Posts by Ole Juul

New MacBook Pro beckons fanbois to become strip pokers

Re: Esc

'attacked with Vim"

and vigour

Self-driving cars doomed to be bullied by pedestrians

meek cars and commuting

The tradeoff is it will be a more attractive experience for pedestrians.

And deer. Lots of those on the road during parts of the year here. If you slow down and wait at a respectful distance, they just assume you've stopped. So there you are. If you don't want to wait so long, then you need to drive right up to them so they see you as a threat. That kind of psychology is not so easy to program.

I'm thinking that the city experience won't be that different. People will stand in the street and finish their conversation before moving over for these meek cars to pass. This sort of thing will make the travel time unpredictable so you can't use these self-driving cars for commuting unless you're prepared to start an hour early, just in case.

Good luck securing 'things' when users assume 'stuff just works'

Re: " I live in an old building with seven outside doors"

lol it's actually an historical old west general store. Crazy and different, but not the castle that some might imagine. (here) Ya, I'm not normal, but I can still remember to lock my doors when I go out.

Re: Your home burglary proved a point unfortunately..

"You could have doors that auto shut, unless physically put in a locked open position. The locks themselves would never have a "latch" position, defaulting to lock on closure."

How many doors do people have that it would be worth doing that in case you forgot one? Seriously, I live in an old building with seven outside doors. That's really unusual, but I keep most of them locked and the front and back door are locked and unlocked as needed. I can't imagine someone not being able to keep track and simply locking a few doors when they go out or to bed.

PayPal patches bone-headed two factor authentication bypass

Re: 2fa choices

"I don't really understand this - there are very few people left who don't have a mobile phone already (the only one I can think of out of everyone I know/meet is my mother-in-law) so why would you need to buy another?"

I was not entirely truthful, but rather using a literary shortcut. I do actually have several cell phones in my parts pile. The problem is that, like a surprising number of places outside of cities, there is no coverage here. The point is that a 2fa implementation needs to be available to everybody and not just people who live in cities. As we see from the responses above, there are ways to accomplish this and it is just a matter of services adopting them.

2fa choices

I'd still like to see see 2fa that I could use without having to buy a cell phone that I don't have any other use for.

Hacker's Icarus machine steals drones midflight

Re: One good thing

I'm expecting to see more used drones on Ebay now. Particularly ones without a controller or the original box.

Password1? You're so random. By which we mean not random at all - UK.gov

Re: or, they could really encourage 2FA everywhere

And lots of people don't even have a cellphone, let along get a signal. Seriously, if a site or service cannot come up with something that works for everybody without having to purchase additional equipment and services they should be questioning their ability to develop security solutions for themselves.

Data ethics in IoT? Pff, you and your silly notions of privacy

tyrants

Nice post lukewarmdog.

"What happens when you add ethics is that the car decides your lifestyle is impure."

This is what is happening now. People's choices are being taken over by overzealous and misinformed corporate marketers - from my perspective, evil. It is imperative that people take control and ownership of the technology they use and that it not dictate their choices. I am reminded of this quote by Napoleon Bonaparte: "Nothing is more difficult, and therefore more precious, than to be able to decide."

Parliamentarians ask Obama to withdraw Lauri Love extradition request

The US

Always overreacts to anything to do with their stupid computers.

Hacktivist crew claims it launched last week's DDoS mega-attack

IoT

more trouble than it's worth

Thanks, IoT vendors: your slack attitude will get regulators moving

Re: National regulation won't do a damned thing.

Problem is these "nice things" are interfering with normal things. Perhaps some day we'll evolve to where bling is not considered cool.

Dyn dinged by DDoS: US DNS firm gives web a bad hair day

Re: Redundant DNS providers

The problem in this case is that DYN is the host for these domains which are spread over many servers. It is not like one domain name and one IP. Unless you have relevant information in cache, a lookup isn't going to work.

Today the web was broken by countless hacked devices – your 60-second summary

Re: Maybe..

A class action law suit by users of these devices would cover older models just fine. My non-lawyer thinking suggests that being put at risk without any warning labels would make a case. I want to see these socially irresponsible companies put out of business. I'm sure there are others willing and able to take their place.

IoT insecurity: US govt summons tech bosses, bashes heads together

Re: Walled Gardens?

"I would rather buy a device that uses open protocols"

I'm with you there. And I would like to see IoT labelled in that regard. If it isn't open source it should say:

WARNING, this device contains CLOSED software and will need future repairs from the manufacturer.

