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'Think Tank' Issues Microsoft-Funded Troll
dlur (among many others) writes: "According to this ZDNet article, a Washington think tank known as the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution is soon to release a study stating that Open Source Software allows terrorists an easy time hacking into our systems. It's little suprise that this group takes money from Microsoft."
The Register's story
is good too.
All the whoring reports in the world won't make open source any less secure. This same institute backed destabilizing, unworkable '80s missile defense
and thinks Alexis de Tocqueville would have wanted the
V-22 Osprey deathplane.
Also, see what their coin-operated policy dispenser spat out for
internet privacy
(eat what you're fed) and
antitrust
(advantage of Microsoft monopoly: "manufacturers of computer hardware need to provide only one
driver").
We weren't going to run this, but there were a lot of submissions, so ...
It seems to me that when software is created by "hackers" and made by "hackers" that they would as a team know what to do to make the software as hackerfree as possible. By making a product open source, it is only sensible that it is then open to be studied by hackers and exploited by malicious hackers but at the same time, just as genius "white-hat" hackers can quickly repair these security flaws thus keeping the software secure. So, how then can it be possible to say that Open Source is more hacker prone than proprietary software? Beats me
"This same institute backed destabilizing, unworkable '80s missile defense and thinks Alexis de Tocqueville would have wanted the V-22 Osprey deathplane."
Nice to see no politics being spouted here.
>i>from the insitute-and-prostitute-share-a-lot-of-letters dept.
They share even more letters if you spell institute correctly.
Open source would have a much better security record if Sendmail were killed off.
What I do not understand is why there aren't any similar groups for the OpenSource / non-Darkside avocations.
If MS can fund groups such as these to spill forth what is obviously [then again, not much is obvious it seems to the 90% of the population] utter trash, surely we [ non-MS ] can do the same.
If this group spills out such toxic waste words as these, why does it gain so much attention in the general public?
Is there any reason why we cannot write an article stating "Microsoft Closed source enables Terrorists to easially render 90% of the information market paralized"... (after all, there is far more 'hard' evidence in the form of email-worms etc than there is behind what has been written in this article).
They're not running their touted monoculture on their own web servers!
"My opinions are my own, and I've got *lots* of them!"
I am a lone out post of open source in the military agency where I work. My solution, just show them the NSA funded SE Linux information.
Who are the green suiters going to trust? A bunch of paid "think tank" lackeys or the good ole spooks behind the triple fence?
So far NSA's advocacy has been used to let me get away with all kinds of open source implementation.
Of course, NSA has an agenda too I'm sure but that's between the military and NSA.
This same institute backed destabilizing, unworkable '80s missile defense....
You are aware, are you not, that the Reagan administration's emphasis on missile defense technology forced the Soviets to spend billions on research into their own missile defense systems? And that that level of unsustainable spending contributed directly to the collapse of the Soviet economy, and the eventual dissolution of the USSR as a political entity?
Just spreading around a little knowledge.
Read that last sentence again - it's a thousand-pound gorilla.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Subject: "Opening the Open Source Debate"
Date: 31 May 2002 15:45:59 +1200
Some references you might wish to consider before publishing your article "Opening the Open Source Debate"
http://www.businesswire.com/cgi-bin/f_headline.cgi ?bw.053002/221502375
Bruce Schneier, one of the recognized leading expert on computer security on Kerckhoffs' Principle and Secrecy, Security, and Obscurity of software.
http://www.counterpane.com/crypto-gram-0205.html#1
Dr. Blaine Burnham, Director, Georgia Tech Information Security Center (GTISC) and previously with the National Security Agency (NSA), gives an keynote speech overview of current encryption and security technologies and outlines possible strategies for future defense.
http://technetcast.ddj.com/tnc_play_stream.html?st ream_id=411
Also you might wish to address the issue of Microsoft's disproportionately high number of open vulnerabilities in its Internet Explorer components. All of which where discovered without access to the source code.
http://jscript.dk/unpatched/
Richard Purcell, Microsoft's director of corporate privacy, has recently stated that any major improvement in regard to the security of it's products may be at least "5, 10 years, maybe".
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/may 2002/tc20020523_6029.htm
As for the issue of Trojan horse injection into open source code, it is far from being an open source only issue.
http://www.eeggs.com/
Or were all the "Easter Eggs" currently found in Microsoft's products officially authorized?
If you are looking for a methodology for providing a suitably secure and hardened solution, start with a real world example.
http://www.openbsd.org/security.html
I welcome any open debate.
After all, we're now pretty well aware that people are not looking through open source code looking for bugs and back doors: yes, flaws get discovered, but it's usually through the "exploit-patch-fix" cycle, rather than pre-emptive security work.
OpenBSD is, of course, not dead and a very notable exception.
Sometimes secrecy is useful in security: ask the NSA; yes, in theory, all of their algorithms would stand if they were placed in the open.
But they still keep them secret because it is one more obstacle for an intruder to have to overcome to compromise a system.
Of course, none of this matters because we're talking about M$, those nice folks asking to keep with Windows source secret because it has security flaws large enough to be considered economic and national security risks.
But, in theory, I think there are times when closes source might be the way to go.
Hexayurt - open source refugee shelter,
However, how can we have more companies like Microsoft when that very article is condoning a monolopy? Yes, I acknowledge that they're probably talking about 'one monopoly in each market'. However, we all know that Microsoft is trying to take over as many markets as possible. How far away is Microsoft-branded Vegemite? :)
Stupid. Totally, absolutely stupid.
... that we run it on our OWN damn servers:
$ httptype www.adti.net
Rapidsite/Apa/1.3.20 (Unix) FrontPage/4.0.4.3 mod_ssl/2.8.4 OpenSSL/0.9.6
Who wants to place bets as to when Microsoft learns of this, and promptly switches their systems?
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
The purpose of Open Source projects is to offer technology in an open and cheaper manner than traditional vendors. If what ADTI is implying that because of Open Source anyone, including terrorists, can use computers for free then I guess it is true.
;-)
What would be the contrary to this? Would the ADTI really have us believe that hacking with paid closed software is better than open? If Open Source projects can't expect or know the ultimate intent of the users of the software then why would any closed vendor would? It sounds like ADTI does! I guess they are brilliant.
And MySQL.
And OpenSSH.
And Tomcat.
And wu-ftpd.
And PHP.
And squid.
And mod_ssl.
...
You know, if we reduced it to just the kernel running on an isolated box locked in a secured meat locker, and you throw away the key.
But, qmail is better =)
"How cruelly ironic, that the man who celebrated the spirit of volunteerism
he found in communities all across the new nation he chronicled has his good
name usurped and sullied by the likes of these."
