after the legendary HBO Satellite hack that resulted in the words "HBO Sucks" displayed across North America.
Hacking uplink content on a video distribution satellite is NOT hacking the satellite control system. Not even close.
There was a story a few years ago about people "hacking" a military satellite system because they found out that it was acting like an open repeater. That, too, is not hacking the satellite control system.
This summary is crap, the claims are ridiculous, and/. should never have repeated this nonsense. News for nerds, indeed. Hysteria for morons, more like it. "Oh, those awful hackers could drop an HBO satellite weighing MANY TONS and going FASTER THAN SOUND onto my head! I better put a second layer of tinfoil on my hat..."
I don't see a surplus in places like Nevada or Amsterdam, so yes, I assume that this would not change.
Unfortunately for you, the evidence is on my side. Try looking at a country where it's legal, eg. most of Europe.
Why yes, I see scads of beautiful women just lining up to become sex partners with the kind of men who need to pay for sex, because it is such a wonderful, safe, and desirable profession. I remember walking down the street in Amsterdam to see what could be seen, and I remember wanting to flush my eyes with bleach after doing that.
While the supply might be amazing in such places, the demand isn't for what the supply can do, and the costs of being legal are still lost profit to those who act extra-legally. Legalizing prostitution is not the answer to sex trafficking and unwilling participants, any more than legalizing booze was the solution for moonshining and bootlegging.
Good job of ignoring the important points and picking out the BTW aside. It's still SESTA that talks about websites, so when you single out websites you are talking about SESTA. FOSTA deals with all online services.
It doesn't matter, the other points I made still stand. You trust lawyers paid to have the opinion you like instead of reading the law for yourself. Why do we even have a criminal justice system if we should just trust the word of the defense lawyer that his client is not guilty? Why would he lie? Why would you expect an EFF or ACLU lawyer to say anything other than the sky is falling because of SESTA or FOSTA?
This is just an opportunity for the international community to profit at America's expense by scooping up all this business
It's pretty hard for someone to "scoop up" all the money from running a prostitution or sex trafficking operation without some physical presence in the country where the operation takes place. I'm not sure how much profit you can make by advertising German hookers in the US, or why you see an issue with prosecuting the sex traffickers who are in the US just because their bosses are in Argentina.
The answer to trafficking is to legalize all forms of prostitution. If there's plenty of consenting supply then there's less profit in supplying it illegally
You assume there would be "plenty of consenting supply". And you assume that the regulation of the industry would not impose costs that illicit providers would avoid, just like those who smuggle and illegally distribute alcohol, cigarettes, and pot already do.
Where there is profit, there is a profit motive. No, I'm sorry, but the answer to trafficking is to keep it illegal and prosecute those who profit and promote it.
Read. The. Law. It's online. The Verge is not a definitive source.
The bill would make websites criminally liable for hosting ads and other content linked to a sex-trafficking enterprise.
Websites, and WITH THE INTENT OF PROMOTING OR FOSTERING. Cloudflare is not a website, they are a web hosting service. They don't have the intent. By the way, if you read the law, it is SESTA that talks about websites.
Well, the EFF and ACLU have staff lawyers.
The EFF and ACLU are hardly unbiased sources. Lawyers will say what you pay them to say. Do you really think that every lawyer who argues that his client is not guilty actually believes his client is not guilty? Do you think a lawyer paid by EFF will say "there's nothing to see here, move along"? My goodness, lawyer's opinions are even more purchasable than scientists', and "everyone knows" that scientists who are paid by energy companies are bought and paid for. Why do we assume lawyers are less flexible?
And being fractal makes the initial question of "how long" meaningless. To what resolution? If you look at the molecular level, it is nearly infinite. If you look at the sand grain level, less so. If you look at one foot intervals, even less so.
That of course leaves the question of how you define the coastline. It's not just bays and similar features that create issues, but AT WHAT TIDE LEVEL? Do you define the "coast" as being at the mean high high water (MHHW), mean sea level (MSL), high water line, or where? Do you count both sides of the Outer Banks in North Carolina, both sides and the inner edge of the sounds behind them, or just the outer edge?
The question is also meaningless because it changes nothing. Nothing changes if you say that the US coast is 1,000,000km or 200,000km or 1km. If you're estimating how much it will cost to install coastal protection you will measure how long the protection measure is, not how long the coast is behind it.
You know showing a lot of leg isn't porn, right? It's one of the ways escort websites advertise, though. Then again, so is porn.
You know that "escort service" is not "prostitution", right? It is a cover name that some pimps use, but just "escort service" is not illegal. A webhosting service that is approached to sell services to "Fred's Escort Service" is not knowingly and intentionally selling service to a site offering illegal prostitution services. FOSTA is not violated if they do sell.
Now, if Fred tells the hosting service that he'll pay them with hookers and blow, THEN you can infer intent and prior knowledge, but if it's just cash, check, or credit card you cannot.
Yes, of course. The title of the article here is about FOSTA, the analogy that was presented was about FOSTA, and you refer to FOSTA after you try to present your corrected version of that analogy. Why would I assume you were NOT talking about FOSTA? Just what is your analogy "more like" if not FOSTA?
Ah, that logic works fine for a gun,... It falls apart when referring to a service rendered wholly on your premises, such as the services offered by Cloudflare because, ostensibly, you should know what is being done on your premises.
