in the UK, the CAP readers are totally standalone and powered by batteries - i.e. need no host computer. Given that i use Linux myself, there was no way I was building in OS restrictions.

The Telegraph on Friday have made accusations that Lord McAlpine's brother (who ran the huge building company) lived close by the care home and had a huge collection of expensive cars (noted by witnesses at the time). There are some theories that this was a simple mix-up by a key journalist/the police and fingered (bad expression) the wrong brother which has now caused the BBC to go into melt-down.

What's odd is that The Telepgraph published another article which seems to downplay the idea that Jimmie was in any way involved.

I wonder whether this is an orchestrated plot to reduce the power of the very-Labour-focussed BBC by the government (Conservative/liberal coalition) which will also play well for Scotland (led by the SNP) that has it's own BBC problems etc

Not so, if an individual does not reveal during their vetting procedure then that individual can be compromised. Usually it's OK to retain clearance if you have affairs or browse goatse.CX so long as its declared during vetting. I imaging that he did not come clean during vetting, hence the dismissal/resignation.

compare and contrast to the MegaUpload case where the US prosecuting legal team are claiming that the digital assets, even if they have copyright of the owner or are confidential, are not the property of the owner if stored on third party systems. interesting times.

it's called CAP, Chip Authentication Programme. I was the designer of the system that used by a big UK bank. It requires a self powered sleeve reader (that looks alike a calulator) and it's an open standard so that all EMV cards can use any branded reader device (they don't tell you that). Some of the readers have a "MENU" button and you can read off the transaction counter etc on your card. A handy way to tell if someone close has been using the card while you're not looking. if you do muck around with your card, be careful. I changed my PIN to be 6 digits on some test gear and ended up having to get a new bank card because the UK ATM network is hard coded to 4 digits. EMV cards support 6 digits.

The modern RAST tests for Cobalt allergy using patches that are (usually) stuck to the patients back for a period of 96 hours.

no - just take a photograph of behind you and then hang it on your front.

TFA is way out. The was a more valuable Roman find of Roman Torcs 3 miles to the west of Stirling in Scotland which netted around £4m which he had a share of £500k

What's interesting is that the Romans didn't last long in Scotland but there are still visible signs of our italian pals from 2000 years ago, such as the Fendoch fort in the Sma Glen north of Crieff and the fort at Braco some 5 miles south of Crieff.

We found some tunic broaches with a metal detector in my parents field a few miles away. Still looking for the pot of Roman gold. There are legends that Fendoch had a large stash of gold but there just legends and no one has ever found them plus metal detecting is illegal on recognised Roman forts which is a bit of a set back!

The BBC are hardly any better. Whilst the BBC for generations has had a good reputation - in Scotland, the BBC are showing themselves to be a state broadcaster and at every opportunity take the unionist cause (which incidently is way off their charter). Over the last year, Scots have been subjected to TV shows about "how good it is to be British" and "why the UK is great for Scotland" which are not shown south of the border.

They have been cutting back coverage of the Scottish referendum for independence and have been accused of dirty tricks and biased reporting in the lead up to the 2014 referendum.

It's incredible since the BBC is also paid for by Scots (though a mandatory tax called the TV Licence). Scotland is hoping to be the first country to become independent without a drop of blood being spilt.

or indeed an uncle-fucker etc, ad nausiem

sounds like a modern day re-run of the supply problems of the Terra Nova Expedition in 1920 that ended up killing Scott and his team on the return journey from the pole.

Just completed an entirely unscientific look at the data - I checked the UDID's of the iPads we have registered here (at a large financial company in the UK) and none are in the list. Given that this is 1m of 12m records, what ratio is 12m of the total population size for iphones and ipads?

i.e. if I checked 20 UDIDs, none of the came up, can we say that (allbeit with a low degree of confidence) the sample does not include UK registered devices? is it just USA registered devices? has anyone outside of the USA seen their iPad/iPhone on the list?

(usual EU mobile coverage disclaimer) but I have a 3G booster antenna on the roof of my van that I use at mountain bike races. I then bridge it to wifi and the whole lot works off the van's leisure battery (a second battery) topped-up with some solar panels. it quite often will bump up to 3G if you are on the edge of 3G reception where a phone/3G dongle can't.

I used to live 1km from the ANPR that was situated on the "ring of steel" near Canary Wharf in London - or, more accurately - my bedroom window was right next to the point that the cop cars would catch up with the non-taxed, non-MOT'd cars after they had cruised through. At the beginning of the month it was about 2 a night that would be stopped as police cars operated a pincer movement around the Isle of Dogs

the slightly scary thing is that you can buy your own ANPR System off the shelf. (I know that geeks can easy create it themselves using motion and some OCR tools - but, imagine selling this to normal people!!

no, it was driveby MySQL vulnerability. using your terrible analogy, it's the equivalent of visiting each organisation across the world looking for a well known safe manufacturer that has a vulnerability in their locking system.