security
Airport Security Experiencing Complete Turbulance!
No doubt that just about everyone in the world has heard about The Grinch who tried to blow himself up on an airplaine as it was landing in Detroit on Christmas.
Well, since then world wide airport security has taken steps…backward.
Whether it be passenger incompetence about things you can’t bring on board (NO EXCEPTIONS!), turning the plane around for one passenger whose name is similar to another person on the No-Fly List and doubling travel time and expenses, freaking out because some guy left LaGuardia Airport wasn’t on any of the aircraft but was on the No-Fly List so the airport had to be shut dhow for six hours, cancelling everyone’s flight over a jar of honey, or illegally seizing someone’s computer for being critical about current and new, rediculous security measures. If this is what you call an effective system, even if nothing is found (because it still costs way too much money to conduct any search), the system is in panic. And what happens when a person has anxiety attack, they become paranoid.
Even with terrorist threats picking up again, the TSA’s level of effectiveness is SLIPPING!
Terrorists are smart. We assume that these guys are people who live in caves and shout things in Arabic wearing scarves and toating AK-47s and C4 vests to blow themselves up. But this is wrong. To quote Keanu Reeves from the movie Speed, terrorists are “crazy, not stupid.”
The guy who stuck up the flight in Detroit this Christmas was the son of a wealthy Nigerian lawyer. Osama bin Ladin and much of his family and next of kin are wealth. Bin Ladin is the heir of a wealthy construction company. We thought that locking up his bank account would stop a guy who has enough money that he can pay for everything with cash.
Then their are all the other terrorists we have forgotten about. People who were part of the Irish Republican Army, Hezbollah, November 14th, E.T.A., Animal Liberation Front, and of course the domestic terrorists in our own country, some who may have been at the Town Hall Outbursts last year mearly to observe rather than engage in the madness.
We’ve spent the past eight years chasing ghosts, and locking up the wrong people, while suicide bombings and IEDs still go off on a daily basis, but the news media shugs it off like it is mearly a bug hitting a windshield.
Yet, you can’t enter or leave London anymore whout getting a full body high-power X-ray which is unsafe and illegal. You don’t go to the Airport anymore to travel, you go there to be herded, profiled, and treated like cattle only to have the airport shut down, flights cancelled, and planes turning around after nearly reaching their destination because of one passenger whose name matches some retired terrorists in Ireland.
People forget that terrorists are smart. They don’t need to fly commercially if they have their own private jet. They don’t even need to be at the airport to enter this country. They can hop a cargo ship, a train, or just WALK IN to the country from some port of entry no one thinks about. And what about the Domestic terrorists? Clearly, they have the ablity to drive to their destination, catch a train, or simply WALK where they want.
We are looking in the wrong direction. We have all this high technology to check someone at the airport, yet the terrorist don’t even need to use the Internet. They can be low tech and on the downlow. Look at Ted Kazenski, the Unibomber. The FBI was on a nation wide manhunt for him, yet their he was living in his little cabin in the woods, self susstaining, and off the grid.
This is why after nearly a decade, we still haven’t apprehended Osama Bin Ladin. Why shoes are taken off at the airport and strip searches are kicking in. Why an X-ray machines are being installed in airports.
Frequent exposure to X-rays in a place that really isn’t a hospital is VERY dangerous! Why in the world would when you go to the dentist, you have to wear a lead apron? So that your entire body isn’t exposed to X-Ray radiation. If you are a frequent flyer, you are about to have cancer, because the Airport is not the Hospital or the Dentist.
We worry that terrorists will set off a radiologically device, when the airport has several of them going off all the time, exposing everyone to radiation hazards daily. The guy at the TSA at the security gate is not the X-Ray Technician at the hospital.
We’ve lost at this point. The TSA is beating a dead horse hoping that it will live and still work and is lashing out at everyone who doesn’t believe that they have the ability to resurenct that horse to back to life and become Optimus Prime of the Transformers.
