Posts by Pascal Monett

Trump blinks again in trade war bluff-fest with China: Huawei gets another 90-day stay of US import execution

And you have Fox News to get back to.

If you don't like The Reg, you don't have to come back again and again.

Bunch of US states said to be preparing fresh antitrust investigation into Google 'n' pals

Making things more complicated

Um, we're talking about billion-dollar behemoths that don't pay taxes.

Make their lives difficult, they'll just have to hire more lawyers.

It's not like they don't have the means to do so.

Generous Google gives Chrome users Inbox Zero: Sign-in outage boots own browser out of webmail, services

Re: dumbing down error messages

Well that is kind of inevitable, isn't it ? Given the level of understanding of 99% of users, they'd be complaining that the error was incomprehensible.

Something went wrong is something they can understand.

That said, adding another line saying "Error #0068410B" wouldn't kill the devs either, and then we'd have something to Google and evaluate our situation better.

Behold, the quantum lawsuit in which both sides claim victory: Rimini St fails to bag $30m refund from Oracle

"Oracle lost 23 of 24 claims"

I'm glad you're happy about your success, but from where I sit, you've lost $90 million, you're banned from doing what you did and you're not getting any money back.

In short, you're lucky Oracle did lose those 23 claims, because if it hadn't, you'd be buried by now.

The Pwn Star State: Nearly two dozen Texas towns targeted by tiresome ransomware

So that's how they do it

"In almost every ransomware attack we've looked at, the company was been compromised six to nine months before the attack was launched," he said, noting that allows the attacker to conduct reconnaissance.

When I read that line about how attackers start by deleting accessible backups I wondered how they could get to them. If, however, you infiltrate an organization and lay low for months while gathering data on the network, then you have all the time you need to discover network storage and passwords to access it.

Given that cities are not known for having bank-level network protection, I'm guessing that once in, there won't be much of a warning to IT admins that an enemy process is worming through their systems.

Breaker, breaker. Apple's iOS 12.4 update breaks jailbreak break, un-breaks the break. 10-4

So, unc0ver is open-source ?

Interesting. So Apple should be all over that code to see what it's using and patch the holes. Apparently, Apple does not do that.

Now the question is : why on God's green Earth did Apple unfix a fix and re-allow jailbreaking ?

Another question : how long before a patch is published that re-applies the fix, thus locking the phone down again ?

Because Apple is aware of this, and they had the fix, so I really don't see that it is interesting to go and use the unfix to jailbreak the phone since it's likely going to be locked down again at the next patch release.

Lenovo ThinkPad X390: A trusty workhorse that means business but it's not without a few flaws

17.6 hours

Oh, I'm sure you can get that - if you throttle the CPU to 20% of its capacity and turn the screen brightness down to minimum, set the disk to sleep after one minute of inactivity and the screen to go blank likewise.

In other words, you'll get 17.6 hours of use if you make the i7 function like an anemic i3. Yay.

I'd like to see battery life expressed in real-life, pedal-to-the-metal situations. If you're a programmer, you're going to be taxing those 16GB of RAM and probably the disk as well. I want to know how long I will be able to work, not just look at a dimmed screen.

But that'll never happen. Nobody will like to publish those numbers, they're too weak.

Subcontractor's track record under spotlight as London Mayoral e-counting costs spiral

"whether electronic counting is in fact the right approach"

Simple answer : it is not.

Use paper. That won't cost you £9M this time, and it won't cost you more next time. Better functionality ? It counted the votes last time, didn't it ? So what better functionality is worth double the price ? Is it more secure ? Somehow I doubt that that is what they have improved.

I want the code to be public and open, so that we can get eyeballs on it and ensure that it does what it says on the tin in the proper way. Until that happens, I won't trust it and neither should anyone else.

It will never be safe to turn off your computer: Prankster harnesses the power of Windows 95 to torment fellow students

BOFH potential for sure

Personally I am content that he does not get to exercise that particular potential in a major IT outfit of any capacity.

