Dead on arrival
Prepare the hole in the ground - more landfill coming soon.
192 publicly visible posts • joined 19 Sep 2008
This is a constant, complex game of whack-a-mole where HMRC keep defining and re-defining their definition of 'employed' vs 'self employed'. All this does is get contractors to revise the wording on a bit of paper known as a contract, to keep them the right side of the line. It also lines the pockets of legal teams, costs a fortune and drags everyone down when it goes to court.
This just goes round and round in never-ending circles then, as the gamekeeper keeps telling the poacher how to avoid being caught by them. Surely from any distance this just looks absolutely barmy. What is the difference between a tradesman (eg a bricklayer) and an IT consultant? From a distance the brickie is OK but the IT consultant isn't simply because IT projects take longer - sometimes several years. I struggle with that, as they both have a lot in common (pension, holidays, risks, etc etc - same old stuff).
It does make me wonder why HMRC cannot maintain a set of 'minimum salary' scales (just watch the jobs market and the salaries on offer) and then say "if you are a consultant doing job x then your minimum salary is y and you must pay yourself that, and all tax and NI arising". If they did that people would abide, and everyone would surely be happy...….. maybe......
" German export law prohibits malware from being shipped directly to Turkey, according to DW."
Wait..... what???? I nearly ruined my keyboard as I read that. Can that really be true - that they actually have legislation that specific about...… malware?
Clearly they have high standards that must be upheld at all times. Why, we wouldn't want our malware shipped to such a dreadful place would we? Nonono. We only want to ship our malware to nice places, where human rights are respected, the quality of living is high, the beaches are clean, and (perhaps more importantly) the financial gains are greater...…...
In the article the wording seems to imply that simply OPENING the email does the damage. Is that correct? As far as I am aware the damage only happens when the carbon-based retard 'opens' the ATTACHMENT that is embedded in the email, or clicks on the link.
You may think this is a minor point, or nit-picking but it is very important that people (especially the carbon-based retards) understand where the risk really is. They struggle enough as it is, bless them. Of course, if people really have found a way to launch an attack when a user simply OPENS an email then I stand corrected and expect the downvotes.
I know I'm a bit of a grammar pedant but my radar went off the scale when I read the following, which is attributed to the legal bod....
"What has occurred is user Steffan Needham accesses Amazon Web Services for Voova, changed Mr Gonzalez password and secured his user login 'Speedy'. He has then terminated servers, checked the settings and logged out. They were done by the defendant, who used the Speedy login covering up that it was he deleting the servers."
Where does one even begin with such an egregious barrage of crimes against our beautiful language? Has it been mistyped? Even if one ignores the grammatical issues how does one even go about 'deleting' a 'server'?
I give up.
"Not that there is an awful lot one can actually do with a 16k ZX Spectrum" ???? Tongue in cheek I hope. OK I admit the larger-capacity one was better (can't remember if it was 32k or 48k) but initially there were bucketloads of programs and games that it could run. Sure it wasn't meant for business use, although things improved marginally when the Microdrive came along. I still remember buying mine, and hooking it up to the TV in the living room. Games! Colour!! Sound!! It didn't get much better at the time, unless you were rich.
I lived in Portsmouth at the time - home of Automata, who quickly recognised the machine's potential and started producing games for it. Ah yes those were indeed the days.....
....I'm pretty sure I used to go out with her. I should have known - she was a bit limited vocabulary-wise but on the plus side she was compliant, although it did worry me when she said "Dave I'm afraid I can't allow you to do that". I got more suspicious when she told me to call her Alexa during sex.
So all of those vulnerabilities exist because someone decided the whole thing absolutely HAD to be web-based. Why is it web-based? Or more importantly why is it ALL web-based? Is there really a saving in term of development costs? The UI still needs to be designed and built - just using a different technology stack. All you seem to get is vulnerabilities and attacks.
