I wonder what was in the essay that made the teacher go bonkers.
Ah, but you're missing the point of censorship - you see, once something has been censored, nobody can see it. If we could see it, we'd have to use our own common sense and judgment to determine if it was actually harmful or not. That's not only hard work, it might even lead to the wrong conclusions - you may end up disagreeing with the Powerful Ones as to whether or not it needed to be censored. Plus, children might see it! As anybody who's never spent any actual time with an actual child knows, children have minds more fragile than Tiffany glass which can be irreparably, irreversibly destroyed by the slightest immoral thought at any time.
Rational subjective judgment and censorship can't coexist; we have to throw one out. Clearly, censorship is the lesser of the two evils.
No, it's more like, you run an open access point, and some woman has marijuana smoke IM'ed to her and she notifies the police and when they show up and find marijuana, you say, "no, somebody was smoking that pot through my open access point, it wasn't me".
someone who knows enough about wireless to raise the "open access point" defense also knows enough to know the risks of an open WAP and to do something about it
No, they're not the ones raising the defense - their lawyers are (which is as it should be).
Or, install an encrypted overlay darknet on top of the hobbled network and communicate freely. And herein lies the problem - there are solutions to curtail government censorship in existence RIGHT NOW. Unfortunately, they never gain any traction, because everybody seems to support the censorship of something or other because, well, "X is REALLY bad and NEEDS to be censored, whatever the cost." There seem to be very few of us who understand that censorship is all or nothing.
will my hosting the Word of God cause me to be a criminal under this bill?
No, because they'll apply the same ambiguous, mercurial, politically motivated "standards" to censoring the internet that they apply to censoring radio and television. "If you hold the wrong opinions, we'll shut you down. What are those opinions? Well, you just tell us what yours are, and we'll tell you if you're shut down."
Not really. The COPA was struck down as being overbroad, and it was resurrected with a very, very slightly narrower focus a few years ago and there's been at least one conviction. (Although from the picture, I think he may have been partly convicted of being really ugly and just looking like somebody who was probably doing something wrong).
Oh, that's entirely related to the story. Don't you see? Anything that protects The Children must be done, no matter what the consequences and fallout. Even if it doesn't actually protect The Children. If you're not with us, you're against us. You perv. The cops are on their way to your house right now.
What if someone figured out your SSN, Birth Date, and a couple other key piece of information, and opened a credit card in your name
They still arrest the guy who lives at the address where the bill goes (I would think). If the bill goes to the perpetrator, they have their man. If the bill goes to the identity theft victim, that's something of a tip-off to the person under whose name you're trying to hide.
People well gladly sell their house for the best lawyer in these circumstances.
I'm not sure that's really a shining example of justice in action, assuming the person accused was actually innocent (as were so very many of the accused in TFA).
it is not clear what happens if you just forgot the password.
Or if there's no encrypted file to begin with. If I, um, had something to hide, I'd make it as non-obvious as possible that file X is actually an encrypted file to begin with. "Officer, I don't know what that file is or what it's for - it's in that 'windows\system' folder, and I don't know what any of those files do". For all they know, WeatherBug could have installed that file whose contents just happen to not be plain text.
Yeah, he was kind of a moron. Dude - write a script to: connect, download, disconnect. Drive up, idle for a minute while the script runs, drive away before they can catch you, go home and see what you donwloaded.
"I do it because I can" is a pathetic justification by control freaks
See, and I'm thinking that the people who care are the control freaks. I mean, I care because, evidently, I'm legally obligated to care since if you use my router to do any of the myriad things that are (mostly unjustifiably) illegal to begin with, I'll get punished for it, but otherwise I don't care. As long as you don't hog bandwidth or get my service terminated, be my guest - what difference does it make to me?
But that's not what the quote says. The quote says "the person installing the network, be they a home user or a business, has ultimate responsibility for any criminal activity that takes place on that network", not "the person installing the network, be they a home user or a business, has ultimate responsibility for any criminal activity that takes place on that network unless they set up WEP". That's, um, pretty terrifying actually...
Depends on how much trouble you'll get in if law enforcement agents manage to get at the data... seeing as how that's the only *possible* use I can imagine these things would ever be put to.
That's true... today. However, if corporations start using open source contributions as a yardstick to measure potential candidates en masse, the landscape will change dramatically. Consider college - used to be, you didn't go to college unless there was really a point in learning for the sake of learning. Them employers started demanding degrees. All of a sudden, degree mills start popping up, grade inflation makes 4.0 GPA's meaningless, colleges are pushed to teach "practical" "skills"...
Slashdot Mirror
I don't have to know how to write secure software - I just need uncrackable keys, like "09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0".
Unless, of course, children might see it - then all bets are off.
