* Posts by John Smith 19

16327 publicly visible posts • joined 10 Jun 2009

High Court smacks down 'emergency' UK spy bill as UNLAWFUL

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Thumb Down

Anyone find the antics of the serial downvoter ironic?

Someone so afraid to state, or argue, or even be recognized on their position on state surveillance that's the only way they can communicate.

Staggeringly pathetic.

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Gimp

it's the unchanging common denominators,

"a.k.a. the Home Office, the Intelligence Services,the Police and so on. You can vote for any tint of government you like, but when the dust has settled, one layer down from the Home Secretary and the PM you'll still have exactly the same people scaring the new bosses rigid with the same intelligence stories and scenarios (accurate, exagerated and imagined) as they did the old ones, and pushing for the same "absolutely essential" measures (i.e. greater powers for them) that are needed "for the county's safety". Oh, and the terrible political consequences of not doing so."

You are correct.

Which is why something like 10 Home Secretaries all sound like the same sock puppet on this. :(

The group behind them simply have no concept of any limit on state surveillance. As far as they are concerned it's impossible to have too much data on too many people, despite the fact this is the equivalent of putting the haystack with the (terrorist) needle in it (the excuse for this in case anyone has forgotten that) into a field of haystacks.

This has no logical basis in reality. It's a compulsive desire (or fetish) to collect such information.

It's not a policy, it's a disease.

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Gimp

Re: So?

"It was a Tory who took the case to the court, one of the few who voted against it in parliament as well."

It was a Tory and a Labor MP that took it to court.

Forget the party manifesto.

All MP's have just 2 variations.

The "democrats" who believe in the will of the people and the "authoritarians" who believe in the will of themselves.

And the authoritarian view is very seductive to the more feeble minded law maker, especially if they have a sense of entitlement.

John Smith 19 Gold badge

"this may do a lot to allay the fears" "legislation could be misused as a tool of oppression"

Should read

this may do a lot to allay the fears that this legislation will be misused as a tool of oppression.

FTFY.

John Smith 19 Gold badge
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@Loyal Commenter

"plenty of resistance from the SNP (who will certainly be opposed), Tory back-benchers (many of whom are not nearly as right-wing as the front bench), and the Labour party.

SNP. Probably.

Tory back benchers. Torn between their "hang em high" and "small government is better government" memes.

The Labor Party. Who brought this in? The party whose leader wanted the UK to start carrying Identity Cards after the UK's only significant persistent terrorist (1 explosion a week or month on the mainland, not 1 a decade) threat had been disbanded?

I wouldn't be putting up any "Mission Accomplished" banners just yet.

Intel TOCK BLOCK: 10nm Cannonlake delayed to 2017, bonus 14nm Kaby Lake to '16

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

"8086 JIT compiler inside. "

So like the "Machine Level Interface" used by the IBM AS400 and later iSeries machines.

But there you could see the swap from CISC to POWER PC inside at work.

But as others noted with the complexity of the 8086 ISA I think it's more an interpreter than a compiler

And exposing it would of course mean you'd freeze the architecture.

So the code museum runs on.

John Smith 19 Gold badge

Re: we're all doomed!

"Only a few generations of shrinkage to go. "

If I've got the math right 14nm is about 60 atoms wide.

But normally the oxide is 1/10 that.

So about 2 generations unless someone finds a really clever way to make high aspect ratio conductors, like 20 atoms high by 1 atom wide.

But I'm not sure how good insulators can be when they are 1 atom thick.

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

At the end of the day though it'll still just implement the same Intel ISA we all know

and Microsoft seem to love.

8086 inside.(not TM)

Yay.

Brit school software biz unchains lawyers after crappy security exposed

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

Oh look, it's #7 on the Common Weaknesses Enumeration list 2011.

As found here

The latest list is much longer

While writing your software to avoid these won't guarantee you're software is bug free it will be substantially more f**kup proof than otherwise.

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

Skipping the "notify the developers and give then some time to fix it" part was not smart.

But lawering up and screaming "copyright" on a number just makes the company look like whiny ass b**ches with clueless legal representation.

