March 2017 archive

Mar 28

Facebook Adds Stories to iOS/Android Apps to Try to Kill Snapchat

Facebook stories

Facebook truly DESPISES Snapchat!

As documented in a blog post today, Facebook has now added "Stories" to their main mobile apps. Just like Snapchat, these stories:

  • expire after 24 hours
  • can be either images or videos
  • have all sorts of filters and effects you can add
    • this includes a "masks" feature similar to Snapchat "lenses" that can change someone's face
  • can also be sent directly to one or more of your friends
    • and just like Snapchat, the recipient can view the photo - and then view the photo once more in 24 hours
  • can be created by simply swiping to the right to rapidly access the camera

If you reload your iOS or Android app today, you should see that the top of the app has changed. You now have:

  • a camera icon in the upper left corner that lets you open the camera
  • a "Direct" icon that gets you to images or videos sent directly to you. (Yet another messaging inbox.)
  • a bar of icons of all the friends who have posted Stories so far

And, as mentioned before, you can now swipe to the right to access the camera. If you don't have this feature today, you should within the next day or so.

Cloning Snapchat again and again...

Adding "Stories" to the main Facebook app comes as no surprise. It's been clear for a while that Facebook was jealous of all the people using Snapchat and wanted to bring them back inside Facebook's shiny walled garden. Facebook had already rolled out "stories" in their other Messaging apps:

  • Instagram Stories
  • WhatsApp Status
  • Facebook Messenger "My Day"

Of these, Instagram Stories has been viewed as successful. The WhatsApp and Messenger launches have been very recent and so it's not clear how many people will use them.

How will Facebook differentiate from Snapchat?

In their blog post, Facebook notes that:

Over the coming months, we plan to introduce new ways for the Facebook community to create their own frames and effects that can be used on any photo or video created with the new Facebook camera. Our goal is for the camera to be a home to hundreds of dynamic and fun effects that give you new ways to connect with friends, family, and your community.

We hope that with the new Facebook camera, Stories and Direct, it will be easier than ever to see the world through each other’s eyes

While it is possible in Snapchat to create a custom "geofilter", this teaser from Facebook sounds like a great bit more.

Facebook, of course, has a huge userbase. As I wrote in my "Directory Dilemma" post a few years back, users will use an app for messaging if the people they want to communicate with use that app. And the reality is that Facebook is the center of many people's communication.

So on one level, Facebook doesn't need to differentiate from Snapchat. They simply need to provide this functionality... and hope that this keeps people from opening up the yellow ghost app.

And of course, Facebook still supports regular text posts, photos, links, all of which last longer than 24 hours. They also have Facebook Live video streaming.

This is just really a way to bring "ephemeral messaging" (messages that disappear after a period of time) inside of Facebook's walls.

How many places can people post "stories"?

The question to me is really:

how many places can people realistically post their 24-hour "stories"?

Right now people have at least FIVE major options:

  • Snapchat
  • Instagram
  • Facebook
  • Facebook Messenger
  • WhatsApp

... and any other apps that are copying Snapchat right now.

The reality is that users won't post to all of them. They'll choose one... maybe two... and that will be it.

Many people will probably choose to stay right inside of Facebook's walls and use that. Or, if they are already using Instagram Stories, they may stay there.

But what about Facebook Messenger?

One curious aspect of this announcement is bringing direct messaging BACK INSIDE the Facebook mobile app.

Facebook has spent a couple years now moving messaging OUT of the "Facebook" app. They have forced people to use Facebook Messenger to send and receive direct messages on a mobile device.

Now using the "Direct" inbox, we can send and receive messages inside the Facebook app again.

Granted, the messages can only be viewed twice within 24 hours - and they are in the form of images or videos. But we do have messages in the Facebook app again.

It will be interesting to see how Facebook evolves these many different messaging and "stories" channels they have.

Which will YOU choose?

If you have read this far... do you see yourself using the Facebook Stories?

Or will you stay with Snapchat? or Instagram Stories?

Or are you using WhatsApp Status or Facebook Messenger "My Day"?

