Even suppose you use opensource software and that said software was compiled with an uncomprimised compiler the hardware could still be comprimised.
Maybe, but the determined amateur, having thought of this possibility, would be highly likely to have all but eliminated that risk by configuring the hardware in a way that can be trusted (eg: stand alone livecd firewall/router and so on). But for an integrated system like a laptop, that is a realistic problem.
That means that EVERY product and service from the U.S. could be compromised. Those who don't want to risk U.S. surveillance and control won't want to risk buying from manufacturers in the United States. We already treat anything that is US owned as probably compromised. But then, anything running closed source can be assumed to be compromised. Easy solution: just don't trust anything important to the yanks.
Yet there are enough positive examples around to globe to support the idea that focusing on the character of government and society in earnest is infinitely better than cynicism that tries to replace govt with religion or a money-religion.
No argument there. It is an ancient truth that having the moral highground is necessary to have success in a war. A corrupt government and society is weak and destined for collapse. Agreed on religion also, because no government should have a leadership that has no accountability, and religious governments tend to have that nasty habit... but then again, so do atheist dictatorships. Some political scientists say that all government has the tendency to grow until it becomes so bloated and corrupt that an unworkable situation develops and a revolt is all that can follow. Let's hope for once this isn't true.
It's a bit like the war. The apparent reason to government insiders was financial necessity. The apparent reason for the public was to treat some kind of dire evil. The real reason is power and protection of the wealthy at the behest of the hidden hand.
The purpose of government is nolonger the service of the populace, but the suppression of any uprising against the establishment. And if there is to be any uprising, it must be controlled by the establishment.
I've looked myself for examples of the "successful" kind, but found none. I am not at all surprised, because it would probably mean that a CA had its key stolen (very unlikely) or that a CA had been conclusively caught participating in MITM.
It might also be because it does happen infrequently, unless they like going on fishing trips... which I wouldn't put past them.
And just who would risk that anyway when so many VeriSign and Network Solutions employees are ex-NSA, with their business model and sense of loyalty predicated on an expanding police surveillance state?
Yeah, there does come a point where government starts to look no different from an organized crime mob. As some people in the ex-soviet bloc say - "You have to pay tax - otherwise who is going to catch the guys that steal from my shop? You must pay it to the government and/or the mafia. Either way, you get some kind of protection, but you get better protection when you pay it to the mafia."
You're right, and it was a thoughtless oversight to ignore the trust factor in encryption (I did know that, but forgot to consider it).
As for MITM attacks on encrypted connections, I have wanted to learn more about who does it, how they do it and how often it's happening. Not sure where to look.
As for the STASI/KGB/etc, for all their brutality, they succeeded because of low-tech, human approaches to problems. I don't mean torture and the like. It is well known to be counterproductive (except for terror) and taints any information obtained. What I mean is that by infiltration they had their people in the appropriate target communities (eg: underground priests, activists, underground publishing houses) and pretty much had both sides of the fight under their control. Even the collapse of the USSR has been argued as having been more or less staged in this way.
As for our own intel services, I would hope that they don't go about screwing up the very people whose intention is to improve everyone's lives, including theirs - genuine peace activists, critics of bad government etc. It would be wise of them to go to some effort to take the moral highground and win the respect of the public. But with the way laws are heading, it appears everyone is now a suspect and nobody's privacy is given any regard. If that's the case, I hope they stumble and fail.
There is a reason why the lock appears in the address bar, because it validates that you are connected with the real holder of that address.
Checking credentials and so forth is a different matter from preventing the user from being tracked and profiled. If all traffic was encrypted, then it goes a step towards genuine net neutrality. Your ISP can't profile you and the warning "you are about to send data across an unencrypted connection" would nolonger be a nag but useful.
As for trust, well this is a problem in any market place. Online money transactions should be handled directly by the companies that handle money, in my opinion (eg: your bank). If you are spending money on the internet, you are expecting to be identified... but wouldn't it be great if there was an online cash system that was anonymous for smallish transactions?
I do keep harping on about it, but for the purposes of crime prevention and anti-terrorism-schmism, sniffing data and such is a waste of time and an unneccesary invasion into the private lives of the innocent and unsuspecting public. Real intelligence is human intelligence.
[astonishing...] there are people who think the solution is legislation
A very valid point. The solutions to most of the Internet's privacy problems lie in software design, such as default encryption and anomymizing of traffic. Although nobody can force Microsoft to create a half decent browser, or anything else for that matter, we can at least encourage open source software developers to reduce the end-user's internet fingerprint. Sure, anyone who is interested in not being followed around on the 'net can achieve this by installing a couple of firefox plugins and so on, but the way for the privacy conscious to protect themselves best is to encourage everyone else to do the same.