It's finally happened: Hackers are coming for home routers en masse

Re: "It's finally happened"

Don't know about "custom router". Sounds like you're doing the hardware too. I'm sure that can have advantages, especially with the low power consumption computers like Raspberry Pi and such. However, lots of off-the-shelf routers support Linux. I've never had to run the proprietary software on my home routers, choosing instead to install Tomato immediately upon getting the device. My main router is currently an older Asus RT N-16. Has lots of memory for extra stuff too.

This speech recognition code is 'just as good' as a pro transcriber

now run that through an editor

to get rid of the 20% consisting of um and ah.

Oh God, here comes the artificially intelligent boss bot – look busy!

I get it

we'll soon have companies declaring that they've appointed smart-looking chairs to support executive decision making.

Then it will actually make sense to address the chair.

Crims cram credit card details into product shots on e-shops

am I missing something?

$ echo "here is some text" >> picture.jpg works just fine. Doesn't show in the image which looks just the same as it did before. You can read it clearly in the code by doing $ cat picture.jpg. Try it. This isn't exactly what I'd call hacking.

NFL is No Fondleslab League: Top coach says he'd rather use pen and paper than Surface tab

"I just can't take it anymore"

Gets critical MS comment of the year award. Priceless!

Google's crash canaries' muted chirping led to load balancer brownout

even Google?

So even Google can't keep the cloud from breaking? This does not bode well.

DNS infrastructure sprinting to IPv6 while users lag

My ISP doesn't do IPv6, period

The buck stops right there, and that's probably the problem in most cases. Servers have been capable for a long time, and most operating systems within the last 10 years have supported it out of the box. That leaves a few very old consumer routers and the ISP - who is really the culprit in the slowness of this transition.

PS: No, I can't change ISP because there isn't another one offering service where I live. That's probably the case in most of North America.

Yahoo! hides! from! financial! analysts! amid! email! hacking!, privacy! storm!

Re: Any DuckDuckGo users out there concerned about partnership with Yahoo???

I'd buy it for a buck, just for the lols. Anybody here get a SCO share certificate before the collector's price went up?

Ecuador admits it cut Assange's internet to stop WikiLeaks' US election 'interference'

Not such a big deal

Equador is not making a political statement but does have a need to remain neutral, and so must distance themselves from any influence on the US election. Wikileaks will function just fine in the meanwhile.

Freeze on refrigerants heats up search for replacements

Re: Newer refrigerators use pentane

Propane is a direct drop-in for R12 and you can use it safely in your car. See here. Lots of people are doing it. A licensed person probably can't do it, but you can do it yourself or use an intermediate refrigerant to circumvent the law - this will depend on country.

There is a lot of FUD on this topic. I suspect that it is both political and emotional. I note that the ones crying fire/danger are not generally experts and in fact refrigerative engineers think propane (sold as R290) is just fine. Here is an article from actual experts: Propane as R22-Replacement in Commercial Appliances

What the FUDsters (fudtards?) don't seem to know is the basics. Propane has a very narrow flammability limit. In fact 2.15 and 9.6% of the total propane/air mixture must be propane in order for it to be combustible. If you are outside of this range, it won't burn. It is an exceptionally safe gas. Appliance engineers calculate the amount of propane in a refrigerator and look at what mixture you would get in a small kitchen if all the propane got out at once. This would be an extremely rare event but even then you could not have a fire or explosion because there is not enough propane to make a flammable mixture.

I'm thinking that there might be some economic and control issues somewhere in the supply chain regarding traditional refrigerants. Bringing up the fear of fire and explosion is an effective way to stop people considering this gas - even though the scientific facts show them to be lying.

US government wants Microsoft 'Irish email' case reopened

users don't control where data resides?

Major US-based providers like Google and Yahoo! store a customer’s email content across an ever-changing mix of facilities around the world.

I've chosen to not use those services and instead opt for a private service which suits my taste. It is a fallacy that users have no control. That would imply that they cannot chose what company they use. Which is wrong.

The answer to Internet of Things madness? Open source, of course!

Re: The real answer

If the safety pin was invented today, it'd have an 8 core ARM, a buggy OS, a battery life of less than 8 hours, and 102 forms of telemetry to "enhance user experience".

Got it, thanks. I'm off to the patent office.

Take it away, ICANN: US States drop internet handover lawsuit

Re: Wow!

"You mean they finally realised that no matter how hard and long you flog a dead horse, it's never pulling your wagon?

