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Comment A lot of corporate work is routine. (Score 1) 156

"... no longer secure..."

OpenBSD is secure because it was examined carefully for vulnerabilities. Microsoft makes more money if there are vulnerabilities, and if its older products are considered likely to be insecure.

"... when it no longer boots..."

We have corporate users who do the same thing every day on computers installed in 2004. They don't want change.

"... when none of the software you use will still run on the old OS"

Yes, you and I. But some corporate users do specialized corporate work on software that ran under DOS. It does what they want. There is little call for change.

"... when you have to employ tech staff with out-of-date skills..."

The Windows command line windows are mostly just the old DOS. There is nothing out-of-date.

"... when the software is a dead do-do that nobody wants to touch..."

Lots of people do lots of things that have remained stable for decades.

"Sorry, but everything has an end-of-life."

I talked to a guy who makes a lot of money per hour maintaining Cobol programs on old mainframes. Yes, end of life. But possibly decades from now.

"When you can't log into your damn bank because it's said that IE6 is too old..."

The browsers are updated frequently, of course. And computers connected only to an internal network have no outside internet vulnerabilities, if there are no DVD drives. I talked to a woman who worked at Tektronix who could not send an email from her work computer because there was no outside access.

Should employees be allowed to explore the internet during lunch breaks? Sure, on a separate network in the lunch room.

I have the latest hardware and software, a 24-port gigabit switch, and multiple 3 Terabyte RAID drives. But that's because I make a lot more techological demands than the average person.

I don't feel conflict of interest. Unfortunately, conflict of interest is a big factor in the lives of many people who are involved with computer technology. Their minds are persuaded by what would make them more money.

Comment 20 Windows XP computers: No problems. (Score 1) 156

What I said may be imperfectly expressed. However, we have about 20 Windows XP computers operated by people who are not intense about cooperating. Those computers are guarded only by Malwarebytes and the fact that are all limited users, and we've had no problems.

The point I was trying to make is that, if there is enough attention given, software can be free of vulnerabilities.

Comment End of support, not "end of life". (Score 4, Insightful) 156

Software does not have an "end of life". It continues to do what it always did.

"End of life" is a marketing term used so Microsoft can sell more copies of Windows, apparently. My understanding is that fixing newly discovered vulnerabilities in Windows XP or Windows Server 2003 would be fairly inexpensive.

I've explored the issues concerning Windows XP: Microsoft Windows XP "end of life": Conflict of interest.

Submission + - Oak Ridge's Hyperion Offers More Powerful Malware Detection (hacked.com)

giulioprisco writes: R&K Cyber Solutions has licensed Hyperion, a cyber security technology from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), which can detect malware by looking inside an executable program to determine the software’s behavior without using its source code or running the program. The Hyperion technology, which has been under development for a decade, offers more comprehensive scanning capabilities than existing cyber security methods.

Submission + - Oracle Releases Massive Security Update (securityweek.com)

wiredmikey writes: Oracle has pushed out a massive security update, including critical fixes for Java SE and the Oracle Sun Systems Products Suite. Overall, the update contains nearly 170 new security vulnerability fixes, including 36 for Oracle Fusion Middleware. Twenty-eight of these may be remotely exploitable without authentication and can possibly be exploited over a network without the need for a username and password.

Comment They're not thinking clearly: Side-effects. (Score 1) 290

Exactly. And maybe one of the radar makers will secretly start a corporation that makes radar jammers. Eventually all radar will become useless.

And anyone re-painting a wall could put aluminum foil on the wall first.

Most importantly: Some of the automobile radar detectors would probably work as house radar detectors.

Comment It's VERY easy to fix the problem with radar. (Score 1) 290

It's VERY easy to fix the problem with radar going inside houses. Build houses with aluminum foil on the walls.

In older houses, put aluminum foil on the walls, then more insulation, then drywall. Save money on heating and cooling.

Make a law that says no new houses can be built without foil on the walls.

Submission + - These Geeks Want to Fix the Drought 1

bearhuntz writes: VC-backed WaterSmart is trying to fix the California drought by using data and shame.

“Research shows,” says Yolles, “that only one out of ten people are motivated to save money and only one out of ten are motivated to save the environment. But eight out of ten will do so to keep up with the Joneses.”

Original story: https://medium.com/backchannel...

