Headline: “Dozens of squid found on Provincetown sandbar.” Slow news day.
As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered.
Read my blog posting guidelines here.
echo • July 17, 2020 6:52 PM
Apologies for the infodump. I’ve been watching military youtubes for some months now and felt I derived a few things from them. I’m just putting this out there to show a different view than you usually get on security issues from politicians.
I’ve been watching a few youtubes by ex British special forces. Most of the information you can gather is more about them as people and their attitudes with near zero “trade secrets” which is to be expected. People will always have their own perspectives and gripes including with each other, and the media including movies play up to things just to gain an audience. Others are much smoother. I’ve been left scratching my head wondering how to respond to this from a public policy or professional standards point of view. I guess what I’ve taken away from this is different people are different.
I’ve also watched videos on operations. There’s some things which didn’t make sense such as why did a situation occur or why was an operation conducted that way. Wouldn’t it have been better to do things this way or that way but then this is easy to say with hindsight or perfect knowledge. It’s telling that even “the enemy” are people and behave like people.
Before this over the previous months I watched a lot of other youtubes on foreign forces and survival youtubes just to give things context.
During the pandemic some notable ex special forces or “survivalists” had some very interesting comments to make. None of them put on warpaint and duck rolled to their “bug out locations”. All of them without exception were led by the science and put being sensible and helping the community first. The messages were all about staying put and staying calm, sharing food supplies with vulnerable people, and basic hygiene and wearing masks to protect yourself and others. This mirrored how “celebrity” ex special forces helped support charitiesand how others who have had other military careers but been ivolved with special forces spoke more of character and community and not killing people but of saving lives.
I don’t know what this has to say to politicians who like to talk tough and crack down and who promote “offensive security” across the range of public policy or how they compare themselves to the brave men and women paid a fraction of what they earn keeping shops open, carrying goods, and looking after the old and infirm. In fact it was a youtube of one ex military guy who came over as decent and caring which prompted me to write this.
Ismar • July 17, 2020 7:05 PM
Came across this IoT security initiative by Panasonic – seems like a step in the right direction ?
https://news.panasonic.com/global/press/data/2020/01/en200130-2/en200130-2.html
Ismar Duderija • July 17, 2020 7:08 PM
Also, this description of a hack-for-hire operation linked to an Indian company BellTroX as reported by Citizen Labs
https://citizenlab.ca/2020/06/dark-basin-uncovering-a-massive-hack-for-hire-operation/
echo • July 17, 2020 7:33 PM
As Johnson talks up returning to normality by Christmas (where have we heard this before?) here is a new report for those interested in supply chain security and human rights.
Euronews sheds a light on the harsh reality seasonal and migrant workers face across Europe to bring food to our plates. #InvisibleWorkers a joint investigation by @LHReports @DerSpiegel @Mediapart @Guardian @Euronews @FTM_nl @irpinvestigates
SpaceLifeForm • July 17, 2020 11:32 PM
Seven ‘no log’ VPN providers accused of leaking – yup, you guessed it – 1.2TB of user logs onto the internet
hxxps://www.theregister.com/2020/07/17/ufo_vpn_database/
And they were all leaking data onto the internet from that unsecured Elasticsearch cluster, VPNmentor reported. Altogether, some 1.2TB of data was sitting out in the open, totaling 1,083,997,361 log entries, many featuring highly sensitive information, it is said.
Weather • July 18, 2020 12:47 AM
The DNS and iis are type of the same, the program need a temp cache,for repeat request, but they didn’t have ( they had (= the program used different dword Hash’s.
myliit • July 18, 2020 5:06 AM
@rrd
Regarding satire, humor or the like “… to the ever-hilarious TheOnion and a new one I found recently, Australia’s “The Shovel”.
We need all the smiles and chuckles we can get these days.”[1]
From The Shovel https://www.theshovel.com.au/, I, more or less, saw:
Australia is searching for a new logo
The queen didn’t learn of Australia until 1975
Silicon Valley Invents New ‘Remind Me Tomorrow’ Button For Dealing With Climate Change [aka Climate Catastrophe [2], Global Warming, etc.]
US Could Have Avoided COVID-19 Entirely If They Hadn’t Done Testing …
[1] https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2020/07/china_closing_i.html#c6814036
[2] https://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/climate_by_any_other_name.html 05 December 2008 or 12 May 2008
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/oct/08/global-warming-must-not-exceed-15c-warns-landmark-un-report 8 October 2018
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2020/06/29/worlds-climate-catastrophe-worsens-amid-pandemic/ 29 June 2020
Cbemip • July 18, 2020 6:03 AM
@Clive – can you shed some light on this please?
http://nickpope.net/wpte19/rendlesham-forest/
Clive Robinson • July 18, 2020 8:43 AM
@ Cbemip,
can you shed some light on this please?
Whilst I was an adult back then I don’t remember it at all.
The sort of “UFO” investigation I’ve been involved in the past are not the ones of “popular culture” but things that have fallen off of aircraft or other man made structures including satellites.
For various reasons of physics, I find it highly unlikely we would ever be visited by intelligent life forms[1] from outside our solar system (Speed of light and energy).
I guess you are going to have to get the book or any other information made available by FOI etc.
However if there was an object the odds are more likely it had a terestrial origin but was secret for some reason. We do know for instance the USAF have accidently dropped nuclear weapons off/out of their aircraft. As far as we know publically the first so called “Boken Arrow” incident was Valantines Day 1950 in British Columbia, at the time the USAF and US Government lied repeatedly and it was only some time later that the fact a Mk 4 nuke was involved. As we’ve not yet heard it’s been found we have no idea if it was actually “hot” or not we’ve only got the word of people who previously lied that it was not…
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1950_British_Columbia_B-36_crash
Thus from earlier USAF and US Gov behaviour if there was something in the woods to do with nukes or Elint etc we know they would most likely have lied about it…
Not much more that can be said realy.
[1] That is quite dependent on what you concider “intelligent”, “life” and “forms” to mean. The British Astronomer Fred Hoyle did consider that it was posible for a planet with life on to get hit by a sufficiently large rock that like a Newton’s Cradle another rock from the planet could escape the gravity well, travel across space and get captured by another planets gravity well and thus get through it’s atmosphear and release any biologicaly active chemicals inside of it onto that planet. Whilst we do have several tonnes of rocks dropping in on us each year most but not all are from our own solar system. But most would have heated up way beyond the tempratures the only biological chemicals we know of would survive either on entering the atmosphere or hitting terra firma. That said we do know much to our embarrassment that there are tens of thousands of “near earth objects” that are covered in both urine and fecal matter which would contain amongst other things viral and bacterial if not higher biological objects and that some organisms such as tardigrdes can survive being in space,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardigrade
So in theory at a very very low probability life from another planet might have arived at this planet, but is highly unlikely to have survived re-entry. As far as we know all life on this planet is based on the same basic chemical components, so unless we came from another planet there’s currently no evidence that any form of life has come from a different planet.
myliit • July 18, 2020 9:44 AM
https://twitter.com/emptywheel/status/1284410252461514752
From comments section:
“… My favorite part so far of Marcy living in another country- when I have insomnia she is tweeting.“
IP disclosure: Many of my posts here stem from @emptywheel. I hope to be around for awhile, but if I disappear there is that.
Of course, we don’t need to worry about being picked up as much, perhaps without cause, in the United States of Amnesia compared to some other countries. Oops, now there’s this:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/07/17/portland-protests-federal-arrests/
Into the weeds with legal eagles:
https://www.lawfareblog.com/what-heck-are-federal-law-enforcement-officers-doing-portland
https://twitter.com/steve_vladeck/status/1284466587140055040
And
https://harvardlawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/471-535_Online.pdf Pdf 65 pages
no.name • July 18, 2020 11:07 AM
Using the “Spiegel” as a reference….
The Guardian
euronews
The Brussels bootlickers.
NYT when…?
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/business/media/bari-weiss-resignation-new-york-times.html
JonKnowsNothing • July 18, 2020 11:46 AM
re: How to brick old tech with XML
MSM report on the “surprise bricking” of old Samsung Blu-ray players.
There were several possibilities about why older players suddenly bricked into terminal reboot loops. This report flags an error in a boot up XML file. The file contains and empty list element that the older machine parser doesn’t recognize and fail overs the system to restart. Since the file is parsed each boot up cycle it cascades into a never ending reboot.
There is no fix. Customers have to send the machine in for an update/repair to the firmware.
Along with the interesting analysis is this question:
Machines were bricked that NEVER did the faulty firmware update.
How did that happen?
Well it turns out that Samsung was sending “hidden telemetry” and “log files” if the machine was connected to the internet, even if certain options were “OFF” or “Not ON”. Routinely on boot up, if the system was connected to the internet, it would fetch the remote XML file and apply it as well as transmit user logs.
[If you] don’t accept the privacy notice nor download a software update, but do connect the device to the internet, your player will still routinely fetch the logging policy file.
…
players that never performed a software update nor used a network service, and were simply connected to the internet, were bricked.
…
The firmware routinely automatically fetches, stores, and parses the logging policy file regardless
…
“Players were bricked even though the users never performed a network update. It was enough for the player to be connected to the internet. Samsung never asked the user if it was OK to download”.
ht tps://www.theregister.com/2020/07/18/samsung_bluray_mass_dieoff_explained/
(url fractured to prevent autorun)
Isenbras • July 18, 2020 12:24 PM
Sir:
I’ve been wondering about secure messaging apps like Signal and WhatsApp. These have been in the news and evidently made some changes lately, but I don’t know how to evaluate “cloud” and whatnot. I also don’t see anything either on EFF or here later than 2016. What do you think about them now? Is there a reliable place to make evaluations for non-technologists? Thanks.
MarkH • July 18, 2020 1:07 PM
@Clive:
I thought that in Britain, the conventional terminology is BFOs (bits falling off), not UFOs 🙂 Probably you’re familiar with the Fermi paradox, which essentially supports your position as to improbability.
When I was younger, I watched quite a few hours of documentaries concerning reports and beliefs of visits from beyond earth. I wasn’t interested in space aliens per se (I’d bet all the money I’ve got that no such creature has come to this planet); what interested me was the psychology underlying the formation of such beliefs and conclusions.
I believe that these cognitive patterns show up in many areas of life, and it’s worthwhile to try to understand them.
In one of those TV programs, a psychologist illustrated the subjectivity of the phenomenon by saying, “if five people looked at a light near the horizon, probably three of them would say they saw a light low in the sky; one would say ‘I don’t see anything’, and one would say ‘it’s an alien spacecraft!'”
A dear friend of mine was conscripted into military service when he was young, and was organizing guns in the armory with another soldier when his friend playfully picked up a handgun and pulled the trigger. They were shocked by its discharge — of course, all of the guns were supposed to be unloaded.
They were immediately stricken with fear: their military had severe penalties for unauthorized firing of a weapon; they might both have been sentenced to prison. They did their best to clean up the scene and conceal all evidence of the discharge, but they knew that ammunition was rigorously accounted, and spent the rest of their time in the service worried that the event might be discovered. Toward the end of their term, they learned that a missing bullet had been discovered, and an investigation launched. [Luckily for them, they were never caught.]
General Chuck Yeager (of all people!) recounted in his memoir that in order to satisfy some requirement about serviceability of combat aircraft in theater, he ran a scam in which his crews re-painted tail numbers of the good planes so there would appear to be more than he actually had. He wrote that his military career would have been destroyed, had this fraud been discovered.
Although he was an accomplished combat veteran, and a famously courageous history-making test pilot, it seemed to me from his description of this late-career incident that he was as scared at that time as little boy breaking into a shop at night.
I visited a USAF base at which several officers had recently been disciplined for cheating on tests. These are the officers who sit underground and would launch ICBMs if ordered, and the tests are intended to ensure their knowledge proficiency, so this cheating was kind of a big deal. Such missile officers ought to be among the most trustworthy military officers on Earth …
This scandal had already been reported in the press, but a lieutenant in the organization gave me some background of what the officers had been doing, and how it was detected.
I allege no dishonesty on the part of the two officers whose testimony forms the core of the “Rendlesham incident.”
I merely observe, that although most people might expect members of armed forces serving in responsible positions to be exceptionally sober, careful and trustworthy witnesses … they’re people like anybody else, and they live and work in contexts in which they’re sometimes motivated to do really crazy things in order to avoid some penalty or punishment.
Carl Sagan wisely observed that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
echo • July 18, 2020 3:02 PM
Having now watched most of the Euronews video through I picked up on what German academics have labelled a “system crash”. The Spanish police were indulging in both being very unhelpful and claiming victims were in a mess because of their own choice. This is a very clever choice of words which both misdirects and also disguises wilful blindness and deliberate lack of understanding the system or joining dots. At the same time I know there are people who will try it on or band together to play the victim or magnify one worst example to gain sympathy and leverage this for an advantageous political settlement. That said the pattern of abuse is familiar and the failings in the system are familiar.
Clive Robinson • July 18, 2020 3:19 PM
@ MarkH,
I thought that in Britain, the conventional terminology is BFOs (bits falling off), not UFOs 🙂
It all depends…
As you probably know anything that falls of a moving object follows an orbital path, but due to the size of the earth and usually the close proximity the object crunches into the ground very quickly. Oh and unlike space mass/volume (ie density) kind of matters due to the atmosphere, thus in most cases the orbit decays faily rapidly and it also changes as you get towards max freefal velocity.
