'if you are a person who really has a strict belief in the original, I would not advise that you watch this program. It'll hurt them.'
If you are someone that has a strict belief in the original, what's your secret of eternal youth? Its target group was 8-10 year olds. I was in primary school when I saw it, I was offended by its stupidity.
I was referring to the ones collecting the money (or hoping to) and paying the guys who actually send the spam.
Like if you pay a guy to kill someone, you're guilty of murder (and so is the actual hitman, of course). Basically, follow the money forward, rather than trying to trace the spam back.
They get paid no matter what.
Not if everyone (or most) of the guys who hire them are busted. If you prevent money going into the spam economy it'll collapse soon enough and you'll just be left with the MMF idiots doing it themself until finally even they hear that it's illegal. (All in the fantasy world where spamming is a crime, of course.)
Turn the heat up at the federal level and they'll move off-shore with the cable-box-descrambler and porn-creditcard-scrubber guys.
Virtually all these spammers want you to give them money. And credit cards are about the only viable method. Just freeze their credit card merchant accounts, which must be based in the US to remit US dollars, and you've stopped them.
It costs MONEY to, for instance do business in Hungary, handle transactions and currancy conversions, and deal with fraud. If a particular market doesn't offer enough profit to justify the expense, that market simply isn't worth doing business with.
If you have a credit card, they handle all that (and stiff the customer by several percent with a bad rate -- but the vendor gets US dollars). Having dealt with American companies, I know they believe the rest of the world uses cowry shells as a medium of exchange, but believe me, that's not true. Even more arrogant, if an American company wants to buy something from overseas, they become hightly bewildered when you say you can't accept their cheque on the San Peso Savings and Loan. Trying to get them to actually send a foreign currency is just absurd -- they think it's unpatriotic to use money with someone else's president on it. Foreign companies lose either buying or selling to the US.
if you were actually able to have a long enough attention span to read this entire post, and rub the 3 brain cells that you have together... get off of l33t horse and try to understand the articles (If you even read them)... make childish remarks
First "killing people" is bin Laden's method, not what he wants.
Yes, that's right. So let me revise a little and say that killing people has been his method, and he's found it to be very effective at getting attention.
the repeated strikes at the WTO were strikes at economy.
True, but that obviously wasn't the only motive. It was a strike at Wall Street, and was designed to show that there were personal consequences for meddling in other countries.
Terrorism works by creating fear, and fear of being killed is far stronger than fear of having an optic fibre cable cut.
Using mathematical formulas, he probes for critical links, trying to answer the question "If I were Osama bin Laden, where would I want to attack?"
Bin Laden wants to KILL PEOPLE. He doesn't care about interrupting your porn download, or even bank transactions. The whole "hacker terrorist" hysteria of this story is just garbage. The real motives are hinted at in the news story -- executives want the fragility of their systems kept secret because it's embarrassing.
Adobe should fix the vulnerability and make PDF a secure format again.
If you'd been paying attention, you'd know it has never been secure.
If you want to trust Adobe to "fix" it, that's your look out.
If you don't want to use it, use something else.
There are NO other formats that are acceptable in DTP. And the problem isn't with files I make, but files people send me.
There's plenty of formats that aren't secure.
I'm not interested in using a non-secure format because it's non-secure. I just don't want to have a DTP format made harder to use because Adobe has marketed it to suits as a secure document format, which it never was and hopefully never will be.
It's clear you know little about DTP. I admit I know little about secure documents. We shouldn't be using the same format. But I have used PGP, that's real security and the right way to send and authenticate documents. When security is kept as a separate function and application, it is simpler and verifiable, and replaceable.
Just because you're irritated at the nature of electronic security
I'm irritated at "security" being shoehorned into a DTP appliction. Also, since it isn;t secure abyway (as the article), it's just maiking me waste my time and only providing you with imaginary security.
If the "securing" stage is too irritating or annoying, why don't you use Microsoft Word or OpenOffice Writer or something that doesn't have those options?
Because those applications are quite useless for DTP.
I use PDF because it's part of a publishing system. I lay out books, print to PDF, the printer prints them. That's all I'm interested in. PDF is the lingua franca of DTP. That's what it was designed for. You can use it for what you want, but don;t make it harder for the rest of us.
The "security applications" you mentioned hardly require the graphic abilities of PDF. I'm sure ther are many more secure methods of transferring data. Make one of those more user-friendly, and forget about the broken security of Acrobat.
There are many things in this world that can easily be done, but shouldn't have to be.
My point was that the vulnerability already exists, and if you want to use them for those purposes, you should make sure that they really haven't been tampered with. You said "deal with the problem". That's exactly what I meant.There are probably off-the shelf apps that can compare two PDFs (there is one built in, but it could be better). If the only difference is the signature, then you're fine. Of course, it'd be much simpler if you just used ASCII -- and I don't see why not.
