Taking MD5, it's published, and tweaking a few points (though who ever did this needs to be very competent) would have been sufficient.

No, that would have been stupid. It's unlikely someone would have reverse engineered your hacked md5 algorithm, but it's also possible you could screw it up.

The solution is VERY simple. Generate a random 256 bit string. Hash random-string+data, and use the output as the identifier. Throw away the random 256 bit string.

Some manager probably said any work for addition security wasn't worth the cost. Ooops!

No, some developer didn't know what the hell they were doing. You'd be surprised (but shouldn't be) how little most developers know about security, especially encryption.

I'd suggest the justiced read a little bit from the late computer scientist Dijkstra liked to imagine a world where math was patentable. He was president of "Math Inc" "the most exciting and most miserable business ever conceived." Where he imagined that an important mathematical proof had been patended, and was demanding all the mathematicians that relied on it to pay up!

My dear Jonathan,

After so many years of silence, you will be surprised to receive such a long letter from me. But, read on, and you will understand that this time I must address myself to a lawyer I can trust and of whom I know that he understands.

Remember our schooldays, when we argued about the relative merits of the Greek and the Roman culture? How I defended the Greeks by quoting Plato and you the Romans by quoting Cicero, and how the unsettled question did not impair the friendship and companionship between the two of us? (Happy youths, who could argue hotly about the relative superiority of classical cultures, whereas, today, the inferiority of contemporary civilization seems to be the only common meeting ground!) Our fates were decided that evening by the choice of our heroes: you chose law and I chose mathematics and our ways parted. (It is a strange thought that, if in that same discussion, I had chosen Homer and you Horatius, we might both have become professional poets and our paths might have continued to cross each other....)

Dear Jonathan, I am in a fix. I leave it to your great wisdom or to your worldly experience to decide for yourself, whether my problem is that I don’t understand them, or whether they are so short-sighted that they are unable to understand me. But the long and the short of it is that I am in a fix, I have painted myself into a corner to the extent that I need legal advice, imagine! As you know —Hugo has certainly told you something about it— I am presently responsible for Mathematics Inc., the most exciting and most miserable business ever conceived. It is really most exciting, because —beside being a most flourishing business (and that is saying a good deal, these days)— by blending the strength of Greek contemplation with that of Roman enterprise, we are changing the face of the world! Our problem is, however, that apparently the world is not quite ready for this (truly!) “Cultural Revolution” and is beginning to fight back in a most unartistic manner, just because it —and in particular: its legal procedures!— cannot cope with it. There are legal procedures for the protection of property of “things”, but there is no true protection of property of “ideas”, and of such nature are the products of Mathematics Inc. (There are, of course, patent law and copy-right, but as you read on, you, as a lawyer, will immediately see that in our cases they are insufficient.)

One of our most successful product lines is connected with what used to be known as the Riemann Hypothesis, but now should be named our Theorem. To bring you into the picture, Riemann —originally trained to become a Lutheran minister!— was one of those romantic mathematicians of the nineteenth century, who maintained his fame by dying young enough to ensure that nobody saw that he himself was also unable to prove his conjecture. Riemann completely missed the vision and imagination, needed to escape from the prejudices of the pre-industrial society and, according to the tradition of the period, he fought his problem single-minded: the amateur, needless to say, failed miserably.

To supply the missing proof was for Mathematics Inc. an obvious target, not only because we have built up the first (and only) corporation in the world, that is technically capable of constructing such a proof, but also, because commercially it is a most attractive proposition. The point is that whole flocks of mathematicians have made themselves dependent on it and have (somewhat irresponsibly) based whole branches of mathematics on Riemann’s assumption. Think what a market! All those dangling results, ready to be harvested by the first company that provides the missing link! We have provided the link and, having the Proof, besides claiming all previous results based on Riemann’s Hypothesis, we insist on substantial royalties for all future use of it. That is fair, isn’t it? You cannot expect a huge company like Mathematics Inc. to distribute its goodies like Father Xmas, can you? But, reasonable as our claims are, we experience the greatest difficulties in getting our rights recognized.

