Category Archives: Lifestyle

Mijlpaal ethisch hacken bij gemeente Eindhoven

Afgelopen zaterdag 15 februari was ik als ethisch hacker bij de gemeente Eindhoven op een bijzondere afspraak. Voor het eerst mocht een groep ethische hackers proberen in te breken bij de Gemeente. Zowel Eindhoven als (bijna) alle leveranciers hadden toestemming gegeven. Ik had m’n eerste hack een half uur voordat de dag begon. Eindhoven de Hack-ste! Lees verder…

Aandenken vanuit de gemeente: Shirt met Eindhoven de Hack-ste.

Aandenken vanuit de gemeente: Shirt met Eindhoven de Hack-ste.

Vrijheid blijheid

Een half jaar voorbereiding en alle leveranciers op locatie: deze opstelling maakte het mogelijk om direct lekken te melden op een verantwoorde manier. Dat zag je ook terug in de zeer permissieve twee spelregels:

  1. Het is niet toegestaan om gegevens te stelen.
  2. Het is niet toegestaan om systemen opzettelijk plat te leggen.

Voor de rest: carte blanche. Inbreken is expliciet wel de bedoeling.

Deze scope komt overeen met de ideeën van de gemiddelde ethisch hacker. Het is pragmatisch en biedt ruimte voor creativiteit. Bovendien is ethisch hacken, of ethisch inbreken, een afspiegeling van de realiteit waarin kwaadwillenden toegang willen krijgen tot systemen. In de praktijk gebruiken zowel de “goede” als de “slechte” dezelfde kennis en technieken.

Pilot

Tijdens deze dag gaat het naast het testen van systemen vooral om een pilot: een mix tussen ethische hackers, leveranciers en gemeente. Hoewel we in de raadzaal zaten, het hart van de gemeente, begonnen we onze aanvallen alsof we extern zaten op een herkenbaar adres.

Hacking is natuurlijk niet alleen IT. De hackers kregen de ruimte om fysiek de beveiliging te testen, te spelen met de conferentie infra (voor afluisterdoeleinden) en meer.

Uiteraard hebben we wel allemaal een verklaring moeten ondertekenen. Deze was opgesteld in leesbare taal en zette het Openbaar Ministerie buiten spel. Wanneer de lekken verholpen zijn mogen deze ook gepubliceerd worden. Superbe.

Eerste hack van de dag: studentikoos inbreken op een surface tafel en daar software op installeren.

Eerste hack van de dag: inbreken op een surface tafel en daar eigen software op installeren. Je ziet een trollface, ipconfig, on screen keyboard en nmap. Het a4-tje is een muismat. Foto: Sander de Graaf.

Risico

De term Ethisch Hacker heeft een lange weg gehad en is inmiddels een begrip.

Er is inmiddels vertrouwen in ethische hackers en sturing vanuit de overheid. Het hacken van gemeente Eindhoven was een volgende stap in het aantonen van het nut van ethisch hacken. Kunnen ethisch hackers omgaan met de vrijheden die ze vanzelfsprekend vinden?

Ik zag beren op de weg: stel dat er een niet-ethische hacker de boel komt verzieken? Kunnen we dit dan nogmaals doen? Faalt dan de gemeenschap van ethische hackers? Moeten ethische hackers buigen voor systeemondermijnende anarchistische stinkhippies of worden ze slachtoffer van angstvallige Vogonistische bureaucraten die bij niets beginnen te piepen?

Het was een opluchting om te zien dat iedereen zich aan de spelregels hield en zeer open stond voor het delen van kennis en bekijken / testen van de mogelijkheden. Dat heeft veel goeds gedaan met de relatie tussen de drie partijen. Bovenal worden gegevens bij de gemeente en leveranciers nog beter beschermd tegen aanvallers. Iedereen won!

Resultaat: 15 * 6 uur hacken

Na een dagje testen, scannen, proberen en prutsen zijn we 20 lekken verder. Ze variëren van laag tot gemiddeld risico. De externe omgeving van Eindhoven is van formaat en onder beheer met o.a. firewalls en certificaat-toegang.

Het is onmogelijk om deze hele omgeving in zo’n korte tijd te testen: geen tool of hersenpan die daar tegenop kan. Maar dat was ook niet het doel. Met een man of 15 zijn we 6 uur bezig geweest met het testen van de beveiliging op allerlei vlakken. Helaas mogen we daar niets over vertellen totdat de lekken zijn gedicht.

De media reageert kalmpjes op deze actie en zal dat waarschijnlijk blijven omdat er weinig schade en schande te halen valt. Dit is business as usual… en dat is goed.

