* Posts by Uplink

194 publicly visible posts • joined 7 Apr 2010

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How to keep your money safe if the euro implodes

Uplink
Trollface

On your way out

Don't forget to contribute some more to the recession you're moaning about.

Passwords are for AES-holes

Uplink
Go

Passwords are the past

With the development of smartphones and other portable kind of computers, I do have to wonder why are we still using passwords. Why can't we have something like a general hardware token, like the ones some banks give out, but general? Can be your smartphone with a "Google Authenticator"-style application. One that works like this:

1. Generate a public/private key pair (say, with PGP or similar)

2. Upload the public part to the website or service where you need to authenticate yourself.

3. Put the private key in your smartphone in secure storage (not your SD card, altnough if it's encrypted I guess it can go there too).

4. Each time you need to log in, you pop your smart phone app up, you enter a password (or screen pattern) to obtain access, then generate a six digit code (that lasts 30 seconds) that you input into the service/website to gain access.

If you're paranoid, you could store a key pair for each service you use, and then select it from a list after you unlock your app. There are also plenty of other ways to be even more paranoid: make the password not work unless your bluetooth headset is connected to your phone too for example, but then you'd only have to secure your own phone in the most paranoid way thinkable, not the entire Internet per individual user.

Top Facebook exec begs students: 'Click on an ad or two'

Uplink
Flame

Ads

Once they start displaying proper ads, not scams, I'll click on them. I mean, I'm always clicking at least an ad a week, on Google and other sites, if they catch my eye as remotely interesting. Having 20 ads saying "date person with 7 heads", I'm not clicking on them, ESPECIALLY if they say a friend of mine did so. Give me proper ads, that don't tie a click to my profile.

Bitcoin bank Bitcoinica still titsup after cyberheist

Uplink
Holmes

Guess who else is anonymous

Want anonymity? Well... you're not the only one getting it. The bad guys get it too. Now go find them. Oh, that's right: you can't. You could camp at all the exchanges and see how converts your stolen bitcoin to cash, but that's not enough to declare the seller as being the thief. And you can't even get 4chan ( http://gawker.com/5626105/4chan-on-the-hunt-for-puppy+throwing-girl ) to hunt them, nevermind the authorities.

Carriers, prepare to bleed: EU pops a cap on data roaming

Uplink

I'd assume they'd beef up the number porting infrastructure so when you roam your number is temporarily ported to your roaming provider. I'd assume two porting tables instead of one: one for when you're inside your country, one for when you're outside.

Irish national telco gets 100 days to escape €4bn debt hell

Uplink
Flame

Oh wow

I'd expect that in Romania, my home country, but Ireland? I mean, come on, that's like... the West, right? You don't do stupid shit in the west. You only do stupid shit in the east (and that's why you impose every possible restriction you can - the east isn't "Europe" enough). Yet Romania only did this with the (heavily outdated and very uncompetitive) industry. Telecom is doing pretty well, given that the national operator was sold to the Greeks (you know them, the book cookers). But then, they kind of have to. The competition is kicking them in the balls with fiber to you damn door. They just don't have enough time to strip the assets, because as soon as they'd do that, the firm would collapse the next day, not in the next 12 years. Plus, because they have REAL competition, the state wouldn't give a fuck if they went tits up - and I think the Greeks are pretty aware of that, since the state doesn't give a fuck about anything else either over there.

American search team fails to find women's G-spot

Uplink

Was wondering that myself: how do you expect to find the G-spot in a bunch a paper? Unless your secretary sits on top of them, this scientific method doesn't seem to be that accurate.

New account of Flight 447 disaster published

Uplink

Asynchronous joysticks

Reading the transcript, it looks like having asynchronous joysticks "helped" crash this plane, because the co-pilot Robert didn't have plane feedback to what Bonin was doing, and assumed Bonin was doing as agreed, even though he was doing something else.

If anything, Airbus should look into synchronizing the joysticks and retrofit all their planes free of charge.

Also... put those back between the pilots legs... not out of sight on the side... It's a friggin' plane, not an Xbox.

