1. The (former) Soviet Union was not a communist society, any more than America's government is a democracy. We like to *call* it a democracy, but we're really a representative republic, with some of the representatives being democratically elected (as long as no one games the system...which probably happens a lot). They liked to *call* their system "communism" but the fact that they called it that did not change the truth that what they actually had was dictatorship by committee. The ruling bodies in the Soviet Union exercised too much inept control, drove their own economy into the ground, and then could not keep up with new technology -- they spent huge sums on their military machine to defend their borders against a few great, big, expensive bombers and then couldn't afford to keep up when we rolled out large numbers of little, cheap, nuclear-capable cruise missiles.
2. The RIAA (et al) like to *say* that the whole DRM thing is based on "don't rip off other people's works" but that does not change the reality that the RIAA companies have always been the ones ripping of the artists and that they intend to continue doing so. The fact that they *say* the whole thing is about protecting the artists does not change the fact that their real goal in pushing DRM is retain/regain control over the distribution of popular music and motion pictures in order to preserve their ** HUGE ** profits.
It was never about not ripping off other people's work. It was always about the money in the RIAA companies' pockets.
I agree that Ogg is the way to go, and hopefully we'll soon see an end to the insane efforts to make criminals out of people for making fair use of music (and other products) that they've already paid for.
Hmmm...in a few months, people won't get it, 'cuz they'll have seen only the edited, re-release of the film, where Greedo pulls out... a walkie-talkie!
But it's okay, folks, 'cuz Han Solo has already pulled out his own walkie-talkie under the table, and he quickly... uhhhh... irradiates Greedo's genitals with a high-power RF burst?
Re:But it makes the firewall illegal, no?
on
More MS EULA Fun
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Microsoft has the right to do whatever they want on your computer.
Microsoft claims the right. There is a difference between them claiming it and them actually having it.
Trying to stop them is not only futile but also illegal.
They can put any provision they want into a EULA, and it doesn't mean squat until it's been challenged and upheld in court. Even if some dumb EULA provision is upheld after a court challenge, if you go against it, it's still just a violation of a User Agreement, not a violation of the law. It would be up to Microsoft to go after every single violator that they want punished. They can't get the gummint to enforce their contract except one case at a time.
A report from the AASWEDW discussing IISDCED and UPDESCTG interrelation issues with OPWSEDSC and NMEDSE, along with EWSDICE or WEDGCDSE legislation. Film at 11.
Also, bullet hole in aircraft hull == slow air leak, not sudden decompression.
bullet hole through window?
Bullet hole through plastic window will star the window but not shatter it. If it does take out the entire window, the aircraft pressurization system can easily keep up with the loss. A modern jetliner can lose several windows and not have more than a gentle depressurizaton. Loud? Yes. Need to descend promptly? Yes. Catastrophic? No.
bullet hole through old half-dead panel on a 10 year old plane filled with stress fractures?
When you say "panel" do you mean a window or a panel of the aircraft hull? If you mean a window, see above. If you mean the aircraft hull, those panels are sheet metal. A bullet piercing a hull panel will leave a hole the size of the bullet. Age-related stress fractures aren't an issue. Stress fractures are a problem when they threaten the integrity of the main fuselage or the wing spars. A bullet through the floor and into the wing spar doesn't seem likely to cause more of a problem than one more stress fracture from turbulence... of course, IANAMOAAE (I Am Not A Metallurgist Or An Aircraft Engineer), so YMMV.
And maybe the fuel isn't as explosive as in the movies, but all you need is the right mixture [ntsb.gov] and a spark would be catastrophic.
What you say is true. Given the right mixture of air and fuel vapor in a fuel tank and an ignition source in the right place, the vapor would surely ignite, probably rupturing the tank and bringing down the aircraft. I won't assert that there's no risk involved in gunfire aboard an aircraft. I don't know how to assess the likelihood of:
1. the right mixture being present in a fuel tank, AND
2. events aboard the aircraft become extreme enough that a law-abiding citizen who's already sufficiently trusted as to be issued a concealed-carry permit decides that using a firearm is necessary to resolve the situation, AND
3. one or more shots are fired which either miss their target or overpenetrate, AND
4. out of all the possible paths to take, one or more of those bullets travels through the space where the fuel/air mixture is just right, AND
5. the bullet collides with another piece of hard metal in that volume of space and a spark ensues.
[deletia]
If we were to allow concealed-carry permit holders to travel with their weapons, the terrorists will have no way of knowing who's armed on a given flight.
Not really so wacky.
Yes, wacky. People stuck in confined space - absolutely no way of getting out. Add alcohol, strangers (who people may or may not get along with), etc.
Yes, that's the current situation.
Air rage returns about 500 000 hits [google.com] on google. Imagine adding firearms to that. The consequences would be disastrous.
