Posts by Vic

Accidental homicide: how VoLTE kills old style call accounting

Re: Old style acounting, and old style plans

Who has a mobile phone plan where they actually end up paying for individual calls?

I do. For my usage pattern, it works out a lot cheaper that way...

Vic.

Let's talk about that NSA Diffie-Hellman crack

Re: Re. Primed

A signal that tells an artillery battery to open fire in 5 minutes is fine to send out on a code system which can be broken in 6 minutes time.

At the risk of being pedantic, that's not actually true...

If an attacker can see your historic messages, he can build a picture of you. This will likely give him a good guess at certain phrases that you will usually use in communications. Bletchley Park dubbed these "tells", and they are an important method of breaking future communications. It's essentially how they broke Enigma...

Vic.

Nippy, palaver and cockwomble: Greatest words in English?

Re: More from him...

Indeed, it's a great beer too!

https://www.staustellbrewery.co.uk/proper-job

They've gor a new one called Big Job. A fair bit hoppier, and quite a bit stronger to boot.

I'm currently enjoying one :-)

Vic.

Samsung told to build bots who work for less than Foxconn staffers

then start wanting better conditions, time off work, more pay.

That's basically the motivation that drove Call-Me_Kenneth to start the rebellion.

Vic.

EA Games rubbishes Pastebin breach claim

Re: I have been boycotting EA Games for a few years now

I might log back and change my password though. I think I'll set it to EAGamesSucksBigHairyDonkeyBalls

You're supposed to use a password that isn't obvious...

Vic.

Germany says Ja to data-slurp law 2.0

Re: @Doctor Syntax

I think Theresa May could learn a thing or 2 from the germans.

I think Theresa May could learn a thing or two from that small lump of green putty I found in my armpit...

Vic.

Down and out? Rimini's Oracle slap spells trouble – for Oracle

Re: It's hard to take El Reg seriously

Oracle-bashing is getting a bit tired

You registered just to post that?

One could almost imagine you have an agenda...

Vic.

Re: Hipocracy much ?

copyright infringement is theft.

No, it isn't. However wrong it might be, it isn't theft, for the same reason that driving over the speed limit isn't shoplifting.

We've done this many times...

Vic.

Wheels come off parents' plan to dub sprog 'Mini Cooper'

Re: Belgium wisely prevented Mr and Mrs Renault from calling their daughter Megane

Mercedes is a girl's name.

It's better than that. Mercedes is a Jewish girl's name,

Hitler's favourite car was named after a Jewess. That makes my day :-)

Vic

Someone I knew did name his daughter Theresa ... with the obvious surname of Green.

I went to school with a girl called Theresa Green.

Strangely enough, none of us thought it weird until many years later...

Vic.

Re: wear mine proudly

what in the name of ${DEITY} is *wrong* with giving your child a unique name?

It means they have no choice whether or not to stand out from the crowd; they will do so by your volition, not their own.

As a child, I resented my parents' decision to give me a relatively unusual name. As an adult, I have become accustomed to it - to the extent that I rarely use my surname.But the transition between those phases involved quite a bit of aggravation; I believe my life would have been much simpler if I had had a more commonplace name - although it might have been less lucrative...

Vic.

Navy engineer gets 11 years for attempted espionage

Re: I don't know what Egypt would do with the plans anyway...

Unless its a British carrier, which will have to make do with a solitary Type 45 destroyer. If you're lucky.

No, that's completely unfair.

Most military docks are full of weaponry, and all of that is available to defend all the vessels within them - including carriers.

Vic.

Virgin Media filters are still eating our email – Ntlworlders

Re: ISP email?

I have done something similar to prove that RM sold their account lists - or had them stolen - because they were the only ones ever issued with [e-mail]).

You've done no such thing.

A username part as simple as "rm" could easily have bene found by dictionary attack or domain enumeration. Had your address been "thi[e-mail]", you might have had a point...

Vic.

Re: Banks generally explicitly state that they will never, ever email you

Many banks do email their customers - I get a dozen or so messages from mine every week

I get a dozen or so messages from yours every week too.

Vic.

Minicab-hailing app Uber is lawful – UK High Court

In what way are Uber drivers not very obviously self-employed?

Their work all comes from the same source. Under IR35 regulations, that looks like employment, and HMRC will probably treat it as such (as they do with other self-employed people getting all their work from the same place).

Vic.

Ad networks promise to do something about the awful adverts you're all blocking, like, real soon

I can state with absolute confidence that Cillet Bang has never, ever been purchased by this household

I find those adverts very useful for training in the location of the mute button on unfamiliar TV remotes...

Vic.

UK's Lloyds Banking Group scrambles to patch account-snooping security hole

Re: You say bug he says feature

it is still basic functionality that the test team should have discovered and raised.

It should have been found and fixed long before it got anywhere near the test team...

Vic.

UK drivers left idling as Tesla rolls out Autopilot in US

Re: Parallel parking

Russ Swift would agree there.

I once emailed Russ Swift to see if he did lessons. I asked if he'd "teach me to drive like a nutter".

He replied that the only Vic he knew already drove like a nutter...