Dawdling EU countries smacked over telecoms reforms

Uplink

So they need to speed up these procedures then. If the local legislatures are slow, this can be a nice way to top up the EU budget as well :)

Chinese £200 iPhone killer unwraps for Xmas

Uplink
Facepalm

That would explain the price then.

Also, while I was interested in it when I saw the headline, I no longer am. It's useless to me without 3G.

UK punters happy to pay £3 to top up e-wallets

Uplink

If I see someone with a clipboard, and they spot me, I stop to talk to them. And I talk to them. And I talk to them. 20 minutes later I'm still talking. And I'm not going away, but I'm not giving in either. They're not giving up either until they come full circle and run out of things to say. Then they send me on my way. But I know that in those 20 minutes they didn't get anyone else chugged.

It's interesting to see them insist that I give them my card details (secret number on the back as well) even though I insist I'll go on their website to make the donation.

Busted Romanian TV star fingers Bulgarian airbags

Uplink
Flame

Can't watch

I speak Romanian, so I understand what she's saying without subtitles, but I also have this psychological condition where I have a seizure when I hear stupid people speak, especially if they do so in Romanian (as for some reason stupid people speaking English don't have the same effect), so I stopped watching just after she started quoting PI as 1.41...

Also, what ich said.

'Operation eMule' feds bust duo with 500+ eBay, PayPal accounts

Uplink
Coffee/keyboard

That's too much to ask for

I still ask my bank from time to time if they have a "security token" option for their personal Intenet banking, and they keep saying that no, they only have such a thing for business Internet banking. I don't want to pay the business Internet banking fees, and their business token is also a bit dumb: you press a button and get a code, no PIN to protect the token, no means to use the token to authenticate a transaction. Barclays have what I want, but they turned me down for a basic account on grounds of not having any credit score whatsoever (what does credit have to do with a basic account without overdraft or cheque facilities, I don't know).

On the other hand, people would find the system too complicated and/or would resent carrying "yet another security token" with them.

I hear some banks in Europe send a text message with a code that you have to put in their website. PayPal does this for the UK (I use this feature). I also hear that people buy Nokia 1100 mobile phones with dodgy firmware to intercept such messages, but as of today no one verified this claim (yet the prices did skyrocket).

If I ever had a vote in banking security issues, I would vote for a "paranoid" option like the one suggested by the parent, where I confirm every debit card transaction using my mobile phone in some way. Lock my screen with a code or custom gesture, PIN-protect my SIM, and even if you steal both my card and my phone you can't steal my money.

Rogue TV satellite brought to heel after auto reboot

Uplink
Pint

Satellite boot sequence

Satellite boot sequence on telly? Now this is something I'd watch! And record, and rewatch, and wait for the sequel.

China announces Skype ban to protect telco revenues

Uplink
Black Helicopters

English version

Did you read the Chinese version of their constitution? Maybe the English version is just a propaganda tool, and the Chinese version says "you will obey" in lots of characters.

Skype's mega-FAIL: exec cops to cause

Uplink
Gates Halo

@yosemite

Actually it is. The Linux version of Skype has been stalled at... let me check... 2.1.0.81 BETA for quite a while now. Because it hasn't been upgraded for ages, it just couldn't pull such a stunt as the Windows version. Programmers need to "improve" and "fix" the software for shit to hit the fan. Although I'm not happy that the Linux version is 3 major versions behind the Windows version, it seems it's not entirely a bad thing :)

Mobile operators handed content billing blueprint

Uplink
Flame

Hope this doesn't happen en masse

@dotdavid: We're lucky to have someone here who, single handedly, can cause a loss to the operators based on what he chooses to buy :)

The sad part is that the majority of sheeple slaves out there will likely bend over and take it, in a very democratic fashion, so the only loss caused is to us addicts, unless we make our salaries go through the roof in order to pay for our tools of trade (the Internet isn't just a LOLCAT source to us, but an extra limb, and we'd be handicapped if it were restricted or removed). When BT will see that all their consultants ask for insane fees after BT charge insane prices for the Internet, maybe then they'll understand why they shouldn't be doing it this way. This subsidy of the 95% to the other 5% isn't wrong at all. It's a necessity.