I hate it when people think that they have the right to go and wreak havoc on someone else's computer and find that funny.

Overstock's share price has plummeted. Is it Trump's trade war? Bad results? Nope, its CEO has gone bonkers...

That is not an example to follow

Re: I'm not trolling

The general message is that this has nothing to do with Overstock, is not something a CEO of a billion dollar company is supposed to say, and frankly, being part of an international conspiracy / spy ring is something that happens in books, not in real life.

If Byrne was just another Twitter user, or had a blog like some other Jones, it would be inconsequential. But a CEO is supposed to be objective and rational, and nothing he said belongs to the world of reality.

So there's a problem, and people who value their money are fleeing the scene.

Astroboffins have spied the largest star that has gone supernova and it's breaking all the rules

Why the hell bring the Maori into this ?

And, if you're going to show off your scientific credentials, you need to put a link to what you've published, otherwise it's not credible.

Anyone can say they've published in Nature.

Fancy a career exposing cloud data leaks? Great news, companies are still largely clueless

"protocols that were superseded more than a decade ago"

Um, just a thought : how come those protocols are available on The Cloud (TM) at all ?

Or did they create The Cloud (TM) by including every protocol that has been created in the past twenty-five years, regardless of whether or not it was secure ?

UK.gov opens £250k competition to tackle first-world problem of crap conference Wi-Fi

"help Britain attract more international business events"

Yeah, Brexit is going to make it so much easier to capture all those European company conferences, isn't it ?

And the Japanese, Chinese, Indians and South Americans are just clamoring for the privilege of spending a day in a plane to get to the UK to chatter and feast on stale fish.

Another success story in the making.

And you thought the cops were bad... Civil rights group warns of facial recog 'epidemic' across UK private sites

"There is a dark irony that this authoritarian surveillance tool is rarely seen outside of China"

Um, from what I've read, the UK is just as surveillance-camera bent as China, if not more so.

So the dark irony is that there still are people in the UK who consider that China is worse then them as far as camera surveillance is considered.

Data cops order Ireland to delete 3.2m records after ID card wheeze ruled to be 'unlawful'

Here's a wild guess : Ireland.

You know, St Patrick's Day ? Green ? Ring a bell ?

Top tip: Don't upload your confidential biz files to free malware-scanning websites – everything is public

"In a month, a threat actor would have enough data to target multiple industries"

Great. Give them ideas while you're at it.

NSA asks Congress to permanently reauthorize spying program that was so shambolic, the snoops had shut it down

"the program is a mess but says the NSA should have the powers anyway"

Well of course, grant the NSA the power to ignore the Constitution and citizen's rights, because hey, they're doing it anyway so might as well make it official.

No way you're actually going to institute oversight, right ?

Apple's WebKit techs declare privacy circumvention to be a security issue

Re: Minor Browser?

Safari is at 15% market share.

So, yes, it is a minor browser.

And, since Apple has restricted it to not run under Windows, it's going to stay that way.

Criminal mastermind signed name as 'Thief' on receipts after buying stuff with stolen card

What ?

And where does this Ewari Ellis come out from ? What is the process that allowed the police to get their hands on him ? Why is there nothing about that guy before the last paragraphe of the article ?

We have an interesting read, somewhat copied rather directly from the affidavit, but then the journalist just took the rest of the day off and didn't finish the job.

This article is not finished. We need to know how the police was directed to Ewari Ellis and what he did to get this whole mess started in the first place.

So, waiting for the rest of the article.

'Deeply concerned' UK privacy watchdog thrusts probe into King's Cross face-recognizing snoop cam brouhaha

Re: Why?

What they are using it for ? The article states : "and insisted is there to 'ensure public safety'".

So a private consortium has installed facial recog for safety reasons. I'm guessing that they would have security cameras in place and nobody would mind, obviously they have guards that are viewing the feeds in real time to ensure that nothing bad is happening, but what does facial recog bring them ? If they happen to tag a recognized Syrian terrorist, what are they going to do ?