I doubt that lot will ever learn that. More likely the head council realised it was a dead end for him.

Email security: We CAN fix the tech, but what about the humans?

Re: Preview email in plain text only

"Mobile email has always made me despair. You cannot usually view the headers"

So targeting mobile users has advantages.

Re: Preview email in plain text only

I use only text all the time. Never understood the need for html in mail.

Verizon!'s top! lawyer! ponders! walking! away! from! Yahoo! gobble!

business

Verison is going to play this to the hilt.

A robot kitchen? Whatever. Are you stupid enough to fall for this?

Re: £100 a week for a year with Tesco's delivery service comes in at about £26,000 cheaper

No Marmite. No deal.

PC sales sinking almost as fast as Donald Trump's poll numbers

Re: The Kit Is Fast Becoming Just Tools

"Because, 'new, shiny' isn't enough to sell a new computer these days."

Shiny is especially unimportant when it goes under you desk.

Adobe on patch parade to march out 83 bugs

rolleyes

too bad these guys just don't give up

Hungarian bug-hunters spot 130,000 vulnerable Avtech vid systems on Shodan

Would love to see

Avtech's IP cameras and video recorders offer the world the usual list of possible exploits

What's the chance of those same devices being used to DDoS Avtech?

Twitter yanks data feeding tube out of police surveillance biz

"Police/secret squirrels aren't going to pay commercial rates."

Then they can do without, just like with any other commodity they buy.

Facebook's 'Workplace' collaboration dogfood is now on your menu

not to my benefit

And probably not yours either.

FreeBSD 11.0 lands, with security fixes to FreeBSD 11.0

years of FreeBSD on the desktop

No worries. I'm not impatient and always jumping on the latest and greatest, so still using 10.1 which will is supported until the end of the year. Moving to 11 will be a December project.

Google 'screwed over' its non-millennials – now they can all fight back

Google may be thinking about the average age of employees, perhaps hoping that having Vint Serf on staff is all it takes.

Snoop! stooge! Yahoo! handed! all! your! email! to! Uncle! Sam! – and! any! passing! hacker!

I'm hoping we'll be seeing Verison!

(not sure if formal punctuation demands a period after the ! in that sentence)

Google says it would have a two-word answer for Feds seeking Yahoo!-style email backdoor

Re: The feds would have to ask correctly

Not a bad plan, but that wouldn't get them the contents of emails, which I believe is the issue here.

True man-in-the-middle: Transmitting logins through the human body

Modem?

As referenced at the end of the article, the body is acting as a transmission medium in this case. There's no modulation nor demodulation.

Domain name resolution is a Tor attack vector, but don't worry

Re: Bit of FUD really

It seems to be popular to assume that Tor users are unaware of basic security practice. I guess that makes a more popular story.

Internet handover is go-go-go! ICANN to take IANA from US govt

Re: Loonies

@Kurt Meyer I think you didn't catch the gist. Of course there are loonies everywhere and I completely understand your message. However, you may not have noticed, like I have, the number of posts on DNS forums and IRC looking for alternatives to ICANN because they are afraid that the UN will censor sites talking about guns. Do you really think this is not remarkable? My comment was not a generalised one but targeted directly at DNS interests which is the topic of this article.

And sale of guns will go up in USA. ... buncha loonies.

Firefox to doctor Pepper so it can run Chrome's PDF, Flash plugins

what does better mean?

Yes, Firefox's pdf viewer works just fine already, and it would be better if they just stopped supporting flash altogether. Here's hoping things don't get worse.

Yahoo!’s security shambles

some serious porridge time?

You mean send them to Scotland?

Yahoo! Mail! down?! Great! timing! as! more! US! senators! dogpile! hacked! web! giant!

It's always been down for me.

Never had a Yahoo! account.

152k cameras in 990Gbps record-breaking dual DDoS

Re: Good news

"Agreed, but the bad news is that there's more than enough kit out there to cause havoc and little if any means to get it cleaned up."

Cleaning up what's there may indeed take a long time. But surely there are a few key manufacturers of this kit who could be sued and prevented from continuing the situation. If not a class action suit, then publicly shaming of the these charlatans is at least a possibility. Other consumer devices are required to meet certain basic safety standards. I see no reason why the same principles wouldn't apply here.

Did last night's US presidential debate Wi-Fi rip-off break the law?

fail

"It cost them money to create that "professional capacity" wifi system."

But as it turns out it wasn't actually professional capacity.