Happy Day Everybody!

We have a commercial location!


Soon we will be ready to support all our new members! If you feel like volunteering, come to 918 Breckenridge at 11:30AM on Dec 30th to help us make this move!

Remember, no class this Thursday!

Grant writing is taking some exploratory steps forward. We've contacted MT EPSCoR at the NSF to see how we could help fulfill government grants to add to our funding. Soon we will get to Missoula. It seems like you guys have been hitting our site the most... by 20 unique hits this month alone. That was kind of expected though; Missoula is awesome, intelligent and wonderfully weird. I felt isolated from true hacker spirit/curiosity in Missoula but I was ineffective at doing anything about it(Saint). I only was there for a school year though.

If we congeal our many efforts under a larger umbrella, we can prove that we are willing/able to collaborate. Collaboration is extremely important in getting all grants... especially larger ones that we might need in the future. Let's prove that we can work together just as well as we can work independently!

On that note, I would like to see if DC406-Helena wants to hold at least one of their monthly meetings in our conference. The dc406master seems down with the possibility! Horray! It's just a matter of figuring what to set up for them! I guess I could offer free computer lab, beer and soda(some of us dislike alcohol)? DC406 has been around longer than us... by an order of magnitude (their site is 36 months old instead of 3). They would be able to speed us all along by sharing some wisdom, Int and other stats. 8-|

Hope you had a good Christmas!

UPDATE 12/25/2010:  THE WINNER FOR THIS YEAR'S XMAS ELECTRONICS COMPETITION IS: 

Travis Hyyppä

from Helena MT!

With his Sentient Ornament!

 

Congratulations Travis for a job well done!  You will be receiving $250 of Think Geek awesomeness and a year of workspace and equipment starting when you want it to! 

Welcomed Surprise Entry

Xmas lights to a baseline of Christian Rock!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ei9JNjWVrkk

Vote for a REAL Change--Elect a ROBOT in 2010!

Xmas Hack Competition entries are being posted!

All voting must be done by Noon on the 24th!

We are going to have a simple form with the electronic gadget name and a link to the youTube of the device.

Each person is allowed one vote. If this gets abused, we'll have to require registration. :(

Expect four entries in this so far. However... since we're all procrastinators... you can hand in your late submission by tomorrow morning and we'll still put it up.

Two entries have been posted so far:
Travis Hyyppa's Dynamic Temperature-Displaying Electronic Xmas Ornament
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SI16lV6jZ7o

Saint's Proximity-Testing XMas Mimic Present
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xwy6bi7KW-I

Just over a week to build your XMas Gadget

If you don't have time/resources to make a video, drop it by MEH at 918 Breckenridge we'll make a video and ensure it gets back to you by the 20th for Xmas!

All brainy hats off to ThinkGeek.com which will provide $250 to the winner of the XMas Electronics competition. Check out all the nerdy, glorious gear/gadget you can at ThinkGeek.com

Huge thank you for being our sponsor for this event! ThinkGeek went above and beyond what they needed to. There's no Scrouge in this geeky company!

MEH's third Blood Drive on Monday!

A prerequisite of our Board is that they must make all honest attempts at a weekly plasma drive to Great Falls. Plasma is the blood juice without the blood cells. During this time, we all cram a van/car and discuss future ways to obtain HP, funding/growth and any other business issues and opportunities. We also sometimes use it to gather support/affiliates/sponsors/etc. It's actually pretty fun! Our club secretary records the minutes and we WAY over-accomplish our legal requirement of board meetings.

If you are a member, or even an interested person, please email at bloodmeh@gmail.com. The blood drive is worth 50 HP(hacker points) so two trips will get you 10sqft of hackspace table for the month and Mehmbership. Plus you get to know what happens in our board meetings.

I will, as usual, make 20(or more) PB&J sandwiches for all of us the night before. Then we shall grab some Juice bottles and head for Great Falls. You would need your SSN, Picture ID(with DOB) and any letter that can prove your residence in the past 60 days.

It's about an hour there, two hours when we get there and one hour to go back. Expect faster time, if this isn't your first time donating plasma. We are projected to make around $100 per trip.

ad test

She's out there, my nerdy brethren... just not in Montana. :P

Estimated Reach
fewer than 20 people

* who live in the United States
* who live in Montana
* who are female
* who like electronics, electronics technician, electronics engineering, electronic engineering, hackathon, hack your wii, hackers, ieee, hacking, hacking stuff, hacking computers, hacking zone, hacking cracking, hacking planet, hacking truths, programming, hacking clz, hacking is fuuun or hacking world
* who are single
* who are interested in men

XMas Electronics Competition 11/7/2010 3:16 PM

Funding Options

Long post this time:

We're going over different ways to get money for club improvement.

