The Chinese have been illegally squid fishing near the Galapagos Islands.
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.
vas pup • October 16, 2020 4:40 PM
How would I know if I had (dangerous) Neanderthal genes?
===>Having Neanderthal DNA in your body means you face a higher risk of a severe COVID-19 infection. But how much higher? And how can I figure out if I’m part Neanderthal?
Six minutes audio:
https://www.dw.com/en/how-would-i-know-if-i-had-dangerous-neanderthal-genes/av-55289225
There are other interesting facts related to neanderthal-genes in particular – SECURITY ANGLE – tolerance to pain. CIA should take a note I guess.
vas pup • October 16, 2020 4:50 PM
Assessing state of the art in AI for brain disease treatment
A review of artificial intelligence for understanding brain disease reveals the most advanced algorithms available to clinicians:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/10/201014141102.htm
Read for details!
Sherman Jay • October 16, 2020 4:52 PM
@vas pup,
Just a thought:
I get no compensation of any type from them. And, you should check other hosting firms; many might have similar offers. But, my organization has used this company In Idaho for ~15 years. They are quite responsible have local Idaho help services and you can setup an account with them with 2 mailboxes that are completely under your control for $49.00USD per year. You can use that same acccount to host a website if you have a domain, but you don’t have to.
h t tp://qwk.net/cheap_website_hosting/
AND on another topic
More degredation of security on the internet:
Ajit Paihole (aclaimed in the article as the most hated man on the internet!) proclaims himself Internet Emperor to destroy 1st Amendment Rights, WTF?
h t tps://www.mintpressnews.com/ajit-pai-just-vowed-modify-section-230-communications-act/272062/
vas pup • October 16, 2020 4:56 PM
Automatic decision-making prevents us harming others
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/10/201015101811.htm
“The processes our brains use to avoid harming other people are automatic and reflexive — and quite different from those used when avoiding harm to ourselves, according to new research.
!!!Researchers found a striking difference between the two decision-making processes. They found that individuals made automatic, efficient choices when learning to avoid harming others.
=> However, when learning to avoid harming themselves, choices were more deliberative. People were willing to repeat choices that had previously led to harm if they thought it would produce better results in the future.
The team was also able to identify specific areas of the brain that are involved in these different decision-making processes.
=>They found the thalamus — a small, structure located just above the brain stem that has a role in pain processing — was more active when people were successfully avoiding harm to others. In contrast connections elsewhere in the brain, that are important for learning, became stronger when people choose to repeat an action that harmed someone else. The same connections were not present when people repeated an action that harmed themselves, suggesting different brain systems.”
Read the whole article for more details – clear security angle – harming.
Sherman Jay • October 16, 2020 5:00 PM
@vas pup,
From reviewing past research I’ve gathered, most people’s DNA contains 3%-8% genetic material common to what is known of Neanderthal DNA. Even so, that is such a small amount that what it means for influencing any specific characteristic we may have is not firmly established and may have both pluses and minuses. I’m not going to lose any sleep over it since I can’t really change it. As the mobsters on TV say, ‘fah-get-about-it!’
SpaceLifeForm • October 16, 2020 5:01 PM
@ Bruce, Clive, name....
LOL. 409 now 429?
While trying to post I got 429.
I backed up, resubmitted.
I think it made it.
Post is (as far as know) is:
hXXps://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2020/10/covid-19-and-acedia.html/#comment-356901
“`
vas pup • October 16, 2020 5:05 PM
IMPORTANT FOR SECURITY OF ELECTION
Remember that fake news you read? It may help you remember even more
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/10/201016132013.htm
“People who receive reminders of past misinformation may form new factual memories with greater fidelity, according to an article published in the journal Psychological Science.
“Reminding people of previous encounters with fake news can improve memory and beliefs for facts that correct misinformation,” said Christopher Wahlheim, a lead author on the paper and assistant professor of psychology at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro.
===>”This suggests that pointing out conflicting information could improve the comprehension of truth in some situations.”
Wahlheim and colleagues conducted two experiments examining whether reminders of misinformation could improve memory for and beliefs in corrections. Study participants were shown corrections of news and information they may have encountered in the past. Reminders of past misinformation appeared before some corrections but not others. Study results showed that misinformation reminders increased the participants’ recall of facts and belief accuracy. The researchers interpreted the results to indicate that misinformation reminders raise awareness of discrepancies and promote memory updating. These results may be pertinent to individuals who confront misinformation frequently.
====>”It suggests that there may be benefits to learning how someone was being misleading. This knowledge may inform
!!!strategies that people use to counteract high exposure to misinformation spread for political gain,” Wahlheim said.”
SpaceLifeForm • October 16, 2020 5:51 PM
@ Clive, name...., ALL
In case you did not see this on your news feed today:
Current prices for Corn and Soybeans:
Corn about $4 per bushel.
Soybeans about $10.50 per bushel.
Apparently, there is an incumbent US Senator in Iowa that is not aware of market prices.
I guess she doesn’t get outside much and see what is grown on the farms there.
Maybe she has been distracted because she was looking for Devin Nunes cow.
Wear a mask. Vote. Preferably in person. On paper.
“`
SpaceLifeForm • October 16, 2020 6:14 PM
@ Bruce, Moderator, Clive
Serious question:
Would you like Clive and me to do some moderation here?
We can spot the BS from miles away.
We are timezones apart. We are usually never online at the same time. (because neither of us have a regular sleep schedule)
I think Clive has said he would. I'm willing also.
We are both retired, and usually have no daily obligations.
You have a lot on your plate coming up.
We can weed out the spam.
Give it a thought.
I'll throw in some free debugging.
SpaceLifeForm • October 16, 2020 6:46 PM
@ vas pup, Clive, name.*.*.*.*
"People who receive reminders of past misinformation may form new factual memories with greater fidelity,"
That is what Fox News is about. Fast Talkers.
The 'reminder' arrives before the viewer/listener can assimilate the input that was projected seconds before.
After enough conditioning, they no longer have a fully functioning frontal cerebral cortext.
As my father said 50 years ago:
Give me peace of mind. Let me think.
SpaceLifeForm • October 16, 2020 7:25 PM
@ vas pup, Clive, name.*.*.*.*
Here is an example of a frontal cortext fail.
It could have other points. Like mentioning Russia, Iran, North Korea.
I guess the Cliffnotes book was really cheap.
Not mentioning source. You can find.
---
TWITTER is against us.
THE MEDIA is against us.
BIG TECH is against us.
THE SWAMP is against us.
THE DEEP STATE is against us.
THE HOLLYWOOD ELITE is against us.
CHINA is against us.
SpaceLifeForm • October 16, 2020 7:50 PM
@ Clive, name.*.*.*.*, ALL
It's funny.
Writing style.
Elsewhere, not here.
It's all good.
On our side.
But hidden.
Clive Robinson • October 17, 2020 12:17 AM
@ vas pup,
Remember that fake news you read?
My trouble is trying to find “the not fake news”, it’s getting harder and harder, so much so that I’ve stopped watching and listening to the “news” via the usuall MSM outlets.
The simple fact is even when it’s not fake news it still sounds like it…
For instance, it has been said that the UK Government has decided to approach for the position as the new head of UK broadcast control agency OfCom ex-editor of the Daily Mail. Who had to resign his Editor’s job because he accused three judges on the front page of the Daily Mail of all sorts of things simply because they applied the law against the BoJo attempts to circumvent parliment.
To use the catch phrase of a BBC SitCom “Un-Believable”
@ SLF,
With regards two out of three vowels down on the farm and friends. I’m keeping out of that field for now after all the Owl “Territ Two Wo-rdy” is doing a Farmer Piles act of “Geet hoff me l’hand” from the hedgerow, because he’s not sitting pretty.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 17, 2020 1:43 AM
The “Rights of Man”, Thomas Paine
In arguing the nature of the French Revolution versus the failed and vailed support for monarchs by Edmund Burke:
Because the idea of hereditary legislators is inconsistent as that of hereditary judges, or hereditary juries; and absurd as an hereditary mathematician or hereditary wise man; and as ridiculous as an hereditary poet laureate.
I offer that “hereditary” could be replaced as “sectarian”.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 17, 2020 1:51 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm
Read you loud and clear–and to answer all the queries respecting available information, reports, and political machinations–yes, have read, analyzed, and viewed the various sources you’ve offered up. Keep it up, between the group of contributors the truth can be coalesced with a depth and breadth that is capable of answering the depraved and improvised thinking that surrounds us all.
If you had a chance to see U.S. Senator Whitehouse presentation during the Coney Barrett confirmation hearing, he spoke to the job that is typical of role of senators. Two hundred fifty million to shape the Supreme Court. But that is only a portion of the story.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 17, 2020 2:00 AM
@ Clive
Yes, I remain skeptical about the level intercourse, discourse, and verbal interface around simple and deterministic elements–my patience is vast but not infinite. Did you witness the shedding of a contribution to an expose of ten days less a fortnight brought to mind with wit and vinegar as would be of a view by yours told?
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 17, 2020 2:09 AM
@ Sherman Jay
Quite funny, may I add to your humorous tirade…
Ajit Pihole (3.1415926535 times the diameter of an idiot)
My apologizes if it is sounding like I speak in dungs.
Winter • October 17, 2020 3:02 AM
@vas pup
“I try to create e-mail account on mail.ru”
Try yandex.com if you want a Russian email. Also works with Tor.
My bet for privacy would be protonmail.com. They are located in Switzerland and try to store nothing (e2e encryption) IIRC
@SpaceLifeForm
Would you like Clive and me to do some moderation here?
IMHO, anyone who takes part in controversial debates here should NOT have moderation rights.
It would also help if you could
It’s funny.
Writing style.
Elsewhere, not here.
It’s all good.
On our side.
But hidden.
Winter • October 17, 2020 5:25 AM
@Clive
“it’s getting harder and harder, so much so that I’ve stopped watching and listening to the “news” via the usuall MSM outlets.”
I find that broadening your search helps. Use the Journalistic First Law:
News is only News when you have two (or more) independent sources.
So, I sometimes watch Al jazeera for confirmation. In my experience, they tend to stay close to the facts (at least if it is not Arabic/Iranian news). The Economist have its strong points, as has French Le Monde or Le Point. Nature and Science too have their area of expertise.
My Second rule:
Select trustworthy sources. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. So remember who was right and who was wrong.
20201017 • October 17, 2020 5:29 AM
@Winter:
Protonmail.com is either a CIA asset or directly or indirectly compromised because of the financial relationships and entanglements they have with different state controlled actors.
For privacy and anonymity purposes it would be unwise to “trust” a provider, which in order for one to be able to create and use an email account, requires either a mobile phone number or a donation, therefore in essence either requiring payment data or a cellphone number. These requirements are neither necessary nor beneficial; they only serve the vested interests of the entities in charge.
See here:
https://privacy-watchdog.io/truth-about-protonmail/
However, there still are a few Email providers who don’t require donations or a mobile phone number while nonetheless allowing access through the TOR network, but they aren’t that plentiful and it is all but guaranteed that they will also adhere to their current policies in the future.
One of them is based in Iceland and is called CTemplar:
https://ctemplar.com
Some sort of Comparison between Tutanota, Protonmail and CTemplar can be found here:
https://peakd.com/hive-120808/@anonymouser/protonmail-vs-tutanota-vs-ctemplar-which-is-the-best
20201017 • October 17, 2020 5:30 AM
Where has my previously posted comment from just a few seconds ago gone?
Anders • October 17, 2020 6:28 AM
@ALL
Just in case i post this here too.
Amazing, how easy is to take over this kind of company.
https://www.dfs.ny.gov/Twitter_Report
https://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/national/twitter-hackers-got-access-to-accounts-by-posing-as-it-desk-employees-report-says
Winter • October 17, 2020 6:29 AM
“Protonmail.com is either a CIA asset or directly or indirectly compromised because of the financial relationships and entanglements they have with different state controlled actors.”
Thanks for warning us.
I’ll have a look at ctemplar.
Henry • October 17, 2020 6:34 AM
@20201017: “Protonmail.com is either a CIA asset or directly or indirectly compromised because of the financial relationships and entanglements they have with different state controlled actors.”
Many, many thanks for finally agreeing with me!
SpaceLifeForm & Clive for mods: Why not? They both got the right mindset… (our two wee kungflu bully marshalls from Serco).
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 17, 2020 7:02 AM
15 Oct 2020 — The Trial of Julian Assange
An impassioned Roger Waters in a roundtable discussion expressed concerns about information related to the case before the Old Bailey and why the Nils Melzer report remained relatively unknown. Some comments made by Rogers in an unrestrained and frustrated tirade…
Roger Waters; “Why has no one seen it–why are they f’n around”…
“It obvious why they haven’t let it out.”…
“They don’t give a f*#. They have no interest in the law or protocol or democracy or liberty or human rights or any of the things that they pretend to hold dear. They have no any interest in any of all Magna Carta that it took an American on our panel to bring up.”
EDITORIAL COMMENT:
What has come of this trial in my mind:
Witness not just a threat to free speech, but the loss of free thought. Dissent is not exclusively opinionated, in science and research along with socio-political theory, it is required for proper inquiry. This type of social enforcement by governments, that mandates conformity of thought, means the end of progress–resulting in a bias towards regress.
There is a pernicious tendency to over simplify issues and attempt to reduce them as some snarky meme that encapsulates a narrative that does little to inform. It’s as if lobbing a hand grenade into a conversation is a rational and legitimate argument. It is not…thus the cognitive dissonance ensues. And if you’re called on your grenade throwing, the belief that having retained the pin, the act of tossing the grenade is legitimate. “Well, I held on to the pin so what”s the problem?”
JonKnowsNothing • October 17, 2020 9:32 AM
@Winter @All
re: compromised sites controlled by the Not-Owner
If you are considering some sites for serious business that requires some level of assurance about privacy and secured data, be mindful that in the USA, LEAs can and do “take over” sites and run them as if they are The Owners. This is done on the backend and is a MITM type operation except they become the destination rather than just intercepting packets and data streams.
In addition, iirc(badly) any email stored on a server, internet, more than 18 months old does not require a warrant to access or harvest. Rest assured, it’s all harvested but LEAs do not require warrants for older communications.
This maybe one way that they use their archived data in legal proceedings producing extensive email/chat/text exchanges. Of course, they hack and edit these exchanges to make them appear more “OHHH!” than they probably were at the time they were written.
Additionally, depending on what sort of items you are sending and storing, theses will be harvested too. Both LEAs and Corps harvest images and watermark them as well as using them to build various AI Image Training Sets. Once watermarked they can and do track their further destinations.
Clive Robinson • October 17, 2020 9:45 AM
@ FA,
IMHO, anyone who takes part in controversial debates here should NOT have moderation rights.
There are moderation rights and moderation rights…
Whilst this is @Bruce Schneier’s blog, and he has rules he has show he both listen’s and has discretion.
Thus what Bruce decides is upto him, but like all of us he can only make decisions based on information he has available to him.
Which means that you, me and all others in effect have a responsability in moderation of this site, just as we would at an event in someones home.
I note that more than one person highlights where they find things that conflict with the rules Bruce has posted and alerts the Moderator to them.
Thus they effectively share in the moderation without having any powers that need oversight.
Others have also previously posted topics on the Squid Page as and where they find them else where. I suspect that as some later become threads Bruce reads and considers them. Likewise the comments others make can be seen later in the direction Bruce takes.
All of these activities probably save Bruce time and lift some of the load for him and any Moderator he might have working for him.
As I’ve said in the past when asked why I don’t have my own blog, I can see just how much time and effort is involved not just with background tasks of blog hardware / OS / software administration, but finding daily topics and writing up about them, all of which come before moderation. I suspect few people could commit to what many would find to occupy a considerable amount of time each day thus impact continuously either work or social life or both.
So if people can find ways to help in the background I hope they continue to do so, but I also understand why they could not commit to doing it in any more than a part time activity.
Winter • October 17, 2020 10:18 AM
@Jon
“In addition, iirc(badly) any email stored on a server, internet, more than 18 months old does not require a warrant to access or harvest.”
That is definitely totally illegal in the EU. The law is pretty clear on that point.
JG4 • October 17, 2020 10:53 AM
In order of importance to security. I’ll let the heavy hitters do the math. I may have stopped short of saying that using machines for cognitive and sensory augmentation (real AI) is the most important activity on your planet. At least when the results are not misdirected by humans.
This tape will self-destruct in 5 seconds…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4y9NtHlJvbY
233,313 views•Mar 27, 2016
To Build Truly Intelligent Machines, Teach Them Cause and Effect
https://www.quantamagazine.org/to-build-truly-intelligent-machines-teach-them-cause-and-effect-20180515
Judea Pearl, a pioneering figure in artificial intelligence, argues that AI has been stuck in a decades-long rut. His prescription for progress? Teach machines to understand the question why.
Memristor Breakthrough: First Single Device To Act Like a Neuron
https://spectrum.ieee.org/nanoclast/semiconductors/devices/memristor-first-single-device-to-act-like-a-neuron
Analog computing with neuron-like devices could efficiently solve problems traditional computers struggle with
Room-Temperature Superconductivity Achieved for the First Time
https://www.quantamagazine.org/physicists-discover-first-room-temperature-superconductor-20201014/
Physicists have reached a long-sought goal. The catch is that their room-temperature superconductor requires crushing pressures to keep from falling apart.
JonKnowsNothing • October 17, 2020 11:22 AM
@Winter
re:
“In addition, iirc(badly) any email stored on a server, internet,
more than 18 months old does not require a warrant to access or harvest.”
That is definitely totally illegal in the EU. The law is pretty clear on that point.
I do not think the 5EY+World+Dog worry about that much. With jurisdiction hopping and rerouting, data streams can be harvested anywhere. Even if not used in a court case, they end up in Bluffdale for the perusal of anyone that puts in the proper search key phrase.
And no one in the EU has been so bothered about Gov Harvesters as to actually DO something, outside of a few attempts to rein in Corp Harvesters. They all feed at the same troughs.
There’s a big do downunder about how the Aussies bugged the Gov of East Timor.
ht tps://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/oct/16/secrecy-in-trial-of-witness-k-lawyer-bernard-collaery-an-offence-against-open-justice-law-council
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia%E2%80%93East_Timor_spying_scandal
The Australia–East Timor spying scandal began in 2004 when the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS) clandestinely planted covert listening devices in a room adjacent to the East Timor (Timor-Leste) Prime Minister’s Office at Dili, to obtain information in order to ensure Australia held the upper hand in negotiations with East Timor over the rich oil and gas fields in the Timor Gap.
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Collaery
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Collaery#Witness_K_Trial
summary: Collaery is a barrister and he and his client aka Witness K are charged with espionage for sharing secret government information to the press and courts over the East Timor affair.
(url fractured to prevent autorun)
Winter • October 17, 2020 11:42 AM
@jon
“I do not think the 5EY+World+Dog worry about that much.”
But it does matter. You claim every LEO can access 6m old email without a warrant. That might be true in the USA, it is not in the EU. As a result, such emails cannot be used as evidence in court. That known criminals like Putin or the CIA do not care much about the law was not in dispute
“And no one in the EU has been so bothered about Gov Harvesters as to actually DO something, outside of a few attempts to rein in Corp Harvesters. ”
It might not have been in the news in the USA, but all over the EU data retention laws have been overturned. The law about domestic intelligence services in the Netherlands had to be rewritten with strong oversight after a crushing defeat in the polls.
“There’s a big do downunder about how the Aussies bugged the Gov of East Timor.”
That Australia is not a good place for privacy protection, in line with the rest of the Anglo-Saxon world, is not news. And also not relevant to the legal situation in the EU.
RandomOnReddit • October 17, 2020 11:50 AM
Saw this on Reddit, have to share with Bruce…
There is nothing more terrifying/hilarious than going home with a guy for the first time, him showing you his aquarium setup (which is much more impressive than yours) and then suddenly he loses his shit because “DOC GOT OUT AGAIN!” and he’s asking you to help him “find Doc”…
And there’s a small octopus trying to get up a table leg.
Clive Robinson • October 17, 2020 12:21 PM
@ JonKnowsNothing, ALL,
Rest assured, it’s all harvested but LEAs…
It does not matter if it’s LEA’s doing it directly to storage or members of the various agencies that make up National IC, sniffing the backbones and routers. Sooner or later all communications thus non local storage contents will end up being copied one way or another. Which with the way things look like they are going[1] to pan out, will end up getting given to LEA’s or a chosen few[2] or both one way or another.
Whilst that is a given, there are ways to mitigate communications monitoring, likewise remote storage scraping.
Thus it realy does not matter what ISP or storage provider you use, they either can not stop such behaviours or as many suspect they are complicit in some way.
Thus implementing security for,
1, Data Communications.
2, Data Storage.
3, Data Processing.
Is essential for anyone who has a legal duty of confidentiality to others, a legal duty of confidentiality to themselves, or simply wish to have some level of privacy in their lives, to take working mitigation steps where they can.
The big issue is that most apparent mitigations people think will get them privacy or the required legal necescity of confidentiality actuall do not work, and many that still do very soon will not[1].
As I’ve said a number of times there are many applications that make great claims about their crypto protocols etc, but neglect to tell you they are compleatly and utterly vulnerable to end run attacks through the OS etc around to the User Interface or Storage where everything is in nice easy to see and read plaintext (remember EncroChat[3]).
I’ve explained the basic reason for this and how to properly mittigate communications in the past.
Mittigating remote storage where files always remain encrypted and the metadata is kept minimal and changed regularly is not that much harder, but requires secure processing and secure plaintext storage which is as they say “the rub”.
Getting secure local storage and processing where plaintext is required is a great deal more difficult, but again I have mentioned various ways of how to do it.
I’m not going to go into it again but advise that technology is always changing and it can be impossible to keep up with if you follow “The Microsoft Way” etc. Even when you think you can keep up with technology at the moment it is in reality a “Red Queen’s Race” that you can never win so playing that game is pointless and a waste of your resources. Sometimes called “The hamster wheel of pain administration”.
Thus at first it appears you have lost before you start… However that is only true if you play their game, their way. Becauses they have like gambling houses fixed the “house rules” so you end up loosing either money, sanity or both if you play. The way to win is to set your own rules to your own game and thus they have to play to your “house rules”. They will try every trick they can as a matter of course of “collect it all” over remote connections. So again unless you put certain major barriers such as “energy gaps” in the way they will eventually worm their way in. And trust me they will have AI or similar in the OS actively seeking to not just “ET Phone Home” to the mothership but to download what they want without your permission (as they did with supposadly free Win10 that has cost people a fortune directly and indirectly).
The object lessen in this was told to us by a US President in times past,
“The price of Freedom is eternal vigilance”
Something the readers here realy should take to heart, and help as many others as they can also make the right choices and mitigations.
[1] See latest nonsense about E2EE access from Barr, Patel and others who thirst for despot powers the likes of history’s most evil tyrants and dictators did not have.
[2] Whilst the US claims not to have committed comercial-espionage, there is sufficient evidence to say they lie. Other countries areca little more honest about it, for instance back in the 1980’s the French made the point that espionage was cheaper than R&D. So if you have a limited national budget, espionage has a better return on investment. Thus it’s safe to assume any nation that can do commercial espionarge, will do so for their chosen few in the MIC etc. Mind you it does have it’s funny side… As many know the Chinese were at one time accused of stealing the F35 plans… but it soon became clear that if they had, they were better engineers, hence the joke that “Maybe the US should out source tge F35 to China, because atleast their’s lands in one piece”. But don’t tell that joke in certain circles, as they don’t like to admit that China is rather more technically advanced than the US thus the throwing out of the pram of all the 5G etc toys…
David Rudling • October 17, 2020 12:48 PM
What if the Internet had never become a giant source of malevolence and desktops hadn’t been reduced to thin clients for web pages?
