Don't get stuck on the details, or the analogy breaks down. The book is simply an large, imaginary tome on the Chinese language, containing everything needed to translate to/from English within.
Wasting money on things like this gives these guys a bigger e-penis.
Absolutely, this thing is a real love magnet. Just let her watch it for a minute while copying data around, and she will be hypnotized into submission.
That sounds too incredible to be true. What kind of viruses did it catch exactly, and how would they attack? You mean that, when the browser connected to the site, you got a whole boatload of hits in the firewall, or that free-av actually caught attemted uses of known exploits in Firefox?
Can somebody provide a proof that it is no longer weak?
Well, I certainly can't:), but I agree that it is needed before it can actually be taken seriously by serious people.
Could it for some reason leak a few informations about what was in some of the sectors at an earlier point in time.
That's a very valid concern for all those users in these comments who use Truecrypt on a flash drive, USB or otherwise. As I understand, the controllers for the flash chip try to minimise the usage per individual flash cell, so overwriting a file might not actually overwrite what you think you're overwriting. Even hard drives can leave trails, since sectors can be remapped to spare sectors at the end of the drive, when they start to go bad. Those old sectors that got remapped can usually not be accessed in any way after that. Wiping the area requires more than a simple software-wiper like Eraser. Those issues are for the most part out of Truecrypt's control, though one could overwrite all free space in the entire flash module after closing the volume.
I think what you're referring to, however, is if Truecrypt leaves trails in the volume file/partition itself. That would depend on how Truecrypt deletes files, if it wipes them, or just marks as deleted like a regular FAT32 FS. In any case, since the volume works like any other filesystem, I think wiping and erasing a file with an external tool using random data works just as well.
I imagine that Truecrypt is used by individuals for the most part (a larger company would probably want something with more of a guarantee or contract). Now, while a lot of people have all kinds of spyware festooning all over, these are not the people who would know what Truecrypt is, anyway. A Truecrypt user is also likely to have the media in question reasonably sealed off from network access.
Thus, the scenario is that the media is on a computer that contains no adverse software, and that the media can only be compromised by physical access to the computer. Now, suppose that an attacker gets a copy of a volume and walks off with it, how strong an attack can be made? As far as I know, opening the volume should be as hard as breaking the used encryption, unless.. :
watermarking it such that it could be recognized on an encrypted media
Whoa, now. How does that work? Wouldn't that mean that the encryption used was weak in the first place?
In any case, to me it seems that the main concern with all disk encryption is precisely theft of a disk, what with company laptops wandering off on their own.
Won't there always exist attacks against any practical scheme? I'd say TrueCrypt is (or will be, if you will) secure enough for many tasks, such as storing illegal downloads, private mail, password lists, and other non-life-threatening, non-military stuff.
I can't wait until we have CSS and XHTML support inside all RSS readers!
And we could have a whole bunch of different feeds on one site with different content, in different directories, all linked together. Perhaps they could also be linked to external feeds on other servers.
Yes, workplaces tend to have different customs. Usually nothing stops you from taking your shoes off when at your desk, however.
Anyway, back to the point: I can't fathom a custom where you wear outside shoes inside. If you wear shoes inside on a daily basis, you should get shoes for the inside (lightweight, open and non-sweaty). I can certainly understand that bare feet are a disease vector for people who don't take off their shoes during the day!
There's a short section on shoe customs in wikipedia as per usual, but would any American like to enlighten the rest of us on footwear customs in the USA?
I find it really amusing that/.-ers are pointing out the "socially inept people in Japan".:)
Well, it can certainly be interpreted as inept in a Western way, but I think the ineptitude is relative. If a culture behaves in a certain way, it's part of the accepted culture, and there doesn't have to be anything strange with it. It's only strange when contrasted with a different culture.
Sometimes, I feel that people speak of Japan after having watched a few documentaries, or a boatload of anime episodes. Not to say that it's worthless, quite the contrary, but I've certainly seen several wildly exaggerated and even sensationalist documentaries, not to mention exaggerated Anime!
If you walk with shoes indoors, you'll introduce sand, which is Not Nice. Taking off shoes when entering someone's home is not in any way an exclusively Japanese cutom either, in Finland we do exactly the same. The difference is only that we don't have a specially marked area for it, except for shoe stands, and in how strictly the policy is enforced, but usually, people prefer to take shoes off. Exceptions are: the floor is really dirty already or dangerous in some way (glass, spikes, building materials), just forgot the keys on the table so you run and get them, and so on. Since we sit on the floor less, the need is less, otherwise it's the same. In Japan, however, the floor can be used in more ways than just standing on, which is smart usage of living space.
It is interesting though, that christmas is now celebrated, or at least very well-known all around the world, as a result of it being an amalgam of several different traditions that have slowly merged together into one mysterious mess.
Like the question: "Where does Santa come from?". Depends on which tradition you use as a base...
That's the same reason I use M2 in Opera. It has all the fancy features, and is right there when needed, and keeps in touch with the mail server. It's the mail client of choice on Windows systems. On linux there's more competition though, I use KMail because that's what got installed, and it has the same interface as on my PDA (ie. KOrganizer - Ko/Pi).
