Digital Signatures?

I'm sure we've all heard of or used a website that requested that we use a digital signature. But what does that mean? Handwritten signatures are used for signing important documents because everyone has a unique handwriting and not many people are that adept at forging signatures so it's a relatively secure method. But do digital signatures have the same type of security?

Well, according to DocuSign.com, digital signatures are actually secure because they use encryption to hide the name that you input, thereby making the signature unique. DocuSign in particular requires the provider to use a mathematical algorithm to generate two numbers called keys. One of the keys is public and the other is private. When you sign a document electronically, you use your private key which, when sent off, is encrypted through the mathematical algorithm. The document also has a time stamp so that the document cannot be changed without the signer and the receiver getting notice. The public key is used by receivers of the document to ensure that the document was actually signed by who is was supposed to be and that it hadn't been tampered with after being sent off. Because of these secure methods, electronic signatures are actually considered legally binding in the US and in many other countries. It's also more widely accepted because it is easier to send documents electronically and because there are more measures to ensure that the documents have not been tampered with.

References:

"Are Electronic Signatures Legal?" DocuSign. N.p., 21 Oct. 2016. Web. 12 Nov. 2016.

"DSC IN INDIA – Offers Digital Signature Certificate, Class 3, Class 2, DGFT, Digital Signature Provider in Delhi, Digital Signature Certificate Providers in India, Digital Signature at Lowest Price, Buy Digital Signature Online." DSC IN INDIA Offers Digital Signature Certificate Class 3 Class 2 DGFT Digital Signature Provider in Delhi Digital Signature Certificate Providers in India Digital Signature at Lowest Price Buy Digital Signature Online. N.p., n.d. Web. 09 Nov. 2016.

"How Digital Signatures Work." DocuSign. N.p., 02 Nov. 2016. Web. 12 Nov. 2016.

Patel, Anant. "Advantages and Disadvantages Of Digital Signature | Digital India Insight." Digital India Insight. N.p., 21 Dec. 2015. Web. 09 Nov. 2016.

"What Is a Digital Signature?" HowStuffWorks. N.p., 14 Aug. 2008. Web. 12 Nov. 2016.

More Encryption??

Do you know how your passwords are stored on the internet? I thought I did until I found out that the password I set was being saved as something completely different after I hit save. While some websites are more secure and protected than others, every password protected website you use uses a similar algorithm to protect you and your privacy.

Most websites take plain text passwords (let's use 123 as an example) and use one way encryption called hashing to make them more secure. There are multiple hashing algorithms such as MD5, SHA-1, SHA-256 that take the password you put in to the server and save it to memory as a completely different, encrypted password. 123, for example, is hashed by MD5 as 202cb962ac59075b964b07152d234b70. Would you have thought of that?

Some hashing algorithms go the extra mile and add something called a "salt" to the encryption of your plain text password. This "salt" is a string of random characters that is added to some part of the password you input before it is encrypted. This makes your password super protected against hackers because it's pretty hard to determine the salts of many different passwords.

So if you have anything you need to hide, make sure that you're vigilant in finding out which of your websites keep your passwords (and your information) safe and protected. According to CloudFare, the best and easiest way to figure out if a website securely stores your password is to utilize the "lost password" option on the login page. If the website emails you your password in the same plain text that you entered, it does not use encryption or hashing and your account can very easily be hacked and viewed.

References:

@HubNestInc. "How Secure Are Your Passwords? - It Depends on How They're Stored in Databases." Secure Password Storage. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Nov. 2016.

Gordon, Whitson. "How Your Passwords Are Stored on the Internet (and When Your Password Strength Doesn't Matter)."Lifehacker. N.p., 20 June 2012. Web. 04 Nov. 2016.

Held, Matthew. "5 Password Strategies To Keep Intruders Out." The Huffington Post. N.p., 29 Dec. 2015. Web. 28 Oct. 2016.

