Who would have thought that 7 month later and for most of us there are no plans to go back to the office. For remote workers audio/video conference and collaboration software has become a tool we use sometimes all day. For me personally quality of audio and video has become an important part of work. for me personally its very distracting when someone is garbled, or there video is horrible. I wanted to put up some of my favorite tools I have found to help provide quality remote working experience.
Audio:
Microphones are an important tool for quality audio. If your a teacher providing distance learning or office worker meeting with clients or colleagues good audio is important. I wanted to list USB based audio that would work with most if not all computers and remote access software.Most of them I have tried.
- Audio-Technica ATR2100x-USB Cardioid Dynamic Microphone:
- This thing has been a work horse I have used it for podcasting as well as meetings. Its only downfall you have to be pretty close to the mic for it to pic you up.
- Rode VideoMic NTG:
- I just picked this one up. It's really designed as a shotgun mic to go on top of your DSLR for better video audio, but Rode has also added a USB port that lets it work as a shotgun mic connected directly to your PC. So far I like that I can position the Mic further away but still have rally good sound quality.
- Apple Airpods:
- Many people use these as have I, and for me I have not been impressed. I have not used the Airpod Pros, but I found the original Airpods to be very fickle. Many times the mic would cut out or garble what I was saying. I do like how easy they are to pair with different devices and for listing to music they are great, I am just not a fan of using them as a mic.
- Built in Apple Mic and Speakers
- I have found the built in mic and speakers on my macbook pro to be very capable. Right now I have my macbook docked so the mic is not usable but when I am traveling and working I have never got any complaints about the audio. It nice that it is built in for sure.
- Head Phones or no Head Phones:
- Luckily the video conference software has gotten much better with sound rejection. For example if you are using the speakers and mic on your laptop the software is smart enough to cancel what is coming out of your speakers and only broadcast your voice. That being said it isn't perfect but its pretty close. For me it really depends on the environment. If your working in an airport or Starbucks of course headphones are crucial, at home i kind of bounce between headphones and laptop speakers. I really don't want to wear headphones for 8 hours strait .
Video:
Video for me is not as important as audio quality since most of my meetings are audio, but for distance teachers or just audio video geeks like myself having a nice camera is pretty important.
- Logitech C930E:
- The Logitech C930 series cameras have been the de facto for good quality reliable HD video. I have had mine for 4 years and still haven't been on a call with someone who has better video. There is nothing you can say bad about these cameras accept they are hard to find right now.
- DSLR with HDMI to USB adapter:
- If you are an aspiring YouTuber then this might be the solution for you. There are a lot of older DSLR cameras out there that have really good video features and are pretty cheap. The only issue is the HDMI to USB adapters range in quality and price. Its really hard to tell what is quality and what is junk. If you go down this route it is important you do your research.
- Apple built in FaceTime or iSight Cameras:
- Ahhh... They work but they aren't great. If your on the road running light they work in a pinch. If you have a newer iPhone you may be better using that, they usually have better cameras then the laptops.
- EPOC cam Webcam for MAc and PC:
- Lastly I wanted to leave you with a software alternative. EPOC software is an app that can be installed on your iPhone. Once the iPhone app is installed you install the companion software on your computer. It allows you to use the epic camera on your iPhone as a HD webcam. It also adds the ability to connect to the iPhone camera over wireless or wired. Definitely worth checking out https://apps.apple.com/us/app/epoccam-webcam-for-mac-and-pc/id449133483
Lights:
If your not a professional YouTuber or Video Podcaster it might not be super important but if you have a darker office like me and you attend early or off hour meeting a cheap studio light or good room lighting can dial back the creep factor.
- SUPON L122T Ultra-Thin LED Video Light Pane:
- This light is really chap and worked really well. It pretty bright and you can change the tone from warmer to cooler as well as brighter and softer. It doesn't come with power supply so you will need to order it separately. You can even power it with battery packs so it can be completely mobile, I have been really happy with it.
Hope these ideas can help with your video conference gear ideas.
So the F5 is a tricky beast often refereed to as the swiss army knife of network appliances. The appliances primary role in many networks is to load balance and is a beast negotiating SSL. That being said its not always easy to determine how to configure the clients SSL profiles to be secure and still service the public. F5s documentation is helpful but designed to be vague because cipher suites and browser support is always changing. https://support.f5.com/csp/article/K8802
SSL Labs has become the de-facto to use tool that helps the public understand the nuances of SSL by giving an easy to understand letter grade, https://www.ssllabs.com . The website runs a multitude of tests from insuring your certificate is chained correctly to end device OS and browser simulations, to commonly found vulnerability testing. The down fall of having such a sophisticated tool issuing a simple letter score, is not every environment can be configured for an A or B plus.
