Why do you assume !Eurasia consists solely of the US and no other countries? Last I checked there were two continents in the Western Hemisphere and quite a few countries that aren't the US.
Fun idea, but a better one would be an ultrasonic random noise generator. Might be a good Arduino project. Anyone want to devise a schematic?
I don't know about a schematic, but I've got some old fluorescent light ballasts.... err I mean Cyber-acoustic-gap countermeasures for sale. Only $3700.
Could you do that with bandwidth limited to, say, several kbps?
Several kbps...sounds like dial-up modem speeds back in the day.
Yes, I'm old enough to remember using 2400 baud dial-up.
What's interesting, is that transferring data via audio using modems was artificially limited in data rates, not by the technical capacity of our modems, but because the telephone system basically applied a bandpass filter for voice audio. IIRC it was something like 4khz was the upper frequency that was allowed to pass on voice lines, because human voice reproduction didn't really require the frequencies above 4khz to be understood. That resulted in an artificial boundary compared to the theoretical maximum amount of data Shannon's Theorem indicates you should be able to send over the lines. For telephone lines, excluding fancier techniques, you were basically limited to 2400 baud.
Yet for this audio over air-gap, there isn't that artificial restriction on the bandwidth. You could probably figure out a theoretical maximum transfer rate by taking the bandwidth contained between the maximum limits of human hearing, and the physical limitations of the speaker-microphone pair. Then all you need to do is consider what the S/N ratio is and you could get a pretty good idea of the bandwidth this malware is capable of. (then you need to figure out things like compression, sample rates, etc.)
That was something I wondered about. Sure, you could get information across an airgap this way, but could you get enough information across to be worthwhile? If the purpose of the ultrasonic link is to permit the virus to repair itself against attack, it must be able to download patches and software modules on the fly. Could you do that with bandwidth limited to, say, several kbps?
Easily. Consider something like 'BasicLinux' It's a full fledged operating system that fits in a 2.8MB file. Even if you could only achieve an abysmal 300bps transfer rate, it would only take about 22 hours to transfer an entire operating system. (2.8 * 1024kB/mB * 1024B/kB * 8b/B / 300b/s / 3600s/hr )
300bps would be incredibly slow, and I wouldn't be surpised if that could be pushed much higher.
Has it been observed for long enough to know that is not exactly what is happening? "Immediately" on the scale of a planet spiralling into its sun most likely takes centuries, if not millenia.
I think in most cases, that would be the case. However, this planet has an orbital period of only 8.5 hours! Contrast that with Mercury, which has an orbital period of 88 days. There are just so many opportunities to evaluate this planet it's amazing.
Since Galileo observed Jupiter's moons in 1610, Jupiter has completed its orbit around the sun approximately 34 times. Since the first publishing of the discover of Kepler-78b (not even it's discovery date), it has orbited its star over 469 times!
You are arguing from a position that any device which has the capability to display non-driving related information must be banned. You state that if a feature can be accessed, then the device is not suitable for use by a driver.
With that as your basis, you should also advocate banning:
AM/FM radios, CD players, Tape decks, and any other entertainment system which allows the driver to operate it instead of driving the vehicle.
I didn't get the feeling of 'must be a Miracle of God' speculation in the article... Just a bit of sensationalist headlining. It's possible to be completely secular in your reporting and still be sensationalist. No attribution to the divine necessary.
Hot jupiters have been found as close as 0.0165 AU from sun-like stars. Again, they're very rare, but they exist.
I was trying to come up with an example of something which shouldn't be possible, so I shifted from Jupiter at 0.5 AU to Neptune (assuming it's weaker gravity means that it's gas would be blown away)
Feel free to substitute your own 'impossible' solar system object.
"Stable" is a relative term. According to TFA, Kepler 78b's orbit is unstable, and will degrade in about 3 billion years. "Immediately" in astronomical terms can mean millions or billions of years.
Yup. Literally astronomical. I was mostly glancing at TFA, and I was wondering what they meant by unstable. Did they mean unstable with respect to tidal forces? Or unstable in another manner.
I really want to know what they mean when they say it couldn't have formed and then migrated inward. I don't see why that's 'impossible' given that it isn't in a stable orbit now. If it were in a stable orbit, that would make sense to me, as I could understand why something wouldn't 'fall inward' and then suddenly achieve a stable orbit.
Alas, I think the headline is probably just a bit too sensational, and they really do mean improbable formation, instead of impossible formation.
I don't see how it is bad science at all. It's simple deduction.
