And the data they gathered was data that people chose to broadcast in plain text to a public street. They might as well set up a PA system that broadcasts everything they're doing on the internet. Google didn't do anything wrong by sniffing those packets.
Hmm. While I appreciate your attempt, your analogy is quite insufficient. I think the point is, Google intercepted transmissions that were not intended for them. Stop thinking so hard, you're making my head hurt.
Learn the difference between "to" and "too" dammit!
I'm tired of grammatically incompetent know-it-alls. You have two errors in your "correction." You need a comma before "dammit." Also, "damn it" is the correct way to damn somebody. Good lord the internets is full of tards.
Since space travel like that is all about the coasting, fuel state wouldn't be a problem.
Coasting is a big part of space travel (one of Newton's laws says an object in motion will stay in motion until another force acts upon it), but is it really possible to plan out a perfect space journey without need for fuel-assisted adjustments? Of course not.
You can run out of gas in space.
The GP point still stands: sex (which harms nobody) is taboo while violence (most definitely harmful) is commonplace in cinema and literature.
I disagree. I think sex can be harmful in a number of situations: molestation/abuse creates psychological harm to the victim, unwanted pregnancy can derail long-term goals, and STD's are not "harmless", especially if they aren't treated.
we live in a world where grocery stores continue to make sales when the cash registers are broken
I went to Giant Eagle the other day and their computers were "down" from a recent t-storm. I waited around 15 minutes or so as the store gradually filled up with irate customers (they were NOT making sales) until I finally left and just went down the road to a gas station for my gallon of milk.
*WHOOSH* That's the sound of the importance of users' MAC addresses being publicized flying over my head. Why should anybody be concerned if the RIAA, or Google, or anybody else knows your MAC address?
I fail to see how your NIC's MAC address can be used to extract sensitive or private information. I don't know of any way that it can be cross-referenced or traced. Whenever you are requesting information from a server, doesn't every hop along the way replace the "source MAC address" in the IP packet headers with its own MAC address? The only way, then, for your MAC address to become relevant to outside investigations would be if your default gateway were examined.
Every investigation I have heard of involves IP addresses, not MAC addresses. Hypothetical situation: let's say EvilBob logs into his neighbor's unprotected wireless access point and torrents a few albums. Unfortunately, the RIAA was hosting those songs as bait to catch evil-doers like EvilBob who steal music. The RIAA decides to take action against EvilBob. However, they don't know EvilBob's name. All they know is his neighbor's IP address. They pull a few strings and probably convince EvilBob's neighbor's ISP to release account information such as the name and address under which the Internet service is registered. So the RIAA sends a letter to that address and EvilBob's neighbors scratch their head for awhile, then hopefully end up enabling some security on their access point.
Let's say EvilBob is a part of something more nefarious, like trying to incite riots against government officials. In tihs case, it's not the RIAA who goes to the ISP but the government. The ISP gives relevant information to the feds and they bust down the doors of EvilBob's neighbor's house and confiscate all their computer equipment. Soon they discover that there is nothing illegal on these machines and concur a neighbor was using the unprotected wireless network to perpetrate his crimes. At this point, the AP can be examined and the MAC address of a certain NIC (if it has not been spoofed) can be identified as belonging to the machine that sent/received said illegal material. If they want to find EvilBob, I believe they are giong to have to search the whole city block in search of that MAC address and hope that a) the MAC address they got from the AP was not spoofed and b) EvilBob wasn't parked outside and is 1000 miles away in another country right now, installing botnets in public libraries in Florida.
Why is anybody worried about this issue? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills here!
I don't agree that an employer has the right to spy on employees without their consent as a condition of using the computer.
It IS their right... but you ARE allowed to disagree.
If you are so worried that an employee is going to goof off, then maybe you don't have a clue how to manage your employees.
I'M not a manager, I'm just a general-purpose technician. If a local business manager calls me and says he wants to limit Facebook access, I'm not going to advise him on his managerial skills. I am going to blacklist *.facebook.com on the local DNS server or use a DynDNS account with blacklisting/filtering and point the offender's NIC to that address. If he insists that he has made the decision that he wants spyware installed, guess what - I'll install it for him (assuming it's legal).
