* Posts by Graham Marsden

6899 publicly visible posts • joined 19 Jan 2007

'Encryption will make life very easy for criminals and terrorists'

Graham Marsden
Pirate

@cap'n - Re: won't someone think of the children

THE CRIME ISSSSS LIFE. THE SSSSSENTENCE ISSSS DEATH!

- Judge Death.

Doctor Who becomes an illogical, unscientific, silly soap opera in Kill The Moon

Graham Marsden
Boffin

@Destroy All Monsters

> You may want to explain where gigatons of pure energy come from

Erm, why does the Moon shine...?

Graham Marsden
Thumb Up

@Gordon 10 - Re: However preposterous it was

I agree entirely.

There have been plenty of preposterously non-scientific episodes in past series of Who, but at least we had some real tension in this one and chances for Capaldi and Coleman to stretch their acting talents as well as deliver some lovely lines such as "I'll slap you so hard you'll Regenerate!"

Oh and as for those complaining about "Too many episodes set on Earth", I grew up with the Pertwee era...!

EFF: Cops' spyware for parents is insecure – and a fat waste of money

Graham Marsden
Unhappy

@AC - "Please tell me that this isn't true."

Unfortunately it's very true and very disturbing...

http://www.forbes.com/sites/instituteforjustice/2014/03/12/cops-use-traffic-stops-to-seize-millions-from-drivers-never-charged-with-a-crime/

Graham Marsden
Childcatcher

@Old Handle

Ah, but it's different when *they* do it...

Graham Marsden
Alert

Remember...

... an honest politician is one who *stays* bought..

Our Vultures peck at new Doctor Who: Exterminate or, er ... carrion?

Graham Marsden
Meh

Capaldi - Great, storylines, not so much

Capaldi is a great actor, but, like all such actors, he's struggling with what have been, mostly, frankly naff stories.

They're trying too hard to be "funny" or "mad-cap" or "screwball" which really isn't working and when they do come up with something good such as Listen (although pretty much from the start I was thinking "Hang on, isn't that The Silence he's talking about?") it then ended with what was an utterly ridiculous cop-out ending which ruined it.

Most of the rest of the episodes have been lazy re-treads (hanging a massive Lampshade on the clockwork robots and having a bit of girl-on-lizard-girl action wasn't enough to save the first one) and Robot of Sherwood was just dull.

My feelings on The Caretaker were "well, it was better than the last couple of episodes", but that really wasn't saying much.

Come on, Who writers, you can do better than this...

Cable guy, Games of Thrones chap team up to make Reg 'best sci-fi film never made' reject

Graham Marsden

I cannot remember just how many times I *almost* gave up on the Gap series, but then there would be a page (or even just a paragraph) of the incredible writing which Donaldson is occasionally capable of and it would hook me back in...

You dirty RAT! Hong Kong protesters infected by iOS, Android spyware

Graham Marsden
Thumb Down

"The Android version requested access to the full suite of permissions"

Yet another argument for why we, as users, should get control over what an App can actually access and use, rather than "If you want to use this App, you *have* to give it all these permissions, take it or leave it".

Ello, 'ello, what's all this then? We take a spin on the new social network driving everyone loopy

Graham Marsden
Happy

@ Big-nosed Pengie

Any noun in English can be verbed :-)

Turn OFF your phone or WE'LL ALL DI... live? Europe OKs mobes, tabs non-stop on flights

Graham Marsden
Megaphone

Will you be sitting in...

... Twat or Non-Twat?

Researchers tell black hats: 'YOU'RE SOOO PREDICTABLE'

Graham Marsden
Thumb Down

Another great idea...

... from the Department of Pre-Crime...

FBI boss: Apple's iPhone, iPad encryption puts people 'ABOVE THE LAW'

Graham Marsden

@DeKrow - Re: What a fuckbag

> P.S. The guns, drugs, bags of fertilizer, little boys, sex workers, and my missus' bruises are all hidden in my phone, which is encrypted, so even if we're pulled over there's nothing 'the man' can do about it. Let's ride!

Erm, you do realise that, by stating that in a public forum, you are giving the courts the ability to order you to unlock your phone or be held in contempt of court (and fined/ locked up for it until you do so) because you have thereby given them evidence that you do have illegal material on your phone?

