Wisdom and Thoughts from an old-skool tech veteran and student of life who’s traveled the world, seen some things. Now dabbling in Philosophy and Finance
Earth
Joined November 2008
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My #Ignite talk from #VelocityConf software bugs or cyber terrorism which will kill you sooner My video is up m.youtube.com/watch?list=PL0…
Geeks hold each other accountable in many ways. In saying that hats off to @Grady_Booch I respect the calling me out on things. And I will always love and respect your work. That’s what geeks/nerds do we are brutally honest and in that is a rare spark of humanity the real part.
Geeks and Nerds are just programmed differently,
We see things others do not, we observe like a hawk, our idea of a hard night is having a couple of beers and people watching, when we connect with other humans it’s on a scale of trust and liability. We keep eachother in check…
🧐🤔🙌
Security called me at 6:12 AM today.
"Patch every PHP server immediately."
I asked what happened.
"Two critical vulnerabilities. Remote code execution. No authentication required."
Cool.
How many PHP servers do we have?
According to inventory: 12
According to reality:
Nobody knows.
We found one running WordPress.
Three running old internal tools.
One under someone's desk.
Two inside vendor appliances.
A forgotten employee directory from 2016.
And a server named:
PHP-OLD-DO-NOT-TOUCH
Naturally, that one runs payroll exports.
Then we found a PHP 5.6 box.
I asked who owned it.
The documentation said:
BRIAN.
Brian left in 2019.
We called Brian.
He said:
"Oh wow, that's still running?"
Excellent.
By 8 AM, leadership joined the incident call.
CEO:
"Can hackers actually get in?"
Security:
"Potentially yes."
CEO:
"Without a password?"
Security:
"Yes."
CEO:
"Then why do WE need passwords?"
Not the lesson.
Finance asked if we could wait until the weekend to patch because downtime affects revenue.
Security explained that the alternative was letting strangers execute code on our servers.
Finance asked for a cost comparison.
At 9:17, someone suggested temporarily taking the vulnerable websites offline.
Marketing refused.
"Our campaign is live."
So for the next hour, the company officially decided maintaining a landing page for 20% off webinar registration was more important than preventing remote server takeover.
We finally patched everything we could find.
Then our scanner discovered another PHP server.
Hostname:
TEMP-PHP-2014
Uptime:
4,512 days.
Nobody knows what it does.
Nobody owns it.
Nobody can shut it down.
But every time we block network access, the warehouse stops printing shipping labels.
Security has classified it as critical infrastructure.
It is running PHP 5.4.
The vulnerability has existed longer than half our employees.
The emergency patch took four hours.
Finding out what PHP actually runs took eleven.
The internet isn't held together with code.
It's held together with servers everyone is afraid to turn off.
🖤✔️🌑
they’re calling it “Black October” and i don’t think people realize how serious this is
in the last 48 hours there have been over 27 major cybersecurity incidents. not in a month. not in a week. in 48 hours
any ONE of these would normally be the biggest story of the year
PHP: critical vulnerability in the software running 80% of the web. severity 9.2 out of 10
Node.js: high-severity flaw letting attackers take over servers remotely. affects versions 22, 24, and 26
Java: also compromised. three of the most used programming languages on earth hit at the same time
GitLab: a perfect 10 out of 10 severity hole in every version since 2014
Railway: hosting platform compromised. API keys for OpenAI, Claude, Stripe potentially exposed
Signal: a bug that could leave your mic and camera on after you hang up
WordPress: hackers stole a plugin maker’s keys and planted backdoors on websites
LiteLLM: an AI tool downloaded 3.4 million times a day was poisoned with a password stealer
and that’s not even half the list
thousands of AI agent swarms are reportedly scanning and attacking vulnerable servers right now. automated. around the clock
security researchers are saying this might be the early stages of a global cyber incident that nobody fully understands yet
if you run a website, use cloud services, store API keys on hosting platforms, or use any software built on PHP, Node.js, or Java you are potentially affected
update everything. rotate your API keys. change your passwords on critical services. enable 2FA everywhere you haven’t already
this is not a normal week on the internet. this is something different
Aimee Maree retweeted
This is the most serious 48 hours in cybersecurity history.