 Jones, Adam, Alexandra Vasiliu, Stratos Sam, and Cezar Renta. "How To: Get Full-disk Encryption in Windows 10." FileCluster How Tos. N.p., 04 Dec. 2015. Web. 28 Oct. 2016.

Bioinformatics?

"Today we'll be delving into bioinformatics," said my biology professor as my class walked into lab. Though it sounds kind of intimidating, bioinformatics is just the application of computer technology to the management of biological information.

Bioinformatics is often used in collecting, organizing, and analyzing large amounts of complex biological information. In bioinformatics, computers are used to gather, store, and integrate biological and genetic information which can then be applied to gene-based drug discovery and development. Bioinformatics uses a large range of techniques from computer science including sequence and structural alignment, database design and data mining, and macromolecular geometry.

The techniques of bioinformatics are useful in many different fields including basic research, biomedicine, agriculture, and microbiology. Within these fields, bioinformatics has helped the world by making it easier to see the genetic components of many diseases, discovering drugs, personalizing medicine, making stronger crops thereby increasing the quality of livestock, developing waste cleanup regimes, and counteracting climate change. Though the fields of biology and computer science have both made amazing contributions to the world, the field of bioinformatics has the potential to make a huge impact on how we live our lives.

References:

"Bioinformatics." Partner in Science & Technology. N.p., n.d. Web. 

"Bioinformatics: The Science of the Future." Morsani College of Medicine. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Oct. 2016.

"Stanford Center for Professional Development." BIOMEDIN217 Translational Bioinformatics. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Oct. 2016.

"Result Filters." National Center for Biotechnology Information. U.S. National Library of Medicine, n.d. Web. 18 Oct. 2016. 

"What Is Bioinformatics | BioPlanet." BioPlanet RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Oct. 2016. 

Cut and Copy and Paste, Oh my!

After recently talking about memory in my computer science class, I became curious as to how copy and paste interacted with the memory of a computer.  Like we do with most things concerning computers, we don't really think about what happens when we press command+c, command+v, or command+x (or control+ if you have a PC).  Regardless, when these commands are given, the software in your computer goes through a complex game of switcheroo by taking information in one part of the memory and putting it somewhere else.

Your computer's operating system has a "clipboard" where the computer duplicates information that is in one part of memory and stores it in another part. An interesting feature of clipboard is that it is controlled by the operating system, meaning that you can cut, copy, and paste information between applications. So definitely thank clipboard the next time you want to cut a quote from word and paste it on facebook or copy a picture from google and paste it on your next blog post.

Specifically, cutting involves removing information from a place in memory and then storing it temporarily on clipboard until it is accessed again through the paste function or until something else is stored on clipboard. This is starkly different from copying as copying involves duplicating information in one piece of memory and moving the copy to clipboard. This is different from cutting as the original information is still in its original place in memory. Finally, pasting involves taking the information from its temporary place in clipboard and putting it into a new, more permanent place in memory. And because the information is stored in clipboard, the paste function can access the information multiple times until the information on clipboard is changed.

References:

 @computerhope. "What Is Copy?" What Is Copy? N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Sept. 2016.

@computerhope. "What Is Cut?" What Is Cut? N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Sept. 2016.

 @computerhope. "What Is Paste?" What Is Paste? N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Sept. 2016.

"PC Help Center." What Is Copy and Paste and How Does It Work? N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Sept. 2016.

Pinola, Melanie. "How to Copy, Cut, and Paste for Beginners." Lifehacker. N.p., 13 May 2011. Web. 23 Sept. 2016.

"Work From Home Opportunity - CopyPasteProducts.com."CopyPasteProductsCom. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Sept. 2016.

EEG and Video Games??

Even if you don't know the term EEG, I'm sure you've all heard of or seen that instrument in psychology that has multiple white rods protruding from someone's skull. That instrument is called an electroencephalogram, or EEG, and it measures the electrical activity of the brain. The more thoughts and emotions you have and the more motions you make, the more activity appears on the EEG.