If we consider privacy infringement being akin to getting syphilis, then apart from not using the internet (abstinence), or installing and configuring extra software (condoms, which fall off, or don't get used in the first place), the only option is to supply people with genitalia which is pre-shrink-wrapped, if you get my drift.
The problem isn't lack of transparency: it's that Joe Consumer actually doesn't really give a shit one way or the other. The same way Joe Consumer has been done over by the banks. Of course he doesn't really feel it yet.
I'd say, especially in a society where circumcision is not standard (i.e. not Israel, USA, Philippines, etc.), if you've just had part of your cock lobbed off, you're very likely to change your sexual habits and people are less likely to have sex with you. If you're just given advice and then told to go away, you're more likely to carry on as usual. Indeed. I remember having this "research" shoved down my throat in uni by a very zealous professor. Not very useful advice for Africa, but man it made the short, ugly, nasally circumsised students feel real tough.
This is neither a virus or a worm; it's a trojan. A trojan is a program that does or claims to do something useful, which gets you to install it. Once installed, it does something else in addition to or instead of what you installed it for.
This is a very good argument for making all software free. Whilst Windows has been insecure by design, where just browsing around can cause system compromise, the one universal method to compromise a system is to install software which has been altered. About half of the people I know own and use macs. They paid extra to get one, but most of them didn't buy their photoshop suite, their office suite, etc etc., because they are ordinary home users, they have limited funds and the temptation of saving hundreds of dollars is too much. They don't have a cleanly licensed system anymore. They will always say yes to more pirated software. They are sitters for trojans.
Then my 'linux' friends. Do they need to buy a photoshop suite? No. Do they need to buy an office suite? No, they all came with the system. Do they need to buy games? Who cares, they had extra $$$ left over because they bought a whitebox and now they have an Xbox or some other thing. As for solitaire and sudoku and other coffee-break games, they can find it in their package manager.
Why women soldiers? I'm sure if male soldiers are left out there long enough, they would appreciate a vibration device just as well as their female counterparts. Indeed, why stop there? They should spend another 4 million and develop the Nude Bomb and shower the enemy skies with toys. Then it's just a matter of waiting before the enemy nation becomes a tourist haven for obese elderly nudists. Even the thought of that would be enough to cause widespread peace, I'd have thought.
Thats great, now they just need to give out a load of free pin ups pics so they can all get to work cranking up a good charge to power their gear. Heyyy.. I think I just came up with an idea for a perpetual motion.. er.. vibration device.
Readers be at ease. No cute furry animals were used in the research: They shaved the monkeys and dressed them up to look like [inser favourite politician] first.
Seems the terrorists have already won, with a minimal expenditure of energy/effort. I still wonder if this was the plan all along, to just nudge the civilized world into self destruction on its own, or just an unexpected side effect worth exploiting. Either way its the same result, but i am curious.
Terrorism is like a broom and totalitarianism and government oppression are like a shovel. Now could it possibly be that the same person is holding both?
Indeed, terrorism is intended to have a maximal social effect with minimum outlay. In the dirty tyrannies they just grab a few random individuals, imprisoned them, beat them half to death and released the pale, afraid and shattered life that was left into the community. Worked like a charm.
In this case, however, I think we're heading for a white coat tyranny.
Surely that could be used by terrorists to lure and then annihilate politicians and megarich businessmen of the opposite (or sometimes the same) sex. It smells like a chemistry set too!
Slashdot Mirror
Maybe, but the determined amateur, having thought of this possibility, would be highly likely to have all but eliminated that risk by configuring the hardware in a way that can be trusted (eg: stand alone livecd firewall/router and so on). But for an integrated system like a laptop, that is a realistic problem.
No argument there. It is an ancient truth that having the moral highground is necessary to have success in a war. A corrupt government and society is weak and destined for collapse. Agreed on religion also, because no government should have a leadership that has no accountability, and religious governments tend to have that nasty habit ... but then again, so do atheist dictatorships. Some political scientists say that all government has the tendency to grow until it becomes so bloated and corrupt that an unworkable situation develops and a revolt is all that can follow. Let's hope for once this isn't true.
It's a bit like the war. The apparent reason to government insiders was financial necessity. The apparent reason for the public was to treat some kind of dire evil. The real reason is power and protection of the wealthy at the behest of the hidden hand.
The purpose of government is nolonger the service of the populace, but the suppression of any uprising against the establishment. And if there is to be any uprising, it must be controlled by the establishment.
It might also be because it does happen infrequently, unless they like going on fishing trips... which I wouldn't put past them.
