"Terrorists routinely use multiple identities - up to 50 at a time. Indeed this is an essential part of the way they operate and is specifically taught at Al-Qaeda training camps. One in four criminals also uses a false identity. ID cards which contain biometric recognition details and which are linked to a National Identity Register will make this much more difficult"
So would locking us all in our houses, day and night. I think we all appreciate the need to effectively tackle terrorism and crime, but just because a measure helps with this, it doesn't unilaterally make it a 'good' thing. We need to find a good balance between civil liberties and dealing with crime, and I'm sure the UK security services will think the ID card helps with the latter, but who in the government is there to advocate for the former?
A referendum would allow the people to decide; the government is there to serve the people, and this issues seems to be one the people are sensitive about. As it happens, on the very same petition site, there is a petition for such a referendum:
China have recently said they are against the weaponisation of space. From here:
"China said the priority concern was to further consolidate the international consensus on the prevention of the weaponization of and an arms race in outer space in the form of a legal commitment or a legal instrument."
So what has changed since 2004? Just that they now have the capability and technology? Otherwise, is it that they see the Space Preservation Treaty is going nowhere, implying other countries are fully prepared for the weaponisation of space.
Neither did I, and it is the biggest regret of my life. I got to Deadly, but never Elite.
The sad fact is - I still have my saved game file on a floppy, I still have my notes book for good trading routes etc. In University I even bought a BBC Master Compact for £30 just to oad that baby up.
I remember getting the mission where you had to hunt down the new ship and destroy it, which I did, but I can't remember getting any more missions. Guess you had to make it to Elite.:(
I've never needed to use ssh-agent, and during reading this I thought I'd read up on it a bit. So I google it and found an article, written in 2004, that had this to say:
So the bad news is that your agent keys are usable by the root user. The good news, however, is that they are only usable while the agent is running -- root could use your agent to authenticate to your accounts on other systems, but it doesn't provide direct access to the keys themselves. This means that the keys can't be taken off the machine and used from other locations indefinitely.
Is there any way to keep root from using your agent, even though it can subvert unix file permissions? Yes, you can. If you supply the -c option when you import your keys into the agent, then the agent will not allow them to be used without confirmation. When someone attempts to use your agent to authenticate to a server, the ssh-agent will run the ssh-askpass program. This program will pop up on your X11 desktop and ask for confirmation before proceding to use the key.
At this point you're probably going to realize that we're still fighting a losing battle. The local root account can access your X11 desktop, all your processes, you name it. If you can't trust the root user, you're in trouble.
However this will prevent root on machines to which you've forwarded the agent from accessing your agent.
If someone were to remake all 153 icons, as pretty anti-aliased PNGs and they used AlphaImageLoader to make them work with IE 5.5, IE 6 as well as the other browsers you mentioned, then would PNGs be allowed?
If the "entire purpose of computing is the ease of data exchange", how does this mean Mac OS X "isn't useful"?
I can email you a word document from my Mac with the same ease as I can from my Windows PC. I can view PDF files from a website, read photos off a CD, burn mp3 files to a CD etc etc. What isn't easy?
You clearly know what you are doing, so you aren't the sort of person who will need the safety net.
Most people never run anything that uses the terminal, and these are the people who do need the safety net. I'm aware you can launch any app with this exploit, but Terminal is the likely candidate and the one that could most likely cause the most trouble. My suggested fix is meant to save the majority of people (albeit, probably not the sort who would be reading the comments on slashdot..) from the likely sort of attack.
I guess if someone is clued up enough to bother implementing a fix like this, they would be clued up enough not to open any old file, but I thought the value was there in suggesting it.
Disabling the auto-open in Safari is all well and good, but opening a file from mail is still a problem, as are the other ways people will think up to send this.
Here is a much better solution for now:
1) Open/Applications/Utilities/Terminal
2) Select "Preferences..." from the "Terminal" menu
3) The top item lists 2 options. Select "Execute this command" and enter:
/sbin/nologin
4) Close Preferences and quit Terminal.
That will prevent malicous code from auto-running, be it auto-opened from Safari, opened from Mail or double clicked from the Finder. You are done and protected for now.
If you are someone who uses Terminal, then you will want a way to open Terminal windows. In which case do this before you do the above steps (just revert to the first option of 2 in the Preferences window if you already did it):
1) Open a new Terminal window.
2) Select "Save" from the "File" menu.
3) Save the file as "default" or your preferred name.
4) Open "Preferences..." from the "File" menu.
5) Check the "Open a saved.term file when Terminal starts"
6) Use the "Select..." button to save your file from step 3
Now Terminal with give you a functioning Terminal window when it launches (but still won't running those nasties). If you need another window just go File>Library>default.
I've tested this with Safari, Mail and Finder versions of 2 exploit samples, and it worked nicely.
"Hi. My name is George, and I haven't played WoW for 3 months."
"Ok everyone, give George some applause, he has earned it. Tell us more about your feelings towards WoW, George."
* George looking transfixed at the fire axe in the corner, mumbling about hit rates and stamina bonuses *
"Well, it was OMFG soo cool! LOL! I am a level 60 Paladin, and OMG, Molten Core, there is a big dragon. We're going to kill it. OMG! Just you wait until the patch comes out............."
*next week*
"Hi. My name is George, and I haven't played WoW for 3 days."
Why not accept the offer of OS X, and install RedHat also, and set them up with dual boot. Anyone who can handle Linux to the point of "tinkering" can handle dual boot. Anyone not interested in "tinkering" who wants to just "just work" could easily be shown both and then use whichever.
