Monthly Archive for June, 2006

Today my sister Shaina came into town to start her orientation at Northeastern University. At the dorm she’s staying in, which, like much of the campus, is very nice and modern and in good condition, the prefrosh are given key cards. They swipe the card with the proctor when they enter the building and then, to get into their rooms, they put the card in the door slot and type “9999″ on the keypad. Genius! Three factor authentication! Here is how I presume it works during the actual school year (assuming everyone and everything is doing its job):

# *Something you are* – You have to be a resident to get into the building (verified by proctor, with a photo that pops up on the screen when you scan your student ID card)
# *Something you have* – You need to have your unique key card (student ID) to put in your door
# *Something you know* – You need to enter your unique (or semi-unique, if it is shared with your roommate) four-digit authorization code

In theory this setup is very, very good as far as security goes, because in order to break into your room an attacker would need to gain entrance to the building (or already live there), steal, find, or clone your key card, and also know your secret code. I suppose there were probably also security cameras around, although I didn’t look too closely, and in fact if they made the decision to *not* put cameras in residential buildings, I’d think that was an excellent move on their part.

Two-factor authentication is considered much more secure than traditional single-factor methods like an ID card or a password. Three-factor is better still. And at NEU it is being done is an intelligent, straight-forward way that serves to increase security while minimizing inconvenience. Very cool.

On the “something stupid” side, on my drive home I was going down route 16, a well-trafficed, badly-lit road, and I saw two kids riding some strange sort of miniture bicycles that were low to the ground, lacked reflectors, and were not outfitted with lights. The kids themselves were wearing dark clothing which was completely unreflective. I only saw them because I passed them as we were both near the end of a parking lot that was lit, and I saw their vague outlines next to me. To add to the complete idiocy of all this, they were riding the *wrong way* down an unlit road with no bike lanes. Into oncoming traffic. At midnight. On mini-bikes. Morons. If they got hit, I’d call it Darwin at work, and wouldn’t shed any tears.

On Tuesday, the parents arrive!