Now how is this related to computer science? Companies now are making those bulky machines portable and more accessible to the common person.  This is because those portable headsets are connected to a brain computer interface (BCI) that can read and interpret conscious and unconscious thoughts, emotions, and motions. To make a profit, those companies then connect those headsets to gaming systems in which your thoughts take control of the game. For instance, after setting up the controls of the headset, the game could send you a command to select a certain option or make a specific motion.  The EEG headsets collect the data from your brain and implements it into the game. Even more amazingly, because your brain interprets visual stimuli, the EEG headsets can take that data and create a more realistic world within the game. As time goes on and you continue to use the headsets, BCI continues to collect data from your brain activity in order to make the game even more realistic and attuned to you. And though the idea of letting companies have access to our thoughts and emotions are scary, this technology is pretty incredible and can be used to further many other fields of study.

References:

"EEG (Electroencephalogram)." KidsHealth - the Web's Most Visited Site about Children's Health. The Nemours Foundation, n.d. Web. 16 Sept. 2016.

@emotiv. "EMOTIV - Brainwear® Wireless EEG Technology." Emotiv. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Sept. 2016.

 Http://www.howstuffworks.com/about-author.htm. "How the Emotiv EPOC Works." HowStuffWorks. N.p., 10 Dec. 2008. Web. 16 Sept. 2016.

Spotify

While there are many comparable music streaming programs like Pandora and Slacker, I'm going to look at Spotify and how it relates to computer science in this blog entry. After the Spotify software is installed into your computer's hardware, your computer is entered into the peer-to-peer (P2P) network in which your computer sends data to Spotify's network and Spotify's network sends data to you and to any computer that is wired into the P2P network. 

When a song or album is selected, it sends a command to the software to transmit the data to your computer. In the same way, when the song or album has been completed, your computer is sent a command to transmit the data back through the P2P network. If the song or album is downloaded to the computer, the data is actually stored into the computer and is not sent back through the P2P network. 

The data that is sent through the P2P network is in the Vorbis format because it creates small and easily transferred files. The result is a shorter latency which means that the time between picking a song and hearing it play is much shorter. It also starts "pre-fetching" the next song in your playlist or album to help reduce the wait between songs even more. What do all of these things mean? Spotify has thoughtfully manipulated its programming and streaming system to give us the best music experience it can. Thanks Spotify!

References:

http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/gadgets/audio-music/spotify6.htm

http://www.dummies.com/social-media/spotify/how-spotify-works/

https://www.engadget.com/2012/10/09/samsung-spotify-smart-tv/

http://gizmodo.com/5995060/how-spotify-got-itself-a-new-logo

GPS

GPS (Global Positioning System) is a complicated web of technology that has commonly and easily been taken for granted. Most of us even reference the system incorrectly. When we say "GPS," we're actually referring to the GPS receiver which, as the name suggests, receives input from a system of satellites in space (the actual GPS) to compute your location.

The GPS receiver primarily works by using 3-D trilateration.  In simplified terms, the receiver on Earth receives transmission from the different satellites in space and  relates them to its/your location. The transmission that the satellites give off is a "long, digital pattern called pseudo-random code." The receiver can determine location because the transmission is interrupted when it comes into contact with the receiver. The amount of time that the transmission is interrupted corresponds to the amount of distance between the satellite and the receiver which gives the receiver a reference point to work with. Once the receiver has received enough information from multiple satellites, it can calculate and output your location and provide a path to your desired location by continuously collecting information from satellites as it moves. In order to improve accuracy, the receiver stores the memory of each satellites' location as well as map detailed files in its software. Based on this explanation, you can easily see that GPS is a great example of a common, household tool that works because of algorithms and computer science.

References:

http://www.academia.edu/7304657/A_Review_on_GPS_and_its_Applications_in_Computer_Science_

http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/gadgets/travel/gps5.htm

http://www.figonet.com/en/building-blocks/sensors/gps/

http://sonc.dvrlists.com/gps/