I had a look at Hansard and found the relevant section. It's available at:
Hansard: Regulation of investigatory Powers Bill
It clearly states that it is not `reasonably practicable' for the investigated party to provide the key or plaintext, then that is a defence. Section 47 is about providing information in lieu of a key, which says nothing about verifying that the decrypted information matches the ciphertext.
TCP already includes `niceness' tests checking that TCP flows backoff correctly rather than flooding the network, at the pain of being blacklisted. Could similar traffic analysis tools stop DDoS? How might this work, or if not, why not?
Indeed: elementary crypto error on my part . I guess they can't define the session key to be plaintext, since it is not part of the input the user provides the encryption program: most users of PGP aren't even aware of its existence.
It is odd; the law has a suicide clause: I am always entitled to a empirically untestable defence, when asked to provide information about an encrypted message!
The history I learnt was that TI designed the first integrated circuit, but it was just gate logic. It was Intel who first assembled all of the components of the processing unit onto one chip.
The article makes some worrying claims about the Intel business model: dependent on high margins, unable to reduce costs, long time to market, losing its best engineers. These suggest that Intel can't just mark up its recent troubles to experience and get back to old form. One way or another it does look as if Intel shareholders are not going to be happy.
I don't know so much that people have fallen in love with the Crusoe, so much as that Transmeta have beaten Intel to producing a usable VLIW chip. Maybe the article is right, maybe VLIW is a false path, but if not Transmeta looks like a dangerous competitor to Intel.
No: if a message was encrypted using a public key system, and the prosecutors knowthe public key, then obviously they can check the message.
This is probably the kind of case the police are most concerned about: criminals using cryptography to communicate, and not be understood by the police. The other kind of case would use symmetric key cryptology: eg. the accounting details of a fraud are held locally on a hard drive, and here it wouldn't be able to verify the plain text matches the cypher text.
Now take my case. They hang me up here five years ago. Every night they take me down for twenty minutes, then they hang me up again. Which I guard as very fair, in view of what I've done. And if nothing else, it's taught me to respect the Romans, and it's taught me that you'll never get anywhere in this life, unless you are prepared to do a fair day's work for a fair day's...
What criteria guides you in your choice of subjects for the articles you write here on Slashdot? Which political and cultural views do you find sympathetic on Slashdot, and which, if any, do you have problems with?
Interesting article. Personally I don't think Linux is `there' yet for office apps, but it is at least a viable option. Some thoughts:
Latex: if you need to write up scientific equations, then Latex is indispensible. If not, avoid it, because it is a user-unfriendly nightmare. Scientific users use in becuase there is no alternative, not because it is pleasant to use. Now that MathML is coming, maybe we won't have to use LaTeX for much longer.
PowerPoint: About the non-linear presentations: nice thought, but I have to disagree. Telling a story is a linear thing, and giving a presentation should be like telling a story. If you want to jump around all the time, then it sounds more like brain-storning than presentation to me, in which case I don't think there is a good electronic rival to the flipchart yet. This is one area I think MS has a decisive advantage over anything on the Linux desktop.
Excel: it is the de facto standard, but it is also a buggy dog. I haven't seen the Office 2k rivals, but I think the free software rivals have a chance of displacing it.
The software falls foul of the DeCSS if it fails any of the clauses. So OS automatically passes section C, but if it fails either of the other sections, then it is illegal.
No. The judges interpretation is that defeating the encryption mechanism is illegal even if the intent is not piracy. Given the wording of the law, I don't think he could come to any other conclusion.
The judge argues on the presumption that code is a constitutionally protected form of expression. His argument is that the constitution defends copyright on the grounds that copyright is needed to provide economic incentives to promote free speech, and so there is a constitutional basis for limiting certain forms of free speech when they conflict with issues of copyright.
I think the argument is weak, but the judge is most certainly not ruling that code does not enjoy the First Amendment protections.
There is an explicit reverse engineering provision, but it only protects attempts to make program code usable. The judges injunction ruling discusses this very clearly.
Oops; looks like I misunderstood the judges argument. He clearly dismisses this argument in the following paragraph:
Second, even if DeCSS were intended and usable solely to permit the playing, and not the copying, of DVDs on Linux machines, the playing without a licensed CSS "player key'' would "circumvent a technological measure'' that effectively controls access to a copyrighted work and violate the statute in any case.
Well, it looks to me as if his interpretation of the law is right, and my earlier post is wrong, so I retract it.
I see from the judges ruling that the judge thinks that the original hack was motivated by the intent to duplicate work, which by the DMCA is bound to be a violation.