Submission + - How the U.S. Army Plans to Defeat the Unthinkable: Drone Swarms (nationalinterest.org)

An anonymous reader writes: Yes, the US military loves to use drones against enemies who have no defense against them: think terrorist cells, ISIS/IS/ISIL, the Taliban etc. However, drones are getting cheaper to make, easier to use, and more technological sophisticated. The day is coming--and coming quite soon--where U.S. military planners will have to defend against drones. And they may have to fight off lots of them.

The U.S. Army seems to have some ideas: "The Army wants a weapon that can both detect and destroy a swarm of UAVs. It would "disrupt these platforms’ autonomous flight-control and navigation capabilities or cueing a weapons system like the Remotely-Operated Weapon Station (RWS) or other medium or large-caliber weapon.," said the Army's research proposal. The system would be mounted on vehicles or at Army installations. More interesting, the Army proposal also notes that it might be mounted on UAVs, which raises the possibility of using drones to shoot down other drones."

Submission + - The Most Popular Passwords Are Still "123456" and "password"

BarbaraHudson writes: From the "I-have-the-same-password-on-my-luggage" department The Independent lists the most popular passwords for 2014, and once again, "123456" tops the list, followed by "password" and "12345" at #3 (lots of Spaceballs fans out there?) . "qwerty" still makes the list, but there are some new entries in the top 25, including "superman", "batman", and "696969". The passwords used were mostly from North American and Western European leaks.

Submission + - FBI Seeks to Legally Hack You If You're Connected to TOR or a VPN (fee.org)

SonicSpike writes: The investigative arm of the Department of Justice is attempting to short-circuit the legal checks of the Fourth Amendment by requesting a change in the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. These procedural rules dictate how law enforcement agencies must conduct criminal prosecutions, from investigation to trial. Any deviations from the rules can have serious consequences, including dismissal of a case. The specific rule the FBI is targeting outlines the terms for obtaining a search warrant.

It’s called Federal Rule 41(b), and the requested change would allow law enforcement to obtain a warrant to search electronic data without providing any specific details as long as the target computer location has been hidden through a technical tool like Tor or a virtual private network. It would also allow nonspecific search warrants where computers have been intentionally damaged (such as through botnets, but also through common malware and viruses) and are in five or more separate federal judicial districts. Furthermore, the provision would allow investigators to seize electronically stored information regardless of whether that information is stored inside or outside the court’s jurisdiction.

Submission + - Microsoft Windows 8.1 OEM Pricing As Low As $0.00 After Discounts 1

BarbaraHudson writes: ZDNet has obtained the OEM pricing for Windows 8.1 and Office365, which reveal that, after discounts, the price per copy can be as low as $0.00.

Windows 8.1 with Bing is listed at $10 per copy for Intel-based tablets under nine inches in screen size. But after a "configuration discount," of $10, OEMs get that SKU for those tablets for free. For tablets with screen sizes of smaller than or equal to 10.1 inches, the Windows 8.1 with Bing SKU is listed at $25 per copy, with the same $10 "configuration discount," resulting in a $15 per copy cost for OEMs.

There's another related SKU that is also meant to help stimulate the market for mobile devices running Windows. The "Windows 8.1 with Bing and Office 365 Personal" is another low-price SKU available to OEMs. Like the Windows with Bing SKU, this one also requires OEMs to set Bing search and MSN.com as the defaults (changeable by users) on new PCs. This SKU also includes a free, 12-month subscription to Office 365 Personal.

The prices with Office 365 are identical to those for the Bing SKU without Office 365, meaning Microsoft effectively is giving away a year subscription to Office 365 Personal to OEMs for free.

Submission + - Fox News Apologizes for False Claims of Muslim-Only Areas in England and France (nytimes.com) 1

operator_error writes: Fox News issued an unusual on-air apology on Saturday night for having allowed its anchors and guests to repeat the false claim for a week, that there are Muslim-only “no-go zones” in European countries like England and France that are not under the control of the state and are ruled according to Shariah law.

Fox Report host Julie Banderas, said that “over the course of this last week, we have made some regrettable errors on air regarding the Muslim population in Europe, particularly with regard to England and France.”

“Now this applies especially to discussions of so-called no-go zones, areas where non-Muslims allegedly are not allowed in and police supposedly won’t go,” Ms. Banderas continued. “To be clear, there is no formal designation of these zones in either country and no credible information to support the assertion that there are specific areas in these countries that exclude individuals based solely on their religion.”

The claim that such areas existed attracted widespread attention, and a wave of online derision."

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