Posts by JimboSmith

Hands off our VPNs, privacy groups tell UK ministers

Re: Capita?

There’s a reason Private Eye call them Crapita.

Outlook for Mac bug makes font choice a purely decorative feature

Re: An MS app that won't work right on Non-Windows OS?

One of my colleagues said they expected a banner to appear aking if the unlucky Mac user had tried New Outlook.

Clingy Virgin Media fined £28M for refusing to take the hint

A mate of mine was looking for a new broadband supplier and there was a Virgin Media rep in his local shopping centre when he went in. So he registered his interest but didn’t have the time to sign up there and then. Then six weeks later he had to move to a new area because of a new job, Virgin called him up one afternoon and tried to get him to sign up as a customer. He explained patiently a couple of times that he had moved and that Virgin do not serve this area let alone his street. Salesperson continued with the benefits of taking VM until my mate said he was bored beyond belief.

So he said yes let’s do it, he wanted the fastest Broadband, he wanted every television channel they can get to his house and he might switch his mobile too. Sales person eagerly confirms all the multi tv packages and the broadband which wasn’t cheap every month. There were channels he hadn’t even heard of but he happily signed up for the lot. The bloke on the other end then read out the address he had given in the shopping centre and my mate said “No, as I’ve told you before, I’ve moved!” He gave the actual address of where he’d moved to and the sales guy said he would just check that address. He informed my unsurprised mate, that sadly Virgin do not appear to have reached that town yet. Mate just replied along the lines of oh what a shame, oh well deals off then, ended the call and blocked that number from ringing his phone.

EU urged to act after Pegasus infects phone of spyware inquiry MEP

Re: The Word "Persistent" in the Phrase, "Persistent Malware" ...

Yeah well if we’re just including iPhones then Predator may not be persistent, but Cisco Talos say

Talos’ analysis revealed that rebooting an iOS or Android device may not always remove the Predator spyware produced by Intellexa. Persistence is an add-on feature provided by Intellexa for their implants and primarily depends on the licensing options chosen by a customer.

I woild hope they know more than me about this.

Microsoft says the world is changing faster than it can keep up as it guts commercial, Xbox teams

Anonymous Coward

This follows a broad Microsoft strategy of buy things and then either write them off or sell them for much less than they paid. Nokia phones being one of them, the acquisition of Danger Inc and the launch of the Kin another, Skype anyone?

I’m not a gamer but I’m assuming some of those games brands might not survive. Yeah thanks for killing Skype and not selling it on, I recently had to call my cable company in the states from the UK on their tollfree number. Now I’m dying to know Microsoft, how I do that with a personal copy of fecking Teams. Answers on a postcard to the usual address please. No wait nevermind your AI just told me you can’t.

How about MSFT killing off the perfectly good and more usable (Classic) Outlook and replacing it with the much less capable and dreadful GUI web version? For those who don’t know or use Outlook, Microsoft are “unifying the codebase for Outlook” across all platforms. What this means in practice is killing off the desktop version and making the less capable web version all you’ll be able to get (from I think 2029) in an app wrapper on the desktop.

Oh I agree with that entirely, a member of my team who found it on her desktp (along with Classic) thought it was a fake program made to look like Outlook and steal her. So she pulled out the network cable and reported it to IT as such. "Brian from IT" turned up and told her it was perfectly fine IT had installed it for her. He tells her to “Try it you might like it”. Well she didn’t and said “why does this look like my 6yr old drew the icons and why has one of my rules not worked on the test email I’ve sent? It was then we found out Client Side Rules don’t work, there is no blanket delayed send for all emails and then nobody was happy. She deleted the icon off the desktop after he’d buggered off. It’s like they had a meeting and thought what’s the lowest amount of features from the original we can launch this POS with. Who uses COM addins in 2026, ah you do, well never mind, you won’t soon. Oh and depressingly it’s 2027 not 2029 I believe when Classic Outlook goes belly up.