All very sciency but when you have millimetric radar being used to spot the “unidentified” even the metalic leg rings on geese can show up with a flock giving about the same level of reflection as a “stealth fighter”.
And yes weather balloons or more importantly their MetPac or tri-corner reflector is like a spotlight on a dark but cloudless night.
For guessable reasons some people take a very serious interest in all “unidentified” objects and mostly they are just “bits falling off” or even those nice shiny childrens balloons[1] or something organic doing it’s thing.
Thus they try to classify the traces by their “flight pattern” as this with the help of some computing power can identify many of the objects as not just “unknown” but “uninteresting” as well.
They also kind of interface with the “Space Watch” lot that track objects in orbit that are almost as small as your thumb as one of those hitting a rocket at 17,000mph can leave a sizable hole where you realy don’t want one…
[1] Somebody I used to know had concluded that the reason we give very small children balloons is to teach them the importance of “not letting go” thus the first steps of concentration and paying attention. When it was mentioned I commented that it “sounded rather cruel” to which the reply was “Most life lessons are cruel, especially the ones you survive”…
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 18, 2020 3:45 PM
The Woke Coincidential, and “the One”
In the context of a relatively new political phenomena that surrounds Trump, “the One” cult; there is a adjacent or co-linear affectation in another quarter of society. I call it the Woke-Coincidental, not the Woke-Continetial, consisting of individuals that have become effectively disengaged to civic life (pre Floyd) and local organizing and actions are caught up in a national scandal that produces a shared victimhood (I am just naming it, not making a qualitative assessment) which is anything but efficacious.
Before all the “wokers” attempt to cancel this message, here it out first if to be so kind. The central actor and figure wherein a swirl of conflict and disharmony has disturbed and derailed normal conventional social or political calculus that prior to these events was useful in an environment that no longer exists, this results in endless “new normal” situations. Or as Naomi Klein might say, a “Shock Doctrine” but on a continuing basis.
It’s the Kool-Aid, Stupid
With a large scale hegemonic cult that is not concerned with a context greater than the self, “the One” is leveraging the narcissism and ego centric tendencies of those that are susceptible and plying them in a number of ways. As the ego is central to an emotional appeal and only the narrative is necessary to propel the willing to coalesce about it, the cultist unwittingly participates in a group that would not necessarily organize around any constructive precept or theory. Anger, hate, and rage are employed as the lever in making the appeal stimulating but it does little to form solidarity or shared purpose. It is a cult of “the One” of many.
Unilaterial Disarmerment
Paradoxically, for those that are conscious of the social schism that a cult group represents and the nature of the narrative that causes those of “the One” to act, it can be quite upsetting and frustrating. But, in not taking the necessary strategic and tactical steps to avoid the disunity and chaos that is associated with intersections to this “the One” cult group, the individual is left floundering in despair. The woke-coincidential realizes that there is a ripple in the shared fabric of society in the large but is incapacitated and unable to carry out meaningful action. Thus, “the One” cult disarms the woke-coincidential in the waves of maelstrom that is generated and makes the local community weaker and responses to national
level issues impotent; only the termination of the disharmonious noise coming from “there” will seem to fix the problem.
Welcome to woke-coincidentialism. Eliminating the noise is the goal but does not serve as a useful strategic or tactical response.
Anders • July 18, 2020 4:04 PM
@SpaceLifeForm
Long time no talk on Covid topic.
How things are around you there?
I see infection rise at States.
We have here warm weather and of course i haven’t seen
any masks for weeks by now in not even month and a half.
Although things seems to be stabilized here i’m more than
sure they will come back with big bang.
and since it’s weekend – how everything started 🙂
lurkmore.so/images/4/49/Coronavirus_breakout.png
SpaceLifeForm • July 18, 2020 4:59 PM
@ Anders
So much happening. So many dots.
Welcome to Future Shock.
R.I.P. John Lewis
SpaceLifeForm • July 18, 2020 6:17 PM
@ Anders
Bet there was some crying.
85 infants under age 1 tested positive for coronavirus in one Texas county
hxxps://www.cnn.com/2020/07/18/health/texas-infants-coronavirus-trnd/index.html
echo • July 18, 2020 6:22 PM
@Clive
A problem with Nimrod was it was simply detecting too much stuff and the computational power didn’t exist back then to properly process things. Then Cameron binned the lot much like TSR2, Bristol 188, Black Arrow and other projects. Then there is the implosion of ICL, trampling all over Meiko, and lack of strategic policy allowing the sale of nuclear industry followed soon by ARM and yet more national visionless cowardice over Huawei.
Like a lot of problems things are often as they are because of a point of view. While a childs balloon may simply be a cruel weapon of war to one person is an opportunity to understand and empathise for another.
Why is the new US hand grenade, which can switch between concussion and fragmentation and has a variable fuse, suddenly understandable by squaddies when human rights in conflict are not? Simply because of point of view.
echo • July 18, 2020 6:44 PM
@Anders @SpaceLifeForm
I’m still organising my affairs based on the science and risk management and mitigations. I don’t go anywhere without wearing a mask (I have a supply of FFP3 and FFP2+ and standard surgical masks stored in paper bags and reused in rotation up to their “wear level”. My place is pretty much sealed because I use “passivehaus” principles to stay cool during hot weather and also keep doors and windows shut against wind carried aerosols. All goods arrive are isolated and/or cleaned. Handwashing with bar soap is routine as if I have been handling raw chicken. My immune system and constitution is normally realiably good and I rarely if ever get ill and could probably survive food poisoning without noticing so my precautions may be over the top but then I’m not the one who landed in hospital. Yet.
I avoid people and buildings except where I have to and minimise “time on ground” and “proximity to threats”. Meanwhile due to bad politics and empire builders tripping over themselves and poor enforcement I’m having to navigate a “high risk” environment whenever I go out.
I have noticed both generally and in specific instances both from gathering my own “on the ground” intel gathering and reading a wide variety of domestic and foreign reports that safety is breaking down.
Rather you than me, as people say.
I think if you avoid men under the age of 30, crowded and noisy places, and anywhere too smoke filled or humid or dirty you avoid a lot of the easily avoidable risk. I just have to plan ahead, measure twice and cut once, and if it’s too good to be true it probably is and if in doubt don’t. Needless to say any children in my charge (which thankfully there aren’t) would be kept in a bubble behind this wall. Business as usual then.
If any children are catching coronavirus this is simply because coronavirus is moving at the speed of causality. Remove the cause and poof the virus has nowhere to go. Ask yourself if you are the cause and if you are then simply remove yourself until you can confirm you are not.
Jon • July 18, 2020 7:23 PM
@ JonKnowsNothing :
Well it turns out that Samsung was sending “hidden telemetry” and “log files” if the machine was connected to the internet, even if certain options were “OFF” or “Not ON”.
Which does indeed lead to an interesting question: What makes you think that changing a setting actually changes the behavior?
It’s trivial to write a cheerful User Interface (UI) that looks like you’ve changed something – but doesn’t actually change anything. Or changes something else.
Also easily done just through buggy software – it’s supposed to, but doesn’t, and nobody bothered testing it in the off stage. Or whatever. Microsoft is also notorious for ‘changing them back’ during version updates as well – as if they had to.
Yeah, you can detect this with inspecting firewall logs, but how many people have one of those for their home internet connection? And with phones, it’s even harder – are you sniffing the airwaves for everything your phone does? Just how DO you ‘firewall’ a smartphone?
Jon (Doesn’tKnowMuch,either) 😉
echo • July 18, 2020 9:13 PM
Bureaucracies are no different from electronic or other systems. Decisions without authorisation are made all the time as are decisions made without consent. In both cases a badly designed or faulty interlock mechanism fails and if the error can pass through without being caught you have a problem. As always the problem is usually with those trying to cheapen the product and finding none existant solutions in all the wrong places. DaVinci they are not.
SpaceLifeForm • July 18, 2020 11:49 PM
@ Anders
There is so much more to be said, but we do not need to waste bits right now. There will be something new every day until society collectively does what is correct.
I’d give a bunch of fiat money to Bruce right now, but I have no way to do it securely and privately.
There are many news and/or tech and/or legal sites that I would love to donate to. This site will always be #1.
But, I have not found a way to do so anonymously.
@ Clive
Have you given thought about this donation issue?
@ ALL
Somehow, we all really need to bootstrap.
I know we can pull this off.
How bad can we go wrong, and still fail to make things better?
Even if we fail, we can not say we did not try.
SpaceLifeForm • July 19, 2020 12:30 AM
@ Anders (and others outside US that may seeing fake news)
This is not fake news.
The tide is turning.
RVAT2020
echo • July 19, 2020 1:07 AM
On top of the head of M6 lying through his teeth to prop up the line the UK governments ban of Huawei was because of “security” (by security I read it as meaning a proven threat or vulnerability above background noise which according to published reports the UK has never discovered) it has been discovered the UK government was appeasing Huawei behind closed doors. Very simply the UK ban on Huawei is to appease the Trump regime and mitigate the US exporting its own domestic law. This is a broader definition of security and from my perspective one to be resisted. You don’t give in to threats or blackmail and the head of MI6 should know better, quite frankly, especially when it comes to LYING to the general public for political reasons. Which begs the question. What else is he LYING about?
More news on the masks fiasco.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jul/18/face-masks-public-health-campaign
Police also stop “digital rape”. “Digital rape” is the “collect it all” without justification for gathering all phone and social media data of a victim on the random chance it may be useful in a prosecution without evidence to support this.
(Earlier news is that both prosecution processes and prosectiuon of mentally ill people is being reviewed because of the toxic nature of prosecutions harming both witnesses and the vulnerable).
Ismar • July 19, 2020 1:39 AM
Laughter is the best medicine
“Skipper” the sailor said to his captain as he saluted,
“A special message just came in for you from the admiral. I have it right here.”
“Read it to me,” the captain ordered.
The sailor began reading nervously, “You are without a doubt the most idiotic,
lame-brained officer ever to command a ship in the United States Navy.”
“Have that communication decoded at once!,” The skipper responded
— Pastor Tim’s Clean Laugh List
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 19, 2020 2:01 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm
I’d give a bunch of fiat money to Bruce right now, but I have no way to do it securely and privately.
One way I have been able to provide monetary support to Bruce is by purchasing his books. Donating a large sum of money by way of book purchases is not practical as much of the net is to the publisher. I purchase them as they are released, and when possible a few extra copies make it to friends and family as gifts. Though Bruce’s work is accessible, it is not everyone’s cup of tea. Haven’t been able to break the four book distribution limit in my circle. That either says a lot about me or much about the general population. Friendships are not circumscribed by a set of criteria, no IQ test or Mensa membership required (though a Fields metal is a plus).
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 19, 2020 2:03 AM
Oops, that’s Fields Medal.
Clive Robinson • July 19, 2020 2:14 AM
@ echo,
A problem with Nimrod was it was simply detecting too much stuff and the computational power didn’t exist back then to properly process things.
The same problem exists with all such systems today. Because it is very expensive to turn the actual sensors into usable detectors[1] you tend to put in the best sensors available. In comparison updating the computing power is normally trivial in comparison as all it takes is a PCB swap and software upgrade.
With regards,
Why is the new US hand grenade, which can switch between concussion and fragmentation and has a variable fuse, suddenly understandable by squaddies when human rights in conflict are not?
I guess it needs to be said that such a grenade is an excuse for excessive force. The famous “fog of war” statment will be used to excuse behaviours that have always been questionable (such as “take no prisoners” which realy means “kill everyone”). Thus senior command give an order in a veiled way and can then blaim the troops on the ground for “the wrong setting” when the excesses and “collateral damage” of mangled innocent civilians become political trouble. When the whole notion of “nonlethal weapons” came up decades ago it was pointed out by a US General that US troops “are trained for combat not policing” and went on to make the point that the two roles should always remain seperate. Soldiers like the police are “trained to a role untill it is instinctive” and to expect non instinctive behaviour in fraut situations is asking to much of “the common clay” we are all made of.
[1] Even Fast Moving Consumer Electronics design engineers tend not to believe this untill they’ve “walked the problem through”. So consider what you would need to do to make a 10cent electret microphone into a hydrophone on the end of a half mile long “towed array” good to work from just below the surface to say 500meters down (~744psi) in salt water, that’s 1/3rd of a ton every square inch for which you have to design an “audio port”, “protective housing”, “cabling system”, “commutaror system”, and “gland system” to get the tiny signal to the 24bit Analog to Digital converter, oh and the cable needs to be thin and flexible to be “realed in” as well as strong enough to survive “snagging” on objects. So at that cost why use a 10cent sensor when a 100dollar sensor will not change the price by more than a fraction of a percent, but as it’s many times more reliable in use will save the extrodinarily high repair/replacment costs many times over.