That is your assumption, but it does not appear in the law. You must be providing the service WITH THE INTENT, which means before-the-fact knowledge. There is no assumption in the law that any webhosting service knows what traffic is on those websites. The computers may be "on your premises" but that doesn't mean you are required to look inside the computers to see what the data on them is. Here's a more direct analogy: if I rent a storage room at a ubiquitous storage facility, the owner is not responsible for searching that room every few days to make sure I am not doing something illegal with it. DHS could show up at my room with geiger counters screaming away about the stolen radioactive plutonium pu235 space modulator I'm storing inside, but the owner is not responsible for either it being there or not reporting it.
Once it's been used for illegal purposes, you can no longer claim you didn't know;
Of course you can. All it takes is... not knowing!
Before FOSTA, Cloudflare had the option of simply not looking at what their services were being used for
That's true. And it is also true that AFTER FOSTA they have the option of simply not looking. FOSTA creates no "looking" requirement. FOSTA requires INTENT, and observing a violation of law AFTER you sell something does not create INTENT to sell it for that purpose.
until and unless someone reported illegal activity to them and they failed to act on that report
At THAT POINT, and only at that point, do they incur a responsibility to act. This is a violation of their TOS already, so it is not like FOSTA creates any new responsibility on their part. As well, knowledge of that breach of the law already creates a responsibility to report it. It does NOT create INTENT to sell the service, however, because that has to occur BEFORE THE SALE.
Now, with FOSTA, they must look;
You are wrong. Cite the specific language of the law that creates this responsibility. Don't forget to include the words "with the intent to" in your citation, because that is an overriding requirement.
I thought you were agreeing with the law because you said you could agree with what the law actually says. You misunderstand the law so you don't believe you do.
Unless Cloudflare sells the service WITH THE INTENT of promoting illegal prostitution it is not a target of the law. Finding out after the fact does not create that requisite intent no matter how much you want it to.
I didn't misunderstand, I simply told you that your first sentence was wrong. It is NOT "more like" finding out after the fact that the customer was doing something illegal, it requires knowing BEFORE THE FACT that the intended use is illegal and selling the service WITH THE INTENT of promoting that illegal act.
Additionally, the following statement you made:
except that FOSTA actually puts that liability on Cloudflare even though they have no way of knowing what someone will use their service for
is also wrong, for the same reason. If you have no way of knowing what someone will use the service for, then you cannot have the requisite intent of selling it to them for the promotion of that illegal activity.
I think my comment that you apparently agree with the laws shows I understood that you agreed with the laws.
What we need is responsibility on the individual breaking a law, not the carrier of the information.
These are not completely isolated activities. What if the "information" is the act that breaks the law? "Promoting prostitution" is against the law in many places; "sex trafficking" in many more. If the information is with the intent of promotion then it is already against the law. For example, I cannot legally stand on the street corner and tell people who pull up that they can "pull around the corner to get a bj for $20 from Julie". Conveying that information is, itself, a crime. And if Julie herself stands on the corner and tells someone she'll perform certain acts for $20, conveying THAT information is also against the law.
The new law says that it wasn't the intent of an old law to allow those who are deliberately promoting illegal activities to get off. "With the intent" is a critical part of that law.
You wouldn't blame the post office because someone used their service to ship a package with illegal drugs in it.
If the USPS deliberately advertised themselves as a service to ship illegal drugs, yes, I would. If the USPS found a package of illegal drugs passing through their facility and did not report it to the appropriate authorities, yes, I would. If the USPS offered a service for incoming mail to bypass US Customs with the intent of importing illegal drugs, yes, I would.
Note the common thread to that. The INTENT.
the hosting providers, need to be allowed to do their job which is carrying the data of the user, without being responsible for that users message.
They can still do that, as long as they are not a willing and intentional part of conveying a message that is illegal.
The thing with FOSTA is that it makes Cloudflare and similar companies liable if they *don't* investigate their clients.
No, it does not.
FOSTA goes way past this, and says that Cloudflare is criminally liable for content they end up caching, period.
No, it does not. Have you read the bill? Not just the hype about it or carefully selected excerpts, but all the words? If you did, then you missed the word "intent".
This is basically a way to have some leverage over all of these network/content providers to ensure that the government can get what they want from them whenever they ask.
You do realize, I hope, that there are all kinds of laws that a government can use against anyone they choose if all they want is leverage over them. The IRS is a pretty good tool for that, and has been used before. They don't need FOSTA or SESTA. And such a poor tool it would be. IRS: "Send us copies of all your tax related documentation for the last ten years and prove every deduction or business expense", or even just "we dissallow these deductions, send us a check for the back taxes plus penalty plus interest in the amount of..."
Actually, it's more like selling someone a gun, then learning after the fact that they intend to use it to rob a bank, with the slight difference that, in this case, Cloudflare can take the gun back.
Actually you are wrong. The law requires INTENT to do the act, which means BEFORE it happens. It's not finding out afterwards that something bad happened, it's going into the deal explicitly to promote that act.
Unless Cloudflare is selling ISP services with the intent of promoting prostitution and sales of sex services with sex trafficking victims, they aren't a target of the law.