Or do you just wish this whole "Stories" format would go away? ;-)

Please do leave comments here or wherever this article appears on social media.

P.S. There are many other stories about Facebook Stories appearing today.

Mar 24

TDYR 324 – The Sad, Fragmented World of Messaging Systems

Our messaging systems are a mess - how do you know how to reach someone? They are spread across so many different messaging / chat systems. I wrote about this today on my Disruptive Telephony blog - and recorded this audio commentary. Here's the blog post: http://www.disruptivetelephony.com/2017/03/xkcd-comic-perfectly-captures-sad-fragmented-state-of-messaging-chat-systems.html

Mar 24

XKCD Comic Perfectly Captures Sad, Fragmented State of Messaging / Chat Systems

Xkcd 1810 chat systems

In one picture, this comic from xkcd nails the very sad state of fragmentation with our messaging systems today. The text says:

I have a hard time keeping track of which contacts use which chat systems.

And that is our major pain point today.

Think about it... do you know how to reach most of the people you need to communicate with?

Some readers may have just decided that they are going to ONLY use one service. They communicate on only, say, Facebook. Or WhatsApp. (Or in one case I know, someone has rejected all new messaging apps and will only communicate with email.)

And so if you want to communicate with them you have to use their one service.

But of course, if you want to communicate with other people, you have to use their service... which leads to this comic and the mental energy we all must expend to remember (names are made up):

  • George likes to get Twitter DMs
  • Sue and Jose only use Facebook Messenger
  • Carlos only uses WhatsApp
  • Heidi, Frederick and Laura only use Wire
  • Your parents all use iMessage... except when they decide to use Facebook Messenger
  • Your teenage kids ignore most messages except on Snapchat
  • Nick only responds to Instagram DMs
  • Jon is old-skool and can only be found on IRC
  • Your work colleagues are best found on Slack... except a couple are also Facebook friends so you can reach them that way... and a couple of others are on Twitter and so you can reach them there
  • Your friend in Asia prefers WeChat
  • A number of people you know use Matrix and Riot.im
  • and...
  • and...
  • and... the list goes on...

Think about the sheer amount of thought processing and memory we all must expend to keep this all straight in our heads! And yes, some tools and contact/address books can help... as can some clients.

But it's a mess.

Two years ago I wrote about why I thought that some degree of centralization was inevitable: The Directory Dilemma - Why Facebook, Google and Skype May Win the Mobile App War.

I still believe the "directory dilemma" is the key issue here. All this fragmentation can't last.

Naturally the large players would like us all to forget about the others and move all our messaging to be inside of Facebook Messenger, or iMessage, or WhatsApp. They have zero interest in sharing or federating because they are all about the lock-in and keeping people inside their pretty walled gardens.

And groups like Matrix.org are working on creating the kind of distributed, decentralized messaging I'd like to see. But they run into the issue that it's hard to do that in a way that's simple and easy to an end user.

We don't care about where Fred sends messages...

... we just want to reach Fred.

I do worry that in the end all our messaging will be inside the private, commercial walled gardens, because people will default to the ease of finding people. The big directories will win.

Right now it's a mess.

What do you think? What is our path out of this mess?

A related audio commentary is available:

Mar 24

PaleBlueDot.io – a beautiful background video from space

Pale Blue Dot site

If you’re looking for something beautiful to have on a monitor or other device in the background of, say, a home office, check out http://palebluedot.io/

It is a live video feed from the International Space Station paired with some ambient / relaxing background music. You can of course turn the music off.

Mar 22

Rough Guide to IETF 98: DNS Privacy and Security, including DNSSEC

It is a remarkably quiet week for DNS security and privacy topics at the IETF 98 meeting in Chicago next week. Both the DANE and DPRIVE working groups are moving along very well with their work on their mailing lists and so chose not to meet in Chicago. Similarly, with DNSSEC deployment steadily increasing (as we outlined in the 2016 State of DNSSEC Deployment report in December), the work to be discussed in DNS Operations (DNSOP) is more about exploring ideas to make DNSSEC even more secure.

Here is a quick view of what is happening in Chicago.