So I wanted to through an F5 Client SSL Profile out there that at the time of testing got a solid A- and still supported a ton of OS and browser combinations. You will mostly want to keep the defaults but I will highlight what changes you will want to make to get an A. You will need to select Advanced to see some of these settings.
- The first step is to add your public certificate and the intermediate certificates if applicable as well as the key.
- this is what create the certificates chain
- Next you will want to customize the Ciphers that will be used by the F5 to negotiate SSL with the client. This is where 99% of the magic will happen.
- DEFAULT:HIGH: (are pre canned cipher settings created by F5, the additional settings are additional customization.
- !RSA: Do not use RSA ciphers
- !SSLV3: Do not use SSL version 3
- !RC4: Do not use RC4 ciphers
- !EXP: Do not use Cipher length of 40 or 56 bits export strength
- !DES: Do not use Des or triple Des ciphers
- !TLSv1_1: Do not use TLS version 1.1
- !TLSv1: Do not use TlS version 1.0
- !ADH: Do not use ADH ciphers
- !EXPORT: Do not use EXPORT grade (weak) ciphers
- !SHA: Do not use Message Authentication Code SHA 128
- The complete string looks like this:
- DEFAULT:HIGH:!RSA:!SSLV3:!RC4:!EXP:!DES:!TLSv1_1:!TLSv1:!ADH:!EXPORT:!SHA
- Lastly you will want to set up strict SSL renegotiation:
- Check the Renegotiation box
- Next set Secure Renegotiation to "Require Strict"
From here save your SSL client profile, apply it to a public accessible virtual server, and run SSL labs against your server. Its kind of fun testing and playing around to see what modifying the cipher settings.
Enjoy.
- sudo nano /etc/sysctl.conf
- net.ipv4.ip_forward = 1
- sudo sysctl -p
The WireGuard configuration is as simple as setting up SSH. A connection is established by an exchange of public keys between server and client. Only a client that has its public key in its corresponding server configuration file is allowed to connect. WireGuard sets up standard network interfaces (such as wg0 and wg1), which behave much like the commonly found eth0 interface. This makes it possible to configure and manage WireGuard interfaces using standard tools such as ifconfig and ip. I was going to post a guide but there are so many good guides already on the internet just google it. Also the official documentation is really good and has some install guides as well.
Enjoy, be safe, support and contribute to WireGuard.
https://www.twitch.tv/defconorg
https://www.twitch.tv/defcon_music
https://www.twitch.tv/defcon_chill
https://www.twitch.tv/biohackingvillage
https://www.twitch.tv/blueteamvillage
https://www.twitch.tv/bypassvillage
https://www.twitch.tv/cryptovillage
https://www.twitch.tv/hackthesea
https://www.twitch.tv/passwordvillage
https://www.twitch.tv/roguesvillage
https://www.twitch.tv/dcpolicy
https://www.twitch.tv/hamradiovillage
https://www.twitch.tv/ics_village
https://www.twitch.tv/iotvillage
https://www.twitch.tv/monerovillage
https://www.twitch.tv/paymentvillage
https://www.twitch.tv/redteamvillage
- Identify the talks I want to watch
- Create a youtube playlist listing the talks in order of the live Q&A's (then watch them)
- Created calendar events of the live Q&A with the speaker on the Defcon Twitch channel (https://www.twitch.tv/defconorg)
- between live Q&A I want to watch I stream the Defcon Entertainment channel on twitch (https://www.twitch.tv/defcon_music)
- Hang out on the Defcon Discord server in #linecon, #dcg, #pool-1, and the #pool-3 channels we will see which ones i spend the most time in. Currently linecon is holding most of my attention.
Please also consider "The One!", a unofficial consolidated schedule of all the Villages, Talks, Contests, and various Events occurring during DEFCON 28. One page, one look, all things happening!
Lots of things are still missing, As various schedules get released and processed they will appear. Keep coming back to get the latest.
Village info derived from the following pages
DEF CON 28 Villages page
DEF CON 28 Villages Forum page
Other cons during #SummerHackerCamp
General / previous years
JK-47 - BSidesLV & DEFCON Conference Tips
Just another DEF CON guide
HACKER SUMMER CAMP 2018 GUIDE
On Attending DefCon