SpaceLifeForm • July 19, 2020 2:37 AM
@ Clive
Thoughts? I’m guessing, this is due to fibre to pots conversion hardware. Or could it be a side channel?
hxxps://twitter.com/RichFelker/status/1284534467273601025
RF lazyweb, any idea what could be source of noise spaced ~43 kHz apart starting at ~591 kHz and going up?
echo • July 19, 2020 3:52 AM
@Clive
Yes, everything you say makes sense. The kinds of command abuses and dodges and hanging the lower ranks out to dry you see are too common in ordinary civilian bureaucracies dealing with your average in the street none combatant. This is why I paid close attention to youtubes on Operation Nimrod (not related to the Nimrod AEWS) and special forces chatter about mission rules of engagement and one of their rare publicy known dud operations and public commentary by various brass foghorning about the human rights topic in general. I expect there’s a lot of psychology too if anyone wants to go especially deep on this from context switching to perception to reaction times and contexts. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone in various back offices have crunched numbers on this and produced some pretty spreadsheets and charts. Not that I’m letting anyone off the hook. Most of the foghorning by brass was because the politics conflicted with their comfort ones and they lacked the understanding and emotional qualities to deal with it. This is sadly too true of the brass in civilian departments whether it’s the DWP or police or local council or health systems or whoever.
Modular systems including the best sensors and swappable PCBs and upgradeable software makes sense. Pretty much all major procurements are heading down this path anyway. Another angle is maximum theoretical capabilities can be kept secret. I imagaine there are theoretical scenarious where shredding your engines in 10 minutes is unavoidably needed or who knows what mathematical wizardry is discovered later.
echo • July 19, 2020 4:03 AM
@Clive
Before I forget the biggest worry of the ex US Marine Youtubing about the new grenade wasn’t human rights but soliders blowing themselves or their colleague up by mistake. While the new grenade enables a lot of cleverness while designing responses to various scenarious the grenade has a different blast radius depending on whether it is set to concussion or fragmentation. Their worry was some twonk throwing their grenade set to the wrong setting or timing while their team rushed in and promptly turned in a pile of randomly distributed lumps of warm meat.
myliit • July 19, 2020 5:32 AM
imo, and I think emptywheel’s, Chris Wallace of Fox News Sunday ( 9 am et today, afaik) is good at interviewing people like Trump or Pompeo.
“Trump clashes with Fox News interviewer over false claim about Biden
Donald Trump has clashed with a Fox News interviewer after the president was challenged about a false claim that Joe Biden wants to defund police.
In a clip of Chris Wallace’s Fox News Sunday interview [ 9 am et today ] with Trump released on Friday, the president said his likely opponent in November’s presidential election supported the movement to defund police forces.
But in the interview, held on the Oval Office patio, Wallace intervened to say Biden did not support defunding.
Trump, hoping to prove his allegation, was then seen calling for a copy of a policy charter Biden agreed with Bernie Sanders and which was released this week. The document did not prove his claim.
The interview, the first Sunday interview with Trump for more than a year, will be aired in full this weekend. …”
Blue Roo • July 19, 2020 5:47 AM
When discussing safe havens for cybercrime, the usual suspects are: RU, CN, IR, and a bunch of countries where cybercrime is considered beneficial to local power structures, even good for the economy. No extradition treaty.
However, a safe heaven can be found behind the wall of: money, influence, fame, friendly media outlets, and a small army of lawyers. No need for anonymity. Nothing new, as old as money and society. Not frequently discussed in the context of cyber and hacking.
It may take LE a decade to break through the wall of money, fame, and privilege; if ever. Prosecutors like to win. Faced with burdens of “beyond reasonable doubt”, hard to understand evidence, well funded defense, and celebrity-struck jurors, a prosecutor is likely to look for an easier case to close. Let the statue of limitations sort things out.
As an example, consider the hack from five years ago [1]. Within a few weeks the author found a group involved [2]. Other contributors identified a few members of the group [3]. The important thing about the group is that they wanted to be found. Tweeted an IP address while setting up the infrastructure [4][/photo/2]; later used that IP for distributing stolen data [4][/photo/1]. Used the hack-themed twitter graphics [4][/photo/4]. Plenty of clues.
By following links [3] one quickly finds: fame, entourage, fans, followers, friends with money, friendly media outlets, etc. A bit of Googling shows many good things bestowed upon a member of the group since the hack.
“We dumped from CC processor”, bragged the team in an interview [5]; merely a footnote in an official report [6]. Data dump from a credit card processor? Not from the targeted company? From a financial organization? Wire fraud? A sentence of up to 20 (30) years? Bragging about it within the Five Eyes? That’s bold. What happened next? Heard anything?
BTW, an interesting comment [7]: “What did I tell you about …”. Take a moment to reflect on this. Told the CEO? What? When? Where? Why? How? Who? Pure speculation, but it sounds as if the CEO had been talking to a member of the group before the company got hacked. Just a hunch. Could be a misdirection, or colloquialism. Nevertheless, if true there is a lesson in there, somewhere.
This may all be coincidental. Don’t think so. Bottom line, the shield of fame, influence, and money is as good as a country border. Strong deterrent too, keeps LE at bay.
Cybercrime pays well. Money brings influence, power, and fame. There is never enough fame. Soon, we’ll see cyber Al Capone types giving TV interviews, basking in limelight, and rubbing it in to the DOJ. Oh, wait. Paging Eliot Ness.
Links:
[1] kwwsv[://]nuhevrqvhfxulwb[.]frp/2015/07/rqolqh-fkhdwlqj-vlwh-dvkohbpdglvrq-kdfnhg/
[2] kwwsv[://]nuhevrqvhfxulwb[.]frp/2015/08/zkr-kdfnhg-dvkohb-pdglvrq/
[3] kwwsv[://]nuhevrqvhfxulwb[.]frp/2015/08/zkr-kdfnhg-dvkohb-pdglvrq/frpphqw-sdjh-5/#frpphqwv
[4] kwwsv[://]wzlwwhu[.]frp/Pu_Jkrvwob/vwdwxv/637281344494551041/
[5] kwwsv[://]prwkhuerdug[.]ylfh[.]frp/hq_xv/duwlfoh/epmtbc/dvkohb-pdglvrq-kdfnhuv-vshdn-rxw-qrergb-zdv-zdwfklqj
[6] kwwsv[://]zzz[.]suly[.]jf[.]fd/hq/rsf-dfwlrqv-dqg-ghflvlrqv/lqyhvwljdwlrqv/lqyhvwljdwlrqv-lqwr-exvlqhvvhv/2016/slshgd-2016-005/#iq5
[7] kwwsv[://]nuhevrqvhfxulwb[.]frp/2015/08/zkr-kdfnhg-dvkohb-pdglvrq/frpphqw-sdjh-3/#frpphqwv
P4YOnsyHDioUkPPag/Q2Ea066mO4h55dJL/43tM9NHk=
Clive Robinson • July 19, 2020 10:16 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm,
If I hooked a spec anny up to the CO side of the Demark on POTS twisted pair copper and saw something similar to,
Without knowing the capabiliries of the test equipment or driver, I would as a first guess probably assume it was some form of OFDM[1] probably one of the myriad of xDSL[2] signals.
Most digital signals on POTS are “whitened” by psudonoise from a LFSR like a crude form of DSSS as this keeps the energy per unit of bandwidth low.
If you see a DSSS signal on a spec anny then it looks to the eye like AGWN which thermal noise looks like as well.
Thus the whitened OFDM using multiple carriers right up into the low Mhz region would produce something similar to what is being described.
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthogonal_frequency-division_multiplexing
Anders • July 19, 2020 11:41 AM
Funny and sad at the same time.
http://www.theregister.com/2020/07/18/samsung_bluray_mass_dieoff_explained/
Sherman jay • July 19, 2020 11:48 AM
Like many of you, I am upset by the likelihood that ‘software’ on-off switches are useless.
I put ubuntu on a 10 year old dell desktop for testing.
I set the tray icon for internet connection to ‘disconnect’.
I saw that the internet activity light on my dsl modem stopped blinking.
I let the computer sit quiescent for a few minutes.
I then noticed that the internet activity light on the modem
began blinking rapidly indicating data transfer.
But, the tray icon showed disconnected.
However, when I clicked it and ‘disabled networking’ completely, the modem activity ceased immediately.
Oh, crap!
Also, @Clive and @ SpaceLifeForm
regarding the noise bars you are seeing. I put a scope to the pots terms with the dsl modem running and also after a dsl phone filter and found harmonic noise bars at a fairly low level. It might be harmonics from the multiplexing of the dsl signal on the copper wires, don’t know for certain.
Clive Robinson • July 19, 2020 1:50 PM
@ Sherman jay,
I put ubuntu on a … I let the computer sit quiescent for a few minutes. I then noticed that the internet activity light on the modem began blinking rapidly indicating data transfer. But, the tray icon showed disconnected.
Yup you’ve been “owned-too” by Mark the Shut…
Ubuntu does an ET and “calls home” to the mothership with “telemetry” just as Microsoft does.
And like Billy-Bob’s data stealing, you don’t know what Marky-boy is stealing either.
I’m not sure when it first started but 16.04 was when I first saw it reported,
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2016/01/ubuntu-online-search-feature-disabled-16-04
The later “public face was,
https://www.smartspate.com/developers-of-ubuntu-first-published-a-desktop-telemetry/
Which has a way to remove it,
https://github.com/gp187/Ubuntu-Privacy-Fix
But is that all of it?
Err no not by a very long country mile. Vecause you then find they are upto different tricks as well,
https://www.ghacks.net/2020/06/16/linux-mint-20-will-block-ubuntu-snap-by-default/
Which gets you logged by those great data-rape thugs that “do no evil”… Google and it’s walled garden hell hole…
As far as I’m concerned Ububtu are not just off the Christmas Card List they are also on the “Do Not Install” list, and as like as not Santa’s “naughty list” as well.
As far as I’m aware Debs Dists have not yet crossed the telemetry Rubicon yet…
vas pup • July 19, 2020 2:06 PM
New angle of AI application to provide security of patients during COVID:
https://www.bbc.com/news/av/technology-53348680/apps-help-orthopaedic-patients-prepare-for-surgery
vas pup • July 19, 2020 2:44 PM
What’s the science on the Emirates Mars Mission?
https://www.dw.com/en/whats-the-science-on-the-emirates-mars-mission/a-53857637
This extract below has security implication – could military satellites with similar orbit features (elliptical orbit)be more resilient against attack? Just curious.
“”Mars rotates, like Earth, but in 24 hours and 38 minutes, and the spacecraft will have an elliptical orbit of about 20,000 kilometers at its lowest to 43,000 kilometers at the top,” says Forget, who is also involved in the Emirates Mars Mission.
“When it’s at 20,000 km, it will stay above the same [location on Mars], rotating with the planet for 8 hours and that will let us monitor what’s going on throughout the day — so, for instance, we’ll see morning fog disappearing here, a storm start there,” says Forget, “— and then it will move up again, and when it’s higher, the spacecraft moves slower, while the planet keeps rotating below it. When it returns to the lowest altitude, it will rotate with the planet again. So, we’ll see what’s happening over time.”
Sherman Jay • July 19, 2020 3:39 PM
Dear @Clive,
As always, Thanks for your insights. That confirms what I suspected.
I guess that Shuttleworth has been drinking to much of the Gates Koolaid.
I need a tee shirt that says “Telemetry is NOT your friend” to remind me.
I have Debian with the ‘non-free’ codecs. It does seem much cleaner. And, many versions of puppy linux show the actual traffic RX and TX when you hover over the tray icon and they do truly ‘disconnect’ and the MByte counts don’t increase even after 20+ min. sitting idle and ‘disconnected’.
I’m trying Sparky Linux (Polish distro based on Debian) on a friend’s laptop. He wants a full office suite (libreoffice) and all the regular features. Sparky seems quite stable and complete for a rather light distro. But, as with everything, I need to look into the security features.
JonKnowsNothing • July 19, 2020 3:56 PM
@Clive @All
re: Apple 2FA authenticator fob connects to Lightning port
disclaimer: color me skeptical that this is secure
MSM review of a Apple based 2FA Authenticator FOB. It covers a lot of territory and much of it historically has had “difficulties” in different iterations.
There are lots of reasons and places using or needing 2FA, but I am not that sure that the downsides have been dealt with any deeper than the cosmetic plastic housing.
ht tps://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2020/07/apple-has-finally-embraced-key-based-2fa-so-should-you/
(url fractured to prevent autorun)
Sherman Jay • July 19, 2020 4:05 PM
@JonKnowsNothing @Clive @All
re: Apple 2FA authenticator fob connects to Lightning port
I agree with you. about the need and your skepticism.
I told a person at one of our clinics to get a 32GB flash drive to backup their data files. They did. HOWEVER, he left it in his pants pocket and it went through the washing machine! KILLED IT, DEAD. If that was the apple 2FA fob, how would you recover?
And, it’s proprietary. Apple only. No Linux, No Win10.
And, IIRC, apple cloud servers are all in china under control of the chinese regional gov’t. Would that impact the security of the Apple 2FA fob?
Sherman Jay • July 19, 2020 4:11 PM
@clive,
O.K., stupid NASA Linux pun (just to lighten the mood in the time of the Plague):
Q. What’s a Shuttleworth?
A. Oh, about $0.25usd
lurker • July 19, 2020 4:38 PM
@Ismar
Came across this IoT security initiative by Panasonic – seems like a step in the right direction ?
https://news.panasonic.com/global/press/data/2020/01/en200130-2/en200130-2.html
Reads like a sales blurb, but what would I know… My emphasis added in clips below:
The IC fingerprint is analog and therefore cannot be copied.
The use of an energy harvesting function [4] allows smartphones and tablets to read controller IC information and security incident records in the devices and to configure device operation settings via NFC even when the device power is off.
standingunder • July 19, 2020 5:53 PM
RandomTrue: About Security of our communities.