What if the Internet was only used to facilitate data synchronization between endpoints?
Some (provocative?) non-political reading for the weekend.
ht tps://adlrocha.substack.com/p/adlrocha-what-if-we-had-local-first
ht tps://storage.googleapis.com/jellyposter-store/16620200e730651d20d1a25d315508c7.pdf
Ron Spain • October 17, 2020 12:59 PM
You’re a narrow-minded bigot, Bruce.
jay • October 17, 2020 1:56 PM
this story has some accuracy but also a lot of “fake news” but it is the fake part that makes this story misleading at best. chinese fishermen indeed fish worldwide to feed china’s appetite for fresh water fish. unlike the west, wild caught fish is a major food source especially for regions in the east and southeast where majority of the population concentrates. the fake news part:
1. the picture attached to this story. the ship clearly marked S. Korea, not chinese. western news media routinely makes this kind of rudimentary mistakes. granted, there is a slight possibility that chinese fishermen leased a South Korea vassal but if this is true, the story did not report this.
2. the story clearly reports chinese ships were in “international water” thus violating no laws. yet the headline reads “past illegal”.
as China continues her peaceful rise (not a single bullet fired during her rise since 1979), we must make an attempt to learn about China in a rational, objective and multi polar perspective. this kind of hyperbolic “reporting” is harmful to ourselves (meaning the west). thanks!
1&1~=Umm • October 17, 2020 3:29 PM
@jay:
“as China continues her peaceful rise (not a single bullet fired during her rise since 1979),”
Now that is fake news if ever there was any.
1) China-Indian border troops killed on both sides.
2) South China Seas many civilian fishing vessels and crew have been shot by Chinese forces building artificial islands.
3) Chinese artificial island garrisons and US Navy vessels engage in “star wars style” high energy laser battles.
And a lot more besides.
So neither “peaceful” nor “not a single bullet fired” oh but plenty of illegal expansionism, and plenty of direct threats and attacks against vessels of other nations in the international waters of the South China Seas.
So back to the old days of imperialist expansionism…
Debunker • October 17, 2020 4:01 PM
On media censorship (Huntergate):
Senate Judiciary to vote on subpoena for Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey
The social media company has come under fire from Republicans, including President Donald Trump and his congressional allies.
A Senate panel will vote to subpoena Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey next week to testify on allegations the company is stifling conservative viewpoints, Republican committee leaders announced Thursday.
What’s happening: Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) told reporters the Senate Judiciary Committee will vote on Tuesday on whether to authorize subpoenas to compel Dorsey to testify before the committee that Friday. Cruz, who chairs Judiciary’s Subcommittee on the Constitution, said Dorsey will be asked to address “why Twitter is abusing their corporate power to silence the press and to cover up allegations of corruption.”
A Twitter spokesperson declined comment on the announcement.
Hawley, who chairs Judiciary’s Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism, called for the full committee to also vote on subpoenas for Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, though it was not immediately clear whether the vote would include him.
Key context: The social media company has come under fire from Republicans including President Donald Trump and his congressional allies for blocking users from an article alleging direct ties between the Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden and his son’s business dealings, which the Biden campaign has contested.
Source: politico.com, https://archive.is/kTIvy
Anders • October 17, 2020 4:11 PM
I support SpaceLifeForm & Clive moderation role.
vas pup • October 17, 2020 4:25 PM
@20201017 • October 17, 2020 5:29 AM and @Winter
To create account at ctemplar.com you need to have invitation code: so, either you have to compromise you by providing payment information OR you have to compromise your existing identity requesting invitation code from them (ctemplar.com link inside) from other source of information (e-mail, social media) for free account OR compromise other person’s paid account.
So, there is NO such option as secure e-mail account. No illusion for me at least.
Moreover, our ‘wizards’ in a future if such account could be really created will redirect your future attempt to sigh in to such server from US, UK, Germany you name it to their fake site with similar image as initial logon site, then intercept your id, password, and bounce it back to you with message like: “wrong credentials provided” so you’ll have to enter them again thinking typo was made, then if they are the same – direct to the right site, but having all your credentials stored in their (bleeping) data base.
Bong-Smoking Primitive Monkey-Brained Spook • October 17, 2020 4:53 PM
I support SpaceLifeForm & Clive moderation role.
Only if one of them doesn’t see our identifying metadata. I don’t trust aliens from outer space.
Sherman, Esq. • October 17, 2020 6:20 PM
Re :packing the moderation court
“if nominated I’ll decline. If drafted I’ll defer. And if elected I’ll resign”
SpaceLifeForm • October 17, 2020 9:52 PM
@ 20201017
Where has my previously posted comment from just a few seconds ago gone?
I wrote recently about this. Search here for batcache.
The TL;DR is: wait 5 minutes, force reload.
The behaviour varies due to factors beyond your control.
SpaceLifeForm • October 17, 2020 10:38 PM
@ Bruce, Clive
Maybe the spam problem is not as bad as I think. Maybe it is, but @Moderator is actually doing a bang-up job of whack-a-mole, and we can not see that.
But, there is a reputational problem with the spam comments.
In particular, spam flying under the radar, via posts to old articles.
There is a simple fix for that, but it has a side-effect.
Here is an example of all old article that just got a spam post today.
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2016/10/is_whatsapp_hac.html/
Article originally up on 2016-10-04.
The last 11 comments are clearly all spam. The last 5 are from this year.
The article did not receive spam when it was still fresh.
Everyone spots the spam on recent articles, because of fresh eyes.
But rarely does spam on old articles get spotted.
The simple fix for the spam to old articles problem is to lock the article.
Easily done in WordPress. For example: No more comments allowed after 30 days.
Or 60 days.
Here the side-effect comes in.
By locking the article (no further posts after X days), you now preclude someone adding Useful Information to an old article.
I have done so myself. While researching on AES, I found not only an old article from here, but a much newer article on another website that was related.
So, I posted a link to the newer article under the old article on this blog.
One may ask: Why?
Communication. I may be helping a future researcher.
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 1:38 AM
@ Debunker
Prediction: Senate Judiciary will not even issue a subpoena.
It is noise to distract.
They are hopping mad, hopping I tell you,
that their disinformation strategy was flawed.
They can’t understand Section 230.
Hopping mad.
But, I welcome them to try the subpoena.
And then @jack can just ignore.
Just like any recent subpoena from Congress has been ignored.
The gopers need to read this:
hXXps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200531/23325444617/hello-youve-been-referred-here-because-youre-wrong-about-section-230-communications-decency-act.shtml
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 2:08 AM
@ Kindsburg
@ Bong-Smoking Primitive Monkey-Brained Spook
@ Sherman, Esq.
LOL.
Thank you. We all can use humour every day.
In all seriousness, no one really wants to be @Moderator.
I’m just looking out for the blog. Nothing more.
I have zero motives.
But, IMHO, the spam problem has gotten worse.
Which, counterintuitively, may be a good thing.
But, spam to old articles is not what you want.
If the problem is not worse than what I see,
then locking old articles will probably eliminate most of the spam.
And then, keeping up with recent spam will be much easier. Much easier.
I’m sure Bruce is going to think about this a bit.
I will note that there actually is a valid reason to allow spam.
You will have to think outside the box on that one.
Clive Robinson • October 18, 2020 2:10 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm, Bruce Schneier,
In particular, spam flying under the radar, via posts to old articles.
Posts to old threads do show up in 100 newcomments page[1], –if not caught by various filters– so can be seen as they come in. Usually but not always they are SPAM / Unsolicited Advertising (UA). UA tends to give it’s self away for various reasons but can slip by as I’ve noted in the past.
@Bruce did once mention the times of day most UA came in, which if memory serves correctly was “working day” in East Asia (though there are some that appear in European time from observation).
<
blockquote>The simple fix for the spam to old articles problem is to lock the article.
Rather than “locking” older threads, I suspect it may be possible to divert any comments older than say a month to the moderation que (if there still is one on this new software I’ve not tripped it yet if there is). This would make things a little easier for the person moderating[2].
However spamers can be –but often aren’t– adaptable, and we do see people spaming the current squid page from time to timr.
As for other types of non-UA posting that needs moderating to the rules, that is going to be controversial if done by “known individuals” other than @Bruce Schneier or the appointed anonymous @Moderator effectively employed to do the task.
Other blogs have tried “up/down ticks” for other users to moderate posting and generally such systems do not work. Even when IP address or some other “vote once” mechanism is in place, they appear to be a magnet to certain types, who spend quite some time trying to find a way to subvert them and often they succeed. Going for the anonymous attack appears to be an added attraction for some, whilst boosting their own comment is attractive to others (anyone remember “he who shalt not be named”?).
As I’ve said there are plenty of reasons why I don’t have my own blog and the thorny issue of non-spam/non-UA posting moderation is just one of them. Especially as it usually turns out to be a no-win situation for all concerned.
[1] Spoting name field link based UA used to be easier on the old blog software because the name field showed up as a link there so you just had to hover the cursor. Unfortunately with the new 100 newcomments page it just show the name not the link…
[2] I once had a third line support / bespoke development role with a company that had an open “support@” email account. All support staff had the job of going through it on a rota to forward to other support staff. Some of the stuff that came in was frankly stomach churning and almost certainly illegal. Whilst there was the easy fix of only alowing 7bit ASCII, Mi$o put the kibosh on that… Because they supported HTML and heaven alone knows what else and you got complaints because companies set their Mi$o email systems up to send all that nonsense… And their support staff did not like it when their users got their emails bounced and could get realy quite rude (especially when you told them Mi$o was not “standards compliant” which it was not till it railroaded the system).
Clive Robinson • October 18, 2020 2:20 AM
@ Bruce Schneier, Moderator,
In my above post a “blockquote” appears to have gone wrong around
“The simple fix for the spam to old articles problem is to lock the article.”
Not sure what went wrong best guess was a problem with a “failed match/compare” caused by an initialisation…
That is the first “blockquote” was all lower case, but due to the odderties of this mobile phone web browser the trailing “/Blockquote” had the B in upper case.
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 2:48 AM
@ Clive
Testing.
<
blockquote>Posts to old threads do show up in 100 newcomments page
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 2:49 AM
@ Bruce, Clive
Confirmed.
The HTML parser has a case sensitivity problem.
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 3:21 AM
@ Bruce, Clive
This may actually be a markdown problem.
Still researching.
Since I have no way to disable markdown completely, I can not fully test.
Using the three backtick method does not stop the post from going thru the markdown code.
It’s just telling markdown to treat as a <pre> block.
Which also (will test), mean that any HTML markup inside the pre block will be ignored.
(this via normal post method as you can see because I used the amper lt semi, amper gt semi)
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 3:34 AM
@ Bruce, Clive
Testing.
In this test case, I am using the three backtick method.
First and last lines are exactly and only three backticks.
I want to see what markdown is doing.
I am going to do a normal html line that says blockquote text slashBlockquote.
But, you know, with the actual angle brackets.
And the uppercase B on the closing html tag.
<blockquote>markdown sucks</Blockquote>
This is after the actual line of html. No Preview on this test. We're going Live!
This will be the last line. The next line is the 3 backticks that will disappear.
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 3:38 AM
@ Bruce, Clive
It did what I expected. Once in pre mode, it’s just plain text, and there is no parsing until you end the pre mode.
The problem is in the markdown code.
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 3:57 AM
@ Bruce, Clive
One more test..
Instead of blockquote, I am going to use italic. The close will be uppercase I.
This is normal mode, no Preview. We’re going Live!
Need Sleep, but Clive put HTML email into my brain
Normal line here, next will have uppercase I at front, lower on end.
Need Sleep, but Clive put HTML email into my brain
Suspect this is a mess. That markdown only respects lowercase html tags.
And markdown is hopelessly braindead.
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 4:03 AM
@ Bruce, Clive
I’m shocked! Shocked I tell you!
So, is the case sensitivity problem only on the keyword blockquote?
Or is because it is multiple character?
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 4:11 AM
@ Bruce, Clive
Ok, one more test.
Same as the italic test, but this time strong.
First will be strong closed with Strong.
Your stupid bug cannot hide!
Next, the Strong closed with strong
Your stupid bug cannot hide!
Here we go… No Preview, going Live!
SpaceLifeForm • October 18, 2020 4:15 AM
@ Bruce, Clive
So, it’s not the number of characters.
It sure looks like it’s something with the keyword blockquote.
Something must be hardcoded somewhere in the markdown code.
Clive Robinson • October 18, 2020 4:35 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm,
I suspect our host is now muttering under his breath, I know I sure would be in his place.
Such are the problems in software upgrades and migrations, the path is rarely smooth even with good planing preperation and testing.
Which as we know many admins avoid where possible on live systems. Hence one of the major security vulneravilities of our time “Delayed/Never patching”.
Mind you there is a wry smile side to this, I suspect some of the issues that the users of this site have noticed are “not new”… So where else but a security blog would they get found and reported 😉
Singular Nodals • October 18, 2020 5:00 AM
@SpaciousVivaciousMorphe, et al
Bactiiicks3, half angle bracket line, italic light, no preview, recursive strange …
This was a Turing test, and you passed ! (I’m hoping to pass too, someday, before complexity and infinity close up.)
Lunch for successful candidates downstairs, give the dining hall matron this ticket.
Clive Robinson • October 18, 2020 5:05 AM
Something to take your mind off of things
There are many myths in the world, how they come about is sometimes anybodies guess.
However one thing they all appear to have in common is people believe in them still even when disproved.
After all some are “just to nice” to believe in, such as Gremlins and Murphy’s Law.
Well here are a few that have been debunked but still have life for programmers,
https://github.com/kdeldycke/awesome-falsehood
Enjoy.
Winter • October 18, 2020 10:09 AM
@worry
“BREAKING:”
Before I start to worry, I would like to know where this has been published so I can see who did this research.
Could you give details, e.g., a link?
first poster • October 18, 2020 10:37 AM
Ive yet to see anyone talking about the computer repair shop that supposedly had the Biden hard drive NYP is claiming…
TL&DR: their internal network security is atrocious. Public servers easy to find and decades out of date, clearly infested with webshells, self-hosted non-SSL-enabled IMAP/POP and mail servers, etc… its almost certain that belligerent nations found this info years ago already and had free admin access to anything inside…
The only question is what actually happened.
shodan.io/host/70.91.28.242
hxxp://demacshop[.]net/http/
MikeA • October 18, 2020 10:40 AM
@Worry
Good thing they were using .xls files in the toolchain, or more than 16000 might have been messed with.
(I figured the list could use a little levity, and applying homeopathic levels of “little” felt appropriate for this thread)
JonKnowsNothing • October 18, 2020 12:38 PM
@All @Space
re: The curious case of SURPRISE visitors in AU
note: I am not an Aussie. I am not a Kiwi either.
In the Wonders Down Under they have been fighting the good fight against COVID-19 and both AU and NZ have had some great successes.
NZ has passed their “2nd wave” caused by a failure of their quarantine protocols. As a reward, they don’t have to wear masks or social distance and can party till the cows come home.
There is a pointer to an unexpected infection from a port worker who wears PPE. Not much is being said about this, except they discovered it early and it’s contained. The real question is how did the worker get infected. Lots of previous pointers are cargo containers and cold boxes in other odd-duck outbreaks but all of those have been dropped off the radar.
AU though is a bit more complicated, and you really need a program to tell the players from the players.
The AU State of Victoria, Melbourne is the capital, has been slashing away at their catastrophic quarantine failure and has gotten it down to very low numbers. There are some small outbreaks but they are very close to getting it quashed.
So far 3 government officials have resigned or fallen on own petard over the matter of who authorized the use of Private Security for the quarantine. The crucial time frame is now less than 6 minutes and a phone call was established from call records.
Some of the other AU States are dealing with internal and state border crossing infections and are also getting things squashed pretty well.
So here comes the OWN GOAL from the folks in Sydney where the Federal Government runs the show. Sydney is the Australian Capital in district called Canberra; which is located in the AU State of New South Wales (NSW).
Scott Morrison is the Prime Minister and he has been absolutely desperate to get a Air Bubble Corridor to ANYWHERE. He tried to get NZ to open their borders to no-quarantine exchanges during Wave1 and NZ said Noooooo. After NZ got their 2nd wave clobbered, Morrison again tried to open the air lanes to NZ.
NZ said if you come here, you go into quarantine.
AU said if you come here from NZ, you can come to Sydney.
So a bunch of Kiwis did. Current count is 55.
This isn’t where the OWN GOAL is….
The Kiwis traveled on to the state of Victoria, Melbourne and no one in the Federal Immigration Department bothered to tell the folks putting out COVID-19 fires in Victoria, that they had visitors that had transferred between flights and walkabouts onto new planes and landed.
The 55+ Kiwis are not to be found, because the Federal Immigration folks did not pass along any details of the invasion or destinations. Another problem is that the state of Victoria does not have legal jurisdiction to stop, quarantine, or restrict the visitors who can waltz their matildas around and have done, including visiting some hot spots.
* The Federal Immigration folks said Victoria knew this would happen.
* Victoria said the Travel Bubble is to Sydney NOT Melbourne.
* The Federal Immigration folks said, if you don’t want folks to come to Melbourne tell the air lines.
* The Victoria folks said only the Federal folks can block them from getting on another plane.
It’s a lot of popcorn.
So while it looks like a CFK, there is this comment from the Canberra Immigration Office:
“Thankfully the virus numbers are down, but we need to reopen for the sake of people’s mental health and for the sake of people’s social wellbeing, for general freedom principles but also for economic reasons so that people can return to work. That is what we want to see. Let’s let Melbourne be like Sydney.”
Acting Federal Immigration Minister Alan Tudge 10 18 2020
New South Wales (Sydney) has again recorded more new Covid-19 cases than Victoria…..
It is highly suspicious that there are some suspicious circumstances pointing to Herd Immunity Policy in AU.
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoist_with_his_own_petard
ht tps://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/oct/18/immigration-minister-points-finger-at-victoria-over-new-zealand-travellers
ht tps://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-10-16/14-passengers-from-new-zealand-detained-in-melbourne/12777080
ht tps://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/oct/17/nsw-coronavirus-cluster-grows-as-victoria-reports-just-one-covid-case-and-zero-deaths
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Capital_Territory
ht tps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_South_Wales
(url fractured to prevent autorun)
lurker • October 18, 2020 12:46 PM
@SLF*, Clive, Ors
While you’re out there with your butterfly nets, I noticed a pernicity with ref. numbers. If I make[1] a reference thus, or two[2], then list them below as 1. and 2., the footnotes get turned into an unordered list; in spite of “1.” & “2.” showing in “Preview”.
I’ll have to sbandon my habit from the print industry of different formatting for ref. nrs and footnotes.
lurker • October 18, 2020 12:52 PM
either it’s fixed, or it depends on the sequence Edit-Preview-Submit[1] or Edit-Preview-Edit-Submit[2]
MarkH • October 18, 2020 5:27 PM
@vas pup et alia:
Re mail.ru accounts, with the disclaimer that my experiences are now dated because I lost my desire to visit Russia after its invasions into Ukraine.
In the “noughties” I opened mail.ru accounts without needing a mobile phone.
Some mail services (like gmail) added an SMS requirement to discourage operators from using misusing the free accounts, but I suspect a more sinister purpose in connection with mail.ru.
As Clive just wrote on a different thread about the UK, the Russian government has a “pathological interest in controlling the Internet.”
In Russia, it’s not so easy to obtain “burner” phones — to obtain any SIM card, it’s required to present a passport and the address to which the passport is registered (a police function in Russia).
So, no anonymity — it would seem — for mail.ru accounts.
By contrast, yandex is a multinational company, headquartered in the EU.
xcv • October 18, 2020 7:00 PM
@MarkH
Re mail.ru accounts, with the disclaimer that my experiences are now dated because I lost my desire to visit Russia after its invasions into Ukraine.
In the “noughties” I opened mail.ru accounts without needing a mobile phone.
In other words, you discovered the mail-order brides are too fat, after you made the trip and visited them in person. Otherwise, they’d probaby have found local husbands, I don’t really know, but people have too much “desire” onboard an airplane all of a sudden with all the alcohol and other adulterants in the snacks and food served in the cabin of an airborne motor vehicle.
Ismar • October 18, 2020 7:36 PM
Thanks @Bruce for an interesting article which provides yet another example of our tendencies as humans to wipe everything out as fast as we can.
This, IMHO, still represents the most important security threat to our survival
“We all have the same, basic psychological hard wiring,” Wright said. “It makes us quite bad at long-range planning and leads us to cling to irrational delusions when faced with a serious threat. Look at the extreme right’s belief that if government got out of the way, the lost paradise of the 1950s would return. Look at the way we are letting oil and gas exploration rip when we know that expanding the carbon economy is suicidal for our children and grandchildren. The results can already be felt. When it gets to the point where large parts of the Earth experience crop failure at the same time then we will have mass starvation and a breakdown in order. That is what lies ahead if we do not deal with climate change.”
“If we fail in this great experiment, this experiment of apes becoming intelligent enough to take charge of their own destiny, nature will shrug and say it was fun for a while to let the apes run the laboratory, but in the end it was a bad idea,” Wright said.”
from
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-myth-of-human-progress/
Clive Robinson • October 18, 2020 9:50 PM
@ Ismar,
With regards,
The Myth of Human Progress
The fact that there is an article that says how bad it is, and people read it and understand it.
To an extent belies the title, humanity or atleast parts of it are progressing bit by bit, all be it slowly.
Three decades ago I asked people the question of “Is economic expansion by destroying natural resources a,good thing?” the answer amongst old and many young was “Yes”. If you ask now the number that answer “Yes” is way way less.
But the article mentions the rise of “cult religion” as a possible future. Unfortunately in the poor it is already happening in large swaths of London and they are being exploited.
In Lewisham for instance you find new “Ministries” recruting outside of the MacDonald’s promising redemption and paradise, people openly reading the bible on public transport as though their very lives depended on it. They set up their places of worship in industrial buildings and the like without seeking the required safety permissions, without practising safe distancing or offering any disease protection other than faith, huggs, kisses, and loud singing, even shouting. The result is a hospital packed with the sick and a very much increased death rate. Some of these street preachers blaim the evils of society for COVID but they offer no solution other than the tithing of peoples meager incomes to their churches… You would think it was not possible to see the circling of vultures in a wealthy metropolis, but there they are feeding of the misery and hopelessness of the poor.
The difference between the two groups, the first knowing that destroying the environment is wrong, and the second lost in hopelessness is simply that of education and the opportunity it affords. However as you and I know education alone is not enough, people need opportunity as well and it is that which is being stolen from the young.
As for the rising population of humanity, it is a side effect of being poor, they know from looking around that those who are old are reliant on the help of their children and grand children. Thus large families mean security in their eyes. As nations become industrialized the number of children per family drops, often below sustainability China and Japan know what this means as they are seeing it around them today.
But look in other parts of the world, where the population is insufficient to build any infrastructure… for these are places without infrastructure, healthcare, or any real education and likewise no real opportunities. Where the population is to small to have even basic sanitation or healthy ways of cooking.