As for the Osprey, the most recent one to crash came down not too far (which is to say not far enough) from my backyard, so I checked out what they had to say about that, but to be fair, they wrote it 5 years ago, before anybody but the manufacturers had a chance to really test its airworthiness.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Hacker making software knowing more to stop hackers is such bullshit. Most hackers that use the term like that can't code their way out of a wet paper bag. Saying hackers would make better code is fine, but get a clue that when you use the term "Hacker" no matter how you mean it the mainstream media will always see it as "EVIL" period. No one but the people that profess that hacking is a cleaver way to solve a problem think that it means a way to solve a problem. So what is that 5% if your lucky? Hell they even get pissed when someone else says it if they are not "hackers".
For the love of Pete, everyone else hears hackers making software know how to protect you from the hackers, err sorry crackers, er wackers, black hat, grey hat, white hat, red hat, tinky winky hat...ahh hell you know the "bad hackers" are going to do it also and make us pay. BAh...Your going to code a back door I know it. To push the point they will point to the C compiler...eww but the was to prove a point right?!
Slashdot and the legions of ethical hackers need to learn that the word hacker will forever be seen in the eyes of 90% of the world as bad. Plus no one is going to believe that a bunch of people coding for free is going to not do something devious to make money, despite what you may really do. Those same 90% of the world that see hacking as a bad word also believe people don't work for free. I guess that guy that just loves to dig ditches because it is fun is shit out of luck, because really he is not scoping out anything to steal.
-4 anti-karma whore, I will enjoy the mod-down as you just can't help but to hate the truth.
Neck_of_the_Woods
#/usr/local/surf/glassy/overhead
that every 'think tank' I hear about has some particular groups best interests in mind. And those groups are usually big corporations. I guess they're the only ones that can afford to fund these think tanks and pay for their expensive reports.
After all, thinking isn't free...
This is left as an exercise for the reader.
Don't you think that if your software has a bug and you have its source released to the crowd, people that want to take advantage of this will do it?
,and a good one will, design or apply an already designed patch in hours. You don't have to wait for MS good will to serve your needs. Say that historically Linux has proved itself as a more secure option.
It never crossed my mind that free software doesn't have any bugs at all. It's naive to think none will ever be able to crack your box, even if you run the latest versions and patches.
What I do understand, is that in free software your bugs are discovered and fixed faster than in proprietary, because there are (potentially) more developers and users.
Is it a lie? Hell no. It's manipulation of information? Perhaps. If you are an employe of any entity, be it the governament or a private company, and your boss asks you "With our source there for anyone to have a look, if they find a bug, can you swear that they won't crack us"?
I wouldn't answer yes. I can't answer yes, it's impossible. It's almost impossible to have a bug-free software, since almost all software development efforts always have a reason to add more features, or to make it more compatible with new products.
But, you can give good answers to this questions. Say, for example, that Linux has fewer bugs than Windows. Say that Apache, that runs most of the servers at the whole world, has caused LESS financial damage because of bugs than almost any IIS virus, worm, or whatever.
The manipulation of information comes from this side. When some people can't address the Linux problem logically, they appeal to your emotion. They cite terrorists because that's the great evil of the moment. They touch deep into your fears, and without few 1 + 1 proof.
So, attack with the same power. Say that while it's true that terrorists might have a chance to attack one server because they have found a bug, they won't spread the damages because system administrators can
What will they do, change the past?
Buy a Nintendo DS Lite
I agree. I worked at the same plant during the late 80's and early 90's. One crash was due to the fact that a plug was not idiot proof and was plugged in upside down causing the controls to respond opposite to what they should. Another was caused by a test pilot pushing the aircraft beyond its limits.
A real problem was that some administrations wanted the project and others did not. This caused Boeing and Bell to have to produce a production version before it was really ready. Our pay "Tricky-Dick" Cheney was responsible for that.
I think if the government had decided to build the plane and accepted reasonable schedules, a lot of this misfortune could have been avoided.
If you had ever seen one operating up close, you'd probably be impressed. It's a friggin cool airplane!
I want to be alone with the sandwich
[Apologies for this being slightly off-topic, but chrissy asked for it.]
You should have gone with your initial impression. Not running this, I mean. Could you please try to stuff more leftist tripe in your next article summary?
"destabilizing, unworkable '80s missile defense"? I'm sure most people didn't think anything like that laptop sitting on your desk was possible back in the early 1900's. The technology for reasonable missile defense may be in its infancy now, but that doesn't mean it always will be.
For those who argue missile defense is just another unnecessary aggressive move on the USA's part, I'd say that defensive weapons are the least threatening because they are the ones least likely to get us involved in foreign entanglements: it's hard to send a stationary anti-ballistic missile launcher into a land war in Asia.
And for those who argue it is unnecessary because terrorists will just ship a bomb over on a cargo freighter, I'd ask you if you keep your windows unlocked over vacation just because a thief is most likely to try the front door first. If we start covering our bases now, we won't be caught with our pants down when every rogue nation in the world has a long-range ballistic missile and a wacko with his finger on the button.
As for "deathplane"...I'm not even sure I should touch that one. I'll just say that deathplanes like it are the very reason east coasters aren't speaking German and west coasters Japanese. As a libertarian, I believe it's your right to avoid compulsory service in the military, but you should at least have the decency to respect those who fought and died for your freedom.
[ home ]
Well, they're right-on about the drivers. It's great knowing that 99% of the time I can plug in my hardware and it will work with no problem on Win2K. I wish I could say the same for Linux, Solaris, etc.
Who cares what a "Think Tank" says?
Why does this organization get any press anyway? What exactly is a think tank, and what credentials does it have? I mean, is this anything more than an organization dedicated to producing biased press releases?
The organization's mission statement is completely devoid of meaning.
"Since 1988, the Alexis de tocqueville Instition has studied the spread and perfection of democracy around the world. In this, we follow the principles of Tocqueville himself... At the root, perhaps, is a populist belief in the basic goodness, perfectability, and nobility of mankind and of the human community...Operationally, adTI strives to emulate what one scholar has termed Tocqueville's 'omnicurious style of journalism."
Say what? I mean, read the whole mission statement. It says absolutely nothing using a lot of jackoff big words. I don't get what any of it has to do w/de Tocqueville, a french author who reported on US culture a hundred fifty years ago.
The fact that MS is funding this-- WHO ARE THESE GUYS?! I mean, why would anyone even CARE or bother reporting their opinion?
Sometimes I think these organizations exist soley to have their representatives on talk shows and to have a semblance of a structure from which to spew their opinion.
Yes, like geeks, we must use the tools we have.
From: 8axxx0r l33t
Subject: DESTROY PROPRIETARY SOFTWARE
Message:
First Post!
Heya! Did you know Bill Gates' ASCII code number is 666? That he is the root of all evil?
That there's an alternative to monopoly? And it's FREE (note: as in freedom AND as in beer).
ACT NOW and access Slashdot's webpage, news for normal people, stuff that matter. NO pop-ups, neither pop-unders, ROTFLMAO... Insightful and funny bewolfed comments from all over the world!
Thanks for your time,
l33t.
PS: This is not spam. I hate spams.