In some parts of the US, there are those Asians and Latinos who have partnered together (which is totally OK, yet) and share historical grievances with the United States of the past.
However, within their friendship, perhaps sometimes, are a few individuals who attempted to punish the modern United States for the legitimate issues of the past.
This is similar to some of the recent white mainstreamlike Americans who are sometimes tempted to rebel against modern civilization because of their own grievances which are also legitimate. However, they are at risk of destabilizing what most of us need and want with their caustic rebellion “just add water” type of instant riot grrrl stuff.
Then there a few maybe also like me, who are in fresh recovery from victimization via assaults & abductions & poisonings. My PTSD easily flows into temptation to become the next vigilante, and yet I would rather be doing normal peaceful things in compliance with logic and reasoning and my preferences for aesthetics and niceties.
This is relevant to security because there are some odd junctions between those groups and slightly similar others. Where there is a nice decent meeting of the minds without damages, sincere diplomacy and gift exchanges happen with mutual benefits. However, the current cultural zeitgeist puts many of us at risk of losing our essential diplomacy simply because of the sensationalism and gossip which tends to be paralytically amplified by trends to conform.
The conformity trends unfortunately are not safely referenced to long-term verified and corroborated data and cultural traditions.
To make matters worse, unfortunately, also there are fearmongerings against any technological cultures and advantages and tools. Some of these Luddites might be the ones so routinely messing up our networks and digital inventions and devices and even the nascient hybrid cultures which are also entitled to their fair share of peace and prosperity.
Last but not least, the common and essential for survival biological habitats are currently being rapidly weaponized against nearly all lives and cultures by those who are misled and misinformed and who lack essential education about how they cannot win with that technique. When the habitats are weaponized or destroyed, everyone on this entire planet, of all species, loses.
Thanks for taking the time to study this educated opinion. I am a partial witness to this “testimony”. I am deliberately non-specific about certain details because the details delivered would decrease the good stability. I will NOT willfully reduce the good stability.
Sincerely,
standingunder
echo • July 19, 2020 6:13 PM
This is a useful video by Paul Shillito (a.k.a CuriousDroid) explaining where we are today with respect to Cornal Mass Ejections or CMEs giving rise to what is known as “Carrington events”. He gives a run down both of the history, frequency of these solar events and near misses, satellite data, and the geological and technological reasons and history through to modern day mitigations.
How Prepared Are We For A Carrington Level Solar Storm?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBxjwzKwVl0&
Having lived through a pandemic and the consequences of a lack of preparedness and lack of investment in good science and poor internal and international cooperation I think we can all agree it’s a bad idea to be tardy about these things.
Personally, I’d rather more bandwidth was given to experts brainstorming and developing and testing mitigation plans for scenarious than listen to a single word of the over-promoted middle managers and chancers who call themselves leaders “wargaming” in their invitation only echo chambers and duckrolling in and out of “COBRA” meeting rooms and broadcasters studios. I also wish public policy was taken more seriously and not left in the hands of Hollywood executives and wildcard wingnuts who can simply move a crowd with alarmist dogma. Can we also not lock everything up behind FOIs with the handwavy excuses of “security” to preserve embarassment and “economic damage” to preserve party donations from foreign and domestic big capital?
echo • July 19, 2020 6:25 PM
@standingunder
Both of these articles may be useful. The problem with the whole discussion is people are fragmented and by attacking each other can simply perpetuate human rights abuses and inequality across the board. Problems exist across the whole of society and people who themselves fall into a protected category may well and some indeed do discriminate against others. Of course thus feeds the whole acrimonious go around in circles anger and squabbling on top of pre-existing system and historical discrimination. I have some thoughts on this but getting the right words in the right order is very tricky!
Blaming individuals for structural discrimination will only make it worse.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jul/19/ive-been-tempted-by-righteous-anger-against-racists-its-not-much-help-in-changing-society
What’s the big idea? Theories are contagious .
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jul/19/whats-the-big-idea-theories-are-contagious
lurker • July 19, 2020 8:20 PM
@vas pup
What’s the science on the Emirates Mars Mission?
If you mean what task will it perform when it gets there, it seems to be basically a weather sat.
It will attempt to answer the scientific questions of why Martian atmosphere is losing hydrogen and oxygen into space and the reason behind drastic climate changes of Mars.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emirates_Mars_Mission
https://www.mbrsc.ae/emirates-mars-mission
https://www.theverge.com/21310266/united-arab-emirates-mars-mission-hope-spacecraft-launch-japan
The orbital technique was previously used by early Russian TV and communications earth orbiting satelites. Before their rockets had the power to put a heavy geo-stationary bird in place, they used highly elliptical orbits, arranged so the apogee gave them several hours with the transponders virtually hovering above the USSR.
echo • July 19, 2020 10:27 PM
@Lurker
Science Alert has coverage on the Emirates mars mission. It’s also quite interesting that the probe was named “Hope” instead of the usual “Hammer of God” hysterics we’re used to hearing from the media when relating to Middle-East projects. It’s also fascinating this was a Japanese launch. You hear so little swaggering from Japan it’s easy to forget Japan has a space launch capability.
https://www.sciencealert.com/first-arab-space-mission-to-mars-has-successfully-launched-from-japan
Everette • July 19, 2020 10:32 PM
@Ismar,
I agree with lurker that this is little more than a sales blurb. Looks like a kind of TPM to me, with “IoT” mentioned because it’s trendy rather than because it’s truly related. However useful this could be to IoT in theory, it doesn’t solve the problems that are actually leading to security breaches.
People are not copying/extracting per-device keys from hardware, sniffing them off the memory bus like Panasonic suggests; rather, they’re finding that there is no key, or that the key is the same for every device (and can probably be read directly from the downloadable firmware). Or the manufacturer loads it up with a shitload of software, doesn’t keep it updated, and there’s an exploit. Or everything is “secure”, and the privacy invasions are by design.
Weather • July 20, 2020 1:18 AM
@echo,lucker
Japan does have a strong booster, its also reliable, I think Russia is having economy problems and is selling there technology to China before it becomes out dated, spacex has opened the door for private company to enter the space, but none at present are taking another leap forward, they are just playing catch up. Rocketlab lost a upper stage maybe due to satailite propulsion system exspased to vacuum, but they passed ten so can get insurance.
David • July 20, 2020 4:36 AM
Former ICANN CEO is now co-CEO of the private equity firm that tried to buy .org Domain
https://domainnamewire.com/2020/07/16/fadi-chehade-is-now-co-ceo-of-ethos-capital/
HN discussion:
echo • July 20, 2020 6:10 AM
From Rip-off Britain to Cheapskate Britain. Neither the government nor the monarch pay for security of the crown jewels but the charity “Historic Royal Palaces” which is entirely funded by vistors. What careerist crawler thought of this wheeze? Meanwhile staff have taken a 20% pay cut.
Plus if anyone thinks I am making a “low assurance” and none essential trip just in the middle of a pandemic just because it’s on pause to prop up their finances they’re a hooning idiot. Can we not just end the insanity called “British governance” and have a proper constitution?
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/jul/20/beefeaters-tower-of-london-job-cuts-coronavirus
Clive Robinson • July 20, 2020 4:26 PM
@ SpaceLifeForm, ALL,
You might remember just a short while ago I warned that ‘CA root Certs” were going to start expiring and that would probably cause some chaos?
Well… it just so happens that…,
https://www.theregister.com/2020/06/02/sectigo_root_cert_expires/
You can read it for yourself.
But please note it’s not just the CA Root Certs expiring that’s going to cause problems. Algorithms have changed a bit in 25years, and when the new Certs appear some older software is going to get broken…
Which means that those who like to grab PII etc via web browsers and telemetry etc know you are going to have to upgrade…
Thus with the new CA root certs expect broken software to lead to upgrades full of telemetry and heck knows what form of not so accidental vulnerabilities and back doors and the like.
Clive Robinson • July 20, 2020 4:30 PM
@ ALL,
Speaking of vulnerabilities and backdoors in security related code,
https://www.theregister.com/2020/06/10/gnutls_patches_security_hole/
Yup Google claim that this is very serious or some such, which to be honest it does fall under a certain class of known security failings.
SpaceLifeForm • July 20, 2020 5:04 PM
If you saw the US Navy SeaBee taking the flack from the wannabe SS in Portland, here is more on that story.
This is his account. Broken hand. Will need surgery.
hxxps://twitter.com/Tazerface16
SpaceLifeForm • July 20, 2020 5:50 PM
@ Clive
I’m confused. Am I on the wrong thread? 😉
Danny McClanahan, a software engineer at Twitter who works with open source software, fired back at infosec professionals for using his company’s social media site to disparage GnuTLS and to discourage people using it rather than contributing to the software project and make it better.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 20, 2020 7:06 PM
If legislative agency is given to congress, how is it that the executive by way of an EO possibly bring into force sanctions, sentencing, and arrests of citizens? Oh, yeah–willful injury of federal property–like graffiti, is an injury crime. What’s the penalty for willful ignorance that kills hundreds of thousands of citizens? Bet it is not considered an injury crime but instead a “great job! We have the best numbers.”
Oh, and how is rendition on U.S. soil of U.S. citizens, a thing?
MarkH • July 20, 2020 7:42 PM
@name.withheld:
how is rendition on U.S. soil of U.S. citizens, a thing?
I think you just gave a pretty good definition of the legal term “arrest.”
IFF the persons doing so are law enforcement officers (of which I have no idea, because they’re costumed like Putin’s “green men”), and they reasonably believe they are witnessing violations of federal law — or that someone is in imminent danger — then arresting the suspects/threats is a standard operation of law enforcement.
I suspect that my horror of what is now happening is not very different from yours. When we permit our strong emotions to eclipse reasoning from facts and logic, that helps no one (so far as I can see).
MarkH • July 20, 2020 7:48 PM
PS
I didn’t express clearly, that if the two predicates (federal LEOs, and legal standard for arrest) are not satisfied …
… then what they’re doing is criminal.
echo • July 20, 2020 8:41 PM
@SpaceLifeForm
I limit the number of ways people can contact me for both work and personal life because I don’t need the headache nor do I need the security risk. Phone, email, and Skype and that’s it. I’ve tried getting people to use SIP for video calls but pretty much given up. I don’t even bother with Signal for the same reasons.
I think Danny McClanahan needs to get over his prima donna coder worldview and learn both to delegate and also respect his customers i.e. the end users. Not everyone is or wants to be a coder and they have skills he doesn’t. It’s not just coders who suffer fom this mentality. I did go online today for some market research but may as well have been talking to myself. There are simply people out there who neither understand the technical issues nor care so he ought to count himself lucky experts are offering views and the public is engaged with the issue.
One thing Bruce does well is make himself available. Yes, Bruce has to deal with a lot of repetitive fly by night journalism but at the same time he is good for an opinion and available. This is one complaint in the UK at least that experts, usually but not always academic, take days to get hold of by which time the story has moved on or they don’t even bother developing their communication skills which adds another layer of difficulty. Now because Bruce manages this wellother security professionals will cite Bruce and his works are popular which creates a virtuous circle including more money and more influence to do what Bruce wants to do which is improving security and access to security.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 20, 2020 9:21 PM
@ MarkH, et al
Let me attempt to circle the wagons on this one…but let me first let me thank you for entering into dialogue on this topic. We may all be in a place right now where we are uncomfortable and unfamiliar. I am paraphrasing a quote from Chris Hedges; “I don’t fight fascists because I like to fight, I fight fascists because I don’t like fascism.”
My framing of the previous thread is argumentative and a tool for discussion, I mostly avoid making direct statements in order to cause an exchange that can enlighten. If I start from my own observed conclusion then arguments tend to be about its construction and not the facts and fallacies that surround the issue I’m addressing.
And yes, an extreme emotional response has been felt by more than me. Those in my circle openly talk of this criminal fascism that has crept into the public space. But to continue the thread…
From what I have been able to gather:
a.) as a witness to the event no determination can be made as to the nature or authority and I might attempt to intervene in order to prevent what appears to be criminal kidnapping
How much evidence is needed to determine if a government is failing its administrative functions and it is in fact engaged in maladministration, criminal maladministration with intent to cause harm…
How many bodies in morgues and mass graves will it take to right these wrongs…I predict many more.
JonKnowsNothing • July 20, 2020 9:44 PM
@MarkH @name.withheld
re:
how is rendition on U.S. soil of U.S. citizens, a thing?
I think you just gave a pretty good definition of the legal term “arrest.”
Rendition
In law, rendition is a “surrender” or “handing over” of persons or property, particularly from one jurisdiction to another
Extraordinary rendition
Extraordinary rendition, also called irregular rendition or forced rendition, is the government-sponsored abduction and extrajudicial transfer of a person from one country to another with the purpose of circumventing the former country’s laws on interrogation, detention and torture.
Arrest
An arrest is the act of apprehending and taking a person into custody (legal protection or control), usually because the person has been suspected of or observed committing a crime. After being taken into custody, the person can be questioned further and/or charged. An arrest is a procedure in a criminal justice system…. an arrest must be made for a thoroughly justified reason
Distinction between arrest and detention [USA]
In the United States, there exists a distinction between an investigatory stop or detention, and an arrest. The distinction tends to be whether or not the stop is “brief and cursory” in nature, and whether or not a reasonable individual would feel free to leave.