National Identity Card holding chumps have buyer's remorse

Uplink
FAIL

Why not reuse the equipment?

While reading the article and the comments, I was wondering why didn't they just use their scrapped equipment to issue card-style passports for use within the EU. Pretty much every European has an ID card they can use within the EU instead of a passport. No wonder Mr Hodder and others liked it. Choice between thick and expensive passport vs think and inexpensive ID card.

What I have in mind is to actually give the ID card infrastructure to the Home Office and allow them to issue "light" passport cards for use within the EU (you can't use then in other places because border officials can't stamp them, and can't apply visas).

You can have this "consulting" session on me Home Office! Now grab it before I put the price up.

Windows 7 really was some girl's idea, rules ASA

Uplink
Pint

Windows 7

I run Linux on both my laptops and deleting Windows 7 was my idea :)

Angry Birds find new way to take your money

Uplink

Google Checkout?

I always ignore anything asking me for money so I may have missed this one. But... can't they just use Google Checkout for in-app billing, if they don't do so already? Code your company payment details in the app, your Google Checkout account ID or whatever, and get the money rolling, regardless of app market. I, the user, would then put my login details in the phone, and get asked for my password each time I want to make a payment, just like on the iPhone.

But the other posters have a point: Google Checkout can't use your phone credit. You need a debit/credit card. Kids don't have debit/credit cards. But then again, I didn't know Apple could do this either...

Men may be able to grow a new pancreas from their testicles

Uplink

Perfect donors

Reading the article, I came up with this idea: Do you know the Catholic priests? They are the perfect donors. They're not supposed to marry, thus not supposed to have sex and reproduce, so imagine how many people their testicles can save! But then I heard this voice in my head saying: thing of the children!

Governments stonewall interwebs porn domain

Uplink

Porn inflation... not

"The bid has faced substantial opposition from outraged religious groups, which believe .xxx will lead to more porn."

Because I just came from the ECB website, playing the "Economia" game, I have to say this: Do they say that there will be porn inflation? Porn will grow so fast that people won't be able to keep up with every new release? Or even better: THEY won't be able to keep up with every new release.

"Many US-based pornographers, who believe that having a "red light district" for internet porn will lead to higher prices and invite government censorship, continue to oppose the proposed domain."

No one makes you take up a .xxx domain for your business. .com is perfectly fine if ICANN doesn't force all the porn sites to move to .xxx. And if they filter you, learn from Wikileaks: let the Internet mirror you :D

So the bottom line is: 1. .xxx will inflate porn; 2. .xxx will deflate porn; 1. and 2. cancel each other out, so... all good, right?

Why is Google's new Nexus S like no other smartphone?

Uplink

Hmm

Sounds like an Apple pricing strategy to me. Did Steve Jobs jump ship to Google and the Reg missed it?

Microsoft Windows glider crashes

Uplink

A Linux plane?

A Linux plane would come with loads of _options_ on what to put on it. It's up to you what you put. If you put different size wheels, it's your problem. But you can always take them off and install new ones, until you get a working thing. After you've fitted everything, that plane will fly by itself, without anyone pushing it. And will stay in the air until you unplug the IR blaster from the USB port :)

Spotify ports its music streamer to Linux

Uplink
Flame

Nice try, but...

"And since it doesn't yet handle ads, it's only available with a Spotify Premium account." And Ubuntu 10.04 compatibility isn't. Give me that source code and that NDA and I'll add the ad support you lazy bums :P And I'll throw in a proper Ubuntu 10.04 gconf2 dependency.

'The internet's completely over', declares petulant Prince

Uplink
Grenade

All these numbers! They're not good for you!

By extension, maths is evil. Because they fills your head with numbers. Whatever happened to religion, telling all the truth you ever need to know? When was it replaced with the lies of numbers? Number should be forbidden! Except from the Bible, which needs them.