The guy in question had the same surname as me, but sadly, wasn't me.

Vic.

Holy litigation, Batman! Custom Batmobile cars nixed by copyright

Re: So to condense that

Copyright is ONLY about money. The OP got it wrong when it said that no one can make a Batmobile - anyone can. They just can't PROFIT from it by selling it commercially.

No, that's completely wrong. If it were so, it would be legal to make copies of anything you like as long as you don't sell it. Try copying stuff and telling people about it and you'll find out just how wrong you are...

Copyright is about protecting the original creator's right to make money from his creation.

No, copyright is the right to copy. It's that simple.

Vic.

DevOps tools: The beginner's guide to Chef

Re: This is a little thin

Even for a 101

My thoughts exactly.

I use Puppet on a day-to-day basis, so I'm already sold on CM. I came to the article to see what Chef offers in contrast to Puppet. And I'm going away rather disappointed...

Vic.

US Treasury: How did ISIS get your trucks? Toyota: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Re: USA.gov takes another swing at foregin vehicle maker

I've never understood why people buy them over here.

Some of them look rather pretty...

I've always promised myself that one day, I will own a TransAm. I *know* it's a pile of shite, but I still want one.

It will not be my only vehicle. I am fully aware that it will be the single least reliable vehicle I've ever owned. And I used to have a Lotus...

Vic.

EU desperately pushes just-as-dodgy safe harbour alternatives

Forrester Research, a technology research firm, said the losses could be as high as $180 billion

Are those "street prices"? About £50, then...

Vic.

Factory settings FAIL: Data easily recovered from eBayed smartphones, disks

Re: Wipe App

That's what Blancco sells: Erasure tools for phones & disk drives

I used to be associated with a charity that refurbished & re-sold PCs. We originally set up a dban station for wiping drives. Management then decided that we would have to use Blancco instead,

I don't know if they've changed their model, but back then, the software had an initial cost, *plus* a cost for each use. And this charity was particularly cash-strapped.

I have nothing to do with them any more.

Vic.

Alleged Anonymous-aiding journo's brief tells jury nowt's been proven

Re: Wow...

HR: Oh, him? He left last week.

Your point notwithstanding, I'd also like to point out that his former employer was *also* dumb as shit.

When an employee leaves - under *any* circumstances - you disable the account. Keep the data, but make damn sure the account can't be used to log in to anything.

Vic.

Microsoft, Tesla, build battery that knows how much (energy) you suck

Is it just me?

Or does this idea leave the user with a set of batteries having most or all of the disadvantages of each individual battery?

Vic.

Shutterbug drone biz fined $1.9m for buzzing New York City, Chicago

Re: Unfortunately it will likely happen

Even if that aircraft is a single-engine design? The kind you often see at air-shows?

If the engine is destroyed on take-off, the pilot will follow the standard EFATO drill. This is drummed into pilots since early in their PPL training.

Vic.

Re: Unfortunately it will likely happen

There was a major flap at an air show recently due to reports of a drone reported flying around the runway

I went to a few airshows this summer. There were many announcements over the PA that drone flying was not permitted.

And yet there were still plenty of stalls selling drones...

Vic.

Google .supplies .cheap web .properties with 90 top-level .domains to .world via .partners

Not available outside the US...

You need a billing address in the States to use it.

Vic.

Microsoft updates Band semi-smartwatch for fitness fanatics

Re: barometer

If the device is sufficiently waterproof could you use it for diving?

Very unlikely. Water is so much denser than air, that if it's got the resolution to be useful out of water, it's very unlikely to have the range to be useful underwater.

Vic.

AD-NNIHILATION: Apple-approved iOS tool blocks ALL ads in apps, Safari, Apple News

Re: Again, how does this work?

Assuming https is not horribly broken on iOS, the prerequisite for this would be installation of own fake root CA

Or it might have a hook into the browser, intercepting the traffic after decryption.

This is no less worrisome.

Vic.

Silicon Valley now 'illegal' in Europe: Why Schrems vs Facebook is such a biggie

Re: Let me count the ways...

the transport between the two mail servers is not mandatory encrypted and may thus be in plain text..

You can *require* that your MTA only connects over a TLS link. But that doesn't prevent anything past that hop being plaintext :-(

Vic.

Re: Mainly a public sector issue

I am no MS fan, but MS has datacenters in the EU, the only issue is that they would need to store the data in the EU DataCenters

No.

They are already in court fighting exactly that case; if they win, then what you have said above is (almost) true.

But at present, they are legally oblliged to hand over any data they "control" - i.e. any data in any data centre in the world over which they have any power.

Vic.

Re: ms datacentres

MS have recently gained approval for cloud storage for sensitive data. They have concluded a deal with the MoD. Think about that for a moment.

And if they lose their case against the DoJ, they can *still* be forced to hand over all that data to pretty much any US official that wants a gander. Think about that for a moment.

Vic.

If you don't want your letters to go through the Soviet Postal System, don't send any letters to recipients within the Soviet Postal System.

That presupposes that you know your letters are going through the Soviet Postal System.

Suppose, for example. you were simply emailing a UK organisation form inside the UK. Let's imagine an imaginary digital tabloid. Let's call it theregister.co.uk.

