Posts by simmondp

I don't understand number 11; "Thou will be sceptical of everything on the Internet"

"We just need a little help about where the lock goes on this chastity bra"

Backdoor Encryption Advocates - are you reading this?

In a very simple way, this neatly sidesteps all the technical arguments about can you put an backdoor into encryption for the "good guys" to use, and provides a really simple example of why ** ITS A REALLY BAD IDEA **

So in reality....

Lets ignore the real world top 35, and just splash out multi-millions on hardware, software and consultancy to implement a big-data, APT detection solution...... Oh, and lets not forget more billions on a GRC system.... and while we are trying to avoid actually fixing the root cause (at minimal cost) lets implement a "Cyber Threat Intelligence Integration Center" so we can share our woes with everyone else.....

But then we have always lived in an industry that is vendor driven, where common sense and getting the basics right have no part to play.

Another vendor flogging a product with FUD

Why are the "experts" in this area not coming together to define how to work securely on open, public WiFi?

Secure protocols, with tools that switch on certificate pinning and force HTTPs only, and only allow you to connect with trusted sites must be the way to go; rather than needing to buy a VPN service from a company, as this:

a) does not solve the underlying problems, and

b) wont be used my the majority of the public, and

c) it liable to the same interception / attacks by anyone who owns the termination node.

Only 10 years to late....

By default, data must be appropriately secured when stored, in transit and in use - Jericho Forum Commandment #11. from 2005

Great shame to see they've forgotten about "when stored" and "when in use" - maybe in another 10 years....

Time for a pragmatic solution.

As much I agree with what Which are trying to achieve, the speed is usually governed by physics, namely the length of copper from the exchange (or FTTC box) to the home.

Is not the pragmatic solution to charge for the percentage of actual speed delivered.

This if you advertise 18M for £10/month but I only get 9M then I only get charged £5 / month.

Or is this too simple?

Chrome but not Chromebook

Does not work on Chromebook, go figure..... As a web-based end-point surely this should be an ideal target for this technology - oh wait..... its a laptop that does not support Windows.....

Three weeks without being able to send mail

No meaningful response from support whatsoever.

Closed ticket on not being able to send email, can only re-open by emailing from my email address #Doh! #Catch22

If I open new ticket I go the end of a very long queue.

Recommendations for a new domain hosting company please.

... the company will shortly be releasing a companion perpetual motion machine....

What you fail to mention.....

What you fail to mention is usability; I have TalkTalk2Go, Viber (horribly insecure) and Skype all as apps on my phone, in addition to the actual (standard) phone.

What I want, (and I think most people want,) is a ** SINGLE ** phone interface that works seamlessly whether on 3G, 4G or Wi-Fi.

Why not?

If you suitcase is locked they will ask politely (demand) that you open it - What is the difference?

Don't carry anything through a border that you don't want to be subject to search - saying "electronic" is different is muddying the waters.

The more interesting case comes where if you are carrying a device that has encrypted material for which you do not hold the key (for example it's a corporate laptop used by multiple people one of which has received an encrypted file).

Out of touch with the real world of digital business.

Take a look at the "acid tests" for a decent identity ecosystem, remembering business and e-commerce is global and "Verifiy" fails on all accounts.

http://www.globalidentityfoundation.org/downloads/Six_Conundrums_Of_Global_Identity_v1.0.pdf

Mixing "cell (call) handover" with "roaming"

Let's be clear, when no signal is available from my operator my phone will make call using any operator on the 999/112 number - and I believe even if no SIM is actually present?

Once you have started the call with a roaming operator then all cell handover will need to be done with that operator - big deal I can live with that restriction.

Simply mandate roaming; and Offcom can ensure that your provider pays a sensible surcharge to the roaming provider (at no additional cost to the user) - so when the usage gets too high in a particular area your provider has the ROI to upgrade, in-fill or provide new infrastructure in that area.

Market forces should take care of the rest!

Vote for Android

The biggest advantage I can see in having an Android based UI - assuming it works this way - it that I do not need be be tied to the media sources that the TV manufacturer wants to give me and give long term support to.

Want ITV player - get it from the Playstore, want Plex again go to the store etc.

Need that latest version, no need to wait for a manufacturer supported version simply update it from the "standard" Playstore version.

If it really does work this way, then I for one, will be making my TV choice based on whether it has Android or not.