Voor een uitzonderlijke hacker was een prijs gereserveerd. Het was een close call en uiteindelijk heeft hacker Jacco de reis naar hackersevenement 31C3 gewonnen door een veelheid aan securityprobleemen te vinden in diverse systemen. Gefeliciteerd!

Jacco wint reis naar 31C3. Foto: Brenno de Winter.

Jacco wint reis naar 31C3. Foto: Brenno de Winter.

Smaakt naar meer!

Wat mij betreft is een precedent gezet voor een bredere omarming van Responsible Disclosure. Of de rest dat ook zo vind zal blijken. De gemeente en leveranciers krijgen nu de kans om de lekken te dichten, wat erg goed nieuws is.

Leveranciers en gemeenten die gestructureerd beveiligingsmeldingen willen ontvangen van ethische hackers en alerte burgers kunnen daarvoor een Responsible Disclosure-beleid adopteren. Daarmee stel je de juiste regels en loop je voorop in de tendens om ethische hackers, alerte burgers en andere externen onderdeel te maken van het beveiligingsbeleid.

Ik hoop dat we deze dag kunnen herhalen, op de interne infrastructuur of de overheid. Dat er een jaartje tussen zit is geen probleem… kunnen we alvast de messen slijpen 😉

Media en bronnen

Bekijk het verslag van Studio 040:

Werkt de video niet? Klik hier om deze te bekijken op Youtube.

Bronnen Nieuwsmedia

Overige bronnen

What you get for €2,55

Just visited the local “second hand store” and found some nice stuff: a few house CD singles and a Brada laptop stand.

Aly us – Follow me

Time defining house classic. Slow and smoothly moving to a place where we can all be free. Includes an instrumental, a dub version but of course the original track with an extended edit.

Ruffneck ft. Yavahn – Everybody be Somebody

This cd features 9 mixes (73 minutes) of this house track that’s been produced by Dwayne “Spen” Richardson, Derek A. Jenkings & Steven B. Wilson for Backroom Productions & Groundlevel Entertainment. Samples where taken of the AWESOME Yello – Bostich. Most of the action is on track 8: the full 8 minutes of the tune. The names of the masters at work also appear on this CD but most importantly: the live triangle has been performed by Starvin’ T.

SL2 – On a Ragga tip

Speeds up the sound with breakbeats from London. From XL recordings came this track by Slipmat and Lime (SL2). It’s fast, has the classic rasta influence and is a golden oldie. The CD features four tracks including the five minutes original mix and two other breakbeat tracks using pretty much the same breakbeat. Track 3 is pretty OK, but still a b-side. Extended version it is.

Lidell Townsell – Nu Nu

Piano house classic that can withstand the test of time for the larger part. “She looked so fine, i just had to speak”. Parodied by the 704 boys and the same organ was used by Crystal waters. Including an acapella/dub version for mashing and mixing. Also check out the So Fine Mix The password is play.

Quasar –  Last Train to Paradise

Something from the Turn up the Bass era. The last train to paradise. Bought this one to hear if there where some great remixes that would have less piano and more funk. There is some more acid, an acapella and some percussion. The fun starts at track 4: the 303 edit.

Unfortunately an empty sleeve of 400 hz – i’ve got the music in me 🙁

 

KK Travels – Pippi Langhouse

One of the all time maximum facepalm house classics for kids. It’s based on the Swedish child series Pippi Langkous (Pippi Långstrump). There was a version dubbed in Dutch. That one was sampled, sequenced, mashed and filtered into a house production that is nearly bearable to listen to. The B sides of this record really raises some eyebrows 🙂 And that’s why this is great.

 

Next to the cd’s i found a brada laptop lap stand to place your laptop on your lap. In real life it would look something like this (if i where tanned and wearing white clothes):

Best Wishes from Hack42

Hackerspace Hack42 looks back at 2011. As one of the founders it’s great to see such prosperity. The future for Hack42 looks very bright.

Due to their move to KKN6 it has become one of the largest hackerspaces in Europe in terms of space. In the past year there have been over 50 activities and many projects. Will these numbers increase this year? I hope so!

The complete text is on hack42.nl (in dutch).

Dj Dixz VS Stitch – Closing set Dreamhack Winter 2011

We did the closing set at Dreamhack, the drain the last bits of energy. We started with Hardstyle, cross-mixed it with Dubstep and ended with Hardcore. The track playing is Menace II Society – Chronic Counter.

LMD made a short video on the really awesome lights and lasers on stage. The stage crew of Dreamhack rocks! See you next year!

