Unless you've been living a solitary existence in a warm and cosy cave you'll no doubt have spotted the minor matter of a swine flu pandemic sweeping the world. And if you're in the UK, you'll also have heard about the National Flu Pandemic Service. You'll also probably have heard about how, immediately after launch, the website component of this service crashed and was taken offline for several hours due to "unprecedented demand". You'll have seen the comments from the UK Government about how well the service has worked, and from the Conservative party opposition about how bad and slow the response was. All very interesting.

However this post on Zero Flaws is to tell you one thing, and one thing only. The National Flu Pandemic service (website and call centre) wasn't suddenly created and put into action this year when swine flu began to rear its head. The massive demand for the service also wasn't unprecedented. The service was discussed and designed way back in 2008, after the H5N1 Avian Flu outbreak, and way back then the speed of response and anticipated volume of demand was known, discussed, and represented a huge concern to all involved - both to the Government, and to the companies they asked to tender for the service.

So keep that in mind when you hear reports of how well - or how badly - the service is operating. And that, I'm afraid, is all I can say on the matter.... (Read More)

Whilst I work on the next full length article for Zero Flaws I thought this merited a brief post. The Home Office has now released the consultation paper for the proposed communications monitoring system (as discussed in the previous two articles), called "Protecting the public in a changing communications environment". You can find the paper at this link, as well as instructions on how to submit your comments and response for consideration. The closing date for submissions is 20th July 2009, and rest assured Zero Flaws will be participating!

After sending in the "Dear Ms Smith" letter I thought it would be a long wait for a reply from the Home Office regarding the Government's proposed communications monitoring system. Surprisingly I've received a response already, albeit a canned one that doesn't actually address the questions I raised. In the interests of fairness I've reproduced the reply below. In essence, though, the Government's previous statements have been repeated and the emphasis has been placed on the public consultation due to take place soon. Rest assured Zero Flaws will be participating!... (Read More)

Since the last Zero Flaws post, the UK Government has made some significant noises regarding the implementation of a communications monitoring system. Last week Jacqui Smith, the UK's Home Secretary, gave a press conference to clarify the Government's plans. Essentially she wants to create a monitoring system that records the metadata of phonecalls, emails and web browsing sessions.

Many campaigners have complained about the gross invasion of privacy this monitoring system will cause, and they're absolutely right. However Zero Flaws has another, slightly different concern: this system will be a vast waste of taxpayers' money, and by definition will never be fit for purpose. So, in the spirit of public service, Zero Flaws sent the following letter to Ms Smith this week.... (Read More)

An interesting thing happened last week. The Internet evolved. In a blink of an eye the restrictions on top level domain names - the .com or .net bit at the end of a web site address - were wiped away. ICANN, the organisation responsible for managing and maintaining this addressing system, approved a change to the DNS infrastructure that will allow any top level domain to be registered. DNS, as you'll remember if you read the Robustly Flawed article, is the telephone directory of the Internet. Until last week all top level domains, .com, .uk, .net and so on, were restricted to a tightly controlled list of possibilities. As well as the generic domains such as .net every country gets a top level domain, for example ".uk" for the UK. That's how things work, and ICANN have stuck very tightly to this position. In fact although adding extra top level domains is trivial ICANN have proved very reluctant to actually do it - campaigns to give adult websites a ".xxx" domain have been going on for years.

Great, but it's a shame that it's all pointless. This might well come back to haunt me but let's go for it anyway. Allowing anyone to register a new top level domain is an utterly useless exercise. I predict, to use an Internet meme, an "epic fail".... (Read More)

Virtualisation is a fascinating subject. Simply by installing a piece of software like VMWare or Virtual PC you can instantly host multiple virtual computers on your one, single physical computer. To the vast majority of software and operating systems a virtual PC is indistinguishable from a physical one. But because the entire virtual PC is stored in files on disk it makes backing up, rolling back and swapping between installations as simple as clicking the mouse. This makes virtualisation perfect for home users who want to try a new o/s or application without risking damage to their physical PC's configuration, or for businesses who want to build large test environments without tying up lots of servers.

But virtualisation isn't just for demo labs, training courses and home users. It's being used as a core component of large, critical, commercial and government IT infrastructures, and when a solution is used in a live environment security becomes of paramount concern. VMWare realise this and, at VMWorld 2008, ran a security track within their "breakout" (presentations, to you and I) sessions. I was an avid follower of this track because I have one fundamental concern about virtualisation: it causes security risk to grow silently and exponentially. ... (Read More)