Buy a Nintendo DS Lite
This is gold. Frickin' gold. Quoting the Register:
Oh, we have the highest opinion of HR PHB's
And that's not all! For an extra 25% I'll make a press release to a selection of the top 25 newspapers worldwide and for an extra 50% I'll submit the story to Slashdot.
Get your reports here! Get your reports here!
-- SIGFPE
"And don't forget Kerckhoff's assumption: If the strength of your new cryptosystem relies on the fact that the attacker does not know the algorithm's inner workings, you're sunk. If you believe that keeping the algorithm's insides secret improves the security of your cryptosystem more than letting the academic community analyze it, you're wrong. And if you think that someone won't disassemble your code and reverse-engineer your algorithm, you're naive. The best algorithms we have are ones that have been made public, have been attacked by the world's best cryptographers for years, and are still unbreakable."
--Bruce Scheier; Applied Cryptography (Second Edition); page 7
This seems to apply perfectly to this latest FUD about open source software.
I don't know if this true but I read in a recent ask slashdot that microsoft will show its source code to anyone who can afford it. The source code could easily get stolen and could eventually wind up in terrorist hands. So it would be no better than open source.
Democracy Now! - your daily, uncensored, corporate-free
I'm sorry to be a party-pooper, but where's the evidence that they take money from Microsoft? The ZDNet article says nothing about that, and the talkback comments (at least the few dozen that I read) provide no evidence along those lines, either. The Register says that Richard Smith says that they take money from Microsoft, though they present no evidence along those lines. Smith's a cool guy and all, and he's got a good track record, but I'm going to need a little more than a second-hand non-credited reference to believe this.
I did a little poking around and a little Googling, but was unable to come up with any evidence on my own.
So, please, could somebody enlighten me?
-Waldo Jaquith
Google search for al qaeda and linux
Those search results speak for themselves on who helps terrorists.
The previous has been a secret message to my comrades.
There is nothing "leftist" about making a case for the fact that a missile defense system has a low probability of achieving its objectives. There are very strong arguments in favor of that position. There is also the issue that the Bush administration has had a fixation on missile defense. A case can be made that this fixation was partly responsible for a lack of focus on domestic security (see the Hart-Rudman domestic security report that was virtually ignored by the Bush administration.)
Finally, as an ex-Boeing Helicopters employee, ex-chairman of the North Dakota Libertarian Party, and U.S. Air Force veteran, I find your remarks about the author's decency out of line. Look, the ability to critique the government is one of the most important rights and responsibilities we have. And this right is steadly being eroded as we speak. As a Libertarian, you should be speaking out about that.
I want to be alone with the sandwich
This group also claimed, during Congressional probes into tobacco company fraud, that cigarettes and tobacco products were not harmful to your health. From this memo by a director of the World Health Organization:
l ous.htm
"In addition to creating front groups and contributing funds to groups that have a mission broad enough to carry some of the tobacco industry's goals, the tobacco companies also use publications by allegedly independent think tanks, such as the Virginia-based Alexis De Tocqueville Institution. This group's 1994 report "Science, Economics, and Environmental Policy: A Critical Examination" criticizes the US Environmental Protection Agency's risk assessment methods in 4 areas: environmental tobacco smoke, radon, pesticides, and hazardous cleanup. It dismisses in its first chapter the agency's risk assessment of environmental tobacco smoke, using arguments similar to the tobacco industry's "junk science" arguments described by Ong and Glantz. "
It seems Microsoft is making some strange bedfellows.
Sources:
http://www.smokefreeforhealth.org/studies/YachBia
ZDNet Post
Anyone who has a life wouldn't waste their time in a think tank. Anyone worth their salt with the brains and skills will be at a research facility building stuff, not needlessly thinking about what they might like to consider inventing, if they weren't so busy thinking.
The break throughs in the last two centuries WERE NOT made by people in "think tanks". They were created by "men of action" as Count Rugan would say from the Princess Bride. Look at men like benjamin franklin, edison, and the WOZ. Think tanks are for lazy people who would rather leach off society than get their hands dirty.
The only thing the article reveals is how little news is news today from Zdnet.
that thinkthank is very pro-republican. very, very pro republican. Read more into the site, you'll see it, all the pro defense and pro bush comments. Or maybe i have selective sight(Not being sarcastic, i may actually only see what i want to)
"Humanize war? You might as talk about humanizing hell!" -- British Admiral Jacky Fisher
"The white paper, Opening the Open Source Debate, from the Alexis de
.. closed source is NOT a "Gate" that blocks
h tml
r ticles/A600 50-2002May22.html
.gov likes it just fine ;-)
Tocqueville Institution (ADTI) will suggest that open source opens the
gates to hackers and terrorists."
My $0.02:
... First of all, there ARE NO GATES! All software contains bugs,
sometimes exploitable.
hacking... yes, exactly: nimda, codeRed, klez, iloveyou, and just about
every other "virus" reported in the last two years... blah blah blah...
...shitty analogy...
See: Publications and Accomplishments
http://www.adti.net/pubsaccomps.
They don't exactly seem to be experts in any field of computers,
networks, or security that I can tell. They did some reports for more
traditional defense related topics several years ago, but thats it. They
are however, very good at reporting on controversial issues, mainly
politcal in nature. Hmmm..
Here's a question. Of the total number of security problems reported
regarding closed vs. open source products, what percentage were
pre-emptive fixes reported by whitehats, v.s. those exploited and thus
forced to be officially reported?
My point is... a bug is a bug, but it's a hell of a lot better if it's
patched before it's ever exploited. So it's totally wrong to look purely
at # of reported security problems in product XYZ. I would expect an
open source product to have a significantly higher # of reported
problems. That's a good thing IMO, since that means there's less of them
lurking.
The bottom line: Everything has bugs. More eyes, less bugs. More secure.
Simple. Now would someone try and explain that to these anti-open-source
nitwits?
Oh, and may I point out: (already reported)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/a
http://www.nsa.gov/selinux/
It seems like our
-Mark Renouf
For those who argue missile defense is just another unnecessary aggressive move on the USA's part, I'd say that defensive weapons are the least threatening because they are the ones least likely to get us involved in foreign entanglements:
Okay, then develop your missile-shield technology and give it to every single damn country in the world - hey, it's defensive technology, isn't it? Then that wouldn't represent a security risk, but just make everyone safer, right?
The problem with missile defense is that it upsets the balance of power. Which means that, to compete, nuclear powers have to build more missiles, in the hope of reaching equilibrium again (hoping that a few might get through). Why is nuclear equilibrium important? Because mutually assured destruction is the best deterrent against the use of nuclear weapons. Who cares, if the U.S. has a missile shield, you say? Well, even if that missile shield was effective (which it is not guaranteed to be, despite the gigantic cost), there is this little thing called "the rest of the world"...
So, do you agree that the U.S. should share it's defensive, non-threatening missile defense technology with the rest of the world, then?
Reminder: find a new sig
Absolutely! I agree! We should license it to other countries!
