Hacker News Reader

cypherpunks01on Exposed: How Israeli Spies Control Your VPN

"Unit 8200’s new project, Lavender, uses artificial intelligence to select targets for the Israeli military’s bombing campaign in Gaza"

Link for anyone who missed this story from April, it's not linked in the article:

https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza/

cypherpunks01on How to delete your 23andMe data amid the company's turmoil

I got an identical email, after asking numerous times for them to tell me when all information will be deleted, i.e. when do the compliance requirements expire for my specific account?

They certainly don't seem interested in answering this question, no matter how many ways I phrase it. So much for "you are in control of your data", I guess it was all BS as some people predicted.

cypherpunks01on Why Is Light So Fast?

Causality is *bangs hammer on bell*

Time is a relationship between clocks.. beyond that, yes, it's hard to say exactly.

Time seems to be what prevents everything from happening at once.

cypherpunks01on Why Is Light So Fast?

Yes, I was often very confused as to why the speed of light shows up everywhere, until it was reframed for me in this way. The fact that light travels at the same speed regardless of your frame of reference becomes a little less mystifying.

It feels more intuitive to me when thinking about it as causality always unfolding around you at the same speed, no matter your own frame.

The constant c was not named for causality, but it is a nice coincidence.

cypherpunks01on Mystery creator of Bitcoin identified, new HBO documentary claims

It's intriguing, but writing and coding style seemed to be totally different iirc?

And to me, the whole Halfin-key signed message thing that Shkreli posted kind of seemed to point away from LeRoux due to the suspicious circumstances.

cypherpunks01on Cups Remote Code Execution Vulnerability Fix Available

Attacking UNIX Systems via CUPS, Part I, 2024-09-26 (linked at end of page)

https://www.evilsocket.net/2024/09/26/Attacking-UNIX-systems...

cypherpunks01on Bop Spotter

Have you considered those who are hard of hearing? Should they be made to drive their vehicles in silence?

cypherpunks01on LAPD raid goes from bad to farce after gun allegedly sucked onto MRI machine

I really dislike that news media never give references to the actual court docs that they are reporting on. Many times it's truly lazy, just reporting the fact that another news outlet reported on a case.

Noho Diagnostic Center, Inc. v. City of Los Angeles (2:24-cv-07952), District Court, C.D. California

Full complaint: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.94... [pdf]

Docket: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69172475/noho-diagnosti...

OFFICER FRANCO conducted surveillance on multiple dates in 2023, reporting the "distinct odor of live cannabis plant"..

OFFICER FRANCO compared the power usage of the TARGET PREMISES to nearby businesses and found it significantly higher.

Sounds like Officer Franco may need some retraining.

cypherpunks01on Electronic Warfare Spooks Airlines, Pilots and Air-Safety Officials

https://archive.is/RztnK

cypherpunks01on Is Tor still safe to use?

Remember the Harvard student that emailed in a bomb threat via Tor to get out of a final exam in 2013?

He got caught not by the FBI breaking Tor, but just by network analysis of university network traffic logs showing a very narrow list of on-campus people using Tor at the time the threat was communicated. He quickly confessed when interviewed.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/files/2013/1...

Just another factor to consider when using Tor - who's network you're on.

cypherpunks01on Learning to Reason with LLMs

I can see it too, I am on the Plus plan and don't think I have any special developer privileges. Selecting that option for me changes the URL to https://chatgpt.com/?model=o1-preview

I tried a fake Monty Hall problem, where the presenter opens a door before the participant picks and is then offered to switch doors, so the probability remains 50% for each door. Previous models have consistently gotten this wrong, because of how many times they've seen the Monty Hall written where switching doors improves their chance of winning the prize. The chain-of-thought reasoning figured out this modification and after analyzing the conditional probabilities confidently stated: "Answer: It doesn't matter; switching or staying yields the same chance—the participant need not switch doors." Good job.

cypherpunks01on Using the moiré effect to show different arrows to each observer (2018)

When a grid's misaligned

With another behind

That's a moiré

cypherpunks01on SponsorBlock – skip sponsor segments on YouTube

Came here to say the same thing. Revanced YT patches for Android are extremely sweet. And yes, even better features (for viewers) than YT Premium.

cypherpunks01on FDA Declines to Approve MDMA Therapy, Seeking More Study

The vaccines with the microchips in them? Or the ones that prevented millions of excess deaths?

cypherpunks01on Infinite Proofs: The Effects of Mathematics on David Foster Wallace (2012)

I haven't read the The Pale King, but I absolutely love the reading of this excerpt from the book. The protagonist recalls a speech by his substitute teacher in the Advanced Tax course - https://youtu.be/sJXrXf-0yoQ (10mins. no math). I do hope to tackle the book one day.

cypherpunks01on Prevention of HIV

Yes, it can be confusing if you only read part of a sentence. Recommend continue reading if you're interested in the findings

cypherpunks01on My mental model of setf was wrong

Same. I was reminded of a quote I like from a Mongolian Buddhist lama:

"It's not that you're not real. We all think we're real, and that's not wrong. You are real. But you think you're really real — you exaggerated."

cypherpunks01on Reverse engineering Ticketmaster's rotating barcodes

I dug up the court docs referenced in that article, it's pretty interesting-

AXS Group LLC v. Internet Referral Services LLC (2:24-cv-00377) District Court, C.D. California

Amended complaint: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.91...

