Bruce Schneier: Why Collecting More Data Doesn't Increase Safety

Fiction, not fact. by Black+Parrot · 2013-05-04 06:21 · Score: 5, Insightful

Good luck if he thinks he convince the American public that televised fiction isn't fact.

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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade

Re:Fiction, not fact. by Mitreya · 2013-05-04 06:42 · Score: 2

Good luck if he thinks he convince the American public that televised fiction isn't fact.
Indeed. From what I understand almost everyone believes TV shows as documentaries.
"24" convinced people that beating the crap out of suspects is often the only (and effective) way
"CSI" convinced people that the crappiest image can be enhanced up to a perfectly clear picture in a few clicks.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by swalve · 2013-05-04 06:53 · Score: -1, Troll

And yet, the Boston guys were identified by having a lot of video cameras around and being able to sift through it. Schneier is an idiot.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:01 · Score: -1

Spoken like someone who should be given a lethal injection rather than a ballot.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:05 · Score: -1

Err... did they?
Actually, what I think they identified through video surveillance was that the "suspects" couldn't possibly have been the perpetrators.
http://imgur.com/a/Nx8EU
What you have been fed by the media is NOT THE TRUTH. not even close.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:10 · Score: 3, Insightful

Yes, but thats more of a strategic thing. If you are going to have a big gathering, a bunch of good cameras would be pretty good to identify problems later on.
On the other hand, checking what everybody, everywhere, did on the internet the night and years before that may not be a great benefit.
You want more good and relevant information, always, and while just increasing the general amount of information may actually help get more relevant information, it doesn't always seem to be the best way possible.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by auric_dude · 2013-05-04 07:12 · Score: 5, Informative

Television dramas that rely on forensic science to solve crimes are affecting the administration of justice via http://www.economist.com/node/15949089
Re:Fiction, not fact. by redmid17 · 2013-05-04 07:16 · Score: 3, Insightful

Wow Schneier's point went completely over your head didn't it?
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Zero__Kelvin · 2013-05-04 07:19 · Score: 1

You are kidding right? I've got news for you. Between you and Schneier one of you is absolutely an idiot, the other is definitely not, and the one who isn't is a world renowned security expert.

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Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Re:Fiction, not fact. by doesnothingwell · 2013-05-04 07:58 · Score: 1

Good luck if he thinks he convince the American politicians that televised fiction isn't fact.
Yes that really is better.

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They can have my command prompt when they pry it from my cold dead fingers.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by gl4ss · 2013-05-04 08:03 · Score: 4, Informative

they identified a lot of people on the cameras. a witness told them which guys were the culprits. the realtime videos did zilch to stop them from leaving bags unattended.
but the point really is that because they got so much intel, they ignored the intel which said that the guys were nutcases. they had a whole city of suspects beforehand so feds didn't spend any agents on surveillance on these guys.. which would have made it fairly obvious that they were gonna do something stupid, so they could have then allocated more agents on surveillance on the culprits, so they could have searched them when they were on their way to the marathon.
I mean, they do such ops monthly in Boston for catching pot dealers.

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world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by flyingfsck · 2013-05-04 08:47 · Score: 3, Insightful

If you ask me a question and I give you and answer you immediately know how to proceed. If I give you a book, then you know how to proceed after a few hours. However, if I merely send you down the street to the library, then I haven't helped you at all did I? That is Schneier's point.

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Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 08:54 · Score: 4, Interesting

Not really on either count, though there is certainly an idiot involved here--just not Schneier.
The Boston guys were identified by having one camera showing one of the guys PLANTING THE DAMNED BOMB. Everything else was confirmation. Facial recognition did not help. Spying on people's cell phones did not help. All the high tech crap that law enforcement is always saying they need was almost totally useless, as would every other camera have been had one not been pointing at where one of the suspects planted explosives. If you start from the end point, it's kind of easy to work your way back. I'm not saying the other cameras were uselss, only that they were not useful in primary identification of the first suspect.
Case in point: humans who work for the FBI do not particularly have, on average, better observation skills or vision than anybody else. What they did have was information they didn't share with anybody else at first, specifically the video of the planting of the explosive. Lacking that bit of rather important data, the Internet community tried to prove the value of social networking and crowdsourcing (because we all know those things are superior to absolutely everything, right?), and managed to incorrectly identify several people as suspects who had nothing to do with the bombing at all. In other words, they were spectacularly wrong in absolutely every detail. Despite my sincerest hopes, this will probably not be the knife that stabs social networking in the back, though a man can dream I suppose.
Bottom line: having the video data available was useful. Having video data of a public place is not in and of itself privacy invading, especially when it's only looked at to solve an actual crime. What is privacy invading, and ultimately useless, is doing things like facial recognition, cell phone location tracking, and other things that build up a specific database of where people have been and at what time "just in case". That is the kind of thing we do NOT need more of, or any of, and this case proves exactly that, not the opposite. So the FBI won this battle, and good for them and for the rest of us that they did, but here's hoping that the method of that victory also helps them lose the war on privacy. Schneier is quite the genius.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 09:51 · Score: 1

... believes TV shows as documentaries.

Whatta ya mean? Next you'll be saying chimps aren't monkeys. Or bombs work without the red wire. Or that corpses don't mummify naturally.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by icebike · 2013-05-04 09:55 · Score: 1

Good luck if he thinks he convince the American public that televised fiction isn't fact.
Indeed. From what I understand almost everyone believes TV shows as documentaries.
"24" convinced people that beating the crap out of suspects is often the only (and effective) way
"CSI" convinced people that the crappiest image can be enhanced up to a perfectly clear picture in a few clicks.
Oh, yes, please heap some more insult on Americans. Don't bother with a citation, just dig deep into your sack of bullshit and hurl away.
Ask yourself who is dumber and more gullible, the guy who watches entertaining make believe-drama (and knows its make-believe drama), or the clown who assumes all americans believe the make-believe drama, simply because someone told him so.

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Re:Fiction, not fact. by icebike · 2013-05-04 09:58 · Score: 1

You are kidding right? I've got news for you. Between you and Schneier one of you is absolutely an idiot, the other is definitely not, and the one who isn't is a world renowned security expert.
Schneier is a cryptographer, computer security specialist.
He knows as much about police work and catching criminals or preventing crime as your average sewer worker.
I don't know what that pedestal you place him on is made of, but it seems to attract a lot of flies.

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Re:Fiction, not fact. by khallow · 2013-05-04 10:06 · Score: 3, Insightful

He knows as much about police work and catching criminals or preventing crime as your average sewer worker.
Not very useful unless you determine how much the average sewer worker knows. If they watch the appropriate TV shows, they might actually know a lot both about how crime occurs and the process of catching criminals, despite the notorious exaggerations and biases of that medium.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by icebike · 2013-05-04 10:08 · Score: 4, Insightful

they identified a lot of people on the cameras. a witness told them which guys were the culprits. the realtime videos did zilch to stop them from leaving bags unattended. ...
feds didn't spend any agents on surveillance on these guys. which would have made it fairly obvious that they were gonna do something stupid,
First, surveillance is not about prevention, it is ALWAYS about catching people after the fact.
You can't seriously be suggesting that the realtime video (it wasn't real time, it was recorded) should be enough to have a policeman appear the instant you take your backpack off and put it at your feet? Do you want to live in a society where there are actually enough cops for that?
The feds didn't spend ANY time surveilling these guys. They ask him some questions in 2011, and he gave all the right answers at the time. Do you really want to live in a society where the mere mention of your name gets you assigned a 24/7 surveillance team for YEARS AND YEARS into the future?
Thing about what you are suggesting. Wouldn't you be the first one to jump on Slashdot and bitch about an FBI team following you around because of something someone else said about you?

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Re:Fiction, not fact. by Mitreya · 2013-05-04 10:13 · Score: 1

Oh, yes, please heap some more insult on Americans. Don't bother with a citation, just dig deep into your sack of bullshit and hurl away.
I didn't say all Americans, but the effect is common and well known. Here's some references for you if you'd like to educate yourself (the CSI thing has a Wiki article for a while now)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CSI_effect
http://www.worlddialogue.org/content.php?id=460
Re:Fiction, not fact. by icebike · 2013-05-04 10:21 · Score: 1

Did you read past the second sentence of your first link:

While this belief is widely held among American legal professionals, some studies have suggested that crime shows are unlikely to cause such an effect.

As for the second link, pure rubbish, which never once seriously suggests or offers any evidence that ANYONE believe the torcher aspect of the show.

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Re:Fiction, not fact. by hairyfeet · 2013-05-04 10:25 · Score: 4, Informative

Hell my mom is real civic minded so went and did jury duty when she was called up...only to come in white as a sheet. She had spent 3 days hanging a jury on an arson case where even the investigator admitted on the stand he didn't know what caused the fire and that it didn't make sense for the defendant to burn it down as he didn't have enough insurance to even cover what he owed but the jury was 11 to 1 wanting to convict, why? "Because he is Italian and Italians are in the mob and burn things, haven't you ever seen Goodfellas?". That's right a guy was gonna get 10 years because of a scene in a Ray Liotta movie.
My faith in the human race needless to say went down several notches that day but you sir are correct, sadly many out there can't tell the difference between facts and what they have seen on screen.