Kinda takes the wind out of your sails, doesn't it?
[ home ]
Hey, can anyone provide any proof besides some guy's say-so that AdTI takes money from Microsoft?
I'm looking for hard evidence here, not just "it stands to reason", and "of course they do - they support Microsoft".
To celebrate the occasion of my 1000th post, I will post no more forever on Slashdot. Goodbye.
Well, lets say we believe in them, so the day they publish their study we turn off all computers running any kind of open source software :)
Gives you something to do while your elected representative is filibustering on C-SPAN.
Dyolf Knip
That license is GNU/MissleGuidance
I think it would be awesome if every nation on earth had ABMs! I would definitely feel much safer.
On the other hand, I have to keep installing bigger locks on my door, because the thieves keep building bigger picks. Definitely an upset of power there.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
Complete Bonk.
Open Source is more secure as the problems are fixed faster than closed source, proprietary systems.
All software, closed and open have vulnerabilities.
However, you can't PROACTIVELY peer review and fix closed proprietary software continuously, unlike open source software.
Since you cannot proactively secure closed software, who in God's name would believe such a completely ludicrous report?
God help us ALL if anyone takes those sorts of arguments and so called "studies" seriously.
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
It isn't being called a deathplane because it's been used to drop napalm on villagers or something. It's notorious for killing test pilots. A couple of years ago it seemed like there was a story every month or two about an Osprey crash. Some background can be had here:
http://www.verticraft.com/v22_crashes.htm
Suppose they're right, and OpenSource is easier to hack. Doesn't fixing the bugs count? Would you rather wait for MS to admit the bug, fix the bug, release the fix, etc. or let all the open source crowd fix it in an hour?
;-)
(i submitted this story monday morning, and it was rejected....oh well
I mean, come on!
This is like being surprised that the Tolly Group gave a good report to a product.
When you pay for a review or analysis, you get exactly what you want. This is no different than the Mindcraft "study" that was biased.
When a reputable group/publication comes out with an unbiased study that says these same things then you should get upset. Until then, it's all smoke and mirrors, FUD and MUD.
Nothing to see here.
I don't have a solution, but I certainly admire the problem.
This story just might wind up biting Microsoft in the ass; if the rest of the sharks in the press start smelling blood in the water.
- Alexis de Tocqueville
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
The problem with missile defense is that it upsets the balance of power.
You want to bring Balance to the Force?
If it was going to cost me three hundred billion dollars to lock my windows, I would do just that. Especially if I realized that any idiot would be able to trivially defeat the locked-windows 'system' directly as well (i.e. throw a rock, or a few dozen decoy missiles).
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
Not at all. I would actually support missile defense if it was a global effort to make sure that no one can use ICBMs.
Oh, and if it actually worked, instead of being just another corporate welfare check for the military industry.
Reminder: find a new sig
The missle shield was certanly destablizing, it never helped us in any treaty with another super power, not even as a negotiating gambit. [etc.]
Seems to me it worked perfectly.
The Soviet Union collapsed, ending half a century of Cold War. The surviving USSR government officials said the major factor was SDI. Not a single nuclear bomb exploded on or above the soil of the US, its possessions, or its allies (including all the signatories to the non-proliferation treaty). And it was so powerful we didn't even have to actually DEPLOY it!
Lets see your smart bomb or a START-XVI treaty beat THAT!
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Mutually Assured Destruction was "stable" only as far as retaliatory destruction was really assured. A limited missile defense system makes it impossible for your opponent to be sure that a first strike of theirs will destroy all of your missiles, and so makes MAD more stable, not less.
As far as wheether SDI was destabilizing, reagan administration membrs were pretty clear that was the point of the things, as was teh sr-71 soviet overflights, etc, so I don't see what your problem is. Also, if you think that SDI was or is workable, you don't understand what icbm missiles are. Or mirv warheads. If one warhead in a hundred get through from the kind of attack SDI and ABM are designed for, we're toast.
What's interesting to me is that you assume I'm a leftist when it comes to military matters, as I'm clearly not.
chrisd
Co-Editor, Open Sources
Open Source Program Manager, Google, Inc.
The three biggest lies redux,
smoking is good for you, windoze is secure, the check is in the mail
Comment removed based on user account deletion
This is more than just script kiddies. Open source is good against script kiddies. That may simply be its low radar profile more than anything, but it could be the open source community finding bugs as well.
But when people are interested in more than general vandalism, it becomes a different story. If I need to hack something that is open source, I check out the source, and look for buffer overruns and what not. It's hard for the very popular stuff, but for most programs, a bug is easy to find. And even for the more popular stuff, there are always holes to be found if you expend enough effort looking.
For very popular closed source programs, the first thing to try is the online community. Someone somewhere has something. For companies like Microsoft with poor security reputations, and lots of people trying to hack them, there is actually a lot.
But if you have to figure out a bug yourself, it's time for buffer overflow testing, reverse engineering with a hex editor, and what not.
So which is harder?
I'd say hacking into popular open source programs is the hardest. However, hacking into unpopular open source programs is the easiest. There is a range of security considerations, and it is always possible for evil people to find your vulnerabilities if they have enough resources.
i seem to recall the 9/11 dudes communicating with hotmail accounts on windows machines.
wasn't this a tragedy that closed source could have prevented?
This is one key point I haven't seen brought up yet. In open-source projects, the weaknesses and strengths are well-known and allows for well educated implementation decisions - less risk. With closed-source operations, the weaknesses of the software are known by less people which makes those weaknesses a bit stronger because of the "security by obscurity", but there lies the greatest weakness - the additional security is dependent on people. The people that implement it, develop it, maintain it. The people that are 1) not employed by government (likely a greater security risk) 2) building the software for money (possibly more willing to accept a bribe). Depending on the knowledge known by the person bribed, the exploit could extremely deadly and unpredictable the consequences - more risk.
Well let's see. Bill Gates started Microsoft with Paul Allen who owns the Portland Trail Blazers. Rasheed Wallace is a power forward for the Trail Blazers. Wallace played basketball at the University of North Carolina where Michael Jordan won a national championship his junior year before taking on the NBA himself. Jordan starred in Space Jam with Bill Murray who had an uncredited cameo in "She's Having a Baby" starring...Kevin Bacon.
This just makes me sick. I've read Alexis de Toqueville's Democracy in America several times, it's one of my favorite books. He considered unchecked capitalism a serious threat to participatory democracy. How vile for an organization to sully his name with drivel like this report.
The operating system of choice for terrorists worldwide appears to be Microsoft Windows .
All the captured computers from the taliban and terrorist cells are using Microsoft Windows
So using the same "logic" as the e Alexis de Tocqueville Institution, Microsoft Windows is directly responsible for the events of 9/11.
The reason I said that we weren't going to run this story was a sort of explanation as to why you are seeing a week old story. The demand in the submission queue was there early, but we did think it was a blatant troll. In the end we decided to run it because the /. readership wanted it so badly.