*All the grammar errors above are intentional :)

Motorola advert revels in anti-iPhone schadenfreude

Uplink

Free leather case?

Jobs can fix this by giving a free leather case with each iPhone 4. No need for a recall. And if he does this, he'll be a hero instead of a pariah. Free leather case? Give me an iPhone 4 :) -

Brits are bored with mobile broadband

Uplink
Grenade

Drop the caps

Drop the caps, keep the prices low, and I'll get it. 1GB/month, with an "fatter" option of 3GB, 5GB if you're lucky, slightly more if you're a Ltd. with deep pockets? And yes, I don't mind limiting my speed for "special download services" (torrents). I need mobile Internet for the following: Youtube, iPlayer, Google, The Register, and Work (SSH, HTTP, FTP, that kind of stuff - I'm a developer). But all these can reach your cap mighty fast, even on a slow link which "encourages" me to give up Youtube, iPlayer, and Flash Ads.

Approaching space object 'artificial, not asteroid' says NASA

Uplink
Flame

We suppose...

What kind of science is this? We suppose it could be artificial... And what a Google's Map satellites doing? Can't they point them the other way for a bit, and ask the space debris to say "cheese"? Are DoD's satellites too busy hunting Osama in Afganiraq and they can't spare a few seconds to make a photo of this? Alright, I'll open my trusty Photoshop then...

ISPs told to keep filesharer naughty list

Uplink
FAIL

Notice of infringement

Dear article author,

I accuse you of copyright infringement. I have no proof, but I enjoy accusing people of things. Now, you only need to more like me and you're toast.

Cheers,

- Your accuser

That being said, what stops you being accused for the sake of accusing? I mean, it's the accusation itself that counts, not any proof, so sooner or later everyone in this country will receive a letter like that.

Malware scanners fail

Uplink
Thumb Up

Limited accounts and user chains (as in "metal")

I barely run any firewall or antivirus software, but always - ALWAYS - set up unprivileged accounts. Even in XP, because although XP doesn't have the nice feature of "hey, would you like to run this as root?", it does have "right click -> Run As Administrator", and if that doesn't work, switch user to "Administrator" for the operation and the log out and switch back to your user isn't THAT much of a pain.

So far, my own user got infected (I'm the last person expected to get a virus in my household, yet I was the one to get it :P), but my limited account prevented it from wreaking havoc. My antivirus didn't see it, even though it had the latest updates, and the virus had been on the system for quite a while). One day, the Russian website it was connecting to went down and the virus started hogging my CPU, and that's when I ran MBAM (AM in your article) and found the bitch (which was claiming to be svchost btw, and Windows happily verified its claims to be true).

Ever since I discovered the magic of limited accounts, and the magic of setting a password for the "Administrator" account (which doesn't show in the Welcome screen, and most users tend to leave unpassworded, mainly because they're unaware of its existence), I hadn't had to install Windows. It's been ages since I had to install Windows on my system, and it's happily running to this day. When it breaks, it's because I did something stupid, and I know what I did, rather than "surprise rape".

I also tried this technique on a dumb user's system. She's a school teacher. And she's old. Her machine would always succumb within a month of installation. Then, I created her a limited account, put a password on the admin account, I made her write it down and keep it in a safe place (so safe that she forgot where she put it, so I always kept a copy of the password), and her system has been up 6 years running (that's an estimate btw). I only get the occasional phone call when she gets a new printer or something like that, and the "tech guy" she gets to install it gets blocked by my setup. But that's it.

It's not that users shouldn't be allowed on the Internet. It's that users should be allowed on the Internet only after they've been chained nicely. They get to like their chains when their support bills drop because of said chains. They'll ask for heavier chains too, if they'll be safer as a result. Whip 'em? Sure, as long as their safety is guaranteed.

O2 limits unlimited broadband packages

Uplink
Grenade

The monthly average you say?

"consistently above the monthly average" is their reason? Is the monthly average the figure they use when they set up limits?

In that case, I guess it's time for a little benign trojan that makes all users in the UK use more bandwidth, which would raise the average, which will raise the value of infinity a bit, right?

