With conspiracy hat on: maybe they were going after bigger fishes while working with the government or local law enforcement. So instead of targeting a possible suspect directly, they employed a kind of 6 degrees of separation.
The primary suspect (or suspicious person or one with a low "social credit": remember, even Apple reads emails now to determine a Trust Score[0]) would normally be more guarded.
Had no idea that MX Linux had become so well-known (or increasingly so). Thanks for pointing this out! I'm an ex-Mint user (still love what they've done with the distro and Cinnamon) not because there was anything wrong with it but because of performance issues on my admittedly lower-end (aged) laptop. Went through tons of Live CDs. anti-X drew me in (love lightweight OSes) and it was followed by MX Linux.
Been on it for about 6 months. I was just looking for a distro that would breathe new life into my laptop. I happened to get one that is a rolling release (so rare in the Linux world), running on top of debian (access to a rich assortment of programs). Did not really consider other aspects like systemd - was just looking for a performance boost.
Performance has been amazing (at the end of the day... this is the key). Firefox Quantum runs like a champ on a 10+ year old laptop where the chromes fail miserably. Added the FF extension named "h264ify" (plus the usual anti-trackers) and now Youtube Videos don't cause the laptop into meltdown.
At some point I'm going to have to replace my old non-kiosk laptop (with such a great keyboard, tons of ports, massive hard drive, 16:10 aspect ratio, replaceable components) but not today - all because of MX Linux. I think lots of Linux users are in a similar position as me (running older - tried and true - laptops).
The devil represents the compromises we're often forced to make. Having a BigTech's binary closed source driver (often working in the background) playing any role in an Open Source system is ludicrous when you think about it. Having a horned devil representing this compromise is brilliant! It's also an honest approach to the current state of things.
He was smart enough not to set up an account in Nigeria. That would have been a giveaway.
Seriously though, Google and Facebook can tell you what you had for breakfast three years ago, on any Wednesday: but they are clueless as to whom they do business with. Probably because it would involve "tracking" their own transactions in the same way...
It's the same reason Windows Notepad is my fav "chat" application... when I log into someone else's Windows machine with Teamviewer. It isn't about students being clever (as some posts suggests), it's about finding the easiest solution to a problem. We work with what we have.
> THAT is the biggest reason why I see Google Docs as a chat application.
When will Google rain down hell and fury at this nonsense? When will our own government take action against this reckless and fraudulent activity? In the age where there is no accountability in tech or simply no accountability anywhere... this is just another example of the shitshow we're all living through.
Facebook is a big place. Estimates indicate 2.32 billion active users. That's 2,320,000,000 active users. One group may have 150,000 members, which translates to 150,000/2,320,000,000 - about 0.0065 percent. That's 0.000065 of the total number of active users.
In a city of 1,000,000 do we panic about what a small group of 65 people are doing? Does the opinion of the other 999,935 people in that city not matter? Or do we play with statistics to, once again, control the flow of all information - removing all input and discussion (from the other 999,935 too)?
How about in a smaller town of about 15,500 people - do we start censoring over what a single person does (this too is 0.000065 of 15.5k people)?
"one anti-vaccination group on Facebook has over 150,000 members."
Might as well censor the flat-earthers, astrology and phrenology. We will all miss a good laugh in the process
A website where you actively and publicly (within the site itself) profile yourself. Fav movies, geo location, pics, interests, etc... Plus you have lots of horny people spending countless hours on the site focused only on their sexual impulses, going on dates with strangers while being as open as they can, impulse texting, impulse phone calls.
Best security practices - the furthest thing from their minds.
Tons of attack vectors. The victims... too horny to care until they've lost accessed. Now they're forced to self-pleasure using their imagination or bing pr0n for a few days. Claw-like hands, blue balls... the signs of a hacked dating site.
I can't reconcile the two statements below, like I can't reconcile nearly everything Apple does. If you're so serious about privacy and an app (or apps) completely violated this in such a violent and litigious way - why wait to do something? Toss them off the store... for good!
What they captured without consent is so over the line, the response needs to be equally strong.