Safe to assume that email is staying in the EU? No, it isn't. Because if you actually check the MX records, you'll see that the many MX records for our fictitious organisation all point to the US...

Vic.

Re: Now this is just hilarious

There's so much wrong with this post, I don't know where to start.

At least he missed out the allegations of antisemitism. For once.

Vic.

Linux kernel dev who asked Linus Torvalds to stop verbal abuse quits over verbal abuse

Re: /. dug up some interesting dirt

No, she said that "You may need to learn to shout at people." was "*fucking* uncool". That's not interesting dirt, it's a perfectly reasonable statement.

No, I don't think so. It would appear to be an escalation of the situation.

If you don't like people being told they need to shout[1], starting to swear at them is inappropriate.

Vic.

[1] Even if you do take that bit entirely out of context. In the original context, it was merely a jokey way of telling Greg KH that he needed to be more willing to reject code he didn't like, rather than fixing it himself every time...

Re: If that is the case then please enlighten me with your wisdom

Indeed. If you read the post that this article is about she comes across as perfectly sensible

Well, I'm not going to try to claim some sort of encyclopaedic knowledge here, but from my cursory examination of the spat, she actually appears to be the perpetrator of those behaviours she finds abhorrent...

Vic.

Re: So is this all about a clash of personalities?

Sarah Sharp, on the other hand, is pretty much an unknown quantity

Not any more.

Prior to this, you'd probably only know of her if you'd had USB3 dealings in Linux. But now she's made this big bold statement, people have been looking into her. And it's not gone well...

Vic.

Re: The problem is, usually Linus is right

The fact is that the Linux kernel project is his

Not intrinsically so; he is merely the lead maintainer.

Many a time, he has told people to make a fork if they don't like how he does things. He has neither right nor power to prevent such a thing occurring. The fact that no stable kernel fork has overcome his is testament to the fact that most developers seem reasonably happy with how he runs things.

Vic.

Re: The problem is, usually Linus is right

First, it was not "her responsibility", she is a volunteer. No one obliged her or paid her to do that work.

From a feature on her,

Where do you get your paycheck?

I work in Intel's Open Source Technology Center,

Vic.

Re: The problem is, usually Linus is right

I think the point is that such behaviour is unnecessary and counter-productive at best.

Not necessarily. Have you *seen* systemd?

Vic.

THIS is MASSIVE! Less-Masslessness neutrino boffins bag Physics Nobel

Re: Wait, a coffee cup sized detector?

Sure that isn't just a strong Brownian Motion generator and they are actually building an... Infinite Probability Drive???

No. That would be a tea mug-sized detector.

Vic.

French hacks go after new surveillance law … with the help of the ECHR

Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite

Pick any two^Wonezero.

Vic.

GENUINE STARSHIP as used by PRINCESS LEIA sold for just $450k

It is only the absence of life signs which holds their fire and saves the Galaxy as they know it.

"Hold your fire? What, are we paying by the laser now?"

"You don't do the budget Terry, I do."

Vic.

Rise of der Maschinen: Daimler trials ROBOT LORRY in Germany

Re: Wrong!

it took a long time for me to get used to them not auto-cancelling like in a car.

My bike still has auto-cancelling indicators. But as it's a Yammy, it's only a matter of time before they fail...

Vic.

Re: Wrong!

In the same way, you should never assume that an indicator being on is saying "I will be turning here"

My motorcycle instructor had a awonderful piece of advice: "The orange signals on a car mean one thing and one thing only. The bulb is working at least half of the time".

Vic.

Re: Steel guts, give up control

Going off on a slight tangent...

all the pilot had to do at the end was... let.go.of.the.controls.

There's a wonderful story about the so-called Cornfield Bomber. The pilot managed to get the aircraft into a flat spin, which he deemed unrecoverable (probably correctly).

He ejected.

The thrust from the ejection, coupled with the change in CofG, caused the aircraft to come out of the spin. It then landed in a field, where it was left to run out of fuel. It was returned to service.

Vic.

Lawyers win big in LinkedIn's $13m email spam lawsuit (you might get $10, maybe more)

And I get multiple emails from LinkedIn saying 'be his/her friend pleeeease'.

Lucky you.

I get a list of "people you may know". It always includes Darl McBride.

Vic.

US tries one last time to sway EU court on data-slurping deal

Re: Communicating with targets?

So, if Ahmed bin Nutjob ([e-mail]) buys a pair of fluffy slippers from amazon, then all the communications of amazon are now a legitimate target of global surveillance by the nutjobs in the NSA?

Well of course. But they'll not be indiscriminate about this - they'll delve no deeper than, say, six degrees of separation. More than that would be just silly.

Vic.

Woman makes app that lets people rate and review you, Yelp-style. Now SHE'S upset people are 'reviewing' her

How many people bashing Peeple have actually looked into it

Most of us.

It doesn't take long to realise just how bad an idea it is, for the same reason it doesn't take long to realise it's a bad idea to stand in the middle of an unlit mnotorway wearing black at night.

It just is that obviously idiotic...

Vic.