So it looks quite possible that this case would be lost. *But* it would be quite possible to do a *new* hack, a Nu-DeCSS whose intent is solely intended to play CSS discs on a linux box, and whose authors refuse to cooperate with anyone they know to be promoting the technology for the purposes of duplication. Since the intent is different, the law is different.
The clause of the DMCA cited in the judges injunction provides the following intent test:
"(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under [the Copyright Act];
"(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under [the Copyright Act];
or "(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person's knowledge for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under [the Copyright Act]."
Clearly such a modified Nu-DeCSS would fail all three clauses and so be legal.
Does it do any *good* to specify things in Xresources for standard X applications? You finally find a font that you can tolerate --not actually like, but just about livable with unlike the fonts that X tries to pawn off on you-- then you export your X setup to a different environment and you can't find anything remotely resembling the font you had before. I cannot make head nor tail of the X font naming scheme, it's just insane.
The chapter in the Unix Haters Handbook on X was just too close to the bone for me to find funny. X as a user interface is foul, and the more abstraction layers there are between me and it the better IMO. Not recognising Xresources is a plus for Gtk in my book.
Despite Linus working for Transmeta, and all of the efforts going into new embedded apps, the focus of the Linux development ffort is still the server: am I right?
I don't think that your proposal would preserve anonymity. It is quite possible to infer who someone is from apparently anonymous information.
For example, a point made a while back on the PRIVACY mailing list is that date of birth and ZIP code uniquely identifies a high proportion of US residents.
The idea attacked by (most) linguists is that some natural languages are in principal incapable of expressing ideas that are commonplace in other languages. The weaker idea that it is easier to say certain things in one language than in other languages is not at all controversial, and it is this second idea that Tim makes use of in his article.
He is not implying any such thing. The story is the flames, because it is the flames that are most upsetting. Also in other stories (eg. his one on his experiences setting up Linux), he acknowledged non-flame criticisms of him as not being a qualified representative of the geek community.
What I don't like about what you said in your previous post is your assumption of the mantle of `protector of slashdot culture'. I don't think there is or should be such a thing as the true orthodox slashdot culture.
Slashdot Mirror
I had a look at Hansard and found the relevant section. It's available at:
Hansard: Regulation of investigatory Powers Bill
It clearly states that it is not `reasonably practicable' for the
investigated party to provide the key or plaintext, then that is a
defence. Section 47 is about providing information in lieu of a key,
which says nothing about verifying that the decrypted information
matches the ciphertext.
TCP already includes `niceness' tests checking that TCP flows backoff
correctly rather than flooding the network, at the pain of being
blacklisted. Could similar traffic analysis tools stop DDoS? How
might this work, or if not, why not?
What privision of the Convention is it in breach of?
can't define the session key to be plaintext, since it is not part of
the input the user provides the encryption program: most users of PGP
aren't even aware of its existence.
It is odd; the law has a suicide clause: I am always
entitled to a empirically untestable defence, when asked to provide
information about an encrypted message!
circuit, but it was just gate logic. It was Intel who first
assembled all of the components of the processing unit onto one chip.
Did TI do something that I am not aware of?
The article makes some worrying claims about the Intel business model:
dependent on high margins, unable to reduce costs, long time to
market, losing its best engineers. These suggest that Intel can't
just mark up its recent troubles to experience and get back to old
form. One way or another it does look as if Intel shareholders are
not going to be happy.
I don't know so much that people have fallen in love with the Crusoe,
so much as that Transmeta have beaten Intel to producing a usable VLIW
chip. Maybe the article is right, maybe VLIW is a false path, but if
not Transmeta looks like a dangerous competitor to Intel.
No the encrypted data is evidence. Refusing to decrypt it is like refusing a properly authorised search of your premises.
How is this meant to work? Presumably the police are smart enough to keep multiple copies of the cypher text...
prosecutors knowthe public key, then obviously they can check the
message.
This is probably the kind of case the police are most concerned
about: criminals using cryptography to communicate, and not be
understood by the police. The other kind of case would use symmetric
key cryptology: eg. the accounting details of a fraud are held locally
on a hard drive, and here it wouldn't be able to verify the plain text
matches the cypher text.
Now take my case. They hang me up here five years ago. Every night
they take me down for twenty minutes, then they hang me up
again. Which I guard as very fair, in view of what I've done. And if
nothing else, it's taught me to respect the Romans, and it's
taught me that you'll never get anywhere in this life, unless you
are prepared to do a fair day's work for a fair day's...
First question should be What criteria guide ... not guides.
