Man Reportedly Jailed for Using Lynx

wezzul writes "A Londoner made a tsunami-relief donation using Lynx on Sun's Solaris operating system. The site operator decided that this 'unusual' event in the system log indicated a hack attempt, and the police broke down the donor's door and arrested him." Honestly, though, aside from a BBC article about a tsunami fund hacking probe that doesn't mention user agents there's little to corroborate this. Hopefully Lynx users need not worry too much yet.

Comments

Stupidest mod ever

[mirko]

That idiot doesn't know that besides Lynx, there is also Links.

Parent is not offtopic !

Re:governments are funny.

[James Fryer]

If someone makes a statement to the police, that is evidence, and they can arrest on the strength of it (in the UK at least).

Re:I had to use Lynx once

[wertarbyte]

You are right, (e)links is much better! :-) (Also support mouse control through SSH with PuTTY)

Re:https?

[Dicky]

Lynx has (optionally) supported https for many years now - I used to use it for my online banking (one of the reasons I'm impressed by my bank's service - it uses javascript and stuff, but works fine without it) before I caught this nasty GUI bug...

Re:Where's the buggy-eyed smily when you need it?

[Drantin]

You've heard stories of the infamous $2 bills still floating around the US, haven't you?

Re:Lynx & https

[Anthony]

Lynx has supported https for years. [adavid@adavid work]$ lynx --version Lynx Version 2.8.4rel.1 (17 Jul 2001) libwww-FM 2.14, SSL-MM 1.4.1, OpenSSL 0.9.6 Built on linux-gnu Mar 19 2003 15:33:59 Copyrights held by the University of Kansas, CERN, and other contributors. Distributed under the GNU General Public License. See http://lynx.browser.org/ and the online help for more information. See http://www.moxienet.com/lynx/ for information about SSL for Lynx. See http://www.openssl.org/ for information about OpenSSL.

Re:Lynx & https

[Anthony]

Darn - where did that preview button go? :(

Lynx has supported https for years.

[adavid@adavid work]$ lynx --version
Lynx Version 2.8.4rel.1 (17 Jul 2001)
libwww-FM 2.14, SSL-MM 1.4.1, OpenSSL 0.9.6
Built on linux-gnu Mar 19 2003 15:33:59

Copyrights held by the University of Kansas, CERN, and other contributors.
Distributed under the GNU General Public License.
See http://lynx.browser.org/ and the online help for more information.

See http://www.moxienet.com/lynx/ for information about SSL for Lynx.
See http://www.openssl.org/ for information about OpenSSL.

Re:Hope he gets the sysadmin locked up

[Eivind]

It's a matter of definition I guess. The idea is that you get two different forms of compensation. First you get compensated what you've "lost" in real cash. This typically means something like your salary for the time you where imprisoned minus what you saved by having the state give you food and a bed.

Then there's compensation for the suffering of being imprisoned. i.e. the fact that being in prison is less desireable than being a free person, even if you get the same cash for it.

A person wrongfully imprisoned in the UK gets compensated for this from the state. Yeah, he gets compensated a tiny bit less than he would be if he'd had to buy his own food in jail. If "the compensation is smaller than it'd otherwise be" is what you mean by "pay" then I guess he does pay for being in prison.

But that's a bit like saying if I get paid a bit less from my employer because I have free lunch at work (i.e. the value of the lunch is subtracted from my salary) then I *pay* to work for my employer. The situation really is quite parallell. I get compensation for being at work. This compensation is a bit smaller because I also had a benefit at work (i.e. food). Similarily you get compensated for being wrongfully imprisoned, said compensation gets a bit smaller because you also had benefits in prison (i.e. food)

He doesn't pay for being imprisoned -- on the contrary he *gets* paid for being wrongfully imprisoned. He does however pay for food.

Re:Well I think JWZ put it best for Lynx users.

[slavemowgli]

At the risk of being modded as flamebait, that just shows again that jwz is an idiot.

Yeah, he did some cool stuff like xscreensaver, but when you actually talk to him, you'll find that he's really just a hateful idiot who will insult you simply for being what you are - not a bit better than any racist, sexist or Rush Limbaugh.

I just had to say that. :)

Corrections

[ozbird]

From the article, he was arrested and released i.e. bailed - not "jailed".

If he hadn't been released, he would have been remanded in custody - still not "jailed".

If he was point on trial and convicted, he would have been gaoled - did I mention not "jailed"?

Re:Where's the buggy-eyed smily when you need it?

[ray-auch]

In the UK (and probably accross the EU) large cash transactions are unusual partly because they already come under the money-laundering regulations.

