1.
Cases & Content
1.1.
How many traveling terabytes are there?
At
present, there are two terabyte cases. While they originally
were exact mirrors of the same content, presently the
archive of shared material has grown to such a degree
that one single terabyte can no longer hold it all. The
project has now sorted content into two broad categories:
"knowledge" and "entertainment" and
populates each TTB independently.
1.2.
What sort of content do they contain?
The
content on the two TTBs falls into the following categories..
Tan
TTB - "Knowledge"
-
Security conference presentation videos and audio
recordings
- Non-fiction
audiobooks and lectures
- Documentary
film and educational programming archive
- Shmoo
rainbow hash Tables
- coWPAtty
tables
Green
TTB - "Entertainment"
-
Movies
- Television
Programs
-
Music
- Fiction
audiobooks
The
actual sources of this content are the private collections
of individual contributors. When donating to the project,
individuals are asked to offer only items that they personally
own or have acquired from free sources. Ideally, each
film on the TTB is a reflection of a DVD on someone's
shelf, each album of MP3s equates to a sleeve in someone's
CD case, and each TV episode a capture from public broadcast.
1.3.
Who determines where they go?
At
present, circulation of the TTBs is handled simply among
friends and associates of those with direct ties to the
project. The initial recipients of the first TTB were
contractors and servicemen and women in Iraq and Kuwait.
1.4.
By what methods do the cases travel?
The
TTB cases have traveled both via traditional stateside
and overseas carriers such as FedEx, UPS, or DHL but are
also often transported by hand by passengers on commercial
and military aircraft who are headed to zones where the
TTBs are scheduled to circulate.
We
have no reports of the TTB cases ever being the cause
of difficult questions or significant delays at security
checkpoints, border crossings, etc.
2.
Tech Specs
2.1.
What hard drives are used in the TTB volumes?
Each
traveling terabyte case includes a pair of 500 gigabyte
hard drives. Thus far, in order to keep costs as low as
possible and to enable inexpensive replacement of parts,
EIDE drives have been used. The original TTB was created
with factory-refurbished Maxtor brand disk drives. The
second TTB was assembled with "white label"
generically-refurbished Maxtor drives. The "home
base" computer which houses a copy of all content
in circulation is equipped with four 500 gigabyte Seagate
SATA drives.
2.2.
What enclosures house the hard drives as they travel?
Quite
a bit of discussion was had during the planning of the
project as to which enclosures would be best suited for
the task. Factors such as durability, cooling, interfaces,
and multiple O/S support were considered. Deviant selected
a product known as the "Mini Portable Disk"
enclosure (part number ULT31310)
from Ultra Products.
While
plastic, this item has proven to be rather robust in the
face of mishandling. The enclosure also has an integrated
cooling fan, something of great import in the oppressive
heat of the middle east. This particular model from Ultra
has both USB2 and FireWire ports. It is powered by 12
volts at 2 amps. The included AC adapter can safely handle
source current anywhere from 110 to 240 volts with no
trouble, making these enclosures extra-suited for world
travel.
Deviant
paints the enclosures in either flat tan Krylon
brand enamel spray or olive drab Rust-Oleum
"Camouflage
in a Can" spray paint.
2.3.
What cases house the whole affair for transport?
The
TTB project's initial contributors didn't have to debate
long or hard in order to settle on the choice of Pelican
cases. The Pelican
model 1400 was chosen since it is the best combination
of space and slim size. While it's not spacious enough
to stand the enclosed drives vertically side-by-site within
its walls, it does allow for all components to be packed
with adequate padding for secure transport.
2.4.
How are the drives powered?
As
mentioned above, the external drive enclosures can safely
be attached to both 110 volt and 220 volt power... this
is one of the reasons they were selected. Drawing 12 volts
DC, the enclosures themselves can even be powered directly
from automotive batteries, generators, and other such
industrial sources.
A
hand-crafted power outlet splitter (formatted for north
american outlets and plugs) is included in each case so
that all components of a TTB package can be operated from
a single outlet.
The
TTB cases also include a universal power plug adapter
from Targus. The now
apparently discontinued APK01US
unit (which we've all taken to calling the "salt
shaker" model) allows for simple and instant conversion
between all four major styles of plugs and outlets (North
America, Europe, the UK, and Australia)
2.5.
Miscellaneous Hardware
There
are two other pieces or technology in the traveling terabyte
cases... a waterproof notepad and an all-weather pen,
which together form each TTB's guestbook.
The
notepads are either green or tan "shirt pocket"
units from Rite
in the Rain (item numbers 935
& 935T,
respectively) and are paired with a Nitrogen-charged all-weather
ink ball-point pen.
Each
case contains enough adapters and wires to operate both
drives simultaneously in any mode (the pair of AC adapters
sit next to two USB cables and two FireWire cables, the
brands and models of which are of no possible consequence).
2.5.