(if video doesn’t show: refresh/reload page)

HITBSecConf2011 presentation on Hack42

I did a presentation on Dutch Hackerspace Hack42: how we built it and what you can find there. It was a light-talk to get the track started. Fun! Hack in the Box is one of the leading security conferences in the world.

Slides: D1 SIGINT – Elger Stitch Jonker – Building the Hackerspace.pdf

Slides in image format: HITBSecConf2011 – Krasnapolsky, Amsterdam – 19 en 20 mei 2011

Abstract:

http://conference.hitb.org/hitbsecconf2011ams/?page_id=1676

“We got our space in February and in just a few months we’ve built something amazing. In these fifteen minutes we’ll try to show you everything we’ve done; from the museum to the atmosphere, from the labs to the bar and even our cozy restrooms.”

About Elger ‘Stitch’ Jonker

Some say that during daytime he’s a mad scientist at a large IT specialist. Others say that during nighttime he works on Awesome Retro, Rave Radio and Hack42. All we know is, he’s called The Stitch.

Masterlan 6

I heard you like spare-time so we put some spare-time in your spare-time so you can relax while you relax. It doesn’t work that way.

Previous week I wrote about 101010, the hacker new-years party in The Hague. I traveled about 500 kilometers in a single day, which wasn’t enough. This weekend I traveled about 750 kilometers, in 3 days. If you also add trains, its 1000. This is what happened.

Friday 15 oct 2010

I’m not counting the train i took from Zutphen to Gouda just to have a one-hour meeting and 1 hour of mediawiki fun. Back to Zutphen and there I packed my stuff and went straight to Masterlan 6. This event in Horst-aan-de-Maas is a good lanparty with social people.

Together with JeePee (or GP?) we played Super Mario Bros 3 on the NES. Instead of taking the short-whistle-route we played through almost every level. We’ve seen all maps and now its even more clear why this game is so awesome. Even if you’ve played it for years and years there are still new things to discover and new enemies to defeat. I want to continue with the retro project.

With some guitar hero and some light-coding on my network scanner i called it a day. Oh wait; maybe some poker. 5 euro buy-in. Then all-in at the first round against people i don’t know. Never doing any-stakes poker again.

I expected to have a horrible night sleep in the noisy Merthal, but it turned out to be one of the better nights of sleep in the past few months. Exactly the right temperature and with earplugs there was no noise; i wished i could have slept there longer. But it was time for the next day.

Saturday 16 oct 2010

Saturday started with a 2-hour trip to The Hague, again to the revspace. This time to discuss things for HackSquare for CCC next year. We all talked about what we where doing and have a mindmap-brainstorm on next years theme. Oasis. We discussed all kinds of options including space, memes, holland and water; but it ended in Oasis. And thats what it is. Some of the Hx2 people already updated it check out our wiki (and with “our” i mean COMMUNISM). I’m excited for the things we can do for retro;

Ooh, and there might be a big surprise planned for next years CCC which is definitely vintage. Its one of those things that are SO awesome; its “Insanely Great”. At 6 it was time to get back to Horst. I arrived at about 8.30 and it was time to relax and just see what happened in the mean time.

After some guitar hero we played Anti-Monopoly. This game didn’t really do it for us. As a competitor we found we didn’t earn enough. 3 houses on the most expensive real-estate reels in 100 dollars?  Competitors had an even tougher time, one of them only made it past one full round. The rest of the game he was stuck in prison. With 6 players i cannot recommend this game; but well it was still fun to play it once. In other news; the language-usage-statistics peaked on the word “Henk”. An in-joke on the Mastermovie of Saving Private Henk.

Sunday 17 okt 2010

Then another great round of sleep. I slept from 3  till 12am and it was all good. Time to get up and go to Almere. A family trip. It was good.

And that’s it. 🙂 The second, (and last?), insanity weekend.

Conclusion

Its too much; doing one thing or something sequentially is better. I felt like i had to be at two places at the same time. This is not up to par with slacking. Another lesson learned. But i know someone who’d rather would be at two places at the same time. And i like his mustache.

    101010 – Hacker new years party

    In the spirit of ‘live your life to the fullest’ i’m writing this page on the last two days of my life.

    Friday 08 – 10 – 10

    It all started friday, that day i rewrote part of my ftpscanner so it performs automatic network scans. One of the things was to automatically find the subnet mask. Another thing was to include DC++ scans; which requires recursive XML handing. Thank god for SimpleXML. Anyway; after about 12 hours of continuous programming i called it a day and went to sleep; thats where the madness starts.

