The irony…

What irony. As I link to my story on over-hyping the China threat, LinkedIn links to a story that over-hypes the same story. This one is from The Independent: “Microsoft admits millions of computers could be infected with malware before they’re even out of the box”. I’m afraid that I missed both the ‘millions’ and ‘before they’re even out of the box’ comments from Microsoft. Oh, no, I didn’t – they’re not there.

Liberty, security and prejudice

Prejudice is the difference and depth between any point of view and our own. If someone agrees with us, that person is unprejudiced; if someone disagrees with us, that person is prejudiced – either against us personally or at least our point of view. The ‘difference’ is a measure of distance in argument; the ‘depth’ is a measure of entrenchment despite argument. To be truly prejudiced, someone must have a different view and be impervious to logical and compelling argument.

So, from my point of view, anyone who disagrees with me and refuses to listen to me is prejudiced (and requires educational redirection). To them, it is I who is prejudiced and requires re-educating – but that is just a measure of their prejudice. I make this point so that any person who reads this post and flatly refuses to agree with me can understand just how prejudiced he or she really is.

OK – so I came across this article in governing.com, written by Steve Towns. It starts:

Until cybersecurity standards are in place, security professionals worry that terrorists could shut down large swaths of the U.S. economy with the click of a mouse.

My hackles rise. Typical government-sponsored fear-mongering to get the people to accept loss of freedom to an increasingly authoritarian government in exchange for the fallacy of security.

The second paragraph continues

Dan Lohrmann has been in the information security business for the bulk of the past decade, and he’s scratching his head over the continued inability of Congress to enact nationwide cybersecurity protections.

I don’t know Mr Lohrmann, but I scratch my own head that any thinking person can be taken in by this government claptrap. So I need to know more about Mr Lohrmann. Enter LinkedIn. A quick search reveals

Since his career began as an [sic] computer systems analyst at the National Security Agency (NSA) in the 1980s, Daniel J. Lohrmann has been a recognized leader in addressing the importance of global computer networks and security.

NSA huh? Well that explains it all. Just another pro-government, un thinking, pre-packaged, prejudiced apologist.

But seriously, I beseech all citizens of the land of the free and the home of the brave to stop and ask, just how much of that freedom am I willing to give up for the promise of unquantified, un-guaranteed, undeliverable, vote-winning security?

Password addendum: more on BT’s attitude towards secure passwords

Well, as you know, I got in a bit of a mess over my BT password. All sorted now.

One of the reasons for choosing BT was to avail myself of the 3 million free WiFi hotspots it offers (and yes, when available in the right place, it’s a very, very good service). But, oh, those passwords again. My new BT account password didn’t work with BT WiFi. Nor was my BT account username recognised by BT WiFi.

So I contacted support. Let’s not go into all those recorded messages advising you to check their website for a solution to your problem (which is, of course, that you cannot check their website). No matter. Persist. There is a human being at the end of the monologue. He may not be in the same country, and he is almost certainly difficult to understand – but he exists and is polite so long as you don’t venture off the hymn sheet.

Turns out I needed a BT email address which I didn’t have. It’s OK, he said, I’ll give you one now. Which he did. And your password, he said, is…

Whoa, I said. Couldn’t you mail it to me? No. What about email, and I’ll change it as soon as I get it? No. What about security, I asked? This is secure, he said. What about eavesdropping, I said? It’s not possible, he said. This is secure.

OK. He didn’t actually know he was talking to me over a VoIP phone which I had on speaker in a crowded – but quiet – room. But, well…

This, he said, is your secure password: paris123.

Umm. If you don’t hear from me for a while it’s because our local terrorist or his file-sharing brother sniffed the details and used my account before I changed my brand new secure password.