Microsoft wants pacemaker password tattoos

Uplink
Gates Halo

About ink

What I know about ink is that it's susceptible to moisture. And what I know about the human body is that it produces a lot of moisture, in the form of sweat. Suddenly, that password can become unreadable quite fast. Especially if put on a foot (as in "under socks that retain moisture AND heat").

I also read the "been burned / in a fire" argument, which you need to take into consideration. How about a small connector under the skin, in the vicinity of the pacemaker (if the pacemaker is damaged, then the credentials are useless anyway, so that's the safest place to keep info: next to the pacemaker). Instead of surgery, it would require just a simple needle incision, Matrix style, but in the heart rather than the back of the head, and this needle would be used for talking to the device. When done, pop a plastic cap on the plug (this plastic cap should be penetrable with a needle) so when the skin regenerates it doesn't get in there, put a plaster on the incision point, and you're back to normal. That puncture will regenerate (or make good use of minor plastic surgery), cover the rubber plug and the pacemaker interface connector, and off you go.

As far as I can tell, Microsoft Research did anything but research in this matter.

Rutland Telecom offers local internet for local people

Uplink
Joke

So much money!

BT will never have that kind of money, even if it drags the budget into 200% deficit. I mean, 37000 pounds is beyond their corporate means!

Bulgarians cop an eyeful of Penthouse billboard filth

Uplink
Thumb Up

They can fix it

They should change the poster and display a vagina that pretends to be an eye (i.e. in horizontal position). They could draw a pair of glasses on top, just to confuse people even more. That should teach them.

Labour shock pledge: 16.8-meg broadband for ALL by 2012!

Uplink
Pint

Guess what

Guess what came into the post today. Can you guess it? No? Well, a letter from BT about broadband. According to this letter, the Labour party isn't that far off. Disregarding the use of O2's catchphrase, by itself saying "Become one of the better connected" on the envelope and the enclosed letter, they also say this:

"We're currently rolling out up to 20Mb speed nationwide, depending on line and location*, to bring you our fastest broadband throughout the day".

And where that star is (it's actually a cross on the letter), it says this:

"New network currently available to 50% of UK households, increasing to 55% in March 2010 and to 75% by Sprind 2011. Speeds referred to are download speeds. [...]"

So they may make 2012 after all.

Uplink
FAIL

Error, but maybe not

In Romania, in the cities, people get fiber optics to their flats, and get 50 or 100 Mbps throughput (not just connection - and to the whole Internet, not just the IPSs network) all day round, no caps, no throttles, no line rental, and they pay peanuts for it too: the equivalent of 10 pounds a month (including VAT @ 19%). In the countryside you get ADSL, and it's still 6 Mbps, for a fraction of what you pay in the UK. To make things even more interesting, I think much of that Internet traffic passes through a bunch of wires that pass near London.

Given these figures, I would've thought they mean megabytes as well. Promising 2 Mbps would sound quite lame to me. Also, maybe they will pay Virgin to extend their network and pull an interesting stunt against BT (because Virgin sure take their time).

The shed dwellers get better Internet than Daily Mail :)

Angry Romanian hackers deface Telegraph for Top Gear toss

Uplink
Flame

Romanians and Romanian Gypsies

In Romania, the gypsies are seen as a separate nation of people (they even have their own kings and emperors, and their own set of laws, unrecognised by the state, of course), even if they have Romanian citizenship and ID cards. Romanians hate the Romanian Gypsies because wherever they go they screw things up and then they are labeled by their citizenship in the press. The Romanian people then are feared as a whole, even though, statistically speaking, the good/bad people ratio isn't that much different from any other European country (the UK included).

To make matters worse, the Gypsy ethnic group is called "Roma" and "Romani", which collides with "Romanian", even though the terms are similar only by coincidence, not by relation. The Government itself is taking steps, when it can, to dissociate the terms. The ID cards and passports now use the country identification "ROU" (from French "Roumain", "Roumanie"), replacing the age old "ROM" moniker, because "rom" in Romanian means means "gypsy", "member of the Romani people", and foreigners saw "ROM" as meaning "gypsy" as well.