Note to the manufacture: locking me out of PlayStore and not letting me use Standard android media player apps will mean I will vote with my wallet!

Wanting privacy and security does not equal terrorist.

If privacy is outlawed, only outlaws will have privacy.

Philip R. Zimmermann, June 1991

and it's corollary;

If encryption is outlawed, only outlaws will have encryption.

Thus if I encrypt, does that make me a bad guy, or just someone that wants to protect my privacy.

This is the start of a very slippy legal slope.

You've missed the apps factor

Critical mass on content (apps) is critical, which is why there are only two OS players in town, Android and IOS. Outside of the emerging markets, no one will buy a high end phone unless it runs all the apps they want. So in the west it's all Marketing, marketing and more marketing either to pay a huge premium for an apple badge, or to differentiate my Android from their android.

Sheep of the world, flock to your Apple store

Based on the iPhone 6 launch, it will be a 4:3 format service with 500 lines and only 4 channels available, but people will still be queueing around the block to but it.

Quick soluution

Just use the Google authenticator app......

Primacy & Agency

When will businesses (who want to leverage my information to make money) understand that the only person I want to be in control of my information is ME (Primacy) and that I want to be able to define who then has access to it (Agency).

See the original work out the Jericho Forum on Identity, and now being moved forward by the Global Identity Foundation (www.globalidentityfoundation.org)

Chromebook competitor - not really

The chromebook advantage is not only about cost - my 11in laptop with 9hrs usable battery life, instant on, 7 seconds boot, automatic updating, no additional costs for Office, AV, etc.

Performance - fantastic, browser faster than my BIG windows desktop, just plays 1080p video without problem etc. etc.

Yes the cost is significantly less.

Looking forward to the next generation of 13in 1080 screens, still with 9hrs battery!

Not Free Wi-Fi

Personal Data has value, thus any "Free" WI-Fi that asks for personal information is by definition NOT free and should be prosecuted under the trades descriptions act.

IMHO a good reason to support openwireless.org

It's now my permenant laptop

An Acer C720 was my Christmas "experiment" - to see if I could live with this rather than my "full-fat" Windows 7 Toshiba. The answer is YES, including giving conference "powerpoint" presentations in off-line mode.

I only needed to buy an HDMI to VGA converter dongle for a couple of quid on e-bay.

Apart from that, the ability to just plug in my Android phone and get (configuration free) network connection means working on the road is now simple and instantaneous.

Add to that instant-on when I lift the lid, and a 7 second boot from cold, and a battery lifetime of 9 hours that means I really can do a whole day in London in meetings without needing to carry a charger brick with me.

Configuration free with no updates to manage.....

Close the lid, it sleeps, lift the lid it is ready to go; No more worrying of "will it resume"

The only thing missing is the ability to mount Windows file shares, but it looks like this will be here very soon.

Seem to have missed Draytek off the list.

Not only that, the reason for many people to replace the standard box supplied by the ISP is additional flexibility required, my list of things I need a router to do includes;

* SIP

* VPN

* QoS

* VLAN Isolation

* Ability to configure "openwireless.org" and isolate from home traffic

* Ability to stream Linear IPTV

* USB Dongle for 4G Auto-failover

* (Nicety) Ability to directly support Fibre (FTTC)

Hence the use of a Draytek, however I would be interested how many more routers support configuration at this more advanced level.

Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it

“I think we can take lessons from how physical security has been mounted historically: something as simple as a castle didn’t have just one wall. There were layers of walls and eventually a redoubt within which the most precious items were kept,” Woodward says.

And how many working, walled cities are there in the world right now? Look at the history, the merchants and the people were too contained by the walls and simply bypassed them, making them obsolete, so now they are simply tourist attractions.

Fast forward to today, and if you put (more) security in the way of businesses (friction) then they simply go BYoD, Cloud. Parallel IT etc.

The Jericho Forum outlined this over 10 years ago and also gave you better models to implement.

But those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it (or be out of a job).

Love my C720

Works just fine, boot 6.5 seconds from cold, instant on from standby and I can work a whole day without needing to carry a charger.

Can produce documents and have done conference presentations from it - no it's not full blown windows but then E-mail, Word Processing, Spreadsheets and Presentations are fine.

OS is getting the API's added (not quite there) for mounting Windows Server File Shares - then we will see fuller corporate SOHO adoption.

Brought it as an experiment to see if it was usable when out and about - and it's been real success.

