Posts by Wzrd1

Re: @Trevor

"I care not what role mosquitoes serve. We will help the planet adapt to their absence. Like IP lawyers, they should be made extinct."

Very well, please explain to several species why they are ordained by our idiocy to extinction. Then, explain to those who predate upon them for survival.

You can also explain how new products will be brought to market without profit, as copyright and patents would go extinct, in a scarcity economy.

The very first part of examining a problem is examining what the problem is and next, what mitigation will do in terms of good and harm. If the mitigation creates significant "ripples", it is intensely scrutinized and either abandoned as unpredictable or guarded considered further.

A prime example is to consider Microsoft Windows as a mosquito (or Martin bird, if you prefer), exterminate it and the overwhelming majority of malware in the world would disappear.

Regrettably, the overwhelming number of computers in the world would also cease to operate. Costs would abound in training staff on using permitted operating systems, support costs would crush entire economies.

Yes, that is the reality of it, like it or not.

Personally, I'm OS agnostic, using a half dozen quite happily for various purposes.

But, in a complex environment like a planet, making a significant change could eliminate dozens of species that may very well include the species causing the significant change.

Much like making a significant change in DNA coding for a protein. The result may work out brilliantly, but most of the time, indeed, the overwhelming number of times, it is not rewarded with survival.

Re: Odd statement

"I get the preservation of most species, but - like the mosquito - I feel this one should be erased. We'll sort out the consequences later."

We at Special Circumstances learned long ago, sorting out the consequences later really, really, *really* sucks worse than the original problem did.

See the sorting out of the consequences of Operation Ajax by the CIA, as a favour for the UK petrol industry for one shining example.

Re: Gravity?

I'm dubious of the utility of any explosive, as over half of the explosive force would be outward, rather than toward rock, save if it's accelerated enough to penetrate before detonation.

I'd lean more toward a kinetic penetrator, which is well proven technology, both on and off of Earth.

Re: ArtSat 2

My wife is an artist (fine art) and rather intensely dislikes abstract and "modern art". I tend to agree with her, it's not my cup of tea as well. To each his own, said the lady as she kissed her cow.

Our conversation for this satellite went as follows, a brief description of the project and goals, then a brief Q&A session, placed below.

So, as I said, this is essentially an art project in spaaaaace.

Yes.

So, would you want that on your coffee table?

No.

Just as well that they're throwing it off of the planet, huh?

(Smiled, chuckled and agreed.)

Re: JAXA

"I immediately thought of war rocket Ajax."

I had forgotten that one, but instead thought of Operation Ajax.

Re: DurasnoPeach

The only realistic research that can be learned from social media, especially Facebook and more anonymous social media sites is how many assholes there are on the site.

It rather reminds me of "The Sixth Sense", with a more realistic twist. "I see assholes and they're everywhere and they don't know that they're assholes."

Well, that and the abject failure of the US educational system in teaching the differences in alike sounding words, such as to, too, two, they're, their, etc. But those typically make the sites anti-social media.

Re: Al Jazeera Hackathon

As I personally know quite a few of the Am Jazeera team, I'll take their word for it, rather than your innuendo.

From the site:

"Canvas is a platform for experimentation, and it is being kicked off with an inaugural hackathon. We’re creating a space to explore and invent solutions to challenges that advance humanity while also pushing forward media and open source technologies. At the hackathon, you can collaborate with some of the most innovative minds in media and journalism to imagine the future of news and information. What will you create with a blank canvas? We are taking applications for designers, developers, media experts, and people with a passion for social innovation to join us for the inaugural Canvas hackathon on November 29th – December 1st, 2014."

Re: Adblocks......they're a security measure...

"Do it in the HOSTS file, it's cleaner, more foolproof and you don't need bloaty BHOs installed on every browser you use."

Been doing that myself after getting malware warnings from my antivirus/firewall. If it's alerting on malvertisment now, one shudders to consider zero day attacks that AV/FW may not notice.