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ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 10:39 · Score: 0

Given how stupid most people are, it wouldn't surprise me if it were true. That said, I'm not quite sure they're that stupid.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by slick7 · 2013-05-04 12:02 · Score: 1

Good luck if he thinks he convince the American public that televised fiction isn't fact.
The real question is...To whom do the benefits go? If you believe the Gutterment is concerned about your safety, then why the NDAA?
It's obvious that the confiscation of firearms is virtually impossible but, buying all the ammunition they can purchase with your tax money will make ammunition for those same firearms very expensive. This in turn will cause the remaining ammo to skyrocket in price, guess who's going to sell that ammunition to you? Would you buy it, trust that it will work?

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The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by TapeCutter · 2013-05-04 12:24 · Score: 0

What's the matter, facts getting in the way of your ideological fiction?

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And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by TapeCutter · 2013-05-04 13:01 · Score: 1

I'm pretty sure the cops will get all three of your "answers" from different sources. Schneier's point is obvious but not particularly sharp, sure it would be better to remove the haystack but to do that you must first find the needle.

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And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 16:27 · Score: 0

An idiot?
I guess sanity is the modern idiocy. Fuck off and die you useless retard. Schneier has more intelligence in his middle finger nail than you will ever have.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 17:42 · Score: 0

Lacking that bit of rather important data, the Internet community tried to prove the value of social networking and crowdsourcing (because we all know those things are superior to absolutely everything, right?), and managed to incorrectly identify several people as suspects who had nothing to do with the bombing at all. In other words, they were spectacularly wrong in absolutely every detail.
Because they lacked data your argument spectacularly fails to say anything about social networking. Had that data not existed what evidence do you have that law enforce would have came up with different suspects based on the video the public did. I don't care for social networking personally but this is certainly not an example of failed crowd sourcing. It's an example of incomplete data.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by ai4px · 2013-05-04 18:26 · Score: 1

Thank you for making your point. I also don't want to live in a society where someone commits a crime with a certain type of weapon and I am subsequently barred from owning such a weapon. The fault lies with the individual, not the tool.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by ai4px · 2013-05-04 18:29 · Score: 1

Even better, the wounded brother was found due to a citizen noticing something out of place.... ummm that would be the very same citizen(s) whom the government told to stay inside and that the police had it under control. There cannot be enough police... ever. They must enlist the help of the citizenry, but don't seem to trust us. It is a shame too.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 18:46 · Score: 0

As with most /. early adopters, you don't know shit and it shows.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by marcello_dl · 2013-05-04 21:17 · Score: 1

>First, surveillance is not about prevention, it is ALWAYS about catching people after the fact.
so it is irrelevant for terrorism, suicide missions.
widespread data gathering + law systems so convoluted that everybody is violating something = widespread control.
Welcome to the present planet earth.

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---- MISSING MISCELLANEOUS DATA SEGMENT --- [sigdash] trolololol
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Zero__Kelvin · 2013-05-04 23:54 · Score: 1

No. You're right. He is a world renowned cryptographer and security expert, but he isn't very smart. Or is it you that isn't smart enough to follow the conversation? The OP called him an idiot. Let me bring the two together and paraphrase so you can understand what was written:

OP: "World renowned cryptographer and security expert Bruce Schneier is an idiot!"
Me: "Making such a statement is proof that you (the OP) are the actual idiot.

I hope this helps!

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Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Zero__Kelvin · 2013-05-05 00:00 · Score: 1

To be fair, I might or might not know shit. It is impossible to tell, since you posted as an AC.

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Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Re:Fiction, not fact. by CaptainJeff · 2013-05-05 02:31 · Score: 1

Schneier started his career as a computer security and cryptography guy. Over the past five to ten years, he has largely gotten out of that specialty and more into general security practices, and, more specifically, how trust, security, and society all interoperate. He has largely made it his business to determine what works and what does not to solve large scale societal problems that have anything to do with "security," be that real security or not.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-05 03:10 · Score: 0

"CSI" convinced people that the crappiest image can be enhanced up to a perfectly clear picture in a few clicks.
And don't forget the Visual Basic GUI !
Re:Fiction, not fact. by antdude · 2013-05-05 05:42 · Score: 1

Which appropriate TV shows beside documentaries? :P

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Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Re:Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-05 06:34 · Score: 0

My parents both believe the "facts" in make-believe drama. They even quote them too me. For example, I told my dad fingerprints weren't very reliable. He told me I was wrong, with a partial print, they can put it into a computer and do a search and come up with a name. I told him that was fiction. It didn't work like that. He insisted it was based on reality. I know how fingerprint databases work and it's not even close to being like that. You get matches, many and a human looks at it and uses intuition. I told my mom that judges pretty much rubber stamp warrants. She told me I was wrong, that police work very hard to get a warrant right and that judges usually reject them, because that's what happens on TV. She insisted TV was based on reality too.

Those are just examples. if you think there isn't a huge population out there believing the legal and political facts in these shows, you're a fool.

Oh, another one. My step-father believes liberals are just like the ones in West Wing.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by icebike · 2013-05-05 08:41 · Score: 1

You should listen to your dad more often
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/sciencefair/post/2011/04/fingerprint-evaluations-reliable-998-of-the-time/1

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Re: Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-05 08:48 · Score: 0

And why exactly an opinion needs to be validated with citations? Like finding a link on the web immediately validates your claim...
Re: Fiction, not fact. by philbach · 2013-05-05 10:42 · Score: 1

I'm betting that sewer workers are pretty damn good at sorting shit out...
Re:Fiction, not fact. by pnutjam · 2013-05-06 02:32 · Score: 1

Your study is designed to confirm whether finger prints are unique and whether the methods of examination by skilled examiners truly allows them to properly compare them. It does not say anything about partial prints.
Nice straw man.

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Cheap storage VM.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by pnutjam · 2013-05-06 02:33 · Score: 1

So your one of those... too bad...

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Cheap storage VM.
Re: Fiction, not fact. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-06 07:09 · Score: 0

Well played, sir.
Re:Fiction, not fact. by cusco · 2013-05-06 15:58 · Score: 1

Meant to reply to this the other day and didn't get around to it.

I work in the security industry, and the 'CSI Effect' is very well known. Ask any salescritter in this industry and they'll tell you stories of multiple prospective clients who want to be able to do truly ridiculous things with their security cameras. The good ones gently correct them, the bad ones say, "Of course we can do that!"

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"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin

Person of Interest by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:21 · Score: 1

"The television show Person of Interest is fiction, not fact." - I'd more characterize it as an fs*cking fairy tale, not just fiction.

Re:Person of Interest by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:40 · Score: 0

That's what they want you to think... It's called plausible deniability. Just like they did SG1 to cover up the real ... wait, there's someone at the doo.... /&()*/ç/*)=(/ç(=*
NO CARRIER
Re:Person of Interest by cas2000 · 2013-05-04 16:20 · Score: 1

i'd classify it as propaganda to get people to like the idea of a total surveillance police state because there's good-guy superheroes (including an ex-spook and a philanthropic billionaire. and don't forget the dog. doggies are nice and good guys are nice to dogs, it's the easiest way for you to know that they're good guys) protecting people who need protection from bad guys.

To article submitter Jeremiah Cornelius by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:24 · Score: -1

Your OWN "/. wannabe security guru expert" complete with his bullshit certs (that didn't save him from being TERMINATED @ MICROSOFT for technical incompetence) pulls a "Run, Forrest: RUN!" when confronted here:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3707913&cid=43628705

* :)

(So much for Jeremiah Cornelius, who is ONLY 'EXPERT' @ TROLLING but stupidly get caught accidentally submitting 1 of 100's of anonymous coward submitted spams for all of March, & April 2013 here -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3581857&cid=43276741 )

Jeremiah Cornelius - I must THANK you for allowing me to SHIT ALL OVER YOU, you spineless little worm... thanks for running from a direct challenge, proving my points about "the trolling likes of you" (online scumbag trash, nothing more).

APK

P.S.=> "Ever notice that once in awhile you come across someone you shouldn't have fucked with? That's me..." -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6arlI-z61hU

... apk

Re:To article submitter Jeremiah Cornelius by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:38 · Score: -1

A corrupt slashdot luser has pentrated the moderation system to downmod all my posts while impersonating me.
Nearly 330++ times that I know of @ this point for all of March/April 2013 so far, & others here have told you to stop - take the hint, lunatic (leave slashdot)...
Sorry folks - but whoever the nutjob is that's attempting to impersonate me, & upset the rest of you as well, has SERIOUS mental issues, no questions asked! I must've gotten the better of him + seriously "gotten his goat" in doing so in a technical debate & his "geek angst" @ losing to me has him doing the:
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A.) $10,000 challenges, ala (where the imposter actually TRACKED + LISTED the # of times he's done this no less, & where I get the 330 or so times I noted above) -> http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3585795&cid=43285307
&/or
B.) Reposting OLD + possibly altered models - (this I haven't checked on as to altering the veracity of the info. being changed) of posts of mine from the past here
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(Albeit massively repeatedly thru all threads on /. this March/April 2013 nearly in its entirety thusfar).
* Personally, I'm surprised the moderation staff here hasn't just "blocked out" his network range yet honestly!
(They know it's NOT the same as my own as well, especially after THIS post of mine, which they CAN see the IP range I am coming out of to compare with the ac spamming troll doing the above...).
APK
P.S.=> Again/Stressing it: NO guys - it is NOT me doing it, as I wouldn't waste that much time on such trivial b.s. like a kid might...
Plus, I only post where hosts file usage is on topic or appropriate for a solution & certainly NOT IN EVERY POST ON SLASHDOT (like the nutcase trying to "impersonate me" is doing for nearly all of March/April now, & 330++ times that I know of @ least)... apk
P.S.=> here is CORRECT host file information just to piss off the insane lunatic troll.
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CENSORED BY SLASHDOT
Re:To article submitter Jeremiah Cornelius by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:41 · Score: -1, Flamebait

