Must read articles on systems architecture

• Youtube architecture http://highscalability.com/youtube-architecture

• PlentyOfFish architecture http://highscalability.com/plentyoffish-architecture     

• Scaling Twitter http://highscalability.com/scaling-twitter-making-twitter-10000-percent-faster
      
• Amazon architecture http://highscalability.com/amazon-architecture
      
• Google architecture http://highscalability.com/google-architecture
      
• Database sharding http://highscalability.com/blog/2009/8/6/an-unorthodox-approach-to-database-design-the-coming-of-the.html
      
• StackOverflow architecture http://highscalability.com/blog/2009/8/5/stack-overflow-architecture.html
      
• Flickr architecture http://highscalability.com/flickr-architecture
      
• Facebook http://highscalability.com/blog/category/facebook

source: https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-good-resources-to-learn-about-distributed-scalable-robust-software-architecture-infrastructure-building

Why fintechs will change the banking/credit card market

Last week I had my wallet stolen in a mall in a city near São Paulo. I had no money in there; just my driver's license and three credit/banking cards.

In the same day I started to get in touch to the banks in order to block the cards and request replacement.

Bank 1 - Debit and credit card from a international brand.
I need to call them. Spent about 20 minutes at the phone in order to pass the PID process an give a lot of information. They said to me that the card replacement was requested and that it will arrive in 7 days.
Status - 7 days passed and I did not received the card. Call them and they said that there was no register of card replacement request. I could spend some time complaining but I have no time for that. In fact, I am tired of that. So, asked for the replacement again.

Bank 2 - A famous international platinum card.
I accessed their web site, authenticated with my username/password and choose the chat option (easier for me; I am in the front of a computer almost all the time). The attendant was amazing and after around 5 mins I could finish the card replacement request. I would still need to wait for 5 days.
Status - 7 days passed. I called the contact center and the attendant said that they haven't send the card because they could not confirm my address (What??? I confirm that on the chat!!). Waited 20 minutes on the phone and they said that in 3 days the card will be here and I will need to call them back to release the card for transactions. Well, in 3 days I am leaving for a trip.

Nubank - A fintech (https://www.nubank.com.br/)
I accessed my Nubank mobile app, blocked the card with one touch and accessed the chat to ask for replacement. The first thing the attendant asked was If I was ok, if I had some injury resultant from the robbery. They automatically confirmed my identity from the app and asked me to confirm my address. They confirmed the replacement. In 1 day the app started to show the tracking code for the card flow through the mail service. I could see, day by day, where the card was. Yesterday I saw that it arrived to my town's post office and this morning it arrived home. I get into the app and clicked on "I receive my card". The app asked for the last 4 digits and for the CVV and its done, the card was available to be used.

Do I need to say more? Which card do you think I will use on my trip?

Crianças, Escolas e Segurança da Informação

Comecem vendo este link: https://criancasatortoeadireitos.wordpress.com/2014/06/03/11-fotos-que-os-pais-nao-devem-publicar-nas-redes-sociais/ .

No entanto, a coisa é mais séria. Além dos pais, as escolas e outras organizações como lojas, bancos, consultórios, concessionárias de veículos e quaisquer outras que guardem nossos dados e dados de nossos filhos precisam começar a ser responsabilizadas.

Vou contar UM CASO REAL: Há alguns meses durante uma ventania em São Paulo algumas folhas voaram de uma lixeira e se espalharam pelo chão. Como eu estava caminhando sem pressa, recolhi algumas das folhas, as que não estavam muito longe, e fui jogá-las na próxima lixeira. No caminho, dei uma olhada e reparei que eram folhas com notas de alunos de sexto ano de um renomado colégio de primeiro e segundo graus da cidade de São Paulo, Lá estavam o nome da escola, a disciplina, nome da professora, número de matrícula, nome de cada um dos alunos. Guardei uma das folhas para fazer um pequeno experimento. Quando tive tempo, fui ao Facebook e utilizando o nome - ou partes dos nomes - dos alunos comecei a procurar os perfis. Encontrei quase todos. Fotos, links para os perfis dos pais, fotos de amigos, vínculos de amizade, fotos na frente da casa, no carro do pai, números de telefone (divulgando whatsapp para os colegas) e 3 deles estavam em um evento público em um shopping. Na data do evento, um pouco atrasado, fui verificar o Facebook de um deles e havia o check-in no dito shopping. Bem, para quem tem habilidade de exercitar o "modus cogitatum"de quem está do "lado negro da força", não é difícil imaginar o tipo de maldade que pode se fazer.

É fundamental que os pais monitorem a exposição dos filhos nas redes sociais, monitorem os círculos de amizades e controlem os recursos de "marcação de fotos", especialmente no Brasil. Ainda, além de um maior cuidado familiar, é importante que no Brasil comecemos a pensar seriamente nas responsabilidades das organizações com os nossos dados. Em outros países existem normas rigorosas sobre a privacidade, tais como a FERPA, e a denúncia destas folhas perdidas certamente determinaria uma multa àquele colégio.

Truecrypt - protect your flashdisks

One interesting solution to keep your data securely stored in flashdisks is to use Truecrypt (http://www.truecrypt.org/) as encryption solution.

Truecrypt is relatively easy to install and use. One difficulty I faced was to copy files and directories named with special characters between Windows and Linux. Symbols like á, à, ç, â are indeed very common in the Brazilian Portuguese.


To cope with some incompatibility, go to "preferences" and add the parameter iocharset=utf8 to the filesystem's mount options.

This must guarantee adequate file transfers between Windows and Linux.

Social networks security - part 1

More one article published in Malta... thanks to my friends from Synapctic Labs.

http://www.independent.com.mt/news.asp?newsitemid=149260

Temporarily out...

Thanks to Math's classes of my doctorate at ITA I am temporarily out... getting back after 2012 July... if I'm still alive...

About collaborative services

To those that does not believe in the collaborative movements and in social networks as business drivers and supporters, see that are rising money exchange companies based on peer-to-peer models. Take a look at: http://weswap.com/.

I saw collaborative wifi at MWC 2012 - a great idea! - and there is much more about that (see e.g. http://lifestylesdefined.com/turning-homeless-people-into-wi-fi-hotspots/).
Soon we will get collaborative credit, collaborative charity, collaborative banks... and some day, who knows, collaborative government. I strongly believe in that.

All of these should be based on cloud computing, mashups and trustworthy computing models.