We need a new plan. We know what to look for. Adding security measure after security measure has been ineffective, expensive, a health hazard, and a hassle.
We assume that the enemy is stupid. So we treat everyone with indignation hoping that the terrorist will jump out and say “hey I’m over here!” We’ve been going at this all wrong!
We think that we won’t be treated terribly at the airport, but when you get there, “Surprise!”
If we want to catch people on the No-Fly List before they even enter the airport, why not put security guards at the front door of the airport rather than scattered throughout the terminals? This has been very effective at sports stadiums. They don’t inspect you when you are on the floor where your seats are at the stadium. They do it at the entrance. You can’t even get into the base ball stadium to buy anything unless you pass security. Why is this not the case at the airport?
Why are we find out about terrorists getting on plains seconds after the plane doors are closed, when people’s names are printed on the tickets? Why aren’t we identifying people who buy thier tickets when they are being printed off? We can tell somone their credit card has been declined instantly, but we can’t tell some “sorry sir, you can’t fly on the plane, you are on the No-Fly List.” To which just like the credit card declination, you can go to someone and dispute that information to possibly clear your self, especially if it involves Identity fraud.
What are the chances that a terrorist with your name, has a credit card similar to your own? We are able to identify an identity theif all the time with the credit card, but why not with airline tickets?
And what about the guys who pay with cash? I mean, you need proof of identity to buy the ticket in the first place. If you are flying internationally, you need your passport. SO WHY ISN’T THE TSA LOOKING UP THIS INFORMATION BEFORE PEOPLE GET ON THE PLANE?!
It only makes the terrorists look so much smarter, and the TSA look so much more stupid. Sure the TSA can take the credit when they find someone, but when they fail, they want to blame something else.
Don’t we have a unified system to identify international terrorists? Clearly there isn’t or else that one guy would have been stopped in Amsterdam where he was chaning his underwear to Fruit of a Booms!
No improvements have been made at the airport. If there were, people wouldn’t be critical of the TSA, London wouldn’t be turing into an Orwellian nightmare, and terrorists wouldn’t even be able to get into the airport.
Preparations is more than just guarding the airport, but making sure that terrorists can’t even buy tickets to get on the plane in the first place!
Use your heads, for crying out loud, TSA!
Droid Does Quite Well
Generally when I write my critiques, I have an unconventional way of writing them. I like to point out the faults and grevances first before pointing out the praise, features, and benefits. This way, when someone finishes reading the article they can think postively about the thing that I wrote about. This can work the opposite way if you list the postive first and the negative second.
I’ve had my Motorola Droid for nearly a week now. Though it is a good phone it is not without grevances.
First, there is the grevances with Verizon. The usage of mail in rebates is so last century. The fact that I have to pay an extra $100 to get that $100 back is BS. The concept of the rebate system seems to be on the idea that people are lazy and that they will not take the effort to photocopy a sales recept (easily done at the workplace, local library, Kinkos, or if you are lucky to have an open top printer/scanner). I certainly wasn’t going to go to Sam’s to pay $184 for a $199 phone that is worth paying an extra $8 for an insurance policy. It also would have been nice if Verizon would have created a printout of what the bill would look like. Though service will likely be near $100/month, there are a few things that can be done to reduce the cost of service. When I find out, I’ll be sure to write about it.
Next, their is the grevances with Motorola. I was suprised to here that the Droid was Motorola’s Hail Mary Pass in that hearing things like Motorola has been putting out some bad phones over the years. The Droid is a good phone….but Motorola wasn’t truthful in reporting the SAR rating of the phone. While Motorola told the FCC that it had an SAR rating of 0.89 W/kg (body) and 1.10 W/kg (head), the manual for the Droid has different values. Like 1.5 W/kg (body) and 1.49 W/kg (head). Of course, it is not like there is someone who keeps track of these things, right? On the other hand, I did disable the GPS on the phone, which probably explains why I don’t need to recharge the thing every four hours. GPS is a nice feature to work with mapping applications, but it can be a real battery drainer and privacy invader.
