* Posts by Ole Juul

2726 publicly visible posts • joined 27 Apr 2007

Dark web hacking forum hacked and members' privates exposed

Ole Juul

Dark web?

Lost all credibility right there.

Apple Watch leaks data

Ole Juul

Oh dear

Other Watch flaws could create a denial of service condition.

So you'd have to ask someone for the time?

Help! We're being crushed, cry billionaire cable giants

Ole Juul

Whiner

"What has been so distressing is that much of this regulatory ordinance has been launched without provocation," Powell said.

verb: to snivel or complain in a peevish, self-pitying way

Americans cutting back on online activity over security and privacy fears

Ole Juul

Re: The very large pink elephant in the room

"I'd wager that it isn't much safer banking only offline as it wouldn't surprise me if it wasn't the very same system that the teller uses at the window as you use online with perhaps a different UI. In the end it comes down to whether the crackers attack you or the teller."

I bet you're right. I haven't seen the teller's UI, but when we talk it sounds like the same stuff I work with, only having some deeper admin controls. I've been banking on-line for a long time and can't see it being less safe than going to the bank. It's the same account, after all. Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if in-person banking exposes you to a larger attack surface.

Bots half all web traffic

Ole Juul

half?

"either someone is bad at percentages, or estimating the size of the internet."

It's the latter. I've spent a lot of time trying to analyse traffic to a couple of my sites and make some kind of meaningful sense of it. My best guess is that less than 10% of hits are from legitimate visitors. Half is not a scare word to me. It just makes it sound like somebody has no idea.

Opera claims 50 per cent power savings with browser update

Ole Juul

Re: Opera puts me to sleep too

"I save on power by browsing 50% less."

You could also just close one eye.

Ole Juul

Different ways of working for sure. I run the tabs down the side and wide enough to read them. That gives space for 36 fully readable tabs on my screen. Second, put thumb and forefinger on Alt and Tab so as to cycle through stacked windows. (only works for right handed mouse users) Chose a window for a subject or theme. No need for a lot of clicking on bookmarks which I find bothersome. Anyway, my opinion is that a browser should scale to any number of tabs or windows across as many desktops as I chose. My choice of working style shouldn't be dictated by the program. Ya, I'm dreaming. But really, it's time that developers caught up with the capabilities of the hardware.

(ps: I'm not the one that downvoted you guys.)

Ole Juul

"Was just wondering why the 'net seemed so SLOW today, and found that Firefox was using 1.5 gigs of RAM and 100% of one CPU core. (of 4 and 2 respectively) Even allowing for a couple dozen tabs open, that seems ridiculous."

Without NoScript I still only had about 25% CPU usage on FF, so you probably have some other condition. Perhaps a rogue web page with crazy coding. When I started using NoScript it seemed to cure the problem. With roughly 200 tabs, I'm only at around 4-6% CPU and 3GB ram now. I do think that FF wasn't actually designed to scale though. The comment below here by @-tim seems to suggest the solution, and that is to not have Javascript and the like be active on non-active tabs and windows.

Curiosity find Mars' icecaps suck up its atmosphere

Ole Juul

Really?

Spring: the season when plants and trees begin to grow

United Nations orders plan for tackling online terror propaganda

Ole Juul

I was wrong

It seems that all internet "problems" are perceived to be solvable with censorship but I had hoped that the UN would be above that.

Meet the man who owns his own piece of the internet

Ole Juul

Re: So it's $249,985 extra

$250,000 to acquire it. It will also cost him at least $25,000 annually in dues and running costs. A little excessive when $100 a year will buy and host a dot-com domain.

It's in the article. However, I'd argue with the $100 part, since that's the level that I work at. One can actually get a .com for under $10 per year and annual hosting for the same or less. A C-note would be rather deluxe.

Ireland's international tech sector bumps up against language barrier

Ole Juul

Re: Esperanto?

Esperanto was invented to solve the problem of quibbling over which national language to use. You get to keep your own national language at the same time as having an international language. Furthermore, because of the way it's structured, Esperanto allows a nice way to keep your native style and still be perfectly understood. For those with native western languages it is also the easiest to learn by a large margin. One reason Esperanto is easy is that it has a clear grammar (fits on two pages) with no exceptions, something which cannot be said of English.

That said, now that our everyday and business world has grown to include the Eastern hemisphere, Esperanto is looking a bit old because it is based on Western language roots. For Europe it's still a good idea though. I'd also like to point out that the grammar of Esperanto allows all forms and so facilitates very clear as well as creative expression - suitable for both technical and poetic writing.

Debian farewells Pentium

Ole Juul

Re: Time moves on...

My cousins, condemned by 'time' to be over-60, mostly have Pentiums. No way will they go to PCUniverse, pay good money and get terminally confused. XPpos seems to work perfectly well for them, so should we now abandon hope for upgrade to Linix-on-elderly Desktop?

