Posts by Craig 2 488 posts • joined 1 Jul 2009
As somebody (occasionally) in tech support you get to see both sides of this coin. If I need to speak to somebody, I REALLY need to speak to them to sort the problem out. I've already exhausted all the `autofix` options. Conversely, almost everyone who calls me could have solved the problem with a bit of googling or looking at the help pages or even, God forbid, a bit of elementary knowledge. It's these people that make companies hide their telephone support at the end of a very long and convoluted maze. Otherwise people wouldn't even look at all the self-help ideas, they would just pick up the phone...
Definitely this, if you have your browser relatively locked down, recaptcha will ask every single time for image verification on sites you visit repeatedly. This should indicate that they can't fingerprint you so have to repeatedly verify you're not just a random bot.
Of course, the conspiracy version is that they can still track people running noscript / ublock etc just fine. They're only pretending they can't to make you feel safe....
"The passenger-bus-sized spacecraft will spin with its robotic arm extended, and NASA will measure the moment of inertia to measure the mass inside the sample head on Saturday."
Brilliant: We could put some kind of instrument to measure what we captured, but instead we'll just use the entire spacecraft and physics as an instrument!
Because number plates are 100% reliable and cloned plates aren't a huge problem with criminals....
I'm assuming the start code would work as a one time token the driver tells you before you get in? It could be anything, but something like a famous spy movie quote could add an air of mystery to every journey :)
"I used to enjoy taking photos of other companies' failures," Ben told us, "and sending [them] to my colleagues in the office to make ourselves feel better about our own."
Now there's someone who's honest with themselves! I'm sure we've all felt that little glow as we hear of competitor's tales of woe :)
Said employee is probably instructed to do the exact opposite ie. Pick oldest stuff first to help with stock rotation.
If I remember rightly one supermarket even made an advertising point of saying "we will always pick the freshest" for online orders because of the public's worry about this very issue.
Not sure why Kevin got the downvotes, you're both saying the same thing... I would imagine no "obvious" backdoor would ever be engineered into a device, but an intentional bug could be left in along the lines of: Buffer overflow here gets remote execution there... Then they can legitimately claim bug if it's discovered.
The whole "lets give exploits cool nicknames" thing is another matter, I'm not sure if techno / sci-fi thriller films are copying reality or vice versa.
Regularly run/walk/ride up the downs around the Needles Battery and there are loads of interesting structures. Of course most of them just look like lumps of concrete or fixings poking out of the earth so some historical context from the article is great. There's also tunnels etc. in the cliff facing Alum Bay which are worth an explore if you're adventurous :)
This is one of those cases where the meaning of a word is evolving over time and usage. Hacker to me means someone with technical skills, whether compromising a computer system or picking an electronic lock. To some people, hacker could mean they simply used their easy-to-guess password.
Pop-up selfie camera could also help with privacy concerns of cameras being activated silently without the user's knowledge. Hard to miss if it appears unexpectedly. (I assume it's motorised?)
Selfie camera occasionally gets used as an ad-hoc mirror, or for checking injuries from falling off the MTB... :)
"The lowest-level of penalty is applied if you are found guilty of gaining access to a computer without permission (or officially known as “unauthorised access to a computer”). This crime holds a penalty of up to two years in prison and a £5,000 fine"
Applying £5k PER infringement should force even the largest corporation take note. Of course, sending the CEO down for a couple of years wouldn't hurt too :)
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