Adding firearms to your query? Yes, it'd change the number of hits. 500,000 hits is an indication of how many websites mention "air rage" or similar words. Might or might not be a good indicator of how often it occurs.
Also, based on observed history, I'd guess that people who have applied for and been issued concealed-carry permits are among the least likely to loose control under stress. Remember, the predicted carnage in the streets just did not happen.
I'm sorry, the bigger the weapons the greater the risk.
Obviously, that is correct.
It's much, much more sensible preventing anybody from carrying weapons than letting everyone on a confined space with that many people.
So far, we have not managed to achieve this. Weapons or things that can be used as weapons continue to get through airport security. I think it is important to realize that the terrorists ARE GOING TO GET THROUGH SECURITY. Security can't be so tight that they absolutely cannot get through. They *will* manage it.
Imagine if every shoot out that turned bad in a city street in the US instantly resulted in 400 people dying? That's what you're proposing.
No, it is not. We are not talking about city streets, we are not talking about shootouts between rival street gang members (who don't fly much), we are not talking about liquor store robberies gone bad, and we are not talking about 240-pound drunken wifebeaters advancing on 90-pound scared-out-of-their-wits wives who have managed to buy a weapon to finally put an end to the horror. We are not talking about anything even similar to those things. As terrible as those things are, using that emotional leverage to cloud the issue here is... well, let's just be kind and call it "muddy thinking."
We are talking about dissuading a few highly-motivated terrorists who are considering a plan to take over an airliner that was, up until now, considered a "soft" target. We're talking about how to harden that target in a way that will cause them to consider the plan unworkable. Whatever method we choose must be affordable, and it must be actually possible to do, and must not bring with it other unacceptable consequences.
What we're talking about here are some of those other possible consequences.
In case you hadn't realised after S11, every one of those B747s etc is a big bomb with wings.
I am not an idiot, and neither are most of the other people who submit postings to slashdot. No need to be insulting.
Yes, they are great, big firebombs. I want us to find a way to make sure that they NEVER NEVER NEVER get used again by terrorists the way they were on September 11.
Surveilling all us non-criminals just because we can is like looking for your car keys under the streetlight because it's easier to search there than back between the lights where you dropped them.
Perfect, exactly right. And a good soundbyte. Did you come up with that one? Its really good, I'm going to remember it and use it.
No, I can't claim it. I heard it someplace else and it just seemed to really apply well here.
Those animals didn't use guns or weapons smuggled onboard, they weren't some kind of secret spy martial arts experts...They just used fear.
You're right, but they also counted on being able to control the aircraft -- and because we were all taught to be submissive in a hijacking situation, it worked.
I don't think that will work again.
[deletia]
WHO I AM is not important when I travel on an airplane.
I agree 100%. I don't see any justification for intruding on people's privacy in this situation -- it will not help solve the problem. Surveilling all us non-criminals just because we can is like looking for your car keys under the streetlight because it's easier to search there than back between the lights where you dropped them.
Whether or not I'm carrying weapons, bombs, that is important.
Ummm...bombs aside, I think it's more important to ensure that, no matter what you're carrying, you'll face enough resistance (preferably armed resistance) to prevent you from controlling the situation.
1. put armed soldiers on every flight. you want to secure the air traffic, soldiers will get the job done.
Interesting, but the military is not as well suited for this as it might seem at first glance. Soldiers are not security guards, nor are they policemen -- their training and mentality is completely different.
Also, why make it easy for the terrorists to identify the people who will resist them for control of the aircraft? (see below)
of all your ideas, this is the least stupid... but despite all the movies you may have seen, bullets fired from guns in planes do generally breach the plane's hull. Now, you might kill the terrorist, but it kinda defeats the purpose if a bullet ruptures the fuel tanks.
A bullet piercing a fuel tank wouldn't bring down the plane. The tanks are filled with jet fuel, not gasoline. Jet fuel is more like kerosene -- burns well if vaporized, but does not explode as easily as it appears to in movies. Bullet hole in fuel tank == slow fuel leak.
Also, bullet hole in aircraft hull == slow air leak, not sudden decompression.
2. here's a wacky one... let passengers carry guns on the planes. guns, knives, whatever. who's going to try to overtake the controls of a plane when there is a good possibility that others on the plane have guns and will use them against you. you can take firearms on a grayhound bus, or an amtrack train, why not the airlines?
You got one bit right - wacky. 'Fess up... you're trolling, right?
I mean, c'mon, how often have you heard about the passenger whose had just that little bit too much to drink, and decided to get into a big fight with the poor bastard sitting beside him?
Now, add firearms, knives, etc to the fray.
Sounds like the dire predictions of "blood in the streets" in various states before the passage of concealed carry laws. Needless to say, the predicted shootouts and insane violence did not come to pass in any of those places.
