Posts by CommanderGalaxian

NSA man says agency can track you through POWER LINES

Re: If you've got an audio voice recording...

"are there any grid signalling/control signals sent over power?"

Yes, there are timing signals. All sources of generation have to be co-oridinated to run at exactly the same phase and frequencey. If you buy yourself a decent oscilloscope with decent noise filtering capabilities, you can see the timing signals. Look at the sinusoid, just around the point where it crosses zero, look for tiny spikes or saw tooth patterns - they are the timing signals.

I should caution that you shouldn't stick your oscilloscope probes into the live and neutral holes of your wall socket unless you have been certified (in 17th edition regs, etc.).

Re: 50Hz hum randomiser

That's not a good plan. Just like shinning lasers at aircraft as they are trying to land and squawking on police frequencies, if you start dicking about with frequencies on the national grid you will find you receive a lot of very determined attention very quickly.

Double plus ungood is the fact that you are now the eejit almost certainly with a unique noisy ENF.

Speed of light slower than we thought? Probably not

Re: A basic misunderstanding of supernovae

Franson isn't questioning the speed of light. What he is actually saying, is that over those sort of distances, you can't consider space to be a true vaccum - you have to take into account quantum mechanical effects. Only an idiot would accuse him of being an idiot without first bothering to RTFM.

Re: Did Einstein predict the speed of light?

Einstein recognised the significance of what Maxwell had stumbled upon (and proved) - that the speed of light is a constant - no matter what, not relative to anything (people kept asking the question 'constant relative to what what?'. Einstein through his theories of relativity explained why it isn't relative to anything.

BT at last coughs to 'major outage' after broadband went titsup across UK on Sat

Re: Funny

What's so "super" about it then?

Filter trouble then.

That'll be them fiddling with their new DNS based censorship filters then. The good news (for the moment) is that they haven't (yet) blocked things like openDNS.

Missiles-on-rooftops Brit spy Farr: UK gov can slurp your Facebook, Twitter ... What of it?

Re: I'd be more concerned

Indeed, if Facebook read inbetween the lines and get it wrong, you get spammed with yet more annoying irrelevant adverts. And if you get fed up with it, you can simply abandon Facebook. If the likes of GCHQ read between the lines and get it wrong, as a minimum - your life is turned upside down, if not ruined - and without any sort of remedy.

Protecting code's secrets wins ACM prize

Re: Err, so what gets tested at test time?

Yes, that's basically my point, if the "encryption" method is to run code that is functionaly equivalent to - but not actually the actual code - then wtf? Can't see it catching on for avionics and the like.

Err, so what gets tested at test time?

But surely in order to develop, debug and test, you will still have to use unencrypted binaries. And there's the problem, once you switch on encryption, the code you will be running will no longer be the code you have tested.

But then maybe once you get to test stage you could just use the encrypted version. But then, if there is a problem (and there will be), you will have to switch back to the unencrypted version for debugging...which won't be exactly the same as the encrypted version.

Then again, maybe there will be an auto-unencrypting decompiler/debugger to go with the compiler.

For your next privacy panic, look no further than vending machines

Re: Where will it all end?

Chewing gum.

Tipex.

CD Marker pens.

They all have other use too. >:-)

Microsoft Cortana EULA contains the Greatest Disclaimer of ALL TIME

Re: Shirley...

Is there a noodie version of Cortana?

It's Google's no-wheel car. OMG... there aren't any BRAKES

Rockin speed daemons.

Give it time. It's bound to catch on, just like the Sinclair C5.

Fix capitalism with floating cities on Venus says Charles Stross

I feel let down.

I thought we were supposed to be building a Death Star?

I NEVER DONE BITCOIN, says bloke fingered by new Newsweek

Re: I think he's just afraid of the tax claim he'll get

Your house isn't currency but it gets taxed. Your car gets taxed. Your tv gets taxed. Your gas and electricity get taxed. Your clothes get taxed. Your food gets taxed. Etc Etc Etc. WTF country do you live in where only currency gets taxed!?

Cops cuff 5 suspects after Silk Road copycat secret drug souk bust

Re: At this point...