    Saturday 09 – 10 – 10

    My planning for saturday looked like this: Get laptop @ aetab, visit the rest of the Retro crew and then move to the 10-10-10 hacker new years party @revspace.

    Home, Zutphen, 10 am

    Due to the coding rush from friday, i awoke at 10 am. I had to pack my dj-gear for the revspace party and of course stuff to stay over at revspace. At 12 am, i was off! First destination: Arnhem. Then to Leeuwarden, then to The Hague and then, as it appears, back home. So what happened, what did we do that’s worth mentioning? Well, it was Project Retro and Hacker new year party.

    Laptop, Arnhem, 12.45 pm

    My first stop was Arnhem. My own laptop is at the repair service; i use it to connect to my dj setup which i was bringing for the 101010 party. Because i didn’t pay much attention to the firewire port I ended up borrowing a macbook pro with Firewire 800, instead of the 400 i needed. I should have asked for it 🙂 These things happen.

    I’ll just have to improvise and have hopes on finding a firewire 400 machine. That proved to be quite a challange. But first things first; its 13:00 hours and time to go to Leeuwarden.

    Retro, Leeuwarden, 15.00

    now thats a tasty burger

    Now thats a tasty burger

    We’re preparing our actions for next years CCC in Finowfurt near Berlin. In this we’re supported by the HXX Foundation, we’re determined to deliver the best Retro Gaming Area ever. One of our plans is to double or tripple the size of everything we did before. In order to get there, we’ve to arrange a few things. One of these is to increase the stash of retro consoles. We plan to have these consoles publicly (aka free with an asterix) available to events such as lanparties, hacker conferences and the like. They also will be available at public places such as hackerspaces, makerspaces and such accross the country.

    Our first actions have been set and more information will follow when its ready. Yes, DNF style. One of the things you can expect is a lookback on what we provided in the past years, including pictures, reviews and such. The meeting ended with some delicous homemade hamburgers. And when a hamburger is good, I do make pictures of those things. After eating 3 I was stuffed and ready to move on. Thank Syb and Jacko. I left at 7 pm. Next up: The Hague.

    101010 Hacker New Year Party, 21.15

    Revspace front door

    The party already started. It was nice to see all the familar faces again. Guys and girls from all over Holland joined to celebrate the Hackers new year. (explained for NORPS: 101010 is binary for 42; which is the answer to the ultimate question in life.) And there I was, with my dj stuff and harddrive.

    Setting up the equipment was easy, but still difficult. Psychic already had setup running; laptop, stuff for volume (mids + eq + compressor), headphones, cables and two scratchpads. I brought additional stuff: turntables, a dj mixer, monitors, amp, cambles and headphones.

    professional HD enclosure

    professional HD enclosure

    Before i could start mixing, there was one vital thing to be arranged; a macbook with firewire 400. There was only one macbook with those specs, and I was not allowed to insert my own harddrive in it; it would void the warranty. So we had to come up with another solution. What about an external USB drive? Would it work?

    Well, lets find one. Will-Do let me borrow her laptop and her USB enclosure. Maybe we could mount the disk and run software from it. So we unscrewed it and it, well… sort of. One screw went dull thus there was no other solution then using a drill and drill it out. When we (Brainsmoke, Aequitas) got it open, it appeared to be a PATA enclosure. My disc is SATA 🙂 Attempt 3;

    Zarya took up the task to find something else. After much digging and searching through revspace, he came up with a potentially dangerious setup; a 3.5″ sata enclosure with separate power supply. Because of my history with SATA enclosures and wrong power supplies (*poof, disk dead*) we’d had to look for something else.

    Got Drill?

    And what would that be? Well of course! A bunch of wires! Foobar had something brand-new; so it had to work. It did. We placed the wires into a professional HD enclosure and hooked it up to the mac. Using the Boot settings we could even boot from the USB disk. We did. The system showed up working exactly as my mac used to. Running the machine from USB wasn’t neccisarily slower than my own macbook. Even running DJ software, iTunes and copying files went okey without any noticable performance drawbacks! Thats just freaking awesome! Hackers!

    Sunday 101010

    GMC had the Mic and we all counted down to 101010. Liftoff blasted through the speakers and Psychic started with So Long, and thanks for all the fish. Then the obligatory Rickroll and we (Zarya, Psychic and me) mixed together Happy hardcore, GOA, the Prodigy and closed with minimal techno. Good shit.

    The picture below shows the dj booth; well, it doesn’t really show anything. You might distinguish 4 speakers, 2 laptops, 4 turntables, 1 dj mixer, 100 meter of cables, some lights, a space-invader floor and six giant velociraptors lurking in the background.