Dan York

Mar 21

Rough Guide to IETF 98: DNS Privacy and Security, including DNSSEC

It is a remarkably quiet week for DNS security and privacy topics at the IETF 98 meeting in Chicago next week. Both the DANE and DPRIVE working groups are moving along very well with their work on their mailing lists and so chose not to meet in Chicago. Similarly, with DNSSEC deployment steadily increasing (as we outlined in the 2016 State of DNSSEC Deployment report in December), the work to be discussed in DNS Operations (DNSOP) is more about exploring ideas to make DNSSEC even more secure.

Here is a quick view of what is happening in Chicago.

IETF 98 Hackathon

Over the weekend (25-26 March) we’ll have a good-sized “DNS team” in the IETF 98 Hackathon working on various projects around DNSSEC, DANE, DNS Privacy, using DNS over TLS and much more. This time the work will include a team looking at how some DNS toolkits can work with the impending Root KSK Rollover in October 2017. More specific information is in the IETF 98 Hackathon wiki. Anyone is welcome to join us for part or all of that event.

DNS Operations (DNSOP)

The DNS Operations (DNSOP) Working Group meets on Monday afternoon from 13:00-15:00 CDT. The DNSOP agenda includes the following items related to DNSSEC:

Some of the other discussions, such as DNS over TCP, also have potential impacts on DNS security and privacy.

DNS Service Discovery (DNSSD)

On Tuesday, the  Extensions for Scalable DNS Service Discovery (DNSSD) Working Group meets from 16:40-18:40 CDT. DNSSD is not one of the groups we regularly follow as its focus is around how DNS can be used to discover services available on a network (for example, a printer or file server). However, in Chicago the DNSSD agenda specifically has a discussion around “Privacy Extensions” (see draft-ietf-dnssd-privacy).

DNSSEC Coordination informal breakfast meeting

Finally, on Friday morning before the sessions start we are planning an informal gathering of people involved with DNSSEC. We’ve done this at many of the IETF meetings over the past few years and it’s been a good way to connect and talk about various projects. True to the “informal” nature, we’re not sure of the location and time yet (and we are not sure if it will involve food or just be a meeting). If you would like to join us, please drop me an email or join the dnssec-coord mailing list.

Other Working Groups

Right before the DNSSD Working Group on Tuesday, the Using TLS in Applications (UTA) WG will meet from 14:50 – 16:20 and will be covering several ideas for “Strict Transport Security” (STS) for email. While not directly tied to DNSSEC or DANE, they do use DNS for these security mechanisms. And then in the final session on Friday, from 11:50-13:20, the IPSECME WG will have a discussion about “split DNS” and how that impacts VPNS (see draft-ietf-ipsecme-split-dns).

P.S. For more information about DNSSEC and DANE and how you can get them deployed for your networks and domains, please see our Deploy360 site:

Relevant Working Groups at IETF 98:

DNSOP (DNS Operations) WG 
Monday, 27 March 2017, 13:00-15:00 CDT (UTC-5), Zurich D
Agenda: https://datatracker.ietf.org/meeting/98/agenda/dnsop/ 
Documents: https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/dnsop/ 
Charter: http://tools.ietf.org/wg/dnsop/charters/

DNSSD (Extensions for Scalable DNS Service Discovery) WG 
Tuesday, 28 March 2017, 16:40 – 18:40 CDT (UTC-5), Zurich B
Agenda: https://datatracker.ietf.org/meeting/98/agenda/dnssd/ 
Documents: https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/dnssd/ 
Charter: http://tools.ietf.org/wg/dnssd/charters/

Follow Us

There’s a lot going on in Chicago, and whether you plan to be there or join remotely, there’s much to monitor. To follow along as we dole out this series of Rough Guide to IETF blog posts, follow us on the Internet Technology Matters blog, Twitter, Facebook, Google+, via RSS, or see http://www.internetsociety.org/rough-guide-ietf98.

The post Rough Guide to IETF 98: DNS Privacy and Security, including DNSSEC appeared first on Internet Society.