Observation: Unexplained galactic rotation Hypothesis: WIMPs of a specific type exist Test: Setup a detector for these WIMPs Analysis/Results: No WIMPs detected, but if they existed the test should have caught them
Next step: Adjust Hypothesis and continue.
Unless your OBSERVATION changes, it is pretty much the scientific process to adjust your hypothesis and continue. The only reason you should break out of that loop is if your observation changes, or you have some reason to challenge the observation itself.
So basically you're using the same logic people use to justify the existence of God? How very..... scientific of you
No...
We have observed 'Y'. We think that 'X' might be what is causing 'Y'. We setup an experiment to test for 'X' The experiment did not detect 'X'. The observed 'Y' still exists, but we now know it is not caused by 'X'.
Or an example:
Every morning, my newspaper is delivered. I think that it is being delivered by car. I have a special 'newspaper delivery car' detector. I setup the detector, and check the results the next morning. The detector did not detect any 'newspaper delivery cars'. The newspaper was still delivered, but I now know it was not delivered by car.
Y = Newspaper delivery X = Delivery by car Experiment = Check for delivery cars Result = proof that delivery was not by car
Yet we know 'Y', the newspaper delivery, occurred/exists even though we have eliminated one of the ways in which it could be occurring.
It's not so much that it's an outlier or unlikely, it's that given our current understanding of planets/orbits/forces, it shouldn't be there at all. ie: There should be 0 planets like it in the universe. It would be like finding a neptune-like planet orbiting a sun-like star at 0.5 AUs, due to the solar wind at that distance, it should only be a 'rocky' planet, not a gas planet. The 'problem' with this planet is that it is too close to the star for it to have formed there, and there is no stable orbital migration pattern which would allow it to have formed farther out and drifted inward as close as it has w/o almost immediately falling into the star itself.
If you have physical access to the validator it would be easier to skim some bills from the machine and remain undetected rather than modify it to accept fake bills that will be noticed as soon as the owner brings them to a bank.
There is physical access, and then there is physical access for a long period of time.
This is more impressive because compromising the system only takes a few seconds. Contrast that to a laptop with epoxy on the ports. I have no doubt it could be broken into, but not in a few seconds, and not without obvious physical signs of access.
A learners permit holder you are required to have a person with a valid license in the vehicle. Therefore you are in training. The theory is that the license holder would not give you control of a vehicle without training you in a safe area first as they probably don't want to get killed or damage the vehicle.
This is not universally true. Another example is for motorcycle licenses. In certain states, mine included, you do not need to have a licensed rider with you. In addition, you could, like I did, get your learners permit, and immediately take your drivers exam. Typically the only time there is a requirement for a minimum period of holding a learners permit is when the permit holder is under 18 years old.
Equipment that displays distracting information such as text messages can not be used in a safe manner hence the law against using such equipment. There is no way to safely drive down a road while reading unrelated complex text.
You know what else is unsafe? Looking to the side to check your mapquest printouts for your exit. Or reading one of those giant LED billboards.
You seem to think I operate some sort of device which pops up text messages. I don't. My texts go directly to email. In addition, I noticed you said 'unrelated' text. That implies that there is useful information which can be displayed.
I call BS. Your phone never rings? It never gets text messages? It does not have a browser? You have never forgotten to turn of those other apps when getting into the vehicle?You may only choose to use the app that displays the safe information but that does not mean the it can not display. The problem with Google Glass is that it can not tell when you are driving and when you are not.
I'm not sure what you are arguing about here... it seems like you don't want cell phones to operate in vehicles at all. I don't answer phone calls, I don't make texts, and I don't browse the internet. I could, but I don't. In addition, you can configure your phone to turn off when the vehicle is motion by measuring GPS and disablign itself if you are moving over a certain speed (15mph for example). I actually do this using the Tasker app in my phone. If my GPS position is changing faster than a rate I set, it mutes my phone and text notifications.
Good for you but not all drivers are so conscientious about their responsibilities. By that logic we should not have speed limits because a properly trained driver would know what speed is safe.
No, by my logic we should be focusing on training drivers to understand their responsibilties. By your logic, we not only should have bans on cell phones, but in-car bluetooth, radios, eating, drinking, speaking to passengers, and anything else which a person might do which increases the risk in a vehicle.
You can never eliminate risk, and some of the proposed laws actually block the implementation of other risk reducing features (like SATNAV applications). There already exists laws against distracted driving, or operating vehicles in a dangerous manner, and those are more than sufficient to pull over people who are actually behaving in a dangerous manner.