    Most people left between 2 am to 2.30 am. That left some room open for filthy noise, 4chan music and incorrect jingles. But we also had to stop as it turned out sleeping in the space was not possible. After packing all stuff I left about 3 am. The trip home would take up another two hours and at 5am I was in bed.

    Here are some extra pictures from the revspace at the end of the night. Did you know they run (and are huge fans of) Windows 95? Thank god for that Microsoft Gold Partnership.

    Conclusion

    101010 has been totally fantastic and i can’t wait for 010111 (23), 100111 (39), 110111(55), 011011(27), 101011(43), 111011(59), 011111(31), 101111(47) and 111111(63). Thanks revspace for throwing this great party!

    Happy 42 everybody!

    Omnomnom cakes

    Omnomnom cakes

    MOAR?

    Beertest

    You are probably familiar with those bullshit stories that <your_brand_here> is somehow better/worse than <some_other_brand>. To resolve those issues me and a friend organized a blind beer-test. We found some very nice results. If you don’t know what beer to drink tonight, and you live in Holland: get Palm or Schultenbrau!

    Finding beer

    The first thing needed was BEER! and lots of it. After visiting several supermarkets (super de boer, albert heijn, aldi, lidl, gall & gall, mitra) we bought whatever beer we could. The only limit was the price per bottle and popularity: none of the beer was over €0,60 per bottle and the beers are available at many supermarkets. That limits this test to cheaper beers and pilseners. After spending €36,44 (ex pfand) we came up with 21 brands with 4 bottles each:

    Albert heijn logo Alfa logo Amstel logo bavaria logo Brand logo
    € 0.93/l : Albert € 1.80/l : Common (& Amstel light)

    € 1.53/l : Common

    & € 1.73/l : AH

    (& Bavaria 0.0)

    € 1.30/l : Common

    & € 1.20/l : Common

    € 1.70/l : Common
    dommelsch logo euroshopper logo grolsch logo gulpener logo heineken logo
    € 1.53/l : Common € 0.63/l : Common € 1.57/l : Common € 1.83/l : Common € 1.57/l : Common
    Hertog jan logo jupiler logo Lindeboom logo Oettinger logo Oranjeboom logo
    € 1.83/l : Common € 2.04/l : Common € 2.00/l : Mitra € 0.81/l : Lidl € 1.30/l : Mitra
    Palm logo Pitt logo Schultenbrau Warsteiner logo
    € 1.90/l : Common € 0.67/l : SDB € 0.83/l : Aldi € 1.73/l : Common

    In real life it looks something like this:

    [singlepic id=353 w=640 h=480 mode= float=]

    What’s on the bottles?

    Having so much different sorts of beer made me wonder; what do these bottles tell me? Why should I drink them? What makes them so great? Well… the answer was to analyze all of them.

    All bottles have at least two labels; formatted according to some standards. The foreign beers do not follow these standards; therefore we do not know what is inside Jupiler and oettinger (ingredient X?). Here are some other things:

    • The most popular colors on beer-bottles are gold, white, black, green and red. Not used are pink and purple,
    • One of the brands looks very new, but has a “since 18XX” label on it. I have no idea what it means,
    • Oranjeboom is a fantasy brand: it is brewed FOR oranjeboom and not BY oranjeboom,
    • Other fantasy brands are: Albert Heijn, Euroshopper, SchultenBrau,
    • Gulpener is the only one with a full-color label and a Environment Label (milieukeur),
    • Palm recommends not to drink beer when you are pregnant,
    • Grolsch and Heineken (2 popular brands in NL, rivaled in the east) are priced exactly the same,
    • The 10% more stamp on Grolsch bottles doesn’t mean a thing; Grolsch always has 33CL bottles,
    • Jupiler is the most expensive, Euroshopper the cheapest

    Preparing the bottles

    Since this is a blind beer test, we had to think of a way to mask what is served to the testers. All beers come in the same type of bottle. The only deviants are Grolsch, Jupiler and oettinger; so had to be replaced during the test. Anonymization is simple: hold a bottle in water for 5 minutes and the label comes off. After this just tape the bottles and give em a meaningless number: 10, 15, 20, 22, 25, 30, 33, 35, 40, 44, 50, 55, 60, 65, 70, 75, 77, 80, 85, 88, 90.

    [nggallery id=12]

    The test

    We got about 12 volunteers that where eager to risk their lives. In return they will find out what beer they like best. The results differ a lot from person to person. After the mass-slaughter of beer took place, this is what was left:

    [nggallery id=13]

    Guesswork on the results

    In the world of beer, brand-value and product-experience are the most powerful cards the cheap-brewers have. According to the testers, we could easily replace some of the labels and still not notice the difference. They’re not experienced drinkers, but maybe it says something about the brand value compared to taste.