In short, if an employee can maintain a satisfactory enough output that they retain their job, and have time to goof off, then you evidently don't have enough for them to do.
I would absolutely hate to have a job where I have to maintain "satisfactory output" and have nothing to do, and out of boredom surf Facebook. I have a friend who feels this way, and spends literally hours a day sitting at his desk playing games on his Droid, making $40,000/yr. That actually pisses me off and I hope I don't ever degenerate into somebody who feels like I need a babysitter as a boss who spoonfeeds me work and checks in on me to make sure I'm busy.
The name of the software company ("CyberSpy") sure seems to imply that its marketing strategy is to appeal to the obsessive stalker who needs a convenient way to spy on another person and steal their passwords, read their email, etc. I personally knew a guy that was so obsessed with his ex that he tricked her into d/l a similar spy program with very similar functionality to CyberSpy and all he did was change the filename of the install package to something a little less obvious (unicorns_with_flowers.jpg.exe was a good example).
I agree that the most legitimate use of this software would be for employers to monitor their employees. An employer who owns the computers its employees are using has a right to install spyware without employee's knowledge... duh. They are handing out paychecks and if they don't want their employees farting around on Facebook all afternoon, it's their right to "spy" and verify that rules are not being broken.
No, not ignorant. Neither am I so arrogant and haughty enough that I presume my opinions are infallible. You would probably benefit from a critical thinking course (or just a plain old-fashioned self evaluation) as you seem to be unwittingly disrupting your own intellectual growth by failing to recognize the fallacies inherent in your thought processes. Look up ad hominom fallacy and recognize that you have twice attempted to discredit my opinions by using name-calling...
0 and 1-day cracks aren't due to the l33t skillz of hackerz. It's because DRM manufacturers are limited because consumers cry that their rights are being violated when they have to navigate through a DRM message or validation screen. Consequently, DRM has to lay back in an attempt to appease consumers. Otherwise, they would just implement internet activation for everything and our d/l software would not work.
DRM is simply to reduce damage control - without it, every PC game released would be cracked on the day it was released (if not before). If DRM can delay the game from being cracked for a few days, that is considered adequate and helps sales.
DRM could go the sure-fire route and require internet activation, but current consumers have voiced their opinions that this is an infringement of our privacy.
We really are becoming accustomed to our free movies and games. Digital Rights Management implementation has been heavily criticized in the past because of the arguably invasive strategies that many anti-piracy programs utilize. You could say this criticism is rightly justified, because companies like Sony (to give just one example) have been known to install rootkits on consumers' machines in an attempt to thwart piracy.
There have been incidents where DRM in video games has caused an outcry among consumers and the developing company was urged to revoke their "intrusive" DRM safeguards. Interestingly, there is a fine line that video game developers must walk while trying to balance customer satisfaction with protection of their huge investment from zero-day or pre-release cracks.
IMHO, piracy is in fact a danger to the well-being of the film and video game medium. The producers of the game Crysis vowed to never again release a PC-exclusive game again, due to the sub-par sales which were attributed to piracy. Instead, we now have game developers like Crytek moving towards console development on systems like XBox 360, simply because piracy is riskier and more difficulty to perform on these devices (hardware modification is often needed, and players risk having their XBox Live account banned). Consequently, gamers will be left with games that are developed for old hardware (Like XBox 360's) instead of utilizing the bleeding edge hardware that many gaming enthusiasts possess.
That being said, don't mistake my opinions for a "holier-than-thou" attitude. The RIAA would probably sue me if they got a good look at my hard disks.
Although we have sent radio transmissions into space, don't they peter out before they get too far away? Maybe it's not too late to stop Hawking's interstellar resource-hunters from finding us.
Slashdot Mirror
And the data they gathered was data that people chose to broadcast in plain text to a public street. They might as well set up a PA system that broadcasts everything they're doing on the internet. Google didn't do anything wrong by sniffing those packets.
Hmm. While I appreciate your attempt, your analogy is quite insufficient. I think the point is, Google intercepted transmissions that were not intended for them. Stop thinking so hard, you're making my head hurt.
Learn the difference between "to" and "too" dammit!
I'm tired of grammatically incompetent know-it-alls. You have two errors in your "correction." You need a comma before "dammit." Also, "damn it" is the correct way to damn somebody. Good lord the internets is full of tards.