The world is a very unbalanced place, some solutions are simple, but they just move or change problems not solve them… finding the right solutions is hard. And to make it worse there is little in the way of money to make the opportunities in research to find the right solutions and make them viable.
For instance, one problem, an open fire only burns about one third of the energy in the fuel source the rest goes up through the roof as polution. But of that one third, more than two thirds of that do not heat water or food it likewise goes up through the roof as polution. So less than 10% of the available energy is utilized, the rest is poloution in one form or another. The incorect solution is to make charcoal and use that because even more energy is wasted in the process. One partial solution is a top downdraft gasification rocket stove where the fuel requirment to cook is less than a tenth of that into the overall charcoal process, likewise a fraction of the polution.
Is it the right solution no, there are better ones such as bio digesters that can turn more waste more efficiently into fuel and fertilizer and clean water. However cooking is just part of the problem, hot water storage and insulation to keep in heat are other parts that need to be solved as well. Do not underestimate the “togs value of a bale of straw”, it’s why properly built and stocked barns and bryars are dry and warm heated by the livestock alone even with three feet of snow and howling winds and blizards outside.
But it takes research to find the best solution for each sort of environment and that means finding the resources to make the opportunities to be able to do so…
But as I’ve indicated in the past, we also need to get off of this rock, otherwise we know for certain that mankind is doomed by celestial mechanics and worse basic physics of energies way beyond real comprehension…
Mankind only has a future through sustainable research and the opportunities that provides, and that in turn needs both an educated and sufficiently resourced populous. Which has to live within it’s means. Which means a life of “status” by displays of material wealth is highly undesirable.
SpaceLifeForm • October 19, 2020 12:46 AM
@ lurker
I’m sure that it is markdown getting in the way.
hXXps://www.markdownguide.org/basic-syntax/
But, it may be as you observed that Preview is tied in.
As I noted above, I specifically avoided Preview for the tests.
Must minimize variables when debugging.
Basically, to me, markdown is a solution in search of a problem.
I’d prefer to have a way to disable it completely and just do html if needed.
But, that may not be easy on the server end.
lurker • October 19, 2020 3:12 AM
@JonKN
There is a pointer to an unexpected infection from a port worker who wears PPE. Not much is being said about this, except they discovered it early and it’s contained. The real question is how did the worker get infected.
The ship believed to be involved had some crew exchanged to/from Phillipines. They were kept in isolation while ashore, but not tested. Shades of SLF* from the start of the year:
Stop the Ships!
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/afternoons/audio/2018769029/moh-covid-19-update
Winter • October 19, 2020 3:39 AM
@Clive
“However as you and I know education alone is not enough, people need opportunity as well and it is that which is being stolen from the young.”
2020 has shown the utter downfall of “laissez faire, laissez passer”, i.e., neo-con style libertarianism-light.
The result of the Thatcher-Reagan revolution has been several crippling bank crises. One bank crisis brought Putin to power, and one almost brought down the Wests’ complete financial system. And during the COVID-19 pandemic, the neo-cons had only a single answer: Embrace the pandemic and die.
But much more damaging was the exploding inequality, which resulted in median real wages not rising since 1980, while the economies quadrupled (UK: $11k-$42k /capita) or pentupled (USA: $13k-$65k /capita).
That indeed is an utter loss in opportunity for most of the population. Such an economic downfall is also a good reason for the population to become very angry and aggressive. And an escape into religious sects and conspiracy theories. Historically, such economic downfalls lead to bloody peasant uprisings, pogroms, and mass witch burning. It has also been known for half a century that a young generation without a future is a sure-fire recipe for fascism.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 19, 2020 4:35 AM
19 OCT 2020 — Hosted by Chris Hedges, Assange Extradition Hearing
An interview with Craig Murray, former UK Ambassador, about the London hearing at the Old Bailey.
NOTE: Much of the included text is a compilation of the interview, not a transcript but a summary of their conversation. This was aired on 3 Oct 2020, On Contact, hosted by Chris Hedges on RT America.
SIDE NOTE; If the topic is too mild or your hubris is riding high, I suggest the latest from Chris Hedges at Media Sanctuary. His talk, “The Politics of Despair”, is so sobering that it will drive one to drink.
hxxps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxSN4ip_F6M
Impressions from Murray about the Proceedings
Witness for the prosecution have been shielded from cross-examination by the defense. No witness offered by the prosecution were allowed to be questioned by the defense for Assange.
Vennesa Barristra reads out from a laptop that were written before the arguments are presented in court. Procedural issues, in every case, rulings having been rendered before she hears any arguments. (Note: that the submissions by both the defense and prosecution were available before hand. Editorial note: The defense has repeatedly provided uncontested evidence in contradiction to state’s evidence where material claims are knocked down. How can the judge reach a conclusion were prior claims were not challenged in court) Murray offers that she brings in arguments that someone possibly has written for her.
Preventing coverage of the proceedings, seems to be for the reasons having to do with the farcical staging of the hearing. Forty two seats, five allowed into the public gallery. And video access for NGO’s, the whole lot were cut off by the Judge on the first day–included state members of the European Parliament. It is open to major media organizations via video link but have decided not to cover the case.
The U.S. has argued in open court, that the U.S. has the right to prosecute anyone anywhere for publishing state secrets. And, the U.S. has said that the Espionage Act has not been tested under the NY Times in the Pentagon papers.
Craig Murray’s website went from 300K hits from social media during the February hearings at Belmarsh to 3K hits for the final hearing.
Ralph Nader says we are conservatives because we are calling for the rule of
law. A sadness is expressed by Murray, there was always abuse power but the elites would abide by the contours of law more or less.
“I am a former ambassador, not a natural radical. the old bailey with the blinded statue of justice, it no longer stands for justice of any kind. All the things I was brought up to believe in are plainly exposed has hollow and a sham no longer having meaning.”
Craig Murray, On Contact, 3 Oct 2020
Ismar • October 19, 2020 4:35 AM
@Clive
Thanks for your comment
A couple of remarks
“To an extent belies the title, humanity or at least parts of it are progressing bit by bit, all be it slowly.”
The speed of progress is what matters now more then ever – it might be too little too late if the tipping point is reached before we change our behaviour for better.
With regard to revival in the religious behaviour – not all approaches to religion deny the active role the humanity has to play to improve the state of environment (see for example these people https://www.tikkun.org/category/ecological-transformation) and I believe that progressive voices can be found among all of the society (secular or nonsecular).
We have no choice to hope and act so that that this global issue of climate change will be solved in time to avoid the worst of the cataclysm that awaits otherwise.
There are signs that China is investing significantly in the renewables and hopefully things will change for better in the States once the new American administration takes power and fulfill (at least some) of their electoral promises re climate change.
In Australia, despite the federal government policies still heavily influenced by the fossil fuel lobby, there are very good signs that states have been doing their bits to develop more of the energy production using renewable resources (https://www.cleanenergycouncil.org.au/) .
Not sure where EU is on this but from memory Germany is far advanced with some other member state not far behind (Norway I believe has got very high adaption of renewables).
Lastly, the energy production using renewables is now cheaper then using fossil fuels which is always a very good incentive for the switch.
So there is cause for hope especially with younger generations more acutely aware of these issues.
JonKnowsNothing • October 19, 2020 4:37 AM
@Winter @Clive
re: “However as you and I know education alone is not enough, people need opportunity as well and it is that which is being stolen from the young.”
utter downfall of “laissez faire, laissez passer” … more damaging was the exploding inequality
It seems that some countries have decided to handle the lack of opportunity for their current workforce is to ask, demand, cajole, insist and attempt to legally require that those who can give birth do so on demand, right now, and into the future. Some countries are demanding up to 6 offspring per person able to give birth, to settle their economic debt to the government.
This is rather difficult to achieve for countries that have used science and non-scientific methods to tip their populations to be male heavy: not enough rabbits for everyone.
Other countries are counting the effects of the lost population growth tempo, asking “please increase your night activity” or “sport en chambre” for the betterment of the government and military (a dearth of people desiring death by various explosive devices). While other countries are expecting a Lock Down Baby Bump Up that will counter the lost 3 years of education for those currently Locked Down.
There’s not a penny to be given for the above patriot duty. No food, shelter, jobs, clothing, education needed to go from -9 months to +68 years (current year of retirement in USA) and the required re-training every 3-5 years for new skills and taking into account the 50 year high tide mark which may be closer to 45 now that there’s so many applicants per job.
The other problem is that our Education System in the USA is so entangled that parents cannot teach their children even fundamentals. They have no idea what to do and a good portion of them do not have internet or can no longer afford it, so all the Zoom-Schooming isn’t helping them at all.
A COVID-19 Population Pump for more kids with less education, less money, poor food options, underpaying jobs, no healthcare, and the families have to stand on street corners to raise money for all the funerals.
note: the definition of who can give birth is generally accepted but there are some newer permutations that may also be included.
Clive Robinson • October 19, 2020 4:43 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm, lurker, ALL,
Basically, to me, markdown is a solution in search of a problem.
It was a more than valid solution to a problem some time ago, but the rapid move to “browsers as a desktop” kind of removed the pressing nature of markdown for “command line usage”
It enabled documents to be written on a VT100 or similar using a very simple editor such as ed / edlin or Notepad or even the inbuilt editor in some languages such as BASIC or Forth that were the starting point for many in the 1980’s and later.
It was based around the idea of using a form of then ad-hoc structured ASCII text files that went to line printers and the like. Where “bold” and “underline” was done by causing the print head to go back along the line and then “overstrike” one or more times before advancing the page to the new line. Which was a hundred year old technique used by people using manual typewriters.
It took the even older idea of using “=” and “-” to make headings of different importance for Chapters and Sections etc and used them to change the size of a font etc.
Thus printing out the plain text file remained easily human readable, unlike that of HTML. But also if put through a filter writen for a specific printer would add in the control characters etc to change font sizes and style to produce a much nicer looking document.
However writing a filter to turn markdown into another markup language such as HTML does have it’s oddities and problems.
After all using three dots at the end of a word has multiple meanings and uses. Converting them to a single extended print set where three dots appears as a single print character means things get broken, but not obviously so when a justifing font set is used on the printer.
This blog “swallows three character text smilies” but for some reason only outputs one as a single character which is “; – )” becomes 😉 whilst the others just disapear, which is akward because smilies also often pull double duty as sentence terminators.
Winter • October 19, 2020 4:57 AM
@Ismar
“The speed of progress is what matters now more then ever – it might be too little too late if the tipping point is reached before we change our behaviour for better.”
“Civilization is in a race between education and catastrophe. Let us learn the truth and spread it as far and wide as our circumstances allow. For the truth is the greatest weapon we have.”
― H. G. Wells
It seems Catastrophe is winning in many parts of the world. Especially in places where ignorance is advertised as a virtue.
stine • October 19, 2020 6:25 AM
Can someone confirm this? This is a quote from an article at The Register:
“[W]e need to also remember that all copy machine/laser printer paper has encoded into it the manufacturer of that paper as well as the year and month of manufacture,” he said, according to the indictment. “For that reason I always set aside some packets of copy paper with dates on them – for potential future use.”
Winter • October 19, 2020 6:57 AM
@stine
“machine/laser printer paper has encoded into it the manufacturer of that paper as well as the year and month of manufacture”
I know that laser printers will add a steganographic watermark of origin on every print. However, I have never heard of steganographic codes embeded in pristine paper sheets. It would be relatively easy with standard physical watermarks. And that might indeed be done more often that we know.
That said, it is not exactly rocket science (or quantum cryptography?) to extract the manufacturer and age of a shred of paper. An analysis of the fibers and C14 of the paper would get you at least part of the way. The number of paper mills is not that large:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_paper_mills
Just search Google Scholar (or your favored alternative) for:
document paper forensic
Clive Robinson • October 19, 2020 7:11 AM
@ Winter, All,
It has also been known for half a century that a young generation without a future is a sure-fire recipe for fascism.
Yes, now ask who would like to see the rise of fascism again?
Well certain EU economic plans are about as identical as you can get to those in Germany in the 1930’s. Likewise other nations.
Fascism is almost always seen as a good thing by those with power and influance over politicians, it is after all for a while “very good for business” and if you keep your assets off shore you can skip out to wash rinse and repeate somewhere else a little before the smarter puppet politicos realise that they need to skip out as well before they end up swinging from a lamp post or with their body parts spatially dispersed which is often the fate of less bright politicos.
As the old saying has it “Take the money and run” or better still “fly by night”.
Winter • October 19, 2020 7:30 AM
@Clive
“Well certain EU economic plans are about as identical as you can get to those in Germany in the 1930’s.”
I would suggest to apply HANLON’S RAZOR here:
Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
Economic policies are generally designed by the ideologically blinded to be applied by the technocratic deafened.
Clive Robinson • October 19, 2020 7:42 AM
@ stine,
Can someone confirm this?
Yes it’s been more than possible to do this for over fifty years.
Importantly it does not require a deliberate attempt to create a water mark, most raw materials have unique identifiers and most manufacturing techniques leave impressions that act as signitures much like the rifling in a gun barrel that end up on a bullet.
But adding extra information in a way that you could not determin by examining a few pieces of paper would be trivially easy in paper making.
Look up the principle behind the security marker called “Smart Water” in essence it’s a combination of trace chemicals that the combination of which gives a near unique serial number. Thus slipping different chrmicals into the water used in the papermaking process would add tiny trace chemicals across the entirety of a batch of paper no matter how finely you cut it up.
But it’s not just the paper. Nearly all paper used in or around an office or home is “finished” that is it has the equivalent of chalk or talc pushed into it’s surface to give a nicer feel to the paper, provide usefull characteristics for printer “feed mechanisms” and better surfaces for the fine plastics to adhear to in lazers and photo copiers and the inks of inkjet printers to be absorbed and quickly dry in such that smearing and spreading is significantly reduced.
Thus other chemicals could be added to the finish powders.
But storing paper in sealed dated packets is actually not suspicious in of it’s self, many who do “art” in all sorts of forms do this as do those who have to produce precision images.
I do it because of a “dirty little trick” whole sale stationary suppliers use. When you switch stationary suppliers they send you the best of batches with the best finishes etc. But over time they switch you down to the lowest or worst quality unless you complain. Keeping samples enables you to beat supply reps over the head with them, thus keep the quality of your paper and other stock high. And because you have the evidence in hand they can not talk their way out of it…
Some people even keep paper in sealed packets with ogygen and moisture absorbers inside, in the freezer. This is true of certain Japanese fine papers made in very traditional ways. This is because a few decades back due to a natural disaster the “boards” that were hundreds of years old and had been in continuous use had been destroyed. You can see with the naked eye the difference between paper made on old boards and new boards even new boards that have been in use for a couple of decades. Thus like photographic film and photographs and realy good years for coffee beans people store them in quantity for longevity in sealed packages in freezers.
Winter • October 19, 2020 8:20 AM
@Clive
“But adding extra information in a way that you could not determin by examining a few pieces of paper would be trivially easy in paper making.”
Synthetic DNA tags would be applicable. They are already in use to mark objects with a risk of being stolen.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/synthetic-dna-tags-could-help-artists-outwit-forgers/
Clive Robinson • October 19, 2020 8:36 AM
@ name.withheld…, ALL,
An interview with Craig Murray, former UK Ambassador, about the London hearing at the Old Bailey.
I have been following the extradition proceadings of Julian Assange run by Vanessa Barrister[1] it quickly becomes clear why so little access is alowed, and it’s highly probable the main stream media have been “warned off” probably by being told that they will have access to all other UK Government News Sources removed. Which for those with memories that stretch back a little is something the Trump Executive used against various MSM journalists that were not kow towing to the executive line.
It’s always been used as anyone who has seen the UK Defence of The Realm Act and “D Notices” in use will know. But in the past it was kept infrequent and only used where there was a reasonable need. However in the “Mad Maggie” Thatcher and Ronnie “The Ray Gun” Reagan era in the 1980’s things markadly changed, and have been going down hill since. The only real question is “Have we crossed the tipping point” I rather think we have.
It’s no “State Secret” that the current UK Priminister is not exactly one for “deep thinking” just “naked power”[2][3]. Thus he subcontracts his thinking out to others such as Dominic Cummings who is not just an out and out sociopath, but due to his illegal behaviour barred from standing for political office. However he now does the Priminesters thinking for him, and he is hell bent on destroying the independence of not just the Civil Service but the Judiciary as well.
And frankly nobody appears to know how to stop the pair of them in a civilized way…
Oh and for those readers outside of the Comenwealth Countries, some things come very very cheaply such as “honours”.
It is abundantly clear that Magistrate Barrister and the Prosecution Barristers are all bucking to see their names on a New Years Honours list…
I shall be writing to the awards committee registering my protest at any such awards, and hopefully others will as well. Thus there is a small chance they can be denied the baubles of status they obviously desire.
[1] Of whom very very little is known, so little in fact she could as easily be a bit part player in a horror movie. That certainly is what she is turning the proceadings into. Even Kafka could not make it up. Stylistic analysis of the preprepared stuff she reads out from her laptop tends to point not onky is it written by other people but it has come from people involved with feeding the prosecution team. Some of whom we know from the past have arived accompanied by clearly armed gaurds and vehicles that are clearly US in origin.
[2] Which more than a few women have had the misfortune to come across as a search of newspaper archives will show.
[3] As I’ve mentioned before I once had the opportunity to give the selfish toad a seeing to. But being less selfish and more respecting of society and the people in it, I did not avail myself of the chance. In recent times almost everyday I ask myself what the “Lost Opportunity Cost” on others is of my not availing myself of the opportunity of throwing him under a bus in Westminster Sq…
Clive Robinson • October 19, 2020 8:45 AM
@ Winter,
Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
Unfortunately as is the case in the UK you have to consider that both are in effect.
That is,
“The malicious are leading the stupid.”
See Dominic Cummings in the lead role and Boris Johnson in the led role, even though he’s stupid enough to think he’s the boss.
RE: Protonmail and alternatives • October 19, 2020 8:50 AM
Right now, if I wanted a 5 mins or less setup without using a phone number, I’d choose:
cock.li
Sign up with one of their domains choices and you can use it via cock.li or if you run Tor you can use the following, AFTER you have registered:
http://mail.xdkriz6cn2avvcr2vks5lvvtmfojz2ohjzj4fhyuka55mvljeso2ztqd.onion/
You don’t have to use their webmail, but it’s nice to see a Tor Hidden Service “.onion” for fast and free e-mail. Remember to use PGP/GPG and all that….
Winter • October 19, 2020 9:57 AM
@Clive
“See Dominic Cummings in the lead role”
All signs point to Cummings being a psychopath. So, yes, malice, or brutal self-interest, is a very likely part of his policies. He will have serious trouble getting elected himself, so he will always be dependent on some sock puppet.
Given that he is actively hated by a large part of the population, “most hated man in UK” were some of the headlines, his future in the lime lights seems seriously in doubt. Any role for him will likely be in the deep shadows.
As for Johnson, he seems more like Trump, a man for whom “truth” and “reality” have no meaning. Whether to call his actions malicious or plain stupid is something I still cannot decide for myself. Maybe just both?
Clive Robinson • October 19, 2020 11:33 AM
@ Ismar,
With regard to revival in the religious behaviour – not all approaches to religion deny the active role the humanity has to play to improve the state of environment
As I’ve mentioned before I tend towards the humanist side of things, that is mankind –can if it puts it’s mind to it,– can achive what ever is within it’s understanding and capaviliries to do. Most such things require good will and lack of self promotion, seeing what is good for the most as the goal. Thus as the saying has it “A rising tide floats all well found boats”.
Though many try to deny it, mankind is well beyond the point where any one individual alone can carry out a significant improvement to mankinds lot. Such things require the effort of thousands, even if they do not realise it. Such as the person who makes a bolt that goes in a vehicle that helps make the road or other infrastructure that enables a factory to make the components that go into a rocket that lifts a satellite that by looking down on the earth gives advanced weather warnings that save the lives of thousands. Each in turn has a small part to play in the success that is achieved with every life that is saved.
That at the end of the day is what society is all about, and that joint responsability is the foundation that others seek to deny for their own status, pretense and often illicit gain.
Sadly though, through much of the past century or so, the idea of giants standing alone has been sold to people. This when you examin it is such that a lesser percentage of the population who have little desire except for status, believe they have an entitlement, that they can enforce on others.
Unfortunatly some political systems very much encorage such “status over others” through those who seek power through politics. They, needing to be lifted up against others be it by influance or money, need to make promises and this actually makes them slaves to others. You hear about “Old Coal and Railway money” which gives both influance and money to political candidates that are then required to pay back many many times over via the likes of discriminatory legislation.
Well there are more people wanting a slice of that old money style life and they care not a jot how they obtain it. These are the people that one way or another want to deny education and opportunity to others. All they want is the life style and status they think is their’s by right and they will do anything they can to chase such empty and worthless existances.
From the lowest pan handler and phoney prophet they take what they can, almost always from those who have less in life than they do. Be it a con, theft or legalised theft no matter how low or how high they will take what they can and squander it.
They care nothing for the future, they have only dreams of the here and now in vacuous living and phoney trappings of success, that in turn gets them phoney status as others of their kind prey on them.
Winter • October 19, 2020 12:55 PM
@ Ismar
“With regard to revival in the religious behaviour – not all approaches to religion deny the active role the humanity has to play to improve the state of environment”
Indeed, one of the current parties in the Dutch government is very biblical. But they consider christians as stewards of the earth who must preserve God’s creation.
They can collaborate pretty well with the left wing Green Party.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Union_(Netherlands)
MarkH • October 19, 2020 2:33 PM
.
Take-Over of Communication Privacy Fund Ruled Illegal
The Open Technology Fund (OTF) is a non-profit corporation, sponsored by the U.S. government, with the stated mission to “support open technologies and communities that increase free expression, circumvent censorship, and obstruct repressive surveillance as a way to promote human rights and open societies.”
OTF has notably sponsored TOR and the Signal messaging app.
Its funding comes via the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM), whose responsibilities include overseeing the operations of VOA/RFE (Voice of America, Radio Free Europe).
The CEO of USAGM since June, Michael Pack, is a political appointee who was been broadly criticized for efforts to force USAGM outlets to adhere to pro-Trump messaging.
Apparently, one of the “offenses” committed by USAGM which led to the present effort to turn it into a pro-Trump propaganda arm was coverage of the Covid-19 pandemic which Mr Trump found politically uncomfortable. [Traditionally, news from organizations under the USAGM umbrella has been notably factual and neutral, and well protected from political interference.]
Pack cleared away the CEO, president, and entire board of OTF, making himself chairman and filling all vacancies with his appointees.
Pack has withheld almost $20,000,000 of Congressionally approved funding from OTF, forcing it to stop work on more than 80 percent of its projects.
Last week, a judge in the District of Columbia Superior Court granted a motion for summary judgment, ruling that the appointment of the new board of directors was unlawful.
Hopefully, this is a little good news for those of concerned about internet freedom and communication privacy for those living under authoritarian regimes.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 19, 2020 3:49 PM
@ Winter
It seems Catastrophe is winning in many parts of the world. Especially in places where ignorance is advertised as a virtue.
In the United States ignorance, along with stupidity, are not only considered a virtue–but a right wherein you are entitled to as much of others fortunes as you want. No need to support a meritocracy, intellectual achievement, persistent works of communal support, or even a moral and ethical center. No, just grab hold of stupid and run with it–all the worlds your oyster.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 19, 2020 4:09 PM
@ Clive Robinson
Have we crossed the tipping point” I rather think we have.