As most royalties would come from abroad, our own government —with an eye on the balance of payments— is in principle eager to assist us and to support our foreign claims, but, Good Heavens!, it is incredible how it paralyzes itself (to the point of complete ineffectiveness) by insisting upon all sorts of clearly inadequate, inappropriate and impossible legal procedures. I have now received three letters from three different departments (Science and Education, Commerce and Foreign Affairs), all of them stating that according to (different!) articles so-and-so they can do nothing for us before we have shown our Proof! What do they think? For, as they also explain, this disclosures does not guarantee that they can do anything real for us, oh no, only after the disclosure they can start the investigations whether our claims can be supported! Knowing how our departments work, my heart sinks, for it would take at least another five years!

But, besides this, disclosure of the Proof is absolutely out of the question! Has no one heard of industrial property? You see, we want to sell the result of the Proof —viz. that Riemann’s Hypothesis is no longer a hypothesis but a truth—, but certainly not disclose the Proof itself, for that embodies a radically new technique of mathematical reasoning that, as long as it is ours and exclusively ours, we would like to apply to a few similar outstanding problems. Disclosure of the Proof would be similar to the disclosure of “manufacturing secrets” of classical industries. How can we make them understand this situation?

(There is another reason —but this is strictly between you and me— why I do not care too much about disclosure of the Proof right now, because the Proof, although essentially correct, is still in the prototype stage: minor deficiencies —of which we know, that they are easily mended: it has already all been planned— could be misused to weaken our claims. My marketing division has made quite clear that, as far as they are concerned, disclosure has to be postponed until the Proof has reached such a state of stability that it won’t require significant maintenance for the first five years after delivery.)

Another serious problem —in view of the huge amounts of money involved— is connected with exportation within the European Community, viz. how to compute the Value Added tax to be paid, when we sell the Proof. As you, no doubt, are aware of, the rules don’t provide for it, as we cannot define our “raw materials”: are they the symbols we use, or the Laws of Aristotelean Logic? (Here, I am sorry to say, I expect from my government an even less cooperative attitude!)

* * *

Thank goodness we don’t have only serious problems, but ridiculous ones as well. Before we could get the top twelve floors of the Hosanna Building, I had (to humour the old gentleman who owned half of them) to order from an architect a Toilet Flushing Water Recycling System —I have included a copy of his design—. As the old gentleman died, he did not need any humouring anymore and we decided not to implement the TFWR System, although brilliantly designed, in view of the risks involved. But now the architect complains, even after having received his fee. His argument is that he is entitled to have his ideas realized. He points out that if all his customers would act as we have done, he would end his days with lots of money, received but not earned, and none of his brain-children to survive him. He is now threatening to sue us for wasting his creative powers. I am afraid he is an uncurable artist. (Don’t worry, our regular lawyer will deal with him in the usual way.)

* * *

Dear Jonathan, one of these days I shall ask my secretary to make an appointment for an afternoon. Can we have a dinner afterwards? (I suggest the Restaurant “Bali”: it adds to an excellent kitchen the advantage of the proximity of a cafeteria where my chauffeur can have some food while we are having dinner.) I would like to discuss with someone like you the current mis-education provided by our Universities. Today’s graduates leave the campus made to believe that it is Knowledge that matters, while all of us know that only Secrets matter. If all goes well, I could endow the major Universities with an appropriate chair. How should I call it? “The Edsger W.Dijkstra Chair of Industrial Espionage” or “The Mathematics Inc. Chair of Security and Privacy”? I shall ask my P.R.-man, anyhow, but would appreciate your unbiased opinion.

I am very much looking forward to meeting you again. Till then!

Yours ever
9th February 1975 Edsger W.Dijkstra
Mathematics Inc.
Hosanna Building

http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users...

Most of the people with limited incomes I know don't have a car, they ride the bus. You're right though, it will disproprortionally affect people with low incomes. But it's hardly a tax on the poor, it's a tax on usage. That's fine with me, and realistically ads up to maybe $5-$7 a month. I've been "poor" before, and I could certainly afford $5 a month.

If you want to help people with low income, raise the damn federal minimum wage.

