But the extension, as mentioned in the summary, would be to bake it into internet appliances, such as routers and modems, that would automatically connect via TOR, without user intervention. Now I'm sure that if you are a savvy user and used to going into your router settings to tweak things, there will be a check box to remove TOR default functionality, but most folks will just wonder and complain about how much slower their connection is with the new internet box thingy.
Especially considering the government is already subverted from the will of the majority. They need to be weeding out the bad guys internally first.
Ignoring the biased reported polls, from an informal survey of everyone each of you readers actually know, does anyone know, personally, someone who thinks the TSA is a good idea? Not even a majority, just a single person? I know that everyone I have ever talked to has said it is stupid, useless and completely against their wishes. And that's not to mention all of the other stupidity going on that no one seems to be in favor of. Also, it is across the board from my redneck, gun in the rack across their pickup window, co-workers to the very liberal pro-gay, pro-vegetarian librarian I chat with. I can't seem to find anyone, other than my congress critters that will defend any of the anti-terrorism, pro-spying actions our government is doing. And even the congress pukes are obviously sending out form responses that they don't even believe in and can't defend when questioned in person, other that more rote memorized parroting.
It not even like Obamacare or immigration, where I can find a broad range of opinions, with some rational, well thought out arguments on both sides. The culture of fear we are being force fed seems to be universally despised.
If your plan was compliant with the AHA, which it sounds like it was, then your insurance company is absolutely still allowed to offer that plan. The fact that your insurance company decided to drop that that plan and only offer you a worse one, which is something they COULD HAVE DONE AT ANY TIME ANYWAY, is just down to your insurance company being douches, not a fault of the AHA or Obama. I'm willing to bet that if you shopped around (power of the marketplace, gee what an interesting concept) you'd find someone else offering something similar or better to your old plan at similar or better pricing.
My purely random anecdotal story is that, with the advent of the AHA, my employer offered plans went from a single plan that gave me no choices or options, to the choice of three plans. The first was almost identical in price to the old plan I had, $1,000 deductible, $30 co-pay, same prescription drug coverage both on 30 and 90 day amounts, and with the exception that now it covered routine lab work (out of pocket, no coverage before), and several preventive care options that weren't available previously. But even better were the two other options. For about 20% more I could drop to a $750 deductible, with $25 co-pay and similar reduction in drug costs, or for 40% more than my original I could drop to $500 deduc, $20 co-pay, and even lower drug costs.
While I heartily dislike all of the tracking and spying being done to me, I will admit that I would be far more complacent about commercial companies spying on me to generate demographic data and provide more relevant content, i.e. a higher precision Nielsen, than TLAs doing so for the purpose of putting me in prison.
However, with commercial entities specifically tracking an individual to target marketing to them, problems arise. Nothing like an 8 y.o. getting onto Mom's Amazon account to update their Xmas wishlist, and having "In His Cuffs" show up in the recommended for you section... Or similar circumstance on Netflix, etc.
Additionally, since everything the commercial agencies collect can and will be used against you in a court of law, as soon as you cross some petty bureaucrat's personal line... well, yeah, we have to take the stance that ALL spying and tracking is malicious.
Duh...because currently it is sufficiently easy to transfer Bitcoin to physical currencies at exchanges where they DON'T require identity verification.
Once those requirements are put in place, if the FTC gets its way, then Bitcoin will be FAR more traceable than cash.
Bitcoins are NOT anonymous. Every transaction a particular coin is part of is irrevocably written to that coin for all eternity. So, it is only as anonymous as a person keeps their bitcoin wallet identity anonymous. Which is effectively impossible if you want anyone to say...send you bitcoins. Now tying a particular wallet address to a physical address or person is currently not inherently easy, though not impossible at any point where Bitcoins are turned into, or from, cash.
That is actually the crux of the Senate hearings. Essentially the FTC is asking congress to pass legislation that says that any service designed to exchange between Bitcoin and cash, be required to follow all the laws that other credit/cash exchanges (and a slew of other businesses) have to follow, a key part of which is properly identifying all the participants in the transaction.
So, MtGox,, etc. would be required to verify your name, address, credentials, etc. when you setup an account, so "You" can be tied to a specific wallet address when the Feds go snooping for illegal activities.
That is so incredibly devious! It take s real fiend to spread rumors and lies this malicious.
