* Posts by CrazyOldCatMan

6355 publicly visible posts • joined 6 Oct 2015

Researchers blind autonomous cars by tricking LIDAR

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

it would simply pick a random number at startup and encode that in the beam's modulation

And, depending on the entropy pool used, how do you stop two vehicles setting the same number? And, if it's encoded into the beam, how do you stop the bad guys capturing and replaying a static encoding?

Answer to both - you can't with any confidence.

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: So what would you do if you were blinded while driving?

Not so easy if it's on a multilane road and is now blind to traffic between itself and the side of the road.

Indeed. Which would mean that each vehicle now needs to be generating an "I'm here" signal which is used in concert with the lidar.

Except that that system will then add an extra exploitable sensor - the Bad GuysTM will just scatter emitters for that signal over the road and thoroughly confuse everything.

And tying all the vehicles together into a senser-net won't fix it either - it'll make it more difficult to spoof stuff but it still won't make it impossible - it'll just increase the number of cracked sensor controllers in the vehicle.

US engineer in the clink for wrecking ex-bosses' smart meter radio masts with Pink Floyd lyrics

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Cynicism runs through commentards like 'Brighton Rock' through sticks of candy.

Not always - sometimes I reach the dizzy heights of "mildly disillusioned".

Then the drugs wear off.

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Well, at least he has good taste in music

When I think of some of the lyrics he could have used, it's frightening.

Thunderbolts and lightning?

Robocall spammers, you have one new voicemail message: Cut it out!

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Straight to Voicemail?

Imagine your poor grandmother sitting through hundreds of voicemails from scammers, hoping the next message is from one of her children or grandchildren just calling to say hi.

Most of the people involved no longer have grandmothers - they sold them to the mystery meat market long ago to gain a few extra dollars..

Northern Ireland bags £150m for broadband pipes in £1bn Tory bribe

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Not again...

The electorate then chose to punish the Lib-Dems for not stopping ALL the Tories' policies - and thus gave the subsequent Tory government a free rein with a majority.

And thus ensured that minor parties will *never* now accept a coalition on the basis that the majority party always gets credit for the joint successes and the minority partner always gets the blame for the joint failures.

Games rights-holders tell ZX Spectrum reboot firm: Pay or we pull titles

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: No Comment

...no harm to dolphins, vegan friendly, hypo-allergenic.

.. doesn't cause cancer, contains no calories and definately no rare-earth compounds used in manufacturing. Also does not emit CO2.

UK Parliament hack: Really, a brute-force attack? Really?

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Email != Webmail

Outlook shouldn't be connecting directly to exchange over the Internet, there should be a VPN involved.

Outlook Anywhere doesn't require a VPN at all.. and uses MAPI over https (I think). You need Exchange >= 2013 for it to work though.

Blighty's first aircraft carrier in six years is set to take to the seas

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Ma be a silly question

If the vibration is sufficient and of the right frequency expect fitting such as piping to crack and cable racking to come of their mounts.

Can't the Navy just claim under the guarentee?

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: And in the news today 26 June 26-06-2014

At least the Italians will be bricking themselves.

Just remember, check to see whether the Japanese Naval Envoy is watching..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Well, its good to see the QE going out to sea.

In this day and age, a big carrier is simply a codpiece for the admirals.

Upvoted. For historical examples, see "Dreadnaught"

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

I believe the correct symbol for nautical miles, which I assume you intended, to be "NM", although wikipedia states "M, NM, or nmi" are valid; not however simply "nm".

*Nods approvingly

Just when you think the younger pedantards are slipping, along comes one to reconfirm ones' faith in the future of pendantry.

Men charged with theft of free newspapers

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

It never ceases to amaze me how sad people can get, I mean taking bundles of a FREE newspaper? Why?

Because they get money when taken in bulk to commercial paper recycling centres..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Eek

Learn to speak properly. Everyone knows it's "you're going daahrn you slaaaaaaag!"

I say! You must be from the wilder parts of London old chap! We don't have language like that round here[1] you know! One must have standards..