Based on observed history over the last several decades, people who have permits to carry concealed weapons are just about the safest people to travel with.
If we were to allow concealed-carry permit holders to travel with their weapons, the terrorists will have no way of knowing who's armed on a given flight.
It is to the software maker's advantage to duck liability at every opportunity. The fact that the EULA says that you're buying a license does not mean that this is what's actually happening. It just means that this is what the software maker wants you to believe.
I seem to remember that some high-level courts have decided that the transaction is actually what it appears to be: you went into the store, you saw goods on the shelf, you took goods to the cash register, money changed hands, and therefore you bought the goods you paid for. You did not buy a license. You did not walk out with something that remains the property of the manufacturer.
If it looks like a sale of goods, that's what it is, regardless of the manufacturer's efforts to claim that what happened was only the purchase of a license.
Thanks for responding. You raise a couple of interesting points.
Whitelisting can be broken easily too with autoresponders [...]
I think I see what you're saying, but I also think you might be assuming some things that might not actually work out that way. Here are some thoughts:
1. The spammers who are trying hardest to conceal who they really are will probably not be using email accounts that will actually be delivered. If the account-verification message never gets delivered anyplace, an autoresponder will never process it.
2. The spammers who hijack open relays to transmit their junk are exploiting a vulnerability that's very different from what would be required to set up an autoresponder. At least, I *think* that's true. Someone want to jump in with more info?
3. The spammers who use throw-away, free accounts (are there still any of those?) would have to use accounts that allow them to set up autoresponders. More effort for the spammer (I think), and the service provider could be lobbied to not allow autoresponders on accounts that haven't been paid. Still an improvement over the current situation, I think.
4. If address-verification responses *are* actually being delivered, then it's likely that the actual identity of the spammer can be ascertained and either hit with a complaint or blocked (blacklisted) usefully.
if spam isn't illegal, they will do it and your solution fails
You could be right. We probably do need for it to be illegal, but making it illegal all by itself isn't going to solve the problem.
If only 20% of people whitelisted, you better belive that they would get their spam through one way or another.
Again, you could be right. I'd have to see exactly how they go about it, though, before I'd be willing to give up on some form of whitelisting as a solution.
The reason we don't have thousands of bank robberies a day is because we enforce the laws, and the penalties are stiff.
I don't think that bank robbery is the right comparison. We need a comparison that touches a lot more people and is more similar in other ways. I apologize in advance if this is offensive, but how about this one:
The reason we have such a booming illegal drug business with the accompanying violent crime in this country is because, in spite of years and years of great expense and our best efforts to enforce the existing laws and impose stiff penalties, the bad guys make money at it and do not believe that they'll be caught and punished. Unless they can be made to believe believe that (and that isn't going to happen), we will not make this problem go away using the techniques we're using now. The only way to win this fight is to do something that takes the money out of it. Then, and only then, they'll quit. And up to this point, we have not been willing to do what it takes to take the money out of it.
The reason we have such a huge amount of spam right now is because, in spite of our best efforts to filter out junkmail, close up the holes in the systems, and convey our disapproval to the spammers (even to the extent of trying to make it illegal), the spammers make money at it and do not believe that they'll be caught and punished. They believe that they can creatively work around (read: ignore) or lobby around (read: suppress) any restrictions. The only way to win is to do something that takes the money out of it. Then, and only then, they'll quit.
I'd sure like it if we were willing (and able) to do what it'd take to take the money out of it for the spammers.
The drug problem isn't really a topic suitable for slashdot (I don't think). Perhaps I shouldn't have gone there. If anyone's offended, I apologize.
Thanks for responding. You have found what looks like a fatal similarity between my definition of the problem and part of my suggestion for a solution.
It isn't, however, necessarily so. The similarity between "We absolutely cannot directly control the behavior of all the spammers" and "we need to implement (or lobby for) verified-sender mail delivery systems everywhere, and get it to be the default delivery mechanism for new accounts" may be more apparent than real.
For one thing, we are in an adversary relationship with the spammers. Our relationship with our service providers is (hopefully) more cooperative.
For another, in order to "win" on the local level, it isn't necessary for any one group of users to deal with all of the SMTP servers -- all they need to do is to lobby their own provider.
If we actually tried to solve the problem in this way, once a group persuades their ISP to make the change, that group of users would no longer be troubled by spam. From their point of view, the worst of the fight is over. They can talk about their success, and perhaps their input would be useful in persuading more ISPs to do the same.
You're right that the character of the problem will change as the situation develops, but I don't think that the spammers who are the greatest problem will necessarily find a simple way to work around this. Spammers who hijack open relays to send out their email would also have to gain a great deal more control of the server to install an autoresponder, requiring more access than they might have in many cases.
I don't know exactly how this will unfold, but I'm fairly sure that the answer lies in this direction (whitelists, etc) rather than in legislation or cyber-attacks.
