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User: FlightTest

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Comments · 81

  1. Re:Can I sue you for negligence? on Forum: The Yahoo Denial of Service · · Score: 1

    I'm talking about negligence here, though. If you leave your loaded gun on the front step and somebody uses it to commit a crime, you can probably expect some repercussions. Similarly, leaving a system that has well-known and documented problems with easily available remedies on the Internet could be viewed as a form of negligence.

    Oh, I see. So if I leave my keys in my car and my car unlocked, THEN if it is used in a bank robbery I am negligent because I have left "... a system that has well-known and documented problems (often used for a getaway) with easily available remedies (lock the door and take the keys with you)" out on the street. And so I could be sued by the victims of the robbery for my negligence.

    And I think I can easily make the case that the problems and remidies of the car are much more widely known than the problems and remidies of a computer on the internet. Let's punish the CRIMINALS, the ones who commit the crime, and try to educate the people who may inadvertantly help them through their ignorance.

  2. Re:From the Article . . on British Crackers Demand Millions in Inforansom · · Score: 2

    Well, acutally, VISA _DID_ inform those people whose accounts were affected. Or, at least, they informed their banks, and I happen to bank at a "good" bank (a credit union, actually), that in turn informed me. They cancelled my existing VISA card, and sent me a new one. They did say that the card number had been compromised at VISA, and that VISA had alerted them. At the time, I thought it odd that I had not heard of numbers being compromised at VISA, so I thought it must have been a small scale leak.

    SO, if you were not informed of the compromise either (1) your card was not affected or (2) your bank chose not to tell you. Door number 2 is a black eye for your bank, not VISA.

    Does VISA really have an obligation to tell the whole world that some of their numbers were compromised? IMHO, No. They do have an obligation to tell those people who were affected, and I think they did a good job there, at least in my case. Perhaps they chose not to tell the whole world because their investigation (along with whoever else) was on-going. Perhaps (more likely) they chose not to tell the whole world for fear of a mass canceling of VISA cards prior to Christmas. As long as the affected people were notified, which seems to have happend, I really don't think they screwed up here.

  3. Re:Wait a minute .... on View from the Censorware Trenches · · Score: 2

    Well, yes. But of course many people here on /. (and everywhere else, for that matter) confuse "conservative" with "Republican" in much the same way they confuse "liberal" with "Democrat".

    DISCLAIMER: I would identify myself as "conservative" though I do admit I am not "conservative" on all matters. In other words, yes, I have a political bias. duh.

    IMNSHO, a "true" conservative is for the miminum amount of government necessary to carry out the obligations of the government spelled out in the charter for that government. In the U.S., this would be the Constitution, including amendments. Now, if I remember correctly (it's been a few years), this would pretty much limit the U.S. gov't to providing for the national defense and regulation of interstate commerce. Obviously, the U.S. gov't does far more than this, and even the Republicans want to do far more than this.

    I am not even going to try to define a "true" liberal, as I fear my own biases would get in the way of a rational definition. ;)

    But, alas, in the U.S. at least, the terms "conservative" and "liberal" are so politically charged, that one cannot even define them without getting into a shouting match. Any original meaning has been lost.

  4. Re:oh Fun!!! on Caught Before the Act · · Score: 1

    So you have your fun, get the cameras to watch you "pretend" to steal the car. Now, and for the rest of your life, the cameras will be closely watching every move you ever make. When the country-wide network is built, your history will be shared. You're a trouble maker and the computer knows you. Once a non-conformist, always a non-conformist. It will never forget your face and will always watch you. You'll begin to get a little paranoid. Suspicious that someone's watching you. As you walk down the street, the cameras will turn to follow you. The guard at your local bank will nervously feel for his revolver when you enter. The teller will stutter when talking to you. You'll have trouble getting work. Others will notice the cameras turning to watch you and they, too, will be suspicious of you. No one will make eye contact with you. You're not paranoid, you've made the system paranoid of you. You'd better never Jaywalk again...

    You say that like there's something wrong with that ;P

    Anyways, if EVERYONE, or at least a large number of people, did this, the system would be overwhelmed trying to track all these non-conformists. Pretty soon all the "authorities" would ignore the non-conformist list because d@mn near everyone would be on it.

    Self-defeating technology....

  5. Re:Used for private gain!? on Echelon Confirmed by Australians · · Score: 1

    I thought the most scariest thing was the allegation that information from Echelon was leaked to a private company in the US, so it could outbid a French company. I mean, most people probably expect the government has some sort of eavesdropping ability, and that information was being sifted through to catch "bad guys." But, if it's so easy to bend this to benefit some company, then it's obviously way out of control

    Well, if this is true, turn about is always fair play. It's widely known, escpecially in the defense industry, that Air France has at least all of it's flights out of the U.S. bugged. They listen for executives who are discussing business stratagy. That information is passed to French companies that are involved in the same line of business. Sometimes competitors, sometimes "partners". Not to mention, of course, bugging and outright theft from hotel rooms.

    I'm not saying that makes it right for the U.S. to do it, but let's not delude ourselves into believing the U.S. is the only big, bad government spying on people for economic benifit.

  6. Re:Declassifying Docs on What's the Government /Really/ Classifying? · · Score: 1

    I think they got rid of Confidential a few (3-5?) years ago. They realized keeping tabs on all that classified info was way too expensive. A small amount of confidentilal stuff was upgrade to secret, and the rest was "unclassified". They did pressure companies to keep previously confidential stuff as "company confidential" and limit employee access to it. At least, that's the way I heard it. YMMV.