Posts by Starkadder
56 posts • joined Monday 14th December 2009 19:16 GMT
Try this for size Ms. May
I have no doubt that the good folk at what used to be called UKBA will be telling the Home Secretary that they can do a wonderful job if only she would triple their budget. For three times the money they will check everyone in and out and catch lots of terrorists, asylum seekers, illegal immigrants and nasty people. She will say "no way" and tell them they are incompetent. The usual civil service wrangles will follow.
But there is a way forward. If the UK implemented the Schengen agreement, as it was always supposed to, EU travellers' credentials would not be checked either in or out, so the available resources could be devoted to non-EU arrivals (and departures). This would mean relying on other EU states not to let in terrorists, asylum seekers, illegal immigrants and nasty people - but they seem to be rather more efficient at that than UKBA has been. An incidental benefit is that all the other EU member states would no longer have costs in checking arrivals from the UK, which might make them feel the UK was behaving as a responsible member of the EU for once. What's not to iike?
"PC buyers are more thifty." I always thought there was something funny about them. apple buyers are of course thiftless.
It is just plain illegal and shoud be stopped
I have a right to privacy under the European convention on Human Rights. As a European citizen I also have the right to travel freely freely wherever I want to go in the European Union. The whole ANPR system is illegal, as it spies on citizens who are not suspects and stores information about them which is private (i.e. their legal journeys). It should be scrapped. I am amazed that it is allowed to stay in operation. I am also a California resident and know that any such system would never be allowed by Californians, who actually believe in their ability to have a private life.
Re: "Individuals can reclaim their privacy on the internet at any time"
It isn't that simple. I live in a terrace and repeated requests to remove my house have not worked (even though it was illegally photographed from a private road, where Google had no rights to be.)
Re: Another triumph for the private sector
Because HealthSpace never had a real user, it was just an NHS wet dream. When profit oriented businesses buy IT they ask what it is for, who is going to use it, and how it will save money and/or improve their business operation. HealthSpace would never have passed first base in any private business.
I registered and tried to use it. It is worse than Gutteridge said. It is not "too difficult to use," it is useless.
Re: Remembering a password is no harder than remembering a phone number
I just checked. I have 51 login/password combinations recorded on a file that i keep "somewhere". Many of these are not used often enough for me to remember. A lot of them are passwords that were forced on me by the site and are next to impossible to remember. not the same as phone numbers at all. I'm retired, and a lot of us oldies use the web a lot, but our memories are not as good as they once were. So don't tell us to start remembering lots of passwords, 'cos it ain't going to happen.
Re: Re: Re: Given that NHS Direct is already a massive waste (@teebie)
Nobody said the NHS is a massive waste. They said that NHS Direct is a massive waste, a different comment altogether. NHS Direct costs more than going to see a GP, so in that sense it is a waste, although one must be careful about the scale of "waste" in the NHS. Compared to say, some of the IT programs, NHS Direct costs are minuscule.
If you think the "hallmark of civilisation is high-quality healthcare provided free at point of delivery and available to anyone, regardless of any consideration", then why is it no country provides this? Are there no civilised countries? The NHS is a medium quality service delivered free. Many other countries which are by most counts civilised do not have free healthcare at point of delivery, although it is often heavily subsidised.
British Rail, actually
The Lion went away in the mid-1960s, when the name was changed from British Railways to British Rail. So in the 1980s its correct name was British Rail, whose logo is an arrow pointing in both directions, known as the arrow of indecision.
Interesting Facts
More than half the people living in social housing do not have internet access. Half the people living in social housing are disabled. Five million households are in social housing. Two thirds of households in social housing claim Housing Benefit, and most of these also claim Council Tax Benefit. Most, but I don't have a figure, social housing tenants are also claiming other benefits (disability, unemployment etc.). Do you see where this is going?
Really?
Can you quote the law? Is this UK, EU or what? My understanding has been that if the correct PIN is used in a fraudulent transaction the bank washes its hands of the the problem, which is a major reason why I don't use chip and PIN cards, as the system is inherently insecure and has no protection for the cardholder.