    Therefore the next table; lets see if the testers could figure out what brand they where drinking. (bold = correct guess).

    Comparing actual brands to brand guesses
    Actual brand Guessed brand
    Dommelsch Jupiler, Albert Heijn, Alfa, Lindeboom
    Jupiler Hertog Jan, Euroshopper
    Alfa Palm, Warsteiner, Oranjeboom, Schultenbrau, Alfa
    Palm Palm (2x), Brand
    Bavaria 0.0 Jupiler, Palm, Bavaria 0.0
    Amstel Light Warsteiner, Amstel Light
    Heineken Schultenbrau, Palm
    Amstel Bavaria, Heineken, Gulpener, Pitt, Amstel 0.0
    Bavaria Gulpener, Albert Heijn, Heineken, Bavaria, Brand, Gulpener
    Hertog Jan
    Grolsch Grolsch, Groslch, Grolsch, Grolsch, Alfa, Schultenbrau
    Schultenbrau Jupiler, Dommelsch, Oranjeboom, Bavaria
    Albert Heijn Oettinger, Gulpener, Bavaria
    Euroshopper Bavaria, Oettinger, Bavaria
    Warsteiner Brand, Bavaria
    Pitt Oettinger, Amstel Light
    Gulpener Euroshopper, Amstel, Lindeboom, Amstel, Oranjeboom, Pitt
    Lindeboom Gulpener, Amstel Light, Amstel, Grolsch, Euroshopper, Oranjeboom
    Oranjeboom Dommelsch (2x), Bavaria, Euroshopper, Oranjeboom
    Oettinger Hertog Jan, Amstel, Brand, Schultenbrau

    Did they know what they were drinking? No, only 13 correct guesses out of 73 attempts. With 21 different brands that is pretty nice but there is no significance in all these marks, except for the discovery of Grolsch; which affected its ratings. Apparently some testers found the name and taste of Grolsch great. But the previous table doesn’t help us in getting the value of a brand.

    The following table shows the grades given to each brand; whereas most guesses are wrong! Notice the more popular brands are higher rated. The bottom of the list comprises of cheaper brands.

    Ratings of brand, depending on unknown bottle content
    # Guess Values given to brand High Low Votes Average
    1 Hertog Jan 9 – 7 9 7 2 8
    2 Grolsch 8 – 8 – 8 – 7.5 – 5 8 5 5 7.3
    3 Jupiler 6.1 – 7 – 7.5 7.5 6.1 3 6.87
    4 Palm 7 – 8 – 8 – 5 – 6 8 5 5 6.8
    5 Warsteiner 6.5 – 7 – 6.5 7 6.5 3 6.67
    6 Oettinger 6.7 – 5.5 – 7 6.7 5.5 3 6.4
    7 Albert Heijn 6 – 6.5 6.5 6 2 6.25
    8 Dommelsch 6.5 – 7 – 5 7 5 3 6.17
    9 Gulpener 6 – 8 – 3 – 6 – 7.5 8 3 5 6.1
    10 Brand 6 – 5 – 8- 5 8 5 4 6
    11 Heineken 6 – 6 6 2 6
    12 Bavaria 6 – 5 – 5 – 3 – 6 – 2 – 6.2 – 6 6 2 8 4.9
    13 Amstel 5 – 3 – 5 – 6 6 3 4 4.75
    14 Schultenbrau 4 – 6 – 3 – 5 6 3 4 4.5
    15 Alfa 3 – 4 – 6.5 6.5 3 3 4.5
    16 Euroshopper 4 – 5.5 – 3 – 5 5.5 3 4 4.36
    17 Oranjeboom 5 – 6 – 2.6 – 2 – 5 6 2 5 4.12
    18 Amstel Light 2 – 3 – 5.5 5.5 2 3 3.5
    19 Lindeboom 4 – 3 4 3 2 3.5
    20 Pitt 1 – 3 3 1 2 2
    21 Bavaria 0.0 2 2 1 2

    73 votes Average: 5.27

    Results

    Having seen how the beers are rated (when guessing wrong), its time to see if these values are indeed reflecting the real rating. Now we see unappreciated beers rising to the top: Oranjeboom(11 places), Pitt (10 places), Schultenbrau (7 places). In contrast, higher rated brand to that moved down: Gulpener(12 places), Brand (8 places), Oetinger (10 places).