Even as someone with an active interest in vintage computers, I still can't see this causing grief for people. I agree that a nice old pentium chip is a perfectly good CPU and you can do lots of interesting things with it, but I don't think it's very practical for a modern browser. As for running XPpos, that's fine, but you don't need to go buy a new computer for that since there is a truckload of perfectly good later generation Pentiums available for free.

Ole Juul

Perhaps opportune

I've got a Pentium 4 670 3.8 GHz box here which is working very well with Debian on it. Perhaps this announcement is a good reminder for me to think about changing the CPU/MB. At 115W it's not as beneficial in the summer as it is in the winter. In fact I could probably replace it functionally with something that uses 20 Watts.

Cyber-moolah boss gets 20 years' porridge for money laundering

Ole Juul

expressly?

"Liberty Reserve founder Arthur Budovsky ran a digital currency empire built expressly to facilitate money laundering on a massive scale for criminals around the globe," said Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara on Friday.

I wonder if they were able to prove that LR was set up "expressly" for money laundering for criminals. It seems to me that most financial institutions can be used to facilitate this sort of thing.

Facebook image-tagging to be tested in Californian court

Ole Juul

vote with your feet

Plaintiffs Nimesh Patel, Adam Pezen and Carlo Licata complained that in photo-tagging, the company was collecting biometric identifiers without informing users of what was being stored or why, explain how long data would be retained and how to delete it, or get their permission.

I truly hope you win the case. But ... er ... may I ask why you were using Facebook in the first place?

'I thought my daughter clicked on ransomware – it was the damn Windows 10 installer'

Ole Juul

oh boy!

This looks like it's going to be the year of the Windows 10 desktop.

29 years of data shows no mobile phone brain cancer link

Ole Juul

next up

A study showing increase in brain cancer in people who walked around with a smart meter taped to their heads for 29 years. OK, I guess it may be difficult to get volunteers. Then how about a study showing lowered intelligence in those who suffer from the effects of radio wave paranoia?

'Bitcoin creator' Craig Yeah Wright in meltdown

Ole Juul

Re: Odd

I can't figure out what he wants from all this.

It does look odd, but perhaps we're not actually following the money here. What does his conversation with the tax department look like? Is he actually making money on tax returns? We're all so focused on the Satoshi thing that more personal and real details are not being investigated and reported.

The Lonely Pirate MEP's Holocaust copyright stunt backfires

Ole Juul

Julia Reda MEP on Facebook?

You've got to be kidding! How embarrassing for somebody who claims to be a friend of the internet.

Facebook bungs 10-year-old kid $10k to not 'eliminate' Justin Bieber

Ole Juul

tactics

He should have hit up Bieber first, and then Facebook. Now it's too late.

Reminds me of Hägar the Horrible telling his men "next time, pillage ... then burn.

I am Craig Wright, inventor of Craig Wright

Ole Juul

Re: Explanation

tl;dr

It takes two Craigs to make one Wright.

Ole Juul

Je suis Craig. . . . I think.

Michigan electricity utility downed by ransomware attack

Ole Juul

another company

gets a lesson in security

Web site admins: Brace for weekend traffic surges from iOS devices

Ole Juul

Re: What is the purpose...3

It's there to give perspective.... oh wait

Chap runs Windows 95 on Apple Watch

Ole Juul

an hour to load

That qualifies as a time machine right there.

ICANN in a strop that Intel, Netflix, Lego, Nike and others aren't using their dot-brand domains

Ole Juul

Re: Proof that it was a shakedown all along

hundreds of global brands paid the $185,000 application fee to protect their name

And they didn't even have to fool around with Bitcoin for the ransom. Brilliant.

US govt quietly tweaks rules to let cops, Feds hack computers anywhere, anytime

Ole Juul

what's changing?

This may result in a change to what happens in courts, but probably not what happens on the net. IP addresses aren't guaranteed to lead to a person. Many people use VPNs in different countries from where they are located. Without knowing the specific person, there simply is no knowing where they are. This leads me to think that these FBI law scoffers enforcers have been happily hacking into people's computers all over the world already.

First rocket finally departs Russia's Vostochny cosmodrome

Ole Juul

Vasectomy cosmodrome

I must be seeing things.

Microsoft's Windows 10 nagware storms live TV weather forecast

Ole Juul

Re: Station TV announcement: The 5:17 to Doncaster....

An ad placed like that in the middle of a network show could run half a million dollars. I hope Microsoft pays up.

The Internet of Things edges toward a practical reality

Ole Juul

utility poles and vibrations

I am not a fan of IoT, but this one caught my fancy. I have several times called the utility company to report an outage. It always surprises me that they don't know where the break is. This would help them, and by extension, me. Also, cannot this kind of network be a great way to locate many other things, like explosions or earth quakes?

I should add that, at least in these parts, power outages are many times caused by a motorist hitting a pole. It takes quite a while to locate the problem. In any case, those stupid smart meters have not proven to be useful in detecting outages (or their location) here. Also, "microphones" aren't necessarily sensitive in the voice, or audible, range.