Call the cops is what they should do. After that, I haven't a clue and I doubt they do either.

I have another question : what data are they comparing faces to and how did they get it ? If they are using criminal data from police databases, how did they get the authorization for that, and if not, what's the use of the facial recog in the first place ?

To harass somebody they think is a shoplifter without any proof ?

Security? We've heard of it! But why be a party pooper when there's printing to be done

Re: One rule for you...

Two obvious issues with that one :

1) no manual release would have dreadful consequences if a fire broke out and shorted the power before everyone could get out

2) they forgot to consider all possibilities of manually opening the doors, such as something to prevent the bolt from being moved outside of an order from the proper process

Thankfully, the company that made those doors only end up being ridiculous. They could have ended up being charged with manslaughter and someone would have gone to jail for a long, long time. Which would have done nothing for the people who had died.

Cisc-o-no! 'We’re being uninvited to bid' on China deals admits CEO as Middle Kingdom snub freaks out investors

The USA believes itself to be the leader of the free world because

1) Hollywood has made countless films describing how the USA won WWII

2) The US dollar is the defacto international exchange currency

3) the USA has the most powerful navy in the world and is not afraid of showing it

4) the USA is quite capable of invading other countries (that don't have nuclear warheads) and is not afraid of doing so (if there is petrol to control)

How dodgy browser plugins, web scripts can silently rewrite that URL you were about to hit – and throw you into an internet wormhole

"If a user downloads a toolbar or extension.."

Then the user is already making the first mistake. The only extensions you need are NoScript and uBlock Origin. No one needs a toolbar, they are all malware and have no other reason to exist than to hijack your browser for nefarious purposes.

The second mistake is not running a JS blocker.

The third mistake is not running an adblocker, or a browser that does not handle ads properly (like Brave).

Cryptocurrency lovers slip US watchdog $7m to make claims of ripping off investors, other rule breaking simply vanish

Not very bright

He actually thought that living in Canada was going to shield him against the SEC ? What a moron.

You're all set for your long summer vacation. Suddenly a text arrives. It's the CEO. 'Data strategy by Friday plz'

Good read

But the very content of the article kind of contradicts it's starting premise. After having read the article, it is clear that you do not set a data strategy "by Friday". It seems to me that that is something that will take weeks to elaborate properly, with many a meeting along the way.

I don't think Goldman Sachs got their petabyte-sized data lake described and specced in one week.

But, apart from that, good read.

Apple is a filthy AWS, Azure, Google reseller, gripe punters: iPhone giant accused of hiding iCloud's real backend

Wait a minute

"these iCloud subscribers had their data turned over by Apple to third-parties for these third-parties to store the data in a manner completely unknown to the subscribers"

When your order something on Amazon, you don't care what vehicle is used to get it to you, now do you ?

And when you subscribed to the iCloud, you had no idea of how it worked either, now did you ?

But now you've learned that Apple has actually managed to leverage three* different cloud environments to store your data, and all of a sudden you're all hot and bothered ? More than by learning that Apple uses slave labor to bring you your iShiny ?

Hypocrite.

* I'm supposing Apple does actually have a cloud, and that it is not just using its two competitor's stuff

Yet another reminder: When a tech giant says its AI listens to you, it means humans listen to you. Right, Facebook?

"we paused human review of audio more than a week ago"

Right, the time for all the fuss to die down, then they'll resume. Got it.

It's official – Google AI gives you cancer ...diagnosis in real time: Neural net can spot breast, prostate tumors

Proof of concept

To me, the fact that it is real time is less important than the fact that it is accurate.

I'm less hot on doctors being able to ask the machine what it is they're looking at. Replacing doctor's knowledge with a machine's knowledge just feels wrong to me somehow. If I am to be treated, I want to be treated by a doctor, not a guy who's googling the problem.