End of era as the BBC switches off Radio 4 Long Wave service

Re: Run silent

When I worked in the media someone told me some interesting Cold War facts. The reason that the IBA ran the commercial transmitter network was because the government wanted control of it. In the event, when the chips are down the balloon goes up and the lights go out they wanted to be able to switch the feed to transmitter to what they wanted broadcast. In actual fact this would have been a BBC feed informing you what your wartime local frequency would be and then it would have shut down. This way no one could still be playing the chart show when the listeners would be a few minutes away from reaching 10,000 degrees.

I used to be able to receive Eagle Radio from Guildford in Central London via DAB and that was the only reason I had my DAB radio out of the cupboard.Then when I got back from holiday and Eagle said not available, but I’d moved the radio which might have been the cause. Back in position I scanned the multiplex again to see if it was down to the radio’s location. BBC Surrey worked fine but the Eagle preset just said not available. i checked online and it had closed so the DAB radio went back in the cupboard. Otherwise it was just national stations like Heart and Greatest Hits broadcasting on the local multplieX.

252khz from Ireland only stopped in eatrly 2023 when RTE stopped broadcasting on it.

O2 joins UK 2G switch-off with summer 2029 start date

It would be easier just hitching it up to your WiFi like most things. PC/laptop/tablet/phone Devices, smart fridges, door bells, inside and out CCTV, smart lightbulbs, sound system etc …

Except that not everyone has wifi and not everyone has wifi that reaches their meter. My folks have their meter in an outbuilding and the wifi doesn’t reach there or anywhere outside the house. I know of one person who has no broadband, so no wifi and just tethers off his mobile phone or his work phone.

Well, only in the sense that there's several hundred thousand to several million meters that will need either a new comms hub, or complete replacement. The problem was that like everything associated with Net Zero, smart metering was botched and rushed (meaning it took far longer to roll out than if they'd done it properly). So the technology is 2013, and only so much thought was given to the reliance on mobile radio comms that evolve fairly fast compared to asset replacement cycles in energy metering. So my house has 'leccy and gas meters that were installed 32 years ago and still work properly, and the electricity meter wasn't even new when fitted. Meanwhile, loads of early smart meters have been junked, and in a couple of years we'll start to see the consequence of battery powered smart gas meters stopping the supply of gas (when the battery fails they disconnect supply: far better that consumers should freeze than the industry lose a few quid of revenue).

Not forgetting that the original Smart Meter design had the same encryption key on evry meter. GCHQ had to step in and say in the strongest possible terms “No” to that.

An unnamed senior Whitehall official told the FT that every smart meter used the same encryption key for data communication, opening up a single point of failure for hackers to take over every device if they accessed the key. As a result, GCHQ added further security measures.

Government warned of smart meter security threat back in 2012

At my folks house in the sticks if you are away from a window indoors, good luck gettIng a mobile signal 2/3/4/5G at all. Will be a real boost (no pun intended) to get a signal properly indoors thanks to the switch. Their panic alarm is using the landline and is being looked at for the switch over to VOIP.

Microsoft accidentally kills epic Outlook email threads

Re: Testing, testing 1..2..3?

I use a defer delivery rule for exactly this, so that if I hit reply all by accident I have a 3 minute window to correct it and deal with any other issues. Work started pushing New Outlook but once I tried it I found defer delivery doesn’t appear let alone work on New Outlook rules. I switched back and then a few days later everyone received a survey from IT about Outlook. I explained that I wasn’t switching because the New one lacked that vital feature amongst others and the GUI sucked massively.

IT support contacted me to tell me that in a few years Classic Outlook won’t exist and I’ll have to use New Outlook. I replied that maybe by then they’ll have got New Outlook working as well as Classic and it won’t be missing so many blasted features nor look as horrible.

Signal says UK plan to scan devices for nude images 'endangers us all'

Re: Warrantless search

There’s Nokias such as the Nokia 105 4G that are still a feature phone (no camera) and not Android which you can buy. If you don’t want to get sms/mms on it just change or delete the service centre details on the phone and you will not get an SMS/MMS same with the APN for data.

Re: Mary Whitehouse was a well-meaning

I recollect some of the broadcasting people who were butts of her campaigns regarded her with grudging affection.