Which brings me to the final set of grevances that I have with Google. Google has played a big part in the Android Operating system development. It was kind of a let down that the applications I though Google had availble to use Google’s services weren’t there, or were so much better if used in the Internet browser than on the phone. Sure, you have Google Maps (which is good), Google Calendar (also good), and Gmail (which could use an upgrade), but Google does not have any applications for Tasks, Notes, or Docs. These applications are available for iPhone from Google, but Android users, no matter which phone you are using, will need to go to the Internet for that.
Seeing as how the Android operating system now brings Google applications to a mobile device, one can’t help but wonder if the guy at Google who decided to discontinue Google Notebook isn’t kicking himself right now. Notebook would have been a great app for Android, and the fact that it was discontinued is a foolish mistake. It would be like Microsoft removing Notepad because you have Word. Hopefully, someone will reinstate this service so that moble users can jot down notes.
The Android Market deserves both praise and criticism.
If anyone is not aware of the Anonymous hacker group, you should probably know that these guys mean business even in their quirky unorthodox ways. Anonymous is fickle. To either laud or jeer them would be hazardous to one’s online reputation. However, I find their motives of dealing soundboards in the Android Market (under the guise of “Onymous Heroes”) to be conspicuous. While it is great that the Android has many free appications to try out (although It would be nice to see a few more from Google and the Android group), the fact that one of the most stand-alone-complex group might not be so obvious to many users is a little concerning but at the same time a reminder that not everyone is creating programs in the Market (or App Store for that matter) with good intentions. That is, other groups (not like Anonymous) could have their own applications on the market to do some bad things. It is sort of like a reminder by them to say “hey watch your back” or taking advice from a theif on how to better safeguard your home from intrusion. On the other hand, the fact that no one is really keeping an eye on the Market to weed out programs that can be potential secuirty threats should make Android users wary of who the download their software from.
Reguardless, I do have plans on writing many reviews in the future about Android Apps. I would also like to develop some of them. I probably should put more effort into writing things in Java, to which that is what brings me to the upside of this review.
The Android operating system is Linux based, but many of the programs are written in Java. Perhaps I had alot of bad experiences with Java (as I don’t even use Java when browsing the Internet as the processes will keep on running), but the performance of Java on the Android is remarkable! Back when I had a Motorola RAZR, Java was unplesant. Palm couldn’t use Java work a dan on the Treo. But Android, has pretty much saved Java from being just another legacy language. Android doesn’t use the Java 2 SE or ME standards, which probably explains why Android programs are so fluid.
As stated earlier, the security flaws of the Android operating system is not with the operating sysetem itself, but with programs from some shady individuals selling their wares on the Market. However, there are gems among the junk. Where Palm Treo didn’t have the random number generation to develop a proper encryption key to run things like SSH and IRC (or battery life), the Android operating system does. Security is also one of the main goals of the Android operating system. If anything bad happens to the phone because of a program, Google will know about it. So basically, security is very good on the phone.
The Droid has a beautiful and sharp 16:9 screen. Despite the criticism by many critics about the camera, I think they seem to forget that the camera has two flashes on it. And why is everyone complaining about the 5 megapixel camera? Sure, you have to hold down the picture button to take a photo, but 5 megapixels is a sharp good of not great quality camera. (Perhaps my review of digital cameras is short sighted, then again, I don’t exactly have $700 at the moment to go out and buy the latest Nikon camera on the market. So in my opinion, 5 MP is good.)
Another thing the critics have been ripping on is the audio. Perhaps it is the foolish assumption that because a phone has a speakerphone on it that it can be used as a radio. Well…yes and no. Like just about all other smartphones, you will need to use headphones or an audio adaptor that plugs into your car stereo or home audio equipment. With a 3.5mm headphone jack, any set of headphones can be plugged into the Droid. The iPhone, much like my previous phone which was a Palm Treo, does not have a 3.5mm headphone jack. Instead, iPhone users need to use an adaptor, which in my previous experience of using audio adaptors for headphones, is an unplesant experience as it makes listening to music impossible afte a while. The Droid, like its competitor the Palm Pre, has a 3.5mm jack as opposed with the G1 that has no jack (USB audio only has one purpose: SKYPE!).
