Posts by Your alien overlord - fear me

UK research network Janet under ongoing and persistent DDoS attack

Hmmm, someone forgot to do their homework and thinks that by taking down Janet it'll give them an extra day. So, won't be arts, language or classics students. Wonder what Man Uni specialises in churning out?

Google Ventures ventures away from European investments

And how is el Reg's request for Google cash to investigate Google going?

Hacker reveals lifestyles of the rich and famous in UAE bank pop

Serves them right for not hiding their money offshore as all other millionaires do.

Russian "Pawn Storm" expands, rains hell on NATO, air-gapped PCs

Why don't we asked that nice Mr Putin who is doing it? He's monitoring everything in mother Russia so he's bound to have a good idea who the culprits are!!!

Re: How do you get the data out?

There is the inbuilt one Microsoft uses. Can't remember what it's called (not shadow copy) but it writes hidden stuff to disks formatted with NTFS. Used in audit control/user locking or something.

Putin's Russia outlaws ECHR judgments after mass surveillance case

Well, I blame ISIS for all these govt reds-under-the-bed paranoias.

It's bad enough those kids 5hitting in their own beds, but to go to other countries and do it, it's just bad form.

Re: If Russia's surveillance is incompatible,

Or someone has but GCHQ intercepted that communication and it never got to the Euro Court.

</tinfoil hat>

Weather finally cooperates with NASA, ISS resupply launch successful

Would have thought a water jacket would be a better heat transfer agent. They could recycle the liquid using you know what !!

France mulls tighter noose around crypto

We mock Kazakstan and North Korea but the rest of the world seems to be following them.

What happens when the terrorists use letters? Are govts going to start opening everyones mail as well?

As for banning encryption. Do you mass block countries IP address space if they also don't ban encryption? What if half the terrorists go to Belgium and the other half goto Germany how will France spy on them whilst they're plotting their new target?

So to sum up, the terrorists have won. Civil liberties and basic human rights are being eroded by our own govts whilst the cyber intelligence agencies do nothing but hack celebrity p0rn with no judical oversight.

Ofcom retreats from 4G spectrum auction after legal threat from Three, O2

Refreshing to find a regulator being beaten up by it's clients.

Goodbye, Hello Barbie: Wireless toy dogged by POODLE SSL hole

No doubt CGHQ (and NSA etc.) will be monitoring the conversations as well. Or getting Barbie to ask the kids about mommy and daddy's political stances etc.

BOFH: Taking a spin in a decommissioned racer? On your own grill cam be it

So that's how Google are really doing their autonomous vehicles. Let's face it, they've got enough spare staff and are wanting internet balloons everywhere....

Facebook to Belgian data cops: Block all the cookies across the web, then!

Surely those who don't use Facebook don't face a security threat? Therefore who gives a fcuk about the others? It's FB's problem of not ensuring all it's customers don't use 2 way autherntication to log in, or do like the banks use, those little number generator devices. They've certainly got the money to hand those out.

How I found a small, weird-looking horned dinosaur from eastern USA

“Laramidia” in the west and “Appalachia” in the east.

Why don't scientists get with the times - it should be "the West Coast" and "the East Coast" of America rater than these made up Narnia-esque names. It'd also get kids more into it. Yo yo, my man etc.

'Dear Daddy...' Max Zuckerberg’s Letter back to her Father

So is that brat going to like being plastered all over Facebook (without consent) from now on so that when she's old enough to be bullied, she'll need all of daddy's money just for the analysts help to find out what deep rooted problems she might have had when she was growing up.

Best get myself to uni to get a psycho degree because I see easy money in the future :-)

Safe Harbor solution not coming any time soon, says Dutch minister

Re: You can't argue with the law, punk!

The real Dredd (comics from the 80's) always kept his helmet on. No one can see you frown in MegaCity One.

Well, if you fine them, they'll just offset it against their European tax liability. Oh wait.....

Competition watchdog dismisses plans by TfL to uber-regulate Uber

TfL should just say the company must accept payment in the UK. Then Uber (and others) would have to pay tax the same as other taxi companies. It's not anti-competitive so CMA can go away.

50c buys you someone else's password for Netflix, Spotify or ...

Why is a rap singer buying me passwords?

Bitcoin cloud miners a '$20m Ponzi scheme – there was no cloud at all'

Everyone talks about the fact there was no hardware. Should someone mention that with Bitcoins, there is no actual money either? Or would that collapse the bigger Ponzi scheme that is Bitcoins?

Europe launches search for Einstein's space-time ripples

Let's hope it doesn't get buffeted by solar winds when measuring.

And have they taken into account the force of a laser hitting the cubes is likely to move them at the picometer level?

Mine's the one with real gold cubes in it....

Mobile bank upstart Tandem scores regulatory thumbs-up

No one using iCloud? And of course the cloud is really secure, somewhere I could stash all my p0rn selfies for example?

IT pros are a bunch of wedding and funeral-dodging sickos

Re: Mystical creatures

I used to do that (years ago) but I was young and big. I spent many an hour under the desks in summertime when ladies had computer problems - it didn't matter the problem, it was always "I'll just pop under the desk".

Many happy views, er I mean days.

Probably couldn't get away with that nowadays.

Your browser history, IP addresses, online purchases etc all up for grabs without a warrant

Why oh why do government departments never speak to each other? The NSA had all that and more that they could have let the FBI see back then.