Not necessarily so. Read the details, basically they busted folk by pretending to buyers/sellers. And carrying out stings just as normal in meatspace. Also, TOR has never claimed to defend against traffic flow analysis (specifically the fine manual warns that it doesn't) - you don't need to be able to decrypt the messages between Alice and Bob - you just need to know that statistically they are communicating something. And if, let's say, your are Alice and ask (anonymous) Bob to deliver some drugs to your pal Pete and when Bob then drops by Pete's house to drop the drugs off...and then at that point Bob discovers the hard way that Pete is actually Pete the Plod - then Bob is very much frier tucked and now very decidely unanonymous.

Vice squad cuffs vice chairman of Bitcoin Foundation in $1m money-laundering probe

>>Interesting see how they prove criminal intend when anonymity is one of bitcoin's strengths.

Bitcoin is NOT fucking anonymous. How many fucking times...

http://bitcoin.org/en/protect-your-privacy

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Anonymity

etc

Modern spying 101: How NSA bugs Chinese PCs with tiny USB radios - NYT

Re: Proving His Enemies Right... ExCUSE me?

>>Why would the wily Chinese want to destroy the value of all of those U.S. Treasury Bills they're holding?

As a minimum it gives them huge leverage. And if they really wanted to, it gives them the economic equivalent of the nuclear option. Bear in mind, just a few months back when the US government shut down, the Chinese were threatening - the US better keep paying their debts [to us the Chinese] and not default - or else.

Once upon there was an empire called Rome - it was big and powerful and subjugated peoples paid 'tribute' to the Romans. Then Rome grew fat and lazy and thought they could keep their enemies at bay by reversing the whole process and paying 'tribute' to them. Of course, the Goths and the Vandals and the Huns saw this for what it was - weakness. And the rest is history.

Faster, more private, easier to read: My 2014 browser wishlist

Re: Block by default

>>If you make your browser safe than JS can't hurt it.

>>

But surely people shouldn't have to worrying about making their browsers safe??? Surely the damn things should be safe out of the box?

No anon pr0n for you: BT's network-level 'smut' filters will catch proxy servers too

Re: DNS only / No just porn!

>>If it's only using DNS, on the base that BT doesn't also block traffic to any non-BT DNS, just point your PC (or whatever device) DNS client to 8.8.8.8 (Google) or 208.67.222.222 (OpenDNS).

That won't work. Their filter is designed to block DNS requests - i.e. it doesn't matter whether you are using OpenDNS or another DNS server to do your DNS queries. If you choose to opt of of the filter, they say (for now) that you can use DNS servers other than BT's.

It's very easy to do what they are doing [DNS was not desinged to cope with large scale sabotage by those who control the main infrastructure - it assumed they would be friendlies]. To see how easy it is to filter DNS requests - download a copy of Wireshark - while you still can. :-(

Microsoft: Don't listen to 4chan ... especially the bit about bricking Xbox Ones

Re: I genuinely do not understand...

>>I would genuinely like to hear the motivation behind the creator of this.

Take your pick:

A) To show what a pile of shite the XBOX one is.

B) To highlight the density of those stupid enough to buy one.

Re: I genuinely do not understand...

>>I would genuinely like to hear the motivation behind the creator of this.

Presumably to show what a pile of shite the XBOX one is.

To fel with you! There's an NSA spook in my World of Warcraft

What a bunch of idiots. Everybody knows terrorists are all on "Puffin Party"!

People's Bank of China bans Bitcoin over 'drugs and guns' trade fears

Re: No different than cash?

>>In it's anonymity.

Why do so many people think Bitcoin is anonymous. Peeps fer fuck sake RTFM:

http://bitcoin.org/en/faq#is-bitcoin-anonymous

http://slashdot.org/story/13/12/02/0035206/rms-calls-for-truly-anonymous-payment-alternative-to-bitcoin

Fiendish CryptoLocker ransomware survives hacktivists' takedown

Re: Interesting

"....Should cause a laugh and will hopefully cause them to have me refused entry and flown back to blighty...."

Dude - that's really not a good idea. They might fly you back eventually - after you've spent several months in detention. They really don't have a sense of humour.

LG: You can stop hiding from your scary SPY TELLY quite soon now

Re: Damnit

>>Now I'm going to have to setup a transparent outbound proxy to filter all outbound http(s) traffic

Why assume it's http(s)? Just block every outbound connection attempt from the tv, blue-ray player etc, regardless of protocol used.