Droid does streaming audio much like the iPhone. If there is one Application I can recommend right now, it is imeem Moble. Streaming audio has evolved over the years. Just remember when you do streaming audido, do it where you can get WiFi. Otherwise, don’t forget to bring your music collection with you. (Remember: “unlimited” on the 3G network, no matter which telecom you use, means 5GB.)
So to call the iPhone better because “it has 100,000 apps” and that “it is more popular” is clearly a sign that the critics are not interested in what is new or what is better, just what is cool. Remember that next time when you try to listen to music on your iPhone but can’t because your headphones sound awful because you need to use an adaptor. Remember that when you can’t swap batteries, run multiple applications, take night shots with the camera, or make a phonecall without having to deal with the Jack-In-The-Box-speaker-quality sound.
The Droid Does but Android still needs development.
Wikis-b-gone
After being online for about 3 or 4 years, both wikis were taken down today! Neko and BushidoFacts are no more.
Neko had become an aggressive spam target. And BushidoFacts, which was abandoned a while back, was taken down as it could not be maintained.
However, I did not leave without making a backup of everything. Meaning all the spam IP addresses are currently taking up space on my harddrive in both Binary BLOB and Non-binary BLOB form. (Thank God for phpMyAdmin!)
The Non-binary blob versions of the files will actually give me a chance to exercise my Bash skills.
I could have compressed these archives into tar-balls, but given my interest in MySQL, I’ve though of transforming these archives into an opporutunity to develop tools to extract and back up my data. Dreamhost suggested turning it into an XML file, but every time I tried that (and yes I followed their instructions), I would get end out geting a short XML file stating that the parser encoutered an error.
So if you really want to back up your MediaWiki, you should download all the image files you uploaded and use phpMyAdmin to make an archive both in binary and nonbinary forms. I’m also going to safely assume that all the math and physics equations that were posted in the wikis had been stored in their LaTeX script format.
MediaWiki just wasn’t working out for me. Unlike Wikipedia where they had the templates for citation written, the ability to upload SVG files, new software that would create a reference list and make charts, all those features do not come standard with MediaWiki. At least not the version that Dreamhost offers with one click installs. Also separate is improved security features.
One of my pet peves with MediaWiki is that if a spam account is created, the IP address is not logged. So as I attempt to break down the 49.5 MB and 23.2 MB nonbinary files, I will be tossing out alot of data and hopefully the backups will still have any of my data that was removed when I had taken an interest in the wikis.
The worst part was when I attempted to contact the adminstrators of some of the IP addresses that were in the North American Numbers Plan area (mostly US…and I think Canada once), they wanted me to provide some sort of log proving that it was their one of their computers. You would think that they would actually look at the computer that was doing it and say “Hey! That’s not suppost to be happening! I should fix that!” But that doesn’t happen.
On the other hand, now that I have removed the wikis, it will allow me more time to focus on this blog, extracting the data from the archive files I metioned, and to develop a Fedora Linux upgrade software system that does not require a GUI.
I’d like to explain more about what some of the softwat that is available does and see if some of the software that I have currently installed on my computer is really needed or if it is just taking up space on the harddrive.
Indeed, I have goals that must be fullfilled and a schedule that I must keep track of.
One final note: Tune in to this blog on Friday when I may be using the new Motorola Droid!
Guess Who’s Moved into the Neighborhood? Big Brother!
My town of Florissant is such a diverse and multicultural community. White, black, Hispanic, Asian, you name it. But there is one kind of person that we don’t like in our neighborhood. THIS KIND.
3100 blk N Hwy 67, Florissant, MO
This 15 foot tall pole with the black thing on it that you see in this photo is not a street light. Nor is it one of the traffic cameras that is perched upon the traffic signals near where this photo was taken.