And the article is fairly accurate - we cut off affiliates who spam pretty quickly and block access to their reseller code.
However, such programs generate incredible amounts of traffic - the money generated far exceeds the bad publicity and attention the occasionally poorly targeted email generates.
I think many of us are assuming that the number of emails sent out vastly exceeds the number of useful responses your employer is getting. That's the complaint -- the email campaign bothers a huge number of people and only gets a few responses, but those few are enough to offset the cost of the campaign, so your employer continues to do it.
Could you shed a little light here? How many emails actually go out in a typical campaign, and how many hits (surge volume in the time immediately following the mailing) do you get?
If the number of new clients is a substantial fraction of the number of e-mailings, then the email is well-targeted. If it isn't...well, then that's what we're calling spam.
And if your employer doesn't keep track of such things, well, that kind of points to spam, too.
Stop all the spam? Well, it can be done, but we all have to realize a few things and make some changes. And it will take a little while.
Sorry this is long -- please bear with me.
We need to realize or accept these things:
1. We absolutely cannot directly control the behavior of all the spammers. No law is going to stop all of them from sending spam. No law enforcement agency is going to search all of them out and prosecute all of them. No punitive action (legal or otherwise) by a group of users is going to dissuade all of them. And if we don't stop all of them, there will still be spam in our mailboxes. We can safely give up on this kind of thing.
2. The problem with spam is not that they send it, but that we receive it and it's in our faces when we want to read our real email, and it's annoying to have to deal with it. So we need to stop worrying about the sending of the spam. We have to handle it at the receiving end (our end).
3. The spammers are will continue to be motivated to send spam because it works often enough to be profitable for them.
4. Inbound mail filtering on addresses or message content will never go far enough. Some spam (new junk from new sources) will continue to get through, and the spammers will be encouraged enough to continue.
Solving the problem means making a couple of changes -- one fundamental (about the way we think about email) and one sweeping (across as many email systems as possible):
1. The fundamental part -- we must change the way we think about accepting email from unidentified senders. It is the acceptance of mail from unverified sources that allows spam to work at all.
2. The sweeping-change part -- we need to implement (or lobby for) verified-sender mail delivery systems everywhere, and get it to be the default delivery mechanism for new accounts. These are the kind of systems (like TMDA) that use whitelists to allow mail to be delivered, with all other inbound mail (except the blacklist) gets an auto-response with a code - the sender is asked to reply to the auto-response in order to get their original mail delivered. Responders are added to the whitelist. People will get used to the verification process -- it isn't terribly burdensome.
Anyway, if no response comes back in X days, the message may be discarded, optionally adding the sender's address to a blacklist.
This kind of delivery system stops spam because of the very nature of spam -- the sender never looks at replies to his spam. Think about it.
It isn't necessary to use TMDA -- it's just one example of this kind of system. I ended up writing my own system with scripts and procmail. I'm down from 30-40 spams per day to zero, and my email is usable again.
If we do this across the board and make it the default condition for new accounts, spam will stop working for those who use it. When the response rate drops to zero, they'll quit spending money on it.
This does not address the issue of the cost of receiving the spam (for those who pay by the byte), but if we can make it all dry up and go away by making it stop working, that problem would solve itself.
Disclaimer: this is all opinion, of course. Your mileage may vary.
The cost of complying with/working around the Vermont rules (by *not* including VT records in the list that's for sale) should be insignificant.
It should work like this:
1. Management issues directive to IT to change the list-work programming to exclude VT addresses from the extract.
2. IT makes a code change to the *one* program that does the extract (you don't seriously think that IT writes a new program every time someone wants the list, do you?).
Thereafter, when someone pulls the list, they don't get Vermont.
Of course, this would have to be done by every company that's selling a list that includes Vermont addresses, but the cost per list-selling-company is miniscule.
Anyway, this isn't about that cost. The suing companies' efforts are not aimed at saving their money in the list-selling process -- what they're trying to do is to prevent Vermont from establishing a precedent that will restrict their activities in the future.
You say "[...] half the time the state information we have for the customer is old, or out of date, or deliberatly inaccurate [...]" -- but if these are your customers, and you are providing them with some service and billing them and presumably **GETTING PAID** by them as a result of your billings, then the address info you have on them must be fairly accurate.
If the consumer is no longer your customer, then
1. If you are holding onto their records, you must be planning to treat them as a prospect list, and therefore
2. You should be processing the list against the USPS National Change of Address database to assure that it's current before selling it (this is a normal part of list hygiene in marketing).
Sorry, but I just don't buy any argument from a reputable firm that says "we can't assure that our address list is correct."
I'd sure like to know exactly who it is that is fighting Vermont's new privacy rules. I just want to identify the enemy.