    Test results
    # Brand Avg Rating Votes Price / Liter Avg Estimate Deviation
    1 Palm 7.00 5 1.90 6.8 + 2.85%
    2 Warsteiner 6.73 3 1.73 6.67 + 0.90
    3 Hertog Jan 6.50 2 1.83 8 – 18.75
    4 Grolsch 6.50 8 1.57 7.3 – 10.96
    5 Jupiler 6.30 4 2.04 6.87 – 8.30
    6 Oranjeboom 6.13 8 1.30 4.2 + 45.95
    7 Schultenbrau 5.83 6 0.83 4.5 + 29.56
    8 Bavaria 5.72 9 1.30 4.9 + 16.73
    9 Heineken 5.63 4 1.57 6 – 6.17
    10 Pitt 5.40 8 0.67 2 + 170
    11 Alfa 5.36 7 1.80 4.5 + 19.11
    12 Albert Heijn 4.95 6 0.93 6.2 – 20.16
    13 Euroshopper 4.94 9 0.63 4.36 + 13.30
    14 Dommelsch 4.90 9 1.53 6.17 – 20.85
    15 Lindeboom 4.72 9 2.00 3.5 + 34.86
    16 oettinger 4.67 6 0.81 6.4 – 27.03
    17 Amstel 4.29 7 1.53 4.75 – 9.86
    18 Brand 4.17 6 1.70 6 – 30.50
    19 Bavaria 0.0 4.00 10 1.20 2 + 100
    20 Amstel Light 4.00 5 1.73 3.5 + 14.29
    21 Gulpener 3.71 10 1.83 6.1 – 39.18
    TOTAL
    143 votes 5.27

    Conclusion

    To decide a winner from these meager test-results is hard. With not enough votes to cast a decision on Warsteiner, Hertog-Jan and Jupiler, they have been removed from the list of winners. The next beer-test should address this issue to give a more fair and balanced judgment. I’ve also got my doubts on Grolsch; if it wasn’t discovered or mistaken it might have another rating. Winners and Losers are listed when having 5 votes; supporting the number one.

    Winners/losers

    Winners:
    Palm logo grolsch logo Oranjeboom logo Schultenbrau

    bavaria logo

    1 4 6 7 8
    Losers:
    gulpener logo

    AMSTEL

    LIGHT

    BAVARIA

    0.0%

    Brand logo Amstel logo
    21 20 19 18 17
    Underestimated / overestimated

    Top 5 underestimated
    Pitt logo

    BAVARIA

    0.0%

    Oranjeboom logo Lindeboom logo Schultenbrau
    1 2 3 4 5
    Top 5 overestimated
    gulpener logo

    Brand logo

    Oettinger logo dommelsch logo Albert heijn logo
    1 2 3 4 5

    Evaluation

    Though the fallacies are obvious, this test was a GREAT success. Firstly because there where participants, but also since it was fun to do this. The results might influence some peoples choices when they shop for beer next time.

    The total number of participants was 12 and the total number of votes cast 132. (11 votes per victim). That some beers have been voted less is due to the number of beers to test. After ten beers / beer-samples most people could not distinguish what they where drinking.

    With an highest average rating of 7.00 it is fair to say; nobody really likes these beers. There are some exceptions here and there, but there is not one beer that actually gets an eight. This I would like to see changed in a next beer test. Then we’ll drink only the best premium imported beer from Belgium and America. If you wonder why America? I’ve got this tip from a member of PINT; if you want to get the best beer; get american, they experiment a lot!

    One of the girls in the test liked Alcohol free beer; she rated it highest! Maybe this beer should just be called Girl-Beer with a pink label and a smiling unicorn. The alcohol free beer and light beer where not appreciated by the rest; mostly men. The light beer states that it tastes the same, liars.

    Improvements for a next test

    1. Better beers; great beers! Beers that is so good that you are proud becoming an alcoholic.
    2. Ideal serving temperature: we served all slightly too warm. This was a mistake; cold beer is appreciated.
    3. No more than 10 samples per person; otherwise they’ll explode.
    4. More people, and let them rate every sample.
    5. Not everybody likes to drink their sample; get a bucket to dump the remains (beer fans: ENRAGE!)
    6. With 12 people, you can do with 2 bottles of each brand and still have too much.
    7. Pre-factored Excel sheet; doing things by hand increases the error margin.

    Extra: Where does beer come from?