""Protecting user privacy is paramount in the Apple ecosystem.""... ""and will take immediate action if necessary""
See? That wasn't so hard to figure out from a technical standpoint. It didn't even require the resources of a nation-state to determine what was happening with the data and how easy the spyware, data-harvesting device could be accessed (note: nearly everything nowadays is a spyware, data-harvesting machine).
Instead, we continue to get Smoke & Mirrors with lots of political grandstanding and a "news media" simply parroting the same message with click-baity headlines. The military-industrial-media complex... a hell of a mindtrip.
Now if the US could start a recall of all those IoT devices and routers that have proven backdoors and mesh-like security off the market, maybe we could take their "troll-concern" message more seriously.
Typing VPN into the form discloses that 'Lantern VPN' by Beijing Qimengjialu Technology Co., Ltd is NOT banned. Every other VPN is either banned or unavailable. Good way to test which apps/companies are direct extensions (or an integral arm) of the Chinese Government, although anyone doing business there (including Apple) is directly serving the government.
Apple, for example, provides unfettered access to their datacenters (phones, images, uploaded FaceID, messages, Geo Location, etc). They are probably serving the government much more than Beijing Qimengjialu Technology Co.
I've been watching Momoa since the Stargate Atlantis days. I quickly resented him because he had zero acting ability. He had replaced Rainbow Sun Francks, who was a much better actor and could deliver nuance.
I'm saddened to hear that after all these years, he still hasn't taken any acting classes - if he did, they must be from Keanu Reeves School for Wooden Actors.
> I liked Momoa as Khal Drogo, but here, with English lines, it was painfully obvious he can't act at all...
Meanwhile, Apple has the equivalent of a Social Score (they track calls and emails), removed all apps that bypass censorship in China while also granting China full control of iCloud Data (including daily Face Shots and GPS)... this is just for starters.
They do have colorful ads that keep telling us how much they value privacy while they purposely track, data-mine, data-horde and report on every single user of their ecosystem. They have become China's Great (digital) Wall. The MSM... silent.
In the future, companies like Microsoft will be able to shutdown *their* devices remotely once they've decided support will end. The US, like most countries, don't even have "planned obsolescence' laws (which is why a company like Apple can remotely f*ck with your battery).
> "All customers who have a Windows 10 Mobile device will be able to keep using it after December 10, 2019..."
What odd phrasing... Thanks for your permission, Microsoft: That one guy in France must be very happy.
According to wikipedia, they have about 45k employees (2018). So about 3k. Maybe about a 100 million annual savings (give or take many millions)? Musk and Tesla together are set to pay $40 million in fines because of the "I have a buyer" tweet - just a single tweet. Maybe the other 60 million remaining (from firing 7%) is to pay for future tweets.
For now... it's available to US IP addresses. I was able to login using my IMDB credentials (different from Amazon) and the movies played w/o issue: on Desktop Linux, DRM install required under Firefox and VPN.
I say "for now" because on my FireOS Tablet, I am unable to view Prime Videos using a VPN. Amazon knows who I am (I'm logged in on their proprietary tablet, they track the hell out of everyone as it is). I can do everything else (including ordering) except view Videos with VPN engaged. Once I turn my VPN off, Prime Videos are no issue on my FireOS Tablet.
> Available only for US citizens (to be precise to US IP addresses).
Farandole Composer (.far): Music Module (MOD) from back in the day when computers were actually personal. Much prefer the meaning of the old extension to the new Fuschia-based extension, which is another surveillance, tracking, data-harvesting front-end.
It's not that they don't care. It's that they don't know except in general terms. I'm fairly out of touch... with Main Stream News. I live in my own bubble (fav sites, fave news, on demand streams).
Over the last couple of days (as I do on occasion), I venture into the ad-crazed world of TV media. Except for the usual sports, local highlights, brain-warping political onslaught... nothing on Facebook. Zilch! Not on Free TV, not on Free Radio. It's like I stepped back 20 years.
This news might be big on some tech sites and certain social networks but... Big Media won't sell it unless there's a political angle. Afterall, their online dollars come from ad-tracking surveillance.
