No me, because that would be identifying myself as a relatively privacy conscious nerdy type. Combine that info with one or two other datapoints, and I'm sure it could be used to identify someone.
616 karma · joined March 24, 2018
Also, I believe modern phones randomize their MACs when they scan for networks, but use their real MAC when they connect, and that's visible to anyone within listening range.
Btw, most "guest" wifi networks rely on MAC-based access control, using these same publicly visible MAC addresses.. it's an inherent weakness of the wifi standards and I think the main reason why devices can't randomize their MACs when actually connecting.
Or the network could be compromised through any of hundreds of other ways: email, USB stick, insider attack, etc. etc. etc...
And that's just my bank. Any given transaction will go through several all with similar weak points, and some of them with firewall admins even less competent than myself.
To me there's just no comparison. The scale of failure modes or attack points for a bank is way way bigger than any cryptocurrency. The reason it works at all is banks have well-paid guys like myself pouring over every detail and keeping things working.
Of course you're right, real life gets complicated and messy, and things are never as simple as it seems they should be. Nevertheless, I do believe we, as the technologists designing and building the systems that the world runs on, should put more careful thought into making them fundamentally secure and easy to use.
Nothing wrong with letting notaries use PGP. I think that's great.
I was comparing the network, protocols, and interfaces that make the transaction happen, not the currency itself. Please don't take this as a endorsement of cryptocurrencies, because they do have problems.
Even with improvements you mentioned, there is just no comparison between the technical and mathematical simplicity of the cryptocurrency transaction as opposed to a bank transaction.
The blockchain was a truly genius innovation. It's that kind of out-of-the-box thinking that I believe we need more of and applied to more varied problems (and obviously not blockchain again, because that would be thinking in the blockchain box).
Example: Think of the simplicity and security of a cryptocurrency transaction as compared to a traditional bank. The crypto transaction is so much simpler, easier, and much much more secure.
I work in a bank, and there are so so many moving parts all with a myriad security weaknesses all chained together to make a transaction happen. First there's the web portal where the customer initiates the transaction. This is HTTPS which has well known flaws and so many things that could go wrong. Then his transaction goes into a SQL DB in the bank intranet, could be attacked hundreds of ways, then scripts process it into an ACH file, encrypt it with PGP, and SFTP it to the Fed. Those PGP keys were exchanged through unencrypted email, and the SFTP password was exchanged over the phone. Then the Fed uses a similar process to send it on to the destination bank, each step adding additional weak points.
The cryptocurrency transaction, on the other hand, is a well defined mathematical problem with no ambiguity, few variables, and a few easy concepts to understand. Yes, there are a handful of things that could go wrong, but they are well define and well understood. In comparison to the bank transaction, the whole thing is just so simