‘Microsoft Won’t Patch SMB Flaw That Only an Idiot Would Expose’
July 31st, 2017Cryptogon, 23 April 2017: “People who do this on purpose are idiots.”
By all means, though, companies should keep eliminating and outsourcing IT staff. haha That’s clearly working out great!
(As the former IT people flee to the hills…)
Via: Register:
A Windows SMB vulnerability revealed late last week at DEF CON won’t be patched because Microsoft says the service should be firewalled off from the internet anyway.
The 20-year-old Windows bug was discovered by RiskSense bods, who combed Redmond’s file server code for flaws similar to the ones exploited by the NSA’s leaked EternalBlue tool.
‘Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent’
July 31st, 2017Dangerous precedent?
I think it’s more of a dangerous precedent du jour.
Apple blocks apps for the Chinese regime. Yes, that’s bad. But Cisco built China’s god damned Great Firewall in the first place!
In mentioning Apple’s, “Dangerous Precedent,” this New York Times article doesn’t mention Cisco at all. I’m definitely not defending Apple—their manufacturing practices in China are despicable, but in no way unique. However, Apple’s dalliances with the Chinese regime are minor in comparison to Cisco’s active participation in that state’s atrocities.
The actual dangerous precedent happened so long ago that it seems to have disappeared into the amnesia that constantly afflicts the New York Times.
Let’s go all the way back to 2002: Amnesty slams tech giants for ‘aiding’ Chinese human rights abuse:
The great and the good of the IT industry – including Cisco Systems, Nortel Networks, Microsoft, Sun Microsystems and Websense – stand accused of aiding and abetting human rights violations in China.
…
China depends on the technological expertise and investment of foreign companies who, Amnesty International argues, are providing technology which is used to restrict fundamental freedoms.
And more recently: Cisco Must Be Held Accountable For Aiding China’s Human Rights Abuses:
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is urging a federal appeals court to reinstate a lawsuit seeking to hold Cisco Systems accountable for aiding in human rights abuses by building the Chinese government a system that Cisco officials knew was intended to identify—and facilitate the capture and torture of—members of the Falun Gong religious minority.
In an amicus brief filed Monday with the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, EFF and the groups ARTICLE 19 and Privacy International argue that the plaintiffs sufficiently alleged that Cisco understood that the “Golden Shield” system (also known as The Great Firewall) it custom-built for China was an essential component of the government’s program of persecution against the Falun Gong—persecution that included online spying and tracking, detention, and torture.
In other words, there has been a long history of dangerous precedents involving U.S. companies and the Chinese regime.
Why would the New York Times disappear such obvious and substantial context?
My guess is that NSA is inside China’s Great Firewall due to Cisco’s participation:
But while American companies were being warned away from supposedly untrustworthy Chinese routers, foreign organisations would have been well advised to beware of American-made ones. A June 2010 report from the head of the NSA’s Access and Target Development department is shockingly explicit. The NSA routinely receives – or intercepts – routers, servers and other computer network devices being exported from the US before they are delivered to the international customers.
The agency then implants backdoor surveillance tools, repackages the devices with a factory seal and sends them on. The NSA thus gains access to entire networks and all their users. The document gleefully observes that some “SIGINT tradecraft … is very hands-on (literally!)”.
Eventually, the implanted device connects back to the NSA. The report continues: “In one recent case, after several months a beacon implanted through supply-chain interdiction called back to the NSA covert infrastructure. This call back provided us access to further exploit the device and survey the network.”
Therefore, Cisco’s far more egregious history in China goes *poof* in the New York Times piece about Apple’s accommodation of Chinese government whims.
Via: New York Times:
A year ago, the Federal Bureau of Investigation made an extraordinary demand of Apple. To get inside a dead terrorist’s iPhone, law enforcement officials wanted the company to create a hackable version of the software that runs all iPhones.
To many legal experts, it wasn’t obvious that Apple had a winning case against the request. But facing great legal and political opposition, Apple took a stand anyway. Timothy D. Cook, Apple’s chief executive, argued that the company had a financial and moral duty to protect its users’ privacy and security. He made clear that Apple would obey American law — but only after trying to shape the law.