NSA Operative: Our public profile is way too high, and this Snowden jerk is winning in the popularity polls. We need to discredit him, quick!
NSA Public Relations Rat: Well, we need to get people to despise Snowden and focus on him and his new antics so we can fade back into the background.
NSA Operative: OK, so who is the most despised group on earth? Terrorists? Traitors?
NSA PRR: No. No. We've been trying that for months, and we just can't get any traction with the press or public. Worse, both those arguments lead back to us and our data.
NSA Operative: How about members of Congress, or the White House?
NSA PRR: You mean get him elected? No good, do you know what a seat in Congress is going for these days? Even our black budget can't afford any more than we already have, and don't even get me started on what a White House position costs now.
NSA Operative: Hmm... pedophile rapist?
NSA PRR: Maybe you're onto something... He is in Russia after-all... Wait! I've got it. The most universally reviled, disgusting, hated group in the world!
NSA Operative: What? What!?
NSA PRR: We'll tell everyone he's....... Tech Support.
NSA Operative: You vicious bastard. Even I couldn't have some up with something so foul. I love you for it.
1. Generate key pairs behind the scenes. There is no value added to my (any user) choosing to manually generate a key pair and manage it. The software should be perfectly capable of generating my personal key pair(s).
2. EVERY email sent should have the sender's public key in the Header, placed there automatically by the email client. No reason any typical user should ever have to see the key block. Public key blocks at the end of your signature are just geek peen waving.
3. Email clients should be able to invisibly read the public key in the header, and add that to the local managed keyring, with no user intervention.
4. Email clients should automatically encrypt emails sent to an address for which it has a public key in the keyring, and automatically decrypt incoming messages.
5. If an email is being sent to an address with no key in the ring, then an initial email should automatically be generated sending a request for that address' public key (of course the sender's public key would be in the sent header). A specially formatted subject line or header value could be implemented so the the receiving email client would automatically respond with the public key, encrypted by the key it received in the header, and the request email need never even show up in the user's inbox. The body of the request message could simply be a request for the receiving user to implement a compliant email client, since the recipient would only see it if they were using a non-compliant client.
6. Upon receiving the response email, the original sender's client could compare the encrypted key it receives against the public key in the header, add the public key for that address to the key ring, and then send the email (encrypted) that the original user wanted to send.
The initial exchange of keys could happen very quickly and entirely automated in the background, so the users never even need to realize it is happening.
Implement these six steps in every email client, and the problem would be mostly solved. Of course, there is the rub. Anything that isn't put seamlessly into Outlook, Gmail, iOS Mail, Yahoo, etc. will never get enough widespread use to be anything but blazing sign that this person has something they want to hide, and are willing to annoy all of their email contacts enough to keep sending requests for public keys. with every message.
No. The problem isn't that what the NSA was doing was illegal. As you point out, much, if not all of what they have been doing has been made expressly legal by collaboration of all three branches of government.
The problem is that it is legal, but so against the will and understanding of the general populace that it never should have been allowed. The biggest problems in bringing the law back to what most people would think it should be, are issue with the repeated, persistent, and as hidden as possible, implementation of these rules and loopholes that allow this behavior. Throw in a healthy dose of falsely induced panic in enough of the vocal populace, and even a small retrenchment now, will only be subverted later. Government agency memory is much much much longer that political public memory.
That's what all the fan boys say, but when I checked it out, all he was handing out were poorly documented recipes and a lump of ingredients that I had to bake myself, and when I asked where to go to get the rest of the ingredients I needed, all the other cooks called me noob, and said that I didn't really need those raisins, or I should be using walnuts instead of the pecans I really wanted...
If these are such good IT professionals, how long would it take one of them to throw together an auto script that would "watch" the videos for them, sending clicks for all appropriate buttons, etc.?
I think the high score competition would show you who your best internal hackers were.
Slashdot Mirror
The gene pool could stand to be chlorinated a bit.
But both will still be stuck doing 25 mph on the outer loop during rush hour.
But the extension, as mentioned in the summary, would be to bake it into internet appliances, such as routers and modems, that would automatically connect via TOR, without user intervention. Now I'm sure that if you are a savvy user and used to going into your router settings to tweak things, there will be a check box to remove TOR default functionality, but most folks will just wonder and complain about how much slower their connection is with the new internet box thingy.