Let's see what the sweet, kind, new Microsoft that everyone loves is up to. Ah yes, forcing more Office home users into annual subscriptions

But of course it is

"Microsoft is keen that everyone recognizes this change for the wonderful opportunity it is"

Oh don't worry, we immediately recognize that this is an absolutely wonderful opportunity - for Microsoft.

For the rest of us, it's basically roll call. Who wants to pay for the rest of their lives to be able to use their data ?

Once again, Microsoft is the best argument for Open Software there is.

Viva LibreOffice !

Arrow? More like Boomerang, amirite? Computacenter buys back tech disposal biz it disposed of

I just love it

I just love when companies waste millions acquiring then selling a business, and then turn around and spend more millions, if not billions, re-acquiring the same fucking business.

Kind of demonstrates just how ignorant the CxO-level types actually are, despite all their qualifications and titles. They haven't a fucking clue, just like the rest of us.

Oh chute. Doubts cast on ExoMars lander's 2020 red planet jaunt after another failed test

Um, what about airbags ?

They might want to start thinking about putting giant airbags around the payload, no ?

US insurers face SEC probe over web-access bungle that exposed 'up to 885 million' files

885 million

Yes, we are on track for the billion-person data leak.

Everything is proceeding as planned.

US military swoops into DEF CON seeking a few good hackers for debut aviation pwning village

Re: most people would try their best to sabotage it

You mention a pseudo-recruitement thing that was done as a stunt by non-military people and you take a negative result to mean that people would want to sabotage any such thing ?

Don't you think you're pushing it a bit ?

Researchers peer into crystal ball to see future where everyone's ID is tied to their smartphone

"mobile versions will be easy to scale quickly"

I just love how something that doesn't exist today and hasn't been tried is already touted as being easy to implement and scale.

After all, it's trivial to create a National Identity database and let everyone and their dog consult it to verify a phone holder's identity, right ? Isn't there an app for that ? What could possibly go wrong ?

The only thing that surprises me in this report is that it's not from Gartner.

US still 'not prepared' in event of a serious cyber attack and Congress can't help if it happens

Restrict guns ?

That is anathema. Blasphemy in the Church of the NRA that is the USA.

Might as well ask the Sun to not rise for the next week.

Gun control will remain unthinkable until enough parents are fed up with seeing their children die in school. At that point, even the staunchest NRA-bankrolled Republican will have to take a step back and finally let it happen, or be swept away in the wash of truly national furor.

The sad thing is, there is no telling how many people still have to die before that happens.

All roads in US cable biz GTT's Brit network seem to lead to Menwith Hill

Apparently, everyone is listening to everyone.

Except politicians. They are listening only to those who pay them.

Printer pwnage, phone poppage, and apparently US Homeland Security needs security help

"make sure public access is severely restricted"

What I will never understand is how someone can set up an AWS account and not think of locking it down from public access.

You're putting data on the Internet, don't you realize that ? It doesn't matter what kind of data it is, lock it down tighter than a gnat's arse. If somebody with actual authority complains, you can always relax it a little in his favor.

Better safe than sorry, right ?

Looming US immigration crackdown aims to weed out pre-crime of poverty. And that may be bad news for techie families

"immigration officials determined $1m would be necessary"

And there we go, minions in power disregard the law and set their own criteria.

That is exactly where the USA has gone wrong : letting minor government officials reign supreme without any recourse. That is exactly how a corrupt regime displays itself.

If the limit is $220 000, you little scribbler have no authority to decide that it is suddenly $1 million in a specific case.

But they did it, and nobody can complain about it.

And you still call yourself a democracy ?

What do Windows 10 and Uber or Lyft have in common? One bad driver can really ruin your day. And 40 can totally ruin your month

"all the vulnerable drivers we discovered have been certified by Microsoft"

Well duh. Given how difficult it is for Microsoft to get its own code right, I wouldn't take any MS certification to mean vuln-free.