Alice Cooper was a target of hers because of the song School’s Out which she hated. Her objection was that it promted anarchy in the nation’s educational establishments up and down the land. She was so effective in her campaign that it was banned from Top Of The Pops, which as anyone my age can tell you was a godsend to your sales. The song made number one on the back of this and Alice sent her a thank you bouquet of flowers. I remember hearing him in an interview saying what a lovely woman she was and thanking her for her intervention.

When I started working in broadcasting someone told me how her organisation the NVLA in the 1980’s were against Channel 4 showing their late night films. These were international arthouse films that might have a fight or a shot of a naked breast (just one in a 90 minute film). Of course she was outraged and they campaigned to get a warning added at the start and a “red triangle” on screen during the film’s broadcast. Again this backfired as it made those films very popular. One of my school friends stayed up to watch one of thses “naughty films” on a Friday night and said he was bored shitless. She also had a hand in getting the BBFC (the film censors) to regulate videos too. They were only doing cinema films until her campaign, the upshot of which was the BBFC regulating vidoes too and resulted in a crackdown on the so called video nasties.

Re: This law endangers the privacy of the entire world, not just the UK

Imagine Apple played ball with legislation akin to this. The dev time for a functionality like this would be very expensive indeed, so they'd want to get the most out of it they could. It would not be a hard spin to set up, to push it in all regions saying "Oh we've put this new safety feature in for underage users, our parental controls are the best in the business!" and win some public trust points that way. Everyone now suffers the detriment to their privacy as a result.

Apple already tried it, a backlash halted it. BDSM campaigers created something called backlash.org.uk about restrictions to their lifestyle/business.

https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/apple-client-side-scanning-system

Re: Zombie Starmer's Victorian internet: An Internet without Things.

If it is surrounded by cherubs,

Are those cherubs in your photograph unclothed sir? Maybe we’d better continue this conversation down at the station……

Normally that would be a jokey comment, now……I’m not so sure.

Re: Warrantless search

My sister in law sent me a picture of my nephews (all under 10 at the time) all in the bath at bathtime. I would I presume be stitched up like a kipper if this idiotic idea becomes a reality. That reminds me of Julia Somerville ( https://www.independent.co.uk/news/julia-somerville-defends-innocent-family-photos-1538516.html) who sent a roll of film to be developed and on it was a picture of her daughter in the bath. A totally innocent picture of her daughter on a roll of family photographs which an employee at the Boots she took the film to, reported to the police. Her partner was arrested when he went to pick up the film and she was also subsequently arrested although both were eventually released without charge.

A dumbphone is looking more and more attractive every day.

Every employee’s password was stored in a single Excel file

Re: Insta-Logins

I have worked for a firm where they used to have the details of the firm (name corporate logo etc. printed on the card. For access to IT you already needed 2FA but physical access was just a NFC card. Then a new head of security turned up and basically changed things. All the cards became white with just a picture of the employee their id number and the number to call if you found the card. If you called the number it gave you a PO box to send it to with no mention or relation to the company.

You also were given a speech about how if you kept the card in your wallet/purse and you lost your wallet/purse, your first call wasn’t to American Express or your bank, it’s was to them. When you swiped your card at the main entrance your picture appeared on a screen that security could see and if it didn’t look like the person physically there, they would prevent the gate from opening.

Brit regulator finds mobile network service on trains is far from first class

Re: GWR seats are unspeakably bad.

I've even considered packing a cushion. I have a regular journey of 2 hours+ and it's awful.

I do take a cushion on their trains because the seats are so bloody awful. I’ve had some funny looks but once people realise there is no padding anymore, they’re looking more in envy.

Duo who sold car crash victims' data must repay £118k

Re: Offence

The insurance scammers rarely call me now but one memorable call went as follows:

I had was at work when my mobile rang and there was a lovely chap with an accent from the Indian Subcontinent on the other end. He said he knew about my accident which he was keen to stress was in no way my fault and asked if I had been injured. I said:

Me: "Yes it was awful I've never been in a fatal accident before at least not one where I died"

Sounding very interested: "So you were injured in the accident?"