I think the fellow who reported holes with the remote access to a CCTV system used by a lot of day care centres (reported by El Reg) did it better.

That companies reaction (called in the lawyers as well) was also pretty cretinous.

Companies. If there is any kind of serious competition in your market sector you will lose sales if you behave like this.

It's not like there aren't lists of "stupid s**t to avoid doing when writing software" already available.

NASA boffins peer at Pluto: Could it be ... is that ... OATMEAL?

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Happy

" complex hydrocarbons that had fallen from the sky "

It's raining oil

A space mission that could actually make a profit?

Hacked US OPM boss: We'll fix our IT security – just give us $21 million

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

They can fix this for $21m

Bargain.

If I believed you could fix it for $21m.

600 MEELLION apps open to brute force account guessing

John Smith 19 Gold badge
FAIL

Are you f**king kidding me?

Seriously.

They can't even deliver the security of a 1970's college computer system?

Or is this a case of "not to worry" as long as you don't reuse your password?

Oh, you do reuse your passwords.

How unfortunate.

It's ALIVE! Network Services contract finally staggers upright

John Smith 19 Gold badge

700 question tender questionaire.

And people wonder why only the "The Usual Suspects (TM)" can afford to apply for this sort of thing.

And remember this is a relatively low value contract.

Former spook bigwigs ask for rewrite of UK’s surveillance laws

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Gimp

"seen no evidence" "..British government knowingly acts illegally" "intercepting private comms"

They just didn't bother to check the law in the first place?

The group toured GCHQ with blindfolds on ?

It's not "intercepted" till a human listens to them ? Just feeding it through speech recognition / key word detection and archiving it to unlimited storage is not "intercepting."

I see why it's difficult to develop English language parsers.

What's said is not in doubt. What's meant OTOH is a whole different question.

India ponders home-baked chips for defence and nuke plants

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

Re: Baking != design

"Even if you design the chips, you still have to make sure that you design any IP blocks you use. It is easy enough to slip attack vectors into something like an ethernet controller."

True.

If you're really serious about this you have to have either complete control or complete visibility of the whole chain from layout to finished hardware executing code including all links between the stages to guard against substitution of doctored data files.

If you're a government whose' studied the Snowden documents and you want to keep your secrets a secret and your hardware invulnerable you have to make a very serious investment in time and trouble to do so.

PLUTO FLYBY: Here's your IT angle, all you stargazing pedants

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Meh

Re: Getting to the next star system at that speed is going to take a long time. :(

"Well, they did test the "throw nukes out the back and ride the shockwave" idea, but with conventional explosives. If the world's nuclear weapons arsenal was appropriated for a spaceship, it could send a toddler to Alpha Centauri before the toddler's retirement age."

Orion uses much smaller propulsion packages (in the kiloton range) than most nuclear weapons.

You could built a lot of them them from the worlds nuclear arsenals.

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Boffin

Re: Getting to the next star system at that speed is going to take a long time. :(

"One question I've often wondered. At our current technology level, what speeds would be be able to achieve if the motivation and cash was there? I"

With no new technology you're basically looking at hooking a nuclear reactor to a cluster of ion thrusters, possibly boosted by a booster stage that takes beamed microwave power from solar cells in LEO while inside the solar system. Biggest space nuke however was Russian at about 5Kw.

Once outside this you're looking at solar sails going in close to the sun behind an asteroid then accelerating hard.

The best I've seen with known physics IE not fusion, is the fission fragment rocket. That's a pulsed nuclear reactor whose fuel is made in layers < 10 micrometres thick. At that level fission fragments made when a U235 atom fissions can leave the surface of the fuel and using a magnetic field be pointed out the back.

The fragments are moving at between 3 and 5% of the speed of light versus something like the 0.001% of the speed of light of ion thruster streams.

John Smith 19 Gold badge
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So far we've come, so far still to go.

16 km/sec --> fastest object to leave Earth.

That's roughly 0.000053 c

Getting to the next star system at that speed is going to take a long time. :(

Looks like the only serious chance is with the fission fragment rocket.