Audio & Video Encoding
It
is policy that all of the content contained on the TTB
volumes be in 100% open, nonproprietary formats. Videos
are encoded in MPEG or are container files encoded in
DivX or XviD. All audio is either MP3 or AC3. Compressed
ZIP an RAR archives are used from time to time. eBooks
and other documentation are in PDF format. No Quicktime,
RealVideo, Windows Media, or iTunes formats are permitted.
Content donated to the project in such formats will either
be rejected and deleted or will be reencoded to a proper
format before being included on a traveling terabyte.
3.
Creation
3.1.
What's the story with the project's founder?
Firstly,
as we all like to point out, the traveling terabyte project
was created by members of the international hacker community.
Many of the originating participants are key figures in
the DEFCON community
with close ties to individuals who are working or serving
in uniform overseas due to the foreign policies of the
Bush administration.
If
the project can be said to have anything classifiable
as a "founder" that person would be Deviant
Ollam. A recognizable face in the hacker scene for the
past half decade, Deviant has been a speaker at DEFCON,
HOPE, ShmooCon,
HackCon, HackInTheBox,
and other security events around the world. A Member and
Director of the United States branch of The
Open Organization Of Lockpickers, Deviant frequently
gives presentations about physical
security and lockpicking. In addition to speaking
at security conferences, he has also presented at schools
and universities and has even had the honor of lecturing
the cadets at the United
States Military Academy at West Point.
3.2.
Why and how was the TTB project started?
In
short , the project began simply as a way to keep far-flung
members of the hacking community in touch with friends
back home and as a general way of "giving back to
the community" after feeling particularly sentimental
about how much people in the hacker world do for one another
and act in support of people whom they may have never
met in person.
The
full story can be summarized as follows: Deviant Ollam's
personal network has always had rather outlandish data
storage capabilities. Being a bit of a data hoarder, Deviant
has traditionally constructed very large disk arrays and
maintained huge storage capacity in his home. After making
a forum post about experiencing a horrendous array failure
(and describing the potential loss of nearly 2 TB of data
that this event caused), Deviant was overwhelmed at how
almost immediately emails were arriving from people, some
of whom he only casually knew, with offers to help him
restore much of his lost music, movies, and cartoons.
Although
the majority of his lost data was recoverable from backup
sources, Deviant realized firsthand the unparalleled generosity
of the hacker community and began to coordinate a project
that could focus this generosity and bring much of the
offered material to others who could benefit from it the
most.
Having
in his possession a pair of surplus 500 gigabyte drives
that he purchased with his own funds while acquiring a
bulk order of hard disks for a client, Deviant started
a thread on the DEFCON
forums describing his vision for a community project
and soliciting advice from other hackers. Their response
was immediate and heartwarming.
A
complete transcript of the conversation that led directly
to the first TTB case can be found in the Inception
page of this web site.
4.
The Law
4.1.
Does the TTB project violate copyright law?
Friends
of ours who are lawyers have indicated that this project,
while coming close to the line in a number of ways, does
not explicitly violate copyright law. It is legal to let
a friend borrow a CD or DVD or book that you own. It is
legal to give such an item to them personally or to send
it through the mail. It is legal (and indeed even common)
for friends and family back home to dispatch care packages
of movies and music to men and women serving in uniform.
Boxes of DVDs or compact discs are a common site on bases
worldwide. We are doing nothing different... we're simply
using a very large box.
4.2.
Have any copyright holders expressed displeasure with
the project?
We
have not been contacted at present by the MPAA, the RIAA,
or any other copyright holders expressing either displeasure
or support for the project. In truth, we assume that it
is so small in scope as to not appear on their radar at
all. Even if they were to wrongly assume that we are a
group engaged in piracy, we don't come close to comparing
with the highly-orchestrated and well-oiled for-profit
bootleg operations that flood the marketplace the world
over with illicit DVDs, CDs, and other such content found
on street vendor tables.
4.3.
Does the project contravene any codes of conduct within
the armed services?
To
the best of our knowledge, no, the traveling terabytes
are not violating the rules of conduct for men and women
in the armed forces. While certain base commanders may
view the sharing of movies and music to be a violation
of the law and therefore disallow it at their particular
locations, others in the military brass have allowed the
operation of dedicated "morale servers" which
can host such content from back home. Such a solution
is ideal, actually, as it allows for the viewing
of such shared content without soldiers, sailors, or airmen
having the need to copy the files to personal computing
equipment in violation of the law.
The
organizers of the TTB project do their best to ensure
that these drives, which often travel to middle eastern
countries, do not contain anything deemed patently offensive
to the local populace. In simple terms, those serving
in uniform are prohibited by the military code from possessing
or trafficking in any material that is offensive or illegal
in a host nation. As many nations where the government
has chosen to station U.S. troops are predominantly Muslim,
this means that pornography is often disallowed. As such,
adult videos, photos, and text are unfortunately not suitable
for inclusion on the traveling terabytes.
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