Or just don't use a cellphone
I used to have one but gave it up when people started calling me at inconvenient moments. Life is much simpler without them. and I'm unimpressed by the need to contact people "urgently." It is seldom the case.
That wasn't the question
The point here is that Directgov and its companions have not shown their value, not that gov. websites in general aren't useful. Directgov is a waste of space. I always google the actual thing I need and get taken straight to it. Directgov is a miserable attempt at a portal where none is needed.
Good news from the European Commission
We need this yesterday. It will be a massive stimulus to online sellers who have invested in their ordering and fulfillment systems, and with luck it means bye-bye to many of the cheats and scams. No discussion of how it affects eBay trades that go wrong though.
Tell that to the Judge
This argument would not stand up in court by itself. But a careful reading of your card's T&Cs might reveal that by using the card you gave up your right to privacy. There is also the question of who owns the transaction data - the shop, Visa, the bank, or some combination..
It is worth it
Ever since the banks transferred the risk in card based transactions from themselves to me, by insisting on insecure PINS rather than secure (from the customer's point of view) signatures, I have moved to cash. It has the disadvantages you mention, but the huge benefit of anonymity. I am not going to use a card these days if I can help it for the same reason I would have avoided using one of the last government's hated ID cards, with its attendant usage records. Similarly I will not have a smart meter in my house, with its potential for snooping on my behaviour.
Many shops operate on wafer thin margins, and the financial system may make more profit out of their card based transactions than they do themselves. I've never seen a shopkeeper complain when I've offered cash, and it can often get you a discount or favourable treatment.
Posted in El Reg in SHOCK email address BLUNDER
I didn't know I had a son called Philip, but that's always been my policy. There were only ever two meetings: "Do you know what you did wrong? Well, don't do it again," and, "You did it again. The door is over there, you'll be using it once more as you leave."
Right on
I had lunch the other day with the guy who says he introduced chip and pin to the UK banks. He was amazed when I paid by cash, waving his credit card with NFC logo at me and saying that was the way forward. My answer was that the guy at the next table had just read his card with some nifty electronics he acquired in Israel (or wherever) and paid for his own lunch on my friend's card. Since chip and pin I have pretty much gone back to cash except for unavoidable occasions - and always sign for credit card purchases. Then, and only then, do I have full legal protection against fraud and theft.
But it's not
Broke.
Not so
You are confusing effort with result. The company has produced nothing useful or usable, but that does not mean that scores of folk in cubicles on CSC's payroll haven't been working on the project.
Wrong
The dollar has risen by 7 cents (from $1.61 to $1.54 against the pound) since 1 April.
Posted in MPs: 999 HQ revamp FAIL cost £469m
No they can't
(actual example). "There's a burning narrowboat on the canal about half a mile east of Bridge XX on the Kennet and Avon canal. There are injured people on board including one invalid with mobility problems. (Bridge XX is a farmer's bridge, not on a road, and doesn't have a postcode . . .)
Posted in BBC website ditches modules in facelift
It's too much
The new BBC Home Page is far too busy and uninformative. If they carry this treatment over to their news stories, which are well presented, I won't be using the site at all.
It isn't that hard to work out
Collecting sales tax in California is not that hard. The rates do not "vary all the time". They are available on-line through the State Board of Equalization and the rules for their application are straightforward. The quarterly sales tax return is mildly headache making if done on paper, but anyone who runs an operation of any size in California will have a computer system that tracks all this. Sales tax usually applies at the point of sale, it doesn't vary except for cars and construction materials which are taxed by point of use. The rules for the application of sales tax are fixed throughout the state, it is only the actual rates that vary by local jurisdiction.
It is actually a sales and use tax. All Californian taxpayers have to declare all purchases they have made on which they did not pay tax on their annual state tax return. That currently would include anything bought from Amazon - they must then pay the state tax at the appropriate rate, so says state law. No-one ever does though, which is why they want to collect the money from Amazon and other online retailers instead..
What law
This is news to me, what is the law? Is it applicable internationally?
Rubbish
Diabetes doesn't "just go away." There are more than enough ignoramuses peddling "cures" out there already. And your recommendations would kill the average Type 1 diabetic in a week or two.