The MOST important part is documenting where your assets are, and account numbers. After you die, your assets go into probate, and aren't just simply accessible via logging into your bank. So the username and password isn't really as important as you think it is.

Seriously, talk with a lawyer who's familiar with inheiritance in your state. Obviously documenting where all your assets are is very important, but don't just assume your loved ones are going to login to your account and transfer money out of it a few weeks after you're dead. That stuff gets locked into probate as soon as the financial institutions hear you're dead (with a few exclusions of course).

Odd. I can see someone helping you price a house, and giving advice. Is that worth thousands of dollars? Not really.

Most of the "work" that real estate agents do has been replaced with internet searches. I bought a house several years ago, and found the house I bought through open houses and searches. Why do I need to hire someone to do that? Why should a seller accept losing 7% of the value of a house (a LOT of money) just to pay a middleman who has a trade industry group (MLS) that keeps a monopoly on the listings?

The real estate market is a scam for the service they provide. They're generally nice people and not exactly trying to screw you over, but like all middle-men, they aren't nearly as necessary as they used to be in an information age. Travel agents were nice people too, and they went away. Some people are still convinced they need insurance agents as well. I've never used one and never will. Why would I? I can't figure out insurance on my own? A lot of the agency jobs are being automated away. Searching for a house that meets your needs used to be "hard", now it's simple.

If you want to sell your house, you can't list it on MLS, since you need to be an agent. Though I think there's cheap listing agents now that'll list your house for you, I think you might still have to pay off the other parties agent. There's a cultural change coming as people get more and more used to self-service. I see real estate agents morphing into a far smaller, and far well less paid role.

The article is terrible. The CDC has a very good FAQ on the pertussis vaccine.

http://www.cdc.gov/pertussis/a...

Q: Can pertussis be prevented with vaccines?

A: Yes. Pertussis, or whooping cough, can be prevented with vaccines. Before pertussis vaccines became widely available in the 1940s, about 200,000 children got sick with it each year in the US and about 9,000 died as a result of the infection. Now we see about 10,000–40,000 cases reported each year and unfortunately about 10–20 deaths.

Pertussis vaccines are recommended for people of all ages. Infants and children should get 5 doses of DTaP for maximum protection. A dose is given at 2, 4 and 6 months, at 15 through 18 months, and again at 4 through 6 years. A booster dose of Tdap is given to preteens at 11 or 12 years of age.

Any adolescents or adults who didn't get Tdap as a preteen should get one dose. Getting Tdap is especially important for pregnant women. It’s also important that those who care for infants are up-to-date with pertussis vaccination. You can get the Tdap booster dose no matter when you got your last regular tetanus booster shot (Td). Also, you need to get Tdap even if you were vaccinated as a child or have been sick with pertussis in the past.

Learn more about preventing pertussis.

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Whooping cough can be deadly for babies. Learn how to protect them through vaccination. See this infographic.

Q: Why is the focus on protecting infants from pertussis?

A: Infants are at greatest risk for getting pertussis and then having severe complications from it, including death. About half of infants younger than 1 year old who get pertussis are hospitalized, and 1 or 2 in 100 hospitalized infants die.

There are two strategies to protect infants until they're old enough to receive vaccines and build their immunity against this disease.

First, vaccinate pregnant women with Tdap during each pregnancy, preferably at 27 through 36 weeks. By getting Tdap during pregnancy, mothers build antibodies that are transferred to the newborn, likely providing protection against pertussis in early life, before the baby can start getting DTaP vaccines at 2 months old. Tdap also helps protect mothers during delivery, making them less likely to transmit pertussis to their infants.

Second, make sure everyone around the infant is immunized. This includes parents, siblings, grandparents (including those 65 years and older), other family members, babysitters, etc. They should be up-to-date with the age-appropriate vaccine (DTaP or Tdap) at least two weeks before coming into close contact with the infant. Unless pregnant, only one dose of Tdap is recommended in a lifetime.

These two strategies should reduce infection in infants, since health data have shown that, when the source of pertussis could be identified, mothers were responsible for 30-40% of infant infections and all household members were responsible for about 80% of infections.

