* Posts by Graham Marsden

6899 publicly visible posts • joined 19 Jan 2007

Google's new parent Alphabet owns abc.xyz – and, yup, there's already an abc.wtf

Graham Marsden
Unhappy

Re: In related news

D™A™M™N™

Random numbers aren't, says infosec boffin

Graham Marsden

Re: Bonds

"The first ERNIE was built at the Post Office Research Station by a team led by Sidney Broadhurst.The designers were Tommy Flowers[14] and Harry Fensom and it is based on Colossus, the world's first digital computer.[15][16] It was introduced in 1957,[1] and generated bond numbers based on the signal noise created by neon tubes."

[...]

"ERNIE 4 uses thermal noise in transistors as its source of entropy for generating true random numbers; the original ERNIE used a gas neon diode. Pseudorandom numbers, often called simply random, can be recreated by anybody who knows the algorithm used to generate them as they are produced in a deterministic way; true random numbers can not. The randomness of ERNIE's numbers derives from random statistical fluctuations in the physical processes involved. ERNIE's output is independently tested each month by an actuary appointed by the government, and the draw is only valid if it is statistically random."

Return of the Jedi? StarWars.co.uk bod to fight the Empire (Disney)

Graham Marsden
WTF?

"A notice to appeal...

"...costs £360 (US$560) and provides a further 15 working days for the formal appeal. The formal appeal costs £3600 (US$5,600)."

Ah, "How much Justice can you afford?"

Germany formally drops ‘treason’ case against Netzpolitik journos

Graham Marsden

“Now would be the right time to discuss improved whistleblower protection..."

"...but is very probably not going to happen because National Surveillance Security is so much more important that Civil Liberties and Freedom of Expression."

FTFY

It's incredibly easy to bump someone off online, and here's how to do it – infosec bod

Graham Marsden
Alert

"you're still deceased as far as the law is concerned"

Which, surely, has benefits too...

"I arrest you for the crime of..."

"... you can't arrest me, I'm dead!"

"Ok, then we'll bury you."

"Nope, you can't do that either because a Doctor can't declare Life Extinct as there's no medical cause of death."

"Err..."

Boffinry breakthrough: Bullied bumble bot bolts brutal brat beatdowns

Graham Marsden
Terminator

Re: 3 Laws

Dave Langford's version...

1) A robot will not harm authorized Government personnel but will terminate intruders with extreme prejudice.

2) A robot will obey the orders of authorized personnel except where such orders conflict with the Third Law.

3) A robot will guard its own existence with lethal antipersonnel weaponry, because a robot is bloody expensive.

Graham Marsden
Holmes

"kids [...] will bully, harass, and sometimes even attack robots"

Congratulations! You've just discovered that kids can be little bastards!

Apple, Google should give FBI every last drop of user information, says ex-HP CEO and wannabe US prez Carly Fiorina

Graham Marsden
Holmes

"We know that we could have detected and repelled some of these cyber attacks..."

"...if that collaboration had been permitted," [This section possibly contains original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original research should be removed.]

Graham Marsden
Paris Hilton

@Spaceman Spiff

Sorry, but that information is restricted as it may compromise National Security.

And, sorry, no, we can't tell you anything about what there is in there that would compromise National Security because that would compromise National Security too!

Tobacco field bacteria offers hope for buzz-kill smoking therapy

Graham Marsden
Boffin

"at 98 degrees Fahrenheit"...

... This is the 21st Century calling...

Death to DRM, we'll kill it in a decade, chants EFF

Graham Marsden
Holmes

"when one party in a suicide pact pulls out, the other one does too"

Is it a suicide pact when Corporate America is holding a gun to your head...?

Want to download free AV software? Don't have a Muslim name

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

Hello, my name is John Smith...

*cough* Allahu akhbar! *cough*

Copyright troll wants to ban 'copyright troll' from its copyright troll lawsuit

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

"Please stop them using these words..."

Paging Barbra Streisand...

Windows 10 wipes your child safety settings if you upgrade from 7 or 8

Graham Marsden
Boffin

@P Lee - Re: @Hans 1

> Nicely ripped out of context.

>> Also told them that that has nothing to do with what you actually do with the opposite sex. After all, porn is just for perverts and the insane.

If he'd left it as just the first sentence, I wouldn't have commented. Adding the second sentence, however, makes a big difference.

Unfortunately you also seem to have missed the point with your ridiculous Straw Man arguments of "Hands up who wants a 12-yo watching them get it on... anyone? As for the insane - well maybe those who think putting porn in the hands of a twelve-yo is a good idea?"