Tipping point? The pot with the frog? The frog and the water are gone, burnt away. I have for years, like the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, moved the needle on the frogs status–guess my job is done.
The link I provided to Chris Hedges latest talk is worthwhile (16 OCT 2020), a bit long at 2 and one half hours, but it is disturbing/informative. Laid out like a body at the morgue on a cold slab, Hedges’ examination is thorough and exhaustive exposing almost every wound and knife cut. And if there are believers that want to discuss the merits of faux religious piety–get back to me after you have seen this video. He has made clear what I have been attempt to scream into the wind about. Oh, and Hedge’s bona-fide; Yale school of Divinity as well as seminary and his father was a pastor. His ethical and moral underpinnings are supported in his works; he teaches at a prison. His students have achieved notoriety and awards for their work lead by Hedges.
The talk will really freak you out, there is but one audience member–it has a most surreal feel and vibe. I think I am going to be sick…
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 19, 2020 4:30 PM
@ ALL
Sorry, Chris Hedges was at the Harvard School of Divinity. Wonder where I came up with Yale?
vas pup • October 19, 2020 4:38 PM
@MarkH • October 18, 2020 5:27 PM
I guess you did set up mail.ru account many years ago and they change procedure since that time.
@Winter and other respected bloggers:
Regarding Yandex.com with server in Europe: almost all European countries are members of NATO, meaning by pretext of national security US and UK could get access to those accounts – no questions asked. As 2020, after 75 years after WWII ends, there is no military basis of Russia in any European country (including those fighting on the side of Axis, e.g. Germany, Italy, Hungary) or in Japan, but – you could follow the thought – you are smart.
@xcv – I respect your opinion and would like you continue to be with this blog, but please refrain from personal attacks – emotions are for politicians/media and with those with degree in liberal arts, not for ITs and security professionals.
rrd • October 19, 2020 4:49 PM
@ name.withheld…
You said:
And if there are believers that want to discuss the merits of faux religious piety
Faux religious piety is just that: false. Lying and hypocrisy are but two of the vices of the human heart. Those who abuse religious thinking for their own selfish gain shall surely — as we all most certainly do — reap what they sow.
Their problem is that they have eschewed true religious piety, which is only attained by attempting to love God with all their being and to love all their neighbors as their own self. That Great Command and Its Next are that from which all the Law and its Messengers hang. We each either hang in joy and honor or misery and disrepute, always according to perfect justice, for God always knows and judges our hearts’ intentions as a multiplier with respect to our deeds.
The problem with part of the ignorant populace that rejects religion wholesale is that they see such wolves in sheep’s clothing and deny that there is such a thing as true religious piety.
The wolves certainly appear to be the majority, but that is solely because the majority of human beings have, themselves, eschewed their own internal human spiritual development. People’s Ids always seek to justify the oppressions they foist upon others. Hitler couldn’t have done what he did without lots and lots of selfish, hateful fools glomming on to his obvious hatefulness.
Religion is solely concerned with our becoming deeply concerned with all others’ happiness; the peace and happiness we receive internally as a result of our selfless spiritual efforts is but one effect of a heart turned towards love.
People are ever free to do as they choose, believe as they choose, and ignore any truth they so choose. We Sufis are not in the least surprised that the selfishly ignorant are misguided by the selfishly ignorant — the blind leading the blind. People still support Trump here in America because they want to be able to grab women by the genitals, rip off their contractors, divert their charity’s funds, have a gold-plated lifestyle, or any number of other awful reasons to support that awful man.
We all have the ability to hone our moral compass to detect such frauds, but that requires first establishing a connection with our Creator. Until then, they have eyes that do not see, ears that do not hear, and a heart that does not understand.
“Love, baby. Love. That’s the secret, yeah.” –Pops
It’s only a secret because so many people deny it is the cornerstone of human existence, and that cornerstone can only be crafted in concert with our Ineffable Creator.
When that Rabbi and Billy Crystal spoke at Muhammad Ali’s funeral, it was because they were lovers of God that embraced the unifying love of all that is the heart of all of God’s Commands. As such, they recognized another lover of God, though from a different path.
None of us escape the Law, but we are certainly all free to break it in any way we see fit. Few realize that the Law is only decreed so as to minimize human strife and misery, which we manifest in our mammalian lower selves. To become humane, to embrace humanity, we must rise above our selfish potentials by reaching out within to the Divine, Whose Beneficience falls like rain upon both the righteous and the malicious alike. How we decide to grow, however, remains our free will’s prerogative.
There are still fools on Earth in 2020 that believe the Earth is flat. Of course, a significant majority of people are confused by so important and integral a topic as human morality with respect to our internal world of beliefs and attitudes that drive our behaviors.
People with eyes that do not see, are those that see only what they want to see.
“There are none so blind as those that will not see.”
— U2’s “I Threw a Brick Through a Window”
not steve • October 19, 2020 8:43 PM
a rather large archive of someone’s secret sauce
magnet:?xt=urn:btih:3D8B16242B56A3AAFB8DA7B5FC83EF993EBCF35B&dn=Microsoft+leaked+source+code+archive_2020-09-24&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Ftracker.opentrackr.org%3A1337%2Fannounce&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Fexplodie.org%3A6969
Miss Configured • October 19, 2020 9:27 PM
Speaking of source code and other such leaks due to config mistakes.
https://medium.com/dev-genius/source-code-disclosure-via-exposed-git-folder-24993c7561f1
Fisher King • October 19, 2020 10:41 PM
Since the zerologon and other similar exploits have patches released they will be looking for exploits and 0day for vulnerabilities such as badneighbor.
https://www.mcafee.com/blogs/other-blogs/mcafee-labs/cve-2020-16898-bad-neighbor/
If of course such security concerns are addressed, security policies and staff training are in place to begin with, and someone is not demanding to make networks accessible to the legacy operating system of the senators laptop.
Then there are all those electronic voting systems with promises of “security”
for mainly marketing purposes, without the reliable record that good old paper ballots provide. But ignore that, dogs bark at postman which is a dead giveaway of some kind of collusion or electoral fraud. Nixon never would have trusted the post.
bob • October 19, 2020 11:22 PM
Nixon did say something like, in future anything like Watergate would have to be outsourced. Why not choose a candidate who is not only terrified of the Russians but hundreds of millions in debt? He’d make an excellent puppet in principle, but life goes on regardless of our plans and we know only too well what happens to so many of the best laid plans of mice and men!
Winter • October 20, 2020 12:28 AM
@rrd
“Faux religious piety is just that: false. Lying and hypocrisy are but two of the vices of the human heart.”
When piety, a personal believe, becomes religion, an organization, can lies and hypocrisy be avoided?
In my experience, religions ask the impossible of their followers. All require to abstain from the things that make us human. From cursing to joy, from loving your children and spouse, from having thoughts or doubts, some or all will be the source of the wrath of God.
The stronger the faith, the more inhumane the religious rules imposed on everyone. And the more the “holier than thou” rat race will become. Such a rat race will always be won by those who can lie with a straight face and who can best hide their actions from public view.
SpaceLifeForm • October 20, 2020 12:43 AM
@ Clive
After way too much research today on markdown, I think there is stack confusion.
The filters, i.e., parsers and re-writers, are not all on the same page.
There is no standard for markdown.
What if the stack is using plain markdown in the WP code, and using the PHP markdown-extra also?
Because apparently, markdown-extra is not bundled into WP yet.
Other WP plugins could be involved.
The order of the filters may be a factor.
Preview and Submit may not be using all of the same filters, or not using them in the same order.
SpaceLifeForm • October 20, 2020 12:55 AM
Antibodies fade quickly in recovering Covid-19 patients, study finds
hXXps://www.deccanherald.com/science-and-environment/antibodies-fade-quickly-in-recovering-covid-19-patients-study-finds-904016.html
The study report:
hXXps://mbio.asm.org/content/11/5/e02590-20
Signalto Noiseratio • October 20, 2020 1:35 AM
Remark occasioned
Edward Tufte 1 + 1 = 3, the one, the other, and the interaction between
Here 1 + 1 = 5, the commenter, the reader, the blog, the interaction between commenter and blog, the interaction between reader and blog
Since it’s in part virtual, this seems to sum up musically
youtube.com/watch?v=fZ8Vy8FqnKs
And in old news (again) • October 20, 2020 1:56 AM
https://threatpost.com/doj-charges-6-sandworm-apt-members-in-notpetya-cyberattacks/160304/
Clive is still full of it apparently, how little the apologies change year after year.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 20, 2020 2:36 AM
Discourse more Course?
Writing on blogs, it is in recent days that I have noticed an increased level of participation but a decrease in the quality of the interchange. I recognize something that is worrisome but not yet deadly. Respondents, not responses, seem to have a twitter sized cognitive negotiating or contemplation space within a topic thread. Both the reading and expression of the material seems sparse, but as do the answers and replies.
As a broader portion of the population “gets in” during the season of political posturing, the message one might convey or share is largely not answered or effective due to the inability to critically engage in discourse. In effect, drowning out the insightful and considerate deliberations with noise and chaff. The result is the dilution of ideas into more positional or transactional communications which does little to effect the conversation in a positive and meaningful way.
rrd • October 20, 2020 2:39 AM
@ Winter
All indented quotes are from your post:
When piety, a personal believe, becomes religion, an organization, can lies and hypocrisy be avoided?
Religion is a property of the human universe. It is the reason the Placebo Effect allows the patient to transform the sugar pill into a successful treatment. Science has measured the Effect, but only religion can explain it.
In my experience, religions ask the impossible of their followers. All require to abstain from the things that make us human. From cursing to joy, from loving your children and spouse, from having thoughts or doubts, some or all will be the source of the wrath of God.
“To love God with all your being, and to love your neighbor as yourself. That is the entirety of the Law.”
Not impossible, just difficult. Nothing worth doing in life is easy.
We each reap what we sow. If we sow selfishness, that is what we reap.
The Law establishes the path to minimizing selfishness, for the establishment of peace and happiness for all human beings. Only in peace can we explore this wondrous universe to our fullest extent, with all our abilities. That is the sole intent of religion.
The stronger the faith, the more inhumane the religious rules imposed on everyone. And the more the “holier than thou” rat race will become. Such a rat race will always be won by those who can lie with a straight face and who can best hide their actions from public view.
No. I’m not lying to you. I am explaining what I live each day. And I have nothing to gain from this, that you would consider tangible.
You are perceiving what you want to perceive, misunderstanding the liars as being representative of the truth.
You are free to perceive the world however you choose. You may even believe the Earth to be flat, even if you live near the beach and watch the ships disappear bottom-first over the horizon.
Treating all other human beings with caring compassion cures all the ills we are facing in 2020. Religion is the path to learning how to actually transform one’s self from selfish to selfless. The selfish Id/ego in our being wants nothing to do with that transformation, because that Id is a part of the nature of every person’s initial conditions, and it doesn’t want to be transformed, for love is the death of selfishness.
A man can both claim to be a scientist and that the Earth is flat. Their claims have no bearing on reality.
“You have no idea how little we care about what people say.” –Rumi
To embrace humanity, we must first work to put aside our mammalian impulses. Religion describes how to do precisely that. That doesn’t mean that plenty of mammals won’t choose to lie about religion for their personal gain. That’s just the negative side of our human potential. But not all Germans were Nazis.
A religion without love as their sole goal and ideal, is no religion of God. A man who is not trying to love God and mankind with all their heart, is no representative of God, religion, peace or happiness. If you believe a flat-Earther is a representative of science, you are not going to understand science. The choice of which human being to believe is yours, and those choices have consequences.
Unlike toddlers, we have no parent that makes us each our vegetables. We must choose veggies over cookies ourselves if we are to grow up to be healthy, peaceful and happy in a world full of people who care for each other, instead of preying upon them like the mammals we come into this world as.
Only human beings are capable of the self-evolution of our attitudes and behaviors within our lifetime. Religion merely describes how to navigate that process. Human beings are free to distort that truth however they want, but they are only trading their peace and happiness for the adulation of the ignorant and the riches of this world.
SpaceLifeForm • October 20, 2020 2:46 AM
@ Clive, name.*.*.*.*
It's official now.
Your password must be longer that 8 characters.
hXXps://twitter.com/mshelton/status/1318303047647309824
SpaceLifeForm • October 20, 2020 3:00 AM
@ Clive, name, And in old news (again)
So, ‘And’, what is your point?
Here is another link:
hXXps://www.wired.com/story/us-indicts-sandworm-hackers-russia-cyberwar-unit/
Guess what?
It is pure noise. Nothing will happen.
@ name
re discourse.
Yeah, expect it for the next two weeks. Ignore the trolls.
Clive Robinson • October 20, 2020 3:15 AM
@ old news (again),
Clive is still full of it apparently, how little the apologies change year after year.
And how bad your memory is.
This is a game of politics in the run up to US election time, surely even you should realise that.
It’s a now tedious old game that US politicos play. They “allege” crimes and blaim individual foreign nationals, knowing full well it won’t come to trial.
And so you’ve fallen for what is probably just another yawn worthy political drum banging stunt.
As I’ve said before, it’s very easy to make these sorts of claims, but do they have evidence that will survive even a few minutes in court?
That’s the criteria I’ve always maintained, and still do.
The answer is as even you should realise is almost certainly not. And if you think about it for a few minutes you might realise why.
Attribution is hard very hard and I’ve previously explained why in some depth previously.
For any real evidence to have been acquired without “boots on the ground” it almost certainly would have required criminal acts by the people in the US investigating[1]. Thus would fall under the “fruit of the poisoned vine” issue. And before you say it, no the US Gov can not claim either universal jurisdiction or protection for their “investigators” actions in other sovereign states. Especially for what are computer crimes the investigators would have committed in those states.
The US Gov tried this before with some Russian’s who were rather better resourced, they had lawyers in the US challenge it, then it all went quiet. I’ve no idea what happened after that because it apparently was nolonger news worthy…
This sort of stupidity will carry on untill politicians realise that if they want to stop foreign cyber-crime they need a very different approach. Untill then a lot of innocent people are going to have their lives ruined one way or another. Because at the end of the day the Internet is a “target rich environment” in what is in effect a “lawless zone”. The main reason why it is “target rich” is US corporations like Microsoft, Adobe etc who supply software they have not sufficiently tested.
Grousing at me from behind an anonymous handle is not going to solve diddly squat. Rather than being a whinging moaner, how about being proactive and comming up with comments about how you think the situation can be improved?
[1] Assuming of course it was not some other countries counter-espionage people. Like those in a European country who accessed the “web-cams” on the laptops they had criminaly gained access to, to take images of those at the keyboard.
SpaceLifeForm • October 20, 2020 3:23 AM
@ Clive, name.*.*.*.*, Anders
Seems like a TLA has some OPSEC issues.
hXXps://www.bellingcat.com/news/2018/10/04/305-car-registrations-may-point-massive-gru-security-breach/
Winter • October 20, 2020 3:39 AM
@rrd
“The Law establishes the path to minimizing selfishness, for the establishment of peace and happiness for all human beings. ”
May I remind you that the majority of religious groups in the world, i.e., “Churches”, do NOT want to establish peace and happiness for non-believers. See the murderous ethnic cleansings based on religion in Central, South and South-East Asia, Middle-East, and Africa.
There are several “Churches” in the USA alone who want to force everyone, Christian or not, to live their lives following their particular interpretation of the bible to the letter. The same as is found in Muslim, Hindu, and Buddhist communities all over the world. Such policies do everything to abolish “peace and happiness for all human beings”.
Note that English seems to have no clear separation between religion as a personal believe and Religion as an organized Church. I am talking here about organized religion.
SpaceLifeForm • October 20, 2020 3:43 AM
@ Clive, name.*.*.*.*, Anders
It's a start.
hXXps://www.fincen.gov/news/news-releases/first-bitcoin-mixer-penalized-fincen-violating-anti-money-laundering-laws
SpaceLifeForm • October 20, 2020 3:50 AM
@ Clive
On that attribution problem…
hXXps://twitter.com/RidT/status/1318248441710084098/photo/1
SpaceLifeForm • October 20, 2020 4:24 AM
@ Clive, name.*.*.*.*
Remember, Barr was exposed.
He is in self quarantine until November 4th.
Clive Robinson • October 20, 2020 4:42 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm,
The filters, i.e., parsers and re-writers, are not all on the same page.
Or possibly in the right order.
The fact that smiles get recognised and removed, but only one gets replaced with an extended character set char suggests that you may be right about “not on the same page”
My guess is it’s a little of both seting up some kind of conflict.
But one thing is certain if we are going to investigate further we need a thread where tests are not going to upset other users.
SpaceLifeForm • October 20, 2020 4:43 AM
@ Clive, name.*.*.*.*
hXXps://sg.news.yahoo.com/amphtml/arrest-warrants-issued-founders-panama-052343763.html
Germany has issued international arrest warrants for the two founders of the firm at the centre of the tax haven scandal exposed by the Panama Papers data leak, German media reported.
Clive Robinson • October 20, 2020 4:52 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm,
Antibodies fade quickly in recovering Covid-19 patients, study finds
Yes some of them do and in some cases it’s very quickly, before the body has cleared out all the inactive RNA reminents that can be upto six weeks from first symptoms. In other cases it hapens in the two to four month range.
The thing is we only test for some antibodies and the immune system is rather more complicated than that. I don’t even pretend to have a firm grip on the subject but from what I understand the two antibodies we test for are the “end product” of a longish line of detection and protection mechanisms. Thus whilst the two antibodies do disapper in time as the body stops making them, the viral pattern that gets recognized still gets trigered that causes the T-Cells to start the production chain again.
If anybody has a better handle on this, can they please give a heads up?
Winter • October 20, 2020 5:12 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm,
“Antibodies fade quickly in recovering Covid-19 patients, study finds”
The important part is how fast they reappear when reinfected.
It would be rather inefficient when the body would keep high loads of circulating antibodies against every antigen ever encountered. But for some diseases you would like that to be the case.
Winter • October 20, 2020 5:17 AM
@rrd
“When a person chooses to believe they can act selfishly in the name of religion, that is their choice, but it has no bearing on the Law, it just means they’re a selfish, ignorant asshole.”
Most of the Good and Bad in the world does originate from people organizing in large congregations to follow an idea, or a faith. Whether the outcomes of the organized actions is Good or Bad often is totally unrelated to the morals of the individual supporters.
Some of the most horrible of outcomes in history were wrought with the best of intentions. And organized religion has not been spared many of such cases.
Clive Robinson • October 20, 2020 5:37 AM
@ Muddy Waters,
During September 2020, we identified a new campaign targeting many prominent Israeli organizations.
I’m not surprised by the mechanisms used. In effect it’s cobbled together from other well publically known parts.
This is an increasing trend as it minimises not just work that needs to be done, it “Muddies the Waters” to the point where attribution is a nightmare.
Which is I suspect the reason the article went with “target analysis” to try and identify the originators.
The idea of making the malware look like ransomware rather than what it is designed to do is not new.
However it’s also problematic… Because if you do not setup a believable backend then the “ransomware cover” gets blown very quickly. And the problem with setting up a believable backend means you may well “leave bread crumbs” back to your door…
Back last century malware looked so easy to do, these days we have wised up a little. But those whi write it still have a long way to go. But the biggest impediment to stipping it is still actually politicians and the IC of their respective nations…
But if people are writting ransomware as “cover” they could make it less obvious, with a little thought.
That is make the “attack/breach” code general purpose effectively “fire and forget” that goes up against all systems. Then put a deliberate bug into either the payload downloader or the payload it’s self or both. Such that only computers with the right language, time zone etc make it through these gates and get the actual payload intended for them, and not a generic non functioning payload.
One way to do this is have different payloads for different national languages each target machine is set to. Most are just different forms of ransomware, but one or two have some further nasties that are gated by some other “deliberate bug” such as say the existance of a more specific Command and Control server in a different part of the world. This could be made to look like a “throttling mechanism” to stop a global all at once ransomware attack.
There are all sorts of gating mechanisms made to look like they serve some other purpose or have bugs in them. Each one makes target analysis harder and much less certain.
Clive Robinson • October 20, 2020 6:14 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm,
Seems like a TLA has some OPSEC issues
Yup and not for the first time, remember the consecutive passport numbers from a special sub group of numbers…
Apparently they also tend to use a common “barracks” address in their documentation history as well…
This sort of daft idea happens in commercial organisations as well. Some banks used special bank account numbers to identify their emoloyees. It was a badly kept secret back in the early 1980’s…
But other TLA’s such as OPM and CIA have appeared in the news for alowing identities of those that worked for them directly or indirectly loose via the Internet. In one of those cases a number of people in Iran and China ended up being detained and some never saw the light of day again…
At the end of the day who is to blaim? Well the limited imagination of those setting systems up in the first place might be a good place to start the search…
Clive Robinson • October 20, 2020 6:30 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm,
It’s a start
It does beg the question of why moneylaundering legislation was not used earlier.
The only two uses most crypto currencies get are,
1, Illegal activities.
2, unlicenced currency speculation.
Neither of which inspires me to put a toe in the water.
As for the Panama event, lets say I’m very unsurprised it was not the UK that pushed for criminal convictions… Lets just say the country is not just “a crooked old man” on the map.
As a side not a legal action I’m involved with looks very much like it’s got a chunk of money laundering in it even though it looks like it might just be one quite small part of it it might prove pivotal. Most people do not realise just how easy it is to commit money laundering and computer forensics feeding into financial forensics is one of the ways that “intention” gets revealed.
newb poster • October 20, 2020 10:16 AM
Just in case, if it didn’t pop up here before, here’s an update on COVID-19 longevity in darkness under optimal conditions.
I assume Clive Robinson and our gracious host Bruce Schneier might still care about this.
On flat thoroughly cleaned surfaces and in moderate cold at 20 degrees a COVID-19 biofilm can survive (remain viable) for up to 28 days on steel and phone screens, while on cotton, which is a rough porous surface, this survival time dramatically decreases to 6 days. Increase environmental temps, UV exposure, this decreases further.
Disclaimer, the numbers above are overly simplified. If you care you should read the source.
Of note:
In general rough porous surfaces, wool and the like (non-laminated wood) tend to dry out and destroy, that is inactivate germs, bacteria and virii. You’d need some serious biofilms, grease, to make germs survive on porous surfaces. But stainless steel and glass and especially polymers, common plastic, love to preserve germs when paired with greasy fingers.
Also, you can still detect inactivated, non-viable virii and bacteria and in some cases reactivate them.
And there’s always the issue of contention, virii and bacteria fight each other, the study takes that into account by lowering competition for the biofilm shelter.
Normally, even after washing hands you retain a healthy dose of germs on your hands. Excessive hand-sanitizing tends to create optimal conditions for opportunistic germs, which is why you ought to re-apply some moisture and fat to preserve your skin and repopulate the harmless germs on your hands after some time.
A rant, anyway, here’s the link:
The effect of temperature on persistence of SARS-CoV-2 on common surfaces.
ht tps:// virologyj.biomed central.com/articles/10.1186/s12985-020-01418-7
Clive Robinson • October 20, 2020 1:14 PM
@ newb poster,
Yup I still care about it.
Though 20C (~room temp of 68F) is I admit warmer than that of the chilled air I’m most concerned about of 5C and down (food transportation temps of 41F and less).
In the dark is certainly a criteria in food transportation as are exceptionly smooth plastic surfaces.
