Unless you're complaining that gasoline stations are a commercial infrastructure, in which case I interpreted that bit to mean electrical infrastructure.

They can be a great option for folks who only occasionally travel long distances, because 98% of the time, you're not dragging the extra weight of an ICE around, and you're (ostensibly) using clean energy to power your car, and you only use gasoline when you're traveling too far for electric cars to otherwise be practical. For people who drive long distances regularly, obviously a hybrid or even a traditional automobile would be a better choice (less pollution, better emissions controls, and better fuel economy in all likelihood).

I gotta admit that's one that surprises me.

For the most part, I have no problem with the theory of "targeted advertising." The problem I have is that with all this data that is supposedly being soaked up, it does a pretty crappy job of delivering ads for things I might actually be interested in. Yeah, I suppose it does a good job of filtering ads that I absolutely have no interest in--I haven't seen a "Pampers" ad or something like that.

I'm somewhat in the market for a new car. I like small convertibles/roadsters. I went and checked out the Mini Cooper Roadster on Mini's website and then checked a bunch of the dealer websites to see if they had the options that I wanted in stock (none did). And for the next few weeks, I was seeing ads for the Mini Cooper Roadster from various local dealers whose websites I've already visited!

Yes, I've been there and seen it. I would think it would be showing me ads for the Mazda Miata or Audi TT--similar roadster-type cars. I would think it would showing me ads for dealers a bit further afield.

First of all, you say, "North Korea didn't hack Sony," as if it is an indisputable, known fact. It is not -- by any stretch of the imagination.

The fact is, it cannot be proven either way in a public forum, or without having independent access to evidence which proves -- from a social, not technical, standpoint -- how the attack originated. Since neither of those are possible, the MOST that can be accurate stated is that no one, in a public context, can definitively demonstrate for certain who hacked Sony.

Blameless in your scenario is the only entity actually responsible, which is that entity that attacked Sony in the first place.

Whether that is the DPRK, someone directed by the DPRK, someone else entirely, or a combination of the above, your larger point appears to be that somehow the US is to blame for a US subsidiary of a Japanese corporation getting hacked -- or perhaps simply for existing.

As a bonus, you could blame Sony for saying its security controls weren't strong enough, while still reserving enough blame for the US as the only "jackass".

Bravo.

Many of the same slashdotters who accept "experts" who claim NK didn't hack Sony will readily accept as truth that it was "obviously" the US that attacked NK, even though there is even less objective proof of that, and could just as easily be some Anonymous offshoot, or any number of other organizations, or even North Korea itself.

See the logical disconnect, here?

For those now jumping on the "North Korea didn't hack Sony" bandwagon that some security "experts" are leading for their own political or ideological reasons, including using rationales as puzzling and pedestrian as source IP addresses of the attacks being elsewhere, some comments:

Attribution in cyber is hard, and the general public is never going to know the classified intelligence that went into making an attribution determination, and experts -- actual and self-appointed -- will make claims about what they think occurred.

With cyber, you could have nation-states, terrorists organizations, or even activist hacking groups attacking other nation-states, companies, or organizations, for any number of motives, and making it appear, from a social and technical standpoint, that the attack originated from and/or was ordered by another entity entirely.

That's a HUGE problem, but there are ways to mitigate it. A Sony "insider" may indeed -- wittingly or unwittingly -- have been key in pulling off this hack. That doesn't mean that DPRK wasn't involved. I am not making a formal statement one way or the other; just saying that the public won't be privy to the specific attribution rationale.

Also, any offensive cyber action that isn't totally worthless is going to attempt to mask or completely divert attention from its true origins (unless part of the strategic intent is to make it clear who did it), or at a minimum maintain some semblance of deniability.

At some point you have to apply Occam's razor and ask who benefits.

And for those riding the kooky "This is all a big marketing scam by Sony" train:

So, you're saying that Sony leaked thousands of extremely embarrassing and in some cases damaging internal documents and emails that will probably result in the CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment being ousted, including private and statutorily-protected personal health information of employees, and issued terroristic messages threatening 9/11-style attacks at US movie theaters, committing dozens to hundreds of federal felonies, while derailing any hopes for a mass release and instead having it end up on YouTube for rental, all to promote one of hundreds of second-rate movies?

Yeah...no.

....as long as you have no intention of going car_range/2 further from your house... Otherwise you're still looking at a commercial infrastructure.

Or a generator pod on a small trailer.