[1] NNW London. Where I was dragged up. With a Middlesex postcode..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

spot fine of GBP80 for emptying the remains of her drink of coffee down a street drain

Was it Starbucks? If so, then the sentence was laughably light.

I guess not. The word "coffee" was used, not "laughably-undinkable, burnt water masquerading as coffee".

SpaceX nails two launches and barge landings in one weekend

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Even old curmudgeons are happy!

Let's hope they devise a "used asteroid" disposal system by then

Well, the moon is pretty close by and pretty uninhabited..

Failing that, there's an unimportant building in Washington, USA that could do with some remodelling[1]..

[1] Again. Party like it's 1812, just with bigger booms..

Intel's Skylake and Kaby Lake CPUs have nasty hyper-threading bug

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Crap quality

I remember (many, many moons ago, when I worked at a certain cellular base-station manuacturer that used a stylised bat-wing for a logo) having an arguement with the technical architect about the use of non-Intel processors (AMD had just bought out the K6 and I was quite keen on them).

His answer was to specify that non-Intel processors should never be used "because you knew what you got with Intel and their processors were bug-free".

The next day Intel revealed the news about the FooF microcode bug.

Oh, how we laughed.

WannaCrypt blamed for speed camera reboot frenzy in Australia

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: No internet, huh?

And how do the camera efficiently upload the images they've captured to the server without access to the internet?

Private APN (which is effectively a private circuit).

Now it could be argued that a private APN == some sort of internet but I wouldn't equate them - any more than a private PTP circuit that goes via a single carrier is 'internet'.

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

It's how I'm running two instances of Linux here at work...

Indeed. It's (however), very unlikely that end-user devices like speed cameras are running under hyper-v (or QEMU on cygwin on Windows).

Florida Man to be fined $1.25 per robocall... all 96 million of them

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Where do the fines go?

NO ONE expects the Credit Control Department!

Oi! My wife used to work in Credit Control! How very dare..

Hang on.. Errr..

Hello dear..

Yes dear..

Sorry - must dash. Work to do. Boy stuff.

Virgin Media router security flap follows weak password expose

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

1. Don't care about down-votes, that is why I often troll ;-)

Let me introduce you to the concept of cause and effect..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Who actually uses the router ?

Surely the first thing you do with a car is get the ECU mapped with a grown up config?

Assuming that you don't care about manufacturers warranty[1], yes.

[1] And, under some[2] circumstances, invalidating your insurance. Or, if you tell your insurance, raising the rate from "extortionate" to "selling first, second and third born".

[2] s/some/most/g

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Who actually uses the router ?

I assume that if you using just as a modem

No - because you'll need something behind it to act as a router/firewall/DHCP server..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Who actually uses the router ?

you can't change the lan-side IP address of that thing

Wow. Just, wow.

(In a previous orkplace, our internal LAN was using 192.168.1.0/24 [not my decision, was in place when I joined and would be a nightmare to change becuase of hardcoded paths in stuff like industrial control equipment]. Then the Sales Director demanded, not unreasonably, that all his staff needed to use VPN from home. Most of them were using BT Home, which defaulted to using (you've guessed it) 192.168.1.0/24 for the LAN. Much hilarity ensued until I managed to get people instructions on how to change their Home Hub to use a different range..)

IoT coverage for 95% of UK by 2019? We can't even do 4G, Sigfox

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Hackers delight

What chance has security got if manufacturers can't even lock down Internet routers !

Especially as IoT coders don't seem to have noticed this modern thing calls HTTPS..

Can you spell MITM? I'm sure you can..

Ex-NASA bod on Gwyneth Paltrow site's 'healing' stickers: 'Wow. What a load of BS'

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: open-minded alternatives

"My mind is so open that anything of value has fallen out.."

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

I think she operates on the principle expounded in one of Murphy's Laws:

It is immoral to let suckers keep their money

Isn't that a quote from a Heinlein quote? From one of the later "I'm writing from Another Place[1]" books?

[1] Not in the AC Clarke sense..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: People who hear voices usually suffer from Schizophrenia

I hear ya.

Burn the witch!