The question is what humidity and temprature in darkness gives the longest halflife of virus viability.
Also how long in UV-A through UV-C to render the virus non viable.
That is would say 10mins on a conveyer system that flipped the packaging be sufficient to render inert the virus on packaged and chilled foods that get transported across several borders by truck etc in Europe and the like be sufficient?
MarkH • October 20, 2020 1:49 PM
@Clive et al re SARS-Cov-2 on Surfaces:
After 9 months, there is no public evidence (so far as I’m aware) that transmission by surface contact is an appreciable contributor to the number of Covid-19 cases.
Results from contact tracing still seem to show that almost all infections result from spending at least 10 minutes within 2 meters of a person exhaling droplets.
It occurred to me recently, that we have an instance of Sherlock’s “curious incident of the dog in the night-time.”
The distribution among people of contacts with surfaces recently handled by other people is extremely variable.
Surely, there are small percentages of people who handle currencies, rubbish, mobile phones, recyclables etc. at a frequency of dozens to hundreds of times per day. These contacts may occur at intervals ranging from a few seconds to a couple of weeks from potential contamination with SARS-Cov-2.
I expect that many such persons have taken extra precautions in this time of pandemic, but compliance is always highly variable, and sure to be much less in poor countries.
I suggest that either
If the latter is the case, how likely is it that public health authorities have failed to identify such groups?
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 20, 2020 2:52 PM
Okay, now I am concerned. On my third viewing, the realization hit me and I am going to be sick, if not already.
Hedges delivers the undaunted truth and what he has laid out, as I have said before, the body on the cold slab, tattooed with U.S.A. on every appendage.
hZZtps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxSN4ip_F6M
40 minutes in, make sure you’re sitting down.
If you skip to forty minutes in, he lays out a critique that is a not what anyone (notice the exclusionary expression) really wants to hear. So, if you’re going to red-pill, and I hate memes as such, I must warn and disclose is applicable and I regret having to say so. A feeling of “dirty” is my best summation at this point. As I have mentioned elsewhere, “I am not here to delivery a pizza.”
Sherman Jay • October 20, 2020 3:32 PM
@MarkH
“I expect that many such persons have taken extra precautions in this time of pandemic, but compliance is always highly variable, and sure to be much less in poor countries.”
I understand your desire for responsibility. BUT In the u.s.:
People with masks trying to protect those around them as well as themselves, are often beaten, threatened and spat upon by those who demand their rights to avoid masks no matter how it endangers others.
We have all seen the undoctored photos of masses of people gathering unmasked and crowding together at parties and political rallies. Medical experts have correctly labelled these ‘superspreader events, even at the white house.
Hospitals are paying the price of these unmasked maniacs in money and the increased deaths and rates of infection of health care workers.
I have witnessed this in Arizona. Those in my organization are masked, distanced and avoiding being within 12ft. of these unmasked violent idiots.
Everyone please stay safe and secure.
vas pup • October 20, 2020 5:04 PM
@ALL:
The Psychology of Power and Evil:
All Power to the Person? To the Situation? To the System?
Philip G. Zimbardo, Psychology Department, Stanford University
http://pdf.prisonexp.org/powerevil.pdf
Those are very insightful 27 pages.
In order to justify this link on security blog, I’ll provide small extract below:
“Never allowing one’s self to sacrifice personal freedoms for the promise of security, it is always a bad deal because the ==>sacrifices are real and immediate and the security is a distant
illusion.
This is as true in marital arrangements as it is in being a good citizen in a nation where the leader promises to make everyone safer against a current threat by giving up some of their personal freedoms so that the leader can have more power. That bad bargain usually translates to more power Over Them, as well as over the enemy. It is the first step in creating fascist leaders even in democratic societies, as Erich Fromm (1941) reminded us about Hitler, but is as true
today in many nations.”
SpaceLifeForm • October 20, 2020 5:44 PM
@ Clive, All
This is what I predicted back in Spring (northern hemispere).
Due to Covid-19 and work-from-home.
The question is: who was really behind it?
Remember, attribution is hard, really hard.
And, I still think this is part of a cover story. The truth won’t come out for years.
Drip, drip, drip… Tick, tick, tick…
hXXps://hotforsecurity.bitdefender.com/blog/twitter-2020-hack-caused-by-fake-vpn-login-page-24373.html
Clive Robinson • October 20, 2020 7:03 PM
@ MarkH,
… how likely is it that public health authorities have failed to identify such groups?
A good question and you might not like the answer which is “easily” if they were not looking for it.
COVID-19 is a disease that is being badly mishandled at best. It was less than a month ago that the CDC changed it’s “contact spread” to “droplet spread” advice. Likewise The WHO.
Medical support has been a story of “lets start with designer drug trials” and not do anything else…
One result of this is Remdisivir being shoved into people in the US, the actual evidence it does any good is small at best and is beong questioned, and there is growing evidence it actually causes harm…
However despite clear indicators that people are vitamin and mineral defficient, and this being tied clearly to the severity of respiratory illness nearly a decade ago, there have been no trials on them untill a couple that have just been started.
Yet many doctors are taking 2000-3000IU vitD, 1000-2000mg VitC and 250mg of Zinc a day…
Why because observational evidence on patients comming into hospitals shows a very clear correlation between deficiencies in these and severity of illness and death.
Then there is the myth of “vaccine tommorow” well in the USA the FDA have put the kibosh on their being one approved befor jan or feb at the absolute earliest, other countries will be two or months before that.
But even if we had 300million vaccine syringes loaded and ready to go, unless you are in a special or at risk group you will not feel the needle for probably six months to a year. Due to simple logistics.
That’s 250 or more days away, how many in the US are getting sick or dying each day? You get to see “The Calculus of Death” at work.
So do I think people are actively looking for “contact” or “fomite” infection?
Honest answer is I don’t think they are.
But moving on a bit there is a recent peer reviewed paper out that says SARS-CoV-2 can remain viable on human skin for upto nine hours and Influenza Virus type A (IAV) for upto two hours.
So how do you realistically tell if infection is by inhaled dropplet or dropplet transfer by skin contact?
As I’ve said for quite some time the only way to get COVID under control and near normal life to return is by very strong border control. Both Australia and New Zeland are very good examples of both how well it works when implemented properly and just how bad it can get when it’s not.
Micro lockdowns delay community spread but they don’t stop it because people cross the borders around the micro region keep bringing on and taking it out.
It’s actually not essential in most cases for people to cross national or larger region borders, so stopping it is not going to cause to much harm[1] overall.
But one thing has to travel across and thats “trade” and especially “food”.
As I’ve indicated in the past the transportation of chilled and frozen foods provides what might be considered ideal travel conditions for pathogens and examination of international food poisoning out breaks indicats that it can and does happen.
Thus why are there not being serious tests carried out, not just in how viable SARS-CoV-2 is in food preperation but transportation environments and more importantly viral decontamination measures in those environments?
Because as we know SARS-CoV-2 does not respect wealth, power, politics or many other things and is highly opportunistic in it’s infection vectors.
And realistically the only defense we have against it is “Strong Border Controls”, and that will still be true atleast two to five years after any serious vaccination program starts.
[1] Ues I’m aware it’s going to hurt the travel, tourist and hospitality industries. But compare the cost of their loss to the total economic devestation of repeated hard lockdowns over and over every few weeks or months depending on the season.
lurker • October 20, 2020 7:54 PM
New Zealand seems so confident of their border quarantine that they allow in a charter flight of 230 Russian and Ukrainian fishing boat crew via Moscow and Singapore. All had allegedly “self-isolated” for 14 days and been tested negative before boarding the flight. Day 3 after arrival 18 have positive tests.
I don’t know if my compatriots have a consciencous objection to plundering the deep sea fish stocks, or value their life and time higher than the going rate. We seem unable to recruit or retain local staff.
The ship worker case from the weekend has the genome resolved, and it’s a new strain, new that is to NZ, and new as in not yet in the international database.
Freezing_in_Brazil • October 20, 2020 9:17 PM
@name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons
He has made clear what I have been attempt to scream into the wind about.
I can say the same. Thanks for sharing this great material.
Peace
MarkH • October 20, 2020 9:30 PM
@Clive, who wrote “the CDC changed its ‘contact spread’ to ‘droplet spread’ advice”
If that’s a reference to the “airborne” controversy, that question is perhaps shedding more confusion than light for the public.
From my reading:
• there’s no generally accepted standard of the droplet size threshold
• typical thresholds (such as 5 micrometers) are pretty much arbitrary; the general principle is that smaller droplets remain suspended in air longer, with no actual threshold effect
• very tiny droplets with long “hang times” likely carry small numbers of virus particles: nobody knows whether Covid-19 has ever been transmitted in this fashion
• Covid-19 has reproduction rates and spread patterns very far different from those of measles, which is known to spread via extremely small droplets
• If indeed the tiniest droplets are dangerous, the safety advice is little changed: continue to wear masks and do your best to keep some distance. The biggest change would be to put more emphasis on reducing crowding and improving ventilation of enclosed spaces.
As to concentrations of cases among people doing certain kinds of labor, searching out such patterns is the bread and butter of epidemiologists.
If such concentrations exist, and epidemiologists have somehow failed to detect them, other folks are also in a position to notice such patterns:
• worker safety agencies
• attentive journalists
• labor unions and other non-government organizations interested in the health of working people
• medical providers including hospitals, clinics, and individual physicians
The curious incident, is that no report has yet surfaced of the dog barking in the night-time.
Clive Robinson • October 20, 2020 9:31 PM
@ lurker, ALL,
… allow in a charter flight of 230 Russian and Ukrainian fishing boat crew via Moscow and Singapore. All had allegedly …
Which begs a bunch of questions about those,
Day 3 after arrival 18 have positive tests.
Questions such as,
How long once on vessels at sea do you think it would be before the entire deck hands and processing crew were infected?
Is it likely that the ships would stop fishing or issolate the sick?
What is the likelyhood that the crew would cough and splutter fresh virus in great gobs onto the fish?
As the fish gets chilled or fast frozen how much of that virus do you think would remain in a suspended state?
If unsure remember the Chinese rejected Russian caught sea food at the border because it tested positive for SARS-CoV-2…
And people wonder why I appear fixated on chilled or frozen food crossing borders…
Clive Robinson • October 20, 2020 9:52 PM
@ MarkH,
there’s no generally accepted standard of the droplet size threshold
There used to be but it dated back to the 1930’s, and it was this pandemic that caused the idea to be dropped and the “continuous spectrum” model accepted instead.
Oh and it was not medical research scientists that started the ball rolling on this change it was physics / mechanics reasurch scientists banged the final nail in the coffin with some realy unpleasent back lit fast stop frame images of all sorts of gobs, droplets and spray comming out of a persons mouth…
The problem is though that even though many scientists have accepted the continuous spectrum idea, there are two things missing,
1, Laboratory equipment to support it (only the old standard).
2, No actual research has been done because of it.
So basically it’s an “Egg foo yung” issue.
lawrence • October 20, 2020 10:25 PM
Covid-19 to NZ from Russia with?
@Lurker, Clive, All
Second point first: Our border controls worked with these men. Folk have to come in and it is impossible to know how thorough (or corrupt) controls are in other jurisdictions. Best you can do is keep the incomers isolated. In this instance they arrived on a charter flight which meant no one outside the fishing industry would be exposed to them unwittingly. Amongst other things it is a salutory lesson in not trusting the quality of the testing and isolation of foreign jurisdictions. What with unreliable tests, bribeable testers* and guards, dodgy self-isolation, wide ranging incompetence, bad luck, and down right lies best not to trust anyone.
First point: why import froeigners to work on fishing vessels in New Zealand? This is a hangover from the neo-liberal days when the Key government allowed the fishing industry (along with others) to import workers on the grounds that NZers weren’t prepared to do the work. Which was sort-of true, as the wages and conditions were minimal plus a Kiwi crew might pass on information about illegal by-catch. We can expect/hope that this situation will now change with the fishing industry’s last friend thrown out of Parliament as a result of Saturday’s general election.
Winter • October 21, 2020 2:32 AM
@Clive, All
Whether small droplets or surfaces can transmit SARS2 is a different question than whether these routes contribute significantly to the pandemic.
COVID19 has to enter the body, preferably in large quantities deep into the lungs, or at least the nose or eyes. Swallowing seems to be an ineffective route.
As others have already written here, those who predominantly are exposed to infected surfaces or low levels of aerosols do not get infected measurably more than the general public. However, those that are exposed to air heavy with larger infected droplets do get infected with high probability.
These are all probabilities. The occasional outdoor large distance or contact infections are not driving this pandemic. Addressing such rare events is a waste of time at this stage.
SpaceLifeForm • October 21, 2020 2:38 AM
@ MarkH, Clive
<cough> <cough> Brownian Motion <cough>
p.s. unknown html tags are stripped.
SpaceLifeForm • October 21, 2020 3:04 AM
@ Winter, MarkH, Clive, ALL
And they were doing so good.
By wearing a mask. No travel.
Until 2020-06-30.
I am flipping two paragraphs for context and date ordering.
They are not in this order in the article.
hXXps://www.cnn.com/2020/10/19/europe/czech-republic-coronavirus-intl/index.html
The Czech Republic’s first wave of infection peaked in late March at 408 cases in one day. The highest single-day death toll was just 18, in April. On June 30, the Czech Republic recorded no new Covid-19 deaths. That same day, an outdoor street party in Prague celebrated the end of the pandemic. Masks were not part of the dress code. Theaters reopened, indoor dining returned, people were allowed to travel abroad. Even Babis, the Prime Minister, went to Greece for a vacation.
(out of order from linked article)
There are currently more new Covid-19 cases per million people recorded in the Czech Republic than in any other major country in the world. On Friday, more than 11,100 new cases were reported in a single day, a new record. In the first 17 days of October, more people have died of the virus in the Czech Republic than during the previous eight months of the epidemic combined.
SpaceLifeForm • October 21, 2020 4:09 AM
@ First Poster, name.*.*.*.*
I've lost some links, like one that says Hunter was in California that day.
And one that clearly shows a horrible signature forgery.
But, anyway, this will provide some clues. This is just a few hours old.
Not much to read, the URL says it all.
"rudy, rudy, rudy. Your slip is showing again"
hXXps://www.thedailybeast.com/delaware-punts-rudy-giulianis-latest-hunter-biden-claim-to-fbi-citing-credibility-questions
MarkH • October 21, 2020 4:58 AM
@Clive:
I think it likely that most physicists since Galileo would predict that the time for minute water droplets to fall a specified distance in still air should be a fairly smooth function of their diameter (at least, down to some extremely small limit).
Any fool who lives in a typical non-desert temperate climate can see that the tiny droplets which compose mist fall much more slowly than raindrops. No special apparatus or scientific training needed!
I don’t know why anyone would propose a threshold effect — especially after the discipline of aerodynamics was founded! — unless they were using data from a poor experimental setup, or needed to provide an oversimplified model for some “end user.”
Fairly still air can be obtained in a sealed isothermal chamber, or one of those vast salt mine galleries used for competitions among tiny airplanes powered by elastic bands.
The situation with inhabited indoor environments is exceedingly complicated and variable. I used to work with people who did design work on gadgets to detect aerosols inside buildings, and gained a little appreciation for the complexity of indoor air movements.
As sailplane pilots can attest, even an extremely large and massive “particle” can stay aloft for thousands of seconds, given suitable air currents …
=========================
When I first read about the hypothesis of proton decay (which has never yet been confirmed), I was tickled to read that one physicist had said “we know in our bones” that if protons decay at all, their half life must be exceedingly long (a very large multiple of the age of the universe), for the simple reason that if it were shorter, ionizing radiation from within our own bodies would kill us!
The logic is simple, but irrefutable.
As I’ve said before about the hypothesis of mobile phones causing brain cancer, either there are sharply increasing cancer rates (which have never yet appeared), or we can infer an upper bound for such carcinogenic effect which is very small.
Either there are occupational clusters of Covid infections which would readily become public knowledge, or we can infer an upper bound for fomite transmission rates which is very small.
Winter • October 21, 2020 5:03 AM
@Clive
“So actually we don’t know it’s rare, ”
Epidemiology is a science too. There has been a lot of statistics done on the outbreaks and the current high levels of infections are not caused by contact or aerosol infection. That is, the second wave is not driven by contact spread or aerosols.
However, reintroductions of the virus can occur by any means. A single virus in a bird drop might do the trick.
To stop a running epidemic, you need social distancing and stop people from traveling and congregating. To stop an epidemic from starting, you need track and trace and border controls.
MarkH • October 21, 2020 5:18 AM
@name.withheld:
I’ve liked Chris Hedges, and admired examples of his work, for a long time.
Some while back … perhaps 15 years ago, I lose track … Chris had a kind of psychological rupture in which he seemed to be overwhelmed by feelings of guilt and shame.
Since then, I have seen him wallow — I would even say, luxuriate — in a kind of ritualized self-loathing which he seems to project outward to all of humankind. From this posture, he has made statements which I judged to be foolish and irresponsible. To my eye, it’s a more pernicious version of the medieval Christian practice of self-flagellation, or wearing coarse wool undergarments crawling with lice.
I recall Freeman Dyson warning about the writings of refugees from the Soviet Union, who Dyson felt were so saturated with the pain of their own experiences as to distort their perspectives beyond the point of usefulness.
Without taking a position on whether Dyson was right in that instance, when an author writes from an extreme emotional coloration, I find it useful to read the author with that in mind. If a man with a death wish says that the sky is falling, how should that guide my thinking about what’s best to do?
SpaceLifeForm • October 21, 2020 5:40 AM
@ Clive
Shaking my head.
That river in Egypt keeps flowing strong.
JG4 • October 21, 2020 7:09 AM
From the usual daily compendium. It looks like energy gapping wetware would be a good idea. I’ve heard that tinfoil is effective for stopping thought control beams. This approach currently is limited to dizziness and nausea, apparently with lingering damage.
The Mystery of the Immaculate Concussion
https://www.gq.com/story/cia-investigation-and-russian-microwave-attacks
The affected area is full of effluent from concentrated hog feeding operations.
A flesh-eating bacteria lurking in the ocean is killing people in the Carolinas
https://www.thestate.com/news/local/environment/article246018110.html
rrd • October 21, 2020 7:26 AM
Oops, that first quote of Clive’s should have been from 2020-10-20 (not 2020-10-10), three days after my “I Threw a Brick Through a Window” post.
rrd • October 21, 2020 9:38 AM
@ vas pup
Thanks for the great link to “The Psychology of Power and Evil”. I admire Mr. Zimbardo’s intentions and scholarship, though I’ve barely skimmed it. He is trying, which is the first and most crucial step for each of us.
Note that I have described how both our external and internal environments shape our moral choices of attitudes and behaviors, in relation to the scale of human potentialities from negative/selfish to positive/selfless: in the comments section of Bruce’s COVID-19 and Acedia post. (Yeah, it definitely needs an index.)
The primary problem and impediment in psychology is that they are only dealing with various physical symptoms that occur in human beings with respect to morality slash how and why we make our choices. Without the fundamental understanding of how morality is the single most important fundamental factor in human individual and group dynamics — (as it is an integral part of our total being) — they are like doctors who haven’t studied anatomy because they don’t believe anatomy is a science that will greatly inform their work.
That said, a person with a heart that truly seeks to lessen mankind’s misery (war being the worst of its drivers) is surely doing God’s work, and will be more likely to accept the Sufi Message of Love when it is finally presented to them. (“Blessed are the peacemakers, …”)
The stark reality is that we are all in the state of misguidance at the beginning of our lives, multiplied by whichever values our cultures inculcate in us, for better or worse. This is all saying that we all must — (once we enter adulthood) — make the conscious, deliberate, forcefully-prayerful choice to inwardly seek God’s peaceful, harmonious Will to be manifest in our being while we live, so that we will learn how to no longer cause unhappiness to others. To love someone is to want them to be happy in all ways; mammalian humans only give that love to their own pack, however their Id’s insanely inhumane reason defines its boundaries.
Not understanding how selfishness — (the root of all evil, both individually and in our groups) — is our baseline mammalian non-spiritual amoral perspective — (nearly always made worse by the cultures we grow up within) — and that we have to consciously seek to become more than — (first only with our mind but later with our soul/Id as well) — by making that internal connection with our Creator ; all this lack of fundamental understanding leaves psychologists like Newtonian physicists trying to explain Mercury’s orbital relativistic component’s effects.
As such, psychologists have no notion of a “baseline” human being. And no doctor can cure a patient if they don’t know what healthy even is.
MarkH tipped me off to the “Father of American Psychology” William James’s “The Varieties of Religious Experience”. The final two summary sections of Wikipedia’s entry on the book show his findings quite clearly support every single supposition I have presented here on Bruce’s site regarding the self-evolution of the Id/soul towards the attainment of moral perfection.
No, the Path of Love is not easy.
Yes, the effects of our global ignorance of the truths I present here should be obvious to anyone with eyes that care to see how badly people are mistreating others this whole world over, and the utter destruction wrought from their wars and persecutions and callous cruelties. And all institutions of power have obviously attracted and rewarded the most cruel and deceitful of the negative critters walking around in human form.
I don’t have Acedia. Because I care. Deeply. For every single person in my orbit, which is to say everyone whose orbit my being has careened into.
Thanks again for the great link. Mr. Zimbardo clearly cares as well. It’s an essential part of what proves us to have chosen to seek to be more than animals. Otherwise, we either end up callous to the suffering of others, or wantonly desirous of it. There is no fourth kind of path for a human being on this blessed planet.
Phaete • October 21, 2020 11:28 AM
Sidenote.
Last 2 posting went fairly well.
The posting took about 1 second to get back with a confirmation as succesful in the form of my appended post, as in old times, perhaps double as fast.
No more postings that looked like i just refreshed the page. (GET after posting got cached version?!?). Good stuff.
No service unavailable anymore when it was (supposedly) syncing CDN content with master.
Now just please give me(us) a non javascript preview.
Just us the NoScript tag in html for a seperate preview function/button.
Or any of 10 diff solutions.
Phaete • October 21, 2020 11:47 AM
@rrd,
Every single person on Earth has been harmed by Trump’s administration, and we, here, are dealing with a regime that has committed multiple crimes against humanity.
Show me.
Because as i said above, it really hasn’t harmed me one bit.
And i’m sure i’m in the collection called ‘every single person on earth’
In fact, it’s getting better every year like it has for the years since Bush.
I’m curious, what is your perspective, looking in/out from where?
Phaete • October 21, 2020 12:57 PM
Sidenote 3
nevermind sidenote 2, it’s back to its old behaviour, posting just looks like a refresh of the page; no error, no post.
CDN cowdung all over the place.
Faster content delivery at the cost of direct update/feedback.
why a CDN for just pure text? just CDN the images and make the few Kb plaintext sync directly.
rrd • October 21, 2020 1:02 PM
@ Phaete
You said:
If you disagree, i challenge you to ‘one line’ the palastina/isreal conflict that has been going on for millenia.
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the Children of God” is the result of deeply seeking to manifest the Great Command(ment) and Its Next, for upon those are the entirety of the Law and its Messengers hang.
Phaete • October 21, 2020 1:17 PM
@rrd
That answer is fair enough.
As an Orange, i think i will only agree with your Apple points in very certain specific incidents.
Lets not further disassamble the difference between 2 delicious fruits to infinity, but time for recognition and move forward.
Because i sure as Hades wouldn’t want to be in Apple country right now.