Because the deeds done by these people reach the headlines so fast, the Romanian people are furious. Hacking attempts are just one way of expressing this, and just happen to be a high profile one. I don't condone hacking, mainly because it just adds petrol to the fire, but other means of making it clear that not all Romanians are bad seem to be inadequate in the face of tabloid-like articles.

I've worked on a few European programmes on "gypsy integration", in Romania, and I can tell that it's an excruciating job trying any kind of integration for these people. They'll happily participate in your integration programmes, giving you the impression that they're co-operating and your programme is successful, yet as soon as you're gone, they're back at their antics, making fun of you, behind your back, of how naive you are investing so much money in "educating" them. The only ones profiting from this are the gypsies themselves, yet it has to be tried, hoping that one day a tipping point will be reached.

The Romanians are pissed because they're put in the same pot as the gypsies, and they find this to be very unfair. If you read the papers across Europe, you'll always find mixed articles: one day a Romanian rapes the a woman and/or kills her, the next day a Romanian is killed while protecting somebody from a native. The Romanians are pissed also because the first kind of article reaches first page on the likes of Daily Mail, while the second kind is buried deep on page 66 or something, in small print, on a side column. But then again, that's also true about English, French, American, etc. paedophiles that come to Romania for sex with under-age children, or to adopt children for their internal organs, or they fatally hit a person with their car and they flee to their home country under diplomatic immunity, and so on.

We all have weeds, and the Romanians just happen to show up more often than not.

While writing this, I remembered a film called "Gadjo Dilo". If you can get your hands on it, please watch it. There's one scene in there which shows quite well both the "native" Romanian temper and the Romanian gypsy temper, where a Romanian guy attempts a verbal bad joke about a gypsy - both of them in the same bar, drinking -, in good old Romanian tradition, and the gypsy, showing that he can take a joke, attempts a practical joke of his own: in anger, he throws a glass into the Romanian's face, killing him, in good old gypsy tradition (which typically involves ninja swords, but anything will do if you don't have one around).

Thanks for reading.

Glitch diverts net traffic through Chinese ISP

Uplink
Big Brother

404 on Google Checkout?

Maybe that 404 page on Google Checkout was actually on a Chinese webserver rather than Google's? Just a thought.

Adobe man to Apple: 'Go screw yourself'

Uplink
FAIL

"Smart" multitasking tricks

Being BSD-ish and all, why not use the STOP and CONT signals? SIGSTOP is pretty much guaranteed to freeze your process, regardless of what it had been written in. This argument about "smart" multitasking APIs designed to do what SIGSTOP and SIGCONT do is BS IMHO.

Uplink
Grenade

One more thing

I forgot about this thing called a... what's its name... oh yeah, SCHEDULER. When did they stop using that? Is this "smart" API a "cooperative multitasking engine" by any chance? Did the MS Win 3.1 patent expire on that already? I'm getting old :)

iPhone 4.0 SDK bars un-Jobsian code translation

Uplink
Megaphone

Just americans

We hate socialism! Don't impose national healthcare on us!

But we love corporate dictatorship. Yep, it's totally democratic. Just ask our televangelists :)

Google Checkout checks out

Uplink
Grenade

Not just Google

In the past week, I've seen multiple outages while trying to pay online inside the UK:

Trying to pay for my pizza order at Pizza Hut: unknown error (as in "can't talk to the payment system") - they don't use Google

Trying to top-up my SIM: connection timeout - they don't use Google either

Trying to draw petrol out of a Tesco Pay@Pump petrol station - I'm quite sure they don't use Google :)

It feels more like a UK banking thing than a Google thing, and Google is just playing along. You didn't see an HSBC banner on that 404 page by any chance, did you? :)

Police cuff 70 eBay fraud suspects

Uplink
Happy

Something you don't see

Something you won't see in the Daily Mail any time soon. Because these guys don't live in a shed of a model (with a brother doing modelling as well) who drinks regular Coke (i.e. not diet!).

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