This one right here is used EXCLUSIVELY for one purpose. WATCHING YOU!
"Hi! I'm your new neighbor!"
Average Libertarian
These cameras are classic 1984 surveillance. Of which, if you live in my town, you should probably be pretty pissed off right now.
In the future, this blog will publish all locations of these cameras where ever they are found. Especially if they look like the one at the beginning of this blog entry.
So far, I have found two of them. The one that was in the above was taken at 3100 block of North Highway 67 at New Halls Ferry Road in Florissant, Missouri outside the Mobil Station.
1900 blk N Hwy 67, Florissant, MO
This photo was taken about a mile away near the 1900 block of North Highway 67 at New Florissant Road in Florissant, outside the Steak ‘n Shake and a block away from the Florissant Police Department.
More of these cameras exist. And they are NOT used for catching traffic violations.
Learn more about your rights and why these cameras should be illegal at the Electronic Frontier Foundation website.
Don’t be afraid of Technology! Fight back against those who abuse it!
Let’s shut Big Brother down!
Post your photos of cameras just like these online then send the link as a reply to this post. Preferibly Flikr, TweetPic, or some legitimate photo service website. The spam filter will reject anything from a bad website.
Don’t forget to include the locations of where you found the photos.
Florissant Residents should contact Florissant Mayor Robert G. Lowery, Sr. at 314-839-7601 and tell Mayor Lowery to get rid of these illegal cameras!
Follow up:
Turns out the camera are EXCLUSIVELY in Florissant. There purpose is still the same. Apparently, Bob Lowery has alot of time on his hands. Of course, given his health conditions, he hasn’t spent much of that time on the golf course.
There are a total of FOUR cameras. (Enough to fit one CCTV screen I suppose). The Other two.
800 blk N Hwy 67, Florissant
This camera planted in an almost perfect spot. Unfortunately, no one bothered to try putting one of these cameras up on a hill in Old Town Florissant, where there are NO public surveillance cameras (or as these devices will be known as PSCs). Parked at the Florissant Meadows Shopping Center between Patterson Road and Lindsay Lane-St. Denis Street, this camera watches you eat your ice cream at the Baskin Robins, order a Sack of Ten at White Castle, and pretty much sees everything for a quarter mile until you reach the next and final camera.
8200 blk N Lindbergh Blvd, Florissant
Each camera is about 1 mile from each other. All of them within the city limits of Florissant.
Rupert Murdoch should get a free ride home from the airport complements of the FBI
Telephone hacking, or phreaking, is a common subject in hacker magazines like 2600: The Hacker Quarterly. Because most forms are illegal, they are discussed in hypothetical situations.
Unfortunately, there is nothing hypothetical about paying over $1 million in hush money to quiet victims of telephone hacking. Especially when you are a controvertial billionaire broadcasting magnate who own various media outlets around the world.
Rupert Murdoch, the man who runs the New York Post, Fox News, and MySpace, is in hot water in the UK for hiring hackers to break in to cellular telephones (which are now like mini-computers) to steal personal information. (Hireing hackers is not as rare as you think. The FBI has a page about such people who hire hackers to break the law for them.) Murdoch’s UK company News Group then tried to use hush money to cover up the hackings of THOUSANDS of cellphones.
This is a controversy that not only concerns the UK, but also the United States, where his US company News Corp may have persuaded a judge into making MySpace the victium in the US v. Drew case, where locally, a depressed teenager was bullied into killing herself due to the actions of Lori Drew of Dardenne Prairie, Missouri.
More over, how does the paparazzi manage to get into the cellphonese of celebrities? Why was Barack Obama’s cellular records being looked over by workers at Verizon last year?
Murdoch’s involvement with telephone hacking in the UK will open up alot of questions that involve privacy when the Federal Bureau of Investigation meets up with him upon his return to the United States.
A major computer crime has been committed. Not by some guy with alot of time on his hands, but by a very rich and very powerful person who does not have authorized access to pry into the personal information of people around the world.
