This is certainly an interesting application of cell phone technology and the existing cell phone network - NASA's page mentions savings of multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars per launch.
However, it's hard to see what the significance is overall. Satellites have always been able to communicate in via "realtime telemetry", and could hardly function otherwise.
I think the big thing here is simply that it decreases the amount of special instrumentation needed - any comments from the group?
As I post this, neither Verisign nor MS mentions this on their front page. Do they want to wait until the next cracker to deface the front page of Altavista or Yahoo adds an ActiveX virus and wipes out (quite easily) ten million machines?
The real question is will Microsoft patch it by including proper certificate revokation lists, or will they just patch it by disallowing those two certificates.
At the present time, what is distinguishing the two in question from the 'real' MS certificates? I don't see that much. If it's possible for MS to revoke those two, why can't the crackers revoke the real ones?
As several others have posted, the trust is granted on a per-certificate basis. You're trusting code signed with that certificate. Mind you, that doesn't prevent people automatically agreeing again when they see the Microsoft name on the certificate...
Who should read this bulletin: All customers using Microsoft® products.
Impact of vulnerability: Attacker could digitally sign code using the name "Microsoft Corporation".
Recommendation: All customers should follow the administrative procedures detailed in the FAQ. A software update will be issued shortly to provide permanent remediation.
I find it very fascinating that MS doesn't mention anything about the hazards of running code from an unknown author.
I would also hope that Verisign is taking a very serious look at their procedures - if CAs don't verify identities before issuing certificates, what good are they?
For that matter, how were individuals - MS employees or not - given keys in the company's name? There's no need for an individual employee to have those - especially before calling to check with executives within the company.
Not just new manufacturing - my interpretation is that this applies to all computers sold in Texas.
Needless to say, that pretty much would cut the state out of the modern world. Of course, since most of the world doesn't execute 300 people per year...
Well, IANAL, but I seem to recall that you can be arrested in one state for a crime committed against the laws of another.
For example, murder (unless of a federal officer or certain other unusual circumstances) is not against federal law, but if I commit a murder in Nevada I can sure as hell be arrested in California for it.
I think the issue is that, in America, it's easy for criminals to get guns. If a police officer without a gun is standing thirty feet from a murderer with a gun, he'll die. If the criminal has a knife, the officer can run for his car.
Logically, the police, who deal with those willing to break the law, should be able to defend themselves to the same extent that those they fight are willing and able to attack!
The other point that needs to be made here is that it's impossible to actually construct a Klein bottle - only a model of one, which won't pass through itself cleanly (without a hole).
As such, I find it hard to see how these people could actually go about being arrested for putting an animal into a bottle that doesn't exist!
And besides -- what right does the FCC have to say that the school has to put in a Filter if I (as an ISP)
give them a discount for being a school? "No sir, we can't give you an educational discount because we
don't believe in Censorship." That's BS.
This is all being said by congress - who makes the laws. The FCC is just an enforcement agency and has no real say.
I think I might well use DirecTV, even knowing about this 'feature'. Just because the company can disable their own service doesn't mean they're fundamentally evil.
The electric company can come to my parents' house and turn off their electricity if they fail to pay the bill; if I abuse the campus network, I can be expelled from it. If DirecTV finds that they are falling victim to piracy through their own partners' products, they will naturally act to stop that violation.
Metallica sued Napster; as a regular user of Napster I dislike that behavior, since I do not view Napster to be fundamentally different from recording music off the radio. However, what eventually happens will be determined, naturally enough, not from my own preferences, but from the court's interpretation of the laws of our society.
Given that I rather doubt that companies selling these TV sets sign a contract guaranteeing eternal access to programming of the highest quality, it is difficult to see what cause the consumers have to complain.
So then Microsoft would get in trouble for breaking the GPL? I'd love to see them sued by GNU for, say, 10 million counts of copyright infringment for something that became part of the Linux kernal. Even $ 250,000 per count would bankrupt them. OS sanity test: click here.
The one wonderful thing about Linux: It's secure. In my High School, nearly all the school computers have somehow (I'm not part of it) managed to get Back Oriface put on them; people use it to mess with the work-in-progress of others. A friend of mine once had a swear word (a homophopic remark about the teacher) inserted in one of her papers just before she printed it. The crackers skip school, load up their BO client and search for the assignments of people who have gotten on their nerves. The bad stuff happens nearly weekly, and since our school district has only two computer people for 6 K high school students it often takes a great deal of time to remove BO from the machines. Anyone who has comments or suggestions, please contact me at pakNOSPAMaran42@hotmail.com I am perfectly aware of who runs Hotmail and flames on that subject will be cheerfully ignored. OS sanity test: click here.
Something I once read... Democracy is the worst possible system - except for all of the others. The quote is from Winston Churchill, I believe. I am not sure of the historical reasons for the requirements for becoming naturalized, but I am certain that requiring an intelligence test or any other sort of similiar test for becoming naturalized is a certain path to eugenics. OS sanity test: click here.
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This is certainly an interesting application of cell phone technology and the existing cell phone network - NASA's page mentions savings of multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars per launch.