The situation in Portland, Oregon, USA is fluid and accurate information is lacking.
It is clear, that military-style-attired persons, carrying a multitude of armaments with no or minimal visible identification are taking people from the streets.
It is reported that some of the military garbed persons are not part of the local policing establishment but send by the Federal Government.
There are conflicting reports of cooperation between the military-garbed persons and the local policing establishment. Reports of both physical on the street cooperation and intelligence sharing between them.
Exactly what sort of intelligence sharing, how it was acquired, to what extent is used to target individual(s) is unknown.
Under which laws are the military-garbed persons taking persons off the street is also unknown. There are reports of Border Patrol, ICE (immigration), US Marshals, FBI each with a specific jurisdiction and mandate for enforcement.
Which persons are subject to which jurisdiction is unclear. Reports that persons are taken to a “holding area with in a Federal Compound” indicating that they are under Federal Arrest Jurisdiction rather than Local/City/State Jurisdiction. Specific Agencies, Cause for Arrest or Detention in unknown with released persons receiving a blanket “Show Up Here” notice.
Reports of the involvement of John Yoo, the lawyer who wrote the memo justifying torture, extraordinary rendition etc. as Legal Methods, is currently advising the Trump Administration on How to Rule by Edict/Decree.
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rendition_(law)
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_rendition
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrest
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrest#Distinction_between_arrest_and_detention
ht tps://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jul/20/trump-john-yoo-lawyer-torture-waterboarding
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Yoo
John Choon Yoo attorney and former government official best known for authoring the so-called Torture Memos, which provided a legal rationale for the torture of detainees during the War on Terror.
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echo • July 20, 2020 11:45 PM
I can only give my UK opinion on this but I don’t believe the law is as this advisor claims. Executive orders must be treated like law but are not law. In other words where an executive order conflicts with the law then the exactive order holds no force. It really is this simple and this is indeed what the article goes on to explain. I would also draw attention to Alka Pradhans’ comments that some people treat the law as what they can get away with rather than what is the purpose and letter of the law.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jul/20/trump-john-yoo-lawyer-torture-waterboarding
SpaceLifeForm • July 21, 2020 12:24 AM
Lady Godiva spotted in Portland. Horse is missing.
hxxps://twitter.com/killendave/status/1285282461279109120
SpaceLifeForm • July 21, 2020 1:31 AM
Gee, what could go wrong?
Mastercard announces expansion of cryptocurrency efforts, inks card deal with Wirex
hXXps://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/72226/mastercard-crypto-card-wirex
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 21, 2020 1:46 AM
Absence of Rule of Law; We have a King[Queen]
This topic has been given much scholarly attention, what I suggest is the protagonist take not the cynical one-sided administrative sycophants opinions which receives the majority of attention. To give the most expressive form in evidence of this; summary execution without due process of citizens. There are cases on the books… Another, striking Libya using the Unitary Presidential war authority, which is not a thing.
There is another element to these actions by the President, to take care that the laws be faithfully executed. Or, is obstruction of justice a faithful act? Three ABA reports sent to the White House received no responses, the reports stated that there have been continuous violations of the constitution. The body that represents the legal profession is given the disregard that amounts to an egregious contempt of the law. What the executive has arrogated to himself the role of prosecutor, judge, jury, and executor.
A recording of the Harvard Law School Forum talk is available on YouTube. I know, lawyers talking to lawyers about law–get me my meds.
An interesting discussion that strikes at Yoo’s theories held at Harvard Law School in 2012. Fine and Nadar discussed Presidential signing statements, EO’s, PM’s, and others. They are all fantasy in the context of principal law, i.e. the U.S. Constitution is not permissive. Authorities derived are authorities assumed, the framers were quite clear on the origins of authority and the elasticity of formal mechanisms which may or may not restrict the natural tendencies for overreach and aggrandizement of and by the executive. In 2012, they both argued there is a “constitutional crisis” in evidence. It’s 2020, I say we have constitutional absence–the abolishment of the rule of law. Did you know congress has the stated authority to define administrative departments?
One of my favorite quotable Fine statements: “These are the kind of political moral midgets we have who are ruling the country. And we need to end it, and we can a majority with one man or woman with courage.” A quotable Nadar statement: “This rationalization of illegality is endless. When criminality becomes so institutionalized, it is hardly a subject for law review.”
One of the statements in evidence of the failing institutional care required to maintain their responsibilities to civil liberties was an article by Johnathan Turley:
“This country has comprehensively reduced civil liberties in the name of the expanded security state, they form a mosaic of powers under which our country could be considered, at least in part, authoritarian.” His article included the following ten loses of freedom to the reaction of our government and its supporters after nine eleven:
I would add that Ralph Nadar probably gave one of his most powerful talks though highly critical, he also adds a solution set that addresses some of these grievances.
JonKnowsNothing • July 21, 2020 1:49 AM
@echo @MarkH @name.withheld
re:
John Yoo and Executive Orders
In the normal course of events, the USA judicial branch would opine and define What’s In and What’s Out.
However, SCOTUS and most of the Federal Judiciary confine their opining to what ever was actually “written into the law”. So, their scope of review is very narrow.
There is also a significant delay between Start and Finish with only a few paths that by-pass years of legal costs and delays. For the most part, and for the most of us, it is beyond our personal ability or fortunes to engage in the decades long trek.
In the more recent decades, it has been very expedient for the Executive Branch to just Do What They Want and Not Apologize for It Later. There are so many built in “Nuremberg defense, just following orders” exits for these applications that rarely is anyone held accountable. They all can pass the hand-outs and get-outs and cash-outs to each other.
SCOTUS doesn’t touch Gitmo, doesn’t touch the CIA, it coordinates and staffs FISC with the self-saving feature that they have zero enforcement abilities.
SCOTUS can send down rulings but that doesn’t mean they are followed or implemented. Sometimes if it looks bleak for a particular legal-niggle, congress or the responsible representative authority will re-write and write-around the questionable parts.
This is what John Yoo does. His best thinking is “how to do it anyway” and that requires a “redefinition” of “What Is Is”. He teaches it at Berkeley. He writes books about his knowledge and expertise.
Some do it better than others. M. Yoo is a Pro’s Pro at it.
None of this will help anyone picked up in drive-by-snatch in the short term. Maybe 10-20-50-100 years from now, SCOTUS might have something to say about it.
I’m not holding my breath… I’m wearing a mask.
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Defense
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Yoo
Yoo is the Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley.
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echo • July 21, 2020 2:35 AM
@JonKnowsNothing @name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons
I think it’s useful pointing out both what they are up to and propogating the intellectual tools to both spot them doing it and calling them out with confidence. Both of your comments when taken together illustrate a way.
MarkH • July 21, 2020 4:42 AM
@JonKnowsNothing, @echo, @name.withheld:
If I understand correctly, the Executive Order may not be very relevant to the legality or illegality of present actions. EOs are, by U.S. legal theory, subordinate to the Constitution and federal statute law. However, many statutes delegate certain domains of interpretation to the president.
But if something is flatly illegal, an Executive Order cannot make it legal.
A news report has identified the “green men” as agents of the Border Patrol, who have limited law enforcement authority within 100 miles of any U.S. border.
Reportedly, the pretext is that these officers are protecting federal buildings. Perhaps this obviously false justification is the product of Mr Yoo’s feverish intellect.
It’s not impossible that federal courts could intervene in this matter, though as JonKnowsNothing observed, the process is typically very slow. Sometimes when a situation is inherently urgent, the courts move with uncharacteristic speed.
State and local officials in Oregon have been faced with an unprecedented assault on the civil liberties of the populace, and I am sure are scrambling to identify possible responses.
I suppose that the most likely remedy is electoral: one of the two major political parties has already introduced legislation to restrict some aspects of this abuse of federal law enforcement resources; the other party has, as far as I’m aware, been silent.
Possibly, in about 6 months such practices will be unambiguously forbidden by law.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 21, 2020 4:42 AM
@ echo, et al
I think it’s useful pointing out both what they are up to and propogating the intellectual tools to both spot them doing it and calling them out with confidence. Both of your comments when taken together illustrate a way.
I see the dialog that @ JonKnowsNothing has engaged in is just that, dialog. Regrettably there is too little of this type of interchange that advances understanding and the ability to address issues beyond the banal. Too much of what is improperly characterized as debate or discourse consists of empty ad hominem attacks and reactionary “talking points”. We are fortunate to be able to participate in a manner that can be accessed, assessed, and critiqued.
My way of saying thank you, @ echo and @ JonKnowsNothing, the usuals suspects, and most importantly the host Bruce Schneier.
I for one am not above criticism or reproach, as a flawed being that does not inherently know the answers to anything will of course pay as much respect to those that will patiently take the time and diligence to make what is said worthwhile. I say some inane things, just ask my friends.
If only I could write like Bruce, he has the unique talent of taking a subject, with its complexity, writing in a voice that is clear and be both playful (kind of a reference to the open mind views topics) and frame it with the necessary scope. Many touch a topic at a surface level but fail to extend their analysis to flush out their cognitive bias and sublime agenda while identifying what has been overlooked, understated, or unappreciated.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 21, 2020 4:52 AM
Oops, wanted to directly thank @ MarkH too. I cannot say that there has been a need to limit the dialog or its rewards and my gratitude.
JonKnowsNothing • July 21, 2020 5:44 AM
@All
re: Operation Legend
It appears that the Federal Response in Portland, Oregon USA has a name:
The influx of officers may be part of an initiative by the U.S. Department of Justice called Operation Legend. In July, a press release described Operation Legend as “a sustained, systematic and coordinated law enforcement initiative across all federal law enforcement agencies working in conjunction with state and local law enforcement officials to fight the sudden surge of violent crime.”
There are 6 known or named target cities but the full list for deployment is unknown. Portland, Oregon was not on the known list.
While it may be an exercise in trivia, it might be interesting to speculate what sort of tech surveillance is in use or available.
This would have an area of surveillance, CCTV, mobile phone trackers (Stingray, DRTBX etc) and many cities have deployed surveillance enabled street lighting systems with wifi-connections enabling voice, audio, camera, sound trackers with RT Feedback to a command center.
Battle gear and equipment. Lots of bulky stuff in the pockets and of course large bundles of zip ties on display.
Timing and Coordination. Mass charges out of buildings and “round em up” drive arounds are not likely random nor randomly engaged by the agents.
Coordinated geolocation and ID of everyone within a good radius is certainly one of many displayable maps.
Direct pipeline to other Federal Agencies and the NSA. CIA is supposed to stay outside of box but they’ve been known to enjoy some action too. Internet Network traffic analysis, along with tracking specific persons (reporters and local officials) would be on the NSA detail.
Cyber-command may be gearing up to control the lighting and electronic infrastructure. Turn out the lights and shut down the water distribution maybe a tactic. Water distribution control was key in the Bosnia Wars.
ht tps://www.newsweek.com/what-operation-legend-trump-may-use-federal-forces-us-cities-1519219
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echo • July 21, 2020 5:55 AM
@myliit
I’m more inclined to want to hold members of the current government to account and their shady party funding and failure to investigate electoral or referendum corruption before the Russians. My impression of the report is half is accusatory without landing any real punches and the rest is kick it into the long grass misdirection and flannel. Now we’re promised an inquiry? Hah hah…
https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2020/jul/21/uk-coronavirus-live-covid-19-latest-news-updates
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 21, 2020 6:14 AM
@ JonKnowsNothing
I’m unclear here, the press release wherein:
“working in conjunction with state and local law enforcement officials to fight the sudden surge of violent crime.”
Apparently there is a discrepancy between the stated strategic mission and the tactics deployed. Where is the definition of protesters as terrorists included, and how do they arrest themselves, as these agents are the source of violence. Oh that’s right, I am just to infer that’s the case, my bad.
THIS IS BEING NORMALIZED–
Governors, call your state guard up as a protective shield. Have them face off, without weapons, uniformed and stationed at points intersecting federal buildings or places of authority in numbers four times that of the occupying forces. Don’t let them operate in “your” backyard. Where possible terminate their access to infrastructure. Call on other Governors to join, the battle to “dominate” your state is just that, has nothing to do with what ever they claim.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 21, 2020 6:21 AM
@ JonKnowsNothing…
Notice anything about the cities listed, all the states they are in have been the bearer of a tax burden under SALT. The people of these states are subsidizing their own demise with a tax structure brought to you by the GOP. I guess Mitch McConnell is interested in more than states going bankrupt…
myliit • July 21, 2020 7:13 AM
@echo
“.. My impression of the report is half is accusatory without landing any real punches and the rest is kick it into the long grass misdirection and flannel. … “
I am reluctant to comment on UK stuff, which I know little about. I did find these, however. [1]
On this side of the pond, our, imo, increasingly desperate President, covid-19 Numbers and the economy, is, apparently, full steam ahead, to the best of his ability, to either win the election or not concede it.