If I read it correctly, the businesses affected are those regulated by Vermont's Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration, and there are five "industry trade groups" fighting it.
The American Council of Life Insurers was identified as one of the groups. Unfortunately, the page on their site that lists the member companies isn't working (may be slashdotted).
The article also quotes a spokesman from Citigroup, Inc., which consists of Citibank, Travelers, Smith Barney, Primerica, Citigroup Private Bank, Diners Club International, Banamex, Citi Insurance, Citi Financial, Citi Capital, Citigroup Corporate & Investment Bank, Citiroup Asset Management and Citi Mortgage.
Anybody know who the rest are?
Slashdot Mirror
I want to see the Slim Pickins clip!
"Yeeeee-haaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!"
>FOOOOOOOOOMM!!!!!!!<
1. The (former) Soviet Union was not a communist society, any more than America's government is a democracy. We like to *call* it a democracy, but we're really a representative republic, with some of the representatives being democratically elected (as long as no one games the system...which probably happens a lot). They liked to *call* their system "communism" but the fact that they called it that did not change the truth that what they actually had was dictatorship by committee. The ruling bodies in the Soviet Union exercised too much inept control, drove their own economy into the ground, and then could not keep up with new technology -- they spent huge sums on their military machine to defend their borders against a few great, big, expensive bombers and then couldn't afford to keep up when we rolled out large numbers of little, cheap, nuclear-capable cruise missiles.
2. The RIAA (et al) like to *say* that the whole DRM thing is based on "don't rip off other people's works" but that does not change the reality that the RIAA companies have always been the ones ripping of the artists and that they intend to continue doing so. The fact that they *say* the whole thing is about protecting the artists does not change the fact that their real goal in pushing DRM is retain/regain control over the distribution of popular music and motion pictures in order to preserve their ** HUGE ** profits.
It was never about not ripping off other people's work. It was always about the money in the RIAA companies' pockets.
I agree that Ogg is the way to go, and hopefully we'll soon see an end to the insane efforts to make criminals out of people for making fair use of music (and other products) that they've already paid for.
Aw, geez. Probably all of us.
I wonder how many people will get it?
Hmmm...in a few months, people won't get it, 'cuz they'll have seen only the edited, re-release of the film, where Greedo pulls out ... a walkie-talkie!
But it's okay, folks, 'cuz Han Solo has already pulled out his own walkie-talkie under the table, and he quickly ... uhhhh ... irradiates Greedo's genitals with a high-power RF burst?
Microsoft claims the right. There is a difference between them claiming it and them actually having it.
Trying to stop them is not only futile but also illegal.
They can put any provision they want into a EULA, and it doesn't mean squat until it's been challenged and upheld in court. Even if some dumb EULA provision is upheld after a court challenge, if you go against it, it's still just a violation of a User Agreement, not a violation of the law. It would be up to Microsoft to go after every single violator that they want punished. They can't get the gummint to enforce their contract except one case at a time.
Gobbabytes? Boatloadabytes?
Hell, why not go straight to 1024 bit addressing?
We can call it "one whole shitpotfullabytes."
WTF?
Also, bullet hole in aircraft hull == slow air leak, not sudden decompression.
bullet hole through window?
Bullet hole through plastic window will star the window but not shatter it. If it does take out the entire window, the aircraft pressurization system can easily keep up with the loss. A modern jetliner can lose several windows and not have more than a gentle depressurizaton. Loud? Yes. Need to descend promptly? Yes. Catastrophic? No.
bullet hole through old half-dead panel on a 10 year old plane filled with stress fractures?
When you say "panel" do you mean a window or a panel of the aircraft hull? If you mean a window, see above. If you mean the aircraft hull, those panels are sheet metal. A bullet piercing a hull panel will leave a hole the size of the bullet. Age-related stress fractures aren't an issue. Stress fractures are a problem when they threaten the integrity of the main fuselage or the wing spars. A bullet through the floor and into the wing spar doesn't seem likely to cause more of a problem than one more stress fracture from turbulence ... of course, IANAMOAAE (I Am Not A Metallurgist Or An Aircraft Engineer), so YMMV.
And maybe the fuel isn't as explosive as in the movies, but all you need is the right mixture [ntsb.gov] and a spark would be catastrophic.
What you say is true. Given the right mixture of air and fuel vapor in a fuel tank and an ignition source in the right place, the vapor would surely ignite, probably rupturing the tank and bringing down the aircraft. I won't assert that there's no risk involved in gunfire aboard an aircraft. I don't know how to assess the likelihood of:
1. the right mixture being present in a fuel tank, AND
2. events aboard the aircraft become extreme enough that a law-abiding citizen who's already sufficiently trusted as to be issued a concealed-carry permit decides that using a firearm is necessary to resolve the situation, AND
3. one or more shots are fired which either miss their target or overpenetrate, AND
4. out of all the possible paths to take, one or more of those bullets travels through the space where the fuel/air mixture is just right, AND
5. the bullet collides with another piece of hard metal in that volume of space and a spark ensues.