Me: "Yes mortally wounded as it turned out, the funeral was lovely though"

Sounding very interested: "Can you describe your injuries?"

Me: "Yup Death by Decapitation and not the good kind*, not going to walk away from that"

Sounding extremely interested: "Have you spoken to a lawyer yet?"

Me: "No very few people talk to you when you're dead, I'm grateful for your call."

Sounding disinterested: "Are you saying you didn't survive the accident?"

At this point there is the sound of someone else joining the call.

Me: "Yes, and I wouldn't recommend cremation if I were you!"

Line goes dead

If he'd asked the what the good kind of decapitation was my reply to him was going to be..."The painless kind"

The latest innovation in UK public transport: Schrödinger's trains

Re: "the board was of the Solari split-flap type"

Had a sudden flashback to Airplane and the nun(?) with the guitar

I was thinking of Nicola Walker and Paul Stacey as the Frightful Folk Duo in Four Weddings and a Funeral

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1eFvgQ2FFM

Taiwan cops say student's radio kit brought bullet trains to a standstill

Re: Impressive radio kit....

We do have the fastest steam train [LNER Class A4 4468 Mallard], the fastest diesel train [BR Class 43 / Intercity 125], the fastest conventional rail airport express [Heathrow Express Class 387/1a], and the fastest slow train [GWR Class 387/1 between Paddington and Didcot/Newbury].

We also have the fastest average speed.

And the most uncomfortable seats, on the GWR Class 800! My advice is to take a cushion to sit on.

Microsoft sends Outlook Lite to the great inbox in the sky as memory costs skyrocket

My company’s IT support team have been sending messages to staff members about using New Outlook. They’re very keen on this and apparently the staff are less than keen, some might even say apathetic. Anyway I had to go and see someone from the team about my laptop and he noticed I was on classic Outlook. I was then given gentle persuasion to try it, specifically let me toggle the switch here and let’s see what you think.

I said (and yes I had tried it before) that the icons looked like they were done in crayon and the GUI was very flat. I then tried a test email which was sent immediately to my surprise as I have a rule set up delaying sending by a minute. i looked at the rules and a load of them aren’t there, so I ask what’s happened to them? Ah well apparently you can’t do those type of rules in New Outlook. So I tried to drag and drop a file which did not go well and was told that support for that may be coming (or it might not). Can I view internet headers please, yes I an but they were called something else. Can I customise the “ribbon”? No you can’t.

“So basically it’s missing a load of features and you expect me to downgrade to that?”

“Please don’t call it a downgrade because it is not a downgrade”

“Well what is it then?”

“Microsoft are making it so that there is one version of Outlook across all platforms.”

“Let me guess, instead of using the feature rich desktop version as the one version, they’re using the web version?”

“Yes I believe so.”

“Then at the moment switching to that is a downgrade, and I’ll go back to classic thank you.”

I suspect that getting rid of lite may well be for the same reasons. Unify the codebase for everyone on whatever platform/OS you are using.

Notepad sheds Copilot from toolbar as Microsoft gives subtlety a try

Re: "a return to the basic text editor is not on the cards"

Have a beer, I’ll be trying that tomorrow as soon as I get in.

DARPA looking for battery that could power a laptop for months

Re: This is easy to do

Oh just use a working Solex Agitator instead, the essential unit to convert radiation from the sun into electricity on an industrial scale.

Anthropic: All your zero-days are belong to Mythos

Re: The only mythos here is

I was about to post the same thing as I seem to remember Stowgers being a decorators merchant near one of my previous residences in West London.

Contractor quaffed his way through Y2K compliance while the client scowled

Re: the site was opened

I worked for a firm where with the permission of your line manager you could have a drink at lunchtime. The unwritten rule was that you did not come back drunk to work and that you were capable of completing the rest of the day. Then one day at lunchtime we had a fire alarm activated by a smoke sensor, which turned out to be something smouldering but easily put out. However the rules stated that we all had to evacuate until the Fire Brigade had checked everywhere and given the all clear.