And just who would risk that anyway when so many VeriSign and Network Solutions employees are ex-NSA, with their business model and sense of loyalty predicated on an expanding police surveillance state?Yeah, there does come a point where government starts to look no different from an organized crime mob. As some people in the ex-soviet bloc say - "You have to pay tax - otherwise who is going to catch the guys that steal from my shop? You must pay it to the government and/or the mafia. Either way, you get some kind of protection, but you get better protection when you pay it to the mafia."
They are a mainstream news source and are reliable except when it counts.
You're right, and it was a thoughtless oversight to ignore the trust factor in encryption (I did know that, but forgot to consider it).
As for MITM attacks on encrypted connections, I have wanted to learn more about who does it, how they do it and how often it's happening. Not sure where to look.
As for the STASI/KGB/etc, for all their brutality, they succeeded because of low-tech, human approaches to problems. I don't mean torture and the like. It is well known to be counterproductive (except for terror) and taints any information obtained. What I mean is that by infiltration they had their people in the appropriate target communities (eg: underground priests, activists, underground publishing houses) and pretty much had both sides of the fight under their control. Even the collapse of the USSR has been argued as having been more or less staged in this way.
As for our own intel services, I would hope that they don't go about screwing up the very people whose intention is to improve everyone's lives, including theirs - genuine peace activists, critics of bad government etc. It would be wise of them to go to some effort to take the moral highground and win the respect of the public. But with the way laws are heading, it appears everyone is now a suspect and nobody's privacy is given any regard. If that's the case, I hope they stumble and fail.
Checking credentials and so forth is a different matter from preventing the user from being tracked and profiled. If all traffic was encrypted, then it goes a step towards genuine net neutrality. Your ISP can't profile you and the warning "you are about to send data across an unencrypted connection" would nolonger be a nag but useful.
As for trust, well this is a problem in any market place. Online money transactions should be handled directly by the companies that handle money, in my opinion (eg: your bank). If you are spending money on the internet, you are expecting to be identified... but wouldn't it be great if there was an online cash system that was anonymous for smallish transactions?
I do keep harping on about it, but for the purposes of crime prevention and anti-terrorism-schmism, sniffing data and such is a waste of time and an unneccesary invasion into the private lives of the innocent and unsuspecting public. Real intelligence is human intelligence.
Well if it does end up being called a gPhone, I reckon it'll hit Apple right in the iSpot.
.. which came complimentary with their Microsoft site license (both Excel and the figures!).
I'm so hurt. All this time I trusted the BBC as a veritable, reliable news service. I feel so.. so.. violated!
...not!
A very valid point. The solutions to most of the Internet's privacy problems lie in software design, such as default encryption and anomymizing of traffic. Although nobody can force Microsoft to create a half decent browser, or anything else for that matter, we can at least encourage open source software developers to reduce the end-user's internet fingerprint. Sure, anyone who is interested in not being followed around on the 'net can achieve this by installing a couple of firefox plugins and so on, but the way for the privacy conscious to protect themselves best is to encourage everyone else to do the same.
If we consider privacy infringement being akin to getting syphilis, then apart from not using the internet (abstinence), or installing and configuring extra software (condoms, which fall off, or don't get used in the first place), the only option is to supply people with genitalia which is pre-shrink-wrapped, if you get my drift.
Reading the post, I already felt thoroughly obfusced. Reminds me of the timy my fsck obfsck'd by hard drive and it all turned to water.
This is a very good argument for making all software free. Whilst Windows has been insecure by design, where just browsing around can cause system compromise, the one universal method to compromise a system is to install software which has been altered. About half of the people I know own and use macs. They paid extra to get one, but most of them didn't buy their photoshop suite, their office suite, etc etc., because they are ordinary home users, they have limited funds and the temptation of saving hundreds of dollars is too much. They don't have a cleanly licensed system anymore. They will always say yes to more pirated software. They are sitters for trojans.
Then my 'linux' friends. Do they need to buy a photoshop suite? No. Do they need to buy an office suite? No, they all came with the system. Do they need to buy games? Who cares, they had extra $$$ left over because they bought a whitebox and now they have an Xbox or some other thing. As for solitaire and sudoku and other coffee-break games, they can find it in their package manager.
Readers be at ease. No cute furry animals were used in the research: They shaved the monkeys and dressed them up to look like [inser favourite politician] first.
Terrorism is like a broom and totalitarianism and government oppression are like a shovel. Now could it possibly be that the same person is holding both?
Indeed, terrorism is intended to have a maximal social effect with minimum outlay. In the dirty tyrannies they just grab a few random individuals, imprisoned them, beat them half to death and released the pale, afraid and shattered life that was left into the community. Worked like a charm.
In this case, however, I think we're heading for a white coat tyranny.
Surely that could be used by terrorists to lure and then annihilate politicians and megarich businessmen of the opposite (or sometimes the same) sex. It smells like a chemistry set too!