Re: And...

>>Will all the TV's (anything else? BluRay players?) that do this get patched or only stuff less then a year old?

Realistically, I think you need to assume yes - everything else is probably doing the same. Me personally, I had already been thinking of updating my firewall setup to stop devices like this initiating outbound connections.

My name is NOT Dread Pirate Roberts: Silk Road accused's fam'n'friends stump up $1m bail

Re: Solitary Confinement?

>>Yet another example of Obama's Justice Department running totally out of control.

>>Maybe Obama will hound this guy to suicide, too.

Even although most of Obama's Justice Department laws were brought in during Republican times....?

Chinese Bitcoin exchange disappears, along with £2.5m

419

I'm not clear why this destabalises Bitcoin anymore than 419 scammers destabalise traditional currencies. If you send your money abroad to...well...vaguely somehwhere, with a promise of vaguely something - what exactly would you expect to happen?

Doesn't matter whether it's Sterling, Euros, Dollars or Bitcoins.

Anonymity is the enemy of privacy, says RSA grand fromage

Flap Flap

And parachutes are the enemy of Skydivers learning how to fly.

Blighty's laziness over IPv6 will cost us on the INTERNETS - study

Without IPv6 - "...sensors, and other consumer and commercial devices cannot connect directly to the Internet."

Exactly how is this a bad thing?

Web.com DNS hijack: How hacktivists went on a mass web joyride spree

Re: In another area of life

>If my bank received a fax , with my name at the bottom...

Speaking from personal experience, don't be surprised if they do. Thankfully I did get it back, not least (and perhaps luckily) as it could easily be seen that I couldn't be at a cash machine in one country while simultaneously sending a fax from another.

Rubbish broadband drives Scottish people out of the Highlands

Re: Why not get Satellite broadband?

In one word: Latencey. Have you ever used satellite broadband? Thought not.

Seriously - for satellite broadband the killer is latencey. A modern web page with all its asorted irrelevant junk, 3rd party links and other assorted debris takes for ever to download. Doesn't matter a jot if it tells you you have a 1 mbit downlink - you will only get that sort of speed if you are ftping a single file.

Contention

A lot of the problem isn't caused by poor quality copper or overly long distances from the exchange to subscriber - it's caused by unbundled BT exchanges that allow BT to rip the arse out of things by hooking up 50 subscribers to a single ADSL line.

UK bankers prep for cyberwar: Will simulate ATTACK on system

Strange men bearing gifts.

What about the KVMs?

Feds smash internet drug bazaar Silk Road, say they'll KEELHAUL 'Dread Pirate Roberts'

Re: originally belonged to?

Dude, FYI:

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Anonymity

and

http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/09/05/follow-the-bitcoins-how-we-got-busted-buying-drugs-on-silk-roads-black-market/

>From a technical perspective, would it be possible for other users of BitCoin to know which Bitcoins landed in FBI hands from the blockchain...

Not really no. But unfortunately - BitCoin being only really pseudo-anon - it could be possible for the Feds to figure who the BitCoins originally belogned too.

>>Well they probably sold them, that would explain the dip in the bitcoin prices.

>Of course that could have been a few dealers cashing out but the charts show the big sales just with a couple of hours.

Sounds like Insider Trading to me. You would assume they do the honourable thing and turn themselves in, rather than profiting from drugs and crime and things....

The LSD guru, the 1980s pop-star and video games to reprogram your brain

Favourite Season?

Mines Autumn.

NSA in new SHOCK 'can see public data' SCANDAL!

Re: re: social media is public

"Assuming you friended the NSA !"

https://www.facebook.com/NSACareers?ref=ts&fref=ts

So, Linus Torvalds: Did US spooks demand a backdoor in Linux? 'Yes'

Re: rdrand

No. Not really. Least not for millions. Or billions.

Even an old clunky basic model WWII electro mechanical Enigma machine would appear random up to a trillion or so characters. Modern crypto is *way* more random.

Except, of course, if you have inside knowledge...like what we got by capturing an Enigma machine and were then able to work out that there were a limted number of seed values (a few thousand?) - and hence break the apparently random stream.