Wrong answer, right problem
Texting or alerting an NHS professional is a silly way of solving this problem. The first thing to do is alert the diabetic that his or her blood sugar is dropping. They will normally have time to deal with the problem themselves. If they are asleep the alarm would be via an alarm or phone call. Only if the glucose level kept dropping do emergency services need to be warned. For those who live on their own the best emergency service is probably their next door neighbour.
But no terrorists
Which was the prime purpose of the system in the first place.
Funny name
Why is it still called the "Identity and Passport Service"? The ID card scheme was scrapped last year and, as far as I know, the only function of this body is to issue passports. Or do they know something the rest of us don't?
Posted in Cabinet Office ends website test
Why does anyone use Directgov?
I never bother - just put my query into my search engine of choice and await results, which are usually pretty much what I was looking for. Any single government website is a waste of space - much better to improve the individual sites so you can actually do what you want on them (including filling in all forms online and signing digitally).
Who is doing this?
EADS and PA have been fired from the FiReControl project. Or have they? There is no one at CLG who has the least idea how to assess the Fire and Rescue Services' applications for the £81m. So I wonder who will be doing this. The announcement is fascinating for what it does not tell us.
Search me, guv
Just looked at my gmail and can't figure out if I even have a profile - so don't know how to delete it (or change it for suitably incorrect information. Conclusion: is this a problem no one is actually going to bother about?
Well, perhaps
Have you actually run the numbers? It's a plausible and attractive theory, but not necessarily true. It does raise all sorts of other questions in one's mind though. for example, what percentage of those buying Dan Brown books actually finish them (or even start them)?
But they were only doing their job
The civil servants concerned were trying to implement Blair's brilliant idea about 9/11 type incidents. The idea was given shape and form by John Prescott, who clearly articulated, at the right level of technical detail the way FiReControl would work. Or so i am told. The civil servants were just carrying orders, They plodded round the Fire Brigades explaining how Blair's brilliant idea would work and got very upset when they were told what they could do with it.
They never learn
I know the person who had this bright idea. It seemed, in Whitehall, perfectly logical and reasonable. It wasn't - but their minds could not see past their civil service training into the minds of the people delivering emergency services. Whitehall deeply despised the Fire Brigades for being antiquated, inefficient, unco--ordinated and - worst of all - independent of them. Fire Brigades had a fairly healthy contempt for Whitehall which they showed (undiplomatic I know, but they had good reason).
FireControl was not about efficiency, modernisation, shiny technology etc. It was a way for Whitehall to take charge. If it had ever worked the independence of local Brigades would have gone for ever, and they all knew that. Good riddance. Er, anyone want a purpose built command and control centre designed for fire brigades only, with a thirty year lease? You could probably work out a good deal with CLG - they're stuck with the leases.
The real numbers are under the blotter
It is not clear where the money all comes from. It may be a change to service contracts or a reduction in one time costs. We are not told. It may be a mix of the two. It is not hard to save money, even if the civil service are not up to their job. The present government have canned ID cards,
ContactPoint, and FireControl. They sent Raytheon off with their tail between their legs over e-Borders. And all those projects carried huge start up costs plus ongoing service and maintenance. The only way to get the private sector on their side is to pay the cost cutters by results.
Not Quite!
You really don't understand the DD system. I was there when it was invented, there when it was revamped after torrents of customer complaint and there again when the banks did their best to avoid OFT criticisms of the system. The Dd system was introduced at the request (more like command) of large manufacturers and distributors who wanted to make sure they were paid for supplies by retail outlets. They wanted to debit the little chap's bank account at the same time (often before ) he got his goods. Insurance companies saw it as a good way of collecting premiums, and companies with annual fees (eg National Trust) realised they could crank fees up gradually and most members would not cancel their subscriptions.
As time went by the thorny issue of "what to do when things went wrong" came up and the banks had to issue the "Direct Debit Guarantee" which appears to say that if you have been wrongly debited you are entitled to an instant refund of your money. In practice banks are extremely reluctant to refund money debited where the debit is subsequently disputed. To this day they have considerable costs in this area, because if a DD is disputed it can take a lot of bank time to resolve the problem.