However, it's hard to see what the significance is overall. Satellites have always been able to communicate in via "realtime telemetry", and could hardly function otherwise.
I think the big thing here is simply that it decreases the amount of special instrumentation needed - any comments from the group?
Under the GPL, that would indeed be the case.
Well, yes, you would expect them to make that distinction, would you not? :-)
As I post this, neither Verisign nor MS mentions this on their front page. Do they want to wait until the next cracker to deface the front page of Altavista or Yahoo adds an ActiveX virus and wipes out (quite easily) ten million machines?
As several others have posted, the trust is granted on a per-certificate basis. You're trusting code signed with that certificate. Mind you, that doesn't prevent people automatically agreeing again when they see the Microsoft name on the certificate...
I find it very fascinating that MS doesn't mention anything about the hazards of running code from an unknown author.
I would also hope that Verisign is taking a very serious look at their procedures - if CAs don't verify identities before issuing certificates, what good are they?
For that matter, how were individuals - MS employees or not - given keys in the company's name? There's no need for an individual employee to have those - especially before calling to check with executives within the company.
I didn't say that. I said something like "People who aren't smart enough to buy a computer without an OS don't deserve censorship on that basis".
I think it's too long... that illegal prime thing, OTOH, was a pretty cool idea.
Not just new manufacturing - my interpretation is that this applies to all computers sold in Texas.
Needless to say, that pretty much would cut the state out of the modern world. Of course, since most of the world doesn't execute 300 people per year...
Alright, I use Linux, but this post really upsets me...
Not everyone can download and install an OS - and downloading several hundreds of megs is quite difficult if you have no OS to start with.
Just because someone uses Windows does not mean they deserve to be subjected to censorware.
Pretty crazy, if you ask me. Of course, this will never live through the court challenges...
Well, IANAL, but I seem to recall that you can be arrested in one state for a crime committed against the laws of another.
For example, murder (unless of a federal officer or certain other unusual circumstances) is not against federal law, but if I commit a murder in Nevada I can sure as hell be arrested in California for it.
This would be very inconvenient - the ISS circles the Earth in, IIRC, 90 minutes.
Thus, they are over any given continent at most maybe fifteen minutes, in the case of Asia.
If you want to get an idea how fast they're going, you can see the ISS move in realtime here.
I think the issue is that, in America, it's easy for criminals to get guns. If a police officer without a gun is standing thirty feet from a murderer with a gun, he'll die. If the criminal has a knife, the officer can run for his car.
Logically, the police, who deal with those willing to break the law, should be able to defend themselves to the same extent that those they fight are willing and able to attack!
The other point that needs to be made here is that it's impossible to actually construct a Klein bottle - only a model of one, which won't pass through itself cleanly (without a hole).
As such, I find it hard to see how these people could actually go about being arrested for putting an animal into a bottle that doesn't exist!
I think I might well use DirecTV, even knowing about this 'feature'. Just because the company can disable their own service doesn't mean they're fundamentally evil.
The electric company can come to my parents' house and turn off their electricity if they fail to pay the bill; if I abuse the campus network, I can be expelled from it. If DirecTV finds that they are falling victim to piracy through their own partners' products, they will naturally act to stop that violation.
Metallica sued Napster; as a regular user of Napster I dislike that behavior, since I do not view Napster to be fundamentally different from recording music off the radio. However, what eventually happens will be determined, naturally enough, not from my own preferences, but from the court's interpretation of the laws of our society.
Given that I rather doubt that companies selling these TV sets sign a contract guaranteeing eternal access to programming of the highest quality, it is difficult to see what cause the consumers have to complain.
Thanks much for the clarification.
OS sanity test: click here.
So then Microsoft would get in trouble for breaking the GPL? I'd love to see them sued by GNU for, say, 10 million counts of copyright infringment for something that became part of the Linux kernal. Even $ 250,000 per count would bankrupt them.
OS sanity test: click here.
Check my sig :-)
OS sanity test: click here.
I would hope the same would apply to the Ask Jeeves search-on-a-question patent.
OS sanity test: click here.
Re your point 5, most distributions are available PGP signed.
OS sanity test: click here.
The one wonderful thing about Linux: It's secure. In my High School, nearly all the school computers have somehow (I'm not part of it) managed to get Back Oriface put on them; people use it to mess with the work-in-progress of others. A friend of mine once had a swear word (a homophopic remark about the teacher) inserted in one of her papers just before she printed it. The crackers skip school, load up their BO client and search for the assignments of people who have gotten on their nerves. The bad stuff happens nearly weekly, and since our school district has only two computer people for 6 K high school students it often takes a great deal of time to remove BO from the machines. Anyone who has comments or suggestions, please contact me at pakNOSPAMaran42@hotmail.com I am perfectly aware of who runs Hotmail and flames on that subject will be cheerfully ignored.
OS sanity test: click here.
Something I once read... Democracy is the worst possible system - except for all of the others. The quote is from Winston Churchill, I believe. I am not sure of the historical reasons for the requirements for becoming naturalized, but I am certain that requiring an intelligence test or any other sort of similiar test for becoming naturalized is a certain path to eugenics.
OS sanity test: click here.