Also, since there's hydrocarbons on Titan and ice in the rings and moons of Saturn, I think Clarke picked the wrong gas giant to send his characters to! Saturn's got it going on.
I don't think that the 90 km-deep ocean on Europa is anything to sneeze at. Unfortunately, it's under a few km of ice.
My search for security is precisely because of the human life involved.
In that case, you should search for patient _safety_ first, and then worry about the security of the device. Right now, a doctor needing _quick_ access to the programming of the pacemaker, or a patient catching MRSA or something equally nasty during a surgery to change the pacemakers battery are, while having a very low absolute probability, pretty much infinitely more likely than someone getting harmed by a successful pacemaker hack. And security that will jeopardize patient safety might as well be left out.
Sure. Will you ship your secure, encrypted pacemaker with an external power supply to plug it in ?
Sheesh. These things don't come with a multi-core desktop CPU. They're ultra low-power systems, optimized for battery life because changing the battery requires surgery, which already puts your life at stake (Sorry - cutting your chest open isn't trivial. And the chance of something bad happening during or after surgery (infection, complications with the anesthesia, etc), as of now, is about infinitely higher than someone hacking your pacemaker to kill you).
If you'd get a pacemaker, would you get the one that requires you to be cut open every five years, or the one that requires you to be cut open every eight years ?
Feel free to demonstrate your cluelessness. At least I've got a couple of degrees to back up my smart-assness, while you're just talking out of your arse.
So basically you're telling me that you have to have an external thing strapped to your chest, full time, for it deal with that? I thought they were programmed by a cardiologist once, and left on their own afterwards.
Well, you're thinking wrong. They can be tweaked whenever you don't like what the thing is doing. Getting defibbed while having sex with your SO/girl-/boy-/friend ? Move the tachycardia limit up a bit. Heart rate not going down enough when you're at rest ? Have it tweaked. Want to know whether you really got defibrillated at night or just had a bad dream (yep, that's a psychological effect of these things) ? Ask your cardiologist to read out the status log. Want to know whether your pump is getting worse ? Ask your cardiologist whether it recorded any arrythmia episodes. Want to see how the battery is holding up ? You guessed it.
There are tons of reasons to talk to your pacemaker.
_If_ any model needs it to be done that often, there _are_ ways to have things sticking out of someone's skin (think: dental implants)
Erm, are you serious ? _Anything_ that sticks through the skin is a serious infection risk. Basically, there's _no_ way of having something stick through the skin permanently without some kind of problem popping up sooner or later. Dental impacts don't stick through your skin, they're anchored directly in the jawbone. Your're talking out of your arse again.
or have an electrode go out to right under the skin (think: some hearing implants.) So, you know, they require contact or near contact to work at all.
Sorry, there aren't any cable ducts in the human body. The pacemaker is put fairly close under the skin, and talking to it requires "near contact", if you're not using a really sensitive antenna. I'm sure that with the lab equipment mentioned in the article, you could also remotely mess with the hearing implants you mention.
That still doesn't excuse its being an insecure protocol.
Given that there are tons of ways to adversely affect pacemakers, the insecure protocol is the least of your worries. Also, encryption needs memory and power, and changing the battery on a pacemaker requires a surgical procedure, which also carries some risk and is a significant inconvenience.
So, basically, to wrap this up: I don't know what your qualifications are, but security is obviously not one of them.
Small, ultra low-power embedded systems, biomedical engineering and medicine obviously aren't any of yours. If you want to knock out a pacemaker, you don't need to be able to talk to it. Why plug a really remote security vulnerability, when there's gaping holes next to it that basically cannot be plugged unless you stick the patient into a metal cage ?
At the end of the day, I still don't see why those things shouldn't be more secure.
Because you'd be subjecting the patient to more battery changes, for example ? You'd just swap a very remote hazard for very concrete one. And most patients don't like being cut open multiple times.
I mean, seriously, it didn't take me more than 5 minutes to think up solutions to those issues you raise, and I'm not even claiming to be the smartest guy around.
How about you leave pacemaker design to people who actually have the skill set to design a working pacemaker ? Your contraption would be a serious risk to patient health. Sticking an electrode through the skin, sheesh. Why that's not a good idea is biomedical engineering 101. And it'd probably go through batteries like there's no tomorrow.
This seems like a situation where ultrasonic (or even just sonic) communication might be very useful!