(though i’m sure some(/most?) Apples would rightly say the same thing about Oranges.)
Phaete • October 21, 2020 1:58 PM
@Anders,
The method used is Open Mail Relay.
They’re used to be a lot of those servers, which allowed you to use any email name you wished, but nowadays (30 years later) they are pretty rare.
My (consumer) ISP for example uses scripts to test your email server and if you allow open relay, it closes your email ports. This is pretty common.
Your country should not have been mentioned in the headline IMHO, The evidence just says it passed through not originated.
It was most probably someone with a business internet line making a wrong configuration.
Anders • October 21, 2020 2:10 PM
@Phaete @Clive @SpaceLifeForm @ALL
No, my information so far indicates that the hosted
virtual server was hacked [probably through some ill-coded
web app] and then gaining root access to whole server it
was used for mass mailing.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 21, 2020 2:19 PM
@ MarkH
Let me preface by saying I have ALWAYS appreciated your remarks, comments, and contributions. And especially in this case as often Hedges is left uncritically examined when it comes to his pronouncements and analysis. But in this case, if you listen to his statements starting at the 40 minute position, he sources most of his information–he is reading from prepared text. And admittedly Hedges has a tendency to proselytize or sermon-ate his talks and does reflect more of a victim-ology of sorts. But, what he is saying here is hard to dismiss and in fact shouldn’t be, this is a significant analysis and an important warning to those that are “woke” so to speak. I highly suggest you take the twenty minutes to hear for yourself–one is your opinion would be well regarded and we could certainly benefit from more than my observation on the topic.
Phaete • October 21, 2020 3:05 PM
@Anders,
No, my information so far indicates that the hosted
virtual server was hacked
Ok, the Vice article only gave me a throwaway hoster account and spoofed email header as attribution.
But i’m well aware the i in Vice is not for integrity.
SpaceLifeForm • October 21, 2020 4:19 PM
@ Anders, Phaete, Clive
It’s clear that something illegal is going on.
But, it would require complete view of email headers.
And the FBI has them by now.
Here’s the main hint.
http://www.koolibri.ee is 217.146.70.51
avalik.koolibri.ee is 185.7.252.113
Completely separate netblocks.
SpaceLifeForm • October 21, 2020 4:23 PM
@ Anders, Phaete, Clive
Bugnote: I did not type the http:// into my post above.
Anders • October 21, 2020 4:36 PM
@Phaete @Clive @SpaceLifeForm @ALL
avalik.koolibri.ee is Elkdata.ee hosting.
www is zone.ee hosting.
But our security police KaPo is also investigating.
They usually don’t deal with ordinary cyber criminals.
State sponsored attacks, especially from Russia is
whole another story, this is their main interest.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estonian_Internal_Security_Service
SpaceLifeForm • October 21, 2020 5:06 PM
@ Anders, Phaete, Clive, ALL
It sure looks like an RNC op from within the US.
Also targeted Alaska voters. Including one that lives in another state. But she received the email because she kept using same email even though she moved.
So, it looks like this campaign is targeted at Florida and Alaska, two states that could turn blue.
How do they know who to target? Via something like this:
hXXps://dmdatabases.com/databases/specialty-lists/registered-voter-mailing-list-email-list
Here is another hint that this is an RNC op.
Ever hear of a ‘URL Transfer’?
Me neither.
hXXps://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/10/20/proud-boys-emails-florida/
Enrique Tarrio, the chairman of the Proud Boys and the Florida state director of Latinos for Trump, denied involvement, saying the group operates two sites, and was increasingly migrating away from the domain used in the email campaign.
“Two weeks ago, I believe, we had Google Cloud services drop us from their platform, so then we initiated a url transfer, which is still in process,” he said in an interview. “We kind of just never used it.”
The technical data embedded in the emails do not make clear who was behind the messages. But metadata gathered from dozens of the emails pointed to the use of servers in Saudi Arabia, Estonia, Singapore and the United Arab Emirates, according to numerous analysts.
Clive Robinson • October 21, 2020 5:13 PM
@ name.withheld…, MarkH,
But, what he is saying here is hard to dismiss and in fact shouldn’t be, this is a significant analysis and an important warning to those that are “woke” so to speak.
It’s odd, but when I watched it this evening I found it resonated with my thinking in certain asspects. Especially the lack of difference between the two protaganists of the current drama Hedges was likewise discussing after thr 40min mark.
I noted to @Winter that apart from trivial differences the protagonists were in effect interchangable at the levels that realy mattered to the citizens.
Unfortunately another person decided to jump in with his usuall trollish nonsense and thus got deleated. Which in turn caused the discussion between myself and @Winter to also get rolled up…
Anyway thanks for the link, whilst as @MarkH notes it’s presentation is not to everyones taste, the content is important and tends to confirm what I’ve been thinking about for some time now. Note that although Hedges does not mention it, the issue is not just with one nation but many First World / Western Nations, and it’s realy quite disconcerting.
Clive Robinson • October 21, 2020 5:20 PM
@ Phaete,
I looked up to this man, he has given the world a lot of sanity and debunking.
Sadly “our time” comes to everyone eventually.
But as well as the debunking and sanity, he also did things with style and in a way that engaged. I do not want to call it entertainment, because it was rather more than that, but it was certainly entertaining in the way the facts came across.
Clive Robinson • October 21, 2020 5:37 PM
@ SpaceLifeForm, Anders, Phaete,
It’s clear that something illegal is going on.
Ignoring the political angle, yes they are threats that will have caused “fear, alarm, and distress” in many people. Which makes it criminal behaviour not anything covered by “free speech”.
The question of course is how to find and punish the real people behind it, not just the idiot operators that sent the emails out.
The interesting part is who’s jurisdictions prosecutions could be obtained and thus where those behind it might get extradited to, to hopefully rot away.
But of course I don’t expect any indictments to be issued unless they are “Russian” or “Chinese”.
Which means unfortunately that more likely than not, whilst much moral outrage will be expressed, the reality is the corner of the rug will be lifted and then dropped after a little deft brush work.
And so the circus will move on out of town, untill next it comes around.
Hopefully another country will actually investigate and push for extradition.
vas pup • October 21, 2020 9:06 PM
@rrd • October 21, 2020 9:38 AM
Thank you for your kind words.
After I’ve read Kevin’s Mitnick “Art of Deception” many years ago I become very strong supporter of the idea that human being is the weakest link in ANY security chain.
That is why I do posts on psychology here but usually provide security angle (just to prevent arbitrary deletion of my post by Moderator).
To the subject: we ALL have good and evil part inside of us. Circumstances (society) responsible what part is called upon, and never forget that usually our choice is not between good and evil (morality/religion provide some beacon), but rather less evil.
Only those lucky being born with silver spoon in their mouth could afford NEVER be evil, but that is only choice, but not reality. That is my humble opinion.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 21, 2020 9:15 PM
@ Clive
From a security stand point, rate this one an 11 on a scale of 1 to 10.
I get there by using Hedges’ and Chomsky’s analysis. We should all be focusing on the true threats and not the theatre that surrounds it. Again, I’ve said recently that the President has become irrelevant in the matters concerned. This IS a hair on fire moment.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 21, 2020 9:19 PM
@ Clive
Hedges views went from 3K on 19 Oct to nearly 30K in two days–that means people are being directed to this video. I hope at least 100K see it.
RIP james • October 21, 2020 11:54 PM
@Phaete I just randomly opened captain disillusion’s channel today and came to know about it. Though he has died let’s keep skepticism alive. As privacy minded individuals we should stand against personalised feeds which have brought conspiracies and falacies into mainstream.
In my personal opinion privacy is important to keep rationality and truth alive. Do you agree?
JonKnowsNothing • October 22, 2020 12:48 AM
@All
re: mutations in COVID-19
COVID-19 mutates frequently and most of the mutations have little or no effect on how the virus works or infects hosts. The primary mutation is D614G which the current global strain.
As the virus collects genetic fragments and undergoes natural mutations there are several of note. Some mutations arise spontaneously in different parts of the world. Some mutations drop out and are later reacquired.
None of them have made any significant change to how the virus works but are indicators about how effective vaccines and antibody treatments may be.
N439K started in Scotland where it is now extinct due to the lock down. The same variant is currently circulating in Europe. The N439K variant affects the binding of the spike protein in a way that may inhibit the action of antibodies.
There are 22 variants that have similar properties that may lead to immune escape preventing antibodies from attaching to the virus.
There are 7 of note: (list differs depending on source)
1, N439K
2, Y508H
3, N234Q
4, A475V
5, L452R
6, F490L
7, V493A
Winter • October 22, 2020 1:51 AM
@Clive
“I noted to @Winter that apart from trivial differences the protagonists were in effect interchangable at the levels that realy mattered to the citizens.”
I indeed missed these comments. I do not want to enter in another troll fight (one way this political climate suppresses free and open discussions).
But I can make my general point against defaitism with an old quote from a Dutch politician:
“The margins of politics are narrow, but these narrow margins are the difference between despair and hope (and the difference between a downward and upward spiral).”
SpaceLifeForm • October 22, 2020 1:58 AM
@ JonKnowsNothing, ALL
hXXps://www.cleveland.com/coronavirus/2020/10/first-confirmed-case-of-coronavirus-reinfection-in-us-casts-doubt-on-immunity-protection.html
A 25-year-old Nevada man tested positive for COVID-19 in April and again in June, separated by two negative tests, according to a case study published Monday in the Lancet. The man was infected with two different strains of the coronavirus, the study said.
hXXps://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(20)30764-7/fulltext#%20
The patient had two positive tests for SARS-CoV-2, the first on April 18, 2020, and the second on June 5, 2020, separated by two negative tests done during follow-up in May, 2020. Genomic analysis of SARS-CoV-2 showed genetically significant differences between each variant associated with each instance of infection. The second infection was symptomatically more severe than the first.
SpaceLifeForm • October 22, 2020 2:48 AM
@ name, ALL
re the Chris Hedges diatribe. I’ve watched 20 minutes so far.
While I agree with most of his points, especially regarding fascism, I believe he is in Despair himself.
To which I quote Winston Churchill:
“Never, ever ever ever ever give up.”
To those US voters that have not voted yet:
Wear a mask. Vote.
This is your final Exam.
There will be no Incomplete, no makeup test date.
It is NOW.
This is your final Exam.
MarkH • October 22, 2020 3:44 AM
@name.withheld:
I value your kind affirmations. I try to connect with some kind of truth, and to offer comments which I hope will shed a little light by which truth may be discerned. If that’s sometimes useful to a reader or two, it’s most satisfying to me.
I have rather neurotic horror of watching internet videos … it’s just not what Mark does. If Hedges has published those thoughts in writing, or there’s a transcript of the video, I’ll take a look.
==========================
There’s a notion I’ve been kicking around for some time, which I think of as “index of expertise,” which is a scalar function of person, subject matter, and time.
Here’s how to evaluate the function: at the specified time, count the number of people whose expertise on the specified subject matter is equal or superior to that of the specified person. [Whether to include experts who are deceased or fallen into dotage, whose expertise is still available (in books, for example) is a sort of “implementation decision.”] The index is the log base 10 of that count of experts, lesser indices meaning greater expertise.
For example, when Bruce Schneier writes about strengths and weakness of symmetric ciphers and cryptographic hash functions, I guess his index to be somewhere between 3 and 2.
I suspect that with respect to certain aspects of information leakage via radio frequency emissions, Clive has an index of 2 or even 1, and I’m deeply grateful when he shares that expertise with us.
I mention this, because most of us enjoy discussing / pontificating / bloviating about philosophy, world systems, sociology, international relations, politics et cetera where our indices are in the range of 5 to 7+ (though I’m sure that some of us very mistakenly imagine our Deep Insightfulness to be better than that).
In other words, the odds of our adding anything worthwhile that hasn’t already been said are mighty long … and almost all of this is outside the ambit of Bruce’s blog, as I understand that to be.
For these reasons, although I briefly touch on these matters from time to time here, I think it best that I not to get involved in discussions of them on the schneier blog.
As I wrote on another thread, almost everybody who thinks s/he has made a valuable philosophical discovery is in fact rediscovering what brilliant and learned people already published decades or even centuries prior — usually, with greater care, coherence and clarity.
The crypto equivalent are the noobs (I’m guessing, hundreds per year) who re-invent the stream cipher, imagining that they’ve found the holy grail of cryptography.
==========================
@SpaceLifeForm:
I’m with you.
Counsels of despair may find some receptive audience: if the situation is hopeless, then I don’t have to do anything to correct it! Yippee!!!
It seems to me that Hedges has (probably without being conscious of it) cast himself as a prophet in the tradition of Abrahamic religions: the people have descended so far into corruption and impiety, that the vengeful Almighty will smite every one us, and it’s too late to escape our terrible damnation!
Yawn.
SpaceLifeForm • October 22, 2020 4:27 AM
@ Anders, Phaete, Clive, ALL
Attribution is hard. People are stupid.
What people have done, is they gave up too much PII (Personally Identifying Information) online over time. And other psychoprofile information. And many are registered voters.
And the attackers correlate the information.
This is a multi-way dataset join operation.
Consider the voter table (name, physical address, maybe party affiliation).
No problem getting that data. Note there is no email address there.
Next, you have a phyaddr-party table (physical address, likely party affiliation).
Next, you have a email-phyaddr table (emailaddy, physical address).
And, lastly, an email-psycho table (emailaddy, various psychoattributes).
This is basic relational database stuff. Hopefully you can see how the dots can be connected.
The question then becomes, ok, I can see the voter table. But where does the other 3 tables get their rows?
The phyaddr-party table is based upon historical voting data. I.E., if your address is X, then Y percent in that area vote for party Z. Zip code works well.
The data in the other two tables is where the stupidity comes in.
The email-phyaddr table is filled in via business relationship data. Example would be signing up at Amazon, ordering, and having it delivered. Note that this table has exploded this year due to Covid-19.
The email-psycho table is filled in via stupidity on social media.
The main example here would be Facebook trolling the user, and seeing what the user interacts with. Other angles include Twitter re-tweets. Google search for items to buy. What the user is interested in or not, likely party, sex, age, etc. This is the Cambridge Analytica stuff.
So, the attacker combines the data in the 4 tables. and basically comes up with:
emailaddy, phyaddr, likely party, psychoattributes
And then they target via email.
In order for this to work, it requires the email-phyaddr table.
Which means the person targeted must have a business relationship with some US business that delivers stuff. Or at minimum, had the physical address to mail a bill.
This is why I say this must be a US based attack.
US Citizens are not likely to be doing business with Iran and Russia.
Iran and Russia are not likely to be able to obtain customer-business relationship data from, for example, Amazon.
The call is coming from inside the house.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 22, 2020 7:15 AM
@ MarkH
Don’t want to contribute or cause a neurotic trigger event and will make due consideration in the future; the link to the transcript is:
hZZps://scheerpost.com/2020/10/19/chris-hedges-the-politics-of-cultural-despair
Regards and respect
Singapore Noodles • October 22, 2020 7:28 AM
@MarkH
Re: on the index
One who really lived by your ideal – the (great) Japanese mathematician Kiyoshi Oka was hired as a professor. The graduate students eagerly came to his appointed lecture hours but he was never there. After some time polite (this being Japan) inquiries were raised. Oka, puzzled, said there are books in the library, when I have something new and worthwhile I will come to the class to present it.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 22, 2020 7:36 AM
@ MarkH
Oops…the link correctly transcribed is:
hZZps://scheerpost.com/2020/10/19/chris-hedges-the-politics-of-cultural-despair/
Evidently the terminating / was missing
rrd • October 22, 2020 7:57 AM
@ ALL
Despair is the realm of the enemy of love. It dictates that nothing we do matters, all is lost, etc. etc, but it is only another tactic to lead us away from loving hopefulness in not only what God can do, but we can do in loving service to one and all.
“This is not the Dergah of the hopeless.”
We take in one and all, for we were all lost at one point, and count ourselves lucky to have been found.
When one honestly tries to love God with all their being and then to love all their neighbors as themself, there is only knowledge of God’s Love being reflected back upon us, as we live in wonder at all that is still possible. We have no fear nor grief because we know that we may have fallen short along the path but at least we are counted among those who have tried, that we have always gotten back up and again tried to be better.
And all the magic we have banked with our selfless generosity, kindness and compassion is at the ready, ready to be spent by the universe to effect the impossible, all in service to the establishment of “On Earth as it is in Heaven”.
Anyone despairing of anything is not a person aligned with the Tao, but — Lo! — we live in times where the blind are oft leading the blind.
“Their minds are confused with confusion.” –Bob Marley
When rooted in the truth, one does not welcome death, but neither are we afraid of it. Rooted in gratefulness in these times of plenty, we are ever girded by our Lord to be prepared for circumstances that will shock the ignorant out of their complacency.
Clive Robinson • October 22, 2020 8:51 AM
@ Anders, Phaete, SpaceLifeForm, ALL,
Re ZDNet article,
“US blames Iran for spoofed proud-boys emails threatening democrat voters”
Why am I not in the least surprised the US authorities would say one of their Orwellian “four cyber-existential Nations” as a knee jerk response…
Then I saw, “Mandiant Threat Intelligence” and knew where the “Government” excuse had come from. Their Senior Director of Analysis, John Hultquist… Apparently told ZDNet.
“The information operations we have seen from Iran to date have been about amplifying pro-Iranian messages and pushing a desired narrative out into the world that’s anti-Saudi or ant-Israeli or pro-JCPOA,”
A very clear “On Message” political statment, which should secure a few more millions of tax payer money come trotting in their door.
Hopefully Estonia will carry out their own independent investigation, free from such considerations.
If they do I suspect that they are likely to find “The call is coming from inside the house.” as @SpaceLifeForm has so euphemisticaly described it, is true.
As I’ve indicated in the past the UK had issues and it was investigated by the police authorities. It looked at first like the money involved had come from Russia and much noise was made in the press about it. Then as the Police dug deeper they found that the money was actually US money routed through Russia… As this started to become publically known, the then UK Primeminister Mrs May, had the plug pulled on the Police investigation…
Thus it fell on others to finish the story, and they pointed to one of the three families trying to gain control of the GOP. Who also still had interests in Cambridge Analytica…
As has been noted before with cyber-activities “attribution is hard”. Further where that is the case people use it to hide within. Many think Cambridge Analytica is dead, if it is, it is only by that name, it’s purpose still marches on amd none of the figures involved with it at executive level in the UK appear to have been touched in any way. So whilst the name has died, the mind and body still are free, thus the purpose and mission probably still continue.
So watch out for “smoke and mirrors”, “False Flags”, “Red Flags” and similar. Atribution is hard, thus hiding intent easy, which means others are easily tempted.
What is it they say about fools, dogs and vomit?
Anders • October 22, 2020 10:29 AM
@Phaete @Clive @SpaceLifeForm @ALL
I think FBI was forced to come out quickly
with someone responsible and they chose
someone who is plausible and is reasonable
harmless. Like Iran.
Can anyone get at their hand some on those
email with full headers?
JonKnowsNothing • October 22, 2020 10:34 AM
@SpaceLifeForm
re: reinfections & genetically significant differences between each variant associated
disclaimer: I am not a genetics expert and some of the research is a deep dive.
There are @24 currently documented cases of re-infection. In each a slightly different variant was detected.
Because not every person gets a full genome analysis at the time of illness and a confirmed PCR negative test after recovery (vs antigen testing), there are more “likely but not proven” cases.
The base change in the genome clad is D614G. Trailing after that are the other variations. These are divided into A B C branches and a whole lot of other nodes as they detect new differences.
My interpretation of the research simplified it looks like this:
D614G-A-1-2-3-4-5-6
D614G-A-1-2-3-4-5-6-7
D614G-A-1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8
D614G-B-1-2-3-4-5-6
D614G-B-1-2-3-4-5-6-7
D614G-B-1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8
D614G-C-1-2-3-4-5-6
D614G-C-1-2-3-4-5-6-7
D614G-C-1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8
Some of the re-infections appeared to be within the same main branch: eg 2 versions of B.
D614G-B-1-2-3-4-5-6
D614G-B-1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8
There are a number of pre-prints in the pipeline on this topic. Not all of the supporting graphs are available. Much of the information is fine detail analysis of the chemical bonds and proteins.
Phaete • October 22, 2020 12:36 PM
@Anders @Clive @SpaceLifeForm @ALL
Can anyone get at their hand some on those email with full headers?
The article from Proofpoint is showing most of them.
Set one came via a compromised Saudi insurance company’s infrastructure.
Set two came via an Estonian publisher.
(not publishing IP’s or names, before you know it you are doxxing someone)
The information of any networks it went through before those can be stripped with mailer/tools they used on the last visible compromised network.
So yes, attrib is hard.
They came from left means they came from left as last seen, but no info how they got to the left.
MarkH • October 22, 2020 12:56 PM
@name.withheld:
Thanks, for taking the time to find and share a link to the text. I’ll work my way through as much of it as I can bear.
After a very quick skim, I note:
• It looks like an attempt to translate a primal scream into grammatical English sentences.
• Verbose! That boy needs an editor. A senior guy at Time magazine once said that every writer needs an editor, offering as an example that Hitler’s own title for his book was “Four and One-Half Years’ Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice” before his publisher suggested “My Struggle.”
• I’d lay 12:1 odds that there’s not a fresh idea or perspective in the whole thing.
• I can write a diatribe justifying any position I choose, if I construct it with sloppy propositions. At the start of the second paragraph: “The United States is a shadow of itself.” What self? Consistent with my Abrahamic prophet diagnosis, he seems to suggest that there’s some better U.S. hiding somewhere … perhaps in history? Make America Great Again??? Rubbish.
By way of background, I have been blessed by closeness to people with a large variance in their “political orientations” ranging including rock-ribbed conservativism, typical 20th century American liberalism, Ayn-Randian libertarian dogma, pacifism, burn-it-all-down anti-capitalism etc.
Perhaps because my emission spectrum has always shown the brightest lines in the “liberal” region, I’m especially irritated by what I regard inexcusably foolish strains among the liberal Americans of my time. To offer just a few examples:
• rejection of moderates because they’re not radical enough, which helped to give us G W Bush and Trump
• rejection of nuclear fission power because it feels yucky, even though it’s much better for public health than burning coal, and could have reduced atmospheric CO2 by many billions of tons
• taking public pride in refusal to vaccinate one’s children, because vaccines come from the corrupt “system”
• nauseating defenses and justifications of the Soviet Union’s hideous violations of human rights
• nauseating defenses of Putin’s post-Soviet Russia, because the Wicked West always hates and persecutes poor little innocent victim Russia
• dogmatic belief that the U.S.A. is the worst, most horrible, most corrupt and destructive entity that has ever been: America really is the Great Satan
I could go on, but why bother?
I call this “idiot liberalism,” and I have been exposed to seemingly endless hours of harangues along these lines.
If you visualize millions of schoolchildren in Communist countries sitting at their desks with eyes glazed over, as their teachers recite Marxist indoctrination for the 100th time, you might have some sense of how this kind of dreck lands in my spirit.
Sherman Jay • October 22, 2020 1:43 PM
@MarkH, @name.withheld, et.al.,
Right, Left, Centrist, Communist, Libertarian: those tags are immaterial to the need for us to achieve security based in kowledge, fact and logic as opposed to propaganda.