This man does not hold any leadership in government! There is no George W. Bush to pardon his actions or to make an excuse for him to break the law.
Gordon Brown is not at all pleased that the News Group is hacking telephones. So why should we permit him to break the law here with the News Corp?
I really urge anyone to contact their telephone provider and tell them that Mr. Murdoch does not have permission to break into their cellphone.
It is probably a good idea to shoot off a complaint to the FBI’s Interent Crime Center, especially if you susspect that your phone is being hacked.
It’s time to send Mr. Murdoch where he belongs: IN PRISON!
It’s the Pig Poop, Stupid!
All the hype about swine flu (or as it will be called here “pig flu”) has a simple cause: PIG SH*T.
While the pig flu has killed many people in Mexico, the real reason why it is a pandemic is because despite being a relatively poor nation (no offense to anyone I know who is from Mexico or Latin America) Mexico is a vacation hot spot for many international tourists. In fact, I’d like to go there some day.
The thing is the media has been giving Mexico a bad rap much like North St. Louis. As if illegal immigration and the drug war weren’t bad enough, now there is the pig flu. What’s next? Robots that eat old people’s medication for fuel?
Mexico is going through a bout of bad luck right now. And it doesn’t help that Global Trade egged on the problem.
So what does globalization have to do with the pig flu? More importantly, how did pig poop get involved?
In agriculture, farmers use animal excrement as fertilizer. This is a normal farming practice. Poop from animals such as cows and pigs is nearly 20 times as potent as human poop, which makes it an attractive fertilizer for farmers. The problem is when big corporate owned farms use too much fertilizer.
Large amounts of animal excrement are produced at Intensive pig farms that use Confined Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs). CAFOs are good if you are farming chickens or veal. For animals such as pigs or large cows, they are a disaster waiting to happen which has drawn the ire of many environmentalist, food safety advocates, and animal welfare organizations.
Some CAFOs have large anaerobic lagoons that give off large quantities of methane, ammonia, nitrogen, hydrogen sulfide, that gets into the air. Hydrogen sulfide can enter into the water cycle through evaporation, condensation, and return to earth as precipitation known as acid rain. Ammonia, by nature, is caustic and flamable. Hazardous to both humans and plants in large concentrations. These chemicals are given off as microrganisms that can enhance the fertilizer reproduce.
Just as dirt is subject to erosion on non-level surfaces, fertilizer (containting the microrganisms, including bacteria that can lead to viral infections) can wash down hill too. The excess poop washes into a small stream, lagoon, or river, contaminating the water supply downstream.
Prior to the pig flu epidemic, there were enviornmental protests against CAFOs with large anaerobic lagoons. One of these CAFOs, Granjas Carroll de México owned by Virginia-based Smithfield Foods. Granjas Carroll is located in Perote, Veracruz, east of Mexico City and West of the city of Veracruz. Near by residents of La Gloria (to the south) could not stand the smell anymore and they certainly were not going to put up with a large corporation contaminating their water suppy.
With easy access to a large population and a popular vacation destination, made it easy for the virus to transmit globally.
But keep things in perspecitive. Infection and death rates outside of Mexico have been very low. Even with thousands of cases in Mexico and a couple hundred of deaths, all the cases are in small clusters. Groups that went to Mexico on vacation or Spring Break. It doesn’t at all surprise me that the largest group of people outside of Mexico were a group of Catholic school kids. People who went to the missionaries or the beaches.
If you haven’t been to Mexico in the past month, YOU HAVE NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT!
In fact, go out this weekend! Go celebrate at a Cinco de Mayo party. (Even if Cinco de Mayo is next week an not this week end.) Go to a Mexican restaurant. I plan to do that.
Reguardless of what happens, when this is over, there will be an investigation in to agribusiness and global trade. (As if rich people aren’t in trouble enough already. LOL!)
EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE FINE!
Ghostnet in the Shell
At risk of sounding pro-union or like some “Buy American” redneck (in that someone who shouts “Buy American” but continues to buy all their stuff from Wal-mart), today’s post is pretty obvious.