[deletia]
If we were to allow concealed-carry permit holders to travel with their weapons, the terrorists will have no way of knowing who's armed on a given flight.
Not really so wacky.
Yes, wacky. People stuck in confined space - absolutely no way of getting out. Add alcohol, strangers (who people may or may not get along with), etc.
Yes, that's the current situation.
Air rage returns about 500 000 hits [google.com] on google. Imagine adding firearms to that. The consequences would be disastrous.
Adding firearms to your query? Yes, it'd change the number of hits. 500,000 hits is an indication of how many websites mention "air rage" or similar words. Might or might not be a good indicator of how often it occurs.
Also, based on observed history, I'd guess that people who have applied for and been issued concealed-carry permits are among the least likely to loose control under stress. Remember, the predicted carnage in the streets just did not happen.
I'm sorry, the bigger the weapons the greater the risk.
Obviously, that is correct.
It's much, much more sensible preventing anybody from carrying weapons than letting everyone on a confined space with that many people.
So far, we have not managed to achieve this. Weapons or things that can be used as weapons continue to get through airport security. I think it is important to realize that the terrorists ARE GOING TO GET THROUGH SECURITY. Security can't be so tight that they absolutely cannot get through. They *will* manage it.
Imagine if every shoot out that turned bad in a city street in the US instantly resulted in 400 people dying? That's what you're proposing.
No, it is not. We are not talking about city streets, we are not talking about shootouts between rival street gang members (who don't fly much), we are not talking about liquor store robberies gone bad, and we are not talking about 240-pound drunken wifebeaters advancing on 90-pound scared-out-of-their-wits wives who have managed to buy a weapon to finally put an end to the horror. We are not talking about anything even similar to those things. As terrible as those things are, using that emotional leverage to cloud the issue here is ... well, let's just be kind and call it "muddy thinking."
We are talking about dissuading a few highly-motivated terrorists who are considering a plan to take over an airliner that was, up until now, considered a "soft" target. We're talking about how to harden that target in a way that will cause them to consider the plan unworkable. Whatever method we choose must be affordable, and it must be actually possible to do, and must not bring with it other unacceptable consequences.
What we're talking about here are some of those other possible consequences.
In case you hadn't realised after S11, every one of those B747s etc is a big bomb with wings.
I am not an idiot, and neither are most of the other people who submit postings to slashdot. No need to be insulting.
Yes, they are great, big firebombs. I want us to find a way to make sure that they NEVER NEVER NEVER get used again by terrorists the way they were on September 11.
It's madness. Sheer madness.
There's a lot of that out there.
Regards,
Surveilling all us non-criminals just because we can is like looking for your car keys under the streetlight because it's easier to search there than back between the lights where you dropped them.
Perfect, exactly right. And a good soundbyte. Did you come up with that one? Its really good, I'm going to remember it and use it.
No, I can't claim it. I heard it someplace else and it just seemed to really apply well here.
Regards,
You're right, but they also counted on being able to control the aircraft -- and because we were all taught to be submissive in a hijacking situation, it worked.
I don't think that will work again.
[deletia]
WHO I AM is not important when I travel on an airplane.
I agree 100%. I don't see any justification for intruding on people's privacy in this situation -- it will not help solve the problem. Surveilling all us non-criminals just because we can is like looking for your car keys under the streetlight because it's easier to search there than back between the lights where you dropped them.
Whether or not I'm carrying weapons, bombs, that is important.
Ummm...bombs aside, I think it's more important to ensure that, no matter what you're carrying, you'll face enough resistance (preferably armed resistance) to prevent you from controlling the situation.
Interesting, but the military is not as well suited for this as it might seem at first glance. Soldiers are not security guards, nor are they policemen -- their training and mentality is completely different.
Also, why make it easy for the terrorists to identify the people who will resist them for control of the aircraft? (see below)
of all your ideas, this is the least stupid... but despite all the movies you may have seen, bullets fired from guns in planes do generally breach the plane's hull. Now, you might kill the terrorist, but it kinda defeats the purpose if a bullet ruptures the fuel tanks.
A bullet piercing a fuel tank wouldn't bring down the plane. The tanks are filled with jet fuel, not gasoline. Jet fuel is more like kerosene -- burns well if vaporized, but does not explode as easily as it appears to in movies. Bullet hole in fuel tank == slow fuel leak.
Also, bullet hole in aircraft hull == slow air leak, not sudden decompression.
2. here's a wacky one... let passengers carry guns on the planes. guns, knives, whatever. who's going to try to overtake the controls of a plane when there is a good possibility that others on the plane have guns and will use them against you. you can take firearms on a grayhound bus, or an amtrack train, why not the airlines?