Since space travel like that is all about the coasting, fuel state wouldn't be a problem.
Coasting is a big part of space travel (one of Newton's laws says an object in motion will stay in motion until another force acts upon it), but is it really possible to plan out a perfect space journey without need for fuel-assisted adjustments? Of course not. You can run out of gas in space.
I can still run 15+ year old versions of programs on their newest OS
This is an exaggeration; Windows Vista/7 will not run 16 bit applications.
The GP point still stands: sex (which harms nobody) is taboo while violence (most definitely harmful) is commonplace in cinema and literature.
I disagree. I think sex can be harmful in a number of situations: molestation/abuse creates psychological harm to the victim, unwanted pregnancy can derail long-term goals, and STD's are not "harmless", especially if they aren't treated.
Haha, good call. Personally, I would have modded troll but I try not to waste mod points on AC's.
we live in a world where grocery stores continue to make sales when the cash registers are broken
I went to Giant Eagle the other day and their computers were "down" from a recent t-storm. I waited around 15 minutes or so as the store gradually filled up with irate customers (they were NOT making sales) until I finally left and just went down the road to a gas station for my gallon of milk.
I think your IP should be banned.
Hmm... What happens if you accidentally click the button?
*WHOOSH* That's the sound of the importance of users' MAC addresses being publicized flying over my head. Why should anybody be concerned if the RIAA, or Google, or anybody else knows your MAC address?
I fail to see how your NIC's MAC address can be used to extract sensitive or private information. I don't know of any way that it can be cross-referenced or traced. Whenever you are requesting information from a server, doesn't every hop along the way replace the "source MAC address" in the IP packet headers with its own MAC address? The only way, then, for your MAC address to become relevant to outside investigations would be if your default gateway were examined.
Every investigation I have heard of involves IP addresses, not MAC addresses. Hypothetical situation: let's say EvilBob logs into his neighbor's unprotected wireless access point and torrents a few albums. Unfortunately, the RIAA was hosting those songs as bait to catch evil-doers like EvilBob who steal music. The RIAA decides to take action against EvilBob. However, they don't know EvilBob's name. All they know is his neighbor's IP address. They pull a few strings and probably convince EvilBob's neighbor's ISP to release account information such as the name and address under which the Internet service is registered. So the RIAA sends a letter to that address and EvilBob's neighbors scratch their head for awhile, then hopefully end up enabling some security on their access point.
Let's say EvilBob is a part of something more nefarious, like trying to incite riots against government officials. In tihs case, it's not the RIAA who goes to the ISP but the government. The ISP gives relevant information to the feds and they bust down the doors of EvilBob's neighbor's house and confiscate all their computer equipment. Soon they discover that there is nothing illegal on these machines and concur a neighbor was using the unprotected wireless network to perpetrate his crimes. At this point, the AP can be examined and the MAC address of a certain NIC (if it has not been spoofed) can be identified as belonging to the machine that sent/received said illegal material. If they want to find EvilBob, I believe they are giong to have to search the whole city block in search of that MAC address and hope that a) the MAC address they got from the AP was not spoofed and b) EvilBob wasn't parked outside and is 1000 miles away in another country right now, installing botnets in public libraries in Florida.
Why is anybody worried about this issue? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills here!
I don't agree that an employer has the right to spy on employees without their consent as a condition of using the computer.
It IS their right... but you ARE allowed to disagree.
If you are so worried that an employee is going to goof off, then maybe you don't have a clue how to manage your employees.
I'M not a manager, I'm just a general-purpose technician. If a local business manager calls me and says he wants to limit Facebook access, I'm not going to advise him on his managerial skills. I am going to blacklist *.facebook.com on the local DNS server or use a DynDNS account with blacklisting/filtering and point the offender's NIC to that address. If he insists that he has made the decision that he wants spyware installed, guess what - I'll install it for him (assuming it's legal).
In short, if an employee can maintain a satisfactory enough output that they retain their job, and have time to goof off, then you evidently don't have enough for them to do.