We need to get more computer desks, electronics programing devices/chips, Servos, paints and a large display.

We're looking at the

Senario AL-100 Torpedo Entertainment and Game Projector

Sexy, huh?


We're making weekly "Blood drives" to Great Falls and each trip is getting us about $100 for the club. If you want to get in on this, contact saintmeh@gmail.com. This counts towards your HP. We hold a meeting on the way there, meet with others when we arrive

We also rent out 20 sq(4x5) feet of physical hackspace with a $30 mehmbership. Haha! Get it? no?.. well.. I thought it was funny.

We're also taking preregistration for advanced programming/reverse engineering courses. Lesson's cost either $20 or 100 HackspacePoints(HP).

This month's Public Outreach Security Training is going to be about Online EULAs:

We will discuss two topics:

Public benefit--EULAs( Ferret):

1 What a EULA is

2 What it normally says

3 Important areas of reading for your average Joe

4 What it can't say and how you can protect your rights.

Nerd Benefit--How to set up a darknet( Saint):

1 What is the first amendment and why was it put in place?

2 Is it under attack. If so, how?

3 What are our options?

4 Darknet installations

5 Choosing your friends wisely(read paranoidly).

6 Next topics will be "Naked In Cyberspace--Verifying someone's identity"

We have a secure sign-in for the EULA presentation. This proves to grant funders that we're doing a public service. We also intend to have suggestion boxes inside and outside the door. Everyone is invited to this. This is a great way to meet MEHmbers regarding potential tutelage, work space and/or computer usage.

The POST is in the large meeting room in the Library at 6 on Sunday the 28th.

Incorporation

Getting a 501(c)3 license is a pain in the ass. I'll get it though!

As of today, even small non-profits have to file the $400 paperwork to be a tax-deductable entity. :(

Stupid guberment!

We might not hit our December 2010 deadline to get incorporated as a non-profit.

We have a schedule!?

I mean.. We Have A Schedule! :)

Next presentation will be on how hackers are able to erase their tracks and what system administrators can do to help prevent it.

Good stuff here. Look at any news report on a successful hack. The main two questions a system admin gets asked about his security failure is the "How" and the "Who".

RSVP saintmeh@gmail.com. Or the website form.. or the number on the site... or a bugle outside the house 30 minutes prior. really though, it has to be a bugle. We don't accept slide trombones or saxophones, cats.




PS: We *STILL* don't have a sign in front. I have to wait for the zoning permit. I'm sure we can get a small, unpowered sign on our porch. If not, no problem. Petty thing anyways.

Next presentation

Last Thursday's presentation was not a possibility due to a necessary trip to Denver(just got back 30 minutes ago).

Next Thursday's presentation will be on spoofing SSL certificates!
Why HTTPS doesn't mean anything if your user is uneducated. This is a combination of MITM(you have to have some access to the lines they speak through) and Social(the user has to be less than savvy).

Presentation line-up will be posted soon. Look for it by Saturday.

Cake today at the Library--6PM

Right. So. Come for cake today at the Library--7PM. We have a presentation set to go. I don't expect much for turnout because advertising was off to a bumpy start. The event will include a brief explanation of ways to keep yourself anonymous. It will also include some photos and current setups of our fresh new hackspace. We're a pretty screwy group... no... we're a very screwy group. There are seven of us now. There will be two at the event. We are all relaxed and all very friendly folk.

Err

Amalgamated the few suggestions by fans for the mascot. Hmm... This guy looks even more angry now.

Horray for DC406!

If you haven't checked them out, do so at dc406.com. They seem to be primarily focused on intermediate/advanced hacking methods. They're a group that closely follows Defcon.

Army Surplus... Hmmm

What would YOU do with an army surplus gunner drone?

These geeks made a wildly awesome WiFi mapping drone ^_^.
http://dvice.com/archives/2010/08/geeks-turn-army.php

I would use it to deliver cats.

Misidentity Crisis

Who am I not?!! I mean really when I'm not me, who am I not supposed to be?

Curse you Descartes!

My nickname briefly changed from "Saint" to "Brick" before reverting; I had found another "theSaint" who lived locally-ish and he was also into Computer security. He had the nickname for two years, but he gave it up for me. What a goodfella. He now goes by "theSainted"

Need to setup the about us

If you are a charter member, please write a very small paragraph about yourself that you wouldn't mind placing on the site. Hobbies, focuses, etc. --- they're all great! Send it via either the web form on the "Contact Us" page... or send it to 3@digitaldetermination.com

Two steps forward...