THAT is the problem. Companies use Adobe Acrobat to create forms that should not be altered outside the company, like contracts, and send them to their customers to fill out. If said company can no longer trust that their customers won't be able to change text in their contract without notifying them, then Adobe Acrobat is completely meaningless
Well, I don't want to sound like a jerk, but it's not my problem, and security settings (often applied inappropriately or inadvertently) cause me a lot of hassles.
Actually, if such a change to a contract was made it would be easy to prove when it came to light and grounds for criminal charges, (forgery, fraud, whatever). The same as someone making changes to a paper contract. This is a case of using technical means to "enforce" legalities, and in the process inconveniencing the vast majority of PDF users who use it to transfer and use artwork in publishing. Security was an afterthought, and has never worked well, and I'm happy with that.
Anecdote: Almost 20 years ago, when Adobe introduced PostScript, they tried to keep it proprietary. Fonts in particular were encrypted, and for a long time only Adobe knew how to make real Type 1 fonts, which were very expensive. Then the format was reverse engineered, and we had dozens, then hundreds of alternate sources of quality fonts much cheaper. Adobe eventually opened the format when Truetype appeared which was an open format from the beginning.
It obviously would take quite a long time to manually go through and verify...
This could be easily automated, (I can think of several methods off the top of my head, I'm sure you can too) and since this "vulnerability" has been known for two years or more, and is still open, maybe you should be doing that now.
Is my Lynx text mode console browser going to render them?
No.
you mean is it should look as you intended on (e.g.) IE 6.0....
The fonts I used were just examples of vector fonts, which you are free (beer sense at least) to use in Linux. HTML generally (and preferably) shouldn't be too specific when specifying fonts, and in any case you can override them locally with your browser settings. But you'll most likely be using a vector font (except of course for console mode lynx), and I think most browsers let you zoom the page, or at least the font size, and then the fonts (assuming decent quality) will look better, not worse.
How does Acrobat reader look in console mode, by the way?
I don't see this "vulnerability" as a problem. I quite often use Elcomsoft's utility to unprotect PDF files so I can fix them, or copy some text out. This "vulnerability" means that you can run plugins WITHOUT having them signed by Adobe. This is GREAT. We want to do this, we don't want Adobe to be decide what you can and can't do with your files. I can' think how this could hurt the end-user. You don't install Acrobat plugins that come in spam emails, you do it becasue you want the function (yeah, someone could make a Trojan, but who'd bother in the real world, and word would get out quickly).
Isn't Acrobat VECTOR based? That's why the fonts don't pixelate no matter how far you zoom in or enlarge the document.
How do you plan on doing that with HTML?
PDF has many advantages, but that isn't one of them. You generally use vector fonts in HTML (such as Truetype Arial and Times). When I zoom a HTML page, the type stays smooth. However, graphics in HTML are only bitmap (jpeg, gif, png), and these may not scale so nicely. PDF generally includes images as jpegs, but also can have vector graphics.
True, but it should be pointed out that for decades after that, most scientists thought it was physically impossible to break the speed of sound in an aircraft. There was no physics that allowed > Mach 1 speeds to be achieved. With time, that theory was also proven wrong.
I doubt that. In fact I doubt it so much that I challenge you for a citation.
I heard (just a rumor) that the USA was calling their cases "Pneumonia III" to avoid the stigma associated with SARS.
Well, it was pretty damn annoying that this "SARS" acronym was used, considering that Hong Kong is offically the "Hong Kong SAR" (Special Administrative Region). That really welded it in people's minds that it was a Hong Kong disease. So I (living in HK) am happy if they can use a name that doesn't imply that.
Re:it's about time...
on
SARS Contained
·
· Score: 4, Informative
Even some experts in University of Hong Kong believe that there are multiple ways of spreading the disease, and that include airborne.
Yes, airborne -- sputum, or in Amoy Gardens, from the guy who had diarrhoea and then via the criminally stupid sewage/drainage system there that allowed it to flow back through the drains.
The Government only chose what they want you to believe.
The WHO is subject to political pressure (as when they refused to even talk to Taiwan), but they had a pretty free hand here (as opposed to the Mainland where they tried to hush it up for months).
Re:it's about time...
on
SARS Contained
·
· Score: 2, Informative
I guess the every people in Hong Kong are not so worried these days. Would that be fair to say?
Since there hasn't been any new cases reported for over 20 days, and the incubation period is 10 days, it's been declared safe.
Since when are Canada and China third world nations?
Well , most of China is Third World. But Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong all have better public health systems than the US (for those who can't afford health insurance).
Re:One down...
on
SARS Contained
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
It was hardly an outbreak. How many people in the states died of it?