If you had unlimited power, maybe. Just maybe.
You could attach a voice coil to the inside shell of the pace maker.
The acoustic impedance mismatch between the case of the pacemaker and the surrounding tissue will make this virtually impossible. You might get away with having the US transmitter on the outside, but this opens up the device for all kinds of nasty biocompatibility / degradation issues and most likely drains more power than a RF transmitter. So, interesting in theory, but not really feasible in practice.
I want them to get the pacing rate right BEFORE they sew it in.
Finding out which settings you like or don't like unfortunately involves putting a pacemaker into you first. Of course, you could go with a completely dumb device, but your heart would be paced too fast when you're asleep and too slow when you're physically active.
Not only that, but let's say the President of the United States has a pacemaker... $30000 is pittance for someone who wants him dead.
Now you only need to get that $30000 worth of lab equipment (= big and bulky) within a few inches of your intended victims chest...
Re:That kind of attitude is the problem
on
Hacking a Pacemaker
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
Why _does_ a pacemaker need a WiFi interface anyway?
Because sticking a JTAG connector through someones chest is fairly painful. You're welcome to experiment on yourself to confirm this.
Also, it's not a WiFi interface. It's a short-range (it goes through your chest, and water absorbs radio waves like crazy), custom, wireless interface.
You have no freaking need for those to be networked, in any form or shape.
And you're, what ? An M.D. ? A biomedical engineer ?
Tell you what: Have fun with your dumb fixed-rate 75 bpm pacemaker, but don't expect to be running up any stairs anytime soon.
Any interface to it or from it can be contact-based just as well.
It basically is, genius. Or do you want it so contact-based that they have to shoot a couple of amps through your chest in order to make the pacemaker respond ? Hint: Think of a vital organ that's very, very close to the pacemaker and reacts very badly to having current shot through it.
More importantly, we already do _both_ of those for life-and-death systems like flight control systems on airplanes or brake computers on cars. They're both built and reviewed to be as good as bulletproof, _and_ not wired to talk to the outside world, unless one physically plugs in a special connector and a special computer into it.
They're also conveniently located outside the human body, so plugging a special connector into them doesn't involve going through someones tissue first.
Especially when you read the horoscope and try to apply it to a yet unborn baby. Something along the lines of "You will discover buds that will grow into interesting relationships later..." suddenly gets a completely new meaning - "Sure, those hands and feet will be interesting". Be very scared when the horoscope talks about things like "You're ready to face the world and meet new people." He he.
You could, you know, teach your children not to eat cat shit. Or you could just let them develop an immune system.
I don't think you're familiar with the term "cogenital toxoplasmosis".
It's not my fault that you're a helicopter parent who brought your child up in an oversterilised environment so now they have to live in a plastic bubble.
But thanks for showing that you're totally clueless. Now go and educate yourself, unless you want to embarass yourself in the future.
In other words, is a group of small mirrors with the same surface area as a single large mirror inherently better?
It's not "better", it's "just as good" while being vastly, vastly cheaper. Also, it's not the surface area itself that matters for resolution. So several small mirrors (with a smaller surface area), spaced apart, can deliver the same resolution as one huge mirror.
Is there any school level science problem for which the solution can't be found via judicious use of Google?
Why use Google or read books/datasheets/tfm, when you can just post your question and expect a ready-to-use answer some time later ? (If the latter doesn't occur, jump up and down, pout and insult the members of the discussion forum)
'Perhaps in theory, but the law would never be applied in that way' - they're lying . They intend to use the law that way as early and as often as possible.
Reality is even more insidious than that. They may not even be lying, but be completely honest and never use the law "that way" - but their successors eventually will.
It's just the same with agreements in a contract. Even if the original party will not abuse the terms, their successors will.
How will paying higher than market price to an oligopoly members of which fund and breed terrorists help end terrorism again?
It's a strong motivation to develop alternatives to relying on said oligopoly.
Regardless of whether you pay "market price" or "higher than market price", you're still paying money to quote members of which fund and breed terrorists unquote. Want to dry up the funding for terrorist organizations ? Here's one place to start.
If you check out the image of Earth and our Moon, why do we not see stars? Where did they go?
They went to the same place that they go to during the day. Hey, I don't know where that is, but I don't see any stars when the sun is shining, so they must have gone somewhere, right ?