Now, if you want to say Cloudflare should be liable for illegal activities they're aware of, facilitated by their services, and don't take action to stop, we can probably agree on that.
Then you must agree with FOSTA and SESTA, because the intent requirement is exactly what that means.
3rd party systems in an hospital with old oses that don't get updated is the real issue.
If they don't have a way to hack into them, then adding an update mechanism for security patches creates a mechanism to hack into them. If you can install a patch to stop hackers via a USB stick or WiFi, for example, then hackers could install something else using a new exploit in the update system. The age of the OS doesn't matter if nothing from outside can change it.
I have a glucose meter. It has a connection to dump data to a computer. That connection is probably bi-directional since the computer can ask for the dump. That's a pathway for hacking. If the meter did not have that connection then there is no fear of it being hacked. Well, someone could steal it and pry it open to use JTAG to reprogram it, I suppose, but then I'd miss it and simply get a new one. And JTAG would be the "method to update" that I mentioned. Use a micro with a non-resettable fuse on the program and it won't be hacked. It would also not need critical security patches to keep people from hacking it.
Pacemakers are not just a set electric shock on a set interval timer.
I know what pacemakers do.
If the software making that decision is found to have a bug, then yes there's a good reason to issue a critical software patch that's not just to prevent hacking.
That is not a critical security update. It is a flaw that should have been caught before approval.
You want to avoid surgery if at all possible so it makes a lot of sense to be able to make updates.
You do realize that there are systems already designed that have external wired connections, which would require physical access to the device to hack into? Maybe not. Not every medical device needs wireless, and thus at-a-distance, access.
The pacemaker also makes for a very good data logger to monitor both the device and the patient's condition. The doctors can download valuable information from such a device to inform their choice of ongoing treatment.
As I already said, OUTPUT of data does not require an external interface for INPUT to the device. It could be as simple as a reed switch that a magnet triggers to dump data via RF.
For those who are extremely paranoid perhaps you could make the communication method something that can't be hacked remotely.
You mean like wires? Hold on, I'm gonna go patent that idea. I'll make a killing. Oh wait, prior art. Damn. And electromagnetic coupling, the same. Maybe if I say "on a computer" I'll get a patent I can troll big pharma with?
vacation was 100% non-negotiable but willingly gave up $10k in salary to make up for the vacation they wouldn't provide even though the time off would have cost them 5x less.
Accounting can force that. Vacation time can occur long after a project that pays for the employee ends, but ongoing salary always comes from the current project.
I have more than 30 days of vacation accrued on the books (and before the current limit was enacted, I had almost 60.) I get paid from the current project money for any vacation I take, even if I accrued vacation a year ago on a long-expired one. It's hard to explain to a funding agency why the person who is funded by their grant isn't actually there doing anything.
Unless there's a damn good reason, I don't know why you would want to introduce security holes in a device that is keeping you alive.
The only reason you would need a "critical security patch" is if there were some way of hacking into the device remotely. For most devices the only way people could hack into them remotely is through the new external connection that allows critical security updates.
You create a solution for a problem created by the solution. My head hurts.
I suppose it's convenient to have your pacemaker app on your phone giving you live updates about how well it's working so you can post it to Facebook or something. But not if it means that anyone within range can turn the thing off, or cause it to malfunction.
Sending data TO an external monitor does not require receiving data FROM an external device. I have a half a dozen wireless weather sensors around my house that don't receive a single bit of data via radio, but they repeatedly send data out. Your pacemaker could do the same kind of thing.
Uhhh, so you put a blood in jail and he stops being a blood? What?
Yes, I will agree there is some potential for gang recruitment of previously unaffiliated people, but that's still not because of mistreatment -- except for mistreatment of unaffiliated inmates by the existing gangs. People join gangs for power over others. Strength in Numbers. Not because jailhouse food sucks.
although you can continue to claim that consuming alcohol in high quantities over sufficiently short time spans doesn't cause drunkenness if you like.
I have no idea where you got this from, so I know you are not understanding what I actually did write.
It's not about diplomas or lack of diplomas. It's about jobs, stupid.
No, moron. My comment was specifically about graduation. Here, I'll quote it for you:
Disparity is only a derogatory concept when one's success comes at the expense of another's failure. Getting a high school diploma or good grades does not force other people to get poor grades or miss out on a diploma. Schools are happy if everyone graduates; they'll print as many diplomas as it takes to give one to everyone who deserves one. It's not a zero-sum game.
The example of when disparity is not bad ("sometimes") is in getting a diploma. That's called "graduation" in English.
I said nothing about disparity in jobs. You're response to that comment was, and I'll quote it for you:
Yes it is. Everything is.
Then you started some rant about other things as if that proved that everything is a zero-sum game. The existence of one zero-sum game does not prove that everything is a zero-sum game. I never said there were no zero-sum games in life, I just gave one clear example of when one of the games is not.
If everyone has a high school diploma due to no child left behind,
That's not the only way people get diplomas, and you're trying to use one example of a method of improving graduation rates as proof that all means of improving graduation create bad disparity. That's absurd. You're being absurd because you deliberately avoided responding to what I actually wrote and started of on your own tangent.