Our greatest ability to recognize and reject propaganda is the ability to research and evaluate using critical thinking skills. Bruce points this out innumerable times. In today’s IT and socio-political worlds, there is so much deceit being broadcast and logical fallacies are routinely used to mask lies. (just read articles about the ‘wonderfulness’ of u.s. broadband 5G hype to the public).
If you learn Chris Hedges’ background, you will see he has breadth and depth and experience. His apparent despair shows his concern for our insecurities and is an expansion and explanation of the rampant attacks on so many aspects of most people’s lives and the resultant insecurity and vulnerability that many of us feel. I find his writings (pulitzer prize winner) always provide fresh perspective and insight into the ‘already known’ subjects he examines.
There is significant evidence that the ‘threatening E-mails’ being blamed on Iran are propaganda. For there are a number of tech articles that not only examine the possible sources and routings, but also the fact that the FBI official has a politically motivated record of ‘pointing to the usual suspects’: Iran, Russia, etc. To confirm this or establish it as propaganda, we need to gain a sufficient breadth and depth of knowledge of ‘headers’, likely routings, available tools, etc.
Stay safe.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 22, 2020 2:16 PM
@ MarkH
<
blockquote>Perhaps because my emission spectrum has always shown the brightest lines in the “liberal” region, I’m especially irritated by what I regard inexcusably foolish strains among the liberal Americans of my time.Well said, I like the poetic and technical distinctions melded in to a psychological and political flavor to your perceptions. And, I agree; the left, if there really is one, only seems capable of performative art, and is so ineffectual and woefully ill prepared to “reach” an area of general and genuine social concern is embarrassing. Most of the time I dismiss it as out right buffoonery and unwitting malice–that’s my generous side.
See, your contribution is significant in the sense that you sussed something out that helped me, and maybe others, in setting a more important critique–the ability to mount a formidable challenge to problems in the large. Most people should already know this and the primary elections, once again, should have lead others to this conclusion. Hedges missed the opportunity to be more specific about an answer other than the three choices he expressed.
Thank you.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 22, 2020 2:17 PM
@ MODERATOR — REPOSTED DUE TO MARKUP ERROR — APOLOGIES
@ MarkH
Perhaps because my emission spectrum has always shown the brightest lines in the “liberal” region, I’m especially irritated by what I regard inexcusably foolish strains among the liberal Americans of my time.
Well said, I like the poetic and technical distinctions melded in to a psychological and political flavor to your perceptions. And, I agree; the left, if there really is one, only seems capable of performative art, and is so ineffectual and woefully ill prepared to “reach” an area of general and genuine social concern is embarrassing. Most of the time I dismiss it as out right buffoonery and unwitting malice–that’s my generous side.
See, your contribution is significant in the sense that you sussed something out that helped me, and maybe others, in setting a more important critique–the ability to mount a formidable challenge to problems in the large. Most people should already know this and the primary elections, once again, should have lead others to this conclusion. Hedges missed the opportunity to be more specific about an answer other than the three choices he expressed.
Thank you.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 22, 2020 2:29 PM
@ JonKnowsNothing
You may have inspired me to take the Wolfram modeling, extend the genomic, epidemiological and phylogeny sets and build or join the pathogenic and generational chains to form a very interesting picture. It may lead to the ability to predict the rate and type of change within the codon/allele mappings. For example, generational viruses in the RNA class in a homomorphic environment can be 10K generations in a year. It is not well understood when large reservoirs and infections populations (heterogeneity) exist if mutation rates are greater and more diverse and represent a larger long-term threat or not…
I’ll have to get back to ya…
Anders • October 22, 2020 2:43 PM
@ALL
More nice twitter stuff.
hxxps://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/10/hacker-says-he-correctly-guessed-trumps-twitter-password-it-was-maga2020/
SpaceLifeForm • October 22, 2020 3:22 PM
@ Clive, ALL
Walking OPSEC FAIL!
One does not need an IQ of 197 and 15% of the password!
It requires zero hacking skills.
It cannot even be considered a hack.
I wonder how many guessed the password on the first try? Or the second guess?
The password was ‘maga2020!’
SpaceLifeForm • October 22, 2020 4:05 PM
@ Anders, Phaete, Clive, ALL
Attribution is hard.
What the media is saying, is not accurate.
As James Clapper noted last night, in IC one can expend a lot of time parsing.
So, yesterday evening, was the hastily arranged press conference. You can find it on youtube. It is not long.
The main hack, Ratcliff, spun a tale. Implying Iran and Russia behind the Proudboys emails.
But, this is where ONE MUST PARSE CAREFULLY.
Ratcliff mentioned that Iran and Russia obtained voter data.
Big deal. Anyone can do that. So can China and North Korea.
But, one must watch the presser, and note what FBI did NOT say.
Main point here without touching on other ‘stuff’ is this:
The FBI did NOT sign off on this.
Media headlines implying so, are false.
SpaceLifeForm • October 22, 2020 4:32 PM
@ MarkH, name, ALL
It is important that one avoids ‘labels’.
Such as ‘liberal’ or ‘conservative’.
Labels are used by those that wish to divide us. To compartmentalize.
It is important to remember the first rule of Marxism:
“Never join any club that would have you as a member”
Clive Robinson • October 22, 2020 5:34 PM
@ name.withheld…, SpaceLifeForm,
MARKUP ERROR — APOLOGIES
You are not the only person to see this particular problem
On the off chance you remember can you say what it was that you typed in?
When it happened to me I was able to ‘back button’ and saw the “b” in the closing “/blockquote” had been capitalized to “/Blockquote”.
rrd • October 22, 2020 5:43 PM
@ SpaceLifeForm
Your “Marxism” quote got a chuckle out of me. Well done, indeed.
But, you said:
Labels are used by those that wish to divide us.
Is a liar not a liar?
Is a rapist not a rapist?
Is a Nazi not a Nazi?
Every attitude and behavior we choose to manifest is, in reality, us painting our own selves with the labels our attitudes and behaviors deserve.
The key is to know the truth of the label one paints another with, to do so justly, without enmity, and with the merciful hope that they will overcome any negative labels they currently deserve. Such honesty, however, requires that we first self-evolve ourselves out of any negative labels we chose to paint ourselves with in our past, either ignorantly or deliberately.
Appropot of whatever here, my favorite “Marxism” ends with:
“We’ve already determined what you are, now we’re just haggling over the price.”
Some people sell their humanity for a small price, and their virtue and clarity fly right out the door with it.
SpaceLifeForm • October 22, 2020 5:49 PM
@ ALL
DOH!
If you are poor, you likely have to live in crowded conditions, in old buildings with poor ventilation.
The next 6 months in northern hemisphere will suck.
hXXps://news.yahoo.com/cdc-study-coronavirus-thrives-where-poverty-reigns-170025285.html
Clive Robinson • October 22, 2020 6:01 PM
@ MarkH, name.withheld…,
“The United States is a shadow of itself.” What self?
It’s been said that the last time the US felt good about it’s self, was back in 1969 when a fellow from a one horse town in Ohio took “one small step…”
But the fact is the US had been in effect in an extended grief for a dream started nearly a decade befor, a dream of a man who was to die in his prime in texas at the hands of an assassin.
As the dream closed, and the world turned, the US got draged deeper into a violent foreign policy played out thousands of miles away but seen bright on TV every night. But closer to home civil unrest about the inequality of how people were treated broke into full visability as did the violence by the “guard labour” who just like that in South Africa enjoyed breaking skulls with battons, knowing full well that they were immune to consequences.
Many long myopicaly for the times that pre date the dream that appeared to end it all. That is they long for a pink ribbon tied box with the 1950’s in it.
Sadly they do not realise what the 1950’s were realy all about and what foundations were being layed for the future in that period.
It is the fault not just of the US Education system but many national education systems that history is taught as a form of “feel good propaganda”. Those that lived through the times and those historians who research the past from original source mayerials, see beyond the “rose tint” to what things were realy like, and in many respects nobody in their right mind would want to see them come back.
SpaceLifeForm • October 22, 2020 11:35 PM
@ Clive, JonKnowsNothing, ALL
I would not have suspected that turtles could get Covid-19.
Scroll down in the article, and check the pic.
hXXps://www.cnn.com/2020/10/22/politics/mitch-mcconnell-bruised-hands/index.html
WmG • October 23, 2020 12:28 AM
@ Clive @ All
It seems in hindsight that the shadows that are shrinking the U. S., to change the metaphor slightly, began in 1947, with the creation of the CIA. It represented a capstone of postwar triumphalism, paranoia and destructive hubris. Could it have been done better — not relying on Nazis and old Tzarist White Russians? Forced to follow laws? Maybe.
But with no constraints, no requirements of honest accountability, well, we know the sort of things that happened. Even Eisenhower got taken for a ride when DCIA Dulles got him to approve the Bay of Pigs. Another product of those good old days, was the nuclear arms race. Here in the U. S. we were told a happy story about how we avoided war.
But decades go by, archives open, documents are released, a historian goes to work. And now, there is a new book on the Cuban Missile Crisis that sheds much light on many issues involving security. It really rips away the rose-tinted glasses of feel-good “history.”
I have not finished the book yet, but it’s good, so far.
Here’s a link to a review:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/10/12/the-day-nuclear-war-almost-broke-out
Clive Robinson • October 23, 2020 12:33 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm,
If you are poor, you likely have to live in crowded conditions, in old buildings with poor ventilation.
Likewise your working conditions.
But have you thought about “Sick Building Syndrome”(SBS) that almost always comes about in those sealed glass bricks they call “office blocks” where the middle classes get educated and work?
It realy first came to public attention back in 1976 with Legionnaires’ disease in Philadelphia. But in 1984 The WHO recognised in a report that 30% of new or remodeled buildings suffered from the poor air quality that underlies the syndrome.
It’s mostly caused by lack of ventilation alowing the build up of bacteria, molds, and the outgassing of construction materials and paints and even evaporation of cleaning and other chemicals. In particular heating, and ventilation (HVAC) systems are found to be at fault, often with poor maintenance being a significant factor as the changing of HEPA filters and the like is seen as a reducable expense.
The lack of venilation is usually down to a money saving excersise where those in charge of the buildings do not wish to pay to have the heat losses of ventilation, but rather recycle warm moist air where both bacteria and molds thrive and outgassing becomes concentrated.
In the UK there has been a trend that started in West London for the conversion of older “Brutilist style” office blocks in to multiple housing units or hotels, some of which had been associated with sick building syndrome thus become vacant and unused.
SARS-2003 was and the annual Norovirus and increase in colds and flu are associated with SBS and can spread very very rapidly in Hospitals with similar ventilation issues.
So yes it’s not just going to be the poor in inner cities but also the asperational middle classes who buy up these over priced converted housing units thinking that being closer to work thus not needing to commute is “being green”.
Singular Nodals • October 23, 2020 12:44 AM
Aha! Perhaps this explains the odd 20-30% of posts here.
“Someone used OpenAI’s GPT-3 text-generating software to write a string of posts on Reddit, …”
theregister.com/2020/10/09/reddit_gpt3_bot/
miss information • October 23, 2020 12:51 AM
misinformation campaigns
cyber.fsi.stanford.edu/io/news/twitter-takedown-october-2020
cyber.fsi.stanford.edu/io/news/twitter-takedown-iran-october-2020
Graphika Report: House Intelligence Committee Hearing on Misinformation and Conspiracy Theories
graphika.com/
SpaceLifeForm • October 23, 2020 12:59 AM
@ Clive, Anders, Weather
Emoji and UTF are like malloc() and free().
Not your friends. Fingerprinting.
So many standards, all to avoid. Prefer 7 bit ASCII.
I got to the first link via second link via third link.
It appears a length of a string depends on how and when you look at it.
If you give it a funny look, it may morph before your eyes!
You know, observation and quantum state. I kid. Or do I?
Or if a cut and paste from a GUI. Or a screenshot. Ask Rudy.
You can see the problem if you count the characters below in Bio. Still off by 10.
Even if the emoji takes 4 bytes, that math does not compute. Because all of the other characters can be pure 7-bit ASCII. Apparently, they were not. Fingerprinting via INVISIBLE SEPARATOR.
Bugnote: bookmark this one Dano!
hXXps://www.soscisurvey.de/tools/view-chars.php
hXXps://hsivonen.fi/string-length/
Know in Advance or Compute When Needed?
This introduces a notable question in the design space: Should a given type of length quantity be eagerly computed when the string is created? Or should the length be computed when someone asks for it? Or should it be computed when someone asks for it and then automatically stored on the string object so that it’s available immediately if someone asks for it again?
hXXps://www.vice.com/en/article/epd4x7/twitter-trump-hack-evidence
But multiple security experts including those who track how Twitter accounts are compromised, as well as a review of the material that Gevers provided to Dutch and other media to corroborate his claim, throw doubt onto the hacking claim.
TechCrunch published a screenshot allegedly showing Gevers’ access to Trump’s account. The “Bio” section of the screenshotted profile reads “45th President of the United States,” which, as the screenshot says, is 46 characters long.
But that is not Trump’s bio. Trump’s bio reads “45th President of the United States 🇺🇸,” including the American flag emoji. This is his bio now, and was also his bio on October 15, around the time the alleged hack is supposed to have taken place, according to the Internet Archive. When entered as a bio into Twitter, that phrase with the emoji is 50 characters in length. Jeffrey Knockel from the Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto first highlighted this apparent inconsistency to Motherboard. (Motherboard verified this by altering one of our own Twitter profiles).
Clive Robinson • October 23, 2020 2:01 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm, Anders, Winter, Wael
It appears a length of a string depends on how and when you look at it.
Yup, that’s the fun started by Internationalization in *nix.
You might remember under the older software this blog ran on, @Wael and @Ratio were playing around with sending messages using non printing characters.
The use of “strict 7bit” was once a recommendation for EMail, back last century, but people wanted more visual appeal so 8bit then heaven alone knows how many bits came up… It feels like hardly a week goes by without someone comming up with an excuse to add yet another glyph usually not an allograph of a grapheme to a character set[1]. In effect a new “Devil’s Playground” has been opened up way beyond the Wingdings dingbats Microsoft came up with for Win 3.1.
The real underlying problem is the “many to many” translations which we tend to see of graphemes in the likes of PDFs.
Some idiot thinks that by using two near identical font sets they can in effect “watermark” a document (or make a canary out of it). This of course blows up when the receipients system is missing one of the font sets and so substitutes a “standard” set instead…
It was once remarked that “A cunning idea is the mark of the truly unknowing”[2], personaly I prefere the older and more discriptive Shakespearian remark of “Hoist by his own petard” meaning that such a clever/cunning idea had blown up in his face… There realy should be some special place in hell made for such people that invent mainly usless glyphs.
[1] That is not a variation on an alphabetical or phonem symbol but a pictogram such as an ice cream cone or worse.
[2] Made much fun of in the TV series “Blackadder” where the resident turnip head Baldrick –played by Tony Robinson– had the catch phrase of a “Cunning Plan”. It came up in all sorts of different ways, perhaps my favorite was,
“I’ve got a plan so cunning you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel”
So when you see “Boris Johnson has a cunning plan” as a news item title –that he calls a “moonshot”– you know just what a disaster the journalist has realized it is.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 23, 2020 2:12 AM
@ Clive
There is little in the way of a syllabus or form of pedagogy that can bring the past forward in a meaningful way. I am amazed at how often a history is given (scholarly and academically or first or second person biography) and in time new information that had been “overlooked” comes to the fore. Not unlike the manner classification systems work to prevent disclosure, and what governments consider state secrets in need of “protection”.
There is little I remember of disclosures that were revelatory to the degree that I said to myself–OMG. Snowden, in 2013 was the last time it hit me–but is wasn’t the “secrets” it was the scope and breadth of what the state had decided was okie dokie. Was a member of the NSA IATF until the early `00s, the white hat side of the building (and don’t tell anyone I’m a grey-hat).
@ WmG — Said in my best Northridge High School voice, “Oh my god!” Having the New Yorker as a reference point for a book–now that is so upper-crusty round here. My southwestern drawl didn’t make it out in time. :^)
(I’m emoji intolerant, but not anti-emoji)
Next you’ll be referring us to the London Review of Books, LeMonde, DerSpeigel and the Financial Times. An air is about the place, a haughty and gallant bunch with too much good sense.
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 23, 2020 2:30 AM
@ Sherman Jay
Your statement respecting the gravitas Hedges wields in getting to what others are feeling, the name of his talk is apropos; The Politics of Cultural Despair. And you bring it full circle, in a prosaic symmetry that befits the subject of the talk.
Have come to find a host or raft of new material; printed, book, av media and the like with the same themes running through them. Maybe a new word: Neo-crypto-kleptocratic-theonomic-fascism.
I think I hear the OED police coming towards the gate–they’re in a hurry–pens drawn and loaded.
MarkH • October 23, 2020 2:37 AM
@name.withheld:
On the best days, our conversations here can expand shared understand by some small increment. That’s why I invest time, and I often learn from assertions and questions in the comments.
@SpaceLifeForm:
Among the variants of Marxist thought, the ideas of Julius Marx make the most sense to me!
@Clive:
The Blackadder reference brightened my morning a bit, thanks
SpaceLifeForm • October 23, 2020 3:58 AM
@ Clive, Anders, Weather
Note that I did a cut and paste when assembling the above post, and the Flag shows. For me it does.
So, I cut and pasted from the above post the characters in the Bio between the double quotes, including the comma after the flag. But not the double quotes.
And then I pasted into the first link above.
My results: 39 characters, 45 bytes
I then went to original article at Vice, and cut and pasted from there.
Same results.
So, it appears that the 6 extra bytes are due to the flag emoji.
6 extra bytes. 39 equals the obvious 37 plus the flag emoji which is one Grapheme Cluster, which is actually 2 code points (call them characters).
Which if you mouse over the results box, slowly over the flag, you can see that the flag is actually 2 separate Unicode characters, each requiring 3 bytes but using 4.
Which says it is not UTF-8. Or at least not being interpreted that way. Cut and paste may be doing something too.
That is, each half of the flag is using an extra 3 bytes.
Now, here is where it gets really curious.
Try this: Cut the above including the double quotes on each end.
Past into the website above.
I get 41 characters, 51 bytes. The off by ten!
What happened?
Those are not the double quotes your grandmother used to love!
They are emoji!
I want everyone to be consistent, so I vote for UTF-8!
Further reading (date is ISO8601 order):
hXXps://www.joelonsoftware.com/2003/10/08/the-absolute-minimum-every-software-developer-absolutely-positively-must-know-about-unicode-and-character-sets-no-excuses/
😀
Winter • October 23, 2020 4:49 AM
@Clive
” but people wanted more visual appeal so 8bit”
Not quite. Many people want to write in their home language, which requires more than ASCII can deliver. Americans are a minority on Earth and on the internet.
SpaceLifeForm • October 23, 2020 5:50 AM
@ Clive, Anders, Winter, Wael
Re-parse please.
Note that TechCrunch saw the bio as 46 characters without the flag emoji.
Vice saw it as 50 characters with the flag emoji, **according to Twitter***, after a cut-and-paste from Internet Archive.
That is a difference of 4 CHARACTERS, not 2 CHARACTERS as I see via the website above.
It’s all about the Interpretation of the random bitstring!
TechCrunch published a screenshot allegedly showing Gevers’ access to Trump’s account. The “Bio” section of the screenshotted profile reads “45th President of the United States,” which, as the screenshot says, is 46 characters long.
But that is not Trump’s bio. Trump’s bio reads “45th President of the United States 🇺🇸,” including the American flag emoji. This is his bio now, and was also his bio on October 15, around the time the alleged hack is supposed to have taken place, according to the Internet Archive. When entered as a bio into Twitter, that phrase with the emoji is 50 characters in length.
hXXps://engineering.linecorp.com/en/blog/the-7-ways-of-counting-characters/
The good thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from.
😕
Winter • October 23, 2020 8:51 AM
“TechCrunch published a screenshot allegedly showing Gevers’ access to Trump’s account. ”
When we look at the track records of Trump, the WH, and Gevers’, whom do we trust more to speak the truth? And remember, evidence is NOT a report in a newspaper, that is hearsay.
IIRC, and correct me if I am wrong, since 2016, the WH has spoken the truth only by accident. On the other hand, I have yet to encounter a lie from Gevers (who has cracked Trump’s Twitter account before).
So, what should I trust? Facts or Alternate Facts?
Anders • October 23, 2020 9:06 AM
@SpaceLifeForm
I confirm.
My result – currently exactly 50 characters.
45th President of the United States of America🇺🇸
46 usual ascii bytes + 4 double bytes, that encodes
flag. They are interpreted by my software as 4
so called “characters”, but in reality flag is encoded
via two 4-byte entity.
D83C DDFA D83C DDF8
Anders • October 23, 2020 9:40 AM
@SpaceLifeForm
Here you can see different encoding options.
hxxp://www.iemoji.com/view/emoji/176/flags/united-states
Bur we must forget “characters”, different software interprets
this flag part differently. Some say it’s 4 char, some say 2 char.
In reality the whole string is 46+8 bytes=54 bytes.
Singapore Noodles • October 23, 2020 10:10 AM
@Groucho, Harpo et al, nostalgés, and my favorite Marxians and/or pseudo-Marxians
The 1950s nostalgia spoken of above was already a thing by 1880 or so, by which time the assault on the Constitution was well under way, fostered by, among others, you got it, the Big Tech of the day. A fruit of that original nay-sayer trend and one of its ablest exponents was W. Wilson. Even as a primary school tyke in the late 1950s one could feel that natural teleology had been emptied out and replaced by will to power. Somehow, I know not how, the aims in terms of which the Framers acted still were alive, and are today, though constantly dying.
For a great nostalgia trip, consider Dennis Mahoney, “Politics and Progress: The Emergence of American Political Science”
Or, for an up to the minute short course in applied nostalgia, consider this lecture by Thomas Klingenstein of the Claremont Institute
youtube.com/watch?v=q_4n_MmNdxA
Wael • October 23, 2020 12:32 PM
@Clive Robinson, @SpaceLifeForm, @Anders, @Winter,
You might remember under the older software this blog ran on, @[…]l and @Ratio were playing around with sending messages using non printing characters.
I checked the old message I signed a while back, and I noticed that comment numbers have changed. So I edited the first part of the script that obtains my public key to fix it… then noticed that the icon (was a key icon, if I remember correctly) got changed to a “????”. So the message digital signature verification will fail. I stopped editing the rest of the scripts.
Perhaps I’ll sign another message later on, using a more efficient encoding mechanism.
lurker • October 23, 2020 3:16 PM
@name...*
thanks for the link to the text of the Hedges talk
@MarkH, I agree with your dislike of talking heads, especially in this case 2 hours of talking head for a 15 minute read. As for the content, he’s only stating what is quite visible from the outside. 2hrs of t.h. seems an inapropriate method to get the message to those on the inside.
q.v. the other thread here on visuals for security: the cartoons by Fish down the sidebar @scheerpost are far more incisive than that slab of text, but most unlikely to appear in msm
vas pup • October 23, 2020 4:20 PM
Telegram Bot Steals Pictures of Women and Creates “Deepfake” Versions:
https://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/27805/20201021/telegram-bot-steals-pictures-women-deepfake.htm
“Users of the AI bot can send a woman’s photograph through the messaging app via their computers or smartphones. The Telegram bot then returns after some time, sending back a manipulated “stripped” photo for free with a watermark. Additionally, users can pay a “premium coin,” removing watermarks and promising faster transactions. Sensity reported that the base price for this premium coin is 12 coins for 100 rubles, or about $1.50, with bundles and discounts for larger purchases.