Re: Dress code

Not the press, not feminists, the feminazis will be shrieking until the press arrives just to shut them up.

Re: The Leonid shower in full swing here

Well, it's cleared out where I am, but windy and below freezing.

Cold enough to say, screw that comet and its trail of rubbish.

Re: Information please

"The end of days finally arrives; the good are to be whisked off by angels whilst everyone else burns. So what do the most fervent religious types do? Commit a mortal sin."

Thereby removing the urine from the gene pool.

Re: Android has an answer

"My changing the IMEI had nothing to do with crime, just privacy."

I call bullshit.

Fuck with the IMEI, the cellular network rejects your attempts to join it, unless you forge it.

Of course, IMEI forgery was part and parcel of cellular telephone theft.

I am far from accusing you, only bringing an interesting and annoying legal fact to the forefront to remind all why IMEI is supposed to be not forged.

There are many, many legal reasons to do so.

Re: "What is done on US soil is completely legal"

"More seriously, how high up does a countries law cease to be? If you're in orbit you're outside of earthly jurisdictions, what about aircraft?"

Well, for a few ratified treaties, it's 90 miles for specialized things like space stations, GPS, etc.

For other ratified treaties, it's middle orbit, between geosynchronous orbit and low earth orbit.

For other ratified treaties, it's geosynchronous orbit.

For still other ratified treaties, it's "parking orbit", when a spacecraft is dying/dead.

Then, there is the *entire* space treaty that makes everything in space common to humanity, not a nation.

Meanwhile, you ignored the shit out of national airspace, which is also a ratified treaty.

An hence, is guided by legislated and case law, which means that what is in the air is in the air for all, you, me, the US government.

Do you want to deprive us all of air? ;)

More seriously, do look up US law, international treaties (they're far from difficult to find), international space "law" (there is no international law, only ratified treaties that have the force of law (which the US Constitution clearly states is so, second only to the Constitution itself (so, for the paranoid gun nut, an arms treaty cannot prohibit him his gun)). The entirety of it is in common English, with much of it being American English (as many US citizens can barely comprehend *real* English (I'm conversant, barely)).

"Companies are sensitive to that mood, and are responding - hence encryption by Google, MS etc."

Says one who is the village idiot on protocols of cellular nature.

the IMEI is key to communicating on an initial basis on a cellular network. That is an international standard.

Fuck with that and your phone will work only within the US. Foreign phones won't work in the US.

Real world meets the road.

Learn how shit works before you make an ass of yourself.

Re: PKI

Once upon a time, people actually comprehended networking that they used.

OK, if you plug into a wired network with your PC, is your MAC obfuscated? Nope.

Your mobile uses an IEMI. that can not be obfuscated.

Welcome to the real world.

Beyond that, things get *really* complicated, to to international agreements.

For those in the US, that means ratified treaties, which the Constitution proclaims are the law of the land, only second to the Constitution itself.

Re: BernardL

'".....it's logging location data for every phone within range....." And where in the article does it say it is logging every phone? Oh, it doesn't.'

Actually, it doesn't say what you think.

It's logged as interesting or not interesting.

Much of the time, not interesting goes into the bit bucket, however that is not always the case.

That said, I really don't have problems with it. As in, if I were caught up in the unintentional dragnet, I know quite well my activities would clear me.

The simple reality for many would be, they'd accidentally be given an examination that they were unaware of that would qualify them for a security clearance.

Re: Nothing to hide nothing to fear

"Until your phone imei is often coincidently found in these fishing expeditions & you'll suddenly find you're self under increased scrutiny from the security services for no good reason other than some bad guys happen to be doing business in your locality."

Here in the information world, of interest means a valid bit of data. Not of interest is bit bucket.

Now, if the bit bucket was examined and found to hold correlations of significance for a known felon who was dangerous, I'd most certainly and law enforcement would most certainly be interested.