    Bavaria Bavaria, Bavaria 0.0, Euroshopper, PITT, Schultenbrau
    Heineken Amstel, Amstel Light, Heineken
    Inbev Dommelsch, Hertog Jan, Jupiler, Oranjeboom
    Independant Alfa (meens), Brand, Grolsch, Gulpener, Lindeboom, Oettinger, Palm, Warsteiner
    Unknown Albert Heijn

    Extra: Stories

    Beer bottle labels have beautiful stories on them, trying to add to the value of the brand. The following list can be used to create your own label. (warning: moonspeak)

    Sprankelend, Zuiver, Smaak, Heerlijk, Bouquet, Garantie, 100%, Gecontroleerd, Bron, Bronwater, Vlot, Verstandig, Specifiek, Malsheid, Fruitig, Hop-toets, Allerbeste, Optimaal, Bijzonder, Geniet, Fris, Echt, Helder, Wereldwijd, Zacht, Familietraditie, Traditionele, Natuurlijke, Premium, Geselecteerde, Zuiver, Smaak, Ambachtelijk, Kristalhelder, Eeuwenoud, Topklasse, Uniek, Buitengewoon, Hoogwaardige, Kwaliteit, Onnavolgbaar, Geraffineerd, Liefde, Uitsluitend, Strogeel, Zomerkleur, Stabiel, Fijne, Glanzende, Ochtendfrisse, Rond Rijpend, Levendig, Flueelzacht, Natuurzuiver, Smaaktonen, Subtiel, Zeldzaam, Beproefd, Pittig, Bijzonder, Origineel, Reinheitsgebot, Hart

    Extra: Downloads and media

    The end of bank transcripts in paper…

    Last week I received a letter from my bank. It stated they will stop sending paper transaction transcripts. These receipts are sent out once a month and show all kinds of details on your money.

    The contents of their letter is a notice extraordinaire. Not only do they stop sending me my beloved paper, they are also motivating it. Like I am wasting one of natures most valued resources.

    And that is where things go wrong.

    It’s time to dissect their notice, and give some feedback on the arguments stated.

    Argument 1: 500.000 customers notified us that they didn’t need paper transcripts“.

    I’ve got a hunch that this is the second time a letter like this is sent; 500.000 customers did not take action on receiving the first letter; their transaction were stopped automatically. Apparently they didn’t mind, but is that a notification to the bank?

    Also: why should i care 500.000 other customers did this?

    Argument 2: “ING wants to cut down the unnecessary use of paper, because we want to run our business responsibly“.

    This is a clean-face, dirty hands argument. They are mistaking ‘unnecessary’ for ‘cost saving’. This has nothing to do with the environment. Some studies show that using paper requires more forestation. At least they are not using recycled paper.

    Argument 3:a printout of transactions displayed on our website is valid in court.

    That’s really nice, i don’t have to keep my paper records anymore for legal purposes. Very good for those who lost their paper transcripts. I’m not their target audience for this argument. I skip this one.

    Argument 4: we work together with a nature preserving organization, please help us

    For tax deduction/legal purposes, ING shoves some money to the side. They give it to a nature protection organization, so they can use it for marketing. Like the “postcode loterij”. At least they are not spending it on hookers and blow.

    The meaning of their argument is not clear; are they are trying to make me feel guilty as I’m apparently not helping the environment. This is none of their business.

    Argument 5: You can still choose to receive your beloved paper transcripts if you want it that much.

    So after all hassling, convincing and emotions, it is possible to continue receiving my transcripts. I’m wondering if social pressure for falsely argumented environmental protection will ever convince me to stop choosing for paper transcripts. Hell, I’m just choosing paper transcripts because they send these types of letters (also on paper).

    Argument 6:We provide a tutorial for letting you printing out your bank statements yourself

    This is the last and most mind blowing argument. Instead of sending paper transcripts, you can now print them yourself. From your own printer, coming out of your own pocket! So ING has to do even less for its business. Back in the days, quality of service meant something. (aka; you would go under pulling stunts like this, today banks are immune)

    Conclusion

    ING is cheapskating; the 4 euro-a-year saved from not sending paper transcripts are not going back to the customer. Instead the customer is persuaded to not wanting to have the statements. Using nature as an excuse is silly.

    We will not know what ING is doing for the environment; ING is for the larger part a black box. For maintaining a clean face, their letter fulfills its purpose. The environment is just an excuse for cost savings. The only banks that do care about the environemt are Triodos and ASN.

    The letter is signed by Hans Hagenaars.

    @Hans; better do something awesome for your customers now. Its not all business that makes the world go round. Better not fuck up how nice the Postbank used to be. We want a higher service level for less money. And ow yeah: treat us like humans.

    Note: i’ll scan this piece of shit paper when possible. I guess nobody cares about these arguments.