APK's hosts file is almost 2 million lines (!). That means everytime you do a name lookup, it has to parse and compare 2 million records before it performs a DNS lookup. Of course, APK stores his "top 20 sites -- slashdot, goatse, meatspin, etc -- at the top his hosts file. Fun times when their IP Address changes!
But lets say you follow the link on a slashdot post to a new domain. DNS lookup takes .05 -.10 seconds. Scanning a 2-million line randomly generated hosts file (48 megs in size!) took .5 - 3.5 seconds. And after failing to find the name, it still has to perform real DNS lookup.
If you're using something memory intensive like firefox or using a low-memory device (like many android phones) you probably don't have 48 megs of free ram sitting around to cache your hosts file in the vfs layer so lookups will hist the disk every time and be on the slower side.
And are there really 2 million adware and malware sites out there? How many of those domains were abandoned and shut down long ago? Shady operators often buy up a name, use it for a couple of days, then cancel the purchase. Do you really want your DNS resolution to be 10-100 times slower because asdfs3w5fsdf.com served ads for 3 days back in 2003?
But I'm sure APK will "disprove" the above facts by using bold and CAPITALIZED words.
Re:To article submitter Jeremiah Cornelius by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:39 · Score: -1

It's good to see that apk's troll posts are always instantly modded down to -1 where they belong.
It's too bad that he avoid IP bans using proxy servers and/or TOR, though.
How can we get rid of this clown for good?
Re:To article submitter Jeremiah Cornelius by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:48 · Score: -1

Ok, this is hilariously bad advice. I tested his 645,000 line hosts file under linux. The result: DNS lookups took 3 seconds longer since scanning the hosts file is O(N) and is done for every DNS lookup, before checking the DNS cache, before querying the DNS server.
Under Windows, the situation is the same if you have the local DNS cache server disabled. If the local DNS cache server is enabled, it took almost 2 hours to load the hosts file, during which time all DNS lookups were blocked. Why? Well, the DNS cache isn't designed to holed 645,000 items so after every insert, it rehashes and moves all the previous entries around. That's ~ O(N*N*N) performance.
tl;dr - APK is an idiot or a troll. Probably a troll since his early comments were about Windows being more secure than Linux before he started spewing this HOSTS shit.

After the fact... by QuietLagoon · 2013-05-04 06:26 · Score: 1

... the collection of data helps after the fact, i.e., once someone is caught. The additional data allows a more solid case to be built, and makes it easier to find co-conspirators.

Re:After the fact... by khasim · 2013-05-04 06:36 · Score: 3, Insightful

The additional data allows a more solid case to be built, and makes it easier to find co-conspirators.
Yep. So the "compromise" could be lots of data collected but only kept for a short time (weeks, not years).
On the other hand, the frequency of any threats is so rare that do we really want to erode our liberties like this? Is regular police work just not capable of "connecting the dots" without this kind of surveillance?
Fascism begins when the efficiency of the Government becomes more important than the Rights of the People.
Re:After the fact... by Etherwalk · 2013-05-04 06:44 · Score: 1

So the "compromise" could be lots of data collected but only kept for a short time (weeks, not years).
Or requiring a warrant to access the data.
Re:After the fact... by DarkOx · 2013-05-04 07:06 · Score: 3, Insightful

.. the collection of data helps after the fact, i.e., once someone is caught. The additional data allows a more solid case to be built, and makes it easier to find co-conspirators.
I'll buy that. Once you know who you can go back and sift through logs, security camera footage, peoples cell phone snaps, phone records, etc and find evidence. I don't Bruce would argue otherwise.
But...Where mass murder and terrorism is concerned what is our objective? Make sure we can punish the guilty or prevent attacks?
So far I am not aware of any revelation that has come out of all the surveillance that would have helped us 'prevent' the bombing. Plenty of things we might have done, but all things we already knew we could be doing but had rejected for reasons of civil liberties, cost, character of our nation etc.
Its also entirely possible that something that helps us identify and punish the guilty after the fact harms our ability to detect and prevent in terms of to much hay.

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Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Re:After the fact... by davester666 · 2013-05-04 07:18 · Score: 1

Not a good idea, 9/11 onwards, they have to always include a clause along the lines of: "In cases where the officer writes down any of these phrases 'terrorist', 'child pornography', or 'national security', the officer may then immediately access the information, and then, if they want to, may later apply to the FISA court where a warrant will automatically be granted."

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Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
Re:After the fact... by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:21 · Score: 0

You know what also makes court cases easy? Show trials.
Re:After the fact... by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 08:28 · Score: 1

Given the government's track record for such things, I'd rather not have the data be collected at all.
Re:After the fact... by Opportunist · 2013-05-04 09:13 · Score: 2

You REALLY think suicide bombers are bothered by the fact that you'll know they did it after they did it?

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We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Re:After the fact... by Opportunist · 2013-05-04 09:14 · Score: 1

Replying to myself, I know, but...
You don't need surveillance to find that out, you just have to solve the puzzle...

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We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Re:After the fact... by icebike · 2013-05-04 10:33 · Score: 1

But...Where mass murder and terrorism is concerned what is our objective? Make sure we can punish the guilty or prevent attacks?
So far I am not aware of any revelation that has come out of all the surveillance that would have helped us 'prevent' the bombing. Plenty of things we might have done, but all things we already knew we could be doing but had rejected for reasons of civil liberties, cost, character of our nation etc.
You are exactly right, there is nothing that would be effective in "preventing" the bombing which would not render the country a total police state.
Yes, we lost a few lives, and yes lots of people were hurt.
We lost a hell of alot more lives building a nation where we have the right to walk down town with a backpack without being stopped and questioned. (Except perhaps if you are Black and live in some portions of NYC).
There are simply not enough police to tail every miscreant or potential felon in the country, and I for one wouldn't want to live anywhere there were enough police for this task.
The certainty of being caught is the best weapon we have right now.

--
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Re:After the fact... by icebike · 2013-05-04 10:38 · Score: 1

You REALLY think suicide bombers are bothered by the fact that you'll know they did it after they did it?
In the Boston case, they apparently had no stomach for suicide, and were gullible enough to believe they would get away with it (they didn't even try to leave town). Only after they saw their pictures all over the TV did they try to steal a car.
These were not real bright guys.
And neither are your average suicide bomber from what I have been reading. The "true believers in the cause" have pretty much been expended and the terror masters now prefer the weak minded and gullible with nothing to lose.

--
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Re:After the fact... by SpaceLifeForm · 2013-05-04 14:55 · Score: 1

Actually, the fascists really don't give a damn about any efficiency as long as they can run the world.
The MIC creates "programs" (Bush mentioned that many times), which in reality are the creation of haystacks so that taxpayer money can be spent on these MIC "programs" looking for the needles in the created haystacks that contain no needles. But the MIC gets the money anyway. And since there are no needles in the fabricated haystacks, (damn, that "program" was not funded enough, we need more money, we know there are needles there, we just did not have enough funds to do the proper searches), they create more haystacks, and convince the Congress that more money must be spent chasing the invisible non-existent bogeyman that the MIC has created.

--
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
Re:After the fact... by DarkOx · 2013-05-05 01:41 · Score: 1

The certainty of being caught is the best weapon we have right now.
So what you are saying is that we have no effective weapon. The 911 terrorists did not even expect to survive if successful. I don't think they had much concern about being caught.
It appears the Boston bomber killed his older brother rather than allowing him to be taken alive. When your would be attackers don't value their own lives punishment capital or otherwise is not an effective deterrent.
So back to the original questions. Is the data collection itself turning our society into something different than it has been and is it desirable? Is the volume of data being collected resulting in intelligence spending a lot of time and energy running down unlikely threats and leads; dose that result in less safety gained than if they focused only on the more obvious standouts?

--
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Re:After the fact... by cusco · 2013-05-06 16:24 · Score: 1

If they had bothered to disguise themselves AT ALL they would have gotten away with it too, and the FBI would have had to frame someone for the attack. A blond wig, big sunglasses, a modicum of makeup (even inexpertly applied), a new change of clothes, and a wide-brimmed hat would almost certainly of made pretty much all of their photo evidence useless.

nothing to lose.

The FARC and possibly the PLO have been known to find deeply-indebted people with terminal diseases and offer to pay off their debt and take care of their family in exchange for suicide attacks. With the rise in health care costs in the US there may be a budding industry in the making.

--
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin

A lack of concern for freedom. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:28 · Score: 4, Insightful

The main problem here is that people just don't seem to care about freedom if they believe that something will keep them safe (or at least makes them feel safe). Even if it were true that the TSA, ubiquitous government surveillance, free speech zones, the Patriot Act, and warrantless surveillance in general kept people safe, that wouldn't make them any less wrong. Indeed, the main problem is that people seem to generally be spineless cowards who give up freedom for safety and are easily manipulated (especially after a disaster).

Re:A lack of concern for freedom. by bbelt16ag · 2013-05-04 06:43 · Score: 1

then they deserve freedom nor liberty.