More like increases in solar energy. Wouldn't that be a hoot, disproving the global warming idiots by using a whole other planet as evidence.
You'd still have to explain why the other seven^H^H^H^H^Hsix planets (and the dozens of moons) in our solar system are unaffected by the assumed increase in solar power output.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't think that the 90 km-deep ocean on Europa is anything to sneeze at. Unfortunately, it's under a few km of ice.
In that case, you should search for patient _safety_ first, and then worry about the security of the device. Right now, a doctor needing _quick_ access to the programming of the pacemaker, or a patient catching MRSA or something equally nasty during a surgery to change the pacemakers battery are, while having a very low absolute probability, pretty much infinitely more likely than someone getting harmed by a successful pacemaker hack. And security that will jeopardize patient safety might as well be left out.
Sure. Will you ship your secure, encrypted pacemaker with an external power supply to plug it in ?
Sheesh. These things don't come with a multi-core desktop CPU. They're ultra low-power systems, optimized for battery life because changing the battery requires surgery, which already puts your life at stake (Sorry - cutting your chest open isn't trivial. And the chance of something bad happening during or after surgery (infection, complications with the anesthesia, etc), as of now, is about infinitely higher than someone hacking your pacemaker to kill you).
If you'd get a pacemaker, would you get the one that requires you to be cut open every five years, or the one that requires you to be cut open every eight years ?
Feel free to demonstrate your cluelessness. At least I've got a couple of degrees to back up my smart-assness, while you're just talking out of your arse.
So basically you're telling me that you have to have an external thing strapped to your chest, full time, for it deal with that? I thought they were programmed by a cardiologist once, and left on their own afterwards.
Well, you're thinking wrong. They can be tweaked whenever you don't like what the thing is doing. Getting defibbed while having sex with your SO/girl-/boy-/friend ? Move the tachycardia limit up a bit. Heart rate not going down enough when you're at rest ? Have it tweaked. Want to know whether you really got defibrillated at night or just had a bad dream (yep, that's a psychological effect of these things) ? Ask your cardiologist to read out the status log. Want to know whether your pump is getting worse ? Ask your cardiologist whether it recorded any arrythmia episodes. Want to see how the battery is holding up ? You guessed it.
There are tons of reasons to talk to your pacemaker.
_If_ any model needs it to be done that often, there _are_ ways to have things sticking out of someone's skin (think: dental implants)
Erm, are you serious ? _Anything_ that sticks through the skin is a serious infection risk. Basically, there's _no_ way of having something stick through the skin permanently without some kind of problem popping up sooner or later. Dental impacts don't stick through your skin, they're anchored directly in the jawbone. Your're talking out of your arse again.
or have an electrode go out to right under the skin (think: some hearing implants.) So, you know, they require contact or near contact to work at all.
Sorry, there aren't any cable ducts in the human body. The pacemaker is put fairly close under the skin, and talking to it requires "near contact", if you're not using a really sensitive antenna. I'm sure that with the lab equipment mentioned in the article, you could also remotely mess with the hearing implants you mention.
That still doesn't excuse its being an insecure protocol.
Given that there are tons of ways to adversely affect pacemakers, the insecure protocol is the least of your worries. Also, encryption needs memory and power, and changing the battery on a pacemaker requires a surgical procedure, which also carries some risk and is a significant inconvenience.
So, basically, to wrap this up: I don't know what your qualifications are, but security is obviously not one of them.
Small, ultra low-power embedded systems, biomedical engineering and medicine obviously aren't any of yours. If you want to knock out a pacemaker, you don't need to be able to talk to it. Why plug a really remote security vulnerability, when there's gaping holes next to it that basically cannot be plugged unless you stick the patient into a metal cage ?
At the end of the day, I still don't see why those things shouldn't be more secure.
Because you'd be subjecting the patient to more battery changes, for example ? You'd just swap a very remote hazard for very concrete one. And most patients don't like being cut open multiple times.
I mean, seriously, it didn't take me more than 5 minutes to think up solutions to those issues you raise, and I'm not even claiming to be the smartest guy around.
How about you leave pacemaker design to people who actually have the skill set to design a working pacemaker ? Your contraption would be a serious risk to patient health. Sticking an electrode through the skin, sheesh. Why that's not a good idea is biomedical engineering 101. And it'd probably go through batteries like there's no tomorrow.
If you had unlimited power, maybe. Just maybe.
