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Submission + - What's holding back encryption?

Submitted by
nine-times
nine-times writes: "After many years in IT, I've been surprised to notice how much of my traffic is still unencrypted. A lot of businesses that I interact with (both business and personal) are still using unencrypted FTP, and very few people use any kind of encryption for email. Most websites are still using unencrypted HTTP. DNSSEC seems to be picking up some steam, but still doesn't seem to be widely used. I would have thought there would be a concerted effort to move toward encryption for the sake of security, but it doesn't seem to be happening.

I wanted to ask the Slashdot community, what do you think the hold up is? Are the existing protocols somehow not good enough? Are the protocols fine, but not supported well enough in software? Is it too complicated to manage the various encryption protocols and keys? Is it ignorance or apathy on the part of the IT community, and that we've failed to demand it from our vendors?

What challenges have you faced in trying to increase your use of encryption, and what do you think we can do about it?"
Politics

Submission + - Fed up with the RIAA, a Senate candidate in MA (blogspot.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A Massachusetts software developer, Ken Takusagawa, fed up with the court decisions such as RIAA v. Tenenbaum and MGM v. Grokster, is mounting a independent write-in campaign for the Massachusetts special U.S. Senate election on Tuesday, using Lawrence Lessig's book "Free Culture" as the basis of his campaign platform.
Windows

Submission + - Windows ignores microsoft.com in hosts file

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: If you try to block microsoft.com in your hosts file, windows will just ignore the entry. On Vistas Windows Defender even steps in and tries to stop you from adding microsoft.com to the hosts file, but even if you ignore Defender microsoft.com will still work as if the entry wasn't there.
Security

Submission + - TSA Subpoenas Bloggers over New Security Directive

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens
Hugh Pickens writes: "The NY Times reports that TSA special agents have served subpoenas to travel bloggers Steve Frischling and Chris Elliott demanding that they reveal who leaked a TSA directive outlining new screening measures that went into effect the same day as the Detroit airliner incident. Frischling said he met with two TSA special agents for about three hours and was forced to hand over his laptop computer after the agents threatened to interfere with his contract to write a blog for KLM Royal Dutch Airlines if he didn't cooperate and provide the name of the person who leaked the memo outlining new security measures that would be apparent to the traveling public. ''It literally showed up in my box,'' Frischling told The Associated Press. ''I do not know who it came from.'' Frischling says he provided the agents a signed statement to that effect. The leaked directive included measures such as screening at boarding gates, patting down the upper legs and torso, physically inspecting all travelers' belongings, looking carefully at syringes with powders and liquids, requiring that passengers remain in their seats one hour before landing, and disabling all onboard communications systems, including what is provided by the airline. In a December 29 posting on his blog, Elliott said he had told the TSA agents at his house that he would call his lawyer and get back to them."

Submission + - Field of Glory uses Gimp where Photoshop fails (pressandjournal.co.uk)

Submitted by Andrew Smith
Andrew Smith writes: I recently covered a story for our regional paper about the computer version of the board game Field of Glory being made with a lot of help from friends and relatives of the development team. As part of the process they had to photograph over 350 military figurines, each from 12 angles, and then painstakingly "cut out" the characters from the resulting 4,200+ photographs. Something that surprised me was that, although developers HexWar do have Photoshop, they had to dump it and use Gimp instead as its Intelligent Scissors tool is superior to Photoshop's comparable offering. The team has already started on expansion packs for the game, an undertaking which will see over 70,000 photographs edited in Gimp in this way, with most of the editing being done by 12- and 14-year-old sisters earning some pretty decent pocket money.

Comment Re:Hide in the mountains! (Score 1) 245

by mtempsch (#29554803) Attached to: ICE Satellite Maps Profound Polar Thinning

Ice has less density than water, true, so floating ice that melts will lower the water level, not raise it.

Bzzzzzzt... Mr. Archimedes begs to differ - the water level will remain unchanged

The difference in densities is what causes part of the icecube/berg to stick up above the surface. As the ice melts it will increase it density and lower its volume to perfectly fill the volume that was beneath the surface
Music

Submission + - Artists Attack RIAA after Thomas-Rasset Verdict (rollingstone.com)

Submitted by gzipped_tar
gzipped_tar writes: Last week a judge ruled that Jammie Thomas-Rasset owes the RIAA a $1.92 million fine for illegally downloading 24 songs. Richard Marx — one of the artists whose music Thomas-Rasset downloaded via P2P network Kazaa — spoke out against the court's verdict, saying he's "ashamed" to be associated with the massive fine.

"As a long-time professional songwriter, I have always objected to the practice of illegal downloading of music. I have also always, however, been sympathetic to the average music fan, who has been consistently financially abused by the greedy actions of major labels," Marx said in a statement. "These labels, until recently, were responsible for the distribution of the majority of recorded music, and instead of nurturing the industry and doing their best to provide the highest quality of music to the fans, they predominantly chose to ream the consumer and fill their pockets."

He continued, "So now we have a 'judgement' in a case of illegal downloading, and it seems to me, especially in these extremely volatile economic times, that holding Ms. Thomas-Rasset accountable for the continuing daily actions of hundreds of thousands of people is, at best, misguided and at worst, farcical. Her accountability itself is not in question, but this show of force posing as judicial come-uppance is clearly abusive. Ms. Thomas Rasset, I think you got a raw deal, and I'm ashamed to have my name associated with this issue."

Marx isn't the only artist to take umbrage with the ruling against Thomas-Rasset. Writing on his official Website, Moby said, "What utter nonsense. This is how the record companies want to protect themselves? Suing suburban moms for listening to music? Charging $80,000 per song? Punishing people for listening to music is exactly the wrong way to protect the music business."

In related news, Nate Anderson on ArsTechnica noted that "In the wake of the RIAA win, the organization's legendarily poor public image somehow got even worse". He quoted the words from a music critic Jim DeRogatis: "[the Thomas-Rasset ruling is] infamous as one of the most wrong-headed in the history of the American judicial system--not to mention that it will forever stand as the best evidence of the contempt of the old-school music industry toward the music lovers who once were its customers."

On the other side of the story, an RIAA spokesperson recently commented about their victory: "This group of 12 Minnesotans showed us that, despite the protestations of some pundits who suggest that the digital world should resemble some kind of new wild west, the majority understands and believes that the same laws and rules we follow every day apply online. Not just in theory, but in practice. Another group of 12 people presented with similar questions said the same thing two years ago. That makes a sample size of only 24, but it's certainly enough to learn from."

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