I believe she has two properties in Vancouver she put up as collateral, an ankle monitoring bracelet - in addition to real estate holdings by 3rd-parties put up as collateral. I agree, though. She could easily bolt, lose her properties and pay back the 3rd-parties (who could later be charged with accessory).
If she was any number of other people (eg, less influential, less political) - there would be no bail.
> it won't take anything for her line up a flight direct to Beijing.
Youtube and Netflix are in two different categories. On the web, I often prefer summaries, tl;drs, bullet points. This is what Youtube is: watch a thing for a few minutes, access a news site, go watch another thing for a few minutes. I have watched lots of 4 minute movies on Youtube, for example, without losing my concentration on all the other tabs/apps I have running.
Netflix is like a more detailed article. It forces you to dedicate more of your time. You often need to make time for it. Close all other browser tabs, close other running apps, grab a snack, immerse yourself... It isn't quite a book but in this age of short attention spans, it's the closest analogy.
Youtube is entering the Netflix category with TV and Films. Netflix has not yet considered entering Youtube's playing field of video shorts.
Let's see how much Microsoft Loves Linux and Open Source... In fact, they could have done it long before throwing in the towel - in the hopes of generating some kind of momentum. The fact that they didn't probably means that the source code will expose too much embedded spyware. It'll take months to clean that dirt away before they even consider making the source viewable.
"If we start to focus on ourselves, instead of focusing on our customers, that will be the beginning of the end,"
I like what he's saying. It's something that's lost on most tech shops - even on their first day. Google has no conception of customer first. Apple is a PR company that has created the most user-hostile tech ever conceived. Microsoft has weaponized their Operating System.
Having said this... Amazon is following in those steps. Their tablets are surveillance machines. Alexa is the next-gen snooping device. They have already started looking inward and don't even realize it.
Slashdot Mirror
With conspiracy hat on: maybe they were going after bigger fishes while working with the government or local law enforcement. So instead of targeting a possible suspect directly, they employed a kind of 6 degrees of separation.
The primary suspect (or suspicious person or one with a low "social credit": remember, even Apple reads emails now to determine a Trust Score[0]) would normally be more guarded.
> why take peoples' email passwords?
[0] https://www.independent.co.uk/...
Had no idea that MX Linux had become so well-known (or increasingly so). Thanks for pointing this out! I'm an ex-Mint user (still love what they've done with the distro and Cinnamon) not because there was anything wrong with it but because of performance issues on my admittedly lower-end (aged) laptop. Went through tons of Live CDs. anti-X drew me in (love lightweight OSes) and it was followed by MX Linux.
Been on it for about 6 months. I was just looking for a distro that would breathe new life into my laptop. I happened to get one that is a rolling release (so rare in the Linux world), running on top of debian (access to a rich assortment of programs). Did not really consider other aspects like systemd - was just looking for a performance boost.
Performance has been amazing (at the end of the day... this is the key). Firefox Quantum runs like a champ on a 10+ year old laptop where the chromes fail miserably. Added the FF extension named "h264ify" (plus the usual anti-trackers) and now Youtube Videos don't cause the laptop into meltdown.
At some point I'm going to have to replace my old non-kiosk laptop (with such a great keyboard, tons of ports, massive hard drive, 16:10 aspect ratio, replaceable components) but not today - all because of MX Linux. I think lots of Linux users are in a similar position as me (running older - tried and true - laptops).
The devil represents the compromises we're often forced to make. Having a BigTech's binary closed source driver (often working in the background) playing any role in an Open Source system is ludicrous when you think about it. Having a horned devil representing this compromise is brilliant! It's also an honest approach to the current state of things.
He was smart enough not to set up an account in Nigeria. That would have been a giveaway.
Seriously though, Google and Facebook can tell you what you had for breakfast three years ago, on any Wednesday: but they are clueless as to whom they do business with. Probably because it would involve "tracking" their own transactions in the same way...
We aren't just the product, we're the targets.
