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Karim Said
Karim Said

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May 4, 2018

Hack The Box Invite Insight

I’ve (re)started the Cryptopals Crypto Challenges too many times to remember. I think I’ve implemented a Vigenère solution from scratch enough times, and I need a new technical challenge that I can periodically jump into with enthusiasm and then procrastinate into memory oblivion. Enter, Hack The Box. The first challenge…

JavaScript

3 min read

Hack The Box Invite Insight
Hack The Box Invite Insight
JavaScript

3 min read


Sep 4, 2017

Ethics of Brain-Computer Interfaces

Some Preparatory Musings — I recently got an invitation to watch a debate between the UMBC philosophy and computer science departments regarding the ethics of brain-computer interfaces. BCIs are those interfaces that seek to bypass human motor and sensory systems through direct connectivity to the central nervous system. The field is nascent, but it’s…

Ethics

3 min read

Ethics

3 min read


Sep 4, 2017

Breaking Vigenere

And Other Fun with Cryptography — I’ve been messing around with some basic cryptography challenges ever since DEFCON, which was a ton of fun and very informative. The most recent challenge involved breaking a Vigenere cipher (also known as a repeating key XOR). Here’s the basic algorithm: 1. Calculate normalized Hamming distances for various key sizes, and take the smallest one. 2. Chunk cipher text into key-sized chunks. 3. Transpose the chunk bytes. 4. Find the single-byte XOR key for each transposed chunk with frequency analysis. 5. Concatenate the keys, and find your plain text. 6. ??? 7. Profit!

Cryptography

1 min read

Cryptography

1 min read


Sep 4, 2017

Value-Centric Design

Reflections on an Influential Perspective — In nearly every one of my graduate reading seminars, at some point, we were asked to read Professor Elke Duncker’s 2002 Joint Conference on Digital Libraries (JCDL) presentation, “Cross-cultural usability of the library metaphor”. …

Ethnography

5 min read

Ethnography

5 min read


Dec 30, 2013

Three-Letter Jumble

Pseudonyms I’ve Adopted for the Monograms — Ulav Grado Hildabrand Alessandro Horatio Hernez Mortimer Marlin Mendelbaum Artemis Hogarth Arkham Hannibal Ungar Harmon Geoffrey Ren-Ronson Amira Ram Ghafir Eugene Evigo Kerchiev Hector Mansoor Mahound Lawrence Oliver Lailabert Quinn Elliot Dresdahl Aloysius Wayne Wilburton Nora Omari Malouf

1 min read

1 min read


Oct 6, 2013

Counting

A Quick Chemical Calculation — I weigh about 155 lbs. If you convert that to metric units, it’s about 70,306 grams, which is about as many paperclips. The average human body is mostly water, about 80-some percent. There’s other stuff in there too, though. In fact, the rough breakdown by weight is about 65% Oxygen…

2 min read

2 min read

Karim Said

Karim Said

57 Followers

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