Posts by John Sturdy

'Death knell' for Eye-o-Sauron™ US border stare-towers

If the Yanks won't buy them...

If the Yanks won't buy them, perhaps the Met will. One on every street corner throughout London. Not against Mexicans, you understand. It's the Brazilian electricians that are the threat.

Police issue lock-up-your-chihuahuas killer owl warning

So if the Mosquito is banned...

So if the Mosquito is banned, can we deploy Eagle Owls to deal with hordes of chavlings?

Bloggers spring 'baccy happy landlord from slammer

Drop the exemption for Hazchem warnings?

Apparently tobacco is exempt from having hazchem warning symbols on its packaging that would otherwise be required for the substances it contains -- I read that it would be 25 warnings, including 9 "do not smoke in the vicinity of this substance".

Kentucky woman breastfeeds sheriff's deputy

Won't someone think of the badgers?

Isn't there a risk of her cross-infecting the local badgers with tuberculosis?

Man of God backs Beverley porncoder

They seem to have removed the comments section

Although the link given ends with "#StartComments", not only does it not take you to the comments section of the page, but it appears there is now no comments section.

France leapfrogs past Australia in Big Brother stakes

No big surprise here

France is one of the countries that has tried to ban strong encryption. I'm not surprised that they've moved on to this.

Echelon computers can't cope with bad lines

So will the old joke become true?

Perhaps they'll get enough processing power that the old joke "Want to work for the NSA? Just mention it to your Mum next time you ring her, and we'll get you an application form in the post." will become closer to reality?

Top Gear's Stig prowls Loch Ness

New algorithm?

Perhaps it's a new blurring algorithm, which instead of blurring faces, replaces the whole image of the person with a Stig image? We could call it stiganography!

Report calls for mandatory shared back office

If their servers don't hang separately...

If their servers don't hang separately, they're sure to hang together.

Microsoft predicts Linux will fail mobile 'quality' test

Not just the executives, the crackers as well

People looking to break into a large number of phones will welcome a monoculture, too.

Police snapper silliness reaches new heights

Dilution of data on people who disagree with the government

Spamming the FIT files might help to reduce their usefulness, thus helping the right to express views not approved by the government (and thus lead to the End of Civilization As We Know It, about time too if this is what that civilization has led to).

Come to think of it, they could build a much smaller database if they just listed the few who *do* agree with the government, instead of those who don't.

Muswell Hillbillies force BT to move broadband boxes

Size matters

How come everyone else has been miniaturizing technology for decades, and BT is going to larger boxes? What's in them, ENIACs?

Legless woman falls onto Boston train tracks

Attempted suicide?

Was this an accident while drunk, or getting some Dutch Courage, taking a final desparate smoke, and jumping under a train? Those last couple of steps looked aimed, and she appeared to be looking for when the train was coming moments before (although the latter she might be doing anyway).

Blind gamer sues Sony

Braille notices

What's published only in Braille? See http://xkcd.com/315/

Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ6

But it's Panasonic... so...

Last time I heard anything about Panasonic it was that they were changing their firmware to prevent use with third-party batteries, so regardless of the other characteristics of their cameras, I'll be steering clear of them.

Plods' 'extremist' sheet included BAE mole

What MI5 says about domestic extremism

I googled "domestic extremism", and top of the list came MI5's page, which says "Some extremist groups also have a subversive agenda, seeking to undermine parliamentary democracy or the British economy."

I think us commentards can tell them just who have been undermining parlimentary democracy and the British economy. (See Peter Oborne's "The triumph of the political class" for the horrible details of how parlimentary democracy has been replaced by "manipulative populism".)

Pig plague could crash interwebs, say US feds

Critical networks?

So the US government opinion is that the main problem would be that "stock brokers and other securities market employees would be unable to telework from home"? Evidently more critical than any use for health-related purposes.

Home Office: El Reg may be right on vetting figures

Meaningless

How many people are going to follow up on a claimed `CRB clearance' mentioned in an advert, contract bid or whatever, anyway?

Next thing: meaningless `CRB cleared' lapel pins, probably with an EU stars symbol somewhere on them for good measure. Available from any temporary market stall, you don't even have to go to a passport seller.

GCHQ outsources net snooping... to EDS

@MinionZero

Citizen MinionZero, why so much optimism for the future?

You think the UK's bad? Well, think what the whole EU could be like if Blair gets to be president for the proposed longer terms, and has more strategies to pick and mix from. Think UK-style spying-on-people AND French-style riot police... (and French/German style `not taking your mobile phone with you is evidence of evil intent'!); but of course you get to vote, so they can say it's better than China; in fact if you vote wrong, you get to vote again until you vote right.

