As bad as it sounds, NetworkManager is probably doing almost the right thing. There is no way to safely encrypt a password so that it may be used for access to another system without requiring another password.The only thing that you can do is use the permission structure of the OS to protect the password. (As they have done)

Now, they could have "scrambled" or encrypted the password with a known key. That will prevent the slim chance that a "casual" intruder with root access will get your password, however, any moderately intent intruder who can gain root access will, by design, be able to reverse the password mutation. You can't MD5 or SHA the passwords because you *need* them to gain access to the external system.

I had this fight at a company a while back about accessing Windows servers and storing their credentials, I ended up base64 the creds into a database row or an encrypted database. You needed a password to open the database, so they were safe, but management didn't want to be able to "see" the password once they did. It wasn't real security, but it shut them up.

NetworkManager needs to do something similarly stupid so that stupid people don't say stupid things about a stupid problem. If you can't trust your computer to store your password, then don't trust your computer to store your password. duh!

We hear all the time that freedom is not free it must be paid for periodically. Well, I think the western tradition of freedom is under attack and it is time that the citizens of the USA and the UK band agains their governments becoming like the repressive governments of Hitler and Stallen that they supposidly weren't. My only hope is that we have not built up so much "freedom debt" that we must pay for it with violen revolution.

Does anyone have a viable plan to stop this wholesale nonsense?

The wikipedia article you site only re-iterates the fact that no hard explanation was given about the name NSAKEY and we are left to conclude what it really means. And yes, having worked closely with Microsoft on a couple of their products, I am very comfortable with the obviousness of naming a key for the NSA, NSAKEY. The module was not supposed to have the symbols included.

Remember the Windows "NSA Key" flip a few years ago. You think Microsoft DIDN'T add a key for the NSA now?

Sorry, almost 30 years ago. Damn! I'm getting old.

Almost 20 years ago I worked on the development of a mobile robot security guard at Denning Mobile Robotics. When we tried to sell to a "large security vendor" we were told that the robot was expensive and if it were destroyed, they would be out capital. If they hire low-wage humans, when they get killed they can hire another one cheaply and insurance (that the human pays for) will take care of the rest. Second, what does the robot cost? If it is patrolling a Walmart, it is likely that the robot is the most valueable thing in the room and will, itself, be the target of theft.

Now, toss a blanket over it and you have completely disabled it.

(1) They hire idiots
(2) They tools they have won't find shit

Ist, I've flown a bit lately, and lets be honest, abusive and uneducated are the only words I have for TSA. Just assholes with a uniform there to make your life miserable, not to make people safe, but to make people "feel" safe. A prison cell with a locked door is pretty safe too.

2nd, none of the toys and scanners they have can find anything they are looking for because they really don't understand them or their use.

Welcome to the police state where abuse of citizens means an effective police force.

This was wrong and there needs to be criminal charges against companies that do this. "I'm sorry" doesn't cut it.

Besides, run Debian, you'll realize how much Ubuntu doesn't contribute.

Ban it out right, but be careful.

The problem with trans-fat is that it is mainly a man-made product designed to increase shelf life by stabilizing fats. Sounds great, right? Well, "unstable fats" are a good thing for animals because they do stuff and "stable fats" bad because they don't. Think of an unstable fat as a clean dust rag, think of a stable fat as a dirty one.
Anyway, nutrition is complicated science and we are learning new things every day. There are people who will knowingly create products that are less than healthy to make a buck and most people would not eat them if they knew and could reasonably understand the facts. The facts are complicated, like "high fructose corn syrup" "its just sugar" campaign.100% factual, but a lie. It may be "just sugar," but it's molecular makeup is bad because it is unbalanced and made of mono saccharides with more fructose than glucose. Its not sucrose or maltose, which is what the body is used to when it comes to sugar.

Anyway, when ethical behavior won't keep a product off the shelves after we've discovered it is unhealthy, then the government must step in with the force of law.

Quite wrong, I have and I am not impressed.

If, of course, Bing were usable in any way. Bing is terrible. Bing makes it clear that Microsoft is on its way out as a dictator of the market. Besides capitalizing on the dumb luck of becoming the dominant OS company in the 1980s. It is simply amazing to me how long they were able to keep that going.

One has to admit that they are an important part of the Internet infrastructure. Billions and Billions of dollars of commerce are generated by Google searches for companies that have little or no direct contact with Google. Every time a government does this, Google should shut that country off until the various entities that DEPEND on the free exchange of information complain and withhold campaign contributions/bribes.

Yahoo has them.

Just saying :-)

I expected to see a sled at some point.

I HOPE this is a slippery slope that exposes all religions as cults. Scientology is just one or the more ridiculous and exploitive ones. Any organization that uses unprovable assertions without any reasonable scientific framework to exploit its gullible members should be shut down.