It's like advocating for a 0.0 maximum BAC for driving. Sure, it sounds good on the surface, but it really does nothing to address the root causes of drunk driving, and probably would make the whole situation worse. For example: If 0.0 was the max legal BAC, and I just had a single beer, I would be breaking the law if I offered to be the driver for someone who just had 6 beers in an hour.
The point being, these are devices which can be used in a responsible manner, and focusing your attention on device bans, without trying to address the root cause of the problem which is behavioral, just results in a ban on the device, loss of access to the beneficial features, and doesn't actually improve safety.
And I'm not trying to troll or in general be a jerk. I simply do not understand the purpose of region locking software like this. I don't see an upside for the company - even a perceived one - and it only seems to unfairly punish end users that happen to live in some other country. Can someone explain the thinking to me?
1. Distribution rights for regions. I pay you $X for the exclusive right to be the sole distributor of your product. You agree to not authorize anyone else to sell the product in my region. I hope to make more than $X by selling the product in my region without competition. There are often dozens of 'rights' which are sold off in particular regions.
2. Elimination of arbitrage/maximization of regional max-sale prices: You sell the product for the optimum price in a particular region. By region locking the product, you prevent someone from performing arbitrage by buying the product in a cheaper region and reselling it at a discount in a more expensive region.
Worse, you have works which were in the public domain and were given retroactive copyrights.
Personally, I have a serious problem that there are forms of media which will not enter the public domain until after the contemporary culture in which that work was released is dead. I find it very troubling that you won't have people alive who can build upon these works and experienced them first hand.
Imaging in 2080, asking someone born in 2010 about the cultural influences and impact of John Lennon and how that influenced their own work.
Slashdot Mirror
Now that no one is using it, there are less companies that care enough to spend the money lobbying politicians fighting a ban.
Perhaps the bureaucrats at the FDA wanted to ban it in the first place, but were 'convinced' otherwise by a few hints from congress?
No, we got that it was satire. It only took 16 years for them to find someone who thought it was a GOOD satire.
Might want to tell that to the US government. I'm still reporting an underage drinking charge on my SF-86 even though I was never convicted..
Why do you assume !Eurasia consists solely of the US and no other countries? Last I checked there were two continents in the Western Hemisphere and quite a few countries that aren't the US.
Depends on the material of the wall I would think.
My SSH client tunnels through firewalls all the time!
Fun idea, but a better one would be an ultrasonic random noise generator. Might be a good Arduino project. Anyone want to devise a schematic?
I don't know about a schematic, but I've got some old fluorescent light ballasts.... err I mean Cyber-acoustic-gap countermeasures for sale. Only $3700.
Several kbps...sounds like dial-up modem speeds back in the day.
Yes, I'm old enough to remember using 2400 baud dial-up.
What's interesting, is that transferring data via audio using modems was artificially limited in data rates, not by the technical capacity of our modems, but because the telephone system basically applied a bandpass filter for voice audio. IIRC it was something like 4khz was the upper frequency that was allowed to pass on voice lines, because human voice reproduction didn't really require the frequencies above 4khz to be understood. That resulted in an artificial boundary compared to the theoretical maximum amount of data Shannon's Theorem indicates you should be able to send over the lines. For telephone lines, excluding fancier techniques, you were basically limited to 2400 baud.
Yet for this audio over air-gap, there isn't that artificial restriction on the bandwidth. You could probably figure out a theoretical maximum transfer rate by taking the bandwidth contained between the maximum limits of human hearing, and the physical limitations of the speaker-microphone pair. Then all you need to do is consider what the S/N ratio is and you could get a pretty good idea of the bandwidth this malware is capable of. (then you need to figure out things like compression, sample rates, etc.)
That was something I wondered about. Sure, you could get information across an airgap this way, but could you get enough information across to be worthwhile? If the purpose of the ultrasonic link is to permit the virus to repair itself against attack, it must be able to download patches and software modules on the fly. Could you do that with bandwidth limited to, say, several kbps?
Easily. Consider something like 'BasicLinux' It's a full fledged operating system that fits in a 2.8MB file. Even if you could only achieve an abysmal 300bps transfer rate, it would only take about 22 hours to transfer an entire operating system. (2.8 * 1024kB/mB * 1024B/kB * 8b/B / 300b/s / 3600s/hr )
300bps would be incredibly slow, and I wouldn't be surpised if that could be pushed much higher.
Has it been observed for long enough to know that is not exactly what is happening? "Immediately" on the scale of a planet spiralling into its sun most likely takes centuries, if not millenia.