I don't think it is censorship to not post every link submitted to us. We do get 400+ a day, and before you bring up an ope nsubmission queue, pleae note that has been addressed.
chrisd
Co-Editor, Open Sources
Open Source Program Manager, Google, Inc.
I meant the first sentence to read: Well, I'd agree if slashdot was analogous to the front section of the paper instead of the opinion section.
Co-Editor, Open Sources
Open Source Program Manager, Google, Inc.
I personally don't like posting microsoft stories much, and this one kind of qualified as that too. I mean, that's part of what slashdot is about, so I do post them, but I don't like to post the exchange bug of the week, or the outrageous steve ballmer comment of the month, whatever.
So maybe that clears things up.
chrisd
Co-Editor, Open Sources
Open Source Program Manager, Google, Inc.
Looks more like the Tomás de Torquemada Institution, if you ask me.
-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.
Hey Homer, the NSA doesn't release its own crypto because it believes in security through obscurity.
It doesn't release them because the other guys could use the same crypto. And this violates the NSA charter because either 1) they know how to crack the code, but others could figure that out also and thus they've failed to protect US interests, or 2) they don't know how to crack the code, so they've aided others to work against US interests.
Either way, they'll going to catch a lot of heat if they provide information, much less if they remain silent (modulo their responsibilities). That's a no-brainer.
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
Actions speak louder than words.
Create a worm or virus which tells people that they're helpless because of M$.
Have one of those popping up lound and clear on twenty million screens and the word on closed source wil become loud and heard.
Closed source is pointless.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
I'll bet that ballistics testing is part of the test program. It is for the F-22. They took an airframe and shot it with everything they could to see how it would react.
The V-22 engines are also cross linked so that if one engine fails, the other will drive both rotors/propellers. Most military hardware is tested and designed to survive in combat. All of the armies helicopters are designed to fly without oil or hydraulic pressure for at least a short distance.
"If it ain't broke don't mess with it."
So why aren't we using horses and sailing ships? It's called technological advancement. I'll bet you didn't post that comment on an Apple IIe.
I wonder if he took into account the difference between remotely exploitable and locally explotable vulnerability?
I also wonder if he took into consideration the Window of Exposure between the discovery of the vulnerability and the release of the patch?
See Closing the Window of Exposure by Bruce Schneier , the security section of David Wheeler's "Why Open Source Software / Free Software (OSS/FS)? Look at the Numbers! and also again visit the disproportionately high number of open vulnerabilities in its Internet Explorer.
It sounds to me like the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution is using the Chewbacca Defense!
You're using her as bait, Master!
I have NO IDEA where to start parsing your sig, but I know thats the last time I run a strange piece of bash again. My uptime, shattered!
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
I'm no MCSD, MCSE, or MCDBA (yet!), but I'm very involved in the MS developer community - in particular the .NET community. I go to the Redmond campus at least once a month and know quite a few people that work there. What's interesting is most "MS Tech Geeks" aren't generally anti-OSS and many actually have experience with Linux and other OS's. Sure, there's also a large group that's feeds off of MS dogma but the rest aren't really all that bad. There really are a lot of smart people that either work for MS or primarily work with MS technology that get quite frustrated atMS's marketing FUD. We're all educated (in theory) enough to make our own decisions based on the MERIT OF THE TECHNOLOGY. We don't need restrictive licenses, stupid marketing FUD, or silly gimicks like 100 page color brochures sent to our houses every day. Marketing and PR types can make the image of a company, however, they generally break the image of a company in the eyes of techies which employ simple FUD avoidance algorithms.
I have certain critiques about OSS, moreso GPL's based licenses and less so BSD based licenses, but I'm not about to agree to this "OSS will increase terrorism" BS. Come on MS (et all), STOP TREATING US LIKE IDIOTS!
There is no longer anything that can be done with computers that is nontrivial and clearly legal. -- Paul Phillips
You can compare the software to a car. With closed source, you have a car with the bonnet welded shut. It's hard to steal the car, because it's hard to get under the bonnet to hotwire it. Only the manufacturer can get in.
However, it's probably a better idea not to weld the bonnet shut. If you can get the bonnet open then you can fit a car alarm and immobiliser.
Slashdot is like a giant op-ed piece ...
-Sean
Fear. Uncertainty. Doubt.
I'll probably be modded down by the editors for saying this but that is exactly what this article is.
It doesn't argue against the actual conclusion or the logic used (granted that's kinda hard to do for a study that hasn't been released yet). Instead, there are the baseless allegations about the motivations (no evidence that they actually took money from Microsoft) and completely irrelevant links to other studies which have nothing to do with the subject at hand.
Mmmm.. Donuts
A problem is that nowadays pretty much all computer owners are admins. With always on connections like DSL, everybody's at risk.
And since good security is pretty hard to understand and implement properly because it involves so many issues, most people really don't even have time for it. I personally have shut down all the services in my system, and I believe that's what 90% of all home users should do. I wonder why no distro I've seen offers to do this when installing. It would help eliminate a lot of problems.
If I had to guess without consulting documentation, I'd say:
:(){ #define function ':' which takes no arguments
:|:& # call ':' and pipe its output into
.sigs on slashdot :) that has &'s in it. That function would be easier to stop (using Ctrl-Z or Ctrl-C) if it didn't use & (which disconnects the keyboard from the program's stdin/stdout).
# another running copy of itself, running
# this in the background
}; #end of function
: #call our function
More readably: function destroy () { destroy | destroy & }; destroy
Note that each call to : will recursively expand into no fewer than two calls, both which again invoke two new copies, so it expands very quickly. Since you probably have no shell restrictions by default, it did the same thing a fork bomb would: fill your process table instantly and consume all your memory and processor time.
If you use bash (or probably any bash-like shell), you may have ulimit available. With ulimit's -u switch, you can set how many processes you may start and probably avoid the situation you described. I believe there are similar ways to achieve this in the kernel (probably by recompiling), but I'm not familiar enough to tell you how.
As a general rule, don't run suspicious code (e.g., code found in
I hope this post has been informative enough to outweigh its off-topic nature.
Did MS Pay for Open-Source Scare?
Quote:
A Microsoft spokesman confirmed that Microsoft provides funding to the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution.
"We support a diverse array of public policy organizations with which we share a common interest or public policy agenda such as the de Tocqueville Institution," the spokesman wrote in an e-mail.
The surgeon general has determined that Windows may be hazardous to your wallet.
Because they have the source for their Security Enhanced Linux available for download. We'd better tell them that security through obscurity is much more efficient, eh? ;-)
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
It was sucessful because they didn't nuke us???
...
...
... and now we live in media induced fear someone will [nuke or germ] us ...
Precicely.
After the climax of WW II, when the world found out a nuke was more than "just a bigger bomb", the game changed.
Up until then it had been progressively bigger wars. Now it was "Let's see if we can avoid a war without surrendering."