Flamebait? Bah - the article submission was flamebait.
Are you allowed to at least post those somewhere?
Well, you just wrote the same thing. Submit yourself to the asylum immediately!
Ah, but you're missing the point of censorship - you see, once something has been censored, nobody can see it. If we could see it, we'd have to use our own common sense and judgment to determine if it was actually harmful or not. That's not only hard work, it might even lead to the wrong conclusions - you may end up disagreeing with the Powerful Ones as to whether or not it needed to be censored. Plus, children might see it! As anybody who's never spent any actual time with an actual child knows, children have minds more fragile than Tiffany glass which can be irreparably, irreversibly destroyed by the slightest immoral thought at any time.
Rational subjective judgment and censorship can't coexist; we have to throw one out. Clearly, censorship is the lesser of the two evils.
No, it's more like, you run an open access point, and some woman has marijuana smoke IM'ed to her and she notifies the police and when they show up and find marijuana, you say, "no, somebody was smoking that pot through my open access point, it wasn't me".
No, they're not the ones raising the defense - their lawyers are (which is as it should be).
Or, install an encrypted overlay darknet on top of the hobbled network and communicate freely. And herein lies the problem - there are solutions to curtail government censorship in existence RIGHT NOW. Unfortunately, they never gain any traction, because everybody seems to support the censorship of something or other because, well, "X is REALLY bad and NEEDS to be censored, whatever the cost." There seem to be very few of us who understand that censorship is all or nothing.
When did that start mattering again?
No, because they'll apply the same ambiguous, mercurial, politically motivated "standards" to censoring the internet that they apply to censoring radio and television. "If you hold the wrong opinions, we'll shut you down. What are those opinions? Well, you just tell us what yours are, and we'll tell you if you're shut down."
No, because society would stigmatize him and encourage him to feel victimized for his whole life (far more so than if he were a woman).
Not really. The COPA was struck down as being overbroad, and it was resurrected with a very, very slightly narrower focus a few years ago and there's been at least one conviction. (Although from the picture, I think he may have been partly convicted of being really ugly and just looking like somebody who was probably doing something wrong).
Uhhh.. then the thief didn't get the actual credit card. Hard to use it under those circumstances (I think).
Oh, that's entirely related to the story. Don't you see? Anything that protects The Children must be done, no matter what the consequences and fallout. Even if it doesn't actually protect The Children. If you're not with us, you're against us. You perv. The cops are on their way to your house right now.
They still arrest the guy who lives at the address where the bill goes (I would think). If the bill goes to the perpetrator, they have their man. If the bill goes to the identity theft victim, that's something of a tip-off to the person under whose name you're trying to hide.
I'm not sure that's really a shining example of justice in action, assuming the person accused was actually innocent (as were so very many of the accused in TFA).
Or if there's no encrypted file to begin with. If I, um, had something to hide, I'd make it as non-obvious as possible that file X is actually an encrypted file to begin with. "Officer, I don't know what that file is or what it's for - it's in that 'windows\system' folder, and I don't know what any of those files do". For all they know, WeatherBug could have installed that file whose contents just happen to not be plain text.
Yeah, he was kind of a moron. Dude - write a script to: connect, download, disconnect. Drive up, idle for a minute while the script runs, drive away before they can catch you, go home and see what you donwloaded.
See, and I'm thinking that the people who care are the control freaks. I mean, I care because, evidently, I'm legally obligated to care since if you use my router to do any of the myriad things that are (mostly unjustifiably) illegal to begin with, I'll get punished for it, but otherwise I don't care. As long as you don't hog bandwidth or get my service terminated, be my guest - what difference does it make to me?
But that's not what the quote says. The quote says "the person installing the network, be they a home user or a business, has ultimate responsibility for any criminal activity that takes place on that network", not "the person installing the network, be they a home user or a business, has ultimate responsibility for any criminal activity that takes place on that network unless they set up WEP". That's, um, pretty terrifying actually...
Which is a shame for this company, because idiots are in such short supply these days...
Working from home, but needing to carry sensitive data that will be erased if I miskey the password even once
consultants that have to travel, and carry sensitive documents that will be erased if I miskey the password even once
I can use my imagination to think of better ways to protect such data.
Depends on how much trouble you'll get in if law enforcement agents manage to get at the data... seeing as how that's the only *possible* use I can imagine these things would ever be put to.
That's true... today. However, if corporations start using open source contributions as a yardstick to measure potential candidates en masse, the landscape will change dramatically. Consider college - used to be, you didn't go to college unless there was really a point in learning for the sake of learning. Them employers started demanding degrees. All of a sudden, degree mills start popping up, grade inflation makes 4.0 GPA's meaningless, colleges are pushed to teach "practical" "skills"...