I would absolutely hate to have a job where I have to maintain "satisfactory output" and have nothing to do, and out of boredom surf Facebook. I have a friend who feels this way, and spends literally hours a day sitting at his desk playing games on his Droid, making $40,000/yr. That actually pisses me off and I hope I don't ever degenerate into somebody who feels like I need a babysitter as a boss who spoonfeeds me work and checks in on me to make sure I'm busy.
The name of the software company ("CyberSpy") sure seems to imply that its marketing strategy is to appeal to the obsessive stalker who needs a convenient way to spy on another person and steal their passwords, read their email, etc. I personally knew a guy that was so obsessed with his ex that he tricked her into d/l a similar spy program with very similar functionality to CyberSpy and all he did was change the filename of the install package to something a little less obvious (unicorns_with_flowers.jpg.exe was a good example).
I agree that the most legitimate use of this software would be for employers to monitor their employees. An employer who owns the computers its employees are using has a right to install spyware without employee's knowledge... duh. They are handing out paychecks and if they don't want their employees farting around on Facebook all afternoon, it's their right to "spy" and verify that rules are not being broken.
Are you being intentionally ignorant?
No, not ignorant. Neither am I so arrogant and haughty enough that I presume my opinions are infallible. You would probably benefit from a critical thinking course (or just a plain old-fashioned self evaluation) as you seem to be unwittingly disrupting your own intellectual growth by failing to recognize the fallacies inherent in your thought processes. Look up ad hominom fallacy and recognize that you have twice attempted to discredit my opinions by using name-calling...
Modded 5 informative? *sigh* I think I'll just return to my status as lurker and pick my battles more wisely.
0 and 1-day cracks aren't due to the l33t skillz of hackerz. It's because DRM manufacturers are limited because consumers cry that their rights are being violated when they have to navigate through a DRM message or validation screen. Consequently, DRM has to lay back in an attempt to appease consumers. Otherwise, they would just implement internet activation for everything and our d/l software would not work.
DRM hasn't ever made a difference in piracy
DRM is simply to reduce damage control - without it, every PC game released would be cracked on the day it was released (if not before). If DRM can delay the game from being cracked for a few days, that is considered adequate and helps sales. DRM could go the sure-fire route and require internet activation, but current consumers have voiced their opinions that this is an infringement of our privacy.
We really are becoming accustomed to our free movies and games. Digital Rights Management implementation has been heavily criticized in the past because of the arguably invasive strategies that many anti-piracy programs utilize. You could say this criticism is rightly justified, because companies like Sony (to give just one example) have been known to install rootkits on consumers' machines in an attempt to thwart piracy.
There have been incidents where DRM in video games has caused an outcry among consumers and the developing company was urged to revoke their "intrusive" DRM safeguards. Interestingly, there is a fine line that video game developers must walk while trying to balance customer satisfaction with protection of their huge investment from zero-day or pre-release cracks.
IMHO, piracy is in fact a danger to the well-being of the film and video game medium. The producers of the game Crysis vowed to never again release a PC-exclusive game again, due to the sub-par sales which were attributed to piracy. Instead, we now have game developers like Crytek moving towards console development on systems like XBox 360, simply because piracy is riskier and more difficulty to perform on these devices (hardware modification is often needed, and players risk having their XBox Live account banned). Consequently, gamers will be left with games that are developed for old hardware (Like XBox 360's) instead of utilizing the bleeding edge hardware that many gaming enthusiasts possess.
That being said, don't mistake my opinions for a "holier-than-thou" attitude. The RIAA would probably sue me if they got a good look at my hard disks.
lol...yep 4^10
Actually it's 10^4 (10,000 permutations), not 4^10 (1048576 permutations).
Open sores, open source, same thing.
and it makes it simple for my wife to let others on.
It seems simpler to configure WPA/WPA2 and just type in a password than to manually configure the router to allow a specific MAC address...
You're making me hungry.
facebook needs to start making money somehow...
They're already making tons of money! The CEO of Facebook is the world's youngest self-made billionaire!
The radio waves are already on their way.
Although we have sent radio transmissions into space, don't they peter out before they get too far away? Maybe it's not too late to stop Hawking's interstellar resource-hunters from finding us.
I just hope they are ramen, and not varelse. Orson Scott Card's Hierarchy of Exclusion
A simple "whoosh" would have sufficed. =)