, Barr said that “I need to focus on taking care of my family and rebuilding my reputation ... It's been a challenge to do that and run a company. And, given that I've been the focus of much of bad press, I hope that, by leaving, HBGary and HBGary Federal can get away from some of that. I'm confident they'll be able to weather this storm."

Here is a detailed post on Anonymous's method to break into HBGary.

Anonymous speaks: the inside story of the HBGary hack

By Peter Bright | Last updated 13 days ago

It has been an embarrassing week for security firm HBGary and its HBGary Federal offshoot. HBGary Federal CEO Aaron Barr thought he had unmasked the hacker hordes of Anonymous and was preparing to name and shame those responsible for co-ordinating the group's actions, including the denial-of-service attacks that hit MasterCard, Visa, and other perceived enemies of WikiLeaks late last year.

When Barr told one of those he believed to be an Anonymous ringleader about his forthcoming exposé, the Anonymous response was swift and humiliating. HBGary's servers were broken into, its e-mails pillaged and published to the world, its data destroyed, and its website defaced. As an added bonus, a second site owned and operated by Greg Hoglund, owner of HBGary, was taken offline and the user registration database published.

Over the last week, I've talked to some of those who participated in the HBGary hack to learn in detail how they penetrated HBGary's defenses and gave the company such a stunning black eye—and what the HBGary example means for the rest of us mere mortals who use the Internet.

Hope you think about your e-mail conversations in a different way.  All my business friends know anything really private we don't put in e-mail.

Two Security Companies settle, and agree to stop discussing their dirty laundry– Palantir and I2

Security is a must feature for any data center. but when the competitors fight their dirty laundry aired for all to see can be embarrassing for the companies and their customers. It is ironic that security is a must have feature, but what actually happens is not what gets told to the public to maintain security.  I2 Group and Palantir Tech have settled a lawsuit that was proving embarrassing to all.

VentureBeat has the story.

Palantir’s third black eye: i2 lawsuit settled

February 16, 2011 | Owen Thomas

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For a company named after a magical talisman of vision, Palantir didn’t seem to see what was coming these past few weeks.

The secretive data-analysis startup, based in Palo Alto, Calif. and backed by early Facebook investor Peter Thiel, has suffered a number of blows to its public image of late. The most recent is the settlement of a lawsuit filed by rival i2 Group, based in McLean, Va., over accusations that Palantir employees fraudulently obtained i2 software and used it to design competing products.

Embarrassment #2.

Since Palantir touts itself as the product of fraud-detection technologies pioneered at PayPal, the payments startup Thiel cofounded, those charges present ironies, as i2’s lawyers eagerly pointed out in their initial complaint.

Embarrassment #3.

Separately, Palantir CEO Alex Karp issued a public statement apologizing for his company’s role in preparing a plan for Bank of America to strike back at Wikileaks, the Internet-based nonprofit group famed for obtaining and releasing sensitive documents into the public domain. The company also placed employee Matthew Steckman on leave after hackers released emails showing he was involved in preparing a similar plan for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to damage ThinkProgress, a pro-labor publication.

The joint press release by I2 Group and Palantir Tech agree to stop airing the dirty laundry in a lawsuit.

Joint Statement

i2 Inc., i2 Limited and Palantir Technologies Inc. announce that they have reached an agreement to resolve the litigation between them pending in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia to the mutual satisfaction of all the parties. They have also agreed that no further statement about the matter shall be made.

Owen Thomas does a good job of citing the original complaints by I2 Group and Palantir tech in his article.

Even with all this being said, there is more than is not being said as security procedures are followed and don’t tell the full story.