What criteria guides you in your choice of subjects for the articles
you write here on Slashdot? Which political and cultural views do you
find sympathetic on Slashdot, and which, if any, do you have problems
with?
Interesting article. Personally I don't think Linux is `there' yet
for office apps, but it is at least a viable option. Some thoughts:
Latex: if you need to write up scientific equations, then Latex is
indispensible. If not, avoid it, because it is a user-unfriendly
nightmare. Scientific users use in becuase there is no alternative,
not because it is pleasant to use. Now that MathML is coming, maybe
we won't have to use LaTeX for much longer.
PowerPoint: About the non-linear presentations: nice thought, but
I have to disagree. Telling a story is a linear thing, and giving a
presentation should be like telling a story. If you want to jump
around all the time, then it sounds more like brain-storning than
presentation to me, in which case I don't think there is a good
electronic rival to the flipchart yet. This is one area I think MS
has a decisive advantage over anything on the Linux desktop.
Excel: it is the de facto standard, but it is also a buggy dog.
I haven't seen the Office 2k rivals, but I think the free software
rivals have a chance of displacing it.
The software falls foul of the DeCSS if it fails any of the clauses. So OS automatically passes section C, but if it fails either of the other sections, then it is illegal.
No. The judges interpretation is that defeating the encryption mechanism is illegal even if the intent is not piracy. Given the wording of the law, I don't think he could come to any other conclusion.
protected form of expression. His argument is that the constitution
defends copyright on the grounds that copyright is needed to provide
economic incentives to promote free speech, and so there is a
constitutional basis for limiting certain forms of free speech when
they conflict with issues of copyright.
I think the argument is weak, but the judge is most certainly not
ruling that code does not enjoy the First Amendment protections.
There is an explicit reverse engineering provision, but it only protects attempts to make program code usable. The judges injunction ruling discusses this very clearly.
Second, even if DeCSS were intended and usable solely to permit the
playing, and not the copying, of DVDs on Linux machines, the
playing without a licensed CSS "player key'' would "circumvent a
technological measure'' that effectively controls access to a
copyrighted work and violate the statute in any case.
Well, it looks to me as if his interpretation of the law is right, and my earlier post is wrong, so I retract it.
hack was motivated by the intent to duplicate work, which by the DMCA
is bound to be a violation.
So it looks quite possible that this case would be lost. *But* it
would be quite possible to do a *new* hack, a Nu-DeCSS whose intent is
solely intended to play CSS discs on a linux box, and whose authors
refuse to cooperate with anyone they know to be promoting the
technology for the purposes of duplication. Since the intent is
different, the law is different.
The clause of the DMCA cited in the judges injunction provides the
following intent test:
"(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of
circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls
access to a work protected under [the Copyright Act];
"(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other
than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively
controls access to a work protected under [the Copyright Act];
or "(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with
that person with that person's knowledge for use in circumventing a
technological measure that effectively controls access to a work
protected under [the Copyright Act]."
Clearly such a modified Nu-DeCSS would fail all three clauses and so
be legal.
applications? You finally find a font that you can tolerate --not
actually like, but just about livable with unlike the fonts that X
tries to pawn off on you-- then you export your X setup to a different
environment and you can't find anything remotely resembling the font
you had before. I cannot make head nor tail of the X font naming
scheme, it's just insane.
The chapter in the Unix Haters Handbook on X was just too close to
the bone for me to find funny. X as a user interface is foul, and the
more abstraction layers there are between me and it the better IMO.
Not recognising Xresources is a plus for Gtk in my book.
Despite Linus working for Transmeta, and all of the efforts going into
new embedded apps, the focus of the Linux development ffort is still
the server: am I right?
I don't think that your proposal would preserve anonymity. It is quite
possible to infer who someone is from apparently anonymous
information.
For example, a point made a while back on the PRIVACY mailing list is
that date of birth and ZIP code uniquely identifies a high proportion of US residents.
The idea attacked by (most) linguists is that some natural languages
are in principal incapable of expressing ideas that are commonplace in
other languages. The weaker idea that it is easier to say certain
things in one language than in other languages is not at all
controversial, and it is this second idea that Tim makes use of in
his article.
it is the flames that are most upsetting. Also in other stories
(eg. his one on his experiences setting up Linux), he acknowledged
non-flame criticisms of him as not being a qualified representative of
the geek community.
What I don't like about what you said in your previous post is your
assumption of the mantle of `protector of slashdot culture'. I don't
think there is or should be such a thing as the true orthodox slashdot
culture.