Schneier on Security

Clive Robinson • August 8, 2026 1:49 AM

@ lurker, ALL,

With regards,

“But Stalin owned the bank…”

There is an old joke about Communism and Capitalism both being the same in that,

“They lock up what they profess to love the most.”

But what this actually shows is the “Directing Mind” problem writ large.

Anything that is good or bad to individuals or society unfortunately can and usually does has “value” to one or more “Directing Minds”. The greater the number of such minds or the more abhorrent the idea/thing/practice the greater the “marketable value”.

We can argue about the morals moors and economic minutiae but to a certain percentage of the population they will not care except for the realisable value they can acquire.

Hence a “marketplace” illicit or otherwise will arise as a natural consequence.

And thus “the Camel-Nose” of politics appears around the tent-flap to “make-votes” and this attracts like flies to a turd the lobbyists to hand out emollients to the politicians palms (which is a good enough reason to never touch a politicians hand even if it is not dripping in blood as well).

Clive Robinson • August 8, 2026 6:40 AM

@ Winter, Bob, ALL,

With regards,

“And always, those who called for the killing will be killed by it too.”

Sadly, no.

The reason is,

“Your humble servant”…

Hiding behind the throne and manipulating via,

“Arms length control”

In essence they either put a puppet in control as the leader or they make a puppet out of the existing leader.

This leader is in effect talked into calling for the policy directly or more likely indirectly. But you can be reasonably certain it is that “humble servant” that is actually in control and calling the shots.

This is what we can see happening with “The Heritage Foundation” and the supposed “Project 2025”.

At the end of the day it is this puppet leader who “gets the chop” if it’s going to happen. Whilst the “humble servant” ducks out for a while, just to come back again. Hence the policy goes on.

The thing is the important part is “arms length” segregation that now gives “plausible deniability” or similar. We saw the rise of this with “The Computer says NO” and this is only going to get worse with AI.

And to be honest it is what scares me most about Government and AI even though RoboDebt and DODGE etc have shown without doubt all such systems will be utter failures and only achieve real harms against vulnerable people it’s something no short term thinking idiot can resist be they in Politics or US Style Corporatism.

Clive Robinson • August 8, 2026 11:06 AM

@ Winter,

With regards,

“I was thinking about Robespierre et al.”

A lot has changed now the use of computers has significantly reduced the level of manpower required by any authoritarian organisation.

Many people still do not realise just how much the world has really changed manpower utilisation workwise since the 8Bit CPU got personal back in the late 1970’s.

Unfortunately those who do realise tend to be those who can get themselves into positions of control at minimal personal risk.

Clive Robinson • August 12, 2026 1:35 AM

@ lurker, ALL

With regards the “Taser Mitts”, my first printable thoughts are about how they work and thus how they will fail.

I think we can assume they do not work “from glove to glove” as this would put the person wearing them (operator) at risk of self electrocution as part of the “return path”.

Which would suggest the gloves have several electrode pads each and the “low voltage”[1] the article referres to would be the generated shock voltage which would be DC or chopped DC from pad to pad on the individual gloves not the gloves in pairs.

This has implications for those operating the gloves, as a “reach out and place hand on the chest” of an individual could easily prove fatal [2]. Likewise it has implications for those considering the making of protective clothing against such a risk of death using “screening mesh” or similar.

[1] Remember in the US there are a couple of sayings about “low voltage” AC,

1, It’s the volts that jolt, but the mills that kill.
2, Black Death –for live wire–.

Though treat the second with caution as the NEC color codes are not unambiguous.

[2] Whilst humans can and have survived what appears incredible high voltages, it can take as little as 30V DC –or less– across the heart to stop it and cause death.