Especially considering the government is already subverted from the will of the majority. They need to be weeding out the bad guys internally first.
Ignoring the biased reported polls, from an informal survey of everyone each of you readers actually know, does anyone know, personally, someone who thinks the TSA is a good idea? Not even a majority, just a single person? I know that everyone I have ever talked to has said it is stupid, useless and completely against their wishes. And that's not to mention all of the other stupidity going on that no one seems to be in favor of. Also, it is across the board from my redneck, gun in the rack across their pickup window, co-workers to the very liberal pro-gay, pro-vegetarian librarian I chat with. I can't seem to find anyone, other than my congress critters that will defend any of the anti-terrorism, pro-spying actions our government is doing. And even the congress pukes are obviously sending out form responses that they don't even believe in and can't defend when questioned in person, other that more rote memorized parroting.
It not even like Obamacare or immigration, where I can find a broad range of opinions, with some rational, well thought out arguments on both sides. The culture of fear we are being force fed seems to be universally despised.
Oh for Mod Points. So many +1 for this.
And your paranoia makes this worse than any of the current situation, how?
But obviously, YOU aren't a trolling douche.
If your plan was compliant with the AHA, which it sounds like it was, then your insurance company is absolutely still allowed to offer that plan. The fact that your insurance company decided to drop that that plan and only offer you a worse one, which is something they COULD HAVE DONE AT ANY TIME ANYWAY, is just down to your insurance company being douches, not a fault of the AHA or Obama. I'm willing to bet that if you shopped around (power of the marketplace, gee what an interesting concept) you'd find someone else offering something similar or better to your old plan at similar or better pricing.
My purely random anecdotal story is that, with the advent of the AHA, my employer offered plans went from a single plan that gave me no choices or options, to the choice of three plans. The first was almost identical in price to the old plan I had, $1,000 deductible, $30 co-pay, same prescription drug coverage both on 30 and 90 day amounts, and with the exception that now it covered routine lab work (out of pocket, no coverage before), and several preventive care options that weren't available previously. But even better were the two other options. For about 20% more I could drop to a $750 deductible, with $25 co-pay and similar reduction in drug costs, or for 40% more than my original I could drop to $500 deduc, $20 co-pay, and even lower drug costs.
Choice is a wonderful thing.
Well, as long as the nurse is pretty and she makes certain to achieve maximum blood pressure at the sight in question....sure.
While I heartily dislike all of the tracking and spying being done to me, I will admit that I would be far more complacent about commercial companies spying on me to generate demographic data and provide more relevant content, i.e. a higher precision Nielsen, than TLAs doing so for the purpose of putting me in prison.
However, with commercial entities specifically tracking an individual to target marketing to them, problems arise. Nothing like an 8 y.o. getting onto Mom's Amazon account to update their Xmas wishlist, and having "In His Cuffs" show up in the recommended for you section... Or similar circumstance on Netflix, etc.
Additionally, since everything the commercial agencies collect can and will be used against you in a court of law, as soon as you cross some petty bureaucrat's personal line... well, yeah, we have to take the stance that ALL spying and tracking is malicious.
Admit it... You're just REEEEEALLY hoping for space lemurs.
That doesn't make it any less true.
Hey! Stop messing up both my preconceived, anti-government opinions, AND my defense argument!
Duh...because currently it is sufficiently easy to transfer Bitcoin to physical currencies at exchanges where they DON'T require identity verification.
Once those requirements are put in place, if the FTC gets its way, then Bitcoin will be FAR more traceable than cash.
Bitcoins are NOT anonymous. Every transaction a particular coin is part of is irrevocably written to that coin for all eternity. So, it is only as anonymous as a person keeps their bitcoin wallet identity anonymous. Which is effectively impossible if you want anyone to say...send you bitcoins. Now tying a particular wallet address to a physical address or person is currently not inherently easy, though not impossible at any point where Bitcoins are turned into, or from, cash.
That is actually the crux of the Senate hearings. Essentially the FTC is asking congress to pass legislation that says that any service designed to exchange between Bitcoin and cash, be required to follow all the laws that other credit/cash exchanges (and a slew of other businesses) have to follow, a key part of which is properly identifying all the participants in the transaction.