Man's future in space ... Barack Obama: Mars. Narendra Modi: Mars. Vladimir Putin: Er, Moon

Graham Marsden
Coat

Re: USSR..

That's no...

... oh, wait, yes it is, never mind.

Feds: Cheeky scammers are impersonating us in criminal capers

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

Re: Guilty Conscience

Yes, Flip, of course, because if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear...

Huawei prez: A one-speed internet is bad for everyone

Graham Marsden
Holmes

"Bad for everyone"...?

Hmm, telecommunications company says Net Neutrality is bad for "everyone", what a surprise.

Meanwhile, of course, he makes a flawed analogy, it's not a comparison between ordinary letter post and FedEx, it's where everyone *had* FedEx type speeds, but then got told "If you're trying to ship certain types of package, then we're going to slow them down to letter post speeds".

Poverty? Pah. That doesn't REALLY exist any more

Graham Marsden

Re: @Squander Two - @Tim Worstal - "you've got that $1.25 a day at US prices to play with...

> Can you see why objecting so strongly to the following might have given the impression that you did?

Can you please read the following again, now that you have understood what I was saying, and realise that I am not "objecting" to it, but objecting to the *policy* which causes it to be necessary:

"Charity like this should *NOT* be necessary, because the State should *NOT* fuck up like this.

"It most certainly shouldn't fuck up (or fuck people up) like that as a matter of policy!"

Graham Marsden

Re: @Squander Two - @Tim Worstal - "you've got that $1.25 a day at US prices to play with...

> don't blame me for responding to what you did in fact write.

I'm not. You seem to be deliberately misunderstanding what I wrote.

> the state is not the government. The state is the whole apparatus, including us the electorate.

Now that is just naiive. The State is whoever holds the power and we, the electorate do *not* hold the power. All we have is the choice of electing Tweedledum or Tweedledee who then go and do what the hell they like until, eventually, at the next election, they want our votes again.

> I don't understand your antipathy to charity itself.

And again you continue to misunderstand me. I have no "antipathy" towards charity, my antipathy is towards the people who make such charity *necessary* because of their deliberate policies towards those who end up needing it.

If you don't get that now I see no point in continuing this discussion.

Graham Marsden

Re: @Squander Two - @Tim Worstal - "you've got that $1.25 a day at US prices to play with...

> given that the state, being comprised of humans, fucks up, I think it's great that private individuals do what they can to redress the fuck-ups via charity.

As I said, this is not simply a fuck up, it is a *policy* of deliberately fucking people up. The Tories are targetting the poor, the disabled and those who need the support of the State and using them as a scape-goat to blame for the problems which were actually caused by their rich banker mates (who give them big donations and lucrative Directorships in return).

Why should we have to "step up with private charity" when we are already paying taxes to support the people who need it, only for the government to give tax breaks to people who don't need them and, at the same time, flogging off services like the NHS which we bought and paid for?

Graham Marsden
Thumb Down

@Squander Two - Re: @Tim Worstal - "you've got that $1.25 a day at US prices to play with...

> Is that what you tell people who need charity?

No, it's what I would like to tell idiots like Ian Duncan Smith, along with "Get a conscience, you petty minded bastard!"

Graham Marsden

@Tim Worstal - Re: "you've got that $1.25 a day at US prices to play with...

> I think it's just great that individuals step in to prevent the destititution of their fellows when the State fucks up. [...] Or, as we might say, what in buggery is wrong with charity?

Umm, now I think it's *you* that's not getting it.

Charity like this should *NOT* be necessary, because the State should *NOT* fuck up like this.

It most certainly shouldn't fuck up (or fuck people up) like that as a matter of policy!

Graham Marsden
WTF?

"you've got that $1.25 a day at US prices to play with...

"...even the most drug-addled drunkard in the UK isn't living at anything close to that level."

ORLY? What about those people who have been getting the benefits that they are *legally* entitled to and then suddenly find themselves sanctioned because of some phoney ATOS assessment that says "you can pick up a pen, you can work" or those who get sanctioned because they're supposed to apply for X numbers of jobs a week, but the paperwork got mixed up so two weeks' worth of applications get rolled into one and it doesn't matter that they protest "We don't have you down for applying for any jobs this week, you get no benefits for the next month"?

Those, and many others, are the people who are having to visit the rising number of Food Banks in Ian Duncan Smith's "oh-don't-worry-the-economy-is-recovering" country simply to get enough food to be able to survive until, eventually, they might get their benefits back (IIRC over 50% of appeals succeed).