BTW: this isn't exactly a new issue:

http://www.wired.com/politics/security/commentary/securitymatters/2007/11/securitymatters_1115

It's all about KISS.

"The issue was not about wasting cycles - it's about whether it can *reduce* entropy. ..."

It won't reduce entropy - and it will defo not increase it! (An increase being what you want). So why run yet more s/w - purposelessly? Just something else that can break.

Linus is wrong about Chipzilla. It contributes nothing further to the randomisation if it has a predictable sequence. It's like wrapping an already random stream in see-through paper, that's all. It can't add further entropy if it is no longer usefully randomising. Dunno why he doesn't get that point. Using it just wastes processor cycles.

Moving from permie to mercenary? Avoid a fine - listen to Ben Franklin

@Don Jefe

"I realize the laws are different but I don't think the differences are there between contractors being contractors..."

The point I was making was about the poster before you who seemed unaware that to be outside of IR35 your starting point needs to be a "Contract FOR ServiceS" i.e. that is what a ltd co to ltd co would have. If you have a "Contract OF Service" (and a lot!!! of the agencey contracts would fall into that category) i.e. that's the same type of contract an employee would have.

In investigating IR35 status if your contract isn't a "Contract FOR ServiceS" [and there's rather more to it than just sticking a title at the top of it] - then HMRC *are not obliged* to look any further in deciding that you are indeed caught by the legislation and are a "disguised employee". The length of the contract is a complete irrelevance, in this case. Sadly, all too many contractors remain blissfully ignorant of this. Their own working arrangements may be that of a stone wall contractor - doesn't matter a jot if their contract is not up to scratch.

If - and only if - you clearly have a "Contract FOR ServiceS", are HMRC then required to examine your working practices, to detemine your status.

@ Don Jefe

" Real IT contractors should be moving fairly quickly..."

Not so. That's a tail wagging the dog strategy. If you are adopting that approach, you've not understood the IR35 legislation.

" Contractors can get locked into long term contract where your pay increases with time spent but you have to provide exclusivity (not legal in some states)...."

Any contract in the UK that requires exclusitivity is caught by the IR35 legistaltion - you are a de facto employee of the client and not a contractor.

The laws in the UK and US for contractors are really quite different.

"Wouldn't having multiple customers on the books concurrently also sort out that problem?...."

The more the merrier - it's a strong pointer to you being outhwith IR35 - but not by itself a guarantee.

FUD

"Perhaps someone more expert than I can explain it, but AFAIK IR35 will also bite the company that's paying your fees (they could get stung for employer's NI, which is a lot)..."

No. That was some of the FUD garbage initially put about by Dawn Primarollo, the then Paymaster General, and the beloved Gordon Brown, when they first brought in the legislation. Client companies are only exposed to liability for things like NI [if the contractor doesn't pay what he/she owes to HMRC] - if and only if - the contractor is engaged on a 'Self-Employed' basis (i.e no contractor ltd co involved - and tax and NI assesed under schedule D) - which, immediately proves (according to the IR35 legislation) that he/she is outwith the scope of IR35.

IR35 clearly states that all liability is passed on to the contractor (using a ltd co - not schedule D self-employed) if they fall foul of the IR35 legislation.

[Note also - nobody can be schedule D self-employed and going via an agencey - as prior legisaltion already stated that agencies can only supply people they employe directly or contract with on a ltd co to ltd co basis].

Torvalds suggests poison and sabotage for ARM SoC designers

Aspy Linus?

"But Dr Reg can't escape the feeling he's a bit of a tortured soul, so if you have particular insights into how Torvalds might ease his mind do feel free to share."

You sure he's not just an Aspy?

Boffins follow TOR breadcrumbs to identify users

>>Kind of makes you wonder if this is really an initial discovery...

If you read the fine TOR manual, they have always warned that this type of attack is possible, right down to noting the (many) problems with routing bittorrent through TOR nodes.

I guess this is the first paper to put some actual numbers on things though.

UK mulls ban on tiny mobiles to block prison smugglers

Re: Illegal?

"Never heard about these little boys till I read this article. Two on order now for my evil twins, less than £80 the pair...result"

Mehe - that's you on a watch list now!