RC RANDOM CHAOS

Articles

Long-form writing on tech, culture, and the edges of the internet.

No mitigations, full code execution
embedded securitymemory corruption

No mitigations, full code execution

Memory corruption in shared embedded firmware components grants attacker code execution at firmware privilege, replicated across hundreds of vendor devices.

7 min read
Removing curl and wget stops nothing
dev/tcpliving off the land

Removing curl and wget stops nothing

Bash /dev/tcp opens TCP sockets and sends HTTP with no curl or wget, evading process-name detection while leaving cleartext on the wire.

7 min read
The door was unlocked, not picked
trust boundariesaccess control

The door was unlocked, not picked

Federal concern over fable 5 was a trust boundary failure, not a jailbreak. Fix this code targets content, not access enforcement.

8 min read
1994's eight fallacies hit AI agents harder
distributed systemsAI safety

1994's eight fallacies hit AI agents harder

The eight fallacies of distributed computing turn 21, and autonomous AI agents make every one of those architectural assumptions more dangerous.

7 min read
Contagious Interview ends at npm install
supply-chain-securitythreat-intelligence

Contagious Interview ends at npm install

How DPRK actors turn LinkedIn job offers into code execution via npm postinstall hooks, what BeaverTail steals, and why developer endpoints stay blind.

6 min read
DELETE leaves the body
postgresqldata-destruction

DELETE leaves the body

DROP TABLE and DELETE in Postgres destroy nothing: MVCC dead tuples, unlinked relfilenodes, and WAL keep the data recoverable, and replicas diverge.

6 min read
Forum sellers timestamp breaches before victims notice
cybersecurityincident response

Forum sellers timestamp breaches before victims notice

A cybercriminal's first forum sales thread is often a fresh breach - a timeline anchor, an attribution leak, and the earliest warning most orgs ignore.

6 min read
One login screen now guards your entire machine
identity securitywindows 11

One login screen now guards your entire machine

Windows 11's forced Microsoft account moves the identity boundary to one access point. Compromise the account and you assume the control, not bypass it.

6 min read
The 34x price hike isn't the problem
single-vendor riskinfrastructure dependency

The 34x price hike isn't the problem

Hetzner raised dedicated server prices 34x. The cost is the symptom. The exposure is single-vendor control over a boundary the customer cannot enforce.

7 min read
The contract you pasted is now giving orders
prompt injectionAI security

The contract you pasted is now giving orders

Large AI context windows turn conversations into unsecured databases, breaking DLP assumptions and opening prompt injection paths. Here's how to reassess the risk.

7 min read
Whoever holds the file governs
offline binaryintrusion detection

Whoever holds the file governs

Kage turns a website into one offline binary, decoupling presentation from origin controls and leaving traffic-based detection with nothing to inspect.

7 min read
A name is not trust
software supply chaindependency management

A name is not trust

Package registries resolve a name to an artifact, not a source. When the party behind a trusted name changes, the system inherits trust it cannot verify.

8 min read