Tag: Technology

Oracle Submits One of the Dumbest Court Filings Ever Conceived

Oracle is a company I hold no love for. Their products never impressed me (probably because I have no need for a proprietary high-end database system) and I hate what they ended up doing with the products and services they obtained from the Sun Microsystems acquisition. Yet Oracles latest court filing really takes the cake:

Hewlett-Packard has secretly contracted with Intel to keep making Itanium processors so that HP can maintain the appearance that “a dead microprocessor is still alive”, and make money from its locked-in Itanium customer base and take business away from Oracle’s Sun servers, Oracle said in a court filing on Friday.

That’s right, Oracle is throwing a hissy fit because they believe Hewlett-Packard (HP) are secretly floating money to Intel in order to keep the Itanium processo alive. My questions is this: who fucking cares? When one company gives another money in trade for a good or service that is called a transaction. As these transactions are agreements made between two entities neither is obligated to reveal the details to anybody else.

Why is Oracle wasting taxpayer money by bring up the fact HP and Intel do business in court? This isn’t a secret, anybody with an HP computer knows this as it’s advertised by a sticker on the computer that says, “Intel Inside.” If HP is paying Intel money to continue production of the Itanium processor what does it matter? What justification is there for bringing up this fact in court?

Tactics to destroy competition like this is one of the many things wrong with the United States economic system. Were the state controlled courts willing to simply toss this type of stupidity out the door money would be saved but businesses throughout the country and that money could be put to productive use. Instead our economy is so intermingled with government that you can’t make a single move without filling out the correct form in triplicate and getting the expensive rubber stamp of approval. Our court system needs to stop being a mechanism for companies to destroy competition through monetary attrition.

One Major Kindle Headache

While I absolutely love the Kindle there is one improvement I would like to see, a way of copy and pasting a WPA key. I’m a little over the top when it comes to computer security so you know I’m one of those weirdos who uses a 63-character gibberish string for my WPA key. Needless to say this is a huge pain in the ass to enter when I want to attach my Kindle to my wireless network. With my iPhone and iPad I can simply e-mail the key to myself (as I run my own e-mail server the e-mail goes from my system to my system and thus never leaves my control), copy the key from the e-mail, and paste it in the wireless configuration screen on the device.

I wish Amazon would put in an easy workaround such as letting the user drop a plain text file containing their key in the root directory of the device. Anything would be better than having to enter in 63-characters of gibberish. With all of that said it is much easier to type in the key with the new touch screen Kindle than it was with the old Kindles.

Besides that the Kindle Touch is pretty awesome. I’ll eventually get a full review of the device up that better expresses my thoughts.

Cell Phones are the Greatest Spy Devices Ever Invented

Cell phones are one of the greatest double edged swords human being have ever invented. They’re incredibly convenient communication devices that not only allow the possessor to make and receive phone calls but also send and receive e-mails, text messages, instant messages from various services, and almost any other data communication you can think of. Due to the amount of personal information we put into these devices they also make the greatest spy gadgets ever invented as they have a microphone, list of contacts, your recent e-mail messages, your current and previous locations, and other similar types of data. Because of the latter rootkits installed on phones are far more dangerous than those installed on personal computers, which is why this is unnerving news to say the least:

You may recall from a few articles back that we started talking about something called CIQ or Carrier iQ. This is, essentially, a piece of software that is embedded into most mobile devices, not just Android but Nokia, Blackberry, and likely many more. According to TrevE, the software is installed as a rootkit software in the RAM of devices where it resides. This software basically is completely hidden from view and in it virtually invisible, and worst of all, rather complicated to kill (some devices more so than others and you will see why in a few minutes). This is given root like rights over the device, which means that it can do everything it pleases and you will have nothing to say about it.

Why do we go into this? Well, a while back I was having some conversations back and forth with TrevE regarding all the HTC’s PoCs that he has been working on, and he started wondering about CIQ, as according to him, was one of the worst things that he had found in HTC’s code. So, he decided to start digging a little into this and found out that there is much more to be said regarding this software than even manufacturers will dare say. It turns out that CIQ is not exactly what many people don’t see (as it is hidden), but it is rather a very useful tool for system and network administrators. The tools is used to provide feedback and relevant data on several metrics that can help one of the aforementioned admins to troubleshoot and improve system and network performance. Point and case, the app seems to run in such a way that it allows the user to provide the input needed via surveys and other things. To put things in a more visual way, this is what CIQ should look like

Carrier iQ is likely one of the most dangerous pieces of software in common use today. I do understand the great amount of benefit it gives to cellular providers but we all know anything accessible by said providers can also be access by the government, often without so much as a court order.

There is a second article that brings up some of the implications of this software being installed on many cell phones. To call such software a violation of privacy being too nice, it literally allows third parties to spy on your every move and potentially listen in to your conversations. Smart criminals would have abandoned cellular phones while performing their ill-deeds long ago but intelligent people never follow the mantra of, “if you’re not doing anything wrong you have nothing to fear” in regards to potential surveillance.