The "sex education" children get here in the UK is mostly useless nonsense, more designed to placate Middle England than actually helping children learn about sex and (more importantly) relationships.

Consequently they *don't know* that porn "has nothing to do with what you actually do with the opposite sex", so they try to replicate that (with all the deleterious emotional consequences that follow) and, because they don't know better, results in increased levels of teenage pregnancies and STIs.

We need to teach children what they need to know *before* they know it and not with the coy and embarrassed "education" they get at the moment. Compare this with countries like the Netherlands which start to teach children about sexuality from about the age of 6 (cue the Mail frothing at the mouth about our children being "corrupted"!) and you might start to understand the situation.

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

@Hans 1

> porn is just for perverts and the insane

Nice open minded viewpoint you have there...

AIDS? Ebola? Nah – ELECTRO SMOG is our 'biggest problem', says Noel Edmonds

Graham Marsden
Happy

@BenBell

Nice comments section on that item...

Graham Marsden

Re: He's possibly right about Ebola

> Ebola has been massively over-hyped.

Yeah, but nobody ever made a scary film about Flu, Malaria, TB or Motor Vehicle Accidents...

McAfee tells El Reg: 'My shootout with the police was highly exaggerated'

Graham Marsden
Coat

"Pity stayed his hand...

"... Pity I've run out of bullets", he thought.

- Bored of the Rings

German prosecutor given Das Boot over Netzpolitik treason charge

Graham Marsden
Happy

Re: Downfall?

Damn, you just beat me to that one...

Screw your cutesy plastic art tat, the US govt has found a use for 3D printing: DRUGS!

Graham Marsden
Thumb Up

I have to admit...

... my first reaction of this was "WTF?" because it seemed to be a definite case of using a sledgehammer (or maybe a piledriver) to crack a nut, but as I read further and the reason for using this method to "print" a tablet, ie fast delivery of amounts of the drug which would normally take multiple tablets, I realised that actually it's a bloody neat idea.

Well done for some creative thinking guys!

Chechen women swindle ISIS via social media: 'We need roubles to join you xx'

Graham Marsden
WTF?

@Chris W - Re: Why arrest them?

> It's only a short step away from this to claiming Peter Sutcliffe was doing some good.

Is this some new form of Godwin?

Websites that ID you by how you type: Great when someone's swiped your password, but...

Graham Marsden

Providing they have JavaScript enabled...

Hello NoScript, my old friend

You've helped me stay safe once again

Because a website softly sneaking,

Watched my fingers while I was keying,

And the Javascript that was planted in the pages

Still outrages

Within the sound of typing.

Obsolescence of food is complete: Soylent now comes in bottles

Graham Marsden
Boffin

Sneer at this if you want...

... but how many geeks on here would find it even more convenient if they could simply plug in a power cord and recharge, rather than have to waste valuable computer time cooking and eating food?

Global spy system ECHELON confirmed at last – by leaked Snowden files

Graham Marsden
Thumb Down

@moiety

> I like very much the idea of only targeted surveillance with judicial approval; but sometimes shit goes down too quickly for that.

And then, six months *after* the "shit goes down", we find out that the Security Services had the information all along, but it was buried in such a huge pile of other crap that it was overlooked or discounted.

BAD things happen to GOOD robots in America: hitchBot DECAPITATED

Graham Marsden
Alien

Of course actually...

... it was kidnapped by Aliens and subjected to all sorts of probing.

It will then return a couple of hundred years in the future on a mission to find its creator...

Lottery chief resigns as winning combo numbers appear on screen BEFORE being drawn

Graham Marsden
Alert

Re: Lie Detectors

Yes, they absolutely work.

And I'm willing to take a Lie Detector Test to prove that I really do have a bridge for sale...

Linus Torvalds warns he's in no mood to be polite as Linux 4.2 drags

Graham Marsden
Happy

@ Simon Sharwood, Reg APAC Editor - Re: Give em' a break

> You get ONE LOUSY CHARACTER WRONG and this is what happens ;-)

You must be new here...

Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations stalled until November

Graham Marsden
Devil

USA "so out-of-whack with the rest of the world "

No, it's the rest of the world who are out of whack with the USA!

ATTACK of the ZOMBIE SATELLITE: Run radio hams, run!

Graham Marsden
Coat

@DougS - Re: can we use it for target practice?

> Maybe NASA should offer a $10 million prize

I have a Mr Blofeld on the line...

Edge out rivals? No! Firefox boss BLASTS Microsoft's Windows 10 browser brouhaha

Graham Marsden
Thumb Down

Microsoft...

... back to their old tricks again...

Download Fest goers were human guinea pigs in spy tech experiment, admit police

Graham Marsden

Re: 77 hits?