Mar 09

ICANN 58: List of DNSSEC Activities March 12-15, 2017

ICANN 58 logoICANN 58 takes place next week in Copenhagen, Denmark, and there will be some excellent technical content about DNSSEC and DANE happening in several sessions from March 12-15, 2017.

All times below are Central European Time (CET), which is UTC+1.

DNSSEC For Everybody: A Beginner’s Guide – Sunday, 12 March

On Sunday, March 12, 2017, we’ll have the “DNSSEC For Everybody: A Beginner’s Guide” session that will include our usual skit where a bunch of engineers act out how DNS and DNSSEC work! Yes, it’s a good bit of fun and people have told us it has helped tremendously.

Please come with your questions and prepare to learn all about DNSSEC!

Tech Day – Monday, 13 March

The Monday of most ICANN meetings includes the ccNSO “Tech Day”. While the current agenda does not include anything specific to DNSSEC or DANE, there is a session about DNS Privacy (DPRIVE) that may of of interest to some.  See this link for more information:

Root Key Signing Key Rollover: Changing the Keys to the Domain Name System – Tuesday, 14 March

On Tuesday, March 14, ICANN staff will offer a special session talking about the Root Key Rollover process. While we’ll also have some of this info in the Wednesday DNSSEC Workshop, this special session may be of interest to some. The abstract is:

The keys to the Domain Name System are changing for the first time ever. ICANN operates the root zone key signing key (KSK), which is the “master” key for DNS Security Extensions (DNSSEC). This cryptographic key was created when the root zone was signed in 2010. In this session, members of ICANN’s Technical Team will provide an update on the KSK rollover and answer community questions. This session will be of particular interest to Internet service providers, enterprise network operators and others who have enabled DNSSEC validation.

DNSSEC Implementers Gathering –  TUESDAY, 14 March

Later in the evening of Tuesday, March 14, we’ll have our informal “DNSSEC Implementers Gathering” bringing together people who have implemented DNSSEC or DANE in some way for a time to share information, have conversation and light snacks. We’ll gather at a local restaurant / pub in the city of Copenhagen. Invitations have gone out to various DNSSEC mailing lists – if you are interested in attending please send a message to me at york@isoc.org.  We thank DK Hostmaster for their generous sponsorship of this gathering at ICANN 58!

Please note: This gathering takes place on Tuesday evening in Copenhagen versus the usual Monday evening. As may be obvious, there is no remote participation option.

DNSSEC Workshop – 15 March

Our main 6-hour workshop will take place on Wednesday, 15 March, from 09:00 – 15:00 in Hall A3. Lunch will be included.

THANK YOU TO OUR LUNCH SPONSORS: Afilias, CIRA, and SIDN.

The very full agenda includes:

  • DNSSEC Workshop Introduction, Program, Deployment Around the World – Counts, Counts, Counts
  • Panel: DNSSEC Activities in the European Region
  • Update on IETF DNSSEC Activities
  • Root Key Rollover Update
  • Panel: Validation in ISPs – Root Key Rollover Preparation
  • Demonstration: Opportunistic IPsec using DNSSEC implementation
  • State of ECDSA adoption in (cc)TLDs
  • The Great DNSSEC/DNS Quiz
  • Trusted Email Services
  • Demonstration: SMILLA, an SMIMEA aware MILTER-program for SMTP servers
  • DNSSEC – How Can I Help?

It should be an excellent session!

I will be there in Copenhagen and am looking forward to giving multiple presentations during the Wednesday session. It’s always a great gathering of some of the best technical people involved with DNS.

Please do join us for a great set of sessions about how we can work together to make the DNS more secure and trusted!

If you would like more information about DNSSEC or DANE, please visit our Start Here page to begin.

Mar 06

Here is the DNSSEC Activity at ICANN 58 in Copenhagen March 12-15, 2017 (Featured Blog)

Want to learn more about the current state of DNSSEC? Want to see demos of new software to secure email? Curious about the potential impact of the Root Key Rollover happening this year? Next week in Copenhagen, Denmark, ICANN 58 will include some great technical info about DNSSEC and DANE happening in several sessions. Here is the plan... More...