--
NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER GIVE UP! "No limitations, no boundaries, there is no reason for them."
Re:A lack of concern for freedom. by hedwards · 2013-05-04 07:25 · Score: 1

Sort of, the right seems to care more about their right to bear arms than to rights that are actually meaningful in day to day life. If we ever get to the point where private ownership of firearms is going to make a difference, we've got more serious problems on our hands.
Focusing on things like real trials rather than show trials and actually having an independent judiciary would make a much larger difference in the long run.
Re:A lack of concern for freedom. by jedidiah · 2013-05-04 13:58 · Score: 1

Guns just represent liberty and self-reliance. They are the start of the slippery slope that includes spray paint, decongestant, pressure cookers, and sharp kitchen knives.
The gun grabbing mentality preaches that we are all helpless and need to wait for the nanny state to sort things out should anything go wrong. It implies a contempt for the electorate that should be more obvious to more people.

--
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Re:A lack of concern for freedom. by cheekyjohnson · 2013-05-04 15:39 · Score: 1

But the second amendment isn't the entirety of the constitution, and some people seem to have forgotten that.

--
Filthy, filthy copyrapists!
Re:A lack of concern for freedom. by pete6677 · 2013-05-04 17:34 · Score: 1

Hence the reason why liberals despise private ownership of firearms.
Re:A lack of concern for freedom. by fredgiblet · 2013-05-04 18:12 · Score: 1

Unfortunately BOTH sides are forgetting the parts that are inconvenient in favor of feel-good legislation that usually won't do jack shit.
Re:A lack of concern for freedom. by BorisSkratchunkov · 2013-05-05 01:18 · Score: 1

So sayeth the Anonymous Coward.

WARNING: Jeremiah Cornelius is APK by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:29 · Score: -1

Delete your HOST file immediately or your computer will be compromised.

JC is a sockpuppet of APK, the "host file troll".

This is not I folks: It's Jeremiah Cornelius...apk by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:31 · Score: -1

THIS is why he's doing it & proof of it, here -> http://interviews.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3585927&cid=43295193 when others pointed out Jeremiah Cornelius forgot to submit one of the "first post spams" masquerading as myself as AC, & mistakenly submitted one of the impersonations of myself as his registered 'luser' name here on /. forums.

Pretty pitiful actually, but like every up to no good idiot does? He screwed up & submitted it under his registered 'luser' name here.

* Jeremiah Cornelius: DO YOURSELF, and the rest of us, A GIANT FAVOR MAN: Seek professional psychiatric help!

(Since Jeremiah Cornelius obviously can't get over the fact he made a spelling error on what it is HE ALLEGEDLY DID FOR A LIVING? That's not MY fault... it's HIS!)

APK

P.S.=> I seriously must have dusted JC (in his mind @ least) for his BAD spelling error & it "got his goat"...

I.E.-> Catching what he claimed to do as a job, for YEARS he left "PENETRATION" (correct) spelled as "PENTRATION" (incorrect) on his resume on LinkedIn & I pointed it out as he & his friends trolled me as usual (webmistressrachel, gmhowell, & crew (probably ALL JC no doubt using alterate emails or TOR to do it as a possible - I've caught "them & theirs" doing it before, ala Barbara, not Barbie = TomHudson (same person))).

So THAT is what has gotten his goat in a technical debate & his "geek angst" could only come up with *trying* to "impersonate me" in every news thread on /. for the month of March 2013 so far!

(Just to attempt to 'discredit me' as a spammer here obviously)

Doing so, by posting that "$10,000 challenge" &/or reposts of my old posts on hosts file value to end users into EVERY SINGLE NEWS ARTICLE POSTED on /. ...

It's all I can think of that *might* cause such a mentally troubled 'reaction' like the Jeremiah Cornelius is doing & there's NO QUESTION he's the one doing this spamming of nearly every posted article masquerading as myself...!

... apk

All your points have been disproven, troll. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:32 · Score: -1

I did not post this; this is the impostor... apk by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:40 · Score: -1

A corrupt slashdot luser has pentrated the moderation system to downmod all my posts while impersonating me.

Nearly 330++ times that I know of @ this point for all of March/April 2013 so far, & others here have told you to stop - take the hint, lunatic (leave slashdot)...

Sorry folks - but whoever the nutjob is that's attempting to impersonate me, & upset the rest of you as well, has SERIOUS mental issues, no questions asked! I must've gotten the better of him + seriously "gotten his goat" in doing so in a technical debate & his "geek angst" @ losing to me has him doing the:

---

A.) $10,000 challenges, ala (where the imposter actually TRACKED + LISTED the # of times he's done this no less, & where I get the 330 or so times I noted above) -> http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3585795&cid=43285307

&/or

B.) Reposting OLD + possibly altered models - (this I haven't checked on as to altering the veracity of the info. being changed) of posts of mine from the past here

---

(Albeit massively repeatedly thru all threads on /. this March/April 2013 nearly in its entirety thusfar).

* Personally, I'm surprised the moderation staff here hasn't just "blocked out" his network range yet honestly!

(They know it's NOT the same as my own as well, especially after THIS post of mine, which they CAN see the IP range I am coming out of to compare with the ac spamming troll doing the above...).

APK

P.S.=> Again/Stressing it: NO guys - it is NOT me doing it, as I wouldn't waste that much time on such trivial b.s. like a kid might...

Plus, I only post where hosts file usage is on topic or appropriate for a solution & certainly NOT IN EVERY POST ON SLASHDOT (like the nutcase trying to "impersonate me" is doing for nearly all of March/April now, & 330++ times that I know of @ least)... apk

P.S.=> here is CORRECT host file information just to piss off the insane lunatic troll.

--

CENSORED BY SLASHDOT

Uh by trifish · 2013-05-04 06:42 · Score: 1

Needle-in-a-haystack problem? Really? Seriously, in the post-PC era... data mining gets more difficult as the amount of data increases? uh... I've always thought that to gain any meaningful stats, you need a large enough sample...

Re:Uh by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:50 · Score: 0

I'm thinking this security expert might want to take some data science classes.
Re:Uh by maxwell+demon · 2013-05-04 06:56 · Score: 4, Insightful

This is not a problem of statistics, this is a problem of identifying individual terrorists. Even if you could determine exactly how many terrorists there are, it would help you absolutely nothing to prevent the next terror act. You have to know who the terrorist is.
You can stare at the weather statistics of the last ten centuries as much as you want, it won't help you much when trying to predict when and where the next lightning will strike.

--
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Re:Uh by ThunderBird89 · 2013-05-04 07:04 · Score: 1

As the sample set's size tends to infinity, so does the computational power and/or the time required for effective mining (ceteris paribus, of course).

--
Hyperbole: I use it liberally!
Re:Uh by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:05 · Score: 1

Until you are awash in data. Then you run into a practicality wall. Not to mention limitations on what variables are actually meaningful (i.e. What actually is meaningful? How meaningful? What variables don't we know about? What about counter indicators? etc). After all, these systems are well known for disturbingly large false positives and false negatives.
Re:Uh by DMUTPeregrine · 2013-05-04 07:06 · Score: 1

In statistics you want a large sample so that outliers will be obscured and the overall trends can be discovered. In security it's the outliers you care about, and the trends of what the general population is doing don't really matter. Thus a large sample will be counterproductive.

--
Not a sentence!
Re:Uh by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:17 · Score: 0

Are statistics relevant in a crime?
The data you have to mine through isn't really of the statistics kind, you need to find the correct data, the only correct data.
It isn't really relevant to law that 10% of the people you are surveiling will kill somebody soon, you need to know which 10% it is to sentence well.
Re:Uh by hedwards · 2013-05-04 07:27 · Score: 1

The problem is that you have to store and process all of that data. And much of that data isn't in a form that the computer system can process. Which means that they're storing tons of data that they'll never be able to use, or will at most be able to use it after they've determined whom to arrest. But, in terms of prevention, which is what safety is about, it doesn't do you any real good.
Remember that statistics can talk about populations accurately, but if you try and take that description and apply it to individuals, there's no guarantee at all that the description is accurate.
Re:Uh by hedwards · 2013-05-04 07:30 · Score: 1

To an extent statistics are valuable, however it's difficult to establish what to track with any certainty. Prior to 9/11 it wouldn't have occurred to anybody to track flight schools for possible terrorists as the worst cases previously were flights to Cuba and generally the pilot was trained to just voluntarily make the trip to keep people safe.
OTOH, we do know that things like building height, clear line of site and lighting do correlate with local crime rates and making the conditions that commonly accompany crime less does often times have positive results on making crime harder to commit.
Re:Uh by Zero__Kelvin · 2013-05-04 07:40 · Score: 1

" uh... I've always thought that to gain any meaningful stats, you need a large enough sample..."
Don't think. You weaken the nation. (seriously)

--
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Re:Uh by phantomfive · 2013-05-04 07:49 · Score: 3, Insightful

Your sample should be large enough to have what you're looking for, but no larger. He mentions that the FBI has over 700,000 people on its watch list. They don't have enough people to investigate them all. If they could narrow down that list to 500 serious potential terrorists, their job would be a lot easier.

How to accomplish that? The simplest way is to catch them right before they are about to attack. For example, we could read the minds of individuals who are experienced in seeing the future, call them pre-cogs. Then when they are in agreement, we can catch the terrorist with our future crime force, lead by Tom Cruise.

Just kidding. Bruce Schneier doesn't give an plan on how to stop future terrorists, his point is that there's no reason to shred even more civil liberties in order to try to catch terrorists, especially since it probably won't help.

