SNR monkey - Slashdot User

Submission + - Morality of throttling a Local ISP? 3

Submitted by on Sunday March 15, 2009 @04:39PM

An anonymous reader writes: I work for a small (400 customers) local cable ISP. For the company the ISP is only a smaller side business, so my whole line of expertise lies in other areas, but since I know the most about Linux and networking I've been stuck into the role of part time sysadmin.

In examining our backbone and customer base I've found out that we are oversubscribed around 70:1 between our customer's bandwidth and our pipe. I've gone to the boss and showed him the bandwidth graphs of us sitting against the limit for the better part of the day, and instead of purchasing more bandwidth, he has asked me to start implementing traffic shaping and packet inspection against P2P users and other types of large downloading. Because this is in a certain limited market, the customers really have the choice between my work, and dial-up.

Being a person on the other side of that coin with my local ISP I'm struggling with the desire to give the customers I'm administering the best experience and the desire to do what my boss wants.

In my situation, what would you do ?

Submission + - Europe is testing 12.5 Gbs Wireless 1

Submitted by Lorien_the_first_one on Sunday March 15, 2009 @02:52PM

Lorien_the_first_one writes: Science news reports that in Europe, a Breakthrough For Post-4G Communications has been announced. A public-private consortium known as IPHOBAC, has been developing new communications technology that is near commercialization now. From the article, "With much of the mobile world yet to migrate to 3G mobile communications, let alone 4G, European researchers are already working on a new technology able to deliver data wirelessly up to 12.5Gb/s.

"The technology — known as 'millimetre (mm)-wave' or microwave photonics — has commercial applications not just in telecommunications (access and in-house networks) but also in instrumentation, radar, security, radio astronomy and other fields."

That's great for Europe, but here in the US, I suspect that patent interests will try to stymie the adoption of such technology until they can get exclusive control of it here.

Comment Re:All this sounds nice, but there's another side. (Score 1) 1224

by SNR monkey on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @08:25PM (#25294125) Attached to: Ford To Introduce Restrictive Car Keys For Parents

I guess you didn't watch the video then. You should, it's for people who think like you.

I'll give you a quick recap, a 15 year old Volvo 940 is crashed into 3 year old Renault Modus. The host had to leverage himself against the Volvo to get the car door open after the crash and once you saw the inside, it was pretty clear that if you had been driving, you wouldn't be walking anywhere. The dummy probably would have to be cut out of the car, and the lower leg damage might have been serious enough to warrant amputation. The steering wheel ended up somewhere in the driver's face.

On the other hand, the Renault Modus door was opened with only slight effort with one hand. There was no interior deformation, so the driver would been able to walk away. The air bags protected both the driver and passenger.

The cars deform for a reason - they are built to dissipate the kinetic energy of a car crash. All of the energy that goes into deforming metal is not being directed into the passengers.

Your comment about rural America is a specific case. Even if it was true what you said about deformation (and it isn't), you are saying that you think it is better to be a little more safe in one specific set of circumstances, as opposed to safer on the whole (and I'd argue that you'd be safer one the whole with a newer-built for safety car). Perhaps you do 99.99% of your driving on rural roads, but don't think serious/fatal car accidents only happen to lone drivers in the middle of nowhere when there is no one around to help.

You remind me of some people I knew a few years ago. The argued that they were safer not wearing seatbelts, because if you were wearing a seatbelt and hit in the door, you were more likely to die. They didn't stop and consider that the type of side impact that they were trying to protect themselves against only happens a small percentage of the time, and in all other types of crashes, you are much safer wearing safety belts.

I suggest also checking out the FARS Encyclopedia

Do yourself a favor and watch that video. It will take 9 minutes of your time and it could save your life.

Submission + - Torvalds On Linux In 2008

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 25, 2007 @08:10PM

An anonymous reader writes: Linux Torvalds has engaged in a middling-length email interview with InformationWeek's Charlie Babcock, in which he outlines his objectives for 2008, takes a jab at Microsoft and also says he's not much worried about patent litigation. On next year's plans: "The situation in graphics and wireless networking devices — both of which have been somewhat weak spots — is changing, and I suspect that will be a large part of what continues to happen during 2008 too." On Microsoft: "I simply don't use Microsoft products, not because I hate them, but because they aren't interesting to me." On legal: "I really don't think there is anything real behind that whole intellectual property FUD machine." Torvalds is also very interested in SSDs (solid-state drives), and says they're a game-changer when it comes to reducing latency.

