Schneier on Security

Clive Robinson • January 2, 2018 8:04 AM

@ Bruce,

meaning that it's not a real camera. Instead, it just gets children used to being under constant surveillance.

I've actually seen the device in question (Aldi is a European origin "stack it high knock it out cheap" supermarket that is a recent and popular entrant in the UK market).

My thoughts at the time are shall we say "not permissible before the watershed" with out extensive use of the naughty word button...

Are you familiar with the Yourkshire (in England) expression,

All t'worlds mad cept thy an me

This idea just strikes me as utter madness even in a distopian setting. George Orwell and Franz Kafka would be both intrigued and horrified by such a device.

Oh the good news if there is any is it's now onky 99pence...

@ Wes Reynolds,

Try,

https://www.aldi.co.uk/reka-decorative-santa-cam/p/080878180257400

I suspect the number on the end of the URL has changed due either to the markdown or as some kind of UID, though I suspect the former more than the latter.

Clive Robinson • January 3, 2018 10:10 AM

@ tyr,

The self transforming machine elves of DMT trips and their toymaking. Once you penetrate the surface of jolly fat man it opens the abyss to psychedelic madness lurking just below. Once you see his transdimensional powers the attempt of the trivial IC to ride on his coattails is merely pathetic.

Hmmm which moss have you been "in jesting" the one on the rocks or straight from the can[1] ;-)

With regards,

I always thought that Kim Dot Com and his case was always about his informing NZ about the IC surveillance state rewriting their laws

Actually it's a bit more complicated than that. A few years ago an investigative author found out that the NZ SigInt agency was in effect run by the NSA not the NZ Gov. Basically the office of the head of their SigInt agency had a senior NSA person in the office next door. Appart from domestic administration most of the orders came out of that second office. It was an embarrassment to the then NZ PM to discover that the NZ payed for agency was run not for or by the NZ Gov but both the NSA and GCHQ and most of the intel gathered was never seen by anyone in NZ even the NZ guys running the kit... The reason that AUS Canada and NZ were in the FiveEyes was little or nothing to do with any relationship to the NSA, but where they were located with regards both Cables and Satellites. The kit they ran was designed by GCHQ and NSA and maibly manufactured by/for the NSA and was run by "local technicians" the intel was piped almost directly to the NSA where it was crunched on their computer systems using algorithms designed by both the NSA and GCHQ... It was the NSA assisted by GCHQ that decided originally what intel the other three nations got given back...

I gather a similar approach is still in place with the second tier members in Europe. Which might change a lot when the UK Brexits.

The cartoon on this page might amuse,

http://www.makarov.ca/index.htm

Think of it as a near Canadian listening post ;-)

But yes the FBI stomping it's indiscreet feet all over the place getting caught out lying and conniving with the local LEO's to get an overly broad and illegal warrant, that alowed the FBI to illegaly duplicate Kim Dotcom's hard drives and other privileged information and all sorts of other shady activity has not best pleased the NZ judiciary, a number of it's politicians and quite a few of it's citizens. That is they kind of don't like being treated as an FBI doormat not even a vassal state, let alone a sovereign nation with laws to protect the citizens from such abuses from the US or any other entity. The problem is that the US DoJ and FBI firmly belive their writ applies where ever they chose, and that none shall deny them their self entitlement. For some reason they either don't know or care about how it rubs people up the wrong way...

Which brings us onto more pleasant things,

http://www.salisburymuseum.org.uk/whats-on/exhibitions/terry-pratchett-hisworld

I've been meaning to get over and see, it but I ended up in hospital then quite ill, so I've only a couple of weekends left to get over there. I was looking at rail fares from London Waterloo to Salisbury for a Sat morning and they range from 30-60UKP with no real rhym or reason as to why. The only disernable thing is there are two trains an hour about 20mins appart but ariving about the same time, the slightly slower one is in the bottom half of the pricing. I'm guessing it stops a couole of times where the the later one does not...

Anyway I need to consult with t'lad who is also a fan, and would be somewhat miffed if I did not drag him along ;-)

[1] For those not in the know moss be it Irish, Jamaican or Caribbean is seaweed that has been turned into a drink, often sweetened and likewise with alcohol. Reindeer moss is likewise not a moss but a lichen, but is a staple food for Reindeer along with other lichens. However whilst it is just unpleasintly acidic those other lichens contain poisons with some having brain chemical altering properties thus "very high reindeer" are not unknown. Some people belive that this is something to do with the flying reindeer myth. Humans can and do eat the ordinary reindeer moss as its around 95% carbohydrate but you need to prepare it first. On method is by drying it out, another faster method is to boil it several times each time in clean water with a little bicarbonate. It can be used as a flour replacment/extender, as a thickener in stocks,soups etc and in making fruit jellies (real jello) often with quite tart berries. My advice from experience is unless it's in a half cut scone with a slice of bacon and fried egg on top is give it a miss. The same applies to Laverbread products which are not a bread but a sauce made from an alginate seaweed so similar to Irish moss --but from Wales-- it is used in all sorts of foods to thicken or add flavour, it also ends up in a lot of comercial ice cream. Again my breakfast scone/biscuit recomendation holds.