It's also critical that healthcare professionals are up-to-date with a one-time Tdap booster dose, especially those who care for infants.

Learn more about infant complications.

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Q: Do pertussis vaccines protect for a lifetime? If I've had whooping cough, do I still need a pertussis booster?

A: Getting sick with pertussis or getting pertussis vaccines doesn't provide lifelong protection, which means you can still get pertussis and pass it onto infants.

Pertussis vaccines are effective, but not perfect. They typically offer high levels of protection within the first 2 years of getting vaccinated, but then protection decreases over time. This is known as waning immunity. Similarly, natural infection may also only protect you for a few years.

In general, DTaP vaccines are 80-90% effective. Among kids who get all 5 doses of DTaP on schedule, effectiveness is very high within the year following the 5th dose – at least 9 out of 10 kids are fully protected. There is a modest decrease in effectiveness in each following year. About 7 out of 10 kids are fully protected 5 years after getting their last dose of DTaP and the other 3 out of 10 kids are partially protected – protecting against serious disease.

Our current estimate is that Tdap vaccination protects 7 out of 10 people who receive it. Since Tdap vaccines were only licensed in 2005, we don't yet have results on long-term vaccine protection. We're still working to understand how that protection declines over time or might differ based on which vaccine was received during early childhood (i.e., DTaP or DTP). CDC will be conducting an evaluation in collaboration with health departments in Washington and California to better understand how long Tdap vaccines protect from pertussis. The data from these evaluations will help guide discussions on how best to use vaccines to control pertussis.

Keeping up-to-date with recommended pertussis vaccines is the best way to protect you and your loved ones.

Learn more about protection from vaccines and infection.

 
Q: Do pertussis vaccines protect from severe disease?

A: If you've been vaccinated and get pertussis, you are less likely to have a severe infection. Typically, your cough won't last as many days and coughing fits, whooping, and vomiting after coughing fits won't occur as often. When vaccinated children get pertussis, fewer have apnea (life-threatening pauses in breathing), cyanosis (blue/purplish skin coloration due to lack of oxygen), and vomiting.

Learn more about pertussis symptoms.

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Q: Why are reported cases of pertussis increasing?

A: Since the early 1980s, there has been an overall trend of an increase in reported pertussis cases. Pertussis is naturally cyclic in nature, with peaks in disease every 3-5 years. But for the past 20-30 years, we've seen the peaks getting higher and overall case counts going up. There are several reasons that help explain why we're seeing more cases as of late. These include: increased awareness, improved diagnostic tests, better reporting, more circulation of the bacteria, and waning immunity.

When it comes to waning immunity, it seems that the acellular pertussis vaccine (DTaP) we use now may not protect for as long as the whole cell vaccine (DTP) we used to use. Throughout the 1990s, the US switched from using DTP to using DTaP for infants and children. Whole cell vaccines are associated with higher rates of minor and temporary side effects such as fever and pain and swelling at the injection site. Rare but serious neurologic adverse reactions including chronic neurological problems rarely occurred among children who had recently received whole cell vaccines. While studies have had inconsistent results that the vaccine could cause chronic neurological problems, public concern in the US and other countries led to a concerted effort to develop a vaccine with improved safety. Due to these concerns, along with the availability of a safe and effective acellular vaccine, the US switched to acellular pertussis vaccines.

Learn more about DTaP waning immunity Adobe PDF file [140 KB, 1 page] and pertussis outbreaks.

Q: I've heard about parents refusing to get their children vaccinated and travelers to the U.S. spreading disease; are they to blame for pertussis outbreaks?

A: Even though children who haven't received DTaP vaccines are at least 8 times more likely to get pertussis than children who received all 5 recommended doses of DTaP, they are not the driving force behind the large scale outbreaks or epidemics. However, their parents are putting them at greater risk of getting a serious pertussis infection and then possibly spreading it to other family or community members.

We often see people blaming pertussis outbreaks on people coming to the US from other counties. This is not the case. Pertussis was never eliminated from the US like measles or polio, so there's always the chance for it to get into a community. Plus, every country vaccinates against pertussis.

Learn more about pertussis in other countries.