On an IT note. Look at how much practice and planning is done before the event.

Should be SOP for all major 1 shot events (system cut overs of various kinds mostly).

But is it?

Reddit CEO U-turn: Site no longer a bastion of free speech – and stop posting so much hate

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Meh

Not really thought about it before.

Might visit it now

Might not.

Hacking Team: We're the good guys, but SO misunderstood. Like Batman

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

We live in an unsafe world. So they decided to help to make it *less* safe.

No doubt they do not see things that way.

It would take a pretty strong stomach to live with yourself if you did.

But that's what they are and that's what they do.

If you want to live like that you're infosec had better be airtight.Always.

Otherwise sooner or later you will discover that Karma is a bitch.

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

"your criminal-ware is owned by all criminals - Governments and entrepreneurs."

Is there a line between these groups?

I'm having trouble telling one lot from the other.

Hacking Team hacked: Spyware source code torrent blurts govt customers

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Happy

"Ethical" governments are the ones willing to pay for the daVinci malware.

"The unethical get it for free when they torrent "Window XP mega ultimate w/ activation crack" :p"

Oh yeah.

I hate those guys.

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

Re: "claiming to only deal with ethical governments"

I know this one.

1)They honor their contract with their supplier.

2)They pay on time.

3)They pay in full.

What more can a business ask?

Hacking Team: Oh great, good job, guys ... now the TERRORISTS have our zero-day exploits

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Joke

""And we ain't gettin' paid for it! They'll be using it for free! "

Indeed.

You spend literally hours weeks looking for vulnerability in flash and suddenly some thieving ingrate comes along and steals it.

Outrageous.

Cool-headed boffins overcome sticky issue: Graphene-based film could turn heat down

John Smith 19 Gold badge
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Note it's 4x copper and a *static* system

Heat pipes can do this but there is always the risk of a leak.

Now can they mass produce it?

NASA chooses ace SPACE PILOTS who'll take the USA back into manned flight

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

"Returning the launches of American astronauts to American soil is a top priority"

Unlike Congress.

Who've consistently starved Commercial Cargo & Crew of requested funds.

Their top priority seems to be ensuring that Commercial Crew will not fly a 'naut until their fat a**sed cuckoo little precious SLS flies a meatsack.

Symantec selling Veritas to private equity firm – report

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

Weren't Veritas the company whose CV said he had an MBA when he didn't ?

I think it was.

Kind of liked working for a Veritas reseller.

Good at free clothing supply.

Osbo PRINTS first Tory budget in 19 years with his BARE HANDS

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Gimp

Save a few billion right now

Limit GCHQ's tape storage budget.

Cancel all projects that have been on the Major Project Agencies Red light list repeatedly over the last 3 years or so.

Planet killer: Ex-army officer's Welsh space-rock mission

John Smith 19 Gold badge

For those not acqainted with Welsh civilization a quick summary.

is located here

Not forgetting Dylan Thomas, Anthony Hopkins and Richard Burton of course.

Home Office kept schtum on more than 30 data breaches last year

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

The Home Office *all* your date safe in their hands?

What do you think?

Ex-Goldman Sachs programmer's code theft conviction overturned AGAIN

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

A touch of pot and kettle there.

Indeed.

According to Flash Boys quite a lot of that code was open source to begin with.

It would seem the NYC DA wants to be able to say "See, we did take to court for Goldman Sachs."

No doubt some GS senior employees should have gone to prison.

But they won't.

Security world chuckles at Hacking Team’s 'virus torrent' squeals

John Smith 19 Gold badge
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A company that's all kinds of despicable.

They write spyware but don't have the balls to sell it illegally

They write spyware not in house to their government because of some perceived "national security" threat like NSA or GCHQ. You may not like the PoV but you accept it is one.

Spyware writing X government con-tractor X Sell to any government as long as it is a government --> zero sympathy when you get hit and lots of ROFLMA comments.

You live like a b**ch you die like a dog.

Adam Smith was right about that invisible hand, you know

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

You say "High Frequency Trading"

I say "Man in the Middle Attack."