In it's correct form, "no child left behind" is a reasonable concept. "Behind" doesn't mean "diploma", it means education. If 90% of the class gets a diploma due to "no child left behind" creating an environment where students who don't learn well in the existing system get the help they need to master the material, that's good. It does NOT mean that another other group doesn't get their diplomas -- the school will, as I said multiple times already, simply print more of them.
This is NOT a zero-sum game.
Since you seem to be arguing that "no child left behind" is somehow bad for society, fine. I can counter that argument, too. It's bad because it creates too many educated people for better paying jobs. "... then you've got more competition." Not enough better paying jobs for everyone then, and it creates an upward spiral. Ok. The obvious solution to that is we DO leave children behind deliberately. If it takes a different method of education for you to learn basic math or science or whatever, too bad, because the current system is producing enough employees. If we teach you the same material in a different way so you can graduate you will be "more competition" for those who are smarter than you. This is bad. Yes, let's make it absolutely clear that the schools are nothing but vocational training centers for a limited number of jobs, and not the general education of the next generation of adults.
Is that really what you want to argue?
Eventually society pays the price as we realize that churning out degrees for the sake of churning out degrees
That is not what I was talking about. I said nothing about "degrees for the sake of degrees".
Go rant at someone else.
Let's apply this reasoning to Nicholas Cruz: Hey! If it's illegal to kill people with guns, then guns should be impossible to get, illegal to use or taken away, and everyone should prevent guns from being usable!
You've just described the anti-gun zealot's argument in one sentence.
Just don't say anything when you answer a call from an unknown number.
In other words, let the scammers win because you've wasted your time answering their call in the first place.
The solution is to put an answering machine on the line. If there is no message, the call wasn't important enough to worry about anyway. If you are home and hear someone leaving a message, answer the phone and tell them you picked up just because it was them. That will make them feel special.
For the few stupid scammers that leave messages, yes, your time listening to the message is wasted. Better than having to run to the phone every time it rings to pick it up and say nothing.
Prisons that create insecurity and fail to treat people with basic human dignity fill with gangs and violence,
Gang members are gang members before they go in. Putting gang members in jail is what fills jails with gangs, not how well or poorly you treat the gang members while they are there.
Also, gang activities have little to do with how well people are treated, they are an attempt to gain power over others. Put 10 bloods into a jail housing unit and they will act in concert to have power over the other inmates, no matter how well they are treated. They won't stop being bloods just because they get extra servings of apple pie with dinner and everyone calls everyone else 'sir'. In fact, they'll probably be motivated to take YOUR piece of pie just because you have it.
Put 10 bloods and 10 crips in the pod and then you'll regularly have 20 people ganging up on the rest, with occasional eruptions of 10 on 10 when one group offends the other.
Prisons such as we see in many areas of the United States are cruel and unusual punishment.
This is not because gangs exist, it is because administrations are slow or incapable of reacting to gang presence. They do not monitor the population well, and many of the guards don't care or they think it is part of the punishment. (Who cares if a pedo in prison is gang raped? He deserves it, doesn't he?) If one prisoner beating up another received swift and harsh punishment based on guards observing the action there would be less of it. Not completely eliminated, because power requires demonstration of control, and the reward of power can supersede the cost of punishment. AKA "don't mess with Ox, he'll beat your ass every time he gets back from solitary..."
This system is great if your house is wired the right way. You need to have one wire into the house that the Obi plugs into and then all your other phones plug into the Obi.
My house ain't wired that way. One wire sneaks out to the demarc and then it's all parallel wiring inside the walls to all the other phone outlets. I would have to run another wire out to the demarc to put the Obi in series with the incoming line, and then connect to the rest of the inside wiring. Not impossible, but not something I'd like to do.
Scammers can't afford to have a live person listen to every call.
They wouldn't need to. All they need is the software that already exists -- voice recognition. The same voice recognition that already listens for "hello" from you and detects when it is hearing an answering machine. The same voice recognition that listens for your answers when it is an automated spam call. Program it to listen for "press N" and then it sends "N".
No. Graduating from high school is not a zero-sum game. There isn't a limited number of diplomas to hand out, and only the first 100 get one. Everyone who qualifies gets one. The school will print as many as it needs. A program that results in a 10% increase in graduation for some group does not mean that another group loses 10% because there wasn't enough "graduation" to go around.
The same applies to colleges. There may be limits on how many students can be enrolled, but if 90% of the class graduates instead of 50%, the college will just print more diplomas to hand out. And many colleges would be tickled pink to have a 10% increase in enrollment, so even class size is not a hard limit.
the wisdom of crowds plays a role.
No, not everyone is a programmer. But everyone can benefit from the work of programmers.
"Code audits" are not "wisdom of crowds". Code audits are performed by very few people, and while you may subscribe to the notices that report such results, the vast majority of people do not. The "crowd" has no wisdom about security issues; it's select people who spend the time looking for them and a slightly larger group that cares enough to read the reports.
Whether that information makes it to the public as a whole in large part depends on the apparent nuttiness of the reporter. Act like chicken little, talk about laws prohibiting things like Facebook, and people will tune you out. When you use the phrase "police state" referring to Facebook, people will run from you. Add in a demand that such companies not be allowed to exist and you've completely lost them. Not "mystified" lost, but lost their interest and their attention.
but it's not as easy to determine what data Facebook or Google are collecting as it would be with a FOSS piece of software.