The joke is that there is no need for DDs at all. They are a "pull" system (the money is sucked out of the payer's account by the payee). Standing Orders are a pull system (the payee commands his bank to pay the bill regularly) and online payment allows the payment of bills as and when the payee requires. All three systems are fully automated. whenever required to ay by Dd I always meekly sign the authorisation, cancel it as soon as one payment has been made (as my bank statement then shows me where the money went) and set up a standing order instead. The payment processing costs for the recipient are effectively the same in all circumstances and, the cash flow should not be affected.
A note to the author of the article. lines are toed, not towed, unless airplanes are pulling signs behind them, in which case they may be towed.
You really don't know?
It was invented by the previous (non-computer literate) government.
It is rather meaningless.
The term gov usually means "the boss".
There is no need whatever for a single website as google (insert other search engine if required) will always find what you re looking for more quickly.
Posted in Post Office going tap-cash in 2012
Back to cash then?
No way I'll be using one of these. The insecure chip and PIN is bad enough, I'll be going to the ATM more often i suppose. Oh well . . .
I know who I am
The UK government can make no claim to be authoritative on the score of my, or anyone else's identity. They do not own me, I am not a servant of their state. The government exists to provide certain services for the common good. My identity belongs to me, not to them.
Works now
Site is working fine at 8.15 am Wednesday 19 April.
Not clear on the concept
You clearly do not get the 'privacy thing'. We all have a right to go about our business without being monitored by the authorities or quizzed on the reasons for our journeys. The ANPR system is a gross invasion of privacy. Collecting information because it might be useful down the track somewhere is actually against the law - although our spineless and powerless ICO will not do anything about it. European law says that failure to provide the information demanded by e-Borders cannot be used as a reason to bar travel, and that carriers must so inform their passengers. The British have steadfastly ignored this inconvenient little fact, but it is clear that at present the entire e-Borders system is in serious breach of EU regulations - the main one being that all EU citizens have the freedom to travel from cone member state to another within the EU without our journeys being recorded. e-Borders is going to record every journey you make, even within the EU, for 10 years. Not allowed!
Get Lost
The intrusive and invasive ANPR system operated by the ACPO is of doubtful legality. Our main concern should be closing it down, not using it to spy on people even more. Eagle has completely lost the plot.
look elsewhere for corruption
You make an unsupported statement that many in business or the professions are corrupt, and then extend it by alleging, by a false analogy, that many council officials will be corrupt. This is a blaggardly slur for which you have adduced no evidence.
Huh!
Cutting back on stuff that makes this country work: that includes ContactPoint, ID cards, Vetting and Barring and the bodged Fire Control Centres?
A (very) senior civil servant has admitted to me that the civil servants had a lot of (very rude, they have no manners she says) Labour Ministers breathing heavily down their necks who all wanted bright gleaming IT Projects that would "Solve a major problem." Neither Labour Ministers nor civil servants understood that the approach to most big systems is necessarily incremental. Do what you know how to do, and do it well. The DVLA, for example, has never run a world shattering IT system, but what it does pretty much works, not brilliantly, but it works. That's because there are no big brownie points to be earned by introducing shiny all new all singing all dancing programs into an office staffed by relatively low rankers in Swansea. Makes you think
Hmm
Laws are drafted by parliamentary draftsmen. None of whom, so far as I know, has ever been fired for incompetence. Funny, that.
Wrong
Street View take pictures the public could only take if they were on stilts. And you are forgetting that photographs of individual properties may, by themselves,not be significant, but photographs of properties taken from the air and from the street offer all sorts of information that the property owner might rather keep to themself.
Posted in Unlimited CRB checks may fall away
Just Junk it
The VBA does nothing except create jobs in an area without many. Other countries survive without a VBA, we can too. Without it i might volunteer at my local school. i have absolutely nothing to hide, but am damned if I am going to report to a creepy outfit that uses any gossip that anyone has ever put on record. Scrap the VBA and, if you have to, spend the money on something useful, but even better - give it back to the poor bloody taxpayer.
Oh no you don't
Just tells us how weak and pusillanimous the ICO is.
