back to article 'George Orwell was an optimist. Show me a search history, I'll show you a perv or a crook'

Google researchers came clean about a nasty little security vulnerability they discovered in SSL 3.0 this week, though not before El Reg first caught wind of it. The backdoor into the ancient old encryption standard can only be used if you can intercept the victim’s packets, potentially with a malicious Wi-Fi link, but once …

  1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
    Holmes

    Talking about surveillance. Did El Reg strike a surveillance deal with linkedin, the Facebook For Suits? Recently page load times have gone southwards (or may not terminate) and/or you get the forever spinning wheel after page load seems to have completed. My Firebug seems to indicate linkedin doing its stuff, whatever it is (probably nothing particulary healthy...)

    1. ecofeco Silver badge

      I had an issue like this a few months ago. Turns out it was something that had anonymously (hidden) piggybacked on an install I had done and it took me a day to track it down and uninstall it.

      It was some kind of beacon/redirector/tracker thing and was causing some of my "everyday" websites to load very slowly.

  2. Christoph

    " Show me your search history and within five minutes I'll find something embarrassing or incriminating. Guaranteed."

    "If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." -- Cardinal Richelieu

    1. ecofeco Silver badge

      Beat me to it.

      Upvoted.

    2. Gannon (J.) Dick
      Childcatcher

      Nice!

      The subtle point about the Surveillence Society is that Richlieu has not hanged anyone lately.

      Nancy Astor, Viscountess Astor once famously asked Stalin "When are you going to stop murdering people ?" Stalin replied "When it is no longer necessary" She insisted the question be translated verbatim so there was nothing lost in translation. Nancy and other American chicks probably lose a lot of Translators, however. In any case, Stalin has not murdered anyone recently.

      Seeing a pattern here ? It's not the act, it's the agency.

      'George Orwell was an OPTIMIST. Show me a search history, I'll show you a perv or a crook'

      Won't someone please think of the children ?

      They deserve a better Monster than this little jerk.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Incriminating - try use of abusive and threatening language

      Because that's what you'll get within 5 minutes of asking for my browser history.

  3. Vociferous

    Why does Microsoft want people to stop talking about Windows?

    I mean, yeah, 8 has been a PR disaster, but 10 is coming and is rumored to be less awful.

    1. Sebastian A

      Re: Why does Microsoft want people to stop talking about Windows?

      If you'll read the full article on that, it appears Microsoft had wanted to target specific comments on the videos in question, supposedly ones spreading compromised keys, or download locations for hacks etc.

      So it was most likely a poorly formatted request, or poorly interpreted by Google. And since no human being has any QA input into these processes these days, computer says "boop" and nixed all the content.

      1. JeffyPoooh

        Re: Why does Microsoft want people to stop talking about Windows?

        Solution is automatic, perhaps $100, compensation for each such false DMCA claim.

      2. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge

        Re: Why does Microsoft want people to stop talking about Windows?

        "And since no human being has any QA input into these processes these days, computer says "boop" and nixed all the content."

        So the (almost) monopoly supplier of operating systems and business packages is merely incompetent rather than malicious - that's good to know.

    2. Cipher

      Re: Why does Microsoft want people to stop talking about Windows?

      Desperation born of frustration I think.

      After the market reaction to Windows 8, the Emperor no longer wishes his new clothes discussed...

      1. Charles 9

        Re: Why does Microsoft want people to stop talking about Windows?

        Surprised a video ad from a seller of actual (physical) windows didn't get wiped and the company suing Microsoft for harming their business by wiping out their ad hits.

  4. Wensleydale Cheese
    Happy

    Show me your search history and within five minutes I'll find something embarrassing or incriminating. Guaranteed."

    Embarrassing or incriminating for who?

    1. Charles 9

      For the person whose history he or she submits. He's saying if he knows your search history, he can find skeletons in your closet.

  5. tojb
    Angel

    corollary

    The corollary to this rule (lets call it the Richelieu principle) is that people are way too uptight about a whole load of stuff. If everyone does something which could see them in the dock, then maybe we should take a collective chill pill?

    1. Teiwaz

      Re: corollary

      A really intelligent comment.

      Unfortunately, we're no longer in the 60's. Idealism is mostly dead, and the collective population can generaly be convinced that only terrorists and perverts have anything to fear.

      My main concern is tha the current mentality punishes curiosity. What is the point f having access to the largest encyclopedia humanity has ever asembled if you have to be wary what you look up.

  6. dan1980

    Following on from @tojb's comments, above, I think the problem is calling people 'pervs'. I.e. pervert.

    I agree, broadly with what Hyppönen said but I think the author's paraphrasing is a bit offensive to people. The idea is that looking at pornography is the realm of 'perverts' and not something that healthy, normal and well-adjusted adults with health, normal, well-adjusted sex-lives can enjoy and still be healthy, normal and well-adjusted.

    Of course, even that is a bit off - what's 'normal' anyway?

    If you're single and look at porn, so what? That doesn't make you a pervert, just someone who enjoys looking at something that the human brain has been programmed and conditioned to enjoy.

    If you're not single and you look at pornography then, equally, so what? It's the business of your partner, perhaps, but the situation is hardly uncommon and so should not warrant the label of 'perv'.

    If someone's search history contains <insert comically-named skin flick here> then it would nice if that wasn't considered embarrassing so much as private and even more so if it wasn't considered perverted so much as normal.

    1. Charles 9

      "If someone's search history contains <insert comically-named skin flick here> then it would nice if that wasn't considered embarrassing so much as private and even more so if it wasn't considered perverted so much as normal."

      Remember that the very concept of personal privacy is a relatively new thing: probably no older than about a century and a half for the ordinary joe. Basically, the smaller the community or the larger the reach of its people, the less one's privacy can be guaranteed. Privacy increased with the rise of cities that created a screen of other people and such, but with the increase of electronic communications, particularly those of an audio-visual nature, that privacy has dropped drastically. We're rapidly becoming the Global Village, and I don't mean that in a good way.

  7. HandleMeNot

    We've heard this song before ...

    If one would give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest man, I would find something in them to have him hanged. -- Cardinal Richelieu.

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