Facebook could be completely open software like the Apache web server is and you'd never know what data Facebook is collecting. I can configure Apache to keep all kinds of stuff on every visitor to my websites but you'll never know what my logging looks like based on a code audit of the Apache source.
Slashdot Mirror
after the legendary HBO Satellite hack that resulted in the words "HBO Sucks" displayed across North America.
Hacking uplink content on a video distribution satellite is NOT hacking the satellite control system. Not even close.
There was a story a few years ago about people "hacking" a military satellite system because they found out that it was acting like an open repeater. That, too, is not hacking the satellite control system.
This summary is crap, the claims are ridiculous, and /. should never have repeated this nonsense. News for nerds, indeed. Hysteria for morons, more like it. "Oh, those awful hackers could drop an HBO satellite weighing MANY TONS and going FASTER THAN SOUND onto my head! I better put a second layer of tinfoil on my hat..."
And you assume that there won't be.
I don't see a surplus in places like Nevada or Amsterdam, so yes, I assume that this would not change.
Unfortunately for you, the evidence is on my side. Try looking at a country where it's legal, eg. most of Europe.
Why yes, I see scads of beautiful women just lining up to become sex partners with the kind of men who need to pay for sex, because it is such a wonderful, safe, and desirable profession. I remember walking down the street in Amsterdam to see what could be seen, and I remember wanting to flush my eyes with bleach after doing that.
While the supply might be amazing in such places, the demand isn't for what the supply can do, and the costs of being legal are still lost profit to those who act extra-legally. Legalizing prostitution is not the answer to sex trafficking and unwilling participants, any more than legalizing booze was the solution for moonshining and bootlegging.
It doesn't matter, the other points I made still stand. You trust lawyers paid to have the opinion you like instead of reading the law for yourself. Why do we even have a criminal justice system if we should just trust the word of the defense lawyer that his client is not guilty? Why would he lie? Why would you expect an EFF or ACLU lawyer to say anything other than the sky is falling because of SESTA or FOSTA?
This is just an opportunity for the international community to profit at America's expense by scooping up all this business
It's pretty hard for someone to "scoop up" all the money from running a prostitution or sex trafficking operation without some physical presence in the country where the operation takes place. I'm not sure how much profit you can make by advertising German hookers in the US, or why you see an issue with prosecuting the sex traffickers who are in the US just because their bosses are in Argentina.
The answer to trafficking is to legalize all forms of prostitution. If there's plenty of consenting supply then there's less profit in supplying it illegally
You assume there would be "plenty of consenting supply". And you assume that the regulation of the industry would not impose costs that illicit providers would avoid, just like those who smuggle and illegally distribute alcohol, cigarettes, and pot already do.
Where there is profit, there is a profit motive. No, I'm sorry, but the answer to trafficking is to keep it illegal and prosecute those who profit and promote it.
Oh?
Read. The. Law. It's online. The Verge is not a definitive source.
The bill would make websites criminally liable for hosting ads and other content linked to a sex-trafficking enterprise.
Websites, and WITH THE INTENT OF PROMOTING OR FOSTERING. Cloudflare is not a website, they are a web hosting service. They don't have the intent. By the way, if you read the law, it is SESTA that talks about websites.
Well, the EFF and ACLU have staff lawyers.
The EFF and ACLU are hardly unbiased sources. Lawyers will say what you pay them to say. Do you really think that every lawyer who argues that his client is not guilty actually believes his client is not guilty? Do you think a lawyer paid by EFF will say "there's nothing to see here, move along"? My goodness, lawyer's opinions are even more purchasable than scientists', and "everyone knows" that scientists who are paid by energy companies are bought and paid for. Why do we assume lawyers are less flexible?
Coastlines are fractal and have 1.4 dimensions.
And being fractal makes the initial question of "how long" meaningless. To what resolution? If you look at the molecular level, it is nearly infinite. If you look at the sand grain level, less so. If you look at one foot intervals, even less so.
That of course leaves the question of how you define the coastline. It's not just bays and similar features that create issues, but AT WHAT TIDE LEVEL? Do you define the "coast" as being at the mean high high water (MHHW), mean sea level (MSL), high water line, or where? Do you count both sides of the Outer Banks in North Carolina, both sides and the inner edge of the sounds behind them, or just the outer edge?
The question is also meaningless because it changes nothing. Nothing changes if you say that the US coast is 1,000,000km or 200,000km or 1km. If you're estimating how much it will cost to install coastal protection you will measure how long the protection measure is, not how long the coast is behind it.
So, must be a slow news day at /.
You know showing a lot of leg isn't porn, right? It's one of the ways escort websites advertise, though. Then again, so is porn.
You know that "escort service" is not "prostitution", right? It is a cover name that some pimps use, but just "escort service" is not illegal. A webhosting service that is approached to sell services to "Fred's Escort Service" is not knowingly and intentionally selling service to a site offering illegal prostitution services. FOSTA is not violated if they do sell.
Now, if Fred tells the hosting service that he'll pay them with hookers and blow, THEN you can infer intent and prior knowledge, but if it's just cash, check, or credit card you cannot.