So the West came up with the doctrine of "Mutual Assured Destruction" (MAD - i.e. You'd be mad to set off the first nuke. And US presidents had to put on a show of being just crazy enough to use them, or it wouldn't work.) But that's just a stalemate, no "progress" pushing your agenda.
So the East came up with the "Cold War" - with anti-West propaganda and brushfire wars in "domino" countries. (Salami slicing: Pick off the little guys one by one, then the middle-size guys, until the big guy is alone against the world. Cook the Frog: Never create a "Shelling Point" were the chip is knocked off the big guy's shoulder.)
So the West came up with the arms race: "We've got more money so we can outbuid you. You make a missile, we make an anti-missile-missile." (And Rocky and Bullwinkle satarize it with the anti-anti-[pause]-missile-missile-missile.)
And this went on for HALF A CENTURY. Before that it was a major war every generation, with all the "best" weapons in the arsenal in use. Now it was a declining series of "limited wars", with the biggest bombs very carefully NOT used.
Nukes really had made "total war" obsolete. Three war cycles came and went with no World War Three. And it all worked because expensive weapons were built with the intent that they NOT be used, because they'd be too devastating if they were.
There were abortive attempts to limit the proliferation and avoid "destabilizing" situations, in the form of an anti-missile ban and arms reduction treaties. But "stable" meant the Cold War continued to bleed both sides, and one side disarming too fast might mean the War to End All Humanity. Finally Regan abandoned such attempts and went flat-out for better armor, when the USSR couldn't afford to stay even. And the Soviet Union folded.
There was a LOT more to it than that. Like computers and networks for instance. (Restrict communication Soviet style and you slow progress. Have progress in computers and networking and you get communication you can't ban. Try to selectively free your people's communication and you discover that you can't suppress just some. Infrmation wants to be free because PEOPLE want to be free.)
But at the core, preventing nuclear war was done with weapons that worked by NOT being used; weapons that thus created their effects by MAYBE being able to work, so you couldn't risk them actually being used against you.
So, yes, SDI was successfull because they didn't nuke us. The US won the arms race but we ALL won the war.
Get real
Why get real when I can win with virtual weapons? B-)
Nuclear weapons are like smallpox...America is the only country to have ever used them against someone else
I see the public schools have neglected your education when it comes to germ warfare. For starters look at the history of the European dark ages - with diseased animal carcases being catapulted over fortress walls or dropped in wells and rivers during sieges.
Lived that way for over 50 years already - but with the spectre of a massive, simultaneous attack on everything that might be a target (which means essentially everything). One or two suitcase nukes or tactical-shells taking out one city or one dam? ONE plague released in a few spots, using most like non-engineered organisims, rather than a dozen lab-frankenbugs sprayed over a continent simultaneously? Chicken feed. The damage and death is vanishingly small compared to hurricanes and tornadoes, earthquakes, traffic accidents, clogged-arteries, and cancer.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
"A Microsoft spokesman confirmed that Microsoft provides funding to the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution."
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
Besides the question what sort of software is more secure, what about the terrorists? It has often been stated that they might try to attack the Internet or computers in general or certain computers in particular. But are the Internet and computers really an attractive target for terrorists? What are terrorist trying to achieve, actually, how do they think about it, why do they still prefer suicide bombing over high-tech attacks? I don't have answers, but those constructing a connection between terrorism and the open/closed source issue do not have them either. They don't even ask the right question.
The truth might turn out to be that terrorist just aren't interested in attacks nobody except a few geeks would notice or understand.
http://erichsieht.wordpress.com/category/english/
These are the same people who say smoking is good for you.
Er, no. That is not what your quote says.
Criticizing risk assessment methods is not the same as saying "smoking is good for you".
Standard disclaimers: I don't smoke, and I prefer open source software, when I can use it. But I detest mindless arguments.
Let's just say that spending billions and billions on a faulty system designed to ward against manufactured (and highly improbable) threats while upsetting the nuclear balance just so that some money can be injected into the pentagon system seems like a rather stupid thing to do.
The truth is, before 9/11 the missile defense project was going nowhere. Since then, as America has abandoned rational thinking in matters of defense, it has come back with a vengeance, even though it wouldn't have prevented that awful tragedy, nor will it protect against similar attacks (more probable than missile attacks by a couple order of magnitudes) in the future.
It's quite funny to read about those things in the american media: the U.S. won't spend billions on changing energy consumption habits in order to face a threat (global warming) that - even though it's not 100% proven - has been recognized by its own government as real. But it's more than ready to spend those billions on a missile defense system that has yet to prove to be effective against a threat that most military analysts regard as highly improbable at best!
Actually, Bush and co. don't care if the missile defense system is effective or not, because it is not designed to be used - they know no country in its right mind (even schizoidal North Korea) would attack the U.S. with nuclear missile, there's just too much to lose. And yet lots of intelligent, educated people just gobble it up, it seems...ah, such is the power of propaganda.
Reminder: find a new sig
Many of the headlines are quite revealing about their intentions. Many are about the importance of MCSE:
- Inc. 500 Shops Value Certification Most (MCSE vs college degrees)
- Familiarity Breeds Respect
- Technology Trends: Program Provides Information For New Age
- The Impact of Technology Training Programs Case Study: MCSE Training
And then there are numerous anti-trust criticism articles:"Recruiters tend to hire MCSEs just as often, if not more so, than those with a four-year college degree."
"Eighty-seven percent of human resource managers surveyed believed that MCSE's are equally or more successful than college students."
Etc. Also lots of articles about the precious intellectual property rights, although not specifically in relation to Microsloth.
It was flamebait...
You're not supposed to question Linux, it's unpatriotic!
What? There are institutions in Washington D.C. that put forward only a certain viewpoint? Jesus, why are people surprised at this? And before I hear any swill about them all being tools of conservatives and business, there are liberal leaning think tanks as well (the Brookings Institution, the Center for Science and the Public Interest, etc). There are good institutes and bad on both sides. Some are nothing more than paid hacks, but some of the best minds in the world work for these institutes. For every De Toquville institute, you're going to have a Public Citizen type organization to oppose it.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
"The American republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public's money."
"How many light bulbs does it take to change a person?" --BMcC-->
I agree with you in part (even though your lack of manners, however typical of trolls, is a sure sign that I shouldn't bother answering to your post). To be sure, the hijacking a plane - even an old-fashioned one where the primary goal is to hold hostages or simply escape a country - is probably going to become a thing of the past. As you correctly state, passengers are no longer going to risk ending up in a building. I myself have taken the plane a couple of times since 9/11, and was ready to spring into action if something happened - hey, if you're going to die anyway, might as well try to do something about it! However, that does not rule out every possible use of planes (even smaller ones) against facilities. Nor does it rule out truck bombs, dirty bombs (with radioactive material), bioterrorism (especially if it's domestic, as was the case with anthrax...hey, remember anthrax? It used to be news until they found out it probably came from a U.S. Army lab...)