US government tells Apple it has security problems that Apple fixed last year

Ole Juul

Old trick

Reminds me of the old trick of showing up with a "can I help" just as someone else is about finished washing the dishes. No, FBI, it's not the "thought that counts", it's the intent.

What do you call an old, unpatched and easily hacked PC? An ATM

Ole Juul

thieves with backhoes

Those are real hackers.

Hackers so far ahead of defenders it's not even a game

Ole Juul

Re: Bad Grammar

Bad grammar, intentional or not, provides an excellent filter for the perps. People who see that as a sure sign of phishing get eliminated right away and the remaining people are more likely suckers.

Ole Juul

Hackers vs Boneheads

Companies are unable to change anything to do with computing. Having the latest shiny and concern with how things appear to each other is more important to them than how it looks to a hacker.

More questions than answers, literally, from America's privacy rules

Ole Juul

What's the average of bad and good?

And good policy is nothing but solid compromises.

Compromise is often the only practical way forward, but it is never "good".

Jaron Lanier: Big Tech is worse than Big Oil

Ole Juul

What an odd fellow

"While an oil monopoly might control the oil, it won't take over everything in your life, but information does, especially with greater automation,"

So he rides a bike or a horse, fine. But no food or furniture or plates or clothes? Everything in most people's lives is completely oil driven. Where does he think plastic comes from? Not only production but you can't get stuff shipped to your area without oil, nor likely drive to the stores. Seriously, I doubt this guy rode his bike to China to purchase his computer from a "green" oil-free producer.

I'm certainly not pro oil, but the idea that we'll have a future where we'll survive on trading information is fanciful. Anyway, those are my pearls of wisdom. That'll be $10. Ya, right.

Australia admits to running offensive cyber-ops team

Ole Juul

most important part

He will lead a "cultural change" about how whole of government approaches security, and to better engage the media, Mr Turnbull said.

The media needs to be engaged so people will know they're getting their money's worth and funding will continue. Experience in other countries shows that the rest will be ineffective. Please tell me I'm wrong.

FBI's Tor pedo torpedoes torpedoed by United States judge

Ole Juul

Yet more evidence

Again it looks like the FBI is either incompetent or unable to follow the rule of law.

Tweak Privacy Shield rules to make people happy? Nah – US govt

Ole Juul

Re: My opinion on the last bit...

Indeed, there is no reason why companies shouldn't bear this "huge burden". I would argue that they should have done this in the first place.

US government sued by activists looking for backdoor smoking gun

Ole Juul

we're not in Kansas anymore

"is FISC even constitutional in its operation?"

That's of no consequence. The constitution no longer applies.

FBI's PRISM slurping is 'unconstitutional' – and America's secret spy court is OK with that

Ole Juul

Re: Damn...

"So the bottom line is that the 2nd Amendment will be required to enforce the 4th"

The second says the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed, and since strong encryption is classed as munitions, it looks like that may soon be a gonner too.

Not OK, Google! FTC urged to thrust antitrust probe into Android

Ole Juul

Re: Consumer Watchdog...

Frankly, I don't care who says it. It needs to be said.

NYPD anti-crypto Twitter campaign goes about as well as you'd expect

Ole Juul

Ya right

"evidence that used to reside in file cabinets, closets, and safes is today stored on smartphones"

Oh yes, I remember clearly my grandmother's filing cabinets where she would keep records of all the conversations she had with people. And I'm pretty sure she also wrote down the coordinates of where she was at the time. Seriously, do these clowns even know what day it is?

Google found 760,935 compromised web sites in a year

Ole Juul

760,935 breaches Google detected

I wonder how many of those have active administration. Surely an admin's job is to keep an eye on logs and traffic, so I'm guessing that a large number of these sites don't really have an administrator.

US congresscritter's iPhone hacked (with, er, the cell networks' help)

Ole Juul

Re: within the grasp of powerful crime gangs and government agents

I agree with Trevor. I was being facetious in my top post. For some purposes they can be considered the same, but some government workers genuinely believe they are doing good, even if they aren't.

Ole Juul

within the grasp of powerful crime gangs and government agents

That's exactly the bunch that worries me most.

Apple assumes you'll toss the Watch after three years

Ole Juul

not a real watch anyway

I've got two I use. One was made in 1935, the other in 1966. Neither requires batteries. Both will surely be valued by someone many years from now and fetch a price much higher than when new. Both tell the time. (although you have to look at them)

What's this about Canada reading your BlackBerry texts?

Ole Juul

such excite

Sounds like Motherboard has a sensationalist slant on something not very sensational.

South Korea to upgrade national stereo defence system for US$16m

Ole Juul

Gangnam style

Great! So the Norks will be hearing K-pop interspersed with McDonald's ads. That'll get their goat. /kek