One step back.  The flooring goes against building regulations.  I'll have to have it removed on Saturday.  No matter, I anticipated a few setbacks and this is nothing because there's still a week of extra set up time at this point and I'm almost to the end.  MEH can handle one more major setback before we have to start finding places to make cuts.  I'm a terrifying businessman when I put my mind to it.

It seems our Facebook fan-base is doubling every other week  This is only mildly shocking as we have 26 Facebook fans(far more than enough for a special interest group such as my own).  Our fan-growth seems to be based equally on a word-of-mouth than the advertising budget.  Nine people have clicked "like" out of the ten people who viewed the FB page through an advertisement.  This suggests to me that I should be focusing our marketing group on generating greater word of mouth through publicity stunts and public services.  MEH has 12 page-views from Myspace advertising and 6 views from google AdSense.  Mondays and Wednesdays seem to be peek days to get exposure.  I haven't come to a verified explanation for this, but I have a good theory.  I would like to ensure I know what I'm talking about before I throw any wild hypothesis out on a blog.  Sorry.

The blog poll has most of its votes on "Maintaining Anonymity".  This is excellent news.  I was a little worried what sort of people would select "Creating Thermite."  However, all knowledge is free.  It's MEH's job to guide and accelerate the knowledge in a safe and more responsible manner.  Dinosaurs will die.

Still looking for a projector.

Speeding Along Like a Waxed Modem:P

GHAhh! Things are picking up fast here! We're already getting emails from... fans? They all thank us for fighting the good fight! We've now got some dry wall up but it needs to be mudded/sanded before it can be painted. I have a design layout made by our resident guerilla artist on how the wall is going to look; he's going nuts waiting for our slow asses to finish the walls. I'm going to be so happy when it's done! I've subscribed to 2600 and I would like to make available my: programs, computers, books, magazines and literature.

Soon, I'll have a CEH training center so you'll have something to show for your efforts.

I've met with my charter members both as a group and individually to see what their desires and inputs are. I would like someone to champion a cause that could maintain synergy between us and other interest groups such as the Capital City Amatuer Radio Club, the high school computer science classes, the college gaming/computer club and the chamber of commerce with its ties to the local computer science businesses(Maximus, Northrop Grumman, Black Mountain, etc). Membership can be paid for in volunteer time(which is recorded by handle, date, duration and description)

-----------------How is the CEH coming, Saint?-----------------------
Glad you asked! :P My personal progress on the CEH: The CEH test is very comprehensive. I expected a watered-down quiz of theoretical usages and comprehension of CCNA-type functionality. I don't think anyone needs the CEH to be a hacker, but the CEH is damn-near impossible to get if you aren't a hacker. It seems to be more technology-based than I thought it would be.

I noticed that the practice tests were missing some minor things(mapping of hardware to create hardwired exploits such as key loggers and relay stations). Other than basic Social Engineering, I haven't found anything about psychology of security, which I believe is grossly overlooked.

I'm still on track to take the test Monday September 6th.

Things are coming along. AZN and The Pope made much of the flooring and, after we are trained, I will help with the ceiling. Soon, the hackspace will be graffitied with some wicked wall art by a particularly good guerrilla artist we have around town. Our funding is predominantly coming from myself at this point. I feel I need more credentials for some reason. Tonight, I have been studying like a mad man. I intend to get my CEH by September 1st.

I made the fliers and distributed them downtown. I've met with the head of the IT department for the University of Montana in Helena and he is really excited about contributing to our cause.

333 AM.--Peek coding hours.

Peek coding hours... so why am I typing this up?

I'm doing this hideous task of blogging because I care about our future.

We all need to grow and learn; take from the tree of knowledge because it is the only way to take from the tree of life. Religion, Philosophy, Science and Sociology are all attempts at comprehending the world around oneself. I will create here a heaven for those who would be willing and able to learn. Everyone is welcome once.

The idea of MEH is to create an innovative learning environment that appeals to the insatiable and the driven. All sciences that can be taught, will be taught. The first and foremost is, of course, compromising and immunizing computer network and application security. I've finished creating fliers for the club's first public relations presentation. We will be teaching the public how easy and simple it is to protect themselves from most computer threats at home. This presentation will cover the following basic tools:

1) Antivirus Software

2) Firewalls

3) Browser security choice

4) Securing your network

We will present from 8PM to 9PM on Monday and Thursday of the second week of September. This is the 6th and the 9th.

--The Saint