The fight paid off. On the eve of a courtroom showdown, the F.B.I. rescinded its request. It is worth underlining this point: When Apple took a public stand for its users’ liberty and privacy, the American government blinked.
Yet in China over the weekend, when faced with a broad demand by the Chinese internet authority, it was Apple that blinked.
Apple pulled down several VPN apps — programs that allow iPhone users to bypass the Chinese government’s censorship apparatus — from its Chinese App Store. The developers behind the apps must register with the government under a cybersecurity law that went into effect in January. The law imposes criminal penalties on Apple and other companies that host unregistered apps.
Whatever Apple may have done in private to fight the Chinese internet law, the company has not offered a peep of criticism in public. Apple’s only public statement on the VPN ban said that the company had been “required to remove some VPN apps in China that do not meet the new regulations,” but noted that the “apps remain available in all other markets where they do business.” Despite the pulldown, Apple says there are still hundreds of VPN apps available on its Chinese app store, some of which remain unregistered with the government.
Small Alphabet Team Researching Energy Storage
July 31st, 2017Via: Bloomberg:
The research lab, which hatched Google’s driverless car almost a decade ago, is developing a system for storing renewable energy that would otherwise be wasted. It can be located almost anywhere, has the potential to last longer than lithium-ion batteries and compete on price with new hydroelectric plants and other existing clean energy storage methods, according to X executives and researchers.
…
Malta is not yet an official X project, but it has been “de-risked” enough that the team is now looking for partners to build, operate and connect a commercial-sized prototype to the grid, Felten said. That means Alphabet may team up or compete with industrial powerhouses like Siemens AG, ABB Ltd. and General Electric Co.
Facebook Lobbies to Prevent State Limits on Facial Recognition
July 31st, 2017Via: The Center for Public Integrity:
When Chicago resident Carlo Licata joined Facebook in 2009, he did what the 390 million other users of the world’s largest social network had already done: He posted photos of himself and friends, tagging the images with names.
But what Licata, now 34, didn’t know was that every time he was tagged, Facebook stored his digitized face in its growing database.
Angered this was done without his knowledge, Licata sued Facebook in 2015 as part of a class action lawsuit filed in Illinois state court accusing the company of violating a one-of-a-kind Illinois law that prohibits collection of biometric data without permission. The suit is ongoing.
Facebook denied the charges, arguing the law doesn’t apply to them. But behind the scenes, the social network giant is working feverishly to prevent other states from enacting a law like the one in Illinois.
Since the suit was filed, Facebook has stepped up its state lobbying, according to records and interviews with lawmakers. But rather than wading into policy fights itself, Facebook has turned to lower-profile trade groups such as the Internet Association, based in Washington, D.C., and the Illinois-based trade association CompTIA to head off bills that would give users more control over how their likenesses are used or whom they can be sold to.
That effort is part of a wider agenda. Tech companies, whose business model is based on collecting data about its users and using it to sell ads, frequently oppose consumer privacy legislation. But privacy advocates say Facebook is uniquely aggressive in opposing all forms of regulation on its technology.
Your Banker Is Always In: Sweden Rolls Out the Robots
July 31st, 2017Via: Bloomberg:
Aida is the perfect employee: always courteous, always learning and, as she says, “always at work, 24/7, 365 days a year.”
Aida, of course, is not a person but a virtual customer-service representative that SEB AB, one of Sweden’s biggest banks, is rolling out. The goal is to give the actual humans more time to engage in more complex tasks.
‘Smartphone Zombies’
July 30th, 2017Via: Reuters:
A ban on pedestrians looking at mobile phones or texting while crossing the street will take effect in Hawaii’s largest city in late October, as Honolulu becomes the first major U.S. city to pass legislation aimed at reducing injuries and deaths from “distracted walking.”
The ban comes as cities around the world grapple with how to protect phone-obsessed “smartphone zombies” from injuring themselves by stepping into traffic or running into stationary objects.
World’s Richest Person Escapes Scrutiny From His Own Paper—and Its Rivals
July 29th, 2017Disclosure: Cryptogon has affiliate relationships with Amazon.
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And if Amazon kills my Amazon U.S. affiliate account (like it did with Amazon Germany and Amazon France), Cryptogon is finished. It’s funny/sad that it has come down to this. Who knew Bezos would become a CIA contractor and a major peddler of fake news!?