The point is, low-tech terrorist attacks are much more likely to happen again than some third world nation lobbing nuclear missiles at the U.S. Realistically, the chance of such a nuclear attack is very slim to none - and there's no guarantee a missile defence system would work to ward off such an attack anyway. All in all, it seems an awful lot of money to deal with a highly improbable threat...
Reminder: find a new sig
Well, I tried to troll for imaginary karma (not pretend karma, but rather the sign you get when sqrooting negatives numbers) but have never been successful. Personally, I would love to see a "Incomprehensible, i1" up there, but lately I've starting losing faith in the prospect.
It's not about estimates, it's about understanding geopolitics and reading something else than Newsweek once in a while...Do you even understand the principle of strategic nuclear weapons? It doesn't matter if North Korea has nuclear missiles, because they CAN'T USE THEM AGAINST THE U.S. If they did, they would be completely vaporized. Now, North Koreans may be brainwashed, but their leader is actually an intelligent and reasonable (if cruel, despotic and tyrannical) man. He knows that's a no-win situation, and nothing suggest that he's particularly keen on losing all the privileges that come with the job having his country eradicated. The threat of "rogue nations" using nuclear weapons against the U.S. is just a lure designed by the military industry to keep those govt. dollars pouring in while the rest of the economy teeters on the brink of recession. Get a damn clue!
Reminder: find a new sig
hacking is a cleaver way to solve a problem
I like problems that can be solved by hacking with a cleaver.
--
E_NOSIG
- from Gartner
- from DH Brown
(I had tried to post this yesterday, but for some reason none of the CGIs at slashdot were working. Probably some uber-1337 preteen h4x0r thought that DoSing slashdot would help him reach puberty...)"Anything is better than IE, and you can quote me on that." -- Wil Wheaton.
We weren't going to run this, but there were a lot of submissions, so ...
... being the media whores we are, got in as many trolling jabs as we could when we posted it.
Why subscribe indeed?
I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
Why does Slashdot even make the claim any more? I'm notice less and less factually based news here. It's a soapbox and a spotlight where people can stand up and rant under the guise of news. You just can't take this site seriously anymore. I mean really... "I just won't talk about the subject, I'll tell you my politcial and social-economic views all the while I clue you in as to why i became an evil genius in the first place, not to mention why you're a moron for thinking otherwise"
"Latest IE Hole Lets Gopher Root You" -Good article. Concise, to the point and leaving the rants to the users forums. Unless it's an editorial, that's the way it ought to be. Time for a slogan change: Rants for nerds. Opinions that have no bearing on real life whatsoever. And if you come on a good day, maybe some stuff that might matter.
News: 1a : a report of recent events b : previously unknown information 2a : material reported in a newspaper or news periodical or on a newscast b : matter that is newsworthy
Editorial : a newspaper or magazine article that gives the opinions of the editors or publishers; also : an expression of opinion that resembles such an article.
Rant 1: to talk in a noisy, excited, or declamatory manner 2: to scold vehemently.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Ballistic missile defense is absolutely needed, we're already far beyond the "was SDI a good idea?" phase.
Remember, the US has already been attacked with ballistic missiles (the Scud attacks during the Gulf war). Our defenses didn't do all that well.
We have the ability to create defenses that will work. The kinetic energy interceptors developed by SDI worked. The software to run them worked.
Lastly, if you think 9-11 was bad, imagine an ICBM attack on Manhatten. Even with conventional high-explosive warheads, it would be devastating. And our nuclear arsenal might not be a deterrant, because we would almost certainly not return a non-WMD attack with a nuclear one (pesky ethics).
Jon Acheson
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.
ahhahaha, point taken. I stand corrected.
Neck_of_the_Woods
#/usr/local/surf/glassy/overhead
There needs to be some sort of an IQ test before people are allowed to moderate.: )
There is. You have to be able to type "slashdot.org" into your browser. It's an IQ test, just not an IQ test for high intelligence.
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
Acutally, no, time and time again bullshit arguments were rolled out against SDI and given tons of press.
"Put mirrors on the outside of the missiles." Despite the fact that SDI was developing kinetic interceptors, not lasers. Not that mirrors will stop a laser, mind you.
"Spin the missiles." And watch them rip themselves to shreds: ICBMs are actually fairly fragile. They're not built to spin like that. It's like spinning a volleyball to protect it from a rifle bullet.
"Launch dummy warheads." When the enemy can already barely afford the missiles to launch real warheads, they're supposed to buy three times as many so they can launch dummies? Right. And inflatable dummies CAN be detected (particle beams make good mass detectors, and inflatable dummies don't fly properly within the atmosphere). Dummies the same weight as the real warheads only reduce the number of warheads you can launch. It's like sending out a bomber full of fake bombs. Nobody would do that.
"Launch more missiles." Firstly, this is an inherent admission that the system works against the number of missiles you have now. Secondly, can you afford to BUY more missiles? And how many years will it delay your plans to attack? Do your missiles cost more than the additional defenses to shoot them down?
"Make new missiles that can avoid the countermeasures." If you have to replace your missile fleet to overcome the defense, the defense obviously worked. You can try again next generation, but missile defense won't be sitting still either.
"We don't need missile defense." We have already been attacked by ballistic missiles (the Scuds in the Gulf war). The need IS proven.
When these arguments were inevitably shown to be flawed, there was never any press, though. Sad, really.
Jon Acheson
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.
It's a real shame that this gun-for-hire PR agency adorned itself with the glorious name of Alexis de Tocqueville, who couldn't stand double standards and intellectual dishonesty.
That said, just because despicable people breath does not mean you should not. Whatever these PR whores say, the V-22 is a great concept. Think of it: a plane taking off like a helicopter. It has all the advantages of a regular plane, especially the speed (much faster than a chopper), and it can land vertically.
Of course, it's quite some drain on the ol' budget. I remember a joke in 1989 that "22" in the name refered to the number of billions it had cost so much... I shudder at the thought of the total Osprey program cost nowadays. This thing has been in design and debug forever.
The reassuring thing is that the cause of the most recent crash was pretty mundane: a hydraulic line rubbing against a part each time the Osprey changed phase (pivoting its planes) and finally breaking. It's not like the design is fundamentally wrong.
I know little about the military deployment of the V-22, but I do know one thing: The V-22 is an ideal machine for all the small regional airlines who dream of having a turboprop plane land a handfull of commuters and businessmen in the heart of congested downtowns that are only serviced by ruinous choppers right now.
So, after all these years, we can hope that a civilian version will emerge, all paid by the Pentagone, and that the Japanese and European markets will order hundreds of V-22. Take off in downtown Paris, land in the London City? Heck, I know people who would gladly pay a fortune to avoid the torturous commuting La Defense-Orly-Heathrow-London. Not to mention the stinking tube or the bad-tempered taxi drivers. The market is huge.
Of course, Libertarians object that giving tax money to a private company (Boeing) for building a civilian plane is immoral. But it would not be the first time: The very successful 707 was developed as a military project.