I thoroughly enjoyed watching the Chris Wallace interview with our President. [2] At times I thought our president resembled a round turd on his chair. Our president, of course, is a firehose of 20,000 false or misleading statements or lies. [3]
[1] https://twitter.com/carolecadwalla/status/1285482235664138241
https://twitter.com/jason_kint/status/1285521600402673667
https://twitter.com/LemonSlayerUS/status/1285514855156514816
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/21/world/europe/uk-russia-report.html
[2] https://www.foxnews.com/transcript/president-trump-defends-response-to-covid-crisis-in-exclusive-interview-with-chris-wallace transcript
Curious • July 21, 2020 8:42 AM
I don’t know how new this is, or if this below alreayd has been mentioned previously, but I thought it was interesting:
“Laser-Based Audio Injection on Voice-Controllable Systems”
https://twitter.com/sara_rampazzi/status/1278797332918800384
https://lightcommands.com/ (the pdf paper is dated 22. June 2020)
“In our paper we demonstrate this effect, successfully using light to inject malicious commands into several voice controlled devices such as smart speakers, tablets, and phones across large distances and through glass windows.”
myliit • July 21, 2020 9:12 AM
@SpaceLifeForm
“ If you saw the US Navy SeaBee taking the flack from the wannabe SS in Portland, here is more on that story. …”
@emptywheel wrote recently: “That Navy veteran ought to sue federal officers for breaking his hand under orders from someone acting illegally. …
https://twitter.com/JoyceWhiteVance/status/1285555579243491328
Joyce Alene
@JoyceWhiteVance
Acts authorized by someone in an office in violation of the Vacancies Act are void ab initio. That can be enforced by a lawsuit brought by a private party. For those of you who want to know more about the Vacancies Act, there’s a good monograph here. https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44997.pdf… “
myliit • July 21, 2020 9:41 AM
@SpaceLifeForm
“Lady Godiva spotted in Portland. Horse is missing. …”
iirc, all she was wearing was a hat and mask
re: https://twitter.com/killendave/status/1285282461279109120
To blend something said on Democracy Now this morning, a caption to the photo could read something like:
“Guantanamo Bay meets Stop and Frisk and Art”
vas pup • July 21, 2020 2:39 PM
US report accuses China of ‘digital authoritarianism’
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-53490042
“A US report accuses China of “digital authoritarianism” – using technology not only to track its own citizens but to exert power beyond its borders.
It warns that China’s mounting influence on the digital sphere could soon overshadow that of the US and other democracies.
And it expresses concern about its export of surveillance technology.
The US has put pressure on other countries to ban Huawei from their mobile networks.
And it is also considering a wider ban on other Chinese tech firms such as TikTok.
The report, commissioned by Democratic Senator Bob Menendez, warns that China could rewrite the rules of the internet unless the US and its allies push back.
“The United States is now on a precipice of losing the future of the cyber domain to China,” the report reads.
“If China continues to perfect the tools of digital authoritarianism and is able to effectively implement them both domestically and abroad, then China, not the United States and its allies, will shape the digital environment.”
The report recommends that the US government:
◾sets up a cyber military service academy
◾forms a coalition of countries to counteract China
◾creates a digital rights promotion fund to push back against China’s use of mass surveillance.”
My nickel regarding use of mass surveillance: per Snowden papers, China was not the first on that.
Mr. Peed Off • July 21, 2020 3:33 PM
“the laws be faithfully executed”
Our stable genius may be using a different meaning of the word “execute”.
I see I was not the only one to observe some similarities between Portland and Ukraine.
SpaceLifeForm • July 21, 2020 3:41 PM
Reality Winner tests positive for Covid-19
hXXps://mobile.twitter.com/winnerbrittany?lang=en
hXXps://www.augustachronicle.com/news/20200721/fort-gordon-nsa-leaker-reality-winnerrsquos-family-fights-for-her-health-and-compassionate-prison-release
Their mother, Billie Winner-Davis, said finding out her daughter is sick was incredibly rough, though not surprising. She explained that Winner has had multiple diagnoses of bronchitis, pneumonia, and other such ailments over the years. This is why Winner attempted to gain an early release in April, though it was denied.
Mr. Peed Off • July 21, 2020 3:46 PM
“Regulators in particular face three serious problems in the online domain that underscore the importance of enlisting the behavioural sciences. The first problem is that online platforms can leverage their proprietary knowledge of user behaviour to defang regulations. An example comes from most of the current consent forms under the European Union (EU) General Data Protection Regulation: instead of obtaining genuinely informed consent, the dialogue boxes influence people’s decision-making through self-serving forms of choice architecture (for example, consent is assumed from pre-ticked boxes or inactivity)41,42. This example highlights the need for industry-independent behavioural research to ensure transparency for the user and to avoid opportunistic responses by those who are regulated. The second problem is that the speed and adaptability of technology and its users exceed that of regulation directly targeting online content. If uninformed by behavioural science, any regulation that focuses only on the symptoms and not on the actual human–platform interaction could be quickly circumvented. The third problem is the risk of censorship inherent in regulations that target content; behavioural sciences can reduce that risk as well.”
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-020-0889-7
Perhaps we could find some ways to nudge and boost more secure behavior from internet users?
Weather • July 21, 2020 3:49 PM
@vas pup
I’ll trust nz anytime over China, if we do what they do, I’ll still trust nz based on quality, repeatedly, accurate (most of the time), and I like the people in nz, yes some are Chinese at like them to.
The Chinese people are worried about the yellow and blue conflict, a nice lady from hong Kong, relied she might have to become a refugees soon. They launch rockets not carrying what city is down wind.
Nz sis can spy on me anytime as long as no other country is.
SpaceLifeForm • July 21, 2020 4:44 PM
@ MasterCard: seriously, WTF are you thinking?
Do you not realize that Wirex and WireCard are in same bed?
MasterCard, you are making a huge mistake.
You are going to throw your brand name into the dumpster fire.
There is the reason why I declined to work for you multiple times over the years.
It’s all about the money to your “leaders”.
‘World’s Most Wanted Man’ Involved in Bizarre Attempt to Buy Hacking Tools
hXXps://www.vice.com/en_us/article/jgxvdx/jan-marsalek-wirecard-bizarre-attempt-to-buy-hacking-team-spyware
echo • July 21, 2020 8:56 PM
Well of course but there is also case law on secrecy and the them and us attitude which address the publics right to know in the public interest and hamuan rights. Yes the Russians will read stuff but so do the public. What is more important? Good governance or paranoid dwelling on worst case scenarious all the time? From my perspective negligence and laziness in smoke filled rooms is a bigger threat to UK democracy not to mention book smart dogmatists and walled off ideologues forcing through agendas without supporting law or consensus. In my view lobbyists and political party donors and shit lawyers do more damage to the UK than the Russians ever did.
No I’m not going to ignore or excuse what the Russians (or anyone else) are up to but Russsians are gonna Russian. Honestly, these twerps need to getout from behind their desks and expense account lifestyles and spend a month on their own in the Belize jungle. They might get some perspective.
As with all ISC reports, not everything is made public. The annexes, containing the written and oral evidence the committee’s conclusions are based on, are redacted to protect sources. As the committee explains, Russia “will analyse whatever we put in the public” domain, potentially undermining UK intelligence capability.
myliit • July 22, 2020 6:13 AM
re: Russian Influence Campaigns, two things:
1) I’m glad that the UK ISC report came out, even with redactions. … On this side of the pond, arguments about unredacting redactions regarding Flynn, Stone, Mueller Report, etc., are ongoing.
2) Perhaps Brexit and our President’s 2016 election victory are the biggest Russia wins ever. (period). Text modified from the New Yorker:
“… The 2016 election changed the calculus. In the U.S., investigators pieced together how Russian operatives had carried out a scheme to promote their preferred candidate and to stoke divisions within U.S. society. Senior Israeli officials, like their American counterparts, had been dubious about the effectiveness of influence campaigns. Russia’s operation in the U.S. convinced Tamir Pardo, the former Mossad director, and others in Israel that they, too, had misjudged the threat. “It was the biggest Russian win ever. Without shooting one bullet, American [ and UK ] society [ were ] torn apart,” Pardo said [ my edits ]. “This is a weapon. We should find a way to control it, because it’s a ticking bomb. Otherwise, democracy is in trouble. …”
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/02/18/private-mossad-for-hire
[1] https://docs.google.com/a/independent.gov.uk/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=aW5kZXBlbmRlbnQuZ292LnVrfGlzY3xneDo1Y2RhMGEyN2Y3NjM0OWFl Pdf, afaik, 55 pages
“Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament
Russia”
or
https://www.srf.ch/news/content/download/18779504/file/ISC_Russia_Report.pdf Pdf 55 pages, found with DuckDuckGo search
echo • July 22, 2020 7:30 AM
@mylit
Insofar as Brexit is concern it is my opinion the action was unconstitutional and unlawful on multiplecounts. I don’t think some lawyers and judges tried hard enough to stop it not to mention Comrade Corbyn who deserves a slap.
The whole thing was a national shooting of self in the foot primarily driven by the Tory party, a certain idious toad faced neo-Nazi and scam artist, and Tory appointess and stupid editors at the BBC. There is no current majority for Brexit yet here we are. Heading like crazed demons and drunks for the edge of the cliff. Exactly what the Russian influence was I can’t see it but the current bunch in Downign Street are up to their neck in lies and corruption and Russian money. American hard right dark money certainly had its part to play as well. Plus Murdoch and the evil Barclay brothers and Jonathan Harmsworth a.k.a. Viscount Rothermere. There’s a lot of other names in the mix going back years to the American Newt Gingrich and the Eurosceptic Bill Cash.
Bakin the day kooks would be moderated outor if it was usenetthe damage would be limited to their particular silo. Social media is another beast entirely. Whether the Russians or others have been able to successfully weaponise this I don’t know.
What a pickle…
myliit • July 22, 2020 10:27 AM
@echo
re: again UK politics is out of my lane.
Perhaps I was skeptically thinking about Aaron Banks (and probably others on your side of the pond, Nigel Farage?) in addition to, Bolton, Bannon, Mercers, Cambridge Analytica, Stone, Flynn, Manafort, Gates, FSB, GRU, etc., around 2016, and all, probably, with opsec knowledge and striving for plausible deniability. Two more things:
1) (humor): “Feds in Unmarked Van Looking for Suspicious Characters Pick Up Jared Kushner” [1]
2) It may be hot here at least until January 2021 or until when the new president is sworn in. For example, from Gessen:
“On Sunday, in an interview with Chris Wallace of Fox News, Donald Trump refused to commit to recognizing the outcome of the 2020 election. “I’m not going to just say yes,” the President said. “And I didn’t last time, either.” (Back in October, 2016, Trump was proclaiming that the election he went on to win was “rigged” against him.) He wasn’t telling us anything new, and yet we still have not learned to think of ourselves as a country where the President can lose an election and refuse to leave office.
Lawrence Douglas, a legal scholar and a professor at Amherst College, gave himself the task of methodically thinking through the unthinkable. The result is a slim book, “Will He Go? Trump and the Looming Election Meltdown in 2020.” Douglas begins by taking the President at his word. “While his defeat is far from certain,” he writes, “what is not uncertain is how Donald Trump would react to electoral defeat, especially a narrow one. He will reject the result.”
Douglas argues that Trump’s evident intent to hold on to his office, regardless of the will of the voters, is not the best measure of the damage he has wrought or the power he has accumulated. He writes, “A more powerful authoritarian would never let himself get into this situation in the first place; he would have already so corrupted the process that his chance of losing would have been effectively eliminated.” By the standards of entrenched autocracies, Trump’s grip on power is as weak as his grip on reality. Still, the system of government that he has hijacked is not designed to protect itself against his kind of attack. “Our Constitution does not secure the peaceful transition of power, but rather presupposes it,” Douglas writes. Worse, the peculiar institution of the Electoral College, which separates the outcome of the election from the popular vote, practically invites abuse. …”
“… In what the Department of Homeland Security is calling “an unfortunate incident,” federal agents in an unmarked van who were looking for suspicious characters snatched Jared Kushner off the street.
According to the agents, the van was patrolling the vicinity of the White House when they spotted a “shifty-eyed male” who “didn’t look right.”
“He checked all the boxes for suspicious,” one of the agents said. “He definitely didn’t look like someone who should be anywhere near the White House.”
Despite the protests of a screaming Kushner, the agents loaded him into the van
[…]
According to White House sources, Kushner was missing for several hours before anyone in the West Wing realized he was gone.
His disappearance was finally noticed late in the afternoon, when members of the White House coronavirus task force observed that their daily meeting had gone “more smoothly than usual.”
Speaking to reporters about the Kushner incident, the acting head of the Department of Homeland Security, Chad Wolf, said that the practice of picking up random people on the street and putting them in unmarked vans is a “terrific idea,” but acknowledged that it might need to be “tweaked.”
“Our agents need to be given much more explicit guidance about who qualifies as a suspicious character, or Stephen Miller could be next,” he said.”
vas pup • July 22, 2020 4:05 PM
Predicting your personality from your smartphone data
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/07/200717120152.htm
“Everyone who uses a smartphone unavoidably generates masses of digital data that are accessible to others, and these data provide clues to the user’s personality. Psychologists are now studying how revealing these clues are.”
This part caught my attention:
“”Nevertheless, we still know very little about how people actually behave in their everyday lives
===> apart from what they choose to tell us on our questionnaires,” says Markus Bühner. “Thanks to their broad distribution, their intensive use and their very high level of performance, smartphones are an ideal tool with which to probe the relationships between self-reported and real patterns of behavior.