--
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Re:Uh by mjwalshe · 2013-05-04 07:51 · Score: 1

yes for some ML problems more data is best
Re:Uh by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 10:48 · Score: 0

Bruce Schneier doesn't give an plan on how to stop future terrorists, his point is that there's no reason to shred even more civil liberties in order to try to catch terrorists, especially since it probably won't help.
Which is somewhat ironic for the guy who praised the Boston Gestapo for shutting down the entire city and then raiding houses where the suspect wasn't, all in the name of protecting people from an unarmed injured teenager.
But, hey, what are people's fourth amendment rights when it comes to catching an unarmed injured teenager who managed to slip through an incompetently set up perimeter? Who cares about people's civil rights when there might be - but isn't - a terrorist running around with bombs.
Actions that Schneier praised as "proper handling" by the gestapo - I'm sorry, I mean, "civilian police." Who have tanks, body armor, and carry military rifles. You know, like civilians do.
I kind of stopped caring about his stance on civil rights when he didn't call the whole handling of the Boston suspects the utter travesty that it was.
Re:Uh by ancientt · 2013-05-04 13:31 · Score: 1

I don't disagree with your point, but I think the analogy is flawed.
If you can stare at weather statistics with sufficient data to see what circumstances resulted in lightening strikes, then you can accurately predict where extra effort needs to be taken to avoid them. In fact that sounds really useful and much like what we do with tornados for example. The statistics don't tell you that there will be a tornado at a certain place at a certain time, but the do tell you when they are likely enough to sound the warnings.
This is the crux of the argument: Can statistics gathered in great detail as we do for weather be as useful in the case of terrorist acts as it is for predicting the danger of a tornado.
I think you or Schneier would say that people are not as predictable as weather and think that the personal freedoms lost in the search outweigh the gains. He says "Millions of people behave strangely enough to warrant the FBI's notice, and almost all of them are harmless. It is simply not possible to find every plot beforehand, especially when the perpetrators act alone and on impulse."
The unanswered question for me is whether analysis performed differently can be effective regardless of the level of data analyzed. If you can reliably prove that it cannot be effective, then you have created a compelling argument. If you can state that the level of data that is effective is unreasonable, then you have a compelling argument. I didn't see either successfully presented in the argument or discussion so far. Without a compelling argument, I'm left with a vague sense of dissatisfaction and disgruntled feeling that I've spent far too long considering an opinion piece.

--
B) Eliminate all the stupid users. This is frowned upon by society.
Re:Uh by jedidiah · 2013-05-04 14:00 · Score: 1

This security expert has probably been hip deep in the problem. He's not just some random anonymous loser on some web forum posting from his mother's basement.
He's certainly not the first person to bring up this issue.

--
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Re:Uh by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 15:03 · Score: 0

What tanks? I only saw that their SWAT team had an SUV with stove plate glued to it.
Re:Uh by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 17:29 · Score: 0

Nobody could have prevented 9/11 even if there was enough data available.
You see - nobody could predict there would be a group of terrorist that would fly a passengers airplane into a building in a city center. It is obvious now, but nobody would have taught about it before 9/11. And you know what? Even all the data we have now will predict what will be the next move. It can be something we cannot imagine right now, just like the 9/11 incident. And even if we drive the information gathering to a completely insane level (which will happen if we keep traveling this path), we still not can predict what will happen.
The sad fact is - people want absolute safety, and they are willing to offer anything for it. It is just a question of time before the going to start murdering people to prevent the possibility there could be someone that could murder people. Think about that...

System Reliability by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:43 · Score: 0

Data collection systems suffers from the same math results as machinery systems, only with generally less reliable components.

The so called Justice system is after all a shit filter that also creates more shit.

Eat your words ("big fail") by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:44 · Score: -1

Fact: it takes amost 2 hours for windows to load a 645,000 lines HOSTS file into the DNS cache. While loading, all DNS queries are blocked. That is neither fast nor efficient.

Eat your words ("big fail")

Re:Eat your words ("big fail") by hairyfeet · 2013-05-04 11:35 · Score: 1

On what, a 486DX? I haven't used HOSTS files in awhile (prefer my recursive DNS) but it never took me more than a minute and a half to load mine and that was on an anemic 1.1GHz Celeron I kept at the shop for such jobs.
So I have to wonder how little your knowledge of networking is if it takes you THAT long to load a single HOSTS file, hell even if you went the long way around and converted it into peerguardian format and loaded it up that way it shouldn't take more than 10 minutes tops.

--
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.

LEARN WHY I WAS MODDED DOWN... apk by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 06:46 · Score: -1

See here, explains it all -> http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3561925&cid=43223585

* :)

I.E./Summary: Trolls had a challenge put to them to validly disprove my points in the post I just replied to - result? Trolls FAIL... lol!

APK

P.S.=> That's what makes me LAUGH harder than ANYTHING ELSE on this forums (full of "FUD" spreading trolls) - When you hit trolls with facts & truths they CANNOT disprove validly on computing tech based grounds, this is the result - Applying unjustifiable downmods to effetely & vainly *try* to "hide" my posts & facts/truths they extoll!

Hahaha... lol, man: Happens nearly every single time I post such lists (proving how ineffectual these trolls are), only showing how solid my posts of that nature are...

Ah yes "geek angst" @ it's 'finest' (not), vs. facts & truths = downmod by /. weak trolls!

... apk

Re:LEARN WHY I WAS MODDED DOWN... apk by newmind · 2013-05-04 08:13 · Score: 1

aww dammit, misclicked and accidentally modded this shit up... shut up already, nobody cares

Logical Fallacy by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:00 · Score: 0

"Piling more data onto the mix makes it harder, not easier. The best way to think of it is a needle-in-a-haystack problem" This is simply not true. It assumes that all the data is hay, when infact some of the data could be a needle.

Re:Logical Fallacy by Opportunist · 2013-05-04 09:17 · Score: 2

The problem is that you cannot tell the needle from the hay until AFTER you pricked yourself.
Or, to get out of the idiom, you don't know what data is actually meaningful before the terrorist strikes.

--
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.

The opposite. by khasim · 2013-05-04 07:01 · Score: 4, Insightful

uh... I've always thought that to gain any meaningful stats, you need a large enough sample...

That works for trends. Not for the actions of individuals.

From TFA:

Rather than thinking of intelligence as a simple connect-the-dots picture, think of it as a million unnumbered pictures superimposed on top of each other.

He's a bit wrong there. It isn't a million unnumbered pictures. It's one picture per person in the country at the time. That's over 300 million pictures. Each one overlapping millions of other pictures.

uh... I've always thought that to gain any meaningful stats, you need a large enough sample...

And after a certain point you are just amplifying the "noise". And enough "noise" can appear to be a pattern.

It is only after an event that the "noise" can be filtered out and the extraneous pictures discarded.

missing meme by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:04 · Score: 0

hahaha. in my german speaking country we used to joke (translating) "OH, he's making hay" to say that
someone was messing around not really sure what he's doing.
imagine someone with a pitch fork throwing newly mowed grass into the air...

Collecting Data vs. Analysis by foobsr · 2013-05-04 07:05 · Score: 1

I suppose that it is always easier to collect data than to intelligently analyse the amount of data gathered, just because sensors are less complex devices (to put it simple: compare the time you need to collect a cluster of data vs. the time you need to find interrelations). And, obviously, the problem gets worse with growing data (since the days of cluster analysis).

Obvious, but Bruce does good marketing.

CC.

--
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)

Re:Collecting Data vs. Analysis by fleebait · 2013-05-04 08:47 · Score: 1

It is always possible to collect data, and simply save it. Nobody has to search, nobody has to listen.
Until, maybe a year or two later, when a PERIOD of Interest is identified, which reduces what is to be searched immensely.

The lies from monsters like Schneier by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:15 · Score: 1

The purpose of intelligence agencies in powerful nations has NOTHING to do with threats from 'criminals' and 'terrorists'. No, it is about giving the true masters of these societies the most perfect control possible of the 'mob'.

Today, the internet allows those that rule you to get feedback in real-time that explains the effectiveness of ANY governmental PR campaign disseminated by the mass media. If the response of the sheeple is 'wrong', the message can be immediately re-engineered and broadcast again. Reading the content of the electronic communications of the masses is essential for this feedback process.

Of course, the collection of ever possible detail about every individual serves the old original purpose of intelligence agencies- the elimination of enemies of the 'king' by using the words of those enemies against them. Where an elite believe they have near perfect control, their paranoia over possible 'palace coups' becomes near absolute.

We do not wonder where nations like the USA and UK are going, because we already have the answer from history. Simple turn to the story of the USSR. The fake 'left' and 'right' parties of these two nations are, in reality, far closer than were the various factions of the communist movement within the old USSR. Just like was the Soviet case, who ever you vote for in the UK or USA, you get the same people behind the scenes running the exact same mid and long term policies. The USSR gathered every detail about every citizen that state-of-the-art technology allowed at the time. This information was entirely used to ensure the status quo experienced by the vast majority of Soviet citizens continued.

Increasingly, the UK and USA ruthlessly exterminate opposition movements that arise from the grass-roots. At the same time, they provide state-run, national 'anti-government' forums that the disaffected sheep are instructed to join if they wish to express opposition to anything the government appears to be currently doing. Most of the sheeple are told to express any anti-government sentiment they might be feeling by tuning in to things like the 'Colbert Report' on a mass media channel. The Soviets also used the same form of population control by having state-approved 'comedians' mock the current Soviet ruling classes.