Unfortunately 90% of those staff who were designated and had been trained as Fire Marshals were in one of the local pubs having lunch. So other sensible people were hastily designated as Temporary Fire Wardens and the building was cleared. Given the number of people who did not want to leave meeting rooms, new rules were drafted about following instructions if the evacuation alarm is sounding.

'People's Panel' to check if UK wants controversial Digital ID will cost £630K

Re: A process as bent as a paperclip.

You’re right about the Conservatives being against ID cards before the 2010 elections. Failing Grayling Is quoted in the Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2009/jul/06/id-cards-legislation-fines-tories saying so:

The shadow home secretary, Chris Grayling, told MPs: "One of the first acts of a Conservative government will be cancelling the ID cards scheme. The scheme and the register are both an affront to British liberty and will have no place in a Conservative Britain. They are also a huge waste of money."

According to the BBC timeline https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10164331 the majority of people were against them last time.

June 2003:

The results of the public consultation are in and the Home Office admits that more than 5,000 of the 7,000 responses were against the scheme.

Oh and the BBC say it cost billions last time as well.

EU broadcasters say smart TVs and voice assistants are the next gatekeepers

Re: Special pleading from the old guard

I bought my TV only once I had confirmed that you could actually delete not hide channels and give them the number you want not what someone else has decided. I have to say thank you to a mate who worked for Sony at the time, who tipped me off that their sets could do that.

Re: I'm not opposed

Bloke at John Lewis mentioned Freely, he was quite enthusiastic about it - I wasn’t.

“Can you record with it?” says I,

“You don’t need to!” says he,

“That doesn’t answer my question” says I

“Well you just watch it on catchup no need to record” says he

“Have you thought about being a politician?” says I

Apparently there are Freely devices that will record but Freely has to be off or disabled or something you can then record the Freeview programme. You cannot record from Freely they have put this in their spec, which seems a very retrograde and repressive move. One of them even had Alexa built in which put me right off it.

Re: Big brother is watching and listening to your TV

I have a smart TV i bought a good fre years ago but don’t recall ever having connected it to the internet. It predates the fashion of putting microphones in the remote and anyway I use a 3rd party one. Someone at a John Lewis Partnership store tried to get me interested in a new telly, which didn’t end well. He suggested all these lovely streaming functions and I said no thank you I don’t do that. He seemed a bit shocked but I pointed out if I was buying a Television it was to watch Television on not something to watch internet content. He pointed out the ease id voice control to which I again said no thank you I’m aware of George Orwell’s 1984. Not too sure he was though.

I said if you are going to try and convince me to purchase one, the following need to be present on the set:

Renumberable and reorganisable channels (not just a favourites list)

Recording to a hard drive,

Headphone output,

No requirement to have or use the internet even if just during setup.

Satellite as well as Freeview reception desirable

When asked why I wanted all those features I said because my existing TV does all of that and not having it would be a major step backwards. Would you buy a new electric car that didn’t have adjustable seats? Apparently he wouldn’t.

Starmer's digital ID reboot raises same old questions as its Blair-era ancestor

To quote from Alexander Knox in Batman

You can prove all this? <sarcasm> what am I asking, of course you can</sarcasm>!

Batman Scene

BBC World Service digital switch backfires as online audience drops

Re: They have no clue

Then presumably they would pay a subscription for those BBC shows whilst those who didn't want to watch wouldn't have to pay for them.

Based on my industry experience, the commercial broadcasters would likely strongly object to Ofcom/DCMS a subscription funded BBC just as they did the launch of a BBC1 +1 channel on Freeview etc. which never saw the light of day as a result.

Re: They have no clue

I worked for a commercial broadcaster who didn't like the license fee. However they also didn't want the BBC taking advertising or sponsorship. That would add a sizeable competitor for quality advertising money especially during prime time. Neither did the idea of encryption/subscription go down any better. People apparently might find the idea of two monthly charges unwelcoming (especially if there’s financial downturn) and ditch the commercial one.