Submission + - The Evolving Face of Credit Card Scams

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 18, 2007 @09:03PM

An anonymous reader writes: The 12 Angry Men have a follow up to their piece on the evolving cross sell scam credit card companies have begun using. Their new article concerns another evolving scam being employed, where users are racking up huge fees, and charges on cards which have never even been activated. The article goes deep into the standard way the scam plays out, as well as detailing some interesting history on how credit applications are processed, and where they are typically (and frighteningly) subject to tampering.

Submission + - FBI Doesn't Tell Courts About Bogus Evidence

Submitted by dprovine on Sunday November 18, 2007 @07:54PM

dprovine writes: According to a joint investigation by series of articles in The Washington Post and 60 Minutes, a forensic test used by the FBI for decades is known to be invalid. The National Academy of Science issued a report in 2004 that FBI investigators had given "problematic" testimony to juries. The FBI later stopped using "bullet lead analysis", but sent a letter to law enforcement officials saying that they still fully supported the science behind it. Hundreds of criminal defendants — some already convicted in part on the testimony of FBI experts — were not informed about the problems with the evidence used against them in court. Does anyone at the Justice Department even care about what effect this will have on how the public in general (and juries in particular) regards the trustworthiness of FBI testimony?

Submission + - Vote to Eliminate Leap Seconds 6

Submitted by Mortimer.CA on Sunday November 18, 2007 @04:31PM

Mortimer.CA writes: As mentionted on Slahdot previously, there is a proposal to remove leap seconds from UTC (nee 'Greenwich' time). It wil be put to a vote to ITU member states, and if 70% agree, the leap second will be eliminated by 2013. There is some debate as to whether this change is a good or bad idea. One philosophical point opponents make is that the 'official' time on Earth should match the time of the sun and heavens. People with appliances that blink '12:00' can probably ignore this issue.

Submission + - 15% of United States Workforce Routinely Drunk (sciencedaily.com) 3

Submitted by

bl8n8r

on Saturday October 20, 2007 @01:59PM

bl8n8r writes: "According to an article based on research conducted by the University of Buffalo, Alcohol use and impairment at work is a problem for 15% of the U.S. workforce (19.2 million people). Not surprisingly, Among the broad group of occupations with the highest rate of use were the management and sales occupations with grounds maintenance pulling in an honorable mention. Perhaps the next interview will go better if you bring along some Crown Royal"

Submission + - RealNetworks releases zero-day ActiveX fix

Submitted by rbn on Saturday October 20, 2007 @05:07AM

rbn writes: RealNetworks has issued a fix for a zero-day flaw reported by Symantec, Thurday, which affects the import method of an Active X control. The flaw is actively being exploited and the attacks appear to be targeting specific organizations, including NASA, which reportedly banned the use of Internet Explorer in response to this incident. The issue affects an ActiveX object installed by RealPlayer, accessible over the web using Internet Explorer. By instantiating the object and invoking a specific method an attacker is able to corrupt process memory and execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the browser. The attack currently known to be in-the-wild has been confirmed to download malicious code to the compromised host. RealNetworks has issued an advice to its users to upgrade immediately to its latest player and apply the patch.

Submission + - Hellgate EULA: EA checks out your apps. (bluesnews.com)

Submitted by wild_quinine on Saturday October 20, 2007 @12:35AM

wild_quinine writes: Bluesnews reports on a controversy sweeping web forums at the moment: article 3 of the EULA for the Hellgate: London demo specifies an unusually large amount of information about your system can be obtained, and transferred to any third parties EA sees fit.

3. Consent to Use of Data. You agree that EA, its affiliates, and each Related Party may collect, use, store and transmit technical and related information that identifies your computer, including without limitation your Internet Protocol address, operating system, application software and peripheral hardware, that may be gathered periodically to facilitate the provision of software updates, dynamically served content, product support and other services to you, including online play. EA and/or the Related Parties may also use this information in the aggregate and, in a form which does not personally identify you, to improve our products and services and we may share that aggregate data with our third party service providers.