Before the Mark 1 version of the USSR 'collapsed', its police state control of its population had been the most successful such project in Human History. Even today, it is Soviet space tech that the hopeless Americans rely on to get them to the Space Station. My point is that it is a fallacy to think, by definition, that an oppressive police-state with a brutal intelligence apparatus cannot also be a productive and technologically advanced nation. Sadly (as Slashdot comments so frequently prove) 'technocrats' thrive under authoritarian regimes, because of their common psychological profiles.

Again, re-read '1984' and try to understand it this time. We must accept that technology allows the most evil forms of societal control to be perfected. Evil alphas dream of the coming times when the sheeple are finally put in their "deserved" place for good. The Fabian philosophy, which dominates this planet, is that Humans split into two species- the 'Alphas' who rise to the top given the opportunity, and the 'chaff' who exist only to serve the desires of the alphas. The Fabians, basing their views on a perverted understanding of Ancient Rome', believe that every Human should be given the chance to exhibit their 'alpha' qualities, regardless of race, religion, or accident of birth- and thus they shake off any feeling of guilt as to the fate of those Humans who are not alphas.

To Fabians, intelligence gathering is no different from how and why a farmer keeps records on his livestock. To a Fabian, a World War is the ultimate concept in livestock management. The people that run Google, for instance, are proud to be on record saying that the population of the Earth needs to be massively reduced.

Time to "tear you up", point-by-point... apk by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:21 · Score: -1

I don't do more than 5% dns lookups here (I know it from router logs, my browser histories, & firewall outbound logs I analyzed to make my 20 hardcoded favorites in my custom hosts file's topmost entries, which beat dns indexing by a mile to around 3 million records). Look at my hosts file program's "Speedup Favorite Sites" tab http://start64.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5851:apk-hosts-file-engine-64bit-version&catid=26:64bit-security-software&Itemid=74 - it does a reverse dns ping against the in-addr arpa 'tld' every time I build my hosts file. So much for my fav sites changing then. When your remote dns servers (or locally hosted one, stupid added complexity that wastes cpu cycles, ram, & other forms of i/o vs. what a single simple text file filter in hosts files gives you, operating @ Ring 0/RPL 0/kernelmode does, fast as possible mind you, vs. ring 3/rpl 3/usermode 'solutions' (slow)) fail a lookup, you bring down yet more time, in recursion. That last point brings up a huge security risk, considering most isp level (very bad) dns servers are not patched vs. the Kaminsky flaw, almost 6 yrs. after it was discovered and patched for. Do you even know what "FastFlux" botnet design is? Clue: It is "the" way, & the design botnets have used for more than a decade now, and yes, it recycles/reuses known bad sites/servers/hosts-domain names, like mad. As far as speed gains? Everyone knows that when you cut out adbanners, you lessen download by up to 40% of most website's pages (as well as lessening javascript processing, and the dangers in that in adbanners). Hardcoded favorites resolved locally from ram & kernelmode (IP stack & diskcache) do the rest vs. slower remote dns servers and their security issues especially. You fail again Jeremiah Cornelius.

APK

Re:Time to "tear you up", point-by-point... apk by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:43 · Score: -1

Are you really serious about having 650 thousand lines in your file? I can't imagine why you'd need that many. It also has a crippling effect on one's computer.
To test this, I created a sample copy of a file with that many entries, using the "0" shorthand for IP address and a randomized hostname of average 32 characters. Total size of this file is 22855 kilobytes, and after an hour the DNS cache had only loaded a third of it in. This is primarily due to the choice of algorithm used by the DNS cache service - it wasn't designed for tens of thousands of file entries to be stored, so uses a rather inefficient method of growing the space used to store that involves copying huge swathes of data around for each new entry. It also blocked any name lookups while loading the file.
I decided to try with the DNS cache disabled. This isn't a good idea, as it forces uncached name resolution to be done for every single lookup. This is indeed what it did, and the original 650,000 entry files added around 3 seconds onto every single name lookup, the amalgamated effect of which slowed general Internet access down considerably. Unlike the DNS cache loading, this time there was a slight difference in loading times between the different files - this was expected, as it was reading the entire file each time so that became the bottleneck.
In conclusion, using the file to store tens of thousands of entries has a negative effect on the performance of Windows' name resolution. You should really consider another option to filter all those hostnames.

This is not I folks: It's Jeremiah Cornelius...apk by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:25 · Score: -1

THIS is why he's doing it & proof of it, here -> http://interviews.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3585927&cid=43295193 when others pointed out Jeremiah Cornelius forgot to submit one of the "first post spams" masquerading as myself as AC, & mistakenly submitted one of the impersonations of myself as his registered 'luser' name here on /. forums.

Pretty pitiful actually, but like every up to no good idiot does? He screwed up & submitted it under his registered 'luser' name here.

* Jeremiah Cornelius: DO YOURSELF, and the rest of us, A GIANT FAVOR MAN: Seek professional psychiatric help!

(Since Jeremiah Cornelius obviously can't get over the fact he made a spelling error on what it is HE ALLEGEDLY DID FOR A LIVING? That's not MY fault... it's HIS!)

APK

P.S.=> I seriously must have dusted JC (in his mind @ least) for his BAD spelling error & it "got his goat"...

I.E.-> Catching what he claimed to do as a job, for YEARS he left "PENETRATION" (correct) spelled as "PENTRATION" (incorrect) on his resume on LinkedIn & I pointed it out as he & his friends trolled me as usual (webmistressrachel, gmhowell, & crew (probably ALL JC no doubt using alterate emails or TOR to do it as a possible - I've caught "them & theirs" doing it before, ala Barbara, not Barbie = TomHudson (same person))).

So THAT is what has gotten his goat in a technical debate & his "geek angst" could only come up with *trying* to "impersonate me" in every news thread on /. for the month of March 2013 so far!

(Just to attempt to 'discredit me' as a spammer here obviously)

Doing so, by posting that "$10,000 challenge" &/or reposts of my old posts on hosts file value to end users into EVERY SINGLE NEWS ARTICLE POSTED on /. ...

It's all I can think of that *might* cause such a mentally troubled 'reaction' like the Jeremiah Cornelius is doing & there's NO QUESTION he's the one doing this spamming of nearly every posted article masquerading as myself...!

... apk

Didn't the FBI say something similar by Art+Challenor · 2013-05-04 07:32 · Score: 3, Interesting

Didn't the FBI make a similar comment after it was revealed that they had questioned the Boston bomber in the past? Something to the effect that they could not follow up on every suspicisous character without turning the country into a police state.

Jeremiah Cornelius: Grow up by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:35 · Score: -1

You're embarassing yourself Jeremiah Cornelius http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3581857&cid=43276741 since you posted that using your registered username by mistake (instead of your usual anonymous coward submissions by the 100's the past 2-3 months now on slashdot) giving away it's you spamming this forums almost constantly, just as you have in the post I just replied to.

False positives by gmuslera · 2013-05-04 07:38 · Score: 2

Is not just collection. You face consequences for false positives. And anything you said could be used against you, even if a joke in a private mail (if you ever said something they didn't like).

So you are walking in thin ice, you could get big charges for something that you don't see as a crime (or see it as a joke or a prank). And people do weird things in that kind of situations,

Relevant: by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:40 · Score: 0

Penguin Pete, persona non gratia forever on Slashdot, just put it better last week:

http://penguinpetes.com/b2evo/index.php?title=why_i_don_t_give_a_rip_about_cispa_and_w&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1

QUOTE:

"It doesn't matter how much data you collect. What matters is having the eyeballs to read that data."

Don't need to be a security expert. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 07:48 · Score: 0

I f you introduce an enormous volume of noise into your data sample, you have a lot of noise in your data sample. They collect your personal data to take ownership of your personal life and make you feel subservient. It's mot for the ""terrorists"".

No Person X Re:Person of Interest by mjwalshe · 2013-05-04 07:50 · Score: 1

nah a cover up it woudl have been called Person X - Shows with X in the title do better in the ratings

Re:No Person X Re:Person of Interest by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 14:36 · Score: 0

I suspect that calling it 'Person XXX' could garner even more viewers.

Say what? by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 08:09 · Score: 0

Bruce says we need LESS surveillance, and you call him a liar and monster?

Did you read the article?

And what the hell is that at the end about Fabio? Sure, he's got great hair and a strong chiseled chin, but even he understands that without those less good-looking, he wouldn't be able to earn a living selling them butter substitutes.

Re:Say what? by gl4ss · 2013-05-04 08:33 · Score: 1

Bruce says we need LESS surveillance, and you call him a liar and monster?
Did you read the article?
And what the hell is that at the end about Fabio? Sure, he's got great hair and a strong chiseled chin, but even he understands that without those less good-looking, he wouldn't be able to earn a living selling them butter substitutes.
you obviously replied to a joke. Fabians and all, hilarious. almost as hilarious as scientologists.

--
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.

Unwarranted assumption by Livius · 2013-05-04 08:13 · Score: 1

It was never about increasing safety. Loss of civil rights is a feature, not a bug.

Re:Unwarranted assumption by Opportunist · 2013-05-04 09:20 · Score: 1

He pretty much debunks the bait we get sold to bite the hook.

--
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.

Flawed argument by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 08:16 · Score: 0

Adding pure noise to data sets indeed results in a price to be paid in terms of accuracy of statistical models. However, if statistical modeling is done properly, this price is low.

The proper argument still needs to go back to ethical/civil rights aspects.