Or are you a duck? Sometimes I forget the difference..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: graphite?

I can supply a precision made cylinder of pure natural graphite enrobed in a hexagonal wooden substrate

Surely it would be pointless after going through the tender mercies of the postal system!

PS: Do you hand-deliver? Or is delivery extra?

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: "Here's the number one top..."

The first tip to become a millionaire

Is to have rich parents. And to ensure that any remnants of empathy, commpassion or fellow-feeling are excised well before your first birthday.

As a case study, I present a certain D Trump.

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: digital sound input

digital media with resistor ladder DACs fashioned from graphite pencil lead, and we did fine

You had digital media? Luxury! We 'ad all us fingers chopped off t'feed t'whippet and had to knit us replacements using us teeth and whatever bits of broken glass we could pull out of t'bed..

Kids today eh?

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Where's the harm?

dead Steve Jobs

I think he still posts on Twuttir.

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

if they feel better once their wallet has been suitably lightened, where’s the harm?

I refer the honourable slice of rotation vinyl to the statement by the late Mr P. T. Barnum when he said "there's one born every minute" and to the collorary "and I'm a-going to get my share"..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: High level spirit

solved with a glass or two of a single malt.

Fond as I am of the Holy Water of Life as made in [Scotland, Ireland, Wales, England[1], India[2], Japan], I'm rather more into red wine at the moment.

[1] Yes - we have a proper, licensed whisky distillery. The Chapter 14 release from The English Whisky Company[3] is a very, very fine thing.

[2] Strange as it might sound, I had a bottle of Indian Whisky recently and it was rather drinkable. Can't remember the name though.

[3] I have no affiliation with them. I wish I did cos then I might be able to get a discount..

Doormat junk: Takeaway menus, Farmfoods flyer, NHS data-sharing letter... wait, what?

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: "exciting long-term project"

There will be. It's called GPDR.

I'm *so* looking forward to GDDR. Being peripherally in that sort of field (sometimes anyway) I'm slightly more aware of how many more teeth it does than the current DPA..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

"With your consent"

.. Yeah. Like my GP switching over to electronic prescriptions, complete with assurances that, even though my data may be shared with pharmacies, I have control over whether the pharmacies shares it with external bodies.

Except for the fact that the pharmacy policy isn't opt-out[1] - they are going to share your data with "partners within the same group of companies" but were remarkably shy about who those partners were or what they would use the data for.

And remarkably shy as to whether their partner companies would also pass data on to their partner companies. Apparently, it's up to me to investigate each partner individually.

[1] Yes - you can "op-out". But that means you have to select another pharmacy to get your prescription at and all the other pharmacies are either from the same company or don't do electronic prescriptions (at least, not with my GP). So, legally an opt-out system, but not in any practical way. Unless I want to forego my diabetes and migraine medication..

Smart burglars will ride the surf of inter-connected hackability

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: But can the camera recognize approved cats, or not?

The gang of regular cats spot the intruder and attack it en masse, thus intruder cat is not a problem for long.

Indeed. With current gang of cats, we've yet to have a strange[1] cat in the house[2].

and at least a couple of them are psycho ninja fighters

Yup. At least two of them. And they all seem to be female. Funny how that happens[3]..

[1] It's a running joke that to be a cat in our household you pretty much have to be strange..

[2] Apart from next door's young male cat. But he's good friends with $SENIOR_MALE_CAT [4] so he doesn't count. Especially as $SENIOR_MALE_CAT is quite happy to return the favour and sit in their dining room window with him. And, since $NEXT_DOOR_CAT is about 6 years younger, ours has taught him road caution, just like he did with our younger cats[5]

[3] Female cats fight *very* differently from males. With males there's a lot of posturing and shouting before any actual combat (and often there isn't any combat). Females have more of an attitude of "I can't be bothered with that, I'm programmed to defend kits. I'm going to try to kill you without warning, even if it means I get hurt". Which is why, generally, male cats don't like fighting female cats. They don't fight fair.

[4] See previous post about his preferences..