Of course, a disease isn't serious until it affects Americans.
lack of confidence in the WHO to make such a statement,
They stated it was contained, not wiped out. It's impossible to wipe out a virus that can spread from animals as well as person to person. Doctors have said they expect it back next winter, though it shouldn't be as serious.
Re:Celebrations In HK
on
SARS Contained
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
We went to Ocean Park a couple of weeks ago. It was great to just walk on to any ride we wanted to... of course the park was losing millions and reduced its hours. And personally I lost a lot of money as classes I teach were cancelled due to SARS hysteria. Kids still have to have their temperature taken at school each morning before beig allowed to go in. At least they don't have to wear the silly facemasks now (these work to prevent spread if you're infected, but are little or no help in stopping you from gettng it, especially as most don't fit them tightly).
I'm not sure why the reviewer left his first name out,
Probably the same reason he wrote "Ghimli" instead of "Gimli", or "who's" instead of "whose" (three times that one). It's a good thing we have editors to catch mistakes like that.
Slashdot Mirror
If you are someone that has a strict belief in the original, what's your secret of eternal youth? Its target group was 8-10 year olds. I was in primary school when I saw it, I was offended by its stupidity.
I was referring to the ones collecting the money (or hoping to) and paying the guys who actually send the spam.
Like if you pay a guy to kill someone, you're guilty of murder (and so is the actual hitman, of course). Basically, follow the money forward, rather than trying to trace the spam back.
They get paid no matter what.
Not if everyone (or most) of the guys who hire them are busted. If you prevent money going into the spam economy it'll collapse soon enough and you'll just be left with the MMF idiots doing it themself until finally even they hear that it's illegal. (All in the fantasy world where spamming is a crime, of course.)
Virtually all these spammers want you to give them money. And credit cards are about the only viable method. Just freeze their credit card merchant accounts, which must be based in the US to remit US dollars, and you've stopped them.
It wasn't an "ignorant" blanket statement, but some real anecdotes, from my personal experience in dealing with Americans like yourself.
And if you "ignore" someone, you don't reply to them. You can't have it both ways.
If you have a credit card, they handle all that (and stiff the customer by several percent with a bad rate -- but the vendor gets US dollars). Having dealt with American companies, I know they believe the rest of the world uses cowry shells as a medium of exchange, but believe me, that's not true. Even more arrogant, if an American company wants to buy something from overseas, they become hightly bewildered when you say you can't accept their cheque on the San Peso Savings and Loan. Trying to get them to actually send a foreign currency is just absurd -- they think it's unpatriotic to use money with someone else's president on it. Foreign companies lose either buying or selling to the US.
I won't waste my time arguing with a troll.
Yes, that's right. So let me revise a little and say that killing people has been his method, and he's found it to be very effective at getting attention.
the repeated strikes at the WTO were strikes at economy.
True, but that obviously wasn't the only motive. It was a strike at Wall Street, and was designed to show that there were personal consequences for meddling in other countries.
Terrorism works by creating fear, and fear of being killed is far stronger than fear of having an optic fibre cable cut.
Bin Laden wants to KILL PEOPLE. He doesn't care about interrupting your porn download, or even bank transactions. The whole "hacker terrorist" hysteria of this story is just garbage. The real motives are hinted at in the news story -- executives want the fragility of their systems kept secret because it's embarrassing.
If you'd been paying attention, you'd know it has never been secure. If you want to trust Adobe to "fix" it, that's your look out.
If you don't want to use it, use something else.
There are NO other formats that are acceptable in DTP. And the problem isn't with files I make, but files people send me.
There's plenty of formats that aren't secure.
I'm not interested in using a non-secure format because it's non-secure. I just don't want to have a DTP format made harder to use because Adobe has marketed it to suits as a secure document format, which it never was and hopefully never will be.
It's clear you know little about DTP. I admit I know little about secure documents. We shouldn't be using the same format. But I have used PGP, that's real security and the right way to send and authenticate documents. When security is kept as a separate function and application, it is simpler and verifiable, and replaceable.
I'm irritated at "security" being shoehorned into a DTP appliction. Also, since it isn;t secure abyway (as the article), it's just maiking me waste my time and only providing you with imaginary security.
If the "securing" stage is too irritating or annoying, why don't you use Microsoft Word or OpenOffice Writer or something that doesn't have those options?
Because those applications are quite useless for DTP.
I use PDF because it's part of a publishing system. I lay out books, print to PDF, the printer prints them. That's all I'm interested in. PDF is the lingua franca of DTP. That's what it was designed for. You can use it for what you want, but don;t make it harder for the rest of us.
The "security applications" you mentioned hardly require the graphic abilities of PDF. I'm sure ther are many more secure methods of transferring data. Make one of those more user-friendly, and forget about the broken security of Acrobat. There are many things in this world that can easily be done, but shouldn't have to be.