I think the level of complication added by dual booting would be outstripped by providing the choice. The only downside would be the extra HD space taken up.
Google was previously entirely blocked in China. I read this first in a Wired magazine article, and as I recall, they had to work hard to be unblocked. I believe they consented to a partial blocking, figuring some access was better than no access. Makes sense to me.
Slashdot Mirror
In the UK, BT (the formely state owned Telecom provider, now privatised) is obliged to provide competing operators with wholesale broadband access:
http://www.out-law.com/page-3519
I'm not sure how similarly this situation mimics that in the article, asides from with BT the EU wasn't involved in the decision.
"Terrorists routinely use multiple identities - up to 50 at a time. Indeed this is an essential part of the way they operate and is specifically taught at Al-Qaeda training camps. One in four criminals also uses a false identity. ID cards which contain biometric recognition details and which are linked to a National Identity Register will make this much more difficult"
So would locking us all in our houses, day and night. I think we all appreciate the need to effectively tackle terrorism and crime, but just because a measure helps with this, it doesn't unilaterally make it a 'good' thing. We need to find a good balance between civil liberties and dealing with crime, and I'm sure the UK security services will think the ID card helps with the latter, but who in the government is there to advocate for the former?
A referendum would allow the people to decide; the government is there to serve the people, and this issues seems to be one the people are sensitive about. As it happens, on the very same petition site, there is a petition for such a referendum:
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/IDreferendum/
The people may make the 'wrong' choice, but at least they will have made it; Democracy in action.
Neither did I, and it is the biggest regret of my life. I got to Deadly, but never Elite.
:(
The sad fact is - I still have my saved game file on a floppy, I still have my notes book for good trading routes etc. In University I even bought a BBC Master Compact for £30 just to oad that baby up.
I remember getting the mission where you had to hunt down the new ship and destroy it, which I did, but I can't remember getting any more missions. Guess you had to make it to Elite.
Worry not, brother! I am here! Fallout 2 should make any such list!
If someone were to remake all 153 icons, as pretty anti-aliased PNGs and they used AlphaImageLoader to make them work with IE 5.5, IE 6 as well as the other browsers you mentioned, then would PNGs be allowed?
Or are PNGs not allowed whatever?
If the "entire purpose of computing is the ease of data exchange", how does this mean Mac OS X "isn't useful"?
I can email you a word document from my Mac with the same ease as I can from my Windows PC. I can view PDF files from a website, read photos off a CD, burn mp3 files to a CD etc etc. What isn't easy?
You clearly know what you are doing, so you aren't the sort of person who will need the safety net. Most people never run anything that uses the terminal, and these are the people who do need the safety net. I'm aware you can launch any app with this exploit, but Terminal is the likely candidate and the one that could most likely cause the most trouble. My suggested fix is meant to save the majority of people (albeit, probably not the sort who would be reading the comments on slashdot..) from the likely sort of attack. I guess if someone is clued up enough to bother implementing a fix like this, they would be clued up enough not to open any old file, but I thought the value was there in suggesting it.
Which utilties and installers does this disable?
Disabling the auto-open in Safari is all well and good, but opening a file from mail is still a problem, as are the other ways people will think up to send this.
Here is a much better solution for now:
1) Open2) Select "Preferences..." from the "Terminal" menu
3) The top item lists 2 options. Select "Execute this command" and enter:
/sbin/nologin
4) Close Preferences and quit Terminal.
That will prevent malicous code from auto-running, be it auto-opened from Safari, opened from Mail or double clicked from the Finder. You are done and protected for now.
If you are someone who uses Terminal, then you will want a way to open Terminal windows. In which case do this before you do the above steps (just revert to the first option of 2 in the Preferences window if you already did it):
1) Open a new Terminal window.2) Select "Save" from the "File" menu.
3) Save the file as "default" or your preferred name.
4) Open "Preferences..." from the "File" menu.
5) Check the "Open a saved
6) Use the "Select..." button to save your file from step 3
Now Terminal with give you a functioning Terminal window when it launches (but still won't running those nasties). If you need another window just go File>Library>default.
I've tested this with Safari, Mail and Finder versions of 2 exploit samples, and it worked nicely.
Sony issued an 'apology' yesterday: http://cp.sonybmg.com/xcp/
"Hi. My name is George, and I haven't played WoW for 3 months."
.... ....."
"Ok everyone, give George some applause, he has earned it. Tell us more about your feelings towards WoW, George."
* George looking transfixed at the fire axe in the corner, mumbling about hit rates and stamina bonuses *
"Well, it was OMFG soo cool! LOL! I am a level 60 Paladin, and OMG, Molten Core, there is a big dragon. We're going to kill it. OMG! Just you wait until the patch comes out....
*next week*
"Hi. My name is George, and I haven't played WoW for 3 days."
Why not accept the offer of OS X, and install RedHat also, and set them up with dual boot. Anyone who can handle Linux to the point of "tinkering" can handle dual boot. Anyone not interested in "tinkering" who wants to just "just work" could easily be shown both and then use whichever.
I think the level of complication added by dual booting would be outstripped by providing the choice. The only downside would be the extra HD space taken up.
Google was previously entirely blocked in China. I read this first in a Wired magazine article, and as I recall, they had to work hard to be unblocked. I believe they consented to a partial blocking, figuring some access was better than no access. Makes sense to me.