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Comment Not necessarily (Score 4, Interesting) 487

by sunbird (#34762114) Attached to: Rushkoff Proposes We Fork the Internet
Well, how about we move away from certificate authorities. Impossible, you say? Not so.

Enter the Monkeysphere, a project that leverages the GPG web of trust to build trust paths for secure browsing (among other uses). From the site:

When you direct the browser to an https site using the Monkeysphere plugin and validation agent, if the certificate presented by the site does not pass the default browser validation (using standard, hierarchical X.509), the certificate and site URL are passed to the validation agent. The agent then checks the public keyservers for keys with UIDs matching the site url (e.g. https://zimmermann.mayfirst.org./ If there is a trust path to that key, according to your own OpenPGP trust designations, the certificate is considered valid, and a browser 'security exception' is put in place to allow connections to the site.
XBox (Games)

Anatomy of an Achievement 157

Posted by Soulskill from the you-don't-get-an-achievement-for-commenting-on-this-one dept.
Whether they annoy you or fulfill your nerdy collection habit, achievements have spread across the gaming landscape and are here to stay. The Xbox Engineering blog recently posted a glimpse into the creation of the Xbox 360 achievement system, discussing how achievements work at a software level, and even showing a brief snippet of code. They also mention some of the decisions they struggled with while creating them: "We are proud of the consistency you find across all games. You have one friends list, every game supports voice chat, etc. But we also like to give game designers room to come up with new and interesting ways to entertain. That trade-off was at the heart of the original decision we made to not give any indication that a new achievement had been awarded. Some people argued that gamers wouldn't want toast popping up in the heat of battle and that game designers would want to use their own visual style to present achievements. Others argued for consistency and for reducing the work required of game developers. In the end we added the notification popup and its happy beep, which turned out to be the right decision, but for a long time it was anything but obvious."
Yahoo!

Submission + - Law enforcement guidebooks leaked

Submitted by
sunbird
sunbird writes: "Buried in comments to a blogger's post about his research regarding Sprint's release of GPS records to law enforcement are the law enforcement guidance manuals issued by yahoo (pdf), facebook (pdf), and myspace. (pdf) Each provides helpful hints for law enforcement regarding the specific data available (some of which may be obtained with a mere subpoena and without any judicial scrutiny), and even sample request language to use in different circumstances. According to the manual, facebook retains IP information about its users for 30 days and has an application called "Neoprint" to deliver a handy packet of information about subscribers, including profile contact information, mini-feed, friend listing (with friend's facebook ID), group listing and messages. There is little oversight of this practice in the U.S. because the Department of Justice does not report the number of pen registers issued, notwithstanding a 1999 law requiring reports, and there is no reporting requirement for court orders issued under the Stored Communications Act."

Comment Oh, right because gun license = law abiding (Score 1) 629

by sunbird (#27458453) Attached to: FBI Seizes All Servers In Dallas Data Center

I care deeply about personal privacy for the same reason I care deeply about gun rights - chances are that I will never carry a weapon in my life, but our society as a whole is made safer and more resilient by the fact that law-abiding citizens can own and use them in self defense.

Ummm, yeah, the shooter who killed 14 in NY state "had a permit for two handguns and wore body armor, indicating he was prepared for a confrontation with police."
source.

Comment Slander and defamation -- definition (Score 3, Informative) 484

by sunbird (#23834717) Attached to: Indefinite Imprisonment For Web Site Content
Slander and defamation, by definition, require a false statement of fact causing harm to the aggrieved party. Slander is for verbal statements, whereas libel refers to written statements. See slander - wikipedia.
And, at least in the US, slander and defamation are not crimes. Rather, they are civil remedies (a tort) enforceable not by the state through prosecution, but by the aggrieved individual bringing suit.
Media

Submission + - Technology and resistance in Pakistan (rabble.ca)

Submitted by
sunbird
sunbird writes: "I'm living in Pakistan right now working at the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, an NGO, and despite what you might think from media coverage in the west, there is still significant resistance to Musharraf's second coup. One author is describing the critical role played by technology and media in organizing efforts here, especially among newly-politicized students. Organizers here are using SMSs, blogs, and flash protests (1 | 2) to confound and evade the police. Some of the most current information about events here is often found on blogs (See 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6); although the Pakistani English-language press (1 | 2 | 3 | 4) has done a decent job covering the crisis too, notwithstanding draconian media restrictions that forbid publication of anything that "brings into ridicule or disrepute" the president."

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