It's the same reason Windows Notepad is my fav "chat" application... when I log into someone else's Windows machine with Teamviewer. It isn't about students being clever (as some posts suggests), it's about finding the easiest solution to a problem. We work with what we have.
> THAT is the biggest reason why I see Google Docs as a chat application.
When will Google rain down hell and fury at this nonsense? When will our own government take action against this reckless and fraudulent activity? In the age where there is no accountability in tech or simply no accountability anywhere... this is just another example of the shitshow we're all living through.
Facebook is a big place. Estimates indicate 2.32 billion active users. That's 2,320,000,000 active users. One group may have 150,000 members, which translates to 150,000/2,320,000,000 - about 0.0065 percent. That's 0.000065 of the total number of active users.
In a city of 1,000,000 do we panic about what a small group of 65 people are doing? Does the opinion of the other 999,935 people in that city not matter? Or do we play with statistics to, once again, control the flow of all information - removing all input and discussion (from the other 999,935 too)?
How about in a smaller town of about 15,500 people - do we start censoring over what a single person does (this too is 0.000065 of 15.5k people)?
"one anti-vaccination group on Facebook has over 150,000 members."
Might as well censor the flat-earthers, astrology and phrenology. We will all miss a good laugh in the process
NASA's sudden interest... cause (China) and effect.
A website where you actively and publicly (within the site itself) profile yourself. Fav movies, geo location, pics, interests, etc... Plus you have lots of horny people spending countless hours on the site focused only on their sexual impulses, going on dates with strangers while being as open as they can, impulse texting, impulse phone calls.
Best security practices - the furthest thing from their minds.
Tons of attack vectors. The victims... too horny to care until they've lost accessed. Now they're forced to self-pleasure using their imagination or bing pr0n for a few days. Claw-like hands, blue balls... the signs of a hacked dating site.
I can't reconcile the two statements below, like I can't reconcile nearly everything Apple does. If you're so serious about privacy and an app (or apps) completely violated this in such a violent and litigious way - why wait to do something? Toss them off the store... for good!
What they captured without consent is so over the line, the response needs to be equally strong.
""Protecting user privacy is paramount in the Apple ecosystem."" ... ""and will take immediate action if necessary""
See? That wasn't so hard to figure out from a technical standpoint. It didn't even require the resources of a nation-state to determine what was happening with the data and how easy the spyware, data-harvesting device could be accessed (note: nearly everything nowadays is a spyware, data-harvesting machine).
Instead, we continue to get Smoke & Mirrors with lots of political grandstanding and a "news media" simply parroting the same message with click-baity headlines. The military-industrial-media complex... a hell of a mindtrip.
Now if the US could start a recall of all those IoT devices and routers that have proven backdoors and mesh-like security off the market, maybe we could take their "troll-concern" message more seriously.
Typing VPN into the form discloses that 'Lantern VPN' by Beijing Qimengjialu Technology Co., Ltd is NOT banned. Every other VPN is either banned or unavailable. Good way to test which apps/companies are direct extensions (or an integral arm) of the Chinese Government, although anyone doing business there (including Apple) is directly serving the government.
Apple, for example, provides unfettered access to their datacenters (phones, images, uploaded FaceID, messages, Geo Location, etc). They are probably serving the government much more than Beijing Qimengjialu Technology Co.
I've been watching Momoa since the Stargate Atlantis days. I quickly resented him because he had zero acting ability. He had replaced Rainbow Sun Francks, who was a much better actor and could deliver nuance.
I'm saddened to hear that after all these years, he still hasn't taken any acting classes - if he did, they must be from Keanu Reeves School for Wooden Actors.
> I liked Momoa as Khal Drogo, but here, with English lines, it was painfully obvious he can't act at all...
Meanwhile, Apple has the equivalent of a Social Score (they track calls and emails), removed all apps that bypass censorship in China while also granting China full control of iCloud Data (including daily Face Shots and GPS)... this is just for starters.
They do have colorful ads that keep telling us how much they value privacy while they purposely track, data-mine, data-horde and report on every single user of their ecosystem. They have become China's Great (digital) Wall. The MSM... silent.