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Q: Are most coughs pertussis and does everyone with pertussis "whoop"?

A: There are a lot of causes behind a person's cough and not every cough is pertussis. In general, pertussis starts off with cold-like symptoms and maybe a mild cough or fever. But after 1 to 2 weeks, severe coughing can begin. Unlike the common cold, pertussis can become a series of coughing fits that continues for weeks. The best way to know if you have pertussis is to see your doctor, who can make a diagnosis and prescribe antibiotics if needed.

The name "whooping cough" comes from the sound people make gasping for air after a pertussis coughing fit. However, not everyone with pertussis will cough and many who cough will not "whoop."

Teens and adults, especially those who haven't been vaccinated, may have a prolonged cough that keeps them up at night. Those who do get the coughing fits say it's the worst cough of their lives. And the cough may last for weeks or months, causing major disruptions to daily life and complications like broken ribs and ruptured blood vessels.

Infants may not cough at all. Instead, they may have life-threatening pauses in breathing or struggle to breathe. Any time someone is struggling to breathe, get them to a doctor right away.

Learn more about pertussis symptoms.

 
Q: Are pertussis bacteria changing and causing an increase in pertussis cases?

A: CDC is evaluating potential causes of increasing rates of pertussis, including changes in disease-causing bacteria types ("strains"). Unlike a foodborne illness where one strain causes an outbreak, multiple types or strains of pertussis bacteria can be found causing disease at any given time, including during outbreaks.

Learn more about CDC's Pertussis Strains.

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Q: How contagious is pertussis?

A: Pertussis spreads easily from person to person through coughing and sneezing. A person with pertussis can infect up to 12 to 15 other people. That's why being up-to-date with pertussis vaccines and practicing good cough etiquette are so important.

Many infants who get pertussis are infected by older siblings, parents or caregivers who might not know they have the disease. If pertussis is circulating in the community, there's a chance that even a fully vaccinated person of any age can catch this very contagious disease. But if you've been vaccinated, your infection is usually less severe.

If you or your child develops a cold that includes a severe cough or a cough that lasts a long time, it may be pertussis. The best way to know is to contact your doctor.

Learn more about pertussis transmission.

 
Q: Doesn't herd immunity protect most people?

A: Herd immunity, or community immunity, is a situation in which, through vaccination or prior illness, a sufficient proportion of a population is immune to an infectious disease, making its spread from person to person unlikely. Even individuals not vaccinated (such as newborns and those with chronic illnesses) are typically protected because the disease has little opportunity to spread within their community. Since pertussis spreads so easily, vaccine protection decreases over time, and acellular pertussis vaccines may not prevent colonization, we can't rely on herd immunity to protect everyone.

Vaccines are the most effective tool we have to provide protection against pertussis. It's important that everyone get their recommended pertussis vaccines to protect themselves.

Learn more about vaccine coverage.

To stop cartooning. Beatle Baily, Hagar the Horrible, Garfield and yes... I'll even go far as Dilbert (I'm sure blasphemy to geeks around here) are worn out strips that are recycling the same dumb gags and phone-it-in art over and over. I actually respect Waterson for quitting in his prime.

I assure you that people have unhappy experiences on other hallucinogens as well. Also, you seem to be under the mistaken impression that LSD was the first. It's really more like one of the last. All the ones I listed have been used by human beings for thousands of years.

As far as religion is concerned, I think you misunderstand. It's not that much "religion" as in doctrine as it is an established practice that minimizes harm, but established practices designed to minimize the bad effects of the powerful drugs.

YMMV, but don't assume your experiences are everyones.

The story you linked to says the burden of proof is on the person suing, and must prove the statement was libelous. I believe libel is already illegal. The makes the law really stupid if it's already covered by libel laws. But it's not quite having to be careful about what you say about beef.

LSD has no such traditions. Its just a chemical to get you high.

LSD is a special case because it's very new. There hasn't been enough time to develop traditions around its use. That's not true for other, very similar drugs. These drugs have long traditions of usage outside the west. That includes peyote, psychedelic mushrooms, Ayahuasca, and ibogaine, to name just a few.