Seeing as how I am still unemployeed (send money or a job!), I have tried ever so hard not to bring up the subject of unions. If you are a large corporation, the very though of having union workers or a person who brings up the subject of unions is enough to turn down a resume or fire a worker for possible inserting the though of unionizing.
Many people feel that unions are Marxist or are against the very fabric of what the United States stands for. The fact is, most unions are developed to preserve jobs and benefits and to make sure that management enforces safety practices and don’t run off to the tropics in a private jet when the company’s portfollio tanks.
And while history has painted a very sour story of unions in the United States, there are some people in the tech industry who regret not unionizing when they had the chance.
Microsoft workers in Seattle formed a union in 1998 as part of the Communication Workers of America. Had more employees followed suit, especially in hardware manufacturing rather than just software development, more computers and their components would still be made in the United States.
But now America, and much of the world, has another problem thanks to the exportation of technology to places like Southeast Asia. Ghostnets. A ghostnet is a vast cyber-spying network on many of the latest high tech devices especially the ones from China. (That includes you, iPhone users!) The worries that the United States goverment was using technology to spy on citizens begain to cause concerns for civil liberies groups such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation for most of this decade. But when the Pentagon is complaining that their networks are being hacked by the Chinese, it does no good to complain that China stealing government secrets when stamped on the motherboards on just about every computer the government owns are the words “Made in China”.
Many tech savvy people, including myself, know that it is quite possible to access a computer through a remote host. The only surefire way to keep intruders out is to either unplug the Internet cable, turn the WiFi and Bluetooth off, and run the computer on a battery or solar pannels. But since most of us have come to rely on the Interent over the years, so has the hardware. And that is where the problem lies this time around.
Apparently, some Chinese hardware manufactures (of which it is quite obvious the Chinese government would deny it anyway), put in some backdoors in the hardware. Such that cameras and microphones turn on monitors that have them, computers turn on when they aren’t supposed to, private data such as passwords and account numbers are being transfered.
If you don’t want the Chinese to break into your computer, don’t use any hardware or software developed or built in that area. But since that is impossible due to a globalized market, the government and consumers have every right to experience buyer’s remorse.
The biggests mistake that the American computer industry ever made was to export hardware manfacturing and software development to Asia. Just about everything in you computer is made in China. If you are using Windows Vista, there is a good chance the software was not developed here in the United States anymore. Sure the core stuff may be American, but the rest of it is probably programmed by H1-B visa workers Microsoft sent to Canada (because the United States wasn’t going to let foreign workers in) or exported to India, China, Taiwan, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philipines, Thailand, Singapore, or Pakistan. Why anyone would want to support such a thing is daft. We are talking about computer programmers and information technology worker, not strawberry pickers and farm hands from Mexico.
I suppose that once the locals in that area realizes that when the Americans were being paid $15-25 per hour, had 40 hour work weeks, the big multinational companies will move to other places where the online security of the locals, and the places the locals replaced, can be exported. Somalia perhaps.
The fact is that large businesses have no concept of security in the foreign world. As long as they can pay some one $2 per hour with no benefits to work 80 hours a week while we blindly enjoy the benefits.
As long as people are educated, and not just told what people just want them to know, things should be OK.
But remember, the name of the game is CONTROL. The people with the most education, imagination, and freedom are the most difficult to manipulate. While those who stay in line, do what they are told, and never speak out are the least threatening to the status quo.
Come to think of it, I think this may be why I haven’t landed a job yet. I don’t fit the mold. I’ve never fit the mold. And I am quite proud that I have never fit the mold. I know what I want in life. I’ve worked hard to obtain it. But now that I see that every time I move closer to my goals, the further back they move away.
There are gatekeepers in this world, who are happy with their position and who will fight to keep it. Their will as strong as my own, as I fight to get what I want and often do succeed. But now I see that it is a standoff of wills, to see how long I will break before I get what I want. And that is a job.
I will no longer be denied.
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