So don't call the V-22 a bad name, chances are you'll ride it someday in 2010 when your customers want you to debug their Apache 6.1 config...
--
Mad science! Robots! Underwear! Cute girls! Full comic online! http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/
The same day I post this they find a buffer overflow in BIND 9...
I suppose you could
Seems kinda self-condradictory though
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
Surprise surprise, one says 'the sky is blue' and the other says 'the sky is yellow', for rather understandable reasons: they want to sell their paint. They each have an equal right to claim what they want, as far as that goes, subject to government limitations on what you're allowed to sell as 'sky-colored backdrop paint'. They contradict each other completely, in doing so.
Nothing about this situation implies that the sky is actually green (that being a compromise between the two claims).
Nothing about the Think Tank Troll situation implies that closed-source software is more secure than OSS, free inquiry or not- and the fact that they're preparing to say so, at length, does not make it any more true than 'the sky is yellow', and it does not mean the truth is somewhere in the middle, like 'the sky is green'.
And... want to take bets that Microsoft didn't pay for this report? You could get very interesting odds, because it is enormously probable that it is a corporate 'sock puppet' and nothing more, so the odds that Microsoft outright commissioned a report to say this and this and that are overwhelming. What odds do you figure?
Has its deployment been delayed? Sure. Have there been mistakes both from the engineering side and political side? Of course. Is it the only aircraft to ever deal with these issues? Hell no. If you want to look at a scandal, try the A-12 project. If you want to look at crashes of test flights, consider the B-2.
The Osprey got more press because it is a more "open" project, since it lacks the stealth characteristics of the B-2 which are mostly classified. Furthermore, the major crash that was reported happened to be with an Osprey that was carrying not just the pilot, but 19 Marines.
But look at the chopper the Osprey will replace. Crashes happen all the time, not just to newly designed aircraft. As the CH-46 ages, it will become more and more accident prone.
Also consider that 3 Marine officers were found to have falsified maintenance reports on Ospreys that were under their command. Failure to maintain any plane could cause problems.
So, frankly, for you to call the Osprey a "fatally flawed" plane, is plain FUD. Aircraft crash - that's a fact of life. The goal of engineers is to build them to a standard that minimizes accidents due to mechanical failure. Designs can be improved and corrected if there are problems (although the history of Osprey crashes suggests other factors were responsible).
Before the B-2 was in production use, the naysayers were claiming the same type of thing as you are about the Osprey. Yet now we have a functional aircraft which proved itself to be very capable in many bombing runs. Keeping the old planes is not an option indefinitely: you must stay ahead of the technology curve to maintain an effective military.
SEAL
No one to bribe? These people work for peanuts (or free) in their spare time. I know it's a labor of love, but open source is ripe for bribery.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Well, the way things were going, about 1965 or so the USSR might well have blown us to hell with a half-billion rubles worth of nukes, then duked it out with Red China about 1980 over who would run the remains of the world.
Maybe we could have [done lots of good stuff with the money instead].
The USSR didn't mind polluting a large chunk of their own territory to make plutonium. Chernobyl was just the LAST and worst spill (that we know of). And vaporizing one operating power reactor is a really close approximation to one all-out nuclear war's fallout. But there were plenty of others. (Like the chemical reaction that boiled a major fraction of a Soviet waste dump. The highways through a big chunk of Siberia are still "no stopping zones" due to that one.)
Three Mile Island, on the other hand, was just a little bit of radioactive steam. The atmospheric tests and the military reactor oopsies in the US were larger, but a drop in the bucket compared to either of the USSR incidents above.
Yes the Hanford experiment was cold-blooded genocide. So tell me about it. My wife is one of the "marginal population" they experimented on while she was still in the womb - born in the reservation downwind of the deliberate release. And she has the birth defects, thyroid disease, and occasional propaganda mail about how minor it was (which somehow keeps showing up with updated mailing addresses) to prove it. Seems that experiment was STILL GOING ON, with the victims' health being monitored, at least through the fall of the USSR.
But that sort of expenditure and NAZI-style human experimentation is why it was so important to get the cold war STOPPED. Another win for SDI.
After all, after you've got enough to destroy the world three times over, isn't the rest a bit of a waste?
"Overkill" is misunderstood, and is NOT what you are apparently assuming. Consider this:
One bomb of X kilotons, successfully exploded over a target, kills 1/N of your enemy's population. So you need N such bombs to kill all of 'em, right?
Wrong, for two reasons:
1 That 1/N assumes a "good" target - like the concentrated population and infrastructure of an industrial city. After your first 5 or so bombs blow up all the big industrial centers, your next 100 or so have to go after the little industrial centers. It takes maybe K*N to get 'em all. "Overkill" of K.
2 But these things are going in on bombers (that are being shot at) and missiles (that may fail, and may also be shot at - the USSR did deploy anti-missiles despite the treaties, and were actually allowed one by the treaties). If you don't want to shoot first you fired your missiles (and gave "GO" to your planes and subs) AFTER they shot at 'em - maybe after the bombs landed, maybe yours are in flight while theirs are going BANG. So only one in J gets through. To hit them all you need at least J*K "overkill". Actually you need more - because bomb loss is a statistical process. If you only sent J*K*N bombs some targets would get hit twice and some missed. So you need "overkill" beyond J*K to be sure you level everything you intended to level.
So "overkill" doesn't mean "kill 'em I*J*K times". "overkill" means "bomb each target I*J times, throwing I*J*K times as much stuff as you'd need if they were all just like the easiest one and everything worked perfectly, and PRAY that every target gets hit at least once." If I*J*K happens to be larger than 2 * (World Population / Soviet Population), that does NOT mean you have enough bombs to kill everybody in the world twice.
We've threatened to use nukes at least half a dozen times in the last half century (including the Berlin blockade), we've shown we can't abide by the rules of the rest of civilization, and _you_ feel secure?
YO! DUDE! During the wind-down of WW II into the Cold War we announced that we'd defend West Germany (including West Berlin) by whatever means necessary. We made treaties that REQUIRE us to use nukes to defend certain allies, not just ourselves, from certain kinds of attack. We've announced a policy of responding to government-launced nuclear, chemical, or biological attacks, on our allies and on signatories of the non-proliferation agreement, with nuclear retaliation. (You don't need to develop your own bombs - you can use ours.) And we announced that we would treat siting nuclear missiles in the Americas aimed at the US as an act of war.
Those ARE the "rules of civilization". We wrote 'em. Rent a clue!
("We" includes the rest of the winners of WW II. And the surviving losers as well.)
"As I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death I will fear no evil. For I am the MEANEST son-of-a-bitch in the Valley!" If you TRY to kill me, your whole country will glow for centuries, with nothing left alive but cocroaches and algae. And everybody who might try a classic nuclear, chemical, or biological first-strike KNOWS it. THAT's why I sleep peacefully at night.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way