Clemens Stachl is aware that his research might further stimulate the appetites of the dominant IT firms for data. In addition to regulating the use of passively collected data and strengthening rights to privacy,
===>we also need to take a comprehensive look at the field of artificial intelligence, he says. “The user, not the machine, must be the primary focus of research in this area. It would be a serious mistake to adopt machine-based methods of learning without serious consideration of their wider implications.” The potential of these applications — in both research and business — is tremendous. “The opportunities opened up by today’s data-driven society will undoubtedly improve the lives of large numbers of people,” Stachl says. “But we must ensure that all sections of the population share the benefits offered by digital technologies.”
Read the whole article for more details.
JonKnowsNothing • July 22, 2020 4:05 PM
@Clive @MarkH @All
re: The Death of the Bank of Mom and Dad
I’ve been researching the economic benefits of all the COVID-19 Dead that is expected to fall into the laps of the neoliberal economists, the Herd Immunity Policy, Swedish Ideals, No Masks 4 Me, and Get A Move On and DIE group as the pandemic rolls along.
I found some interesting articles that shed some light on what is actually a complex topic of Inheritance and Wealth.
Early on in the pandemic economic analysis was published:
1 USA Worker == $10Million USD.
100,000 deaths == $1Trill USD economic loss
100,000 deaths == 200Mill lost unrecoverable labor
As some economies push to Open Up or Else, the Bank of Mom and Dad which fueled a lot of the pre-COVID19 economy will no longer be around to fuel consumption of goods and services.
The average value of inheritance in the UK (July 2020):
The inherited wealth of the group 1980s represents about 14% of their overall lifetime earnings from work.
X*14% = £136,000 X=£1,000,000
So a UK worker is expected to make £1Mill lifetime earnings, much less than a USA worker makes and depending on exchange rates.
From this 3 items:
1. In Bank of Mom and Dad is worth £136K
2. £136K is what the neoliberal economists are expecting to free-fall into the laps of the 1990s.
3. Some portion of the £136K will be clawed back in the way of taxes (progressive, regressive, fixed, threshold and other methods.
For the dead with no-surviving family the inheritance falls directly to the government by escheatment. Rules of inheritance are complex and vary by country.
“It is natural parents want to hand a legacy to their kids, but at some point we need a grown-up conversation about wealth. As we build back from the economic shock of coronavirus, politicians should use the tax system to tackle inequality and support high quality public services.”
Robert Palmer, executive director of the campaign group Tax Justice UK
The amount of lost labor per worker dying is approximately 14ys(w) – 17yr(m)
(Australia May 31, 2020).
While things don’t always align, using the UK life time earning of £1Mill as a base and a generous 80yrs from a life table(2017) .
17/80yo = 21% £1Mill * 21% = £210k lost wealth.
So one conclusion that might be drawn is that the Lost Economic Value from COVID19 Impacts will be recovered from the residual value from the Bank of Mom and Dad. There is no recovery for the lost years of labor or investments (compounding interest annuities etc).
This does not cover all the economic losses of course. It does indicated the desperation for Reopening the Economies, forcing people to chose between homelessness, hunger, safety and to gamble on the outcome of a COVID-19 infection and the callous attitudes of those who do not think COVID-19 will touch their wealth or family.
“When they go to school – they’re not going to the hospitals. They’re not going to have to sit in doctor’s offices. They’re going to go home and they’re going to get over it … We gotta move forward.”
Governor Mike Parson of Missouri
It is worth noting that M Bezos earned $10Bill in 1 Day. His accumulated wealth is greater than the GDP of countries. The Empire of Bezos would rank 51st in the order of GDPs. (July 2020)
Other economic numbers are also surfacing in regard to the advantages of dying early and often, to the economy.
Expected School Related Deaths = 2-3% increased mortality
note: the base is unknown. Either (mortality of children) or (overall mortality due to death of children + family).
Continued Opening the Economy with increased deaths = 3%, 4-5%, 7% .
For each additional death, the Bank of Mom and Dad falls into the Economic Recovery Bucket but will not fall into the bank accounts of any survivors.
disclaimer: I am not a statistician. I am not a lawyer. I know nothing. ymmv.
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escheat
Escheat is a common law doctrine that transfers the real property of a person who has died without heirs to the Crown or state.
ht tps://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/jul/23/australian-coronavirus-victims-lost-more-of-their-expected-lifespan-than-those-dying-of-coronary-heart-disease-dementia-and-stroke
ht tps://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jul/21/americans-coronavirus-pandemic-workers-safety
ht tps://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2020/jul/22/one-in-10-born-in-80s-to-inherit-more-than-half-average-lifetime-earnings
ht tps://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/22/us-reopening-politicians-volunteering-peoples-lives-coronavirus
@Clive and Others
ht tps://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2020/03/friday_squid_bl_722.html#c6808282
ht tps://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2020/04/friday_squid_bl_725.html#c6809748
100,000 people and losing a trillion dollars of wealth
losing 100,000 people is losing a 200 million hours of production
value of a statistical life = $10 million USD
(url fractured to prevent autorun)
Clive Robinson • July 22, 2020 5:00 PM
@ echo, ALL,
You might find this interesting.
A star that started but failed to go “high order” as a supernova, has shot a white dwarf out at around 250km/S or 900,000km/h,
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-53415294
As the core is about 40% of the mass of our solar systems sun it is a very large thus very very high energy kinetic object.
You might be tempted to think it’s the largest bullet in the known Universe, you’ld be wrong. However at around 0.083% of C it’s going to take a very long time to get anywhere. For instance it’s said our nearest solar neighbor is Proxima Centauri at ~4.25 light years away. At 0.000833C that white dwarf would take about 5100years to travel the same distance…
echo • July 22, 2020 7:36 PM
@myliit
Yes, all the people you list are dirty. We have our equivalent over here for different reasons. Aaran Banks is one of the obvious but he’s a distraction from others. The whole thing is a mess of toxic connections like you indicate.
@JonKnowsNothing
You need to do a proper compartive analysis on numbers and also comparing capital to GDP is apples and pears.
UK people do earn less than US in headline terms but make it up in a lot of other ways. In the US a lot is wasted on a bloated “make work” healthcare insurance system and military and a lot of stuff which is “baked in” in the UK like most other European countries. The “low tax” idiots on the hard right of the Tory party don’t get this.
@Clive
My brain is taking a rest and I’ve been boycotting the BBC for some years now. But yes there are some interesting cosmological phenomena about. Light (or more accurately the speed of causality) is very slow. Now supernova like you mention can be quite funny. Neutron stars can be similarly funny. I think it is something to do with having different inner cores to the rest of the body. If the mass isn’t high enough you get a “failed” supernova or a “failed” black hole. Now this white dwarf announced itself very loadly and we can see it coming. Its zombie strange stars you should be worrying about. Theoretically they are colder than black holes and not easy to spot. None have been detected so far but it does mean there aren’t any out there. How short the movie would have been if Moonwatcher had discovered a strange star and not an obelisk.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 22, 2020 9:20 PM
Inspired by Randy Rainbow, lyrics for a Broadway musical
Curious how the familiar axiom “strong as the weakest link” applies to a number of security models and operational environments. With this in mind, it is disturbing that with a pandemic actively asserting pressures that require collective responses, we have a situation in the United States that resembles a ward in Bellevue mental hospital.
As forces are deployed to address an imagined threat; violence from the state is used to quash mothers standing in a line, meanwhile the actions to counter the most important medical epidemic in modern history resembles that of someone that’s a graduate from Ostrich University.
While the President of the United States may have graduated from the aforementioned institution, there seems to be a cadre of individuals that are recipients of degrees from the vaunted Sycophant Institute of Stupidity and Yearning (SISY). How is it possible for such a diverse group of incompetent liars to seemingly act in a coordinated manner to dissemble the institutions and structures of self governance and in turn destroy much of the progress achieved during the last century?
There is little in the way of a meaningful response to our shared cluster of cataclysms. We then export this steaming fecal mountain to the rest of the world. I don’t see how other countries haven’t already reached for the handle to flush the source of this duplicity down the “proverbial” toilet.
Lawrence • July 23, 2020 3:12 AM
Capture of rare giant squid near White Island, New Zealand.
“It’s got some pretty cool features. It’s got the largest light organs in the animal kingdoms. The arms have got cat-like claws, about 200 of them on the whole animal, and of course, it’s just very big and that’s always very exciting.”
hxxps://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/421867/capture-of-rare-giant-squid-near-whakaari-white-island
Weather • July 23, 2020 6:46 AM
@echo
About the links I don’t follow links on this site, there are a lot of smart people, some a hackers, I might have pissed some off, I use Bruce mod to filter the site, if you want to paste a short blub, otherwise hxxp and I’ll let Google filter it.
Anders • July 23, 2020 9:02 AM
—BREAKING NEWS—
news.err.ee/1116325/interior-ministry-looking-for-backdoor-into-encrypted-messaging-apps
Clive Robinson • July 23, 2020 9:44 AM
@ Anders,
More gross stupidity from those who should after more than two decades know better, but obviously do not.
I suspect that this bit of nonsense has surfaced because of the failing of EncroChat…
Have they not put two and two together and realised that the success of the EncroChat break was predicated by the fact that currently no laws realy exist to ban end to end encryption from the communications end points? And thst annonymous SIM cards are available?
If they remove those criminals will still communicate by phone but they will get SIMs in others names and use encryption not in the communications end point that can currently be attacked, but in entirely seperate ways that can not be attacked thus the authorities will not be able to “listen in” or “read along” and they will be forced not into using “secret from the user warrants” but “Obvious to the user warrants” which would immediately tip every one else off.
Now it’s known publically how to do “perfect forward secrecy” and likewise make a secret key generating system that can not be “wound back” all messages will be beyond the authorities for good.
Thus the whole idea is “stupid stupid stupid” only the proposers are to idiotic to realise it…
Oh and the non anonymous SIM idea is yet further proof that the Estonian National ID Card like all other National ID cards is a very very bad idea and can only realy usher in a Police State. Something I imagine many older Estonian Citizens would fear greatly and for good reason.
vas pup • July 23, 2020 2:00 PM
Attention @MarkH and other interested bloggers
UK and US say Russia fired a satellite weapon in space
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53518238
“he UK and US have accused Russia of launching a weapon-like projectile from a satellite in space.
In a statement, the head of the UK’s space directorate said: “We are concerned by the manner in which Russia tested one of its satellites by launching a projectile with the characteristics of a weapon.”
On this latest incident, Gen Jay Raymond, who heads US space command, said there was evidence “that Russia conducted a non-destructive test of a space-based anti-satellite weapon”.
He said Russia “injected a new object into orbit” from a satellite.”
Read the whole article for more details.
vas pup • July 23, 2020 2:42 PM
Those two links related to COVID fighting/spreading:
(1)Coronavirus clusters linked to asymptomatic, younger cases
https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-clusters-linked-to-asymptomatic-younger-cases/a-54293037
“But as mounting research suggests people who seem otherwise healthy may play a bigger role in spreading the virus than initially thought, experts are warning against complacency in the face of COVID-19.
Young adults and unexpected clusters
One reason for resurgences in coronavirus cases could be the number of people unaware that they are infected.
In China, one woman who didn’t show symptoms but was self-quarantining after returning from the United States, caused a cluster of 71 cases after using the lift in her building.” Read the whole article – very informative.
(2)Oxford coronavirus vaccine: Will it provide lasting immunity?
https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-vaccine-oxford/a-54268557
“The science behind Oxford’s vaccine
The Oxford vaccine uses so-called “Adenovirus-vector technology.”
Adenovirus causes a common cold in chimpanzees — but, don’t worry, we wouldn’t be infected with a chimp disease if we got the vaccine. The adenovirus is simply used a vector, a carrier or a vehicle, by which the vaccine is delivered into human cells.
The adenovirus has been genetically modified for the vaccine to prevent it from growing in human cells.
It’s also been modified to carry a bit of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes the disease, COVID-19. And that bit of SARS-CoV-2 has in turn been modified to remove all its infectious elements. Its job is to let the body think it’s under attack and, as a result, have the body trigger an immune response.
The SARS-CoV-2 virus has a protein on its surface called the S-spike. The scientists at Oxford have added genetic material, which “codes” for the S-spike, to their modified adenovirus.
As the vaccine enters the body, the immune system recognizes that S-spike as an invader, and uses it to generate antibodies, and — the hope is — immunity against future infections.
Why use a different virus as a carrier?
The main reason for using the adenovirus is speed. It takes a long time to produce viruses, then weaken or kill them for use in vaccines, or modify them as carriers or vectors.”
Very good short videos on subject inside. Enjoy!
Clive Robinson • July 23, 2020 4:24 PM
@ vas pup
RE : US&UK say Russia are testing a space weapon
The first issue is we have no clue as to what the alleged object was designed to do.
One of the most major space problems we have is “orbital junk” every one knows it’s there and that all current rules are going to be inefective at solving the problem, they just kick it into the long grass.
You have to remember is all devices designed to “clean up space to make it safe” can be viewed as weapons or weapons in development. The thing that needs to be avoided is a Kessler Cascade, thus you have to judge on actual results.