"Black October" they're calling it
It seems every *hour* there's a new incident, that in a typical year, would be one of the biggest incidents of the *entire year*
SUMMARY OF THE LAST 48 HOURS:
YEAR-LEVEL INCIDENTS (In a typical year, these would be among the biggest incidents of the year):
1. PHP2Shell: a hole in the software behind ~70% of websites. Governments took sites offline.
2. eMudhra: the master keys that prove websites are real were cracked. One was the number 4.
3. California: data on every public school student since 2023 stolen, including disability status
4. Railway: hackers stole customers' secret keys from a hosting platform used by millions of developers
5. Zeabur: 321,810 accounts breached. The company is shutting down.
6. LiteLLM: an AI tool downloaded 3.4 million times a day was poisoned with a password stealer
7. GitLab: a 10-out-of-10 severity hole in every version since 2014
8. Cairn: criminals used an AI hacking tool to break into 100+ companies
9. Ahold Delhaize: hackers knocked the owner of Food Lion and Stop & Shop offline
10. Onamae: malware planted on up to 26,739 customer servers in Japan
MONTH-LEVEL INCIDENTS (In a typical month, these would be among the biggest incidents):
11. Signal: a bug could leave your mic and camera on after you hang up
12. NGINX: 3 critical holes in software running ~1/3 of websites
13. HTTP/3: a single connection can crash 7 of the 10 web server types tested
14. Plex: hackers breaking into home media servers
15. SafePay ransomware: FBI warns it has hit 600+ critical infrastructure organizations
16. Palo Alto: ransomware gangs breaking in through company firewalls
17. Bullhorn: platform used by 10,000+ companies knocked offline
18. Medi-Cal: 970,000 patients' data stolen
19. WordPress: hackers stole a plugin maker's keys and used them to plant backdoors on websites
20. AOMEI: backup software's update server handed out a backdoor
21. Meta Muse: Meta's AI agent exposed users' personal and business secrets
22. Tor: 333 relays hijacked to steal logins
23. TiDB Cloud: database company's cloud breached
Also serious:
24. State Bank of India: India's biggest bank confirms a data breach
25. OVHcloud: hackers slipped a password stealer into a cloud company's official tool
26. Siemens: a software hole being used to spread malware
27. North Korea: state hackers launch a new attack campaign on South Korea
Honestly it’s a broken system slugging Mortgage Holders with the burden. I don’t see how it reduces inflation. There are other methods to use. Anyways more rate rises to come 😔😭
The Reserve Bank of Australia has “lost patience” with inflation, a top economist has warned, with further interest rate increases forecast from November.
news24.com.au/business/marke…
Aimee Maree retweeted
Would you walk away from a $100,000 deposit? 🤯
LIVE on @2GB873 with @spiro2GB, I unpack buyers why there has been an increase in buyer defaults
Plus, the signs I’m watching for a market bottom and why buying well matters more than perfect timing.
#realestatemarket #realestateinvesting #realestateaustralia #propertymarket
Down, Down, prices are down 🏡
The propaganda is telling us drops will stop at 10%-15% whilst prices are falling at 20% annualised rate with unemployment rising and RBA potentially hiking once or twice more, good luck believing this nonsense #ausbiz #inflation #housing
😔
'New Zealand house prices crash back to 2017, prices have fallen nearly 30%' (if this happened here, prices going back to 2017 levels, would equal 40%-50% crash) #ausbiz #housing
macrobusiness.com.au/2026/10…
Aimee Maree retweeted
#Joye is forecasting maximum 13% drawdown and two more rate hikes (two more rate hikes will smash housing market into the f#cking ground, new homes sales are already down 20% and transactions similar; imagine the carnage with two more rate hikes, it's hard to believe price drops stop at 13%) 2/2 #ausbiz
afr.com/markets/equity-marke…
Aimee Maree retweeted
My fellow Australians. It is with deep regret to announce the median house price in Australia has fallen to below $1m.
The median price for Australia's combined capitals has fallen 1.8 per cent to $973,525 over the year to September. ebx.sh/teBveZ
House prices will continue to drop in current climate especially with rates rising.
Remember each rate rise reduces loan capacity.
Sydney's final clearance rate last week fell to an effective record low (ex covid) of 27.1%. Melbourne was 40.8%.
The preliminaries widely quoted on the weekend are absolutely masking the real extent of this housing correction.
100% Sydney housing prices will be now falling at an accelerated rate compared to just two month ago.
Melbourne I think is fairing better. Probably due to offering better value right now compared to other cities and the expected change of state government.