The report also noted that 7 Telegram channels had more than 100,000 members each. Its main channel alone had 45,000 different members. A poll revealed that most of the users were from former USSR nations, such as Russia. Only 3 percent were from English-speaking countries.
Sensity also cited that Telegram was banned in several countries involved – like Russia, China, and Iran – yet the transactions persisted thanks to a virtual private network (VPN) that passes through Germany, circumventing the ban in their countries.”
Read the whole article for details!
Clive Robinson • October 23, 2020 4:23 PM
@ Wael, SpaceLifeForm, Anders, Winter,
So the message digital signature verification will fail.
I had a feeling that might be the case.
On a more personal not, I’ve not heard from you in a while, I trust you are well, and that your “harsh mistress” is treating you more gently. And that this years “human malware” has left you alone.
I’m still “ducking and covering” from those that bring their diseases to the table… As you’ve probably seen there have been a few other changes to this blog some good some not so, but hey “it is what it is”.
Any way as the old saying has it my friend “Don’t be a stranger”.
Wael • October 23, 2020 5:13 PM
@Clive Robinson, @SpaceLifeForm, @Anders, @Winter,
I trust you are well
Getting better. The eyes had problems. Thought you desteganogriphized the subspace message the wool-skin garment relayed to you?
I had a feeling that might be the case.
Renders all previous work useless! It’s strange that you brought this topic up, as someone asked me about something related just a few hours before you mentioned it!
“harsh mistress” is treating you more gently.
Same old… maybe a little better.
And that this years “human malware” has left you alone.
So it’s manufactured, after all! I may have gotten it early on, can’t say for sure. Had the worst cough and cold but I usually gargle with this bad boy a few times a day at first sign of cold. three or four days later, I was ok. But my mouth was etched raw. This thing is chemical warfare class.
Any way as the old saying has it my friend “Don’t be a stranger”.
I’ll try. Stayed silent for a while, although I was reading along.
blog some good some not so
I guess I need to learn some Markdown syntax…
Clive Robinson • October 23, 2020 5:37 PM
@ Wael,
I guess I need to learn some Markdown syntax…
I’d leave it for now, @SpaceLifeForm can give you a run down why.
Oh on another note,
…this bad boy…
“Original Listerine” has a dubious past…
At one time it alledgedly worked on foot fungus, but proved dubious. Then there were claims it stopped “Various Diseases” and was thus seen in houses of ill repute. But again it did not do what was claimed (Though “Jones the Groans” tells some stories about it). So these days they alledge it’s good for your mouth…
Not sure where they will claim next, but lets just say the few places it has not been claimed might make their next adverts sound like a Startreck intro : – S
Wael • October 23, 2020 6:03 PM
@Clive Robinson,
I didn’t go by advertisements; I went by personal trials. Three or four things work for me when I have signs of cold: Listerine, or Cepacol or a couple of boiled yellow corn on the cob, followed by a hot cup of tea with mints and a nice nap.
sound like a Startreck intro
Space… the final frontier […] where no man has gone before … (I removed what I typed here)
Anyway, so I was having my cataracts surgery in both eyes, and the doctor was telling me about the lens and how it changes as one ages… I told her the index of refraction changes, right? She goes yes, how did you know? I said I am an engineer… During surgery one is fully awake (you can’t really feel anything in the eye after they put some numbing drops.) So during the surgery, there was another ophthalmologist who asked me if he can watch the surgery. I said fine as long as you only watch and not work on my eyes. Before the surgery I watched a few YouTube videos on the procedure (big mistake), so I was aware of all the steps. During the surgery, I told the doctor: Oh! that’s the ultrasonic machine, you’re now shattering my lens and sucking it out, right? she said yea. When my lens was out, I told the doctor “I can see the ultraviolet spectrum now — I feel like a bee”… so the other doctor said something like “what’s with this guy”? she said (it was a female doctor operating on me — really good one) oh, he’s an engineer 😉
Oh, I forgot they stuck an IV in me before the surgery and gave me some mild sedative so I feel relaxed — they call it “happy juice”! It’s also supposed to make you forget what happened during the operation. The doctor told me the second operation patients usually have worse experience because they remember more. I said I remember everything about the first surgery!
Now I don’t know if I remember everything, or if I was jumping and screaming on the table.. but I forgot!
Clive Robinson • October 23, 2020 8:07 PM
@ Wael,
followed by a hot cup of tea
With mint, milk, or lemon?
I’ve found with lemon, works rather well.
Unfortunately the cardiologist has told me “one tea bag” a day max and no coffee not even decaff… Apparently I’m developing a hypersensitivity to caffeine, and they don’t need my heart break dancing all over resuscitation because I’ve been found face down somewhere… And there was me thinking they could do with the entertainment value (I’m also not good with ketamine either it apparently does not help with the arrhythmia).
There are certain things I’m squeamish about, like long grazes, knife wounds to hands and anything near my eyes. These are all “learned” responses from accidents I’ve had such as ripping all the skin of my shins when young due to falling head first out of a tree and getting my legs caught in rusty railings stopped me smashing my head up on a concreat path. Getting a face full of case hardening powder blown into my eyes from a compresser when at school because some other idiot was playing silly buggers. Oh and being stabbed right through the hand when disarming someone when wearing the green.
So reading,
Oh! that’s the ultrasonic machine, you’re now shattering my lens and sucking it out, right?
Kind of made my shoulder blades try to join together.
But I’ve also a problem with gas GA’s and have woken up during one surgury and the Dr noticed, and on another occasion I came to too fast and the paralysing agent was still in effect but the breathing tube had been removed “talk about the buried alive feeling” I still wake sweating a quater of a century later.
So there I was having surgury on an epi, for a hernia chatting away with the anesthatist and swaping jokes. The snotty nozed surgeon was nit pleased as apparently my laughing was making things difficult. When I smeltva greasy electrical arc smell and said to the anesthatist “ahh diathermy”. To which he said Oh we were wondering what to say about it, and I said I’d designed various diathermy machines in my time including those for hair removal, which I’d never let anyone use on me… Which ended up in a longish conversation about how to stop the monitoring instruments taking a walk in the park (apparently even surgeons don’t know the exact way a diathermy machine works…).
Apparently a lot of surgeons find it disconcerting when the body on the table not just talks but knows a lot about what goes on. I did get a wry laugh out of the cardiologist fitting my little box of tricks, when I said to him “I bet when you were studying medicine you never thought you’ld have to learn how to be a wireman”. I guess it was a relief because he’d been having trouble retreaving the recording device, which is about a third the size of a matchstick and my body had grown a bl@@dy great fibroid around it which was making life difficult.
So far I’ve managed to keep out of hospital this year, but I’ve gone and broken my foot through my own daftness. Eventualy I decided going to hospital over something as trivial as a broken toe, was not worth the 1 in 5 risk of catching COVID… Having had pneumonia in the past, it’s not something I would care to repeate.
With regards,
Oh, I forgot they stuck an IV in me before the surgery and gave me some mild sedative so I feel relaxed
Might have been a dose of “Mothers little helper” (valium). Quite some years ago now they gave me some during a proceadure involving what felt like nine foot of garden hose pipe… I won’t go any further because even the best of people can get queasy with that one…
Hopefully your eye surgery has gone OK I’m told cataracts are part genetic part lifestyle with a big dollop of not being as young as you might wish. They are also the second or third biggest curable causes of sight impairment and the biggest cause of blindness.
Having spent five days with my eyes bandaged after the face full of case hardening powder I’ve spent most of my life worried about what sight loss realy means. I’d effectively lost my eye sight for long enough for the brain to do one or two weird things one of which was to realy notice the smallest of echos. Also to notice the doppler effect off of a “feather board” fence as I was whisteling, I could hear a regular warble pattern that coresponded to the board edges.
Which brings us to,
Now I don’t know if I remember everything, or if I was jumping and screaming on the table.. but I forgot!
Hey you could have been doing a song and dance routine, tap dacing and singing a happy tune, why assume screaming and jumping?
Wael • October 23, 2020 8:50 PM
@Clive Robinson,,
I’ve found with lemon, works rather well.
Mint and raw sugar or lemon and honey. Lemon and homey works fairly well too.
Hopefully your eye surgery has gone OK
Yup, gone well. Only a bruise on my upper hand as a result of the vampire trying to stick me with the IV. Took her 5 or 6 tries and still failed. I asked her to bring someone else. She asked the anesthesiologist to do it. He did it in no time. But I have other eye issues to deal with.
SpaceLifeForm • October 23, 2020 11:51 PM
@ Clive, Anders, Winter, Wael
Anders, thank you for putting other eyes on it.
Wael, glad to see you back.
The reason I went down that Rabbit Hole was because there was this big Orange Emoji that looked like a carrot.
Actually, it was because there was a conflict in the reporting.
It does not matter if the password was easily guessable.
There is a lesson to be learned here. Proper forensics.
One must know the software tools they are using, and document them.
In this case, what Gevers observed and Motherboard observed can both be correct.
It’s simple actually. Gevers device had emojis DISABLED.
SpaceLifeForm • October 24, 2020 2:26 AM
🍿
@ Clive, Anders, Winter, Wael
So, Twitter says no indication of hack. The login happened on 2020-10-16.
POTUS had 2FA turned off. Of course, because other people use the account.
Smells like Twitter is trying to cover this up. As in “no 2FA, no log”.
Yeah, sure.
Gevers is saying: Not so fast. GDPR.
He was asked on 2020-10-22 if he got in with Grammarly turned on. (Browser extension).
hXXps://mobile.twitter.com/0xDUDE/status/1319385714312839169
Yes. I was not expecting it would work. Trump was the last in a row of 5/6 accounts I tried last Friday.
hXXps://mobile.twitter.com/0xDUDE/status/1319602840155934722
Dear @Grammarly, I am a pleased Premium user of your service. I would like to request a copy of my personal data (including the telemetry) generated by the web browser extension on Friday, 16 October 2020. How do I start this process and send my request?
SpaceLifeForm • October 24, 2020 2:39 AM
@ Wael
Bet it did not look like either of these:
🔑
🗝️
Probably looked like a gold horizontal skeleton key.
Wael • October 24, 2020 3:03 AM
@SpaceLifeForm,
I think it looked like the top one. I’ll check to see if I have the files on my laptop, or perhaps archive.com.
Clive Robinson • October 24, 2020 3:09 AM
@ SpaceLifeFotm,
Fonts have convicted people, because they always change.
In some respect “zero-width” chars are now the new “document canary” to serial number or finger print documents,
https://medium.com/snipette/font-forensics-9983bd2a4c5d
There is a reason I say “Paper, Paper Never data” as well as, one or two other things such as keeping old systems around and not patching/updating them.
Of course comming up with your own “custom font” as a derivitive to watermark documents is actually not as hard as you might think. A bit like taking a very fine needle file and modifying the actual print strikes on typewriters and golfballs etc in times past.
Singular Nodals • October 24, 2020 4:21 AM
For the rest of the voyage, rig for silent running. Elsewhere the folks may keep chatter. We however are not in a galaxy far far away.
youtube.com/watch?v=okLVbx3uxKk
MarkH • October 24, 2020 4:26 AM
@Clive:
I’m very pleased to know that your surgery went OK. I get your point about it being a big mistake to watch videos beforehand … I’ll be sure to avoid that!
@name.withheld:
Most of the time, I don’t enjoy “take downs” … I wrote what I did about Hedges (whose vision of the direction he’d like society to go is on the side of the angels) only because I believe that his perspective can be a substantial disservice to his readers.
To balance my critique with something positive, I want to cite an example of writing I very much admire: that of late historian Bernard Lewis.
His field was the Middle East, mainly from the advent of Islam to modern times, so those not interested in this subject matter will miss the delights of his writing.
As many historians do, he strove to be objective, or at least neutral. His writing was learned, erudite, steeped in research and scholarship.
My reading is only a small fraction of his output, so I don’t claim comprehensive familiarity. In what I have read, he seems to me to have focused on illuminating what happened and why, steering clear of personal emotion and moral judgments. I see him as respectful and compassionate toward the peoples and cultures he chronicled, though they had so many differences from his own life and culture.
To boil it down in one metaphor, there was much light and little heat.
One compact book of his I have read three times, and probably will read again; to my small mind, the writing is so dense with fact, interconnections, and insight.
Perhaps I thought of Lewis, because he was bitterly despised by that Subset Of Liberalism I mentioned previously. Among the accusations, he was supposedly an agent of colonialism, a purveyor of anti-Muslim bigotry, anti-Arab, an apologist for genocide, given to sweeping generalizations which denied individuality among entire populations, etc. etc. etc.
I don’t suppose that his work was free from error, or some of the many distortions which can arise when people look from one culture or era to another.
But likewise, I don’t find evidence in his writings to support those accusations, which surely condemns me as an equally demonic oppressor of my less privileged brothers and sisters.
However, he was indisputably guilty of being a Jew (and perhaps even worse to some of his critics, a British Jew) who publicly defended the existence of the modern state of Israel. For a certain mindset, such a person is properly condemned to be cast into the outermost darkness.
=========================
Before I leave the subject of Hedges altogether, I note that he holds forth on Kremlin-sponsored media, and rejected Bernie Sanders as insufficiently pure.
I truly understand the frustration of knowing what’s wrong with the world, knowing how to fix it, and seeing people idiotically refusing to immediately adopt my radical solution.
For me, that was a phase from my teens, which I had gotten past by adulthood.
Bismarck said that politics is the art of the possible. We can only accomplish that for which some means to accomplish it either exists or can feasibly be devised. Interestingly, the greatest progress for the “liberal program” in the U.S. has been made under relatively centrist presidents, not those with the most liberal ideological credentials.
I’m indebted to another Jewish author, Israeli novelist Amos Oz, for a wonderful pair of metaphors: at the end of some Shakespeare plays, it can be seen that justice was done, but the major characters lie dead on the stage; at the end of Chekov play, the major characters are deeply bitter and frustrated because none of them got what they really wanted … but they’re still alive.
Our adolescent selves hunger for the quick Shakespearean resolution, the French revolution with its glorious (albeit blood-soaked) calendar starting at year one!
In a democracy (in its literal sense of a state whose governing power flows from the people), durable progress usually comes in the manner of Chekov: slow, tedious, frustrating, painful and anxious, with incessant compromises and horse-trades. To engage such a process requires adult consciousness.
The great Frederick Douglass understood this, saying “Viewed from the genuine abolition ground, Mr. Lincoln seemed tardy, cold, dull, and indifferent; but measuring him by the sentiment of his country, a sentiment he was bound as a statesman to consult, he was swift, zealous, radical, and determined.”
Clive Robinson • October 24, 2020 6:25 AM
@ MarkH, Wael,
In your above you addressed your good wishes to me, when I think you ment them for @Wael.
Wael • October 24, 2020 8:43 AM
@Clive Robinson,
In your above you addressed…
Apparently attribution is harder than we believed.
MarkH • October 24, 2020 1:34 PM
@Wael:
Indeed for you, sir! My attention lapse … somehow, I visualize you as being much too young to need cataract surgery.
I’m glad that whenever this procedure was, you came through successfully.
Wael • October 24, 2020 1:39 PM
@MarkH,
Thank you!
I visualize you as being much too young to need cataract surgery.
Maybe, maybe not. Doctor told me it’s likely the ultra violet radiation in southern California and Arizona that caused it. I didn’t wear sunglasses / shades.
SpaceLifeForm • October 24, 2020 3:59 PM
@ Wael, Anders, Clive, Winter
WYSIWYG is false.
So, I am now observing my above post.
The two emoji keys.
On a different device.
Fistly, only one key is visible to the eye.
Only the first appears, and it appears as as horizontal grey key.
The second appears as whitespace.
They were on two separate lines.
Whereas, what I originally observed was two keys, tilted at 45 degree angle, with the first looking like a modern key, and the second as a skeleton key.
So, indirectly, via your comment, I can conclude with some confidence that you are not using Chrome.
My guess is Firefox.
Input appreciated.
SpaceLifeForm • October 24, 2020 4:23 PM
@ Clive
I hate manual typewriters.
Pinky Swear!
But I can put a mean smiley on a golfball, no problem!
SpaceLifeForm • October 24, 2020 4:55 PM
@ miss information, ALL
So, how did this happen if Twitter was down?
hXXps://www.twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1317044556328730625
SpaceLifeForm • October 24, 2020 5:11 PM
@ Wael, Anders, Clive, Winter
Scrolling back.
On this device the flag shows as two large outlines of the letters ‘U’ and ‘S’.
Light blue.
This via Chrome on old android.
I think the Chrome is fairly current. It’s probably due to other things that are out of date. It’s old, and other pieces are certainly out of date. YMMV.
Wael • October 24, 2020 5:24 PM
@SpaceLifeForm,
I think I’ll need some time to get used to Markdown. Seems it’s feature rich!
SpaceLifeForm • October 24, 2020 6:06 PM
@ Wael, Anders, Clive, Winter
LOL. NOT!
Different device.
Flag shows as a flag.
But it appears as a flag in the wind!
SpaceLifeForm • October 24, 2020 6:54 PM
@ Wael, Anders, Clive, Winter
Apparently, what I wanted to point out must be classified. I’ll leave it at that. The clues are above.
Fingerprinting. Emoji. Keys.
Connecting the dots is left as an exercise for the reader.
Wael • October 24, 2020 7:36 PM
@SpaceLifeForm,
The brain is dysfunctional now. I’ll get to it later.
Clive Robinson • October 25, 2020 1:15 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm, Wael,
The two emoji keys.
But in your post of,
I see only one key in my browser window.
That hopefully cuts-n-pastes, then displays between the two double quote marks “🔑”, which looks like a “Yale Key” at 45degrees, with the keyring hole at top right corner.
But… what I also see is an extra blank line below it which I assume is where the other key should be.
Now I’ve cut and pasted from the visable key down to the first word on the third line down between these two double quotes “🔑
🗝️
Probably” interestingly after the cut-n-paste I now see an empty box square –in this edit box– that usually identifies a non printing character on the line below the key I described.
This suggests to me that my browser has two different paths in it. The first for download&display gives white-space for the non printing/missing character. The second as part of the cut and paste uses a different “empty box” white-space equivalent for the non printing/missing character.
Now the question arises as to what do you see? Which might tell me if the cut-n-paste is modyfing the actual data rather than what is displayed…
Clive Robinson • October 25, 2020 1:28 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm, Wael,
For me in my above when it displays in the ordinary browser window it’s not the “empty box”. But doing a cut-n-paste shows it up again…
Thus I’m guessing the cut-n-paste has made a faithfull copy of the second key? even though I can not see it.
@ ALL,
Sorry if this appears a bit off topic, it’s not. It’s about finding hidden watermarks in web pages using supposadly unused slots in character sets.
Such non displaying watermarks could be used to do all sorts of security related activities such as providing a non obtrusive electronic signiture.
Clive Robinson • October 25, 2020 1:35 AM
@ Wael,
I think I’ll need some time to get used to Markdown. Seems it’s feature rich!
The Markdown languages “plural” are “feature rich”, but all different in some way…
Thus are “Engineer’s toothbrush” problems, so don’t invest your time learning more than the common basics.
SpaceLifeForm • October 25, 2020 4:14 AM
@ Clive, Wael
I see both keys as I originally posted.
On this browser (FF), on Debian derivative, where I originally posted.
I’ll check later via other devices.
I think the bytes are there, but your browser has no clue.
Another test if you can. Without Preview.
This is a beta-test website. My locksmith works below.
hXXps://emojiguide.org/key
hXXps://emojiguide.org/old-key
Use the source Luke!
Wael • October 25, 2020 4:25 AM
@ SpaceLifeForm, @Clive Robinson,
I see both keys as I originally posted.
So do I (as I originally saw them) 🙂
Anders • October 25, 2020 4:41 AM
@SpaceLifeForm
Your keys.
Win10 + latest tor browser = i only see two square unicode boxes with appropriate hex code inside 01F511 & 01F5DD
win7 + FF 81 = both keys are visible.
Regarding flag and U S letters see this:
hxxps://emojipedia.org/flag-united-states/
“The Flag: United States emoji is a flag sequence combining 🇺 Regional Indicator Symbol Letter U and 🇸 Regional Indicator Symbol Letter S. These display as a single emoji on supported platforms.”
Anders • October 25, 2020 8:30 AM
@SpaceLifeForm
hxxps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regional_indicator_symbol
So this Unicode world is strange indeed.
I’ll stuck with CP437 🙂
Sancho_P • October 25, 2020 6:26 PM
@Wael, re etched mouth (good to read you again!)
Look for a product like Lacer Clorhexidine (0,12g), to me it feels much smoother and much more effective on gargle.
However, clorhexidine is not recommended for daily use for more than 2 weeks as it will stain your teeth in the long run. The spray may be better to apply in the throat, the mouthwash / gel for the gums.
Wael • October 25, 2020 6:42 PM
@Sancho_P,
Look for a product like Lacer Clorhexidine (0,12g)
Will look it up. Thanks for sharing!
name.withheld.for.obvious.reasons • October 28, 2020 7:01 AM
@ MODERATE — ONE SQUID OUT — EDITORIAL DISCRETION ASSUMED
28 OCT 2020 — Fatal Calculation
Having made a decision that seeks to maximize their position, the elites have mistaken the political enablement of a neo-theocratic-fascism as parallel to their own interests. Additionally, elites hold the notation that their level of wealth guarantees their position. What they don’t understand, trading the polite and bifurcated political environment will serve their interests even more so when a “hard alignment” is given authority. When a “hard alignment” acquires political position and is given authority, there is but one effect. A “hard alignment”, this neo-theocratic-fascism, begins with advocates across a number of cross interests, but, at a moment the “hard alignment” becomes singular in its scope and goals.
The enemy of the state is ALL, the place where neo-theocratic-fascism begins and ends. Those at the very top attempt to make ALL its mission. Anyone in its way is given the force of the state to make their self-delusional grandiosity for a more heavenly position a reality, even if they are not “believers”.
The “hard alignment” will be narrow at first in its quest for power and control–being subsumed by the profits of pillage brings more hunger and averous. A ephemeral high must be maintained by seeking every greater grandiosity and position. Having invested in this model of governance will, in time, turn on itself. Stalin, began as a party leader, then a ruthless tyrant in a short period of time and eliminated those that put him in position. In the end, family and friends were tested continuously for loyalty and resultantly many became victims of his insanity. Similarly, Saddam Hussain in the acquisition of empire came to the same fate. Hitler, though a more politically driven movement suffered in the same manner as Stalin and Saddam but with a very different political theory. But the common theme, alignment with this type of power structure is fleeting and indeterminate and incalculable to those near and around it.
The moral; If you lay down with bed-bugs, insure that there is a symbiosis—not a parasitic relationship.
Subscribe to comments on this entry
Sidebar photo of Bruce Schneier by Joe MacInnis.
vas pup • October 16, 2020 4:37 PM
@Winter – continue from the previous week – Thank you for your input on privacy search.
I try to create e-mail account on mail.ru (server in Russia), but they required to provide cell phone # from Russian phone provider to send you confirmation code. Definitely, I don’t have such in US, but I just recall that owner of mail.ru resides in US (Wow!), so I guess our ‘professionals’ do have leverage to twist his hand in such way to obtain information from accounts on mail.ru utilizing old mafia technique: to make offer you cannot reject.