Certified by Microsoft simply means they ran it once on a machine and that machine didn't crash inside of 15 minutes.

Tor pedos torpedoed again, this time Feds torpedo four Tor pedos – and keep how they unmasked dark-web scumbags under wraps

Re: lack of proper due process

Um, what makes you say that due process was lacking ? I don't remember reading that the FBI jumped to conclusions or arrested the wrong people.

The fact that the FBI is not making its tracking procedure public does not mean that the judge isn't aware of how it was done, I'm sure the FBI explained everything to the judge behind sealed doors.

Web body mulls halving HTTPS cert lifetimes. That screaming in the distance is HTTPS cert sellers fearing orgs will bail for Let's Encrypt

Money spinner

The use of that term indicates to me that security is not the primary goal of all this hoopla. Indeed, if it's security that is the issue, then I think LetsEncrypt is doing it right : you got a cert valid for 90 days that can autorenew for free.

If LetsEncrypt can do that, then why can't DigiCert and the rest of them ? Because they're in it for the money, security is just the cow they milk.

So here's your solution, DigiCert : go for 90 days auto-renewable, and turn your hefty fee into a yearly subscription without changing the cost to companies. You get your money, web sites get their certs, companies do not pay more, everyone is happy.

Except your Board, of course, who would have wanted to charge the yearly subscription to the 90-day charge, but you can go screw yourselves.

It's a God-awful smell affair.... is there life on Mars? Rocks ruled out as source of mystery methane on Red Planet

The plot thickens

Looks like we're going to need to send more probes.

Brit regulator Ofcom put at helm as hosting platforms threatened with hefty fines for violent videos

AgeChecked

I checked out the site and, apart from blurb assuring how good they are, it is quite light on technical details.

From what I understand, you prove your identity to AgeChecked by " a range of options" (not telling, though), and then AgeChecked vouches for your ID and age to other sites who ask them - for a fee, of course.

The complete lack of technical details make this look like a racket to get money with minimal expense.

Green search engine Ecosia thinks Google's Android auction stinks, gives bid a hard pass

"Google's choice screen artificially creates scarcity where there is none"

Well yeah. How else is Google going to make it's next billions ?

Google to bury indicator for Extended Validation certs in Chrome because users barely took notice

Security is hard

It's because of users. Always has been, always will be.

You can design the perfect security for a house, if the owner forgets to shut the door, it's screwed.

And if you mandate vise-level security, the user will just go somewhere else.

It is quite hopeless, but removing a valuable indicator just because 85% don't pay attention means that the 15% that do will have to do without.

That's sad.

Science and engineering hit worst as Euroboffins do a little Brexit of their own from British universities

Well, you're leaving

And you do have a thing against all those bloody immigrants, right ?

Well they're leaving too. You should be happy.

Ah, but you hadn't thought of that ? Well, looks like we're going to spend quite some time discovering all the things you hadn't thought of, as well as their consequences.

I could throttle you right about now: US Navy to ditch touchscreens after kit blamed for collision

Re: Whatever happend to the 'keep it simple' approach

An MBA came along and redefined the concept of 'simple' with a striking PowerPoint presentation.

Too bad it took a collision

Frankly I am appalled that the Navy got a touchscreen-based steering function installed. You'd think they, of all people, would want to ensure that they could control their ships in all conditions, even if the windows broke in a heavy storm, for example. But no, they went ahead and created something touchpad-based for a crucial function of the vessel and got bit in the ass for it.

Well, at least that's one mistake they'll not make again for long while.

£250m fund for NHS artificial intelligence laboratory slammed as tech for tech's sake

Just out of curiosity, why is it the NHS should be the one to invest in this tech ? Shouldn't some other university or research organization front the costs, trial the thing, prove it works and then the NHS buys the solution ?

I mean sure, I'm all for improving cancer diagnostic and treatment, but the NHS doesn't really have the means to do the research part, does it ?