Mar 06

DNSSEC and DANE Activities at ICANN 58 in Copenhagen, March 12-15, 2017

ICANN 58 LogoNext week in Copenhagen, Denmark, ICANN 58 will include some great technical info about DNSSEC and DANE happening in several sessions. Here is the plan…

All times below are Central European Time (CET), which is UTC+1.

DNSSEC For Everybody: A Beginner’s Guide – Sunday, 12 March

On Sunday, March 12, 2017, we’ll have the “DNSSEC For Everybody: A Beginner’s Guide” session that will include our usual skit where a bunch of engineers act out how DNS and DNSSEC work! Yes, it’s a good bit of fun and people have told us it has helped tremendously.

Please come with your questions and prepare to learn all about DNSSEC!

Tech Day – Monday, 13 March

The Monday of most ICANN meetings includes the ccNSO “Tech Day”. While the current agenda does not include anything specific to DNSSEC or DANE, there is a session about DNS Privacy (DPRIVE) that may of of interest to some.  See this link for more information:

Root Key Signing Key Rollover: Changing the Keys to the Domain Name System – Tuesday, 14 March

On Tuesday, March 14, ICANN staff will offer a special session talking about the Root Key Rollover process. While we’ll also have some of this info in the Wednesday DNSSEC Workshop, this special session may be of interest to some. The abstract is:

The keys to the Domain Name System are changing for the first time ever. ICANN operates the root zone key signing key (KSK), which is the “master” key for DNS Security Extensions (DNSSEC). This cryptographic key was created when the root zone was signed in 2010. In this session, members of ICANN’s Technical Team will provide an update on the KSK rollover and answer community questions. This session will be of particular interest to Internet service providers, enterprise network operators and others who have enabled DNSSEC validation.

DNSSEC Implementers Gathering –  TUESDAY, 14 March

Later in the evening of Tuesday, March 14, we’ll have our informal “DNSSEC Implementers Gathering” bringing together people who have implemented DNSSEC or DANE in some way for a time to share information, have conversation and light snacks. We’ll gather at a local restaurant / pub in the city of Copenhagen. Invitations have gone out to various DNSSEC mailing lists – if you are interested in attending please send a message to me at york@isoc.org.  We thank DK Hostmaster for their generous sponsorship of this gathering at ICANN 58!

Please note: This gathering takes place on Tuesday evening in Copenhagen versus the usual Monday evening. As may be obvious, there is no remote participation option.

DNSSEC Workshop – 15 March

Our main 6-hour workshop will take place on Wednesday, 15 March, from 09:00 – 15:00 in Hall A3. Lunch will be included.

THANK YOU TO OUR LUNCH SPONSORS: Afilias, CIRA, and SIDN.

The very full agenda includes:

  • DNSSEC Workshop Introduction, Program, Deployment Around the World – Counts, Counts, Counts
  • Panel: DNSSEC Activities in the European Region
  • Update on IETF DNSSEC Activities
  • Root Key Rollover Update
  • Panel: Validation in ISPs – Root Key Rollover Preparation
  • Demonstration: Opportunistic IPsec using DNSSEC implementation
  • State of ECDSA adoption in (cc)TLDs
  • The Great DNSSEC/DNS Quiz
  • Trusted Email Services
  • Demonstration: SMILLA, an SMIMEA aware MILTER-program for SMTP servers
  • DNSSEC – How Can I Help?

It should be an excellent session!

I will be there in Copenhagen and am looking forward to giving multiple presentations during the Wednesday session. It’s always a great gathering of some of the best technical people involved with DNS.

Please do join us for a great set of sessions about how we can work together to make the DNS more secure and trusted!

If you would like more information about DNSSEC or DANE, please visit our Start Here page to begin.

The post DNSSEC and DANE Activities at ICANN 58 in Copenhagen, March 12-15, 2017 appeared first on Internet Society.

Mar 06

Here is the DNSSEC Activity at ICANN 58 in Copenhagen March 12-15, 2017 (Featured Blog)

More...