You got one bit right - wacky. 'Fess up... you're trolling, right?
I mean, c'mon, how often have you heard about the passenger whose had just that little bit too much to drink, and decided to get into a big fight with the poor bastard sitting beside him?
Now, add firearms, knives, etc to the fray.
Sounds like the dire predictions of "blood in the streets" in various states before the passage of concealed carry laws. Needless to say, the predicted shootouts and insane violence did not come to pass in any of those places.
Based on observed history over the last several decades, people who have permits to carry concealed weapons are just about the safest people to travel with.
If we were to allow concealed-carry permit holders to travel with their weapons, the terrorists will have no way of knowing who's armed on a given flight.
Not really so wacky.
Dang. I was hoping you'd serve vampires.
I like mine fried.
Wow! That's the same combination I have on my luggage!
I would think that the fine would not be for speeding -- more like "unauthorized operation of an aircraft on public roads".
I seem to remember that some high-level courts have decided that the transaction is actually what it appears to be: you went into the store, you saw goods on the shelf, you took goods to the cash register, money changed hands, and therefore you bought the goods you paid for. You did not buy a license. You did not walk out with something that remains the property of the manufacturer.
If it looks like a sale of goods, that's what it is, regardless of the manufacturer's efforts to claim that what happened was only the purchase of a license.
Of course, IANAL.
If, however, a lawsuit raises the question of product liability, the court will decide where to place responsibility, EULA notwithstanding.
And the problem with that is ... ?
Whitelisting can be broken easily too with autoresponders [...]
I think I see what you're saying, but I also think you might be assuming some things that might not actually work out that way. Here are some thoughts:
1. The spammers who are trying hardest to conceal who they really are will probably not be using email accounts that will actually be delivered. If the account-verification message never gets delivered anyplace, an autoresponder will never process it.
2. The spammers who hijack open relays to transmit their junk are exploiting a vulnerability that's very different from what would be required to set up an autoresponder. At least, I *think* that's true. Someone want to jump in with more info?
3. The spammers who use throw-away, free accounts (are there still any of those?) would have to use accounts that allow them to set up autoresponders. More effort for the spammer (I think), and the service provider could be lobbied to not allow autoresponders on accounts that haven't been paid. Still an improvement over the current situation, I think.
4. If address-verification responses *are* actually being delivered, then it's likely that the actual identity of the spammer can be ascertained and either hit with a complaint or blocked (blacklisted) usefully.
if spam isn't illegal, they will do it and your solution fails
You could be right. We probably do need for it to be illegal, but making it illegal all by itself isn't going to solve the problem.
If only 20% of people whitelisted, you better belive that they would get their spam through one way or another.
Again, you could be right. I'd have to see exactly how they go about it, though, before I'd be willing to give up on some form of whitelisting as a solution.
The reason we don't have thousands of bank robberies a day is because we enforce the laws, and the penalties are stiff.
I don't think that bank robbery is the right comparison. We need a comparison that touches a lot more people and is more similar in other ways. I apologize in advance if this is offensive, but how about this one:
The reason we have such a booming illegal drug business with the accompanying violent crime in this country is because, in spite of years and years of great expense and our best efforts to enforce the existing laws and impose stiff penalties, the bad guys make money at it and do not believe that they'll be caught and punished. Unless they can be made to believe believe that (and that isn't going to happen), we will not make this problem go away using the techniques we're using now. The only way to win this fight is to do something that takes the money out of it. Then, and only then, they'll quit. And up to this point, we have not been willing to do what it takes to take the money out of it.
The reason we have such a huge amount of spam right now is because, in spite of our best efforts to filter out junkmail, close up the holes in the systems, and convey our disapproval to the spammers (even to the extent of trying to make it illegal), the spammers make money at it and do not believe that they'll be caught and punished. They believe that they can creatively work around (read: ignore) or lobby around (read: suppress) any restrictions. The only way to win is to do something that takes the money out of it. Then, and only then, they'll quit.
I'd sure like it if we were willing (and able) to do what it'd take to take the money out of it for the spammers.
The drug problem isn't really a topic suitable for slashdot (I don't think). Perhaps I shouldn't have gone there. If anyone's offended, I apologize.
Regards,
It isn't, however, necessarily so. The similarity between "We absolutely cannot directly control the behavior of all the spammers" and "we need to implement (or lobby for) verified-sender mail delivery systems everywhere, and get it to be the default delivery mechanism for new accounts" may be more apparent than real.
For one thing, we are in an adversary relationship with the spammers. Our relationship with our service providers is (hopefully) more cooperative.
For another, in order to "win" on the local level, it isn't necessary for any one group of users to deal with all of the SMTP servers -- all they need to do is to lobby their own provider.