That is a pretty damn good definition of poverty, I think.

Special pleading against mass surveillance won't help anyone

Graham Marsden

@Matt Bryant - Re: Graham Marsden @Matt Bryant - Graham Marsden @Matt Bryant - ....cobblers.

Snip of a lot of blather where Matt accuses me of nit-picking whilst, erm, picking nits, I'll just address the (few) salient points:

> no doubt do deter other policemen from dishonesty.

Yes, just like the investigation into the Stephen Lawrence case have deterred police officers from Institutional Racism or the finger wagging following various deaths due to excessive force by the Police stopped the death of Ian Tomlinson or... (I'd mention other examples, but Matt's blinkers won't let him see them, so there's no point in wasting my time)

> which is your nit-picking way of avoiding admitting you cannot provide any law broken by the Met in this case

No, Matt, it's pointing out that you seem to have little clue about what you're talking about.

> I have no idea, not being party to the Police's authorization system [...] Firstly, you need to show that there is actually a legal requirement for the Met to record such authorizations - if not, just like all other organisations, they are not going to try double-guessing every possible data retention requirement. Secondly, you also need to show that, even if there was a requirement to record such authorizations, that there was a secondary requirement to make that information publically available upon request.

Ye gods, Matt, did you actually *BOTHER* to read the original article? Let me quote it for you to save you time:

"the police refused to respond, claiming that because they didn't bother keeping records of how often they used RIPA powers [...] given that the RIPA powers it uses for rifling through innocent people's communications metadata must, legally, be “authorised” by a constable of superintendent rank"

And, to save you even more time, let me quote from the RIPA itself:

* * * * *

35 Notification of authorisations for intrusive surveillance.

(1)Where a person grants or cancels a [F1police, SOCA, [F2Revenue and CustomsF2]][F3F1or OFT] authorisation for the carrying out of intrusive surveillance, he shall give notice that he has done so to an ordinary Surveillance Commissioner.

(2)A notice given for the purposes of subsection (1)—

(a)must be given in writing as soon as reasonably practicable after the grant or, as the case may be, cancellation of the authorisation to which it relates;

(b)must be given in accordance with any such arrangements made for the purposes of this paragraph by the Chief Surveillance Commissioner as are for the time being in force; and

(c)must specify such matters as the Secretary of State may by order prescribe.

(4)Where a notice for the purposes of subsection (1) of the grant of an authorisation has been received by an ordinary Surveillance Commissioner, he shall, as soon as practicable—

(a)scrutinise the authorisation; and

(b)in a case where notice has been given in accordance with subsection (3)(a), decide whether or not to approve the authorisation.

* * * * *

Now you can whine and weasel and nit-pick and move the goalposts all you like (and I'm sure you will) but this is an absolute, legal requirement that there must be a *written record* made of the authorisation and that it must be passed on to an ordinary Surveillance Commissioner yet the Police have said that they *DID NOT* keep such records which is in clear breach of the law.

So I have done exactly what you asked, will you accept this, or will you just try to dodge the issue and make yourself look even more of a fool?

PS

> I have a problem with willful self-deception.

ROFL! I'm sorry, I would have liked to reply more in this discussion, but another Irony Detector has just exploded...

As always, feel free to declare victory (which is, of course, in no way self-deception!)

Graham Marsden

@Matt Bryant - Re: Graham Marsden @Matt Bryant - What a complete load of cobblers.

> As Keith Wallis was in a court of law, and the other officers involved got fired, which sounds like they were held to account.

Oh yes, Matt, they've had a *sound* slap on the wrist and that will *definitely* act as a deterrent to all their fellow officers the next time they decide to try to stitch someone up!

> So please do show how any of the actions carried out by the Met investigating this case was illegal under current UK laws. Oh, and please note that is UK law, not whatever fantasy liberal law you would like to have apply.

Oh dear, Matt, shooting yourself in the foot again? It is *not* UK Law, it's the law of England and Wales since Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own legal systems. Didn't you know this? Perhaps it is you who should be doing more reading...

Meanwhile, of course, you're also engaging in your usual practice of shifting the goalposts to where your shot ended up and declaring that you've scored.