You could attach a voice coil to the inside shell of the pace maker.
The acoustic impedance mismatch between the case of the pacemaker and the surrounding tissue will make this virtually impossible. You might get away with having the US transmitter on the outside, but this opens up the device for all kinds of nasty biocompatibility / degradation issues and most likely drains more power than a RF transmitter. So, interesting in theory, but not really feasible in practice.
Finding out which settings you like or don't like unfortunately involves putting a pacemaker into you first. Of course, you could go with a completely dumb device, but your heart would be paced too fast when you're asleep and too slow when you're physically active.
Now you only need to get that $30000 worth of lab equipment (= big and bulky) within a few inches of your intended victims chest ...
Because sticking a JTAG connector through someones chest is fairly painful. You're welcome to experiment on yourself to confirm this.
Also, it's not a WiFi interface. It's a short-range (it goes through your chest, and water absorbs radio waves like crazy), custom, wireless interface. You have no freaking need for those to be networked, in any form or shape.
And you're, what ? An M.D. ? A biomedical engineer ?
Tell you what: Have fun with your dumb fixed-rate 75 bpm pacemaker, but don't expect to be running up any stairs anytime soon.
Any interface to it or from it can be contact-based just as well.
It basically is, genius. Or do you want it so contact-based that they have to shoot a couple of amps through your chest in order to make the pacemaker respond ? Hint: Think of a vital organ that's very, very close to the pacemaker and reacts very badly to having current shot through it.
More importantly, we already do _both_ of those for life-and-death systems like flight control systems on airplanes or brake computers on cars. They're both built and reviewed to be as good as bulletproof, _and_ not wired to talk to the outside world, unless one physically plugs in a special connector and a special computer into it.
They're also conveniently located outside the human body, so plugging a special connector into them doesn't involve going through someones tissue first.
Um, yes you do. Do you want them to have to cut you open because you don't like the maximum pacing rate and want to have it reduced by 5 bpm ?
Yes, but the purpose of this device is unclear. What exactly is it pacing ?
Especially when you read the horoscope and try to apply it to a yet unborn baby. Something along the lines of "You will discover buds that will grow into interesting relationships later ..." suddenly gets a completely new meaning - "Sure, those hands and feet will be interesting". Be very scared when the horoscope talks about things like "You're ready to face the world and meet new people." He he.
In other news, people who keep lions or tigers are unlikely to die of heart attacks, because their pets can sense who in the herd is weak and sick.
I don't think you're familiar with the term "cogenital toxoplasmosis".
It's not my fault that you're a helicopter parent who brought your child up in an oversterilised environment so now they have to live in a plastic bubble.
But thanks for showing that you're totally clueless. Now go and educate yourself, unless you want to embarass yourself in the future.
As long as you don't mind a pet that thinks you're an overblown can-opener, sure.
... reduce the risk of heart disease. Especially if you take your dog on five-mile walks each day (and yes, that means that you walk/bike too).
Or a big suitcase. And last I checked, airport security checkpoints are fairly crowded.
Quick ! We need pre-security security !
It's not "better", it's "just as good" while being vastly, vastly cheaper. Also, it's not the surface area itself that matters for resolution. So several small mirrors (with a smaller surface area), spaced apart, can deliver the same resolution as one huge mirror.
Oh, why not ? Couldn't you have made up something equivalent to four years of garbage ?
Why use Google or read books/datasheets/tfm, when you can just post your question and expect a ready-to-use answer some time later ? (If the latter doesn't occur, jump up and down, pout and insult the members of the discussion forum)
Reality is even more insidious than that. They may not even be lying, but be completely honest and never use the law "that way" - but their successors eventually will.
It's just the same with agreements in a contract. Even if the original party will not abuse the terms, their successors will.
It's a strong motivation to develop alternatives to relying on said oligopoly.
Regardless of whether you pay "market price" or "higher than market price", you're still paying money to quote members of which fund and breed terrorists unquote. Want to dry up the funding for terrorist organizations ? Here's one place to start.
It's also a definition of "The dice aren't loaded.".
They went to the same place that they go to during the day. Hey, I don't know where that is, but I don't see any stars when the sun is shining, so they must have gone somewhere, right ?
You'd still have to explain why the other seven^H^H^H^H^Hsix planets (and the dozens of moons) in our solar system are unaffected by the assumed increase in solar power output.