Time to re-think whether you should expose all your precious data in that way, or whether you can limit the web-based stuff to an absolute minimum, and limit the information held in the DB that serves it. Keep the rest well away from the web I say.
...are really tiny and so easy to conceal under a lapel, in your shoe, in a trouser pocket, in a pack of chewing gum etc etc. 128gb is so cheap these days, and should be plenty. You could even conceal one in the lid of a normal USB memory stick. Hide in plain sight, keep it simple. Makes a total mockery of a law that already makes us a total mockery.
...with poor data quality, and presumably with a poor success rate from their testing (assuming they did some testing). What the heck did they think was going to happen? "If we all close our eyes and cross our fingers it might still turn out OK" ???
Some of the most basic rules of IT Projects broken. Amateurs. They deserve everything that is coming their way, and I say that without considering for a moment that they are glorified loan sharks.
We all know that with every passing day the chance of getting money back from their 'customers' dwindles, so there is a possibility that such an issue will cripple their cashflow and they will then implode.
Moreover there is no magic bullet fix for 'poor data' so I wish them luck with cleaning it.....
I work in IT but am ignorant about the way Bitcoin works, so this may be a ridiculous suggestion. Surely if it is possible to trace a Bitcoin account/wallet thingy that is being used for purposes such as this, it should be possible to freeze it/block it/re-possess it as well? Come on chaps, this is the 21st Century and all we can do is sit watch the crims withdraw their ill-gotten gains?
Surely something can be done, even if it takes a while and requires new laws to be passed. We've got to stop them demonstrating that this is a successful business model.
...are soon parted.
His cupboard must be getting pretty full by now. Even from here I can see his Apple Watch, his VR headset, his drone, his connected doorbell, central heating control system, lighting system, kettle, toaster, fridge, scales, cooker, razor, bed, bicycle and nasal hair extractor.
Is there room for this total pile of utter shite as well, I wonder.
I bet he works for Apple or Google as well, in some 'visioneering' team, the twat. I hate him because he gives money to these charlatans.
I was working for IBM at the time, at their UK Headquarters, so I got my free copy of OS/2 Warp.
There was a big demo with loads of PCs all running Windows-based games and software. I hit problems installing it on my PC because I wasn't prepared to re-partition my hard drive and lose all my existing data. Rubbish.
I watched OS/2 go down the drain, followed by several other doomed products. Then the bottom dropped out of the mainframe market and things took another slide. The 'partnership' with Lotus was a bit of a disaster too.
IBM? They just do software and services right? And a lot (but not all) of the software was obtained through acquisitions. I remember when they actually made stuff - like a PC keyboard that cost £120.
Shame really.
...why they don't just force the self-employed to pay themselves a salary that is the equivalent of the same permie job. They would then have to do the NI as well. The rest is an honest profit to be disbursed in the same way that any company does it.
It's a win-win because my understanding of the original problem is that the National Insurance coffers are running dry. I used to be a contractor and I would have had no problem with such a fair and reasonable approach.
I can't help noticing that most scary stories (TM) like this one follow the same template....
Web and Network Security Expert (insert name here) warns of very scary exploit (insert exploit name here) that might make you sufficiently scared that you might want to consider.....
a) Purchasing Web and Network Security Expert (insert name here)'s latest exploit defence software (insert product name here)
b) Procuring the services of Web and Network Security Expert (insert name here) to give your setup an overhaul/assessment.
c) Attending Web and Network Security Expert (insert name here)'s next seminar where you can hear more scary stories(TM) and get the low down on how great their software/services/seminars really are.
Or better still, all three!!