And how many False Positives did they get in that time...?

Graham Marsden
Joke

@Adam 52

So perhaps we should tell the Police "If you can't stand the crime, don't do the time"...?

Top German data cop slaps down Facebook's real name policy

Graham Marsden

Re: There is an important reason behind that Real Name thing..

> When you sign up to such a service, you engage in a contract.

Which AIUI is unenforceable in many places because, for a contract to be binding, *both* parties should have the right to negotiate terms, instead of being told "this is how it is, take it or leave it".

Italy: Human rights are so old hat. The future's in internet rights

Graham Marsden
Thumb Up

You may mock...

... but at least someone is trying to do *something* to level the playing field.

Maybe it won't work, however it might just get people thinking about what's happening out there.

Let kids delete their online rants, demand campaigners

Graham Marsden
Devil

You haven't met some of the children I have...

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

"try and decipher the iRights website"

"Kids should be allowed to run around and shout and scream and scribble on the walls without any supervision from their parents and then get off scot free and not have to take responsibility for what they've done or the mess they've left behind them."

FTFY.

Graham Marsden

Re: Does this mean the Queen....

Whereas the ones of the England Football Team saluting Hitler on the orders of the Foreign Office will remain...?

Gamers zap brain-to-computer kit market to US$200m by 2020

Graham Marsden

@AC - Re: WARNING - Not again!

Nope, I'm using broadband at home, that was for the benefit of those who aren't and don't want to a) use lots of data allowance or b) wait for ages for it to download (it took a couple of minutes on Virgin's "high speed" broadband) or c) both.

Graham Marsden
Thumb Down

WARNING - Re: Not again!

That's a 32MB PDF file if you're thinking of clicking on the link...

World-beating TWO-QUADRILLION-WATT LASER fired by boffins

Graham Marsden
Coat

"you're not going to be blowing up any planets with LFEX"

I find your lack of faith disturbing...

(Mine's the long black cape)

Voyager's Golden Record now free to download

Graham Marsden
Thumb Up

Re: Take me to your lawyer

Let's ship ALL the copyright trolls out there on a ship designated, say "B"...

W3C's failed Do Not Track crusade tumbles to ad-blockers' Vietnam

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

"tactics like denying content to users with DNT turned on"

Which (if they don't already exist, I haven't checked) will simply result in people creating browser extensions that will send spoof data back to the trackers...

Oh and as for "an advertising-based revenue model that works much better – for readers and advertisers – when ads are tailored to users' interests" it may work better for the advertisers, but if I'm looking for something I don't want recommendations based on who has paid the most to the ad slingers to get their stuff in front of my face, I want ones based on whether the product is any good!

Oh, Obama's responded to the petition to pardon Snowden. What'll it be?

Graham Marsden
Holmes

"He should come home to the United States...

"...and be judged by an authoritarian regime!"

FTFY!

Biometric behavioural profiling: Fighting that password you simply can't change

Graham Marsden
Boffin

"If you have JavaScript enabled"

Hello NoScript...

NSA: We'll move your metadata into /dev/null when you stop suing us

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

Why does this sound like...

... a bully grabbing your arm and saying "Stop hitting yourself"...?

UK.gov: Are we talking about Big Data enough? Should we plug it more?

Graham Marsden
Thumb Up

@moiety

That was exactly what I was thinking when I read this. I don't want to "feel" that my data is protected, I want to KNOW that my data is protected!

There are already too many organisations and businesses and governments who think that they should have free and unfettered access to everyone's data and, of course, then be able to sell it off to anyone they want (possibly with some sort of lip-service paid to "anonymisation"), but it is *our* data and *we* should have the right to decide who can get their hands on it.

And that's not simply "if you use this app you consent to us troughing your data, so if you don't like it, don't use it"!

Boffins' audacious plan to blow up aircraft foiled by bomb-proof bag

Graham Marsden

Re: Not mentioned in the article...

The 300 cubic metres is for the cargo hold version. There are smaller versions for bombs in the passenger cabin.

Game over for epic 15-year-long console ban, China says

Graham Marsden
Trollface

What they didn't mention...

... is that the foreign vendors will be restricted to the consoles they were producing 15 years ago, so the Chinese can look forward to the PS 2, Dreamcast, Game Cube and X-Box.

ICANN further implicated in .Africa controversy

Graham Marsden
Coat

Re: My question is: who cares about a .africa domain?

Paging Lady Mondegreen...

The Wilson Doctrine isn't legally binding, MPs CAN be spied on, says QC

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

@Pete65 - Re: If politicians have nothing to hide...

I think you need a new Irony Detector. Yours appears to be malfunctioning.