Not bothering with AC because anyone who can cause a problem will be able to track me down anyway. I'm sure I'm already on a list, because a couple of times I've tried telephoning a friend who's involved in peace activism, while I happened to be at Shannon Airport (where there are regular protests again US military use of it) and I couldn't phone her from there; I can phone her number from anywhere else, and I could phone anyone else I thought of trying from there, and I tried it again on other days, and got the same effects; so I'm pretty confident there was deliberate blocking, and I don't expect that any blocking system will fail to record who it's blocked.

Tories will let voters 'rewrite' legislation online

A move in the right direction, in several ways

It's about time something like this was at least tried. It needn't (and shouldn't) stand in isolation; people (any people, not just the government... in fact, preferably anyone except the government) could set up annotation sites to do the discussion, perhaps with automoderation (karma schemes etc) so you wouldn't have to wade through all comments if you didn't want to.

And as for legislation being indecipherable: this could be the opportunity to push for comprehensible legislation.

The next step would be for people to start standing as direct democracy party candidates, like Demoex and Aktivdemokrati (both in Sweden).

OMG US states to ban txting + driving

@Fred 4

Agreed -- if a call is important, stop and concentrate on it. A phone that you can take with you is still a lot better than a landline.

And if your business can't survive without making calls on the move, I'd rather give my custom to someone better organized than you anyway.

UK.gov appeals for developers to mashup 1,000 datasets

Simple

Make available all data that there's no specific (and good) reason not to provide. For a start, that's all non-personal non-security-sensitive data. And don't leave out any details just because you can't think why anyone would want them.

Do it in an open format (XML, CSV, HTML, plain text, etc).

Make everything bookmarkable so we can cross-reference it from citizen-generated data such as a massive sousveillance database :-).

My main (and largely rhetorical) question is why weren't they at this stage ten years ago?

Euro project to arrest us for what they think we will do

Suspicious behaviour

Forms of suspicious behaviour (from David Mery's article "Innocent in London", GIYF if you haven't already got it bookmarked):

* I went into the station without looking at the police officers at the entrance or by the gates, i.e. I was ‘avoiding them’

* two other men entered the station at about the same time as me

* I am wearing a jacket ‘too warm for the season’

* I am carrying a bulky rucksack

* I kept my rucksack with me at all times (I had it on my back)

* I looked at people coming on the platform

* I played with my mobile phone and then took a paper from inside my jacket.

Let me guess, the database will be confidential and so they won't be allowed to give you this amount of information when they use the database as an excuse for arresting you?

I'm glad I emigrated from the UK. My next move will probably be non-EU, I hear (from a Chinese colleague) that day-to-day freedoms are much better in China as long as you don't want to vote, whereas here (Ireland) if you vote the wrong way (Lisbon) they just ask you to vote again, and both in Ireland and the UK the only parties with much chance of getting in aren't going to do anything significantly from each other.

Time for a massive souveillance database perhaps? Then we can correlate frequency of speeches with Hansard with the phase of the moon, and find out which MPs are actually werewolves ;-)

NO2ID beats off ad complaint

Lost data

And of course there could never be a case of certain government departments planting false information on a laptop and leaving it on a train, then making sure the press publicize it to make sure the targetted recipients hunt around to buy it from whoever found it. Such things would never happen in a civilized society.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ7

@rob davis

Given that Panasonic have changed their firmware to force you to use their own batteries, I'd be surprised if they gave write access to the firmware.

From someone who'll replace his Panasonic camera by a different make when it wears out.

Oxfordshire reveals ANPR traffic camera sites

3 hours?

If they expect you to take up to three hours to drive from one camera to the next... it's probably time to get out and start walking!

Kent Police clamp down on tall photographers

@AC 14:27

A hi-viz jacket with official-looking reflective lettering would be even better -- I'm thinking of having one made with "Covert Operations" in big obvious letters. Then when they ask for my ID, I can reply "I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you."

The 3G map Ofcom didn't want you to see

do it ourselves?

Perhaps the public could do better, couldn't people add their local reception levels to an open map such as http://www.openstreetmap.org/ ?

Triangular buttons key to touchscreen typing success - inventor

@John -- Rounded buttons

Been done long ago, and it worked fine. Anyone else here remember teletypes (ASR-33, etc)? Lovely clunking keyboard, gave your forearms a bit of a workout and no-one got RSI on them.

Ireland scraps e-voting in favour of 'stupid old pencils'

A bit more detail of the storage scandal

See articles such as http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/ireland/article6123034.ece (or use a search engine to look for "irish e-voting storage nephew shed" for a bit more variety).

Quote from another page:

Josephine Duffy has denied any impropriety and said her nephew's steel frame shed in Scotstown, Co Monaghan, was the only suitable facility, even though he did not submit a tender.

'[Being my nephew] didn't make a difference. I do not do deals with relations. It was between his solicitor and mine, " she said

Mine's the one with a Friend of Bertie rifling the pockets. Still, it beats living under NuLab.

Police ad urges: 'Trust no one'

A step towards a one-party state

Remember the pro-hunting protestors being banned from protesting near the Labour party headquarters?