My details got hacked, and I was getting nuisance calls several days before they came clean about the hack. Customer service was poor; their systems don't fully support someone moving from one property to another and wanting to take their old number with them. I had to set up a new email address when I moved because my old one was permanently linked to my old property even though that account was now closed (hints at a very badly-designed IT system underneath). I signed up to a new 18-month contract and then they increased their prices 3 weeks later. When I rang them to tell them I was moving again I was told that the phone and broadband would remain connected at the old property (and therefore would be used by the new occupants) until the end of their mandatory one-month notice period on such things. Then they tried to tell me I wouldn't be able to take my number with me unless I used them at my new property (which turned out to be a lie). Just awful. I will never use them again. Ever.
.....inventing shiny, expensive and ultimately useless gadgets to suckers with more money than sense. I heard he's going to make a solid gold underwater bicycle next..... or maybe that was just an unfounded rumour.
Why there are rich pickings out there for anyone that can find the key - a web-enabled egg whisk, single shoes for one-legged people, a hat that doubles as a wifi hotspot, trousers with a built-in keyboard, a 'connected' iron that can send tweets telling everyone what you are ironing, and a drone that can fire a deadly laser beam to annihilate your enemies.
There - that's enough to keep him in the manner to which he has become accustomed for the next ten years at least.
..... to have a clever bit of software running, that intercepts ALL inbound emails from external sources, and EDIT them such that all links are turned into plain text before they are allowed through to their original destination?
I work in IT but I wouldn't have a clue as to whether this is viable or not. It strikes me that it is a potential solution to this particular conundrum.
Just wondering.
......yesterday. The only difference is that I don't use Virgin. I use Yahoo Mail. Someone/something appears to have obtained my yahoo contact list, and spoofed emails to everyone on that list. The emails claim to be from me, but from a weird email server (vait.se). It's the same old 'click this link' thing. I have checked and according to Yahoo's records, no-one has accessed my email account but me, from my computer and phone. The emails were sent at 2pm yesterday, when my pc was off and my phone was not connected.
So I have to conclude that the clever b'stards somehow managed to pull my contact list somehow. If that is right then I don't think there is anything I can do, apart from abandoning Yahoo and using something else instead.......Gmail? Any suggestions?
Last week a friend brought me a broken PC to look at. It had a lovely Motherboard (big, shiny AsRock thing with pretty blue cooling fins - very swish), a high-spec Core i7 and a simply massive CPU cooler with huge fins and two very large fans strapped either side of the fins.
Turns out the Motherboard had failed, but the CPU had survived so a new (cheap) mobo and he was good to go.
The case was a tower, so the mobo was vertical and the cpu cooler must have been applying considerable sideways/downwards force. Yes it had an X-plate under the mobo but I still think the enormous/crazy/excessive/heavy CPU fan might have caused the damage.
Now I'm wondering how long that new (cheap) mobo might last.....!
So Apple has a product, and FitBit has several products. Where is Valencell's product?
What? They never intended to actually MAKE a product? They just had a bunch of ideas and then sat back for others to release their products, so they could sue them (or as someone else has already suggested, they hoped they would be 'acquired' ) for mega bucks.
Why not go after everyone who has produced a 'wearable band'? There are shedloads of them. Motorola? Asus? Withings?
Hang them all as an example to all the other wannabe patent trolls, I say.
I simply can't see the point in ANY household appliance being 'connected'. You have to get off your lazy, fat arse in any case, to either put stuff (eg water, clothes, food) in and to take stuff (eg hot water, clean clothes, food) out again.
I kind of get a fridge/freezer/larder that can tell me what I need to order (or possibly passing the order direct to the supermarket of my choice) but we are nowhere near that level of maturity yet.
I kind of get a central heating system I can control from my mobile phone when I am out but the advantages/savings are outweighed tenfold by the cost of the gear.
I say stop now before it all ends in tears.
Since they pretty much forced me to sign a two-year contract with them earlier this year, they have put their prices up twice, and now this FFS.
It is also clear that they don't even know what actually happened and how much damage has actually been done. On the face of it, my personal details were stolen via a sustained DDoS attack. Hmm. Utter bullshit.