Only downside - Google Docs, import and export of Word, but then Libre Office on a PC also suffers, but then the blame should rest squarely with MS and their "open standard" docx format.

Voicemail to e-mail

Really nice, 3CX Voice-mail will mail you a copy of the voice-mail left. However, it still (despite many requests and much grumbling on the bulletin board) support MP3, so it's a full-fat WAV file - not great over a poor (or mobile) e-mail link.

Other than that - probably the best SIP exchange for SOHO/SME. IMHO

Serious point

Notwithstanding the date....

£10000 for a backup contract vs £10 for a subject access request - no contest!

View but no print

Well not that I could find, so rather pointless, view it but need to find a PC to print it out??

Good but no banana!

Let's not forget ICI

The failed ERP implementation at the Quest division which resulted in the share price diving resulting in dropping outside the FTST 100 for the first time in its history. First the Quest CEO and then the ICI CEO (yes CEO not CIO) fell on their swords to placate the city - and ultimately (many think) this led to demise / sale / break-up of ICI.

Oft quoted as #1 in all time IT failures!

http://www.information-age.com/industry/uk-industry/297461/sap-supply-chain-implementation-ravages-ici

Two simple low cost solutions.

1. Buy from e-bay or similar a USB to SATA adaptor, then remove your hard disk and connect it to a second (clean) computer with this adaptor. Now run your scans and tests without any root kit being able to easily hide itself.

2. Put in your diary a reminder, every two weeks to run backup. Use the Microsoft "Backup" (Create System Image) - to snapshot your C: drive, along with a daily or real-time data backup program.

Corrections

"Non-strategic business" (Areas we’ve failed in)

"Non-core business" (Areas we make no money from)

Chrome OS Corporate Fail

As an owner of a Chromebook (which I love) the biggest barrier to getting the Chrome OS into the corporate environment is an inability to mount Windows File Shares or Print to Printer Shares.

Fine is you want to go HTML for all your apps, but GoogleDrive and CloudPrint is not a prime-time solution for 99% of Corporates!

SoHo users in a greenfield environment maybe.......

Lets get real

The last 30 years of the PC revolution is littered with the need to upgrade or lose you Data.

The "standard" for desktop publishing was Xerox Ventura - I cant read or translate any of those files now.

How about DAT backup - loads of those tapes - little chance of reading them.

ARC compression - spend a day translating them to ZIP

I've lost count of obsolete programs and file formats I've either had to move from or that are unreadable.

Remember: in computing, if you can buy it - it's obsolete! (and plan accordingly).

In cloud: cloud is outsourcing - and any good business school will tell you the first rule of outsourcing is "understand your exit strategy".

Got one for Christmas;

Positives;

* 6.5 second boot to log-on, instant sleep and restore with no worries about will it make it or not that you get with Windows.

* Instant browser, and gmail just works.

* Plugging in a USB to my Android phone and tethering just worked.

* (claimed) 9 hours on battery - the promise of a whole day on the move without a charger

* Size & weight

* Screen - good and resolution on this size screen more than adequate.

* Feed HD videos on the SD card - just works

Negatives;

* No Bluetooth tethering

* No SMB mounts to allow access to Windows file servers.

It's all about the key location......

But where are the keys held? If you hold the keys good - if they hold the keys then the encryption is about as much good as a chocolate teapot. (Patriot Act request for Data AND Keys and you know will nothing about it).

If you hold the keys then at least a legal request needs to come to you asking for the keys, and then you can make a decision about what to do (comply or fight) - and if you comply then at least you know that the spooks have which bits of your data.

This could solve both coverage and reliability issues. If every-time there is no signal from your provider your phone is allowed to roam and ** your provider ** picks up the ** full cost ** of you having to roam to another provider, then market forces will quickly ensure coverage in those black-spots and also ensure a reliable network.

Or is this too simple?

Product looking for a Problem - More

Ditto to previous, plus am I going to have to put batteries, or charge all those USB keys and other USB devices that get their 5V power down the cable?

Bluetooth worse!

Worse is the bluetooth problems with 4.3 on a Nexus, paining with cars / headsets is buggy and the bulletin boards awash with issues about bluetooth keyboard.

Polar Drill runs out of steam?

Could explain why the Wise Men did not show up until January.

Motorola Accompli 008

Motorola Accompli 008 - a product before it time, only really sold in Asia, not available in Europe or USA.