In the future, companies like Microsoft will be able to shutdown *their* devices remotely once they've decided support will end. The US, like most countries, don't even have "planned obsolescence' laws (which is why a company like Apple can remotely f*ck with your battery).
> "All customers who have a Windows 10 Mobile device will be able to keep using it after December 10, 2019..."
What odd phrasing... Thanks for your permission, Microsoft: That one guy in France must be very happy.
According to wikipedia, they have about 45k employees (2018). So about 3k. Maybe about a 100 million annual savings (give or take many millions)? Musk and Tesla together are set to pay $40 million in fines because of the "I have a buyer" tweet - just a single tweet. Maybe the other 60 million remaining (from firing 7%) is to pay for future tweets.
For now... it's available to US IP addresses. I was able to login using my IMDB credentials (different from Amazon) and the movies played w/o issue: on Desktop Linux, DRM install required under Firefox and VPN.
I say "for now" because on my FireOS Tablet, I am unable to view Prime Videos using a VPN. Amazon knows who I am (I'm logged in on their proprietary tablet, they track the hell out of everyone as it is). I can do everything else (including ordering) except view Videos with VPN engaged. Once I turn my VPN off, Prime Videos are no issue on my FireOS Tablet.
> Available only for US citizens (to be precise to US IP addresses).
Farandole Composer (.far): Music Module (MOD) from back in the day when computers were actually personal. Much prefer the meaning of the old extension to the new Fuschia-based extension, which is another surveillance, tracking, data-harvesting front-end.
It's not that they don't care. It's that they don't know except in general terms. I'm fairly out of touch... with Main Stream News. I live in my own bubble (fav sites, fave news, on demand streams).
Over the last couple of days (as I do on occasion), I venture into the ad-crazed world of TV media. Except for the usual sports, local highlights, brain-warping political onslaught... nothing on Facebook. Zilch! Not on Free TV, not on Free Radio. It's like I stepped back 20 years.
This news might be big on some tech sites and certain social networks but... Big Media won't sell it unless there's a political angle. Afterall, their online dollars come from ad-tracking surveillance.
There's a war going on re: The Control and Flow of Information. This is a small part of it.
I believe she has two properties in Vancouver she put up as collateral, an ankle monitoring bracelet - in addition to real estate holdings by 3rd-parties put up as collateral. I agree, though. She could easily bolt, lose her properties and pay back the 3rd-parties (who could later be charged with accessory).
If she was any number of other people (eg, less influential, less political) - there would be no bail.
> it won't take anything for her line up a flight direct to Beijing.
16:10 aspect ratio on a 17" laptop that's only 3lbs! $1,700 price tag: can't afford... Waiting game, maybe price drop by next year.
Youtube and Netflix are in two different categories. On the web, I often prefer summaries, tl;drs, bullet points. This is what Youtube is: watch a thing for a few minutes, access a news site, go watch another thing for a few minutes. I have watched lots of 4 minute movies on Youtube, for example, without losing my concentration on all the other tabs/apps I have running.
Netflix is like a more detailed article. It forces you to dedicate more of your time. You often need to make time for it. Close all other browser tabs, close other running apps, grab a snack, immerse yourself... It isn't quite a book but in this age of short attention spans, it's the closest analogy.
Youtube is entering the Netflix category with TV and Films. Netflix has not yet considered entering Youtube's playing field of video shorts.
Let's see how much Microsoft Loves Linux and Open Source... In fact, they could have done it long before throwing in the towel - in the hopes of generating some kind of momentum. The fact that they didn't probably means that the source code will expose too much embedded spyware. It'll take months to clean that dirt away before they even consider making the source viewable.
"If we start to focus on ourselves, instead of focusing on our customers, that will be the beginning of the end,"
I like what he's saying. It's something that's lost on most tech shops - even on their first day. Google has no conception of customer first. Apple is a PR company that has created the most user-hostile tech ever conceived. Microsoft has weaponized their Operating System.
Having said this... Amazon is following in those steps. Their tablets are surveillance machines. Alexa is the next-gen snooping device. They have already started looking inward and don't even realize it.