Please try looking at the *first paragraph* of the article and note where it says "Earlier this week we discovered that not only are London's Metropolitan Police rampantly abusing data-snooping laws to hunt down and punish employees who talk to journalists."

Also note where it says "given that the RIPA powers it uses for rifling through innocent people's communications metadata must, legally, be “authorised” by a constable of superintendent rank, the need for such monitoring becomes obvious", now tell me, are they authorising the use of these powers and then not making a note of it (as they are supposed to) or are they just not bothering with such authority at all? Either way they are behaving in a way that is not open nor transparent and certainly not in a way that is compatible with the Common Law principle of the Presumption of Innocence (even though, in your fantasy fascist land that would be the first principle to be disposed of).

As for your comments desperately trying to cover up your error of forgetting to include your usual Ad Hominem, it seems that you have some sort of paranoid conspiracy theory about the Mod being "out to get you"...

Anyone got a tin foil hat for Matt?

Graham Marsden
Meh

@Chris G - Re: Constitution

> What the UK needs more and more as time goes by is a written binding constitution

Yes, but what said Constitution *also* needs is to be devoid of Weasel Phrases such as "except when needed to investigate crime" or "except during an emergency" or "except for the protection of public health and morals" etc which can be used to effectively neuter any Rights that it contains at any point at which they become inconvenient to TPTB...

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

Re: Graham Marsden @Matt Bryant - What a complete load of cobblers.

> Wow, you really are determined to hate the police!

No, Matt, I am determined that they should be accountable for their actions, that they should behave in a way that is compatible with Human Rights and Civil Liberties legislation and that they should *NOT* have carte blanche to do what the hell they like.

Yes, they should gather intelligence and investigate crime, but not by simply assuming everyone is guilty and grabbing as much information as they can in the vague hope that, somehow, they'll actually find something of use.

PS I'm really not sure what extra credibility the participation of a "journalist" from The Scum gives to your argument.

PPS Oops! You forgot to call me MarsBarBrain...

Graham Marsden
Childcatcher

@Matt Bryant - Re: What a complete load of cobblers.

> What 'innocents'? They were legally investigating a possible crime, by members of the Police force, not 'slurping' anything

You know, Matt, you'd have been an even better Witch-Finder than Matthew Hopkins. Why bother with actually looking for suspects first, just assume that *everyone* is guilty and investigate to your heart's content.

Graham Marsden
Big Brother

"Putting aside the notion...

"...that a public sector body should be able to get away with pretending that it doesn't carry out even the most basic of internal compliance auditing..."

What about the notion that our Police are supposed to work in an open and transparent manner for *our* benefit to enforce the law, rather than acting as Judge and Jury behind closed doors in some sort of Star Chamber manner?

Let alone the idea that *they* are not above the law and should be held to at least the same, if not a higher standard, than the rest of us...

UK banks hook themselves up to real-time cop data feed

Graham Marsden
Holmes

"UK banks will receive real-time warnings about threats to their customers' accounts "

Still doesn't mean they'll *do* anything about the security flaws in their systems...

US team claims PARIS paper plane launch crown

Graham Marsden

@Michael Hawkes - Re: /me

> Do you mean to have PARIS mount LOHAN?

Sure, you'd just need a device for Supplementing The Register's Aircraft by Penetrating Orbital Navigator or STRAP-ON for short...

Will Europe's ISPs unmask anonymous IP infringers?

Graham Marsden

"due diligence checks banks are obliged to conduct...

"...to ensure that their customers are who they say they are and are not involved in money laundering activities"

And not, in any way, colluding with them to do exactly that *cough*Barclays*cough*

Germany strikes again over Amazon warehouse pay

Graham Marsden

@DNTP

I think you're trying for sarcasm.

If so, try harder.

CloudFlare ditches private SSL keys for better security

Graham Marsden
Big Brother

Well obviously...

... now everyone involved in this should be arrested for Assisting Terrerism...

New UK.gov DATA SLURPING diplomat to push US telcos to share more subscriber info

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

Why does this sound like...

... Waaah! They got lotsa snooping powers me want them too...!!!

Graham Marsden
Black Helicopters

@MyBackDoor - Re: Free enrollment?

> I want to know where I can enroll for these free Spying classes

Ah, but the qualification for enrolling in the classes is being able to find them yourself!

THE DEATH OF ECONOMICS: Aircraft design vs flat-lining financial models

Graham Marsden

@ql - Re: One factor left out - The System

> Anyone know of a political party with differing ideologies these days?