UK.gov pooh-poohs Virgin Media's whinge to Brussels over beefy broadband pot

So if there is upto £800 million in returns, why the $%^& isn't VM fighting tooth and nail for it? It's not likely that it's too much money for the bearded one's old company surely? Or is it that VM's new American owners can't workout the exchange rate properly?

Report: VW execs 'knew' about fuel economy issues last year

You all seem to forget - German efficiency is legendery. If they can't produce a diesel engine that beats even the Japanese their very existance will cease to be. That's why they cheated.

"Ich betrügen, also bin ich" as IBM might say !!!

How to solve a Rubik's Cube in five seconds

Re: It's Monday morning

I'm still struggling with the aftermath of the weekend. And yes, lots of coloured squares spinning don't help.

Sysadmin's former boss claims five years FREE support or off to court

I've never worked a notice period. Hand in my notice, desk empty by the end of the day.

I've also never allowed previous employers to contact me about 'just fix this would you' since that normally means you're not exclusively working for your new employer which I find pretty standard nowadays.

Now do I know they've screwed up after I've left - oh yes. Do I care, oh no. Why? New company, new priorities, new problems.

LHC records biggest bang ever with 1 Peta-electron-volt jolt

At that temperature, perhaps someone can point Nigella to it to actually start cooking something more than just toast?

Telegram Messenger delivers candygrams to stalkers

Perhaps this is a spooks snooper operation? Front man says it's secure and we can't give the spooks what they want even under court order (good publicity), that gets lots of bad people using it i.e. drug dealers/paedos which gets into the mainstream news (all publicity is good publicity remember), then even more bad people use it i.e. terrorists when it's shown that it can't be intercepted/cracked.

But all along, certain people have been eavesdropping. The trouble is, they have the knowledge of to-be-commited crimes/atrocities but like when the British broke the Enigma code, if you foil all activities the oppostion know you've broken it. Even if it means members of the public will surely die, some people (unaccountable and acting in the National Security guise) believe that's acceptible.

Personally I don't.

Kids charity hit by server theft

If they can still write to all their patrons, the names and addresses must have been stored somewhere else. An organisation doing backups per chance?

German ex-pat jailed for smearing own pat all over Cork apartment

New meaning of taking your work home with you (Apple = crap job !!)

Protection at last: Operation Emergency UPS succeeds for Telecity

How about wiring them up to that new Russian data centre - the one built ontop of a nuclear reactor? That should keep the juice flowing.

Hungryhouse resets thousands of customers' passwords

I like mike's tweet.

Continuous Lifecycle call for papers: It’s the final countdown

How many of the talks are on soft skills* ?

How to sell ideas/methodology etc. to upper management/bean counters?

How to sell your products to paying punters/marketting etc. for independent developers?

All these are as important as developing actual systems.

* Soft skills are p2p (people to people) requirements. As we all know hard skills are what we do and Joe Public doesn't (understand).

Who owns space? Looking at the US asteroid-mining act

Just wait until I genetically mutate my space sharks to have frikken lasers on their heads.....

This is similar to the moron who 'owns' the moon. Just because you're American actually means nothing to anyone else in the world (let alone the existing Intergalatic Federation of Asteroid Mining Consortium).

If I decide to mine an asteroid, I don't want anyone else muscling in so lasers on standby....

BOFH: How long does it take to complete Friday's lager-related tasks?

I know exactly how they feel - spending more time on admin than real work - a plan devised by upper management because they sit around doing squat all and think that everyone else has the same amount of free time.

Lights, power, action! Smartplugs with a twist

3 out of 5 - you being drinking from the generous cup?

Also, in the UK our double sockets are horizontal.

US gourmets sizzle in bacon-scented underwear

Is this kosher?

IOCCO: Police 'reckless' for using terrorism powers on journo sources

In future all whistleblowers will be hunted down by Hellfire carrying US drones to prove it wasn't the Scottish Police targetting any journos.

Nominet to hike price of UK web domains by 50%

And this is why I dropped my .co.uk names and just use the proper ones (com,net and org).

Nest defends web CCTV Cam amid unstoppable 24/7 surveillance fears

So do Sky boxes, 38 watts whether powered on or off.

Just as well this Nest eco-system isn't designed to save electricity !!!!

Thin-lipped chancellor tight-lipped on contractor-nudge-onto-payroll plan

"Entirely missing from the document, however, is any mention of the government's promise to bring in a legally binding broadband service obligation by 2020, as pledged by PM David Cameron earlier this month."

That'll be passed in law in April 2020 so the Labour gov't will have to sort it out when they get elected in May 2020 - nice one Davey.

UK gov sinks £25k into Pi-powered cyberdesk

Isn't this just a standard desk with a few holes punched in it with all the cables neatly tucked out of site?

Amazon resets account passwords feared compromised – report

Well, I get password reset requests from so many banks,web stores and even Apple store and I can't even remember opening up accounts with them.

Tor Project: Anonymity ain't free, folks. Pony up

Surely all those paedoes, terrorists and drug dealers should be ponying up.

Re: old fashioned check

Americans eh !!!

Hacker predicts AMEX card numbers, bypasses chip and PIN

Either Amex is crap at thinking up numbers or Samy had access to more than just 20 other numbers. And how extactly did he obtain those ones?

Uber wants UK gov intervention over TfL’s '5-minute wait' rule

Waiting 5 minutes will cost drivers £19 million quid. Really? Isn't it waiting 5 minutes will cost Uber £1900 million quid cos of the crap rates they offer drivers?

But don't worry HRMC, it won't affect our tax returns because we'll still pay sod all in taxes because we don't earn income in the UK.