If we actually tried to solve the problem in this way, once a group persuades their ISP to make the change, that group of users would no longer be troubled by spam. From their point of view, the worst of the fight is over. They can talk about their success, and perhaps their input would be useful in persuading more ISPs to do the same.
Regards,
I don't know exactly how this will unfold, but I'm fairly sure that the answer lies in this direction (whitelists, etc) rather than in legislation or cyber-attacks.
Regards,
Could you shed a little light here? How many emails actually go out in a typical campaign, and how many hits (surge volume in the time immediately following the mailing) do you get?
If the number of new clients is a substantial fraction of the number of e-mailings, then the email is well-targeted. If it isn't...well, then that's what we're calling spam.
And if your employer doesn't keep track of such things, well, that kind of points to spam, too.
Sorry this is long -- please bear with me.
We need to realize or accept these things:
1. We absolutely cannot directly control the behavior of all the spammers. No law is going to stop all of them from sending spam. No law enforcement agency is going to search all of them out and prosecute all of them. No punitive action (legal or otherwise) by a group of users is going to dissuade all of them. And if we don't stop all of them, there will still be spam in our mailboxes. We can safely give up on this kind of thing.
2. The problem with spam is not that they send it, but that we receive it and it's in our faces when we want to read our real email, and it's annoying to have to deal with it. So we need to stop worrying about the sending of the spam. We have to handle it at the receiving end (our end).
3. The spammers are will continue to be motivated to send spam because it works often enough to be profitable for them.
4. Inbound mail filtering on addresses or message content will never go far enough. Some spam (new junk from new sources) will continue to get through, and the spammers will be encouraged enough to continue.
Solving the problem means making a couple of changes -- one fundamental (about the way we think about email) and one sweeping (across as many email systems as possible):
1. The fundamental part -- we must change the way we think about accepting email from unidentified senders. It is the acceptance of mail from unverified sources that allows spam to work at all.
2. The sweeping-change part -- we need to implement (or lobby for) verified-sender mail delivery systems everywhere, and get it to be the default delivery mechanism for new accounts. These are the kind of systems (like TMDA) that use whitelists to allow mail to be delivered, with all other inbound mail (except the blacklist) gets an auto-response with a code - the sender is asked to reply to the auto-response in order to get their original mail delivered. Responders are added to the whitelist. People will get used to the verification process -- it isn't terribly burdensome.
Anyway, if no response comes back in X days, the message may be discarded, optionally adding the sender's address to a blacklist.
This kind of delivery system stops spam because of the very nature of spam -- the sender never looks at replies to his spam. Think about it.
It isn't necessary to use TMDA -- it's just one example of this kind of system. I ended up writing my own system with scripts and procmail. I'm down from 30-40 spams per day to zero, and my email is usable again.
If we do this across the board and make it the default condition for new accounts, spam will stop working for those who use it. When the response rate drops to zero, they'll quit spending money on it.
This does not address the issue of the cost of receiving the spam (for those who pay by the byte), but if we can make it all dry up and go away by making it stop working, that problem would solve itself.
Disclaimer: this is all opinion, of course. Your mileage may vary.
It should work like this:
1. Management issues directive to IT to change the list-work programming to exclude VT addresses from the extract.
2. IT makes a code change to the *one* program that does the extract (you don't seriously think that IT writes a new program every time someone wants the list, do you?).
Thereafter, when someone pulls the list, they don't get Vermont.
Of course, this would have to be done by every company that's selling a list that includes Vermont addresses, but the cost per list-selling-company is miniscule.
Anyway, this isn't about that cost. The suing companies' efforts are not aimed at saving their money in the list-selling process -- what they're trying to do is to prevent Vermont from establishing a precedent that will restrict their activities in the future.
If the consumer is no longer your customer, then
1. If you are holding onto their records, you must be planning to treat them as a prospect list, and therefore
2. You should be processing the list against the USPS National Change of Address database to assure that it's current before selling it (this is a normal part of list hygiene in marketing).
Sorry, but I just don't buy any argument from a reputable firm that says "we can't assure that our address list is correct."
I'd sure like to know exactly who it is that is fighting Vermont's new privacy rules. I just want to identify the enemy.
If I read it correctly, the businesses affected are those regulated by Vermont's Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration, and there are five "industry trade groups" fighting it.
The American Council of Life Insurers was identified as one of the groups. Unfortunately, the page on their site that lists the member companies isn't working (may be slashdotted).
The article also quotes a spokesman from Citigroup, Inc., which consists of Citibank, Travelers, Smith Barney, Primerica, Citigroup Private Bank, Diners Club International, Banamex, Citi Insurance, Citi Financial, Citi Capital, Citigroup Corporate & Investment Bank, Citiroup Asset Management and Citi Mortgage.
Anybody know who the rest are?