Being prepared to protect specifically the current government party seems to me to be the first small step to a one-party system. There are a lot of other steps before they'll get there, but I reckon that was a step in that direction. Then they can start defining themselves as "The Social Party (tm)" and implying that other parties are anti-social, and you know what happens to people who Behave Anti-Socially!

A long way off, but I reckon they're facing that direction.

PS for those wondering where to move: the Republic of Ireland is OK if there are still any jobs by the time you get here; the politicians aren't control freaks even if they are "the best that money can buy"!

Privacy campaigner vows legal challenge to Google Street View

So what's the real story?

So what are the real problems GSV can cause?

And (quite separately from reality, I suspect, particularly with Davies' Phorm connection), what is Davies really on about? Since he's "not sure what exactly the legal basis of a challenge to the system" would be, does he have an actual issue? Or is what he's really on about that "consent is required for a photograph that is used commercially", and he really wants to be able to demand payment from Google for any appearances he makes on GSV?

I wouldn't normally want to accuse someone of developing a resemblance to a Belgian newspaper, but perhaps for a Phorm supporter it's only fair.

Minister admits thought crime is on the agenda

He's just parading his virtue

I reckon what he's really saying is "Look how pure I am!"

I've seen an equivalent effect in religious settings which have a strong in-group effect -- people claiming more and more extreme "beliefs" (typically in the form of taking literally parts of the Bible that others reckon are about moral truths rather than literal accounts -- a "membership categorization device") because it's all-important to be on the right side of the enclosing fence.

So the real message is "I'm a good NuLab person, look at me". When the focus is back on terrorism, the same people will be supporting bizarre anti-terrorism schemes. Or did that already happen?

I've already got my coat -- I emigrated five years ago, the best move I ever made.

Spooks and techies to be vetted for their online networks

MIx might have more active uses for FB

MI5/6/n/CID might set up accounts of "people" declaring dodgy interests, and see who gets in touch.

Swiss boffins build bonkers iPhone-operated electric sportster

@AC 13:20 -- important safety interlock?

The `"important functions of the car" will stop if you recieve a phone call'?

That's one way of stopping people talking on the phone while driving.

On the other hand, if the phone refused to take or make calls while the car control application was running, it might make some real sense.

Russian rides Phantom to OS immortality

@Martin Gregorie

The idea is older than that -- try Multics (1964), which had "segments" instead of files. The VM mechanism would bring the necessary parts into fast memory on demand.

Penguin icon as El Reg didn't see fit to provide an Archaeopteryx one.

1m French out of work thanks to dodgy data - UK next?

Keep learning Chinese....

Keep learning Chinese, it'll soon be the language of the (relatively) free... :-(

When will the west and the east cross over on freedoms? Another decade? Perhaps I'm being naive, but I'm not sure which way!

Mine's the one with the phrasebook in the pocket....

American Stereotype™ walks Google's mean Street View

But it's all alright 'cos

Well, at least he's not "carrying concealed"!

Unless, of course, he has some more guns on him too.

EU slaughterhouses may get animal welfare officers

Re small local slaughterhouse

I doubt that big industry would allow the EU to allow small local slaughterhouses.

Ryanair cancels aggregator-booked tickets in escalating scraping war

re: Why don't they just

If they do something like that, they'll probably make it impossible to use with screen readers (for the blind) -- although I expect most blind travellers are avoiding Ryanair already after a well-publicized incident of some being turned away. However, it could give someone a chance to bring a discrimination case.

Sony touts weird multi-sensor handheld gadget tech

Surprising

I'd be surprised if there's no prior art on this one.

The war on photographers - you're all al Qaeda suspects now

Photographic memory

The one that bemuses me is "No photography in security area" in airports. If I were ever on a journey that I wanted an excuse to get out of, I'd be tempted to say to the supervisor "I've got a good memory. Do I have to go through with my eyes closed?"

Could pen-sized GPS jammers paralyse UK shipping?

@Mark_T

Even a big light on a tower that cycles on/off at known periods could theoretically be spoofed, using another big light that cycles on/off at the same periods (perhaps mounted on a cherry-picker for quick set-up and getaway). In fact, in an earlier form, it was an old wreckers' technique. And it's probably easier to design than a GPS jammer!

Your personal data just got permanently cached at the US border

@Steve Roper -- UK is getting there

The UK already has ANPR "on all major roads", and the Oyster card in London --- not yet stopping you travelling, but they'll know where you've been (incompetence of authorities and contractors permitting).

MoD coughs to laptop triple whammy

@Tim Spence -- The Laptop That Never Was

I suspect that sometimes these are like "the man that never was" (a corpse made to look like a drowned naval courier, with planted false invasion plans, in WWII) -- a way of leaking misinformation to certain parties. They'd have to be well-packed with other information, to stop it being too obvious.