How Many Keys Have You Pressed?

teardrop.ca writes "A new project created by Jason Hooper involves the counting and displaying of statistical information regarding the number of keys you have pressed since sign-up to this project. A change from the distributed problem solving projects that have been around for awhile. " Finally a truly frivelous use of distributed computing! It's a bit thin, looks like it could be easily gamed, but damn it'd be funny if the whole world did this (never mind the security and privacy issues). I'm curious how many more times some keys are pressed then others (perhaps this would explain why my spacebars always seem to break on my laptops :/)

Comments

Pardon?

[RC514]

I'm supposed to download a program that sits in the tray and records all the keys I press? I mean, to count them, they all have to pass their code, right? And it has network functionality... HELLO? Security?

Re:Right

[MrHat]

And on a more serious note, here is their privacy policy.

Re:My GOD! Can we say "security risk"

[Ageless]

Here's a wacky idea. Read the pages before you comment. They don't keep track of which keys and how many times. Just how many keys total. The return ONE integer to the server periodically and that is: Number of total keys pressed since last contact.

Re:Read the site!

[jargonCCNA]

Well then, why not join up, and run a port sniffer at the same time? That way you'll actually have proof.

Just because it's been written to run on Windows doesn't mean it's vanilla Micro$oft spyware.

Re:Read the site!

[Jeremi]

Well then, why not join up, and run a port sniffer at the same time? That way you'll actually have proof

Nope, that wouldn't prove anything except that the software wasn't sending secret info out in any obvious way. It could well be watching just for your password/credit card number, caching it when it sees it, and sending it out to a remote machine 1 bit at a time, as part of the "acceptable" data packets, over the next 24 hours.

If you want proof, you would need to get the source, inspect it line by line, and compile it yourself.

We've read the site & its still VERY dangerous

[SomethingOrOther]

Jay's a good friend of mine, I know he wouldn't log the actual keys.

Heh
My ex-wife was a good friend of mine.
She wouldn't tip brake fluid over my car :- /

Besides, when you go to the Privacy Policy on the page it mentions what Pulse will and won't do

And this privacy policy comes under European law also?
Is Jay open to bribes from unscrupulous bastards who will pay for the data he collects?
Can a melicious version of this code be put out there so a clueless windoze user downloads the wrong one? (one without a ''privacy policy'')

Even if your mate has the best intentions, encouraging people to install spyware like this is very bad karma. You are encouraging people to take stupid risks.