Well I'm off and just let them try levying any termination fees. Its a shame as their TV box is really nice and the (fibre) broadband is pretty good too. Freeview + another ISP + another phone provider = cheaper monthly payments for me anyway so good riddance.
Ah the awful stench of Marketing Bullshit. This time, the bullshit was written by Marketing, to sell something to.... Marketing. "Give us your big data and we can infer all kinds of crazy sh*t from it that you can neither deny nor confirm". Consumerism and Capitalism all rolled into one. It would make me run a mile. Or ten.
By the way, I think you'll find the term is 'Eke out" rather than "Eek out", however the phrase "Eek! ......Out!!!!" is very apt in this particular case.
That's what Twitter is. No longer content with one or two posts per day on FuckWitBook, the most seriously mentally-deranged nutters with their over-inflated egos think they have something important to say on a minute-by-minute basis, and the thing they need to say is so important it absolutely HAS to be shared with the even sadder pathetic shambling apologies for people who have nothing better to do than 'follow' them.
The sooner that utterly useless 'business' implodes the better although I fear the fallout when all those sad sacks have to find something else to fill the gaping void in their miserable, vacuous existences. I guess most of them will buy droids and start flying them near aeroplanes and helicopters instead.
A little piece of me died when I discovered that I can now contact TV companies, banks and building societies by Twitter. To make matters worse my employers are considering that option too. Oh the horrors.
Every update to Flash that I get told to download always addresses two issues:-
It improves performance (apparently)
It makes it more secure (allegedly).
I have just invented Moore's law for Flash...... "evey year Flash gets twice as fast and four times more secure than the previous year". Yes I believe it! Any day now it will be so fast it will start launching animations before I have so much as thought about clicking my mouse, and it will stop hackers from even thinking about developing new ways to steal my money.
Mmmmm. Nice!
Most eloquently put, Mr Ledswinger and an upvote from me.
You quite rightly highlight exactly how complex the underlying energy market actually is, and a very small number of people appreciate that. It's really easy to make cheap jibes at energy companies (even politicians do it, so that just shows you how easy it is) but it is far harder to understand and appreciate what truth lies beneath the surface. As you say, energy suppliers actually make a very small profit and take a daily kicking from press, public and politicians. I predict that it won't be long before a few of the 'big six' make a strategic exit from the supply business because it has become such a toxic mess thanks to constant, bungling government interference in a failed structure that was actually created by a Labour government, to give the gullible public the impression there was a free market with genuine competition.
I do like the "people treat a PC like a car" analogy - it's excellent, so let's stick with it.... most (but not all, apparently) of the people who get infected with this particular malware are doing the equivalent of driving a car at 120mph, without having passed a test, with no seat belt, and whilst tweeting/texting/posting a witty remark (with emoticons) on FuckwitBook. And then they act all dismayed when they crash and hurt themselves.
Don't get me wrong - I will always do my level best to help them (if I can) but like I said earlier I struggle to ermpathise. Must be my particular combination of Tourettes and Autism I guess!
Upvote for Boris - well said. This is the 21st century so we should be able to track them down.
It's not totally clear how Cryptolocker gets onto one's computer in the first place..... is it....a) User gets clever 'social engineering' email and foolishly clicks on a link it contains or b) User is browsing really dodgy, NSFW sites which they know darned well they shouldn't be looking at, and picks up a nasty infection dropped onto an unprotected PC which doesn't have all the latest updates installed or c) User is illegally downloading free warez because they don't want to pay for their software, and download somethign with a nasty payload in it.
I know I will get downvotes for this but either way they must be mouth-breathing knuckle-draggers who need to try harder so it is quite difficult to empathise.