See quote below (from here).

Generally, dealers must make a "suspicious activity report" to NCIS on any cash transaction of more than 15,000 euros (about £10,000) - although smaller transactions must also be reported if they arouse any suspicions.

Re:Where's the buggy-eyed smily when you need it?

[rpjs]

Although its legal throughout the UK

Um, not exactly. According to this Wikipedia article Scottish banknotes aren't even legal tender in Scotland!

"Legal tender" is a bit of misleading concept though in that it only really applies to the settlement of debts - i.e if you owe somebody and pay them in legal tender they have to accept that payment, but they don't have to accept payment by other means. It's worth noting that buying something in a shop does not constitute settling a debt as you pay before you receive legal title to the goods, so "legal tender" does not apply.

Ultimately you can pay for anything with anything if the other party agrees. Shops in Scotland will of course accept Scottish banknotes because they're familiar with them and trust the Scottish banks to back them. Many shops in England will similarly accept Scottish banknotes for the same reasons. Some shops in England and Scotland will take Euro notes, and a few at airports US dollars and other currencies. You're unlikely to find a shop that will accept Bhutanese Ngultrum, say, though I suppose it's possible if the shopkeeper happens to be about to go on holiday to Bhutan and can't find a bureau de change that carries Ngultrum...

Re:False alarm.

[James Fryer]

In theory the police can bring a case of 'malicious prosecution' against the complainant. In practise they will just drop the case.

Re:False alarm.

[pjt33]

There's an offence of wasting police time.

Re:Where's the buggy-eyed smily when you need it?

[Anonymous Coward]

I like 'em, but they are considered "unlucky"......to remove that you are supposed to tear the upper right corner off the bill.

Re:Where's the buggy-eyed smily when you need it?

[mider]

Actually, all the new Canadian notes have braille on them.

I've never seen paper money with braille on it, so I'm curious how blind people ANYWHERE manage paper money?

Re:And for good reason!

[Anonymous Coward]

Links is garbage, it doesn't use terminfo or even termcap, it just sends out Linux Console escape codes, no matter if the terminal supports it. Which a Wyse-50 or Wyse-30 doesn't, so everything is just garbage.

At least lynx works.

Re:And for good reason!

[grandmofftarkin]

I think you mean elinks. It has every thing Lynx and Links has plus a lot more. including Frames, tabs, basic javascript, some CSS support, etc. They are even in the process of adding bittorent support right into the browser. Best text-only browser going!

Re:Where's the buggy-eyed smily when you need it?

[zebs]

In the UK all coins and notes are distinctly differnet, none have braille though.

For full details see:

http://www.royalmint.com/talk/default.asp, and

http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/index.htm , and finally

http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/knowyourn otes.pdf

Re:Where's the buggy-eyed smily when you need it?

[biglig2]

Time for my usual pedantic pointing out that legal tender is nothing to do with buying something in a shop.

Legal tender defines forms of payment that, when used to pay off a debt, the creditor cannot refuse. This rule prevents an evil creditor from bankrupting you by not accepting anything you offer as payment.

In a shop, however, you are negotiating a contract, and so the shop can demand, as a term in that contract, that you pay in any way they want. If you don't like it, don't agree to the contract.

Scotish bank notes are indeed not legal tender anywhere, including Scotland, and for that matter English notes aren't legal tender in Scotland.

Um, it's Cory Doctorow

[argent]

Cory Doctorow isn't exactly a random luser, he's a well-known commentator and online journalist.

Re:Wait a sec

[RenHoek]

Lynch mob? Lynx mob! :)

Re:Where's the buggy-eyed smily when you need it?

[I confirm I'm not a]

Nope, it's a common misconception that she's the head of the CoS. The CoS doesn't have a "head", just a elected moderator who serves as a spokesperson for one year.

Live and learn! I knew about the Moderator, but I was equating the Moderator with the Archbishop of Canterbury (which is - roughly - correct), and assuming the Queen had a similar role in both Church and Kirk. You're quite correct, however: The Queen is a member of the Kirk with the same rights as any other member except that she, or her representative, normally declares the General Assembly of the Kirk formally open.

Re:Where's the buggy-eyed smily when you need it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually the `German' gag has been out of date for about a hundred years. If you go by grandparents, the queen's about half English and a quarter each Scottish and German, with some other bits and pieces in there at more distant removes. Sorry to be picky...

Re:And for good reason!

[sepluv]

As far as I can see most visual CSS properties are applicable to the tty CSS media type (text-mode UAs).

That's why tty and screen both come under the visual group.