One of my current colleagues had complained a while ago about the license fee. With the cost of living going up he was worried that the family was paying for both Netflix and now Disney too. As an experiment they made a note of what the family watched over a typical week. After looking at everything he decided that they could do without either Netflix or Disney as those weren’t used nearly as much as Freeview. The family couldn’t live without Eastenders, I’m a Celebrity, Strictly, Masterchef, Coronation Street, Traitors, The Apprentice, Gladiators etc.

Iran all but vanishes from the global internet amid US-Israel strikes

Re: Another war for oil

My Iranian friend is hoping that this will result in regime change and more freedom for the citizens of Iran, including the family they have there.

Microsoft to auto-launch Copilot in Edge whenever you click a link from Outlook

Re: Scene

I’m now genuinely curious as to how this will work on my company laptop. I disabled NoPilot on my Edge browser the second I got the thing back to my desk. That was the second thing I did after fixing the position of the start button on the taskbar back to the left hand side*. Are Microsoft going to re-enable NoPilot on my copy of Edge when they push this out?

*Ideally I would like the taskbar vertically on the left hand side of the screen too but Microsoft have not yet seen fit to allow that.

Break free of Ring's servers, earn a five-figure bounty

Re: Why even bother?

A good salesperson recognizes and acknowledges when a customer has a specific, non-negotiable requirement. Doing otherwise burns their credibility.

Three steps to every sale: sell yourself, sell your organization, and then sell your product.

Immediately pushing cloud consumer crap on a customer who specifically requested no cloud consumer crap virtually guarantees that salesperson won't sell anything to that customer.

Even if the store didn't stock any camera solution which met the customer's needs, they probably stocked other products which might. An electrical supply store probably has supplies the customer needs even if he finds his own RPI solution for the camera. Let's start with the most obvious: need a spool of Cat6? Hardwire is much more reliable, can deliver PoE, and isn't vulnerable to crooks with Chinese WiFi jammers. What else might an electrical retailer have? Perhaps a UPS? Good idea for reliability.

Instead, the customer's takeaway was that the salesperson was a clown.

I’m guessing you’ve never been to Currys, they wouldn’t be my first choice for most things electrical. Especially if you want something thet is specialised (like a UPS) or not the ususal consumer stuff. I’ve met some fabulous sales people over the years who have understood my needs and made every effort to find what I was looking for or say we don’t have it. This guy just ignored what I asked for and ran through the list of products they had available whether or not they were suitable. Maybe he thought I would suddenly change my mind when presented with his ‘superior’ sales skills. There was no danger of that, but if someone says If you don’t have anything that meets the requirements please let me know now…………it is rather annoyIng to be standing there 5 minutes later saying “So you don’t actually have anything at all!”

The one saving grace is that if he didn’t have anything I wanted to buy, he couldn’t push an extended warranty on me.

Re: Why even bother?

Posted this before but I tried to buy a camera for viewing my front door a few years ago. It was just for letting me see who was at the door making a delivery, when I was at home, in the garden out the back. Would be going on a closed circuit wifi or wired network.

I had suffered from deliveries not being dropped off, not ringing the doorbell and just dumping a sorry we missed you card

Went into my local electrical retailer named after a popular Indian culinary delight as I happened to be passing.

Gave the sales bloke my requirements, told him there obviously couldn't be any cloud element and I didn't really need recording. If he'd got nothing that fit the bill please would he tell me now and save me some valuable time.

He then proceeded to show me a Ring doorbell which when queried if they'd released an update to allow offline working admitted they hadn't. He was very keen on Ring and I certainly wasn’t. I was then shown Nest, Hive and I think something else, all of which needed an internet/cloud connection.

When I said no to all of them he informed me that I was obviously going to need the internet or how could I view the camera when away from home? I asked if he'd listened to my requirements when I first spoke to him and that I’d only be using it when at home. He rather bizarrely said yes to this which did nothing for lowering my blood pressure.

I asked what use the camera would be if the cloud service went down or bust? He didn't have an answer to that. I said what if it’s going somewhere without an internet connection? He just told me everywhere had the internet now. I asked what happened if the internet connection went down or (again) the company went bust which earned me a shrug of the shoulders.