I couldn't agree more!! made my own 'arcade coffer table' using an old LCD, PC motherboard etc etc plus some nice joysticks and buttons but I'm no programmer and it all boots up to Windows, then starts MAME which has to be operated with a keyboard/mouse until you choose the game you want to play. I wish I was clever enough to put a nice GUI on it but wouldn't know where to start :-(
I have given up with Chrome. I get asked to clean a lot of PCs and laptops which have accumulated all manner of malware and adware. By far the hardest things to get rid of are these Chrome 'extensions'. They avoid all detection by popular scanners such as Malwarebytes and Super Anti Spyware. They don't show when I run 'Hijack This'. They don't use the Windows Task Scheduler. No anti-virus product detects them. They even survive manual registry editing. They seem unaffected by all the guidance to "re-set eveything" in Chrome, and if you remove them via the GUI in Chrome itself they just re-appear next time Chrome is launched. Simple solution? Un-install Chrome and use a better browser. Plenty of choice out there now. Never go back to Chrome under any circumstances. Easy!
Just another over-priced toy for over-paid twerps. They go into the same bin as mini motos, jet skis, GoPro cameras on bicycles, sports cars, iPhones, iPads etc etc.
Some children really do never grow up, and manufacturers never went broke over-estimating the stupidity of the buying public.
Ban them all I say and a blight of smallpox on all who make them and all who buy them.
My wife's lovely touch-screen ASUS laptop has just failed yet again. It's the third time since she bought it WAAAAAY back in October 2013. Since then it's had a new hard drive and then a complete replacement motherboard....... which appears to have packed up just 4 months later. Appalling, and now out of warranty too. Never again. Four hundred smackers down the drain after just 16 months. I wouldn't mind but it's had very light use and has never been dropped or abused in any way. Piss poor.
Because I like to fix PCs and Laptops, someone brought me yet another ASUS laptop last year and that too had total motherboard failure just a couple of months after the warranty expired. I'm still scanning Ebay in the vain hope that I can buy a cheap donor machine but no luck yet.
I've seen way too many Dell and HP machines with motherboard failure (mostly to do with Nvidia GPUs I hasten to add).
Looks like I won't be considering a Lenovo replacement as they appear to have just decided they don't much care for the home consumer marketplace with their rather unfortunate strategy.
From experience Toshiba make the most reliable machines, but even those have suffered from failed power supply sockets..... a cheap part but a pain in the ass to replace. A severe case of penny-pinching when you consider how much punishment they take. Someone else used the term "race to the bottom" in their posting..... it would appear to be true, sadly.
My congratulations, sir, for the highest defect density I have seen in a posting for some while. Considering the relatively small number of words used, you have surpassed the usual levels attained by the regular clientele of this website.
Awesome job. I assume you work in journalism, like a previous responder who doesn't understand the difference between "its" and "it's".
Double fail.
He things his 'gift' comes from 'God'? He believes in the great sky fairy? Now that bit does worry me. If he's at all religious he would hopefully see the conflict between that and being in charge of one of the most ethically unsound companies on the planet. Not even the slightest hint of conflict there?
...I just felt a little bit of vomit in my mouth from reading Microsoft's description of this new cack. I think it was also caused by the nauseating aroma of bullshit that also emanated from my computer screen.
I love the way that they say 'Sway is an exciting way of creating Sways which are really exciting'. Awesome. Their Marketing department needs a pat on the back for that.
Must go now..... where's my bucket!!!???
A major issue (IMHO) with the current HUDL is that you can't get the parts to replace a broken screen. My nephew dropped his, and the screen cracked. He was gutted as it left a sharp edge, meaning it was dangerous to use. Uncle Dave has further disappointed him because he can't find replacement parts anywhere. My latest idea is to buy another HUDL on ebay with a decent screen but with other issues (eg the "usb port bust so won't charge any more" one that also blights these units) and to create one working unit out of the two broken ones. I'm not looking forward to it though as the screen appears to be very strongly bonded into the case and it would probably be very easy to break the good screen while trying to remove it.
I won't be recommending that new model to anyone until I hear that you can replace a cracked screen with ease. Saving the planet requires that. A cracked screen should not result in having to throw the tablet away!