Posts by scrubber

Apple pushes first-ever 'rapid' patch – and rapidly screws up

Testing

If you're forcing people to take something maybe, just maybe, test it to ensure it has virtually no negative side effects and if it does let people know so they can choose whether to risk those side effects or not.

As to iPhone updates...

Florida folks dragged out of bed by false emergency texts

Not An Activation Signal

I look forward to being told there is a flood in my area, hastily followed up with another alert reminding me the hosepipe ban is still in effect.

UK consortium bid for NHS data platform falls at first hurdle

Bang Those Pots

Palantir. Palantir? Where have I not been allowed to hear that name again?

Guy accused of wrecking crypto exchange now hauled into court

DAO are Code

What did he do wrong?

If you write stupid code and people exploit it who's at fault really? AI ain't gonna care about this so future automated trading systems gonna wreck oversights like this in milliseconds.

UK spy agency violated Snooper's Charter with 'unlawful' data retention

The Great Reset

All government discussions and actions should be made available to the public who apy for them. All owners of companies (shareholders) should be jointly and severally liable for any damages and debts the company has.

This would make for a more equitable world with less growth but more accountability and less harm to people.

ChatGPT has mastered the confidence trick, and that's a terrible look for AI

Re: Coding for morality?

"most coders have some basic moral code"

BofH wants a word...

Re: I asked it what War and Peace was about.

"I took a speed dating course and found my perfect woman in 20 minutes. It was my daughter." --- also Woody Allen

Re: A sttrange article in which to find this essential general truth..

And yet the rational part are now on the cusp of nuclear war with Russia and the adult bookstore need conference turned out to be not only true but genuinely newsworthy.

As always though, the cover up is actually worse than the original crime.

Doctors call for greater scrutiny of bidders for platform that pools UK's health info

Negative health outcomes

The inability to know what happens to anything you tell your health provider inevitably means they have limited or wrong knowledge about you which leads to sub optimal treatments and diagnoses. The people in charge either don't know this or don't care.

Swiss bankers warn: Three quarters of retail Bitcoin investors are in the red

Anon

"understand why retail investors continue to participate in cryptocurrency exchanges"

A darn good question as the main benefit of cryptocurrency is not going through kyc and enabling other people to know or control what you want to own.

NHS tech chief dismisses concerns over loss of statutory power to protect patient data

Medical misinformation

When I now see my GP I have to respond to every question with "is that medically relevant to the issue I came in with?" That is not good for our relationship, trust between GP and patient, my treatment, or my willingness to support the NHS. Sub optional outcomes and more strain on the NHS are inevitable.

Teardown shows Apple iPhone 14 Pro is not pro-repair

Buy New, Buy Often

Or just rent it. Own nothing and be happy.

Janet Jackson music video declared a cybersecurity exploit

Re: Unbelievable

Current computer parts may not have moving parts but that doesn't mean you can't have a well crafted program to generate frequencies that affect interior operations, e.g. getting something to clock at around 2.4GHz might be able to block and/or mimic a Bluetooth device.

Now-frozen crypto-lending biz Celsius accused of devolving into a Ponzi scheme

Interesting Model

So they lost if the market rose and lost if the market fell?

Crypto market crashes on Celsius freeze, inflation news

Re: Inflation hedge

Are you Gavin Turk?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artist%27s_Shit

Inflation hedge

Some Cryptos are conceptually inflation hedges due to fixed supply. If people are leveraging their real world wealth to fund their crypto speculation then obviously any real world problems or crypto falls will lead to a disproportionate sell off in leveraged assets to cover margins etc.

As for Celsius, well, there is some form there from previous associations that investors should have looked at before handing over control of their assets.

Australian digital driving licenses can be defaced in minutes

Re: Stop Using Phones for This

Most people have faceID enabled (please don't do that!) so as soon as you hand over your device the office can claim he had to check some details, seeing camera towards you and it is unlocked. Even without this they can take it to their car and plug it in to make a backup and hack it at their convenience later.

Stop Using Phones for This

Anyone handing over an unlocked phone to a stranger is crazy, anyone handing over an unlocked phone to law enforcement is a Person of Interest.

Safari is crippling the mobile market, and we never even noticed

New Browser, New Rules

Maybe a different browser would allow you to set global cookie rules that websites would accept with no user interaction?