Docket: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/68163191/axs-group-llc-...

One item of the complaint is regarding the "secure.tickets" site, which I wrote about in an earlier comment below (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40906148#40910690).

Basically, brokers are using the "secure.tickets" and similar websites to proxy ticket barcodes to buyers, without going through the actual ticket transfer mechanisms on the primary ticketer AXS/TM, (similar to how this blogger does). Then resellers are delivering these ticket URLs, hosted on random websites, to Seatgeek and Stubhub customers, and those platforms are supporting their delivery by telling their customers that the tickets are legit. Sounds like AXS is fighting back against this practice.

cypherpunks01on Reverse engineering Ticketmaster's rotating barcodes

It's simply 0% financing for their business. No more complex than that.

cypherpunks01on Reverse engineering Ticketmaster's rotating barcodes

Yes, these systems are getting more popular recently, I believe they are typically being run by large ticket broker platforms.

I don't know about the specific site you mentioned, however the large broker platform Automatiq runs a number of domains like this, where they effectively proxy the original ticket token, recreate it with TOTP just as in this article, and display it to any user who has the right link in a similar format to how TM displays it. They advertise this service as "Transferless Delivery" to their ticket reseller customers. The main Automatiq one is called "secure.tickets".

It reduces work for sellers, because they never even have to transfer the tickets out of their Ticketmaster account anymore. Of course, it's horrible for buyers because they have no idea whether the random website link they were sent is actually going to serve them a barcode corresponding to a real ticket or not, or whether the site will be up, and they have no rights to the ticket as far as the primary ticket issuer (TM) is concerned, buyers don't even know the name on their own tickets.

Seatgeek and StubHub seem to be aware of these systems because of how closely they work with ticket brokers, and just coach customers to accept them if they are from any of the domains known to them. See https://support.seatgeek.com/hc/en-us/articles/2074030716443... the Automatiq site is called out specifically on that page.

cypherpunks01on Mongo but on Postgres and with strong consistency benefits

Can a Generated Column read data from a JSONB column? That'd be really cool, but I'm not familiar enough with generated columns to know.

cypherpunks01on New ways to catch gravitational waves

I was surprised that the article doesn't mention LISA at all. I had thought that's the next stage gravitational wave detector on the horizon?

https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/LISA_f...

cypherpunks01on Tripping on Xenon Gas (2023)

From season 3, they're all great, but besides the Xenon one I also remember "Ultra LSD" and "Synthetic Toad Venom Machine" being especially great episodes.

cypherpunks01on Denver gave homeless people $1k/mth. Year later, nearly half had housing

Conclusion from Year 1 report:

While the findings outlined in this report indicate overall improvement for DBIP participants across many targeted outcomes, minimal differences were observed when comparing outcomes across the different payment groups. This may suggest that consistent cash assistance of even $50 can improve many aspects of one’s life. Or, as we heard through member checking, it was the aggregate of the whole DIBP program that made a difference for individuals. This means the trust conveyed by delivering guaranteed income, attention by community based organizational partner staff, phones and phone plans, and connections.

I think this effect is seen a lot in various psychological and well-being studies, I'm not sure if it has a name. But basically, if someone demonstrates they are interested in your well-being and stays in touch with you, it can often have an outsized positive effect on one's life, especially when connection and support have been difficult to find.

cypherpunks01on Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free

Yes, he'll be in court in Saipan on Wednesday morning to enter the plea. Apparently he's already left London, according to WikiLeaks twitter account and other reports. Don't think he's flying coach though : )

cypherpunks01on Julian Assange has reached a plea deal with the U.S., allowing him to go free

The case is federal, it's not confined in jurisdiction. But the plea deal is being entered there because of "defendant’s opposition to traveling to the continental United States to enter his guilty plea and the proximity of this federal U.S. District Court to the defendant’s country of citizenship, Australia, to which we expect he will return at the conclusion of the proceeding"

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nmid.64...

cypherpunks01on Robots on Lake Michigan beaches to prevent drownings

I love this. An incredibly simple design for instant buoyancy. I'd think the device could be more affordable if there was additional competition. At $80 price-point it should include a small light (and/or sound) strobe that triggers for locating people in the dark. Gas cylinder refills are incredibly cheap and available everywhere. Makes a lot of sense to keep these around for open-water group swimming adventures, with swimmers of mixed strength.

cypherpunks01on The tiny chip that powers Montreal subway tickets

Ah yes, it's not quite there, but almost. Contactless payment directly at the turnstile is coming to Boston MBTA this year, I believe. Like how NYC works now, where you can just use your credit card for entry.

cypherpunks01on The tiny chip that powers Montreal subway tickets

Not a huge advantage, but I'd say mostly range and flexibility. You may want to put the tag farther away than you could hear an alarm clock, if you want to go to another room. And you could customize the alarm so you're guided towards a different tag every day of the week, without needing multiple (or any) alarm clocks.

cypherpunks01on I am using AI to drop hats outside my window onto New Yorkers

Yes, there's truly huge interest in the technical ability to accurately place hats on people of all ages and backgrounds, across the globe.