That said, the fruit of the poisoned tree comes into play and a parallel investigation begins. One that uses none of the tainted information at all. If that plays true, it's rather likely that further criminal matters are present and one requires a court of law to examine the facts.

That *is* the case law and text of the US Constitution.

Now, as one who actually reviewed his own personal morale call home text file, dutifully recorded by an unnamed agency, after a certain soldier tried to kill his peers for religious reasons, I can say, I don't have that great a deal of problem with that. That isn't blind faith, that is due to the checks and balances in the US government.

They may fuck up on occasion, but usually they do work.

Re: Pity...

"If they had a warrant they could get the info from the phone company. So I'm guessing no, they are fishing."

In a way, yes. In the comparison of going to the fish market for your fish vs actually actively going after fish with a hook.

Warrants are served, the data is *not* in realtime. That is something I learned in the military.

If the guy is at the 711 yesterday at 11:23:43, whatinhell good is that today at 22:00:00?

Now, can it be abused? Absolutely. That is why we have a court system, a Congress and a POTUS. Each is checks and balances against the other two branches of government.

That all said, if the states get hold of this technology, the entire Constitution will become a regional clusterfuck that will take ages to untangle.

For those not from the US, our central government is relatively weak, with civil rights and federal rights defined in the Constitution. Anything not covered there devolves to the states, if not claimed by the state, devolves to the county, then to the town/city/township, then to the citizen.

Much isn't codified and is mixed US Constitution, some state Constitution and a *lot* of UK common law of 1776.

A rather bizarre thing occurs, as many states have not outlawed the judicial duel, such is legally possible in quite a few states. Don't see it happening, but it is technically possible.

Think of traveling in the US as a citizen as traveling in Europe with a Europass, but without having to present it at a border (travel papers are prohibited in the US Constitution).

For fun, do read our Constitution. It's an easy read, it's relatively short and it's plainspoken. Then, research history of the UK in 1776 and remember the history and some abominations that occurred in UK history over religion and personal protection from harm from another and assorted other items.

Or read Justice Scalia's opinion in Washington, D.C. vs Heller for the history.

Justice Stevens attempted to engage upon historical revisionism, only the immediate victor may revise history, not the progeny. ;)

Personally, I'd put quite a few firearms under the National Firearms Act (do look that up).

Well, it's nearing 05:00 local time, I need to get some sleep. I'm midshift.

Re: Pity...

"It's a pity that they have to slurp the entire area and then mark which ones are of interest."

What happens is, the phone pretends to be a tower. Hence, it reads *all* phone ID's in range. Hence, it slurps all and discards that which is not of interest.

Before you comment, do learn how the technology works. To do otherwise actually does disrupt service.

Re: Dirtboxes being used by dirtbags!!

"Well, my respect for the Marshal's Service just dropped several notches."

Well, mine actually went up. I rather dislike fugitives, especially armed ones. Especially armed ones that seek to force themselves into my home and force me to expend ammunition to halt such harmful activities.

So, to be blunt, I'm glad the Marshal's Service is saving me ammunition and door fixtures.

Blithering idiot!

Of course, I'm one that the government knows perfectly well where I am for 8 hours per day and is reasonably certain where I am the rest of the time. But then, I work in a government security operations center keeping their networks secure.

Earlier in my career, I literally had government agents follow me to ascertain who my associations were, beyond what was self-reported.

So, sod off, you paranoid delusional person, go seek professional mental health care guidance on finding balance between caution and paranoia.

For those outside of the US, please excuse my tirade against my countryman, however you should be made aware of one fact.

The United States of America has no real mental health care system. What previously existed was dismantled due to a handful of cases of abuse, with the promise of community based health care.

What that actually meant was mental patients were literally ejected from the closing mental hospitals, to become homeless. The community based mental heath care system was and remains underfunded to the point of being an embarrassment it it were in such a state in Somalia.