So, MtGox,, etc. would be required to verify your name, address, credentials, etc. when you setup an account, so "You" can be tied to a specific wallet address when the Feds go snooping for illegal activities.
Obligatory
announced on Halloween...
So...they are indistinguishable from Minnesoatans?
That is so incredibly devious! It take s real fiend to spread rumors and lies this malicious.
NSA Operative: Our public profile is way too high, and this Snowden jerk is winning in the popularity polls. We need to discredit him, quick!
NSA Public Relations Rat: Well, we need to get people to despise Snowden and focus on him and his new antics so we can fade back into the background.
NSA Operative: OK, so who is the most despised group on earth? Terrorists? Traitors?
NSA PRR: No. No. We've been trying that for months, and we just can't get any traction with the press or public. Worse, both those arguments lead back to us and our data.
NSA Operative: How about members of Congress, or the White House?
NSA PRR: You mean get him elected? No good, do you know what a seat in Congress is going for these days? Even our black budget can't afford any more than we already have, and don't even get me started on what a White House position costs now.
NSA Operative: Hmm... pedophile rapist?
NSA PRR: Maybe you're onto something... He is in Russia after-all... Wait! I've got it. The most universally reviled, disgusting, hated group in the world!
NSA Operative: What? What!?
NSA PRR: We'll tell everyone he's....... Tech Support.
NSA Operative: You vicious bastard. Even I couldn't have some up with something so foul. I love you for it.
Bonehead easier would be better.
1. Generate key pairs behind the scenes. There is no value added to my (any user) choosing to manually generate a key pair and manage it. The software should be perfectly capable of generating my personal key pair(s).
2. EVERY email sent should have the sender's public key in the Header, placed there automatically by the email client. No reason any typical user should ever have to see the key block. Public key blocks at the end of your signature are just geek peen waving.
3. Email clients should be able to invisibly read the public key in the header, and add that to the local managed keyring, with no user intervention.
4. Email clients should automatically encrypt emails sent to an address for which it has a public key in the keyring, and automatically decrypt incoming messages.
5. If an email is being sent to an address with no key in the ring, then an initial email should automatically be generated sending a request for that address' public key (of course the sender's public key would be in the sent header). A specially formatted subject line or header value could be implemented so the the receiving email client would automatically respond with the public key, encrypted by the key it received in the header, and the request email need never even show up in the user's inbox. The body of the request message could simply be a request for the receiving user to implement a compliant email client, since the recipient would only see it if they were using a non-compliant client.
6. Upon receiving the response email, the original sender's client could compare the encrypted key it receives against the public key in the header, add the public key for that address to the key ring, and then send the email (encrypted) that the original user wanted to send.
The initial exchange of keys could happen very quickly and entirely automated in the background, so the users never even need to realize it is happening.
Implement these six steps in every email client, and the problem would be mostly solved. Of course, there is the rub. Anything that isn't put seamlessly into Outlook, Gmail, iOS Mail, Yahoo, etc. will never get enough widespread use to be anything but blazing sign that this person has something they want to hide, and are willing to annoy all of their email contacts enough to keep sending requests for public keys. with every message.
No. The problem isn't that what the NSA was doing was illegal. As you point out, much, if not all of what they have been doing has been made expressly legal by collaboration of all three branches of government.
The problem is that it is legal, but so against the will and understanding of the general populace that it never should have been allowed. The biggest problems in bringing the law back to what most people would think it should be, are issue with the repeated, persistent, and as hidden as possible, implementation of these rules and loopholes that allow this behavior. Throw in a healthy dose of falsely induced panic in enough of the vocal populace, and even a small retrenchment now, will only be subverted later. Government agency memory is much much much longer that political public memory.
But it will still have to submit to being groped by the TSA before conducting its terrorist assault.
That's what all the fan boys say, but when I checked it out, all he was handing out were poorly documented recipes and a lump of ingredients that I had to bake myself, and when I asked where to go to get the rest of the ingredients I needed, all the other cooks called me noob, and said that I didn't really need those raisins, or I should be using walnuts instead of the pecans I really wanted...
Or, at least the wrong fears...
If these are such good IT professionals, how long would it take one of them to throw together an auto script that would "watch" the videos for them, sending clicks for all appropriate buttons, etc.?
I think the high score competition would show you who your best internal hackers were.