Submission + - iPhone/Yahoo mail security vulnerability (isode.com)

Submitted by

Will Sheward

on Thursday July 19, 2007 @07:13PM

Will Sheward writes: "Whilst trying to figure out how the iPhone was doing it's 'push' email with Yahoo (it seems it doesn't — but that's another story) we came across another security flaw. The iPhone authenticates with Yahoo using a private protocol called XYMPKI, used in conjunction with IMAP. Yahoo do not provide a general IMAP service — they use IMAP only for iPhone access. Although the iPhone supports TLS (Transport Layer Security) Yahoo! IMAP doesn't, which can lead to a replay attack. Anyone able to eavesdrop on the authentication exchange, such as when using any open (public or private) wi-fi service, can easily gain full access to the user's email account until the user changes their password. We would advise against using the Yahoo service with an iPhone, because of this security risk. Full details here"

Submission + - Bill proposed to redefine 'broadband' in the US

Submitted by

edmicman

on Saturday May 26, 2007 @03:27PM

edmicman writes: "Infoworld is reporting on a new bill introduced in the U.S. Senate that would have the FCC revise what bandwidth rates qualify as "broadband":

Senator Daniel Inouye, a Hawaii Democrat and chairman of the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee, introduced the Broadband Data Improvement Act Thursday along with five Democratic cosponsors. The bill would require the FCC to re-evaluate whether 200Kbps is sufficient bandwidth to justify being called broadband, and it would require the agency to create a new measurement, known as second-generation broadband, to identify networks' capability of transmitting high-definition video.

The bill would also require broadband providers to report availability of broadband and second-generation broadband connections within smaller geography areas than the postal zip codes the FCC now uses to measure the availability of such services.

"

Submission + - No charges for chatroom suicide observers

Submitted by

Benjamin Fox

on Saturday May 26, 2007 @02:52PM

Benjamin Fox writes: "The BBC reports that chatroom participants who apparently "watched" a man commit kill himself will not face charges for the comments made up to and during the suicide. A crown prosecution spokesman said, "We examined all the evidence passed to us by the police and have concluded that none of the comments made in the chatroom amounted to a criminal offense." What could this mean for electronic witnesses of other meatspace crimes and tragedies in the UK?"

Submission + - Simple Comm Technique Beats Quantum Crypto

Submitted by

Atario

on Saturday May 26, 2007 @08:46AM

Atario writes: "Spying is big business, and avoiding being spied on an even bigger one. So imagine if someone came up with a simple, cheap way of encrypting messages that is almost impossible to hack into?

American computer engineer Laszlo Kish at Texas A&M University in College Station claims to have done just that. He says the thermal properties of a simple wire can be exploited to create a secure communications channel, one that outperforms quantum cryptography keys."

Submission + - Google search by employer not illegal, say judges

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 10, 2007 @05:42PM

An anonymous reader writes: A court of appeals for the federal circuit has upheld a ruling (PDF) against a man who sued his former employer for Googling his name before firing him. He had accused his former employer of participating in "ex parte" communications — off-the-record communications that are used to play a part in the final outcome of a decision — that ultimately affected the decision to fire him from his job. However, the three-judge panel ruled that an ex parte communication did not occur in the case when the employer used Google.

The man in question, David Mullins, was a government employee at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Weather Forecast Office in Indianapolis, IN. Through a series of events, Mullins' employer found that he had misused his government vehicle and government funds for his own purposes — such as sleeping in his car and falsifying hotel documents to receive reimbursements, withdrawing unauthorized amounts of cash from the company card, traveling to destinations sometimes hundreds of miles away from where he was supposed to be (and using his company card to fill up on gas there), and spending company time to visit friends and/or his children. Mullins' supervisor provided a 23-page document listing 102 separate instances of misconduct.

Mullins took issue with a Google search that Capell performed just before authorizing his firing. During this Google search, Capell found that Mullins had been fired from his previous job at the Smithsonian Institution and had been removed from Federal Service by the Air Force. Mullins argued that his right to fundamental fairness was violated when Capell performed the search and that she committed perjury when she stated that the search did not influence her decision to fire him.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070510-goog le-search-by-employer-not-illegal-say-judges.html

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