It doesn’t look as though there is much that can be done about Carrier iQ without giving up the convenience of smart phones. Still it is smart to be aware of this technology so you can make the decision of what is more important; have the ability to communicate almost anywhere or a stronger guarantee of privacy.

Big Brother in Our Street Lights

I’m getting rather sick of all the new devices coming out that help our government spy on us. The number of new devices and laws being presented the help government agents listen in on our conversations and watch our ever move is mind-boggling. Not satisfied with the current state of eavesdropping technologies now even street lights are being converted from their benevolent use of providing light to a more sinister purpose:

They are being used for entertainment and safety. but some critics say this is nothing more than the watchful eye of big brother keeping track of your every moment.

[…]

When you step come into view of the street light, there is a camera that spots you, and the person on the other side sees you by white specs on a black screen. The camera senses that somebody is there, and if wants, it can even take your picture.

The system is also capable of recording conversations making critics cry invasion of privacy.

While this is being touted as a great thing by the manufacturer I must say what they think is great I think is despicable:

He said this project “demonstrates how business and government can work together for economic, environmental and social benefits.”

I get a sick feeling in my stomach every time I hear a business tycoon say they can or have demonstrated how business and government can work together. There is a term used to describe a social and economic system where business and government hop into bed together, and that term is fascism. No good comes from a tyrannical government working hand-in-hand with private businesses and let’s be honest, the only thing faster than light is the speed our government is driving down tyranny road.

While I have no expectation of privacy when I’m out and about I do expect my supposed Constitutional protections against government snooping to apply at all times.

A Trojan that Generates Bitcoins

It was bound to happen eventually but a trojan is now circulating for OS X that syphons a victims computing power and uses it to mine Bitcoins:

“This malware is complex, and performs many operations,” security researchers from Mac antivirus vendor Intego warned. “It is a combination of several types of malware: It is a Trojan horse, since it is hidden inside other applications; it is a backdoor, as it opens ports and can accept commands from command and control servers; it is a stealer, as it steals data and Bitcoin virtual money; and it is a spyware, as it sends personal data to remote servers,” they explained.

The Bitcoin mining program that DevilRobber installs on infected computers is called DiabloMiner and is a legitimate Java-based application used in the virtual currency’s production.

The one flaw in this trojan (besides requiring manual intervention by a user to get installed) is using a Java-based application to perform Bitcoin mining. Mac OS 10.7 doesn’t include Java by default and the user must manually install it if they want to run Java applications. While a prompt will appear asking the user if they want to install Java when they try to use a Java applet those are fairly uncommon at this point so the chances of a user running 10.7 having Java installed is actually pretty low.

Still the application appears to also seek out and steal Bitcoin wallets. I’m rather shocked that we didn’t see this kind of trojan come to the attention of network security sites before now. When I first looked into Bitcoin one of the first ideas that popped into my malicious thought filled head was how easy it would be to use a massive botnet to mine a great number of Bitcoins.

Demand and Supply

I’m sure you know about the flooding that hit Thailand and caused absolute devastation but you may not realize how that event is impacting us here. Most hard drive manufacturers rely heavily on production capabilities in Thailand which has turned out to be a pretty bad things right now:

The brunt of the flood has since flowed south — Bangkok saw horrendous flooding through the weekend, with more than 380 dead and 2.4 million people affected. But the water remains in central Thailand, and it will take weeks just to get the water out. Repairing the facilities and replacing the equipment will take many months.

The flood took out approximately 25 percent of the world’s hard drive manufacturing capacity — but that isn’t the whole story.

Western Digital has a second large plant in Malaysia. Seagate doesn’t have any manufacturing in the flooded areas. Toshiba makes hard drives in several locations, not just Bang-Pa In. All of the major manufacturers rely on parts supplied by companies that were hit by the floods, but there are alternate suppliers in different locations.

According to the article these companies were smart enough to have manufacturing facilities elsewhere which means their production capacity hasn’t been devastated. Let this be a lesson to everybody, never keep all of your eggs in one basket. Even though hard drive manufacturers are expected to meet their production numbers this year the prices of drives have certainly jumped right the fuck up. Why is this? The same reason ammunition prices jacked way up shortly after Obama’s election, rumors leading to hoarding.

Many people are buying up harddrives hoping that they’ll be able to ask even high prices in the future. While this purchasing crazy is leading to higher prices it will only last for a short while. Still it shows how fragile commodity prices are how demand can go up due to natural disasters elsewhere in the world.

State Censorship

Uncle let us know that members of law enforcement in the United State have amped up the frequency in which they ask Google to remove videos of police brutality from YouTube:

The technology giant’s biannual transparency report shows that Google refused the demands from the unnamed authority in the first half of this year.

According to the report, Google separately declined orders by other police authorities to remove videos that allegedly defamed law enforcement officials.

The demands formed part of a 70% rise in takedown requests from the US government or police, and were revealed as part of an effort to highlight online censorship around the world.

Figures revealed for the first time show that the US demanded private information about more than 11,000 Google users between January and June this year, almost equal to the number of requests made by 25 other developed countries, including the UK and Russia.