Slashdot Mirror
That's nothing. Ping is broken in my WinXP install.
Don't get stuck on the details, or the analogy breaks down. The book is simply an large, imaginary tome on the Chinese language, containing everything needed to translate to/from English within.
Sure, but it seems you've extrapolated from one researcher's behaviour to an entire country. That is a useless argument.
Absolutely, this thing is a real love magnet. Just let her watch it for a minute while copying data around, and she will be hypnotized into submission.
It appears you are part of the reason there's such a ridiculously overblown media hype around child molesters.
Speaking of wonders and tv signals, what's a good choice for video/tv-in cards, that work in linux as well?
Also, is that free-av any good, i.e non-obtuse?
Well, I certainly can't :), but I agree that it is needed before it can actually be taken seriously by serious people.
Could it for some reason leak a few informations about what was in some of the sectors at an earlier point in time.
That's a very valid concern for all those users in these comments who use Truecrypt on a flash drive, USB or otherwise. As I understand, the controllers for the flash chip try to minimise the usage per individual flash cell, so overwriting a file might not actually overwrite what you think you're overwriting. Even hard drives can leave trails, since sectors can be remapped to spare sectors at the end of the drive, when they start to go bad. Those old sectors that got remapped can usually not be accessed in any way after that. Wiping the area requires more than a simple software-wiper like Eraser. Those issues are for the most part out of Truecrypt's control, though one could overwrite all free space in the entire flash module after closing the volume.
I think what you're referring to, however, is if Truecrypt leaves trails in the volume file/partition itself. That would depend on how Truecrypt deletes files, if it wipes them, or just marks as deleted like a regular FAT32 FS. In any case, since the volume works like any other filesystem, I think wiping and erasing a file with an external tool using random data works just as well.
I imagine that Truecrypt is used by individuals for the most part (a larger company would probably want something with more of a guarantee or contract). Now, while a lot of people have all kinds of spyware festooning all over, these are not the people who would know what Truecrypt is, anyway. A Truecrypt user is also likely to have the media in question reasonably sealed off from network access.
Thus, the scenario is that the media is on a computer that contains no adverse software, and that the media can only be compromised by physical access to the computer. Now, suppose that an attacker gets a copy of a volume and walks off with it, how strong an attack can be made? As far as I know, opening the volume should be as hard as breaking the used encryption, unless .. :
watermarking it such that it could be recognized on an encrypted media
Whoa, now. How does that work? Wouldn't that mean that the encryption used was weak in the first place?
In any case, to me it seems that the main concern with all disk encryption is precisely theft of a disk, what with company laptops wandering off on their own.
Won't there always exist attacks against any practical scheme? I'd say TrueCrypt is (or will be, if you will) secure enough for many tasks, such as storing illegal downloads, private mail, password lists, and other non-life-threatening, non-military stuff.
And we could have a whole bunch of different feeds on one site with different content, in different directories, all linked together. Perhaps they could also be linked to external feeds on other servers.
Wait, this reminds me of something ... ?
Hey baby, would you like to increase my 3-dimensional divergence by heating my kernel bounds?
And in 0,1% of situations involving a failure, it occurs in the fifth dimension.
I prefer DoubleSpace for maximum file-destroying activity.
What kind of instability, specifically? I haven't noticed anything.
Anyway, back to the point: I can't fathom a custom where you wear outside shoes inside. If you wear shoes inside on a daily basis, you should get shoes for the inside (lightweight, open and non-sweaty). I can certainly understand that bare feet are a disease vector for people who don't take off their shoes during the day!
There's a short section on shoe customs in wikipedia as per usual, but would any American like to enlighten the rest of us on footwear customs in the USA?
Well, it can certainly be interpreted as inept in a Western way, but I think the ineptitude is relative. If a culture behaves in a certain way, it's part of the accepted culture, and there doesn't have to be anything strange with it. It's only strange when contrasted with a different culture.
Sometimes, I feel that people speak of Japan after having watched a few documentaries, or a boatload of anime episodes. Not to say that it's worthless, quite the contrary, but I've certainly seen several wildly exaggerated and even sensationalist documentaries, not to mention exaggerated Anime!
What do Americans do with their shoes anyway?
Anyway, Japan is very crowded. Logically, more people should be moving out right now, not in.
So is everybody else, but no-one wants to admit it because it would be "racist". Bah, humbug!
It is interesting though, that christmas is now celebrated, or at least very well-known all around the world, as a result of it being an amalgam of several different traditions that have slowly merged together into one mysterious mess.
Like the question: "Where does Santa come from?". Depends on which tradition you use as a base...
That's the same reason I use M2 in Opera. It has all the fancy features, and is right there when needed, and keeps in touch with the mail server. It's the mail client of choice on Windows systems. On linux there's more competition though, I use KMail because that's what got installed, and it has the same interface as on my PDA (ie. KOrganizer - Ko/Pi).
Is there some other way? Like launching a bunch of random apps, and killing the ones that were wrong?
The standard resolution you want is 1280x960, which is supported by all video cards, and easily achieved on CRTs. Go CRTs!