Meta to squeeze money from WhatsApp with Cloud API for businesses

Make money?

They already have the network of mobile number connections, that's what they paid the money for. Anything else is gravy.

How ICE became a $2.8b domestic surveillance agency

Just the beginning

Wait until you hear what the new Congressional Police get up to. Oh wait. You can't. They are not subject to any oversight and are not covered by FOIA requests.

Meetings in the metaverse: Are your Mikes on?

Missing the larger point

As cute as this scenario is, wait until "Mike" is permanently banned from your meeting as well as the whole metaverse because he posted something on facebook that while factually correct is currently politically verboten. Then when it comes time to pay his salary the banks have kicked him off their platform too, assuming there isn't already a CBDC for the government to directly control. Mike has to be let go as he can't attend meetings, view online docs, or be paid. When he tries to get another, more menial, job, MS won't let him use linkedin because of something he said about a virus possibly coming from a lab. This is our real future.

Coca-Cola probes pro-Kremlin gang's claims of 161GB data theft

Jurisdiction

"Russian government's illegal invasion of Ukraine"

They ain't broken no laws the US has signed up to.

Heresy: Hare programming language an alternative to C

Only fools

He who Hares Rodney, he who Hares.

Your AI can't tell you it's lying if it thinks it's telling the truth. That's a problem

This statement is a lie.

Good luck getting a computer to understand that one.

Sniff Test

AIs are as reliable as dogs. We think we know what they're up to, but we can't tell exactly what parts of the training are being picked up on, e.g. it has been shown that drug dogs react to almost imperceptible cues from their handler rather than the scent of drugs or money.

To trust our money, our freedoms and even our very lives to systems you cannot reliably interrogate or understand is madness.

Elon Musk's Twitter mega-takeover likely imminent

Musk Social

Might sign up. Just to see how many people call him a pee dough after what he said to that british cave guy in Thailand.

Google Docs' AI-powered inclusive writing auto-correct now under fire

IBM Ethics?

Weren't they a key supplier to a certain Boss uniformed group of Germans in the 1930's?

UK spy agencies sharing bulk personal data with foreign allies was legal, says court

Only humans can breach privacy?

"...as BPDs are searched electronically there was inevitably significantly less intrusion into individuals' privacy, as any data which has not produced a 'hit' will not be viewed by the human operator..."

That's not how it works. Spying on people is still spying on people. Either LEOs can go through what is stored later, or repeatedly, or knowledge of it inevitably changes the spied upon's actions.

Scientists repurpose hoverfly vision to detect drones by sound

Use Cases

My mind immediately went to checking whether there is a government drone nearby recording your conversation rather than securing airports or finding drones with explosives.

It would appear I think the government are more dangerous than the terrorists.

The time you solved that months-long problem in 3 seconds

Re: Fuck that

I agree with your sentiment, but there are worse ways to waste some time than a fully expensed week in Venezuela.

China's top tech city Shenzhen locks down completely for at least a week

Re: 5 Year Review

@iron

"How about we prosecute non-mask wearers"

Show me the evidence that masks work in the real world.

"anti-vax activists"

Ask your doctor if this vaccine is right for you.

"COVID deniers"

I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend until death your right to say it.

"lockdown breakers"

Show me the evidence that lockdowns have a net benefit and you may have a point. But we need to wait 5 years to see the actual result and that was the point of my post.

"Lockdowns and WfH kept my partner safe."

WFH kept your partner safe, other people being locked down did not.

"explain how it was all a hoax"

Methinks you are putting words in my mouth.

5 Year Review

All these countries lauded as performing brilliantly with Covid (civil liberties aside) cannot be judged until the pandemic has gone through its whole life cycle and the impact of public health measures can be felt (missed medical appointments, childhood development, mental health issues, excess deaths and years of life lost etc.) and that is not possible until around 2025. I have my suspicions, but will wait until the dust has settled before asking for prison time for Ferguson, Ardern, Cuomo, Whitty et al.

Internet backbone Cogent cuts Russia connectivity

Re: Conspiracies not all wrong?

@veti "What restrictions is "the west" putting on free speech?"

This wasn't about RT - although I think that was a silly decision - it was about the following:

The United States security services have declared that mal-, mis-, and dis-information are all potentially terrorist activities. The Surgeon General has asked social media companies to send him a list of people making medical claims that do not fit the current narrative for purposes yet to be determined.