Not only do I rely on Amazon Affiliate commissions for income, but I wind up spending some of it right back to Amazon when I buy homeschooling materials for my children, and other books.
Yes, I know about Amazon alternatives, but what you may not know is that even those are typically linked to Amazon directly or indirectly. In NZ for example, online retailers are, in many cases, simply forwarding stuff they’re obtaining through Amazon in the U.S. When the item says, “Ships from USA,” yeah, that means Amazon.
Hilariously, The Nile’s Amazon scraper sometimes pulls Amazon references in product titles and includes them on their site:
Woopsee. haha
For years, I’ve made references to company towns on here… Yep, looking in the mirror can be pretty interesting.
The Matrix has you.
Via: FAIR:
The three most prominent US newspapers haven’t run a critical investigative piece on Jeff Bezos’ company Amazon in almost two years, a FAIR survey finds.
A review of 190 articles from the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and the Bezos-owned Washington Post over the past year paints a picture of almost uniformly uncritical–ofttimes boosterish–coverage. None of the articles were investigative exposes, 6 percent leaned negative, 54 percent were straight reporting or neutral in tone, and 40 percent were positive, mostly with a fawning or even press release–like tone.
The last major investigative piece we found in any of these three publications was a 4,500-word critique of Amazon’s labor practices in the New York Times (8/16/15) almost two years ago. Considering that Amazon is the fourth-most-valuable company in the world, with a 43 percent (and growing) share of all US online commerce, it’s a striking absence of journalistic scrutiny.
The line between straight reporting and fawning coverage wasn’t always clear, given the nature of technology journalism, but, in general, a distinction was drawn when reporting on Amazon’s latest moves featured no criticism or contrary third-party input, and the article was mostly indistinguishable from a press release.
Motor Trend: The Tesla Model 3 “Is the Most Important Vehicle of the Century”
July 29th, 2017Via: Motor Trend:
The Tesla Model 3 is here, and it is the most important vehicle of the century.
Yes, the hyperbole is necessary. The original Tesla Model S was a proof of concept—it was possible to make a long-range electric vehicle. The Model X showed that you could make an electric SUV. But neither was affordable to the masses. And although the Chevrolet Bolt has shown that 238 miles of electric range is possible for less than $40,000, GM’s volume aspirations are modest.
Not so for Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who wants to blow out the walls of his Fremont, California, factory to build a half-million Tesla Model 3s every year.
Tesla gave Motor Trend an opportunity for an extended test drive with the Tesla Model 3 engineer. Following is Testing Director Kim Reynolds’ review.
How Governments, Food Companies, Big Pharma, Media and Healthcare Operators Keep Us Fat and Sick
July 27th, 2017If you thought the Military Industrial Complex was something…
Via: The Drs. Wolfson:
These numbers clearly reveal a U.S. economy totally dependent on the healthcare system. Were the need for healthcare to cease, or be reduced dramatically, the U.S. economy would be in crisis of unprecedented proportions.
So, what has the government been doing to promote sickness to stabilize/grow the economy?
Let’s examine the following…
Bollinger Unveils New Minimalist All-Electric Truck with Up to 200 Miles of Range
July 27th, 2017No pricing was revealed, which is good, since it would probably melt our faces off.
Via: Electrek:
Today, Bollinger Motors unveiled what it calls a “no nonsense back-to-basics all-electric sport utility truck (SUT).”
The minimalist-looking vehicle with sharp edges and bare interior will not be for everyone, but with a promised range of up to 200 miles and quite a few interesting features, it could check all the boxes of a lot of people looking to buy an EV that can go on and off road.
The New York-based startup brought the prototype to the Classic Car Club of Manhattan. They released the entire spec list, which we added at the end of this article, and revealed almost everything about the vehicle except for the price.
Bollinger Motors’ founder and CEO, Robert Bollinger, commented on the unveiling:
“We are so thrilled to be able to finally take the wraps off of our Bollinger B1 SUT. This is the culmination of what has been a 40-year-long boyhood dream of mine and I couldn’t be more pleased with the vehicle and the incredible team who worked so hard to create it.”