As for the ammunition bit, well, firearms *are* quite commonplace in the US. Most sane people only move about with them to and from the range or to hunt, when the game is in season. My firearms are in safes, with one special safe reserved in case of the not so vanishingly rare occurrence that someone breaks in and is armed. If they're unarmed and run away, oh well, I'll have to replace a window. If they're unarmed and remain, they'll get to meet the local police force, who will be advised that the suspect is peaceful.

I had quite enough of violence in the military and really don't want to see things military at home.

"Machines with deactivated security measures as prone to infection as those without security measures? No shit, Sherlock."

Does that mean that a broken lock is as bad as an unlocked lock? ;)

Re: FTFY

"User who don’t update their operating system away from Microsoft, may as well install virii themselves, according to infection rate statistics published by world + dog."

I've had *nix admins proclaim that Windows is a virus. I disagreed and defined a virus for them and they were forced to agree.

A virus does something.

Re: What are the infection rates for desktop linux users?

Geeze, I forgot to address the original question.

The rate is present, low to mild. Most people who know how to operate their Linux boxes know enough to avoid letting something be run as root. That leaves malware at the user's permission level only (save for some sploits).

If it has an OX, it can be compromised. Most often via the stupidity of the user and we've all had our moments.

These days, I'm at the point that when my firewall gripes about malvertisement from a particular site, I quickly sudo vi /etc/hosts and redirect them to 127.0.0.1.*

*The hosts file isn't big enough yet to merit the usage of emacs. :P

Re: What are the infection rates for desktop linux users?

"Geeks, nerds and fanbois run Linux. Ordinary people run Windows or OSX."

You mean sub-ordinary people. Power users and network types use Linux, *BSD or OS X.

Oh well, at least this OS X machine comes with Apples built-in antivirus.*

Microsoft has their own free offering, it's not the best, but it beats a stick in the eye or a rootkit on the machine.**

*Yeah, there really is built-in antivirus on OS X, though it's indistinguishable from having no antivirus software, it's so efficient.

**OK, I've manually killed rootkits as too. Still, some can be annoying, having watchdog processes that have to be hunted down one by one, then simultaneously terminated.

You know, the fun ones. ;)

"Not enough people are employing full time (researcher) cryptographers. I know Google and Apple do, anyone know about MS?"

Yeah, but the NSA stole them all away.

Re: Supposed to be internal testing.

It never ceases to amaze me, I take a few days away from monitoring the security news and all hell breaks loose.

I was wondering about those odd attacks coming from our vulnerability scanners. Now, I have to update the IPS and assorted other sensors with these vulnerabilities.

Oh well, it sure beats reading pcaps all day.

Re: AaaaUUGGH

"Fingers are crossed for a monster CME that hits us, here at Ledswinger Towers. "

I've long had the habit to track space weather activities, as my life did, quite literally, rely upon decent satellite communications for fire support and evacuation support.

Much later, I still track space weather, somewhat out of habit, somewhat to consider disconnecting certain expensive electronics if a CME is inbound and, erm, interesting.

Still, one ponders about the US, where substantial parts of the energy grid dates to the 1920's, with the majority being 1950's technology.*

*Note to self: Do pick up a proper generator for the house, along with an upgrade on fuel storage. I suspect 5000 gallons will be insufficient.

But then, I inherited a petrol tank under the property, courtesy of my deceased father, who had trivial access to such underground tanks and installed one during the US energy crisis. He subsequently added fuel to it, gradually, as petrol stations required repair and the remaining fuel was pumped out to be discarded.

There *is* a benefit for inheriting something from someone who lived through the Great Depression. Most of it is hoarding, some hoarding is beneficial today.

Re: This is what happens

"(For those who find this excessively feeble, a Conservative MP announced just a week or so ago that sex education led to teenage pregnancies. Ignoring the fact that the numbers are actually dropping)"

This gives me some consolation across the pond. It proves that the US does not hold a monopoly on moronic conservatives, we only hold the current largest market share.