The UK has banned unapproved protests. The Online Safety Bill will prevent people from saying "legal but harmful" things online.

I'm sure there are plenty of other things in the offing, but isn't it funny that these are being pushed while everyone is distracted? I half expect them to come after our medical data again.

Conspiracies not all wrong?

The use of this conflict to restrict free speech, free press, protest etc. makes it look like opportunism by the west.

The ability to take people out of the financial system for 'reasons' means that they can now do that to the rest of us suggests more than opportunism. But that would just be a crazy conspiracy, right? Like vaccine mandates, government shutdown of scientific debate, vaccine passports, limits on travel, shutting down bank accounts, covid camps, two tiered society, medical apartheid, bans from social media for mentioning lab leak etc. etc.

The zero-password future can't come soon enough

Business Opportunity

Hi, is that Lasik? Yes, my computer got hacked. Again.

GDPR?

It's not about you. If someone else has your real name and phone number and installs a meta app then you are toast.

Ukraine asks ICANN to delete all Russian domains

"actual facts"

That'd be nice. Do you have a link?

In an arms race with criminals to protect our privacy, it's too early to admit defeat

Protection Racket

Maybe we'd do better against foreign nations and criminal gangs if government agencies didn't hoard zero day exploits then lose them to people who offer them for sale on the Dark Web. Just a thought.

Facebook exposes 'god mode' token that could siphon data

Damage done

While I'm sure some bad actors will use this to scrape the data for nefarious purposes, I'm genuinely wondering if any of them could possibly do worse with it than Facebook is already doing?

Cambodia cans critics of its snoopy Internet Gateway, says every nation has one

Cambodia???

I thought it said Canada.

Sig-int

Knowing who communicates with who, in what order, on which dates and times and for how long can actually be much more valuable information than the content of any given message.

The Omicron dilemma: Google goes first on delaying office work

Omicron ftw

Wonder if people will be posting retractions and apologies?

Oh, you agreed with removing restrictions all along. Funny that.

Re: Safely reopen?

I look forward to you posting a link to a peer reviewed scientific paper showing the efficacy of face coverings (i.e. non-surgical masks). And a pithy response as to why the unvaccinated are now being infected less per capita than the vaccinated (ons stats).

Re: Safely reopen?

Actually, people do respond rather well to their own view of risk. The problem is models which do not include people changing behaviour in the face of apparent risks or even things like school holidays. hence the apocalyptic predictions of at least 100k cases per day and half a million deaths leading to the disastrous policies of lockdowns, vaccine passports, mandatory vaccinations, and internment camps.

Looking at the stats, case numbers were falling before lockdown measures were taken in the UK suggesting the reduction was due to people's behaviour changing and not government rules.

Re: Safely reopen?

Fine, use QALY (Quality Adjusted Life Years) as almost all public health and public safety initiatives did before covid.

A disease that disproportionately affects the elderly and those with comorbidities will not come out as a major public priority unless you happen to be in government and think that a large headline number of deaths is impolitic, regardless of the actual value of those lives.

The dark equation of harm versus good means blockchain’s had its day

Possible uses for blockchain:

Please note I detest all of these (except one)

* A way to store vaccine status and history that governments cannot tamper with

* A centralised account whereby governments, or their agents, can scrutinize and approve/disapprove of transactions depending on participants and subject matter

* A traceable, tamper-proof social media identity that can be anonymous online, but also de-anonymised by a court order/signed warrant

* A non-alterable history of police entries or other public bodies' actions who have a history of editing the record when wrongdoing is uncovered

* A history of all locations and purchases so that doctors, or others, can see where you've been and what you bought in case of a medical or legal need

China's Yutu rover spots 'mysterious hut' on far side of the Moon

It's just another brick in the wall

Crypto for cryptographers! Infosec types revolt against use of ancient abbreviation by Bitcoin and NFT devotees

Re: how about "Cryptography means Cryptography"?

NickHolland: "truncating words and abbreviating them is just snobbish"

Then goes on to use: I'm; doesn't; and don't.

Take the high road indeed.

GPU makers increasingly disengage from crypto miners

Re: "counterargument"

In a very reductive sense fiat is backed by a government's ability to enslave its people and obtain their economic output.

But people don't like to talk about that.