Posts by Effigy

TikTok appeals to have Trump – or Supreme Court – decide its fate later

Re: A pox on them all

TikTok collects no more data about users than other social networks. The difference is that US TLA's are free to surveil citizens via e.g. Facebook but is unable to surveil TikTok users. This is the entire intent of the law.

A Chinese crypto farm next to a nuclear missile base? Not on my watch, says Biden

This is clearly more industry protectionism, purchased by the finance lobby. Likely another forced sale to a friend of a congressman, who is pleased that the facility, circuits, etc are built out already. Congress would like such a forced sale for TikTok (but a ban is more likely and also desirable to owning-class interests).

More US farmland is foreign-owned than you think, much owned by Chinese agribusiness (perhaps next to military facilities). Presumably this is a greater national (food) security threat than a single crypto shop. This is allowed to keep land speculators fat, and land assets are easier to seize.

Palantir's CEO calls 'woke' a 'central risk to Palantir, America and the world'

Re: Paganism.

Hey Joe McCarthy: stop Russia-jacketing and dehumanizing everyone you think is sus. This lowers every discourse, which is certainly your intent. I'll call you Joe McCarthy in every thread I see you do this, or maybe just start reporting you.

Chinese government website security is often worryingly bad, say Chinese researchers

"found not to have name server (NS) records"

... meaning the security researchers were given a spreadsheet with stale data, or with applications available only on private networks. I know because my shop's infosec team flags similar "issues".

While some findings in this list are concerning, this is generally "dog bites man" given the general state of internet security. Commenters seem eager to extrapolate some dictum about China but I promise you similar results will be found in a sample of 14k websites in any of our home countries.

Gentoo Linux tells AI-generated code contributions to fork off

"a huge issue", well as stated it's one of several issues that taken together prompted the ban. There's no equivalence, since the Gentoo user base isn't prompting large capital to build new data centers every week.

Ex-White House CIO tells The Reg: TikTok ban may be diplomatic disaster

To add nuance, the partnership is required to either yield majority stake to the Chinese partner _or_ yield the technology rights. So a foreign company operating in China chooses whether to share the tech. This avoids companies operating there but providing no benefit to their economy beyond labor extraction. The more sinophobic westerners somehow turn this into "they're stealing our tech!"

That Asian meal you eat on holidays could launder money for North Korea

You can't back a single claim with evidence. It's all conjecture. They're a poor country that no one will trade with. They have nukes solely so they don't get Iraq'd by the US. I don't doubt the state does some shady things from desperation. But in 2024 "axis of evil" claims will require evidence beyond quotes from State-Department-mouthpiece news outlets.

The restaurants in southeast Asia run by DPRK are well-known. There's a legitimate purpose which is to accumulate cash in foreign currencies for conducting trade and reducing trade imbalances. This is normal activity even if not normally done directly by a state.

I'll buy that there's some laundering but the scaremongering isn't necessary. Crypto heists are awful. Freelance tech workers? The world is full of workers from the global south working, possibly undocumented, in the global north and sending remittances home. Concealing their identity and "laundering" earnings through a restaurant in a non-sanctioned country isn't as nefarious as the linked article makes it out to be, nor is it unique to DPRK. The claim that these remittances "reportedly help to fund the country's development of weapons of mass destruction" could be said about the taxes of any wage-earner in a nuclear-armed country.

Please apply your critical thinking to all media, even El Reg.

Texas judge turns out the lights on federal survey of cryptominers' energy consumption

"The idea that the cost of power credits paid to the miners is "passed on to everyone else" rather than just being a tiny fraction of the profits the power companies make from the miners is rather ridiculous"

The credits come from ERCOT and ultimately from taxpayers (me). It's a public subsidy for industry from lawmakers that despise subsidies when they're for actual public benefit.

"many miners in Texas don't receive any such payments" ... "tiny fraction" ... "a few of those dollars"

If it's such a pittance, and no one really claims the credits, then the subsidy isn't needed right?

Underwater cables in Red Sea damaged months after Houthis 'threatened' to do just that

Re: conflicting accounts

Thanks for digging. FP and MEMRI are far from objective sources, and they have no problem making evidence-free allegations to advance a narrative. It's not like Ansarallah (Houthis) to attack infrastructure in an indiscriminate way (though also not impossible). As you pointed out, they would take responsibility if they did it.

Houthis shouldn't be mischaracterized as "rebels" since they're the de facto government for 80% of Yemen's population. The oft-repeated claim that they're "Iran-backed", while plausible, remains entirely unexamined by media outlets. I wish El Reg was more careful with this kind or reporting or avoided it entirely.

Microsoft deigns to fix five-year-old Defender bug that slowed Firefox

So that was the problem

Since updating, my laptop has been running responsively for three days now without a reboot. I was definitely affected by the bug. For the last couple years I have to reboot every 48 hours, usually less because the system became so slow. I assumed everyone lived like this and I've been bad-mouthing Windows the whole time. Anyway, nice to have it fixed even at this late date.

Russian developers blocked from contributing to FOSS tools

It's a stretch to call Germany's reparations substantial. In the west Nazis were allowed to keep their good jobs and positions of power (the GDR identified and fired those people). The family wealth and institutional wealth cross generations and are largely intact.

Sanctions are war and the point is absolutely to cause suffering among the most vulnerable. The average Russian has zero power to stop the invasion, exactly as much as I did when I protested the US' invasion of Iraq twenty years ago. Fine if you want retribution but be honest about the intent and impact.

For password protection, dump LastPass for open source Bitwarden

Secure notes are encrypted, not just passwords.

Phil's question hasn't been answered in the comments or in the article: what reason do I have to think that the same headline won't appear for BitWarden a year from now?

It matters because I'm being told to take on another migration to something that isn't better. For this effort we should move to a team-aware offline solution (git-crypt or the like).