First of all that’s one hell of an increase in takedown requests by the government. Second let us all take a second to thank Google for refusing to remove the videos. The rate of attempted government censorship and demands of customer personal information isn’t surprising but it is still depressing for those of us who would rather not live under a police state.

John McCarthy is Dead

Fuck it, I’m renaming this month Black October. Along with technology giants Steve Jobs and Dennis Richie, John McCarthy has passed away this month:

The creator of Lisp and arguably the father of modern artificial intelligence, John McCarthy, died today. He studied mathematics with the famous John Nash at Princeton and, notably, held the first “computer-chess” match between scientists in the US and the USSR. He transmitted the moves by telegraph.

McCarthy believed AI should be interactive, allowing for a give and take similar to AI simulators like Eliza and, more recently, Siri. His own labs were run in an open, free-wheeling fashion, encouraging exploration and argument. He won the Turing Award from the Association for Computing Machinery in 1972 and the National Medal of Science in 1991.

He was a great mind that contributed an unfathomable amount of knowledge to the field of artificial intelligence. Like Dennis Richie, the works of John McCarthy are marvels that enrich our lives everyday but few know anything about them. He was another grand master who worked in the shadows to deliver us better computing technology.

I would damn him for creating the LISP programming language and the endless number of parenthesis it demands his contributions well makeup for the syntax of the language he born. We will miss you John, and while your contributions to society won’t be celebrated to the degree Steve Job’s were do know that many of use recognized you for who you were and the accomplishments you made.

Now if every other major player in the technology industry would do me a favor and stay alive until November I’d greatly appreciate it. I don’t enjoy having to write three obituaries in one month.

A Primer on Cost

One of the common complaints about e-book readers is that the books are too expensive. These complaints usually bring up the fact that e-books should be much cheaper than physical books because you don’t have various costs such as printing, shipping, and storage to deal with. While those facts are true there is one economic fact that everybody seems to forget, cost of production has nothing to do with the sale price of a good:

Consumers set prices based on their preferences. It doesn’t matter what a book costs; what matters is what a reader will pay for it. Likewise, consumers in the Western world determine the prices — not by haggling — but by buying or not buying.

The fact is we set the cost of goods by buying or not buying them at asked prices. Hewlett-Packard’s TouchPad wasn’t selling at all when the price was set equal to the iPad but started selling like hotcakes when the price was reduces to $99.00. Obviously somewhere between the price of an iPad and $99.00 lies a price people are willing to pay for the device. Firearms are anther good that demonstrate the cost of production has nothing to do with the price people are willing to pay. Heckler and Koch make extremely expensive firearms that are functionally no more reliable than other similar firearms on the market yet people are willing to pay their higher asking price. Well I’m not willing to pay their price but that gets us into the fact that different people value different things:

There is no necessary and direct connection between the value of a good and whether, or in what quantities, labor and other goods of higher order were applied to its production.… Whether a diamond was found accidentally or was obtained from a diamond pit with the employment of a thousand days of labor is completely irrelevant for its value.

Value is subjective and different from person to person. While I find the additional cost of an Apple computer acceptable for what they are many are not. I find the higher cost of certain beers well worth every penny while others who are fine with Budweiser value the cost of beer different.

While I would love to see e-book prices drop I know they won’t be doing so any time in the near future. The sale of e-books has exploded suggesting that people are fine with their cost often being similar to a hardcover or paperback version of the same title:

Book sales for all of last year rose 3.6 percent, from $11.25 billion in 2009 to $11.67 billion in 2010. But e-book sales rose a stunning 164.4 percent ($441.3 million vs. $166.9 million) and downloaded audiobook sales increased 38.8 percent, while physical audiobook sales decreased 6.3 percent.

A 164.4 percent increase in e-book sales would indicate that the price is currently set at a level acceptable to most consumers. When you complain that something is too expensive remember that you can vote with your wallet and simply not buy that product. If enough people follow you then the producer will have to reduce the price or face bankruptcy (unless the government bails them out). This ability to negotiate with your money is one of the greatest aspect of the free market. I only wish I could do the same with government services.

Verizon to Collect Personal Data for Marketing Purposes

If you’re a Verizon customer take note that the company is making changes to its privacy policy so they can collect your personal information for marketing purposes:

For the last month, Verizon Wireless has been notifying customers through email of a major change to its default privacy setting: it will begin collecting your Web browsing history, cell phone location and app usage, for third-party marketing purposes.

You can opt out of such surveillance, although Verizon has promised not to share any identifiable information with these third-party companies.

It wouldn’t be so bad if this change was an opt-in instead of opt-out program. For example if Verizon told customers they could receive a $5.00 monthly discount on their Internet bill if they chose to allow their anonymized personal information to be shared with third-parties there would be little to complain about. Sadly whenever a telecommunications company decides to make sweeping changes to their privacy polices they always make them opt-out ordeals.

I would also like to point out that anonymizing data leaves little comfort these days. Data mining techniques are becomes ever more sophisticated, which allows companies to take mounds of anonymized data and tie that data to specific persons with a high degree of accuracy. Personally I would prefer third-parties not have access to information such as my location or web browsing history.