You fail again Jeremiah Cornelius... apk by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 08:18 · Score: -1

The local kernelmode diskcache subsystem will take over for you caching hosts file data (unaltered - which allows my top 20 to beat dns indexing up to 3 million or so entries mind you for my favorite sites) into ram, & then the IP stack also in kernelmode does the rest (as fast as possible, with least complexity). You fail again, Jeremiah Cornelius. You point out wasteful ways of doing it with dns (especially if setup as a separate system burning power you pay for), or the faulty with big hosts files Windows' dns clientside cache service. Especially for single system home users. (Should I post material from Symantec or O'Reilly on the note of speed custom hosts give you too, to back myself up here, not that I need to? I have before, just ask & "ye shall receive"...). What I find extremely amusing is watching you attempt to bury this with tons of ac trolling posts.

APK

P.S.=> Clue: You have to disable the faulty with larger hosts files local dns clientside cache service in Windows. This is 1 thing I will give Linux over Windows in fact (that, & the fact it can still use the smaller/faster 0 block address vs. even 0.0.0.0 or the largest/slowest of them all, in the loopback adapter address of 127.0.0.1. The latter 2 also create slower parse for load, and larger files - Windows can't, vista onwards, since "Patch Tuesday" 12/09/2008 & even Microsoft's then "Windows Client Performance Division" VP conceded this to me here on slashdot before -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1467692&cid=30384918 in Mr. Richard Russell who posts as Foredecker here). Learn something for Pete's sake since I have corrected you on this many times before. You can here on the left-hand side on the page in the hosts file installation section -> http://hosts-file.net/?s=Download from MalwareBytes' hpHosts (which also features my program too, bonus)... apk

I blame city slickers by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 08:19 · Score: 0

Only someone who has not lived on a farm could ever think that you build a bigger haystack to make it easier to find a needle in it.

Re:Fiction, not fact. They had been suspects prior by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 08:20 · Score: 1

They had been suspects prior, from what I have read and heard. The FBI and other unknown agencies had questioned the two long before the bombings. You have, about 20 American neo-nazi groups that are going to resort to using terror tactics, and the FBI and other agencies have no idea who will be the ones to start it. But they have files on the the people they dub to be a threat, usually the ones most active in spreading the message, and it is almost a a sure bet it will be the followers that have not been profiled that will start it.

Bottom line to me the 2 involved in the bombings were doing it for a thrill, and not because of some unjust religious cause. Then you have the mass murders walking into any building and opening gun fire at anyone, who haven't been profiled. I am surprised the agencies at power haven't just come out and used that as another excuse to squeeze more out of your privacy.

They use one to try and monitor guns, and the other to monitor people, all of it is propaganda. Yes there are terrorists groups but the government is using it as a means to implement controls of its own citizens. Far beyond what they used to do..

This is not I folks: It's Jeremiah Cornelius...apk by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 08:43 · Score: -1

THIS is why he's doing it & proof of it, here -> http://interviews.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3585927&cid=43295193 when others pointed out Jeremiah Cornelius forgot to submit one of the "first post spams" masquerading as myself as AC, & mistakenly submitted one of the impersonations of myself as his registered 'luser' name here on /. forums.

Pretty pitiful actually, but like every up to no good idiot does? He screwed up & submitted it under his registered 'luser' name here.

* Jeremiah Cornelius: DO YOURSELF, and the rest of us, A GIANT FAVOR MAN: Seek professional psychiatric help!

(Since Jeremiah Cornelius obviously can't get over the fact he made a spelling error on what it is HE ALLEGEDLY DID FOR A LIVING? That's not MY fault... it's HIS!)

APK

P.S.=> I seriously must have dusted JC (in his mind @ least) for his BAD spelling error & it "got his goat"...

I.E.-> Catching what he claimed to do as a job, for YEARS he left "PENETRATION" (correct) spelled as "PENTRATION" (incorrect) on his resume on LinkedIn & I pointed it out as he & his friends trolled me as usual (webmistressrachel, gmhowell, & crew (probably ALL JC no doubt using alterate emails or TOR to do it as a possible - I've caught "them & theirs" doing it before, ala Barbara, not Barbie = TomHudson (same person))).

So THAT is what has gotten his goat in a technical debate & his "geek angst" could only come up with *trying* to "impersonate me" in every news thread on /. for the month of March 2013 so far!

(Just to attempt to 'discredit me' as a spammer here obviously)

Doing so, by posting that "$10,000 challenge" &/or reposts of my old posts on hosts file value to end users into EVERY SINGLE NEWS ARTICLE POSTED on /. ...

It's all I can think of that *might* cause such a mentally troubled 'reaction' like the Jeremiah Cornelius is doing & there's NO QUESTION he's the one doing this spamming of nearly every posted article masquerading as myself...!

... apk

Contrary to his previous opinions by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 09:13 · Score: 0

In 2010 he wrote an argument for data sharing between federal intelligence agencies in a yet another almost arrogantly titled post[1].

they need to share information among the different parts of themselves.

I can't help but feel that in recent years he has started to ride the popularity wave and has lost sight of the reality; he seems to only comment on hot button issues at just the right time and is thus becoming less relevant.

[1] http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/article/Fixing-intelligence-failures-3202795.php

You lose again Jeremiah Cornelius by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 09:18 · Score: -1

Hilarious watching you try bury this Jeremiah Cornelius http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3717059&cid=4363075 so, so much for your security certifications, Jeremiah Cornelius. You aren't very good at it & small wonder Microsoft fired you for technical incompetence. I find it hilarious seeing you react the only way you know how, attempting to bury that with tons of ac posts which is the classic "troll" trick called forums sliding which you evidence yourself to be as a troll using it, as usual, per my 1st post exposing you in a massive fail in it doing it by accident using your registered lusername here http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3581857&cid=43276741 . Keep reacting showing everyone here just what you're made of (bullshit certs, very little technical acumen, and being fired at Microsoft for it). Next will be technically unjustifiable downmods from Jeremiah Cornelius' multiple sockpuppet accounts. Mark my words. I've got that moron down to a tee.

APK

P.S.=> Here's your BIG FAIL here (Linux has no such issue, however, Windows does): You have to disable the faulty with larger hosts files local dns clientside cache service in Windows with larger custom hosts files. Learn something for Pete's sake since I have corrected you on this many times before. You can here on the left-hand side on the page in the hosts file installation section -> http://hosts-file.net/?s=Download from MalwareBytes' hpHosts (which also features my program too, bonus)... apk

Re:You lose again Jeremiah Cornelius by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 09:38 · Score: 0

You fail it, Paul. Your skill is not enough.

Jeremiah Cornelius is "reacting" trollishly by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 09:34 · Score: -1

You got hilariously smoked here on that very thing http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3717059&cid=43630759 and here http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3717059&cid=43631081 here too. Usermode might yield results like you see (which is where dns on Linux iirc via libc but correct me if I am wrong here), but my hosts is loaded into ram for fast as possible & unaltered parsing via the local kernelmode diskcache, and the kernelmode IP stack does the rest (way, Way, WAY faster than ring 3/rpl 3/usermode is). Funny that I am watching you, Jeremiah Cornelius, react the only way a troll like you knows how (like you did here getting caught trolling by accidentally posting using your registered username here http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3581857&cid=43276741 screwing up even at trolling. You aren't any better at it than you are on computing technicals which is evidenced in this exchange. Hence, Microsoft terminating your technically weak ass, lol).

Re:Jeremiah Cornelius is "reacting" trollishly by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 09:35 · Score: 0

You fail it, Paul. Your skill is not enough.

Re:Fiction, not fact. They had been suspects prior by icebike · 2013-05-04 10:10 · Score: 2

Check your facts.

One (not both) had been questioned at the request of the russians. The russians refused to supply enough information about the nature of their prior request, and the FBI questions were answered satisfactorily.

--
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.

You know what increases safety? by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 10:13 · Score: -1

Killing the fuckin' terrorists.

And, when you put someone on death row, you actually fuckin' kill them, so it's actually a bad thing to be on death row.

Generally, making things safer means getting rid of the fuckin' people who make it unsafe. It's pretty simple, really. The rest of us who want it to be so safe need to fuckin' grow a set and actually do something about it, instead of fuckin' apologizing all the goddamn time to the people who want to make our world unsafe.

Thanks for confirming what he said by joh · 2013-05-04 11:02 · Score: 1

What good did all the control and data for the USSR and East-Germany? The latter really had perfected the art of its citizens spying on its citizens and still: It just collapsed. You can't really control a population. There are just too many people and when they decide to do something all your control is moot.

That's actually the point Schneier tries to make: From a certain point on collecting more and more data the ROI (and eroding civil liberties is one of those "investments") just isn't there anymore. You're sitting in a nice deep hole and busy yourself with digging it deeper.

The Washington Post:

The top-secret world the government created in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do the same work.
These are some of the findings of a two-year investigation by The Washington Post that discovered what amounts to an alternative geography of the United States, a Top Secret America hidden from public view and lacking in thorough oversight. After nine years of unprecedented spending and growth, the result is that the system put in place to keep the United States safe is so massive that its effectiveness is impossible to determine.

"Impossible to determine", exactly. The US is so poor and the government spends so much without getting anything useful done because the wars it sprays over the world and the cold war on the people.

It would be wiser to accept some risks. You can't (and don't want to!) have a state in which two young people can't get at some black powder and pressure cookers and learn how to make a bomb. This is madness.