Typically these drugs are taken in group settings with an experienced person or group of people to guide the experience. It's really completely contrary to our current medical system where the patient is given a drug and sent on their way. Medical practitioners have sometimes used them in a one-on-one setting, which can probably work as well, but still represents an inherent clash with the medical establishment, and is quite contrary to how the traditional cultures where these drugs were first used have used them.

I'd totally agree with you that none of these drugs should be available at the corner 7-11. These drugs aren't compatible with our consumer driven culture. They're all very powerful drugs that invoke a profound experience on the user and need to be respected. But also our medical establishment really isn't suited to their use either. So what's to be done?

Umm.. no. It's no surprise to everyone that countries spy on one another. It's a big surprise to most that the US government is spying on everyone in the world, including its citizens.

In this case the wife is played by the American people, Not Russia.

He said he didn't have the documents with him to steal, and destroyed them after he gave them to the journalists. Now.. he could be lying of course but...

Snowden is a sharp guy. He knows that having those documents with him would make him a really, really good target to just be killed by the US CIA, or be kidnapped by whatever they're calling the KGB these days. Remember the US is the country that waterboarded people, and said it wasn't torture.

Now... whether he's given some form of assistance to Russia is a different matter. We all know he's willing to act as a political puppet for Putin, throwing him some softball questions to deny the Russians aren't spying on it's citizens. "Yes Mr. Putin sir, oh greatest leader of Russia Sir! You certainly aren't spying on YOUR citizens like those dirty, dirty Americans are, right sir?"

The sad thing is- Snowden's actions will probably hurt us abroad and not do a thing to stop the fascist and creepy internal spying on U.S. citizens.

You might be right. But the thing about Snowden's actions are that it put the burden on the American people, and the government to do something. If they don't, so be it, but he's giving us the chance to. If he didn't, most Americans would still be living in silent bliss about the spying going on.

Now, as far as who hurt who, I'd say the US government is FAR more responsible for hurting it's own relationships by doing the spying in the first place.

    It's sort of like cheating on your wife, then getting mad at a mutual friend when the mutual friend tells your wife. Then end of your marriage isn't really the fault of your friend, and it's not your friends problem if you don't learn anything from it and become a better person.

Are you kidding me?

Russia would be tough, but Snowden only wound up in Russia after he was left with no other options. So if he kept a low profile, he'd never have wound up in Russia.

If you think the US doesn't have the power to take it's own citizens from many, many countries in the world and just make them disappear, you're living in a delusion, The US has a golden ticket that the lawyers have been ever-expanding their justification to do anything. It's called the Authorization_for_Use_of_Military_Force_Against_Terrorists, and it's been used to justify killing and targeting people that have no connection to the Sept 11 attacks. You think they wouldn't try use it to legally justify kidnapping Snowden?

And if they couldn't do that, you think they wouldn't use a CIA operative to kidnap him, or get some other group to do it? Countries are mean motherfuckers. You're under the misapprehension that countries actions are ruled by laws. They aren't, they're ruled by politics and what they can get away with. The OP is right. If Snowden hadn't put up a big profile rather quickly, the US govt would have found him and hung him out to dry in one way or another. (And I'm certain Ed Snowden is under no illusion this would have happened, and likely was a major reason he DID come forward).

You've missed a very, very big loophole. The US government decides NOT to prosecute him. Banks commit massive fraud and destroy our economy in 2008.. and... nobody gets prosecuted. That was most certainly a political decision to prosecute or not. It happens all the time. It's really quite business as usual.

What I'd like to see is the Obama administration simply say they were wrong to spy on Americans and vacuum up masses amounts of intelligence without a warrant, then stop doing that crap and pass a law that says they can't. Then refuse to prosecute Snowden for any wrongdoing.

The law works like this ALL the time. I'm no fool and I sure as hell realize this isn't going to happen anytime soon. But wait a few years for current guys to get out of office, and someone else to get in (likely a Democrat wanting to distinguish themselves from the past, or one of those extrodinarily rare beed of non-crazy Republicans who also are wiling to stand up to their crazy party every so often). Then it might, just might happen. But not for perhaps 5-10 years.