My point was that the vulnerability already exists, and if you want to use them for those purposes, you should make sure that they really haven't been tampered with. You said "deal with the problem". That's exactly what I meant.There are probably off-the shelf apps that can compare two PDFs (there is one built in, but it could be better). If the only difference is the signature, then you're fine. Of course, it'd be much simpler if you just used ASCII -- and I don't see why not.
Well, I don't want to sound like a jerk, but it's not my problem, and security settings (often applied inappropriately or inadvertently) cause me a lot of hassles.
Actually, if such a change to a contract was made it would be easy to prove when it came to light and grounds for criminal charges, (forgery, fraud, whatever). The same as someone making changes to a paper contract. This is a case of using technical means to "enforce" legalities, and in the process inconveniencing the vast majority of PDF users who use it to transfer and use artwork in publishing. Security was an afterthought, and has never worked well, and I'm happy with that.
Anecdote: Almost 20 years ago, when Adobe introduced PostScript, they tried to keep it proprietary. Fonts in particular were encrypted, and for a long time only Adobe knew how to make real Type 1 fonts, which were very expensive. Then the format was reverse engineered, and we had dozens, then hundreds of alternate sources of quality fonts much cheaper. Adobe eventually opened the format when Truetype appeared which was an open format from the beginning.
It obviously would take quite a long time to manually go through and verify ...
This could be easily automated, (I can think of several methods off the top of my head, I'm sure you can too) and since this "vulnerability" has been known for two years or more, and is still open, maybe you should be doing that now.
No.
you mean is it should look as you intended on (e.g.) IE 6.0....
The fonts I used were just examples of vector fonts, which you are free (beer sense at least) to use in Linux. HTML generally (and preferably) shouldn't be too specific when specifying fonts, and in any case you can override them locally with your browser settings. But you'll most likely be using a vector font (except of course for console mode lynx), and I think most browsers let you zoom the page, or at least the font size, and then the fonts (assuming decent quality) will look better, not worse.
How does Acrobat reader look in console mode, by the way?
I don't see this "vulnerability" as a problem. I quite often use Elcomsoft's utility to unprotect PDF files so I can fix them, or copy some text out. This "vulnerability" means that you can run plugins WITHOUT having them signed by Adobe. This is GREAT. We want to do this, we don't want Adobe to be decide what you can and can't do with your files. I can' think how this could hurt the end-user. You don't install Acrobat plugins that come in spam emails, you do it becasue you want the function (yeah, someone could make a Trojan, but who'd bother in the real world, and word would get out quickly).
PDF has many advantages, but that isn't one of them. You generally use vector fonts in HTML (such as Truetype Arial and Times). When I zoom a HTML page, the type stays smooth. However, graphics in HTML are only bitmap (jpeg, gif, png), and these may not scale so nicely. PDF generally includes images as jpegs, but also can have vector graphics.
I doubt that. In fact I doubt it so much that I challenge you for a citation.
Well, it was pretty damn annoying that this "SARS" acronym was used, considering that Hong Kong is offically the "Hong Kong SAR" (Special Administrative Region). That really welded it in people's minds that it was a Hong Kong disease. So I (living in HK) am happy if they can use a name that doesn't imply that.
Yes, airborne -- sputum, or in Amoy Gardens, from the guy who had diarrhoea and then via the criminally stupid sewage/drainage system there that allowed it to flow back through the drains.
The Government only chose what they want you to believe.
The WHO is subject to political pressure (as when they refused to even talk to Taiwan), but they had a pretty free hand here (as opposed to the Mainland where they tried to hush it up for months).
Since there hasn't been any new cases reported for over 20 days, and the incubation period is 10 days, it's been declared safe.
It's a coranavirus, spread by sputum and other bodily fluids. No magic, just a tough virus that has to be treated with respect.
Disclaimer: I live in Hong Kong - the city which has the major outbreak of SARS.
So do I.
Well , most of China is Third World. But Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong all have better public health systems than the US (for those who can't afford health insurance).
Of course, a disease isn't serious until it affects Americans.
They stated it was contained, not wiped out. It's impossible to wipe out a virus that can spread from animals as well as person to person. Doctors have said they expect it back next winter, though it shouldn't be as serious.
We went to Ocean Park a couple of weeks ago. It was great to just walk on to any ride we wanted to ... of course the park was losing millions and reduced its hours. And personally I lost a lot of money as classes I teach were cancelled due to SARS hysteria. Kids still have to have their temperature taken at school each morning before beig allowed to go in. At least they don't have to wear the silly facemasks now (these work to prevent spread if you're infected, but are little or no help in stopping you from gettng it, especially as most don't fit them tightly).
Yes, but some do -- if you RTFA he found that car audio CD drives did the best, being able to play 140% capacity disks.
Probably the same reason he wrote "Ghimli" instead of "Gimli", or "who's" instead of "whose" (three times that one). It's a good thing we have editors to catch mistakes like that.