WRONG! by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 11:07 · Score: 0

There are some criminals that act out of an inability to control their actions. Cams and the like or the threat of being caught will do nothing to slow them down. Usually they self limit as they take no precautions against being caught.
But there is an entirely different world of criminals who are in it for the money and are calculating and hard to catch. My late brother in law was a criminal who specialized in the theft of tractor trailer rigs and ran a chop shop where the engines and valuable parts were extracted and sold. The repair facilities that buy and install stolen engines and transmissions know exactly what they are buying by the way. My brother in law spent seven years in a federal prison as a consequence. After release he would jokingly complain with the jovial remark"What's a criminal to do?". That was in reference to the new technologies and the difficulty of being a criminal in the new, electronic age. He would remark that crime was no longer a "good way to go". But although he gave up on chopping trucks and the like he never did really leave crime. Defrauding an insurance company or a marriage for which he was paid in order to gain citizenship for an immigrant and all kinds of petty schemes were always part of his life. He suffered from paranoia and schizophrenia and hated society intensely. But I do agree with him that the normal, old fashioned crooks don't stand a chance these days. In some areas there are so many private cams up and running that burglars often appear on chains of cam as they approach a home and break in. It is no longer a matter of parking a distance away as with so many cams tracking him back to his vehicle can be a breeze. Our local crime rates are trivial. In a nearby community every public street is surveilled non stop by the police department. The town has one road in and one road out as well so every vehicle is on tape as well as where it stops, when it stops and how long it stops. What's a criminal to do? They tried invading by boats a couple of times. Oops, precautions exist against that as well. No resident of the town is not a millionaire and no dwelling or apartment under one million dollars exists.

image enhancement by Foresto · 2013-05-04 11:16 · Score: 2

"CSI" convinced people that the crappiest image can be enhanced up to a perfectly clear picture in a few clicks.

Nah... we've been convinced of that since Blade Runner at the latest. Probably much earlier.

Re:image enhancement by ppanon · 2013-05-04 20:15 · Score: 1

To be fair, Blade Runner was a science fiction movie where they had flying cars. Deckard didn't just blow up a small part of the picture, he actually blew up something that was hidden from the standard point of view. The only way that made any sense was if it was some kind of 3D interference hologram that somehow didn't come across in the 2D movie projection. i.e. it's not a photograph as we know it Jim, not as we know it.

--
Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. - Voltaire

More basic issues by NitWit005 · 2013-05-04 11:28 · Score: 1

I suppose this is a problem, but we have to be realistic here. The FBI has failed repeatedly to complete large software projects. They have trouble handling even clear-cut data. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_Case_File

Bruce Schneier facts by KugelKurt · 2013-05-04 13:04 · Score: 5, Funny

Bruce Schneier doesn't need to hide data with steganography - data hides from Bruce Schneier
Bruce Schneier knows who the Anonymous Coward is
Bruce Schneier can recite pi. Backwards.
Bruce Schneier can securely wipe any hard drive by shaking it like an etch-a-sketch.
Bruce Schneier knows Chuck Norris' private key.
Bruce Schneier can write a recursive program that proves the Riemann Hypothesis. In Malbolge.
Bruce Schneier can read captchas.
Hashes collide because they're swerving to avoid Bruce Schneier.
Bruce Schneier is the root of all certificates.
Bruce Schneier intercepts all your internal monologues by a man-in-the-middle attack.

http://www.schneierfacts.com/

Re:Bruce Schneier facts by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 23:49 · Score: 0

Bruce Schneier doesn't need to talk about security theater, he defines it.

The Machine by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 15:08 · Score: 0

The reason that having more data makes things harder to track is because we don't have "The Machine". YET!!

If you want to contact Bruce Schneier... by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 15:20 · Score: 0

...just type his name into your shell prompt.

have to try this one. lol

Re:If you want to contact Bruce Schneier... by KugelKurt · 2013-05-04 23:52 · Score: 1

Bruce Schneier accurately predicts the random.
http://www.schneierfacts.com/facts/485

Enhance by dutchwhizzman · 2013-05-04 18:30 · Score: 1

... presses the enhance button repeatedly to view the person from another angle and 20ft away, using satellite images.

--
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?

Jeremiah Cornelius = "3 strikes & yer out" by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-04 23:40 · Score: -1

Here http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3717059&cid=43630759 and here http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3717059&cid=43631081 and here too http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3717059&cid=43631405 He's now merely exposed a miserable troll that everyone knows uses sockpuppets or ac submits as shown here trying to impersonate me but mostly to moddown posts where I "cleaned his clock" to try to 'hide' them, in the links above, & on actual technical materials shown above.

(And, that jackass supposedly worked @ Microsoft? No f'ing way, but that MIGHT explain why MS stuff sucked prior to Windows 2000 then, with lame staffers like Jeremiah Cornelius, lol... especially based on his lack of simple networking stuff I blew him away on above).

LMAO - Funniest is watching Jeremiah Cornelius 'dance', lol, & basically going nuts with all of his other posts by ac here, and in other posts, to try "defend himself" by ac posts (even though he's been caught doing it using his registered username on slashdot by mistake as I pointed out and he exposed himself with) and downmodding my posts that not only dust him, but expose him as an utter NOOB.

No wonder Microsoft canned him. Not only does he suck at technical material in the computer sciences, but he sucks at trolling too!

APK

P.S.=> In the end, I pretty much have "your number down" based on your lack of understanding on this level of material - you're NOTHING more than a "techie": In over his head here, and guys like you? Many here may NOT LIKE IT, but this is truth: Techs are merely users, so are network admins (users with a better password, not much more usually) who merely "use" what folks like myself in programmers create for them to 'use', nothing more... I can state that, I've BEEN both over 18++ yrs. professionally + successfully! apk

Tearing you up again... apk by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-05 01:54 · Score: -1

I don't do more than 5% dns lookups here (I know it from router logs, my browser histories, & firewall outbound logs I analyzed to make my 20 hardcoded favorites in my custom hosts file's topmost entries, which beat dns indexing by a mile to around 3 million records). News aggregator sites help also. They stop you hopping all over and summaries here for example are usually good. Comments do the rest from posters. Look at my hosts file program's "Speedup Favorite Sites" tab http://start64.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5851:apk-hosts-file-engine-64bit-version&catid=26:64bit-security-software&Itemid=74 as it does a reverse dns ping against the in-addr arpa 'tld' every time I build my hosts file. So much for my fav sites changing then. When your remote dns servers (or locally hosted one, stupid added complexity that wastes cpu cycles, ram, & other forms of i/o vs. what a single simple text file filter in hosts files gives you, operating @ Ring 0/RPL 0/kernelmode does, fast as possible mind you, vs. ring 3/rpl 3/usermode 'solutions' (slow)) fail a lookup, you bring down yet more time, in recursion. That last point brings up a huge security risk, considering most isp level (very bad) dns servers are not patched vs. the Kaminsky flaw, almost 6 yrs. after it was discovered and patched for. Do you even know what "FastFlux" botnet design is? Clue: It is "the" way, & the design botnets have used for more than a decade now, and yes, it recycles/reuses known bad sites/servers/hosts-domain names, like mad. As far as speed gains? Everyone knows that when you cut out adbanners, you lessen download by up to 40% of most website's pages (as well as lessening javascript processing, and the dangers in that in adbanners). Hardcoded favorites resolved locally from ram & kernelmode (IP stack & diskcache) do the rest vs. slower remote dns servers and their security issues especially. You fail again Jeremiah Cornelius.

APK

More surveillance by rkomando · 2013-05-05 04:42 · Score: 1

While Collecting More Data Doesn't Increase Safety, authorities might not have been able to track down the bombers in Boston before they made it to New York. I am not advocating big brother, but if your in a public place you really can not expect any privacy. There are just too many idiots out there. Americans simply rely on the government to take care of them.

Add needles with the hay by Cacadril · 2013-05-05 05:09 · Score: 1

The question is if the needle to hay ratio is better in the added hay.
If there was no needles in the original haystack, adding more hay may add a needle.

--
There is no substitute for common sense. Especially, no body of rules will do.

Jeremiah Cornelius = Paul by Anonymous Coward · 2013-05-10 08:37 · Score: 0

Projecting his own "modus operandi". He runs from a simple question -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3722427&cid=43654735 (since he outright lies on trolling others by ac posts, uses sockpuppets galore to mod himself up + his detractors down, & was caught doing so in the 2nd link below red-handed), & he also claims to have worked at Microsoft (b.s., imo because of what I state next), & yet got completely spanked by "yours truly" on actual computer technical information regarding custom hosts files - very fundamental networking & algorithmically oriented stuff no less, real 'CSC-101 stuff' -> http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3725365&cid=43659719 (which he can't disprove, but it certainly did prove his ac trollings which he outright lied about & by the 100's that he gave away he was doing here http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3581857&cid=43276741 ).

* Bottom-line here? Hey - Unlike YOU, I don't NEED 'support' like you do, sockpuppet master: Facts did you in & they're ALL I need, above.
(NOW - Whose "skill is not enough"? See those links above, & especially the 2nd one, on the note of skills...)

APK

P.S.=> You fail Jeremiah Cornelius - & you're a pitiful pot calling a kettle black hypocrite here since the 1st link has you doing a "Run, Forrest: RUN!!!" avoiding answering it, and YOU failed miserably in the 2nd link above, 3x in a ROW/"3 strikes yer out" (& you know it)... apk

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Bruce Schneier: Why Collecting More Data Doesn't Increase Safety

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