I think in most cases, that would be the case. However, this planet has an orbital period of only 8.5 hours! Contrast that with Mercury, which has an orbital period of 88 days. There are just so many opportunities to evaluate this planet it's amazing.
Since Galileo observed Jupiter's moons in 1610, Jupiter has completed its orbit around the sun approximately 34 times. Since the first publishing of the discover of Kepler-78b (not even it's discovery date), it has orbited its star over 469 times!
You are arguing from a position that any device which has the capability to display non-driving related information must be banned. You state that if a feature can be accessed, then the device is not suitable for use by a driver.
With that as your basis, you should also advocate banning:
AM/FM radios, CD players, Tape decks, and any other entertainment system which allows the driver to operate it instead of driving the vehicle.
I didn't get the feeling of 'must be a Miracle of God' speculation in the article... Just a bit of sensationalist headlining. It's possible to be completely secular in your reporting and still be sensationalist. No attribution to the divine necessary.
Hot jupiters have been found as close as 0.0165 AU from sun-like stars. Again, they're very rare, but they exist.
I was trying to come up with an example of something which shouldn't be possible, so I shifted from Jupiter at 0.5 AU to Neptune (assuming it's weaker gravity means that it's gas would be blown away)
Feel free to substitute your own 'impossible' solar system object.
"Stable" is a relative term. According to TFA, Kepler 78b's orbit is unstable, and will degrade in about 3 billion years. "Immediately" in astronomical terms can mean millions or billions of years.
Yup. Literally astronomical. I was mostly glancing at TFA, and I was wondering what they meant by unstable. Did they mean unstable with respect to tidal forces? Or unstable in another manner.
I really want to know what they mean when they say it couldn't have formed and then migrated inward. I don't see why that's 'impossible' given that it isn't in a stable orbit now. If it were in a stable orbit, that would make sense to me, as I could understand why something wouldn't 'fall inward' and then suddenly achieve a stable orbit.
Alas, I think the headline is probably just a bit too sensational, and they really do mean improbable formation, instead of impossible formation.
Oh I definitely agree, it's not that it IS impossible, it's just impossible based on our current models.
I'm of the opinion that it's a captured exoplanet, or one which suffered a collision and lost angular momentum.
I don't see how it is bad science at all. It's simple deduction.
Observation: Unexplained galactic rotation
Hypothesis: WIMPs of a specific type exist
Test: Setup a detector for these WIMPs
Analysis/Results: No WIMPs detected, but if they existed the test should have caught them
Next step: Adjust Hypothesis and continue.
Unless your OBSERVATION changes, it is pretty much the scientific process to adjust your hypothesis and continue. The only reason you should break out of that loop is if your observation changes, or you have some reason to challenge the observation itself.
So basically you're using the same logic people use to justify the existence of God? How very..... scientific of you
No...
We have observed 'Y'. We think that 'X' might be what is causing 'Y'. We setup an experiment to test for 'X' The experiment did not detect 'X'. The observed 'Y' still exists, but we now know it is not caused by 'X'.
Or an example:
Every morning, my newspaper is delivered. I think that it is being delivered by car. I have a special 'newspaper delivery car' detector. I setup the detector, and check the results the next morning. The detector did not detect any 'newspaper delivery cars'. The newspaper was still delivered, but I now know it was not delivered by car.
Y = Newspaper delivery
X = Delivery by car
Experiment = Check for delivery cars
Result = proof that delivery was not by car
Yet we know 'Y', the newspaper delivery, occurred/exists even though we have eliminated one of the ways in which it could be occurring.
It's not so much that it's an outlier or unlikely, it's that given our current understanding of planets/orbits/forces, it shouldn't be there at all. ie: There should be 0 planets like it in the universe. It would be like finding a neptune-like planet orbiting a sun-like star at 0.5 AUs, due to the solar wind at that distance, it should only be a 'rocky' planet, not a gas planet. The 'problem' with this planet is that it is too close to the star for it to have formed there, and there is no stable orbital migration pattern which would allow it to have formed farther out and drifted inward as close as it has w/o almost immediately falling into the star itself.
Gee, and to think my silly S.O. just yells out the window.
Sorry--your example is good. It just strikes as me being like the two people sitting at the same table sending texts to each other...
No problem, I figured it would throw some people off. My lower 'yard' is about 500' from the house.
If you have physical access to the validator it would be easier to skim some bills from the machine and remain undetected rather than modify it to accept fake bills that will be noticed as soon as the owner brings them to a bank.