"Why 73% of UKIP supporters should actually vote Green"

Relive the death of Earth over and over again in Extinction Game

Graham Marsden
Thumb Up

"It's only...

"... the end of the world, again"

- Disaster Area

'Kim Kardashian snaps naked selfies with a BLACKBERRY'. *Twitterati gasps*

Graham Marsden
Meh

Whilst the security failure is worrying...

... I do have to say "Who?"

(Followed by "and why should I care?")

Driving with an Apple Watch could land you with a £100 FINE

Graham Marsden

@The First Dave - Re: Knee Jerk Off

There is a big difference between the training that the Police get to drive or ride on Britain's streets and driving or riding on a closed course where there's much less chance of having someone pull out on you or do something equally stupid.

And even then it can go wrong, eg the recent crash involving Prince Harry's motorcycle outrider, but at least they're better prepared.

Graham Marsden
Thumb Down

@DougS - Re: "Advanced training"

Let me guess, you've never had any advanced driving training?

In fact, I'd wager that, like 99% of the people out on the road, you've never had *any* more training than what you had to pass your Driving Test which simply means that you've achieved the bare minimum level of competency to be allowed out in charge of a vehicle.

Your local IAM or RoSPA group will almost certainly offer you a free Assessment of your driving skills, why not see just how good you actually are?

Graham Marsden

@Laurent Somers

Yes, but we all know that, somehow, when any such device crosses the Pond, the exchange rate magically becomes £1 = $1

Graham Marsden

@Version 1.0 - Re: Knee Jerk Off

> Should we actually wait and see if using a watch is a problem before legislating?

The legislation is *already* there.

* * * * *

The Definition of a Hand-Held Mobile Phone

The Regulation includes any "device, other than a two-way radio, which performs an interactive communication function by transmitting and receiving data".

It states that a "mobile telephone or other device is to be treated as hand-held if it is, or must be, held at some point during the course of making or receiving a call or performing any other interactive communication function". "interactive communication function" includes:

sending or receiving oral or written messages;

sending or receiving facsimile documents;

sending or receiving still or moving images; and

providing access to the internet

* * * * *

Graham Marsden
Boffin

Blue Light Aware

> If an emergency vehicle is behind, just keep driving until there is a nice safe place to slow right down or pull over, not hard is it.

http://www.bluelightaware.org.uk/

Oi, London thief. We KNOW what you're doing - our PRECRIME system warned us

Graham Marsden
Facepalm

Isn't it convenient...

... that London is built around a regular grid pattern so they can output their map in nice square blocks that line up with the roads...

Gigantic bazaar Alibaba WILL turn share price up to 11, er, $68 for biggest IPO ever in US

Graham Marsden
Thumb Down

@ razorfishsl = Re: It may not be worth more than Amazon

Or you could actually supply us with a couple of useful links to back up your vague insinuations of wrong-doing...

Supermassive black hole dominates titchy star formation

Graham Marsden
Coat

"Well, the thing about a black hole...

"... its main distinguishing feature - is it's black. And the thing about space, the color of space, your basic space color - is it's black. So how are you supposed to see them?"

- Holly

eBay promises to refund seller fees after latest MASSIVE OUTAGE

Graham Marsden
Devil

@MJI Re: I would move like a shot

You forgot "Doesn't force you to accept PayPal which, of course, they own, so they get two bites at the cherry as they take another chunk of your profit"!

PLEASE STOP with the snooping requests, begs Google as gov data demands skyrocket

Graham Marsden
Holmes

"requests for access to Google's user data leapt by 15 per cent in the last six months"

Well perhaps that's because they know that Google has been snooping on everyone's e-mails and web searches and so on for ages, so there's got to be some data worth having.

Maybe Google should think about how they could stop this happening...

Facebook's self-destruct status update beta test will self-destruct

Graham Marsden
Coat

Well I think that...

<DELETED>

Go home Google, you're drunk! Desktop Maps says The Shard's TWO MILES from actual loc

Graham Marsden
Black Helicopters

Not Maps, but Street View

At the moment, for some reason, parts of Street View appear to be giving black screens.

I was looking for a location near Russell Square in London WC1B 5BB but Street View showed no images, just black.

Other locations, however, worked fine.

Maybe it's an anti-terrorism measure...!!!