Ah, I see, you think I was talking about FOSTA,
Yes, of course. The title of the article here is about FOSTA, the analogy that was presented was about FOSTA, and you refer to FOSTA after you try to present your corrected version of that analogy. Why would I assume you were NOT talking about FOSTA? Just what is your analogy "more like" if not FOSTA?
Ah, that logic works fine for a gun, ... It falls apart when referring to a service rendered wholly on your premises, such as the services offered by Cloudflare because, ostensibly, you should know what is being done on your premises.
That is your assumption, but it does not appear in the law. You must be providing the service WITH THE INTENT, which means before-the-fact knowledge. There is no assumption in the law that any webhosting service knows what traffic is on those websites. The computers may be "on your premises" but that doesn't mean you are required to look inside the computers to see what the data on them is. Here's a more direct analogy: if I rent a storage room at a ubiquitous storage facility, the owner is not responsible for searching that room every few days to make sure I am not doing something illegal with it. DHS could show up at my room with geiger counters screaming away about the stolen radioactive plutonium pu235 space modulator I'm storing inside, but the owner is not responsible for either it being there or not reporting it.
Once it's been used for illegal purposes, you can no longer claim you didn't know;
Of course you can. All it takes is ... not knowing!
Before FOSTA, Cloudflare had the option of simply not looking at what their services were being used for
That's true. And it is also true that AFTER FOSTA they have the option of simply not looking. FOSTA creates no "looking" requirement. FOSTA requires INTENT, and observing a violation of law AFTER you sell something does not create INTENT to sell it for that purpose.
until and unless someone reported illegal activity to them and they failed to act on that report
At THAT POINT, and only at that point, do they incur a responsibility to act. This is a violation of their TOS already, so it is not like FOSTA creates any new responsibility on their part. As well, knowledge of that breach of the law already creates a responsibility to report it. It does NOT create INTENT to sell the service, however, because that has to occur BEFORE THE SALE.
Now, with FOSTA, they must look;
You are wrong. Cite the specific language of the law that creates this responsibility. Don't forget to include the words "with the intent to" in your citation, because that is an overriding requirement.
I thought you were agreeing with the law because you said you could agree with what the law actually says. You misunderstand the law so you don't believe you do. Unless Cloudflare sells the service WITH THE INTENT of promoting illegal prostitution it is not a target of the law. Finding out after the fact does not create that requisite intent no matter how much you want it to.
Additionally, the following statement you made:
except that FOSTA actually puts that liability on Cloudflare even though they have no way of knowing what someone will use their service for
is also wrong, for the same reason. If you have no way of knowing what someone will use the service for, then you cannot have the requisite intent of selling it to them for the promotion of that illegal activity.
I think my comment that you apparently agree with the laws shows I understood that you agreed with the laws.
What we need is responsibility on the individual breaking a law, not the carrier of the information.
These are not completely isolated activities. What if the "information" is the act that breaks the law? "Promoting prostitution" is against the law in many places; "sex trafficking" in many more. If the information is with the intent of promotion then it is already against the law. For example, I cannot legally stand on the street corner and tell people who pull up that they can "pull around the corner to get a bj for $20 from Julie". Conveying that information is, itself, a crime. And if Julie herself stands on the corner and tells someone she'll perform certain acts for $20, conveying THAT information is also against the law.
The new law says that it wasn't the intent of an old law to allow those who are deliberately promoting illegal activities to get off. "With the intent" is a critical part of that law.
You wouldn't blame the post office because someone used their service to ship a package with illegal drugs in it.
If the USPS deliberately advertised themselves as a service to ship illegal drugs, yes, I would. If the USPS found a package of illegal drugs passing through their facility and did not report it to the appropriate authorities, yes, I would. If the USPS offered a service for incoming mail to bypass US Customs with the intent of importing illegal drugs, yes, I would.
Note the common thread to that. The INTENT.
the hosting providers, need to be allowed to do their job which is carrying the data of the user, without being responsible for that users message.
They can still do that, as long as they are not a willing and intentional part of conveying a message that is illegal.
The thing with FOSTA is that it makes Cloudflare and similar companies liable if they *don't* investigate their clients.
No, it does not.
FOSTA goes way past this, and says that Cloudflare is criminally liable for content they end up caching, period.
No, it does not. Have you read the bill? Not just the hype about it or carefully selected excerpts, but all the words? If you did, then you missed the word "intent".
This is basically a way to have some leverage over all of these network/content providers to ensure that the government can get what they want from them whenever they ask.
You do realize, I hope, that there are all kinds of laws that a government can use against anyone they choose if all they want is leverage over them. The IRS is a pretty good tool for that, and has been used before. They don't need FOSTA or SESTA. And such a poor tool it would be. IRS: "Send us copies of all your tax related documentation for the last ten years and prove every deduction or business expense", or even just "we dissallow these deductions, send us a check for the back taxes plus penalty plus interest in the amount of ..."
It's not going to take long for the CIA
'nuff said.
Actually, it's more like selling someone a gun, then learning after the fact that they intend to use it to rob a bank, with the slight difference that, in this case, Cloudflare can take the gun back.
Actually you are wrong. The law requires INTENT to do the act, which means BEFORE it happens. It's not finding out afterwards that something bad happened, it's going into the deal explicitly to promote that act.
Unless Cloudflare is selling ISP services with the intent of promoting prostitution and sales of sex services with sex trafficking victims, they aren't a target of the law.