It could, also be a bit of Russian “Grand Standing” heck they did that a lot during the first cold war so why should it be any different in this current cold war…
Again it could also be “fraud” as well. That is Russian seniors milking billions in supposed technology development whilst pocketing most of it and fielding failures to keep investigators off of their backs (after all who want’s to be the first forensic accountant in space on a one way ticket 😉
But such fraud is in no way unique to the old CCCP, back in the 1980’s Maggie Thatcher was embarrassed to find out that a Billion pound UK spy satellite was infact a scam, as for the US they’ve had so many “6000USD Hammer” scandles that they have serious legislation rewarding whistle blowers with big chunks of fines/paybacks… So fraud is a definate possibility,
But as you probably remember not so long ago we had what was thought to be a Russian Pluto nuclear hypersonic engine go “high order” so lots of suspicion very little evidence….
As Winston Churchill once noted in a radio broadcast in October 1939,
And as a French reporter noted nearly a century before that,
<
ul>“plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose”
<
ul>
(translates as “the more things change, the more they continue to be the same thing”)
What we need to judge is real evidence, and to make a perhaps more relevent quote,
Clive Robinson • July 23, 2020 5:47 PM
@ SpaceLifeForm, vas pup, ALL,
With regards COVID-19, I’ve not been saying much on it recently because doing the research was getting more and more time consuming (there are now more papers being published a day than most people have time in a day to read them).
But something that will be of interest is G614D mutation research.
Another is that due to UK stockmarket legislation a UK company that makes “Interferon Beta”[1] for MS sufferers has run a very small trial in Southampton on an inhaled version for COVID sufferers, the results from the stockmarket filing look very promising, especially as it improves the immune system. Hopefully the peer reviewed paper will encorage further urgent trials as it promises to be effective not just against SARS-CoV-2 but all respiratory viral infections which will be vital come “flu season”.
But back to G614D research. As some know there are two main mutations of SARS-CoV-2 the original D version from China that is now close to being extinct and thr European G version running rampent or like wildfire in much of the rest of the world outside Asia[2].
Dr J.Campbell PhD and frontline A&E,worker in the UK NHS, somehow finds time not just to do his NHS job but also do not just the time intensive research but actually make understandable videos about it. He’s just put up one on G614D research (with links to the papers),
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=u2TB91sDEHI
(He’s also got a couple up on the Interferon Beta required stockmarket notification).
[1] Interferon is a natural protien and is one of the inter cell communications (cytokines) messengers. As I’ve mentioned in the past a cell that is infected with a virus releases Interferon so that the cells around it effectively get “turned off” from protien making, thus in effect making a barrier or firewall around the infected cell thus significantly reducing the in vivo disease spread. Recent research shows that SARS-CoV-2 somehow stops a cell making Interferon thus it significantly impares the bodies immune system alowing rapid in vivo spread and the high mortality rate in those with already impared immune systems. By replacing the Interferon at the site of the infection (base of the lungs) would have significant effects on ALL viruses in that area not just SARS-CoV-2 but all the flu, cold, pneumonia etc that cause early mortality in people who are also significantly “economically productive” in “winter time” / “flu season”. Importantly it reduces average in hospital time by around 2/3rds which is vitally important as it ups ICU capacity by 50%. The current injection form of the drug for Multiple Sclerosis (MS) sufferers is around 22GBP so it’s to be hoped that the inhaled version would be around 30USD a dose or 150-200USD for a course of treatment which would work one heck of a sight better than Remdesivir at 512USD per dose or 3000-6000USD per course. Also being given by nebulizer it does not require either specialist or hospital care to be administered so could be done in early infection stages well away from other vulnerable patients who would be subject to cross infection.
[2] More proof if it is required that the way SARS-CoV-2 has been handled and is being continued to be handled in Asia and parts of the antipodies is the right way to go. As I indicated some time ago SARS-CoV-2 could have been made extinct if a propper 35day quarantine lockdown had been followed, which is why as far as we can tell the few cases in Asia are now all “brought in” European strain. Where as the moronic “do nothing”, “Swedish Method”, “Herd Immunity Policy” or what ever you want to call it in the UK and US is very very definitely the wrong way to do it, with the European strain leading the “Jetset and Party animal” lifestyle.
JonKnowsNothing • July 23, 2020 9:35 PM
@Clive @MarkH @All
re:
Death of the Bank of Mom and Dad
Returning Children to Schools will increase mortality rates.
Expected School Related Deaths = 2-3% in increased mortality.
As noted previously, the base in unknown. Either (mortality of children) or (mortality of children+family)
A new study indicates that UK children could ‘lose 3% of lifetime earnings’ due to lockdown school closures.
This is calculated as
The value of the 3% reduction of £40,000 over 45 years out of potential income of £1,350,000 = New Reduced income is £1,310,000.
No one likes a pay decrease but getting a £75 or more per month pay increase in time isn’t out of expectation.
What is hidden under the demand to Open the Schools Now! is the value of the lost taxes on £40,000 and of course the profits when the mortality rate hits and the neoliberals pocket not just the £40,000 decline in earnings but the entire full amount of £1,350,000 for each death.
UK Deaths = @45,500 +3% extra deaths = 1365 Value of Death Earnings 1365 * £1,350,000 = £1,842,750,000 Value of Bank of Mom and Dad = £136,000 No Inheritance Value 1365 * £136,000 = £185,640,000 Total In Hand Cash Savings = £2,028,390,000
disclaimer: I am not a statistician. I am not a lawyer. I know nothing. ymmv.
ht tps://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/jul/24/uk-children-could-lose-3-of-lifetime-earnings-due-to-lockdown-school-closures
(url fractured to prevent autorun)
1&1~=Umm • July 23, 2020 10:17 PM
@JonKnowsNothing:
Your figures assume equal per annum earnings across a working life. In reality you start of earning little and earn the most in the last years of your working life also inflation increases wages with time. In some cases 50% of actual lifetime earnings happens in the last decade of a working life.
With COVID killing those over fourty increasingly with age, the neo-liberal bonus will be much larger than your figures tend to indicate.
echo • July 23, 2020 10:46 PM
@1&1~=Umm @JonKnowsNothing
It’s funny how the “Gordon Brown is stealing our pensions” mob have gone quiet. Whatever the rights and wrongs of either him or Labour it seems Tories love to attack anyone on their “left” (or simply not in their tribe) yet the millisecond “their party” obtains power all the arguments evaporate and they turn into unobservant follow the leader cowards with Stockholm syndrome.
JonKnowsNothing • July 24, 2020 10:09 AM
@1&1~=Umm
re:
Your figures assume equal per annum earnings across a working life.
The figures are as presented by reports and represent actuarial values or present value averages. These are the sorts of values that are used to define your life and value to the economy.
In reality some people make zero or very little, while others make a lot or ginormous amounts and the skew between them makes a difference to how such numbers get presented.
Actuaries have been doing such calculations for a long time and in many frameworks their values are accepted as baselines. Life Tables, injury payouts, social service uses/costs and retirement funding are just some of the areas where these sorts of valuations are used.
The side calculations are my best-guess at extracting meaning from the presented numbers and do not represent your personal income or future. As I don’t have a supercomputer nor ginormous economic modeling system nor a tribe of actuaries, I can only present simple views based on published information.
The important item is to understand why your death, the death of your family and the death of your children, is needed to fuel the economy.
Older people were “catastrophically let down” and many died before their time… [the] policy of discharging the elderly from hospital into care settings without a Covid-19 test as a “terrible mistake” .
Many hospitals did discharge known COVID-19 positive patients into “protected” environments. It was not a mistake. It was a decision. It was intended. People died.
There is an economic value to these deaths. A benefit to governments and neoliberal economists consider very carefully in their computations. Other economists also make the same calculations and come up with different answers.
Neoliberal economists = Herd Immunity Policy / Kill You Fast
Other economists = Lock down / Kill COVID-19 Virus Fast.
If you are in the selected to die group, it’s at least interesting to learn how they expect to profit from your death.
ymmv
ht tps://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/24/lack-of-coronavirus-testing-and-ppe-among-uks-key-mistakes-mps-told
(url fractured to prevent autorun)
myliit • July 24, 2020 12:16 PM
@jones
“I don’t get it.
What does this have to do with squid?”
Perhaps you were looking for the current squid page. The squid page involves security topics that may not belong in other Schneier threads. Posts that don’t run afoul of blog posting guidelines sometimes aren’t deleted. [1]
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2020/07/friday_squid_bl_737.html .
If you check back later today, usually by 7 pm et each Friday, a new weekly squid should be available at:
For example, I plan to try to post about Noam Chomsky’s interview on Democracy Now there tonight. Here’s a link, if you are curious.
https://www.democracynow.org/2020/7/24/noam_chomsky_on_trump_s_troop
“ Noam Chomsky on Trump’s Troop Surge to Democratic Cities & Whether He’ll Leave Office if He Loses”
[1] Commenting policy for this blog:
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2017/03/commenting_poli.html
myliit • July 24, 2020 12:18 PM
Oops, meant to post the above elsewhere
SpaceLifeForm • July 26, 2020 12:17 AM
Not waiting for NIST.
State-of-the-art crypto goes post-quantum
The TinySSH server aims to eliminate post-quantum cryptography weaknesses.
hXXps://opensource.com/article/20/7/tinyssh
…
Into this controversy, TinySSH, a minimal SSH server with an embedded focus, has implemented a hybrid key exchange involving NTRU Prime (a round 2 finalist in the NIST competition) combined with conventional ed25519 elliptic curve keys.
…
The TinySSH server adheres closely to cryptographic technology associated with Daniel J. Bernstein, relying on chacha20-poly1305 for the bulk of the SSH session traffic; no other cipher is allowed. It likewise does not allow password logins but requires user ed25519 keys to be in place for a successful connection. These constraints may seem rigid, but they are also best practices.
Weather • July 26, 2020 1:47 PM
@spacelifeform
Re tinyssh having a keyfile is good but you still need a password, the keyfile is stored on the computer, but the password is stored in the person, mixing both is good.
Weather • July 26, 2020 1:55 PM
@spacelifeform
I all so don’t trust forks of ssh, I download a ssh fork and if you entered root0x31111111àaaaaaaaaaaa you could exploit it, so be werry.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • July 29, 2020 8:07 AM
@ Moderator, — TWO SQUIDS OUT —
Jed, Move Away From There — 29 Jul 2020
…so he moved to Beverly, Hills that is; Swimmin Pools, Movie Stars…
I don’t know if you are aware, many of the IC-based contractors and suppliers headquarter out of the state of Georgia, or did. Recently, many of the companies that had chartered in George have moved to new locations outside of Georgia. There may be a relationship between the former chair of the IC in the Senate and the change of location for these companies to new cribs. If one were to write a book, an appropriate title might be:
Greed, Intelligence, Money, and Law have a common subtext;
Location, Location, Location.
Don’t take STOCK…
What I read from various sources is (WSJ, WPO, NYT, and others) an alignment between a number of companies and who is the chair of specific committees, but especially the intelligence committees, create zones of opportunity. One senator that chaired the IC committee also chaired a company providing online electronic stock trading. Retiring in 2016, the senator surely found retirement challenging given what social security provides to retirees…but I’m sure I am wrong.
I don’t remember any reporting about the DoJ dropping the investigations into three U.S. Senators. It was clear that that any holder of the particular stocks would be hurt or helped (indicated by certain sell or buy orders) from what was disclosed in briefings and private meetings held in late February of 2020 where the subject of the SARS-nCoV-2
virus outbreak in Wuhan was the topic. The sale of transportation, travel, and resort stocks (including cruise lines) and the purchase of remote video, meeting, and on-line conference services cannot be coincidence…can it? But it gets even better.
Why Would we Do That
The U.S. Senate does not seem to be engaged in any ethics review of its own at this point after dropping “an” investigation. Clearly the senator from Georgia is off the hook and don’t know if they ever took up a formal review process, cannot seem to find one. Just reports of a large donation to a certain campaign of one million dollars by a disinterested party. Have yet to determine if any of the other senators are under the scrutiny of the Ethics committee, will follow-up.
A millionaire, move away from there…
What makes this scandal so infuriating is the provision wherein congress is exempt from provisions in the STOCK Act if said trades or transactions are performed online/electronically. There is a notion that somehow these trades were not “politically motivated”. Does it matter what their motivation is, and how intellectual dishonest is the claim to their exoneration? How hard would this be to prove, and how is that related to “for financial reasons”? They weren’t prosecuted or found to be in violation of the law per se, it was on a simple technicality. Does this make any sense:
A senator or congressperson execute trades in stocks by calling a broker and telling them to sell or buy x, y, and/or z–guilty. But, if that same senator or congressperson goes on-line using their Ameritrade or E-trade account and execute the same buy and sell order–not guilty.
The Big Short, I mean Take Away
Constituents being gaslighted with ads claiming that their senator’s exoneration in the matter (“off on a technicality” seems a bit weak to be characterize as anything else) clears them of any wrong doing. No, it only clears them of the appearance of wrong doing…the smell of it still lingers.
Chalk up another one for institutional self regulation and policing. With all the institutional layering, commercial interests, legal sidestepping, corruption, and plain old amorality, is there any doubt as to the nature of U.S. political and administrative malfeasance–or is this just a moment to once again facepalm with the obligatory Homer Simpon:
"Doh! Where's Fauci?"
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David Fitzsimmons • July 17, 2020 5:54 PM
I just saw the SigRed coverage. Windows DNS, for the last seventeen years, has been vulnerable -but it has never been used ‘in the wild’. It’s regrettable that not CheckPoint nor Microsoft would share details. Good old ‘security-by-obscurity’.