Ever hear the phrase, "Her register was short"?
I define cheese as Lunar regolith. You wouldn't believe the prices NASA charges for a simple gouda.
There is physical access, and then there is physical access for a long period of time.
This is more impressive because compromising the system only takes a few seconds. Contrast that to a laptop with epoxy on the ports. I have no doubt it could be broken into, but not in a few seconds, and not without obvious physical signs of access.
A learners permit holder you are required to have a person with a valid license in the vehicle. Therefore you are in training. The theory is that the license holder would not give you control of a vehicle without training you in a safe area first as they probably don't want to get killed or damage the vehicle.
This is not universally true. Another example is for motorcycle licenses. In certain states, mine included, you do not need to have a licensed rider with you. In addition, you could, like I did, get your learners permit, and immediately take your drivers exam. Typically the only time there is a requirement for a minimum period of holding a learners permit is when the permit holder is under 18 years old.
Equipment that displays distracting information such as text messages can not be used in a safe manner hence the law against using such equipment. There is no way to safely drive down a road while reading unrelated complex text.
You know what else is unsafe? Looking to the side to check your mapquest printouts for your exit. Or reading one of those giant LED billboards.
You seem to think I operate some sort of device which pops up text messages. I don't. My texts go directly to email. In addition, I noticed you said 'unrelated' text. That implies that there is useful information which can be displayed.
I call BS. Your phone never rings? It never gets text messages? It does not have a browser? You have never forgotten to turn of those other apps when getting into the vehicle?You may only choose to use the app that displays the safe information but that does not mean the it can not display. The problem with Google Glass is that it can not tell when you are driving and when you are not.
I'm not sure what you are arguing about here... it seems like you don't want cell phones to operate in vehicles at all. I don't answer phone calls, I don't make texts, and I don't browse the internet. I could, but I don't. In addition, you can configure your phone to turn off when the vehicle is motion by measuring GPS and disablign itself if you are moving over a certain speed (15mph for example). I actually do this using the Tasker app in my phone. If my GPS position is changing faster than a rate I set, it mutes my phone and text notifications.
Good for you but not all drivers are so conscientious about their responsibilities. By that logic we should not have speed limits because a properly trained driver would know what speed is safe.
No, by my logic we should be focusing on training drivers to understand their responsibilties. By your logic, we not only should have bans on cell phones, but in-car bluetooth, radios, eating, drinking, speaking to passengers, and anything else which a person might do which increases the risk in a vehicle.
You can never eliminate risk, and some of the proposed laws actually block the implementation of other risk reducing features (like SATNAV applications). There already exists laws against distracted driving, or operating vehicles in a dangerous manner, and those are more than sufficient to pull over people who are actually behaving in a dangerous manner.
It's like advocating for a 0.0 maximum BAC for driving. Sure, it sounds good on the surface, but it really does nothing to address the root causes of drunk driving, and probably would make the whole situation worse. For example: If 0.0 was the max legal BAC, and I just had a single beer, I would be breaking the law if I offered to be the driver for someone who just had 6 beers in an hour.
The point being, these are devices which can be used in a responsible manner, and focusing your attention on device bans, without trying to address the root cause of the problem which is behavioral, just results in a ban on the device, loss of access to the beneficial features, and doesn't actually improve safety.
So you are doing a bit of work for them to give them more of your information so that they can more effectively convince you to part with your money.
I mean, my hobbies cost me money too, but you've got a bit of a strange one there.
And I'm not trying to troll or in general be a jerk. I simply do not understand the purpose of region locking software like this. I don't see an upside for the company - even a perceived one - and it only seems to unfairly punish end users that happen to live in some other country. Can someone explain the thinking to me?
1. Distribution rights for regions. I pay you $X for the exclusive right to be the sole distributor of your product. You agree to not authorize anyone else to sell the product in my region. I hope to make more than $X by selling the product in my region without competition. There are often dozens of 'rights' which are sold off in particular regions.
2. Elimination of arbitrage/maximization of regional max-sale prices: You sell the product for the optimum price in a particular region. By region locking the product, you prevent someone from performing arbitrage by buying the product in a cheaper region and reselling it at a discount in a more expensive region.
Worse, you have works which were in the public domain and were given retroactive copyrights.
Personally, I have a serious problem that there are forms of media which will not enter the public domain until after the contemporary culture in which that work was released is dead. I find it very troubling that you won't have people alive who can build upon these works and experienced them first hand.
Imaging in 2080, asking someone born in 2010 about the cultural influences and impact of John Lennon and how that influenced their own work.