Now, if you want to say Cloudflare should be liable for illegal activities they're aware of, facilitated by their services, and don't take action to stop, we can probably agree on that.
Then you must agree with FOSTA and SESTA, because the intent requirement is exactly what that means.
3rd party systems in an hospital with old oses that don't get updated is the real issue.
If they don't have a way to hack into them, then adding an update mechanism for security patches creates a mechanism to hack into them. If you can install a patch to stop hackers via a USB stick or WiFi, for example, then hackers could install something else using a new exploit in the update system. The age of the OS doesn't matter if nothing from outside can change it.
I have a glucose meter. It has a connection to dump data to a computer. That connection is probably bi-directional since the computer can ask for the dump. That's a pathway for hacking. If the meter did not have that connection then there is no fear of it being hacked. Well, someone could steal it and pry it open to use JTAG to reprogram it, I suppose, but then I'd miss it and simply get a new one. And JTAG would be the "method to update" that I mentioned. Use a micro with a non-resettable fuse on the program and it won't be hacked. It would also not need critical security patches to keep people from hacking it.
Pacemakers are not just a set electric shock on a set interval timer.
I know what pacemakers do.
If the software making that decision is found to have a bug, then yes there's a good reason to issue a critical software patch that's not just to prevent hacking.
That is not a critical security update. It is a flaw that should have been caught before approval.
You want to avoid surgery if at all possible so it makes a lot of sense to be able to make updates.
You do realize that there are systems already designed that have external wired connections, which would require physical access to the device to hack into? Maybe not. Not every medical device needs wireless, and thus at-a-distance, access.
The pacemaker also makes for a very good data logger to monitor both the device and the patient's condition. The doctors can download valuable information from such a device to inform their choice of ongoing treatment.
As I already said, OUTPUT of data does not require an external interface for INPUT to the device. It could be as simple as a reed switch that a magnet triggers to dump data via RF.
For those who are extremely paranoid perhaps you could make the communication method something that can't be hacked remotely.
You mean like wires? Hold on, I'm gonna go patent that idea. I'll make a killing. Oh wait, prior art. Damn. And electromagnetic coupling, the same. Maybe if I say "on a computer" I'll get a patent I can troll big pharma with?
vacation was 100% non-negotiable but willingly gave up $10k in salary to make up for the vacation they wouldn't provide even though the time off would have cost them 5x less.
Accounting can force that. Vacation time can occur long after a project that pays for the employee ends, but ongoing salary always comes from the current project.
I have more than 30 days of vacation accrued on the books (and before the current limit was enacted, I had almost 60.) I get paid from the current project money for any vacation I take, even if I accrued vacation a year ago on a long-expired one. It's hard to explain to a funding agency why the person who is funded by their grant isn't actually there doing anything.
Unless there's a damn good reason, I don't know why you would want to introduce security holes in a device that is keeping you alive.
The only reason you would need a "critical security patch" is if there were some way of hacking into the device remotely. For most devices the only way people could hack into them remotely is through the new external connection that allows critical security updates.
You create a solution for a problem created by the solution. My head hurts.
I suppose it's convenient to have your pacemaker app on your phone giving you live updates about how well it's working so you can post it to Facebook or something. But not if it means that anyone within range can turn the thing off, or cause it to malfunction.
Sending data TO an external monitor does not require receiving data FROM an external device. I have a half a dozen wireless weather sensors around my house that don't receive a single bit of data via radio, but they repeatedly send data out. Your pacemaker could do the same kind of thing.
Empirical evidence has shown this is false,
Uhhh, so you put a blood in jail and he stops being a blood? What?
Yes, I will agree there is some potential for gang recruitment of previously unaffiliated people, but that's still not because of mistreatment -- except for mistreatment of unaffiliated inmates by the existing gangs. People join gangs for power over others. Strength in Numbers. Not because jailhouse food sucks.
although you can continue to claim that consuming alcohol in high quantities over sufficiently short time spans doesn't cause drunkenness if you like.
I have no idea where you got this from, so I know you are not understanding what I actually did write.
It's not about diplomas or lack of diplomas. It's about jobs, stupid.
No, moron. My comment was specifically about graduation. Here, I'll quote it for you:
The example of when disparity is not bad ("sometimes") is in getting a diploma. That's called "graduation" in English. I said nothing about disparity in jobs. You're response to that comment was, and I'll quote it for you:
Then you started some rant about other things as if that proved that everything is a zero-sum game. The existence of one zero-sum game does not prove that everything is a zero-sum game. I never said there were no zero-sum games in life, I just gave one clear example of when one of the games is not.
If everyone has a high school diploma due to no child left behind,
That's not the only way people get diplomas, and you're trying to use one example of a method of improving graduation rates as proof that all means of improving graduation create bad disparity. That's absurd. You're being absurd because you deliberately avoided responding to what I actually wrote and started of on your own tangent.
In it's correct form, "no child left behind" is a reasonable concept. "Behind" doesn't mean "diploma", it means education. If 90% of the class gets a diploma due to "no child left behind" creating an environment where students who don't learn well in the existing system get the help they need to master the material, that's good. It does NOT mean that another other group doesn't get their diplomas -- the school will, as I said multiple times already, simply print more of them.