I said I’d try elsewhere and got a Foscam on Amazon. Yes they have been slated for crap security https://www.theregister.com/2017/06/08/whitebox_webcam_scatters_vulnerabilities_through_multiple_oems/ but I turned off the wifi on the camera and wired it into a dedicated decent wifi router which wasn’t connected to anything other than the tablet I used for viewing the video feed.

Microsoft teases ‘reimagined SharePoint experience’ with added AI

Re: Eldritch Horror!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I don’t want AI in Sharepoint and I don’t want my OneDrive files showing up (even if only visible to me) in a search on Sharepoint. Yes i know the latter can be turned off in the admin centre for specific users. Most people I’ve asked would like it to be off by default and enabled for specific users.

Also I’ve seen enough people who have got misconfigured folders on OneDrive that makes them findable by anyone on Sharepoint via search. Amongst the GDPR howlers I’ve seen and reported are; performance reviews, CV’s and disciplinary results. I also saw a new project which was supposed to be top secret, sitting there for anyone to find. Can’t imagine the introduction of copilot is going to improve matters at all.

Oh and have an upvote for the Sir Pterry reference.

Majority of CEOs report zero payoff from AI splurge

Re: GOOD

Yep the same thing happens at my place except they don’t let you know the correct answer. A colleague who had taken one test four times and failed, attepted to bribe me to do it for them. I weren’t happy to just give them the answers and instead told them I would teach them. After that they passed first time, and the year later when it reared its ugly head again. She said I should be doing the training not a computer program.

Apple knits up $230 sock for your iPhone in time for Christmas

I was thinking it looked like a Borat Mankini when I first saw it. I asked a few others and once they had stopped laughing they said oh my goodness yes that’s exactly what it looks like.Then I mentioned the price and the laughing started all over again.

AN0M, the backdoored ‘secure’ messaging app for criminals, is still producing arrests after four years

Actually it probably relates to the Comancheros an outlawed biker gang in Australia. Drug smuggling Australian kingpin Hakan Ayik who was involved with the gang was also heavily involved with distributing An0m.

Re: Quantum ?

Have an upvote for the Sir Pterry reference. Just to clarify something here from the article, it wasn’t a three or four letter agency that came up with or created An0m. Though they did end up with all the data and were the ones who ultimately pulled the strings they actually didn’t set it up. It was a bloke known by a pseudonym “Afgoo” who was a distributor for Phantom Secure. He was facing charges related to that phone system and decided to see if he could cut a deal with the FBI. He was thinking of setting up his own “secure app” and approached the feds to try and reduce his potential sentence by offering them full backdoor access. I read a very good book about An0m called Dark Wire by Joseph Cox which I highly recommend if you’re interested in this.

AWS outage turned smart homes into dumb boxes – and sysadmins into therapists

Re: Really?

I have Hue lights in my house and they are connected to a closed circuit wifi network. I’ve never seen the need or had the desire to connect them to the internet/cloud, could not see the point of doing so. I don’t want Philips or any other data firm to know that I have a lighting setting in the bedroom that is called “Let’s get it on” and how often i use that. Someone recently tried to sell me a smart tv which I declined as I would rather use an aerial and dish. Same with a “smart” kettle although upon closer inspection it wasn’t what most on here would describe as smart. It was instead one where you could choose the temperature the water warms to, no internet or cloud needed.

China blames US for cyber break-in, claims America is world's biggest bit burglar

Who watches the Watchmen - Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

RIP Sir Pterry..

'Fax virus' panicked a manager and sparked job-killing Reply-All incident

We had one arrive one day that read this is a Lazy Fax Virus, Please fax me on to other people in your address book.

Microsoft moves to the uncanny valley with creepy Copilot avatars that stare at you and say your name

Re: Share and Enjoy…

“Your Plastic Pal who’s Fun to be with”

After Marvin from the HHGTTG my next thought for that line was “Inflatable Ingrid” from Red Dwarf.

I’d never use this avatar thing because I don’t consciously use AI, oh and I think it’s more than just a little creepy.