Buyer. "buy X shares of Y" (from Seller)

300 microseconds later...

"Hello Mr Buyer, I'm the HF Trader who bought those shares 200 microseconds ago. Pay me instead".

It's no surprised trading volume doubles when HFT's turn up.

There are now 2 transactions going on for every real trade in the market.

Kobo Glo HD vs Amazon Kindle Paperwhite: Which one's best?

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

PIty. Most of the stuff I'm interested in is in PDF

If neither is that good....

<sigh>

Will rising CO2 damage the world's oceans? Not so much

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

In caves water loses CO2 --> Stalagmite & Stalagtites. Water gains CO2 --> They dissolve

Similar principle of any carbonate rocks anywhere.

And carbonate rocks are everywhere.

Boffin: Will I soon be able to CLONE a WOOLLY MAMMOTH? YES. Should I? Hell NO

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Go

Revival is essential if the truly key questions are to be answered.

What parts make the best burgers.

Next I'll be looking for an answer to the question "Dodo egg omelet. Worth the wait?"

German army fights underground Nazi war machine hidden in Kiel pensioner's cellar

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Coat

So, good performer in heavy snow then?

Enquiring minds.....

That's my heavy winter coat.

What's black, sticky, and has just 8GB of storage?

John Smith 19 Gold badge
FAIL

Still not really seeing the point of this. Except as a way of bumping up Windows X sales

Ah. That's the the point.

Intel 80386 queen Renée James quits as chipmaker's president

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Terminator

An intel spokesperson commented "McAfee has now been assimilated.

Resistance is futile."*

*Not.

Chair legs it from UK govt smart meter installation programme

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

@LeeE

In short, it's a government scheme for transferring bill payer funds to private industry, and as such it's been a huge sucess already.

FTFY

Universal Credit white elephant needs 'urgent breakthrough' says MP

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Meh

Re: This is what happens when a minister tries to impose good practice on the "professionals"

"Right at the very start the Minister said he wanted the "pathways" checked before any code was cut."

If true that would seem like a very good idea.

In fact it would seem like a very good idea for all upgrade/re-engineering projects with a substantial chunk of data housed in one or more existing databases (pretty much all UK govt projects).

So why isn't it SOP and why would a Minister have to request it?

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

A mad, bad, bold, bald plan

Anyone have any more adjectives that might be appropriate?

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

15 benefits (on how many mainframes?) integrated together in a single big bang

What could possibly go wrong with such a mad bold plan?

Harvard: Psst, Mr Future President. We just got PWNED by hackers

John Smith 19 Gold badge
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Oh for more innocent times

When it was probably the students doing it.

Now it could be anyone

From anywhere.

Atos buys up Xerox ITO, splashing almost $1 billion in process

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

"as we welcome 9,600 Xerox ITO employees to Atos."

For the time being.

Then after the redundancies they'll really start making the remaining little piggies sweat.

Let the squealing commence.

Privacy watchdog ICO slashes its fines in half

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

Start putting *senior* people in prison.

Once the first ICO does some serious time the rest of them will start paying attention.

After all it's not the UK has any problem putting people in jail with, IIRC, proportionately the highest number of people in prison of any country in (at least) Western Europe.

Except the last attempt to get this activated (I believe it's in the relevant legislation) failed because, once again, the Home Secretary was clueless ar***ole irresolute.

UK.gov spied on human rights warriors at Amnesty International

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

Bet this claim won't end up in the Sunday Times.

Unlike the claim Edward Snowden (while working for the NSA) managed to get hold of the MI6 list of officers and assets not working at British Embassies.

Difference is this one is probably true, given the UK governments "friends" in The War On Terror (TM).

It's all downhill from here: Avalanche spins STT-RAM

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Go

Staggering

If it works.

China's best phone yet: Huawei P8 5.2-inch money-saving Android smartie

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Unhappy

"demand far more privacy and security features "

Perhaps Western buyers should do that too?

Do you want a valuable comms device or a spy-in-your-pocket.

I know which I prefer.