[5] Except the little airhead social butterly tabby and white. If she was a Pathfinder character, her primary stat would most definately be Charisma and her dump-stat would be Int.. Which is why she has her pelvis held together by titanium rods, only the stump of a tail and no head of femur on the rear-left.

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: But can the camera recognize approved cats, or not?

Works until the ginger f*** from two doors down hacks it and puts his own RFID identifier in the DB....

We haz RFID too. But mostly so the vet can identify the cat scraped up off the tarmac. And in our household, it wouldn't be the ginger hacking the cat door (except in the traditional sense of 'using a blunt object (his head) to break down obstacles").

No, it would be the half-Siamese ginger and white, assisted by his lovestruck assistant (sister of previous said ginger and the one who inherited the brains in that family) who has long adored said ginger-and-white despite the fact that he seems only interested in boys[1].

He is on the right-hand side of the intelligence bell-curve and she's part-ninja. Complete with patterned camoflage.

[1] And our senior female. But that just protective behaviour so that she doesn't rip his face off and use it to wipe her butt.

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: But can the camera recognize approved cats, or not?

What if a rogue cat enters the house?

That could never happen, no sir. And any reports from my neighbours about two male cats bearing a striking resemblance to mine are pure fiction and probably made up by the dog[1].

[1] A Great Dane (allegedly m'lud). Who, quite sensibly, kept herself out of the affairs of her betters[2].

[2] Allegedly. Did I say allegedly?

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Link mayhem

Because that's part of the fun, duh :)

A maze of twisty little videos, all equally vapid.

(Accurate summation of YoooToobe? Place bets now!)

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: "Lawyers, calm down."

They've only just started getting excited at all the things that could go wrong, and the possible consequences.

"Ah. I love the smell of a lawsuit in the morning[1]! Reminds me of London in 1966[2].."

[1] If high-priced lawyers work mornings. More likely, they have lowly-paid minions for that. After all, the coffee isn't goning to make itself!

[2] Date purely indicative and bears no relation to any real date, either actual or imagined. So there.

UK and Ecuador working on Assange escape mechanism

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Mail readers

Conspiracy is hard.

Conspiracy Cat [1] says "nah, you just need the right genetics"..

[1] A character I made up many, many years ago but never did anything with. Feel free to use, with attribution..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: And what does Assange say?

ration him to one Ferrero Rocher per day.

Or, even worse, expired MREs, courtesy of the US Army.

WikiLeaks doc dump reveals CIA tools for infecting air-gapped PCs

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Air gap with Windows gateways, you say (imply)

unladen?

Wasn't he killed a while back?

Let's go live to the 3rd circle of Hell – and see what Comcast and Charter are screwing up

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: 3rd level of hell

Morbidly I am now wondering how many more levels of hell this project can deliver

Think of a number. Multiply by the number of external "consultantants". Then multiply by their daily rate.

Add (number of project managers X number of senior managers involved).

Divide by (number of bottles of whisky you are allowed to drink daily at work+1)

Breaking news, literally: Newspaper's quakebot rumbled for fake story

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: To err is human...

Computers may only be as fallible as journalists, but they don't drink as much and don't fiddle their expenses claims.

And can't be bought by (cough) pre-release high-end kit that they somehow forget to return.

Eh Alastair?

Waymo: We've got a hot smoking gun in Uber 'tech theft' brouhaha

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Monty Python

Uber did not want any Google information

Wink, wink, nudge, nudge, say no more!

Lordy! Trump admits there are no tapes of his chats with Comey

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Still don't understand this bullshit

(**) "Patronise" means talking down to someone.

Unless the 'someone' in question is a restaurant or person-of-negotiable-virtue. Then, it's something *quite* different.

Ain't English grand? Same words, utterly different meaning.

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: Still don't understand this bullshit

First you agree with me and then call me a troll. I suggest in future you think before you type, GW.

I'd try to teach you the meaning of the words "irony" and "sarcasm" but I suspect it would be a waste of effort akin to shouting "no!" at a black hole..

CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

Re: It only gets worse

expected logic and reason from a committed-to-any-platform voter

There FTFY.