The U.S. drone fleet is hit by a computer virus!

It's not often that a news story gets an LOL out of me. Supposedly the network is air-gapped, meaning no direct connection to the internet, but other supposedly air-gapped networks run by the Department of Defense occasionally get hit by malware. One possible source might be infected USB memory sticks, it's hard to say. This particular malware is a key-logger, it's debatable how much value the information it could capture would be since these are such specialized systems, it's not like they're typing in banking passwords. It's also debatable if the malware is capable of transmitting the data to whoever wrote it.

The amusing thing is that a quote in the article says "we keep cleaning it and it keeps coming back", which means there's a computer on their network that they can't clean that keeps reinfecting their cleaned computers, most likely a high-ranking officer who won't give them access.

It hasn't interfered with any missions, but I'm sure it's quite an annoyance for their IT crew.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/10/virus-hits-drone-fleet/

http://news.slashdot.org/story/11/10/07/1828220/us-drone-fleet-hit-by-computer-virus

California appeals court approves cell phone sucking

So theoretically, if you get pulled over for a traffic stop, the officer can suck your phone dry using the same sort of device they use in cell phone stores to transfer data between phones. Your best defense is to silence it and put it in the glove compartment and refuse all requests to search your car without a search warrant.

Since this is an appellate court, hopefully it'll get appealed to the SCOTUS.

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/11/10/06/1234232/calif-appeals-court-approves-cell-phone-searches