This is NOT a zero-sum game.
Since you seem to be arguing that "no child left behind" is somehow bad for society, fine. I can counter that argument, too. It's bad because it creates too many educated people for better paying jobs. "... then you've got more competition." Not enough better paying jobs for everyone then, and it creates an upward spiral. Ok. The obvious solution to that is we DO leave children behind deliberately. If it takes a different method of education for you to learn basic math or science or whatever, too bad, because the current system is producing enough employees. If we teach you the same material in a different way so you can graduate you will be "more competition" for those who are smarter than you. This is bad. Yes, let's make it absolutely clear that the schools are nothing but vocational training centers for a limited number of jobs, and not the general education of the next generation of adults.
Is that really what you want to argue?
Eventually society pays the price as we realize that churning out degrees for the sake of churning out degrees
That is not what I was talking about. I said nothing about "degrees for the sake of degrees". Go rant at someone else.
Let's apply this reasoning to Nicholas Cruz: Hey! If it's illegal to kill people with guns, then guns should be impossible to get, illegal to use or taken away, and everyone should prevent guns from being usable!
You've just described the anti-gun zealot's argument in one sentence.
Just don't say anything when you answer a call from an unknown number.
In other words, let the scammers win because you've wasted your time answering their call in the first place.
The solution is to put an answering machine on the line. If there is no message, the call wasn't important enough to worry about anyway. If you are home and hear someone leaving a message, answer the phone and tell them you picked up just because it was them. That will make them feel special.
For the few stupid scammers that leave messages, yes, your time listening to the message is wasted. Better than having to run to the phone every time it rings to pick it up and say nothing.
Prisons that create insecurity and fail to treat people with basic human dignity fill with gangs and violence,
Gang members are gang members before they go in. Putting gang members in jail is what fills jails with gangs, not how well or poorly you treat the gang members while they are there.
Also, gang activities have little to do with how well people are treated, they are an attempt to gain power over others. Put 10 bloods into a jail housing unit and they will act in concert to have power over the other inmates, no matter how well they are treated. They won't stop being bloods just because they get extra servings of apple pie with dinner and everyone calls everyone else 'sir'. In fact, they'll probably be motivated to take YOUR piece of pie just because you have it.
Put 10 bloods and 10 crips in the pod and then you'll regularly have 20 people ganging up on the rest, with occasional eruptions of 10 on 10 when one group offends the other.
Prisons such as we see in many areas of the United States are cruel and unusual punishment.
This is not because gangs exist, it is because administrations are slow or incapable of reacting to gang presence. They do not monitor the population well, and many of the guards don't care or they think it is part of the punishment. (Who cares if a pedo in prison is gang raped? He deserves it, doesn't he?) If one prisoner beating up another received swift and harsh punishment based on guards observing the action there would be less of it. Not completely eliminated, because power requires demonstration of control, and the reward of power can supersede the cost of punishment. AKA "don't mess with Ox, he'll beat your ass every time he gets back from solitary..."
My house ain't wired that way. One wire sneaks out to the demarc and then it's all parallel wiring inside the walls to all the other phone outlets. I would have to run another wire out to the demarc to put the Obi in series with the incoming line, and then connect to the rest of the inside wiring. Not impossible, but not something I'd like to do.
Scammers can't afford to have a live person listen to every call.
They wouldn't need to. All they need is the software that already exists -- voice recognition. The same voice recognition that already listens for "hello" from you and detects when it is hearing an answering machine. The same voice recognition that listens for your answers when it is an automated spam call. Program it to listen for "press N" and then it sends "N".
Yes it is. Everything is.
No. Graduating from high school is not a zero-sum game. There isn't a limited number of diplomas to hand out, and only the first 100 get one. Everyone who qualifies gets one. The school will print as many as it needs. A program that results in a 10% increase in graduation for some group does not mean that another group loses 10% because there wasn't enough "graduation" to go around.
The same applies to colleges. There may be limits on how many students can be enrolled, but if 90% of the class graduates instead of 50%, the college will just print more diplomas to hand out. And many colleges would be tickled pink to have a 10% increase in enrollment, so even class size is not a hard limit.
No child left behind? Grade inflation?
That's not what we're talking about.
the wisdom of crowds plays a role. No, not everyone is a programmer. But everyone can benefit from the work of programmers.
"Code audits" are not "wisdom of crowds". Code audits are performed by very few people, and while you may subscribe to the notices that report such results, the vast majority of people do not. The "crowd" has no wisdom about security issues; it's select people who spend the time looking for them and a slightly larger group that cares enough to read the reports.
Whether that information makes it to the public as a whole in large part depends on the apparent nuttiness of the reporter. Act like chicken little, talk about laws prohibiting things like Facebook, and people will tune you out. When you use the phrase "police state" referring to Facebook, people will run from you. Add in a demand that such companies not be allowed to exist and you've completely lost them. Not "mystified" lost, but lost their interest and their attention.
but it's not as easy to determine what data Facebook or Google are collecting as it would be with a FOSS piece of software.
Facebook could be completely open software like the Apache web server is and you'd never know what data Facebook is collecting. I can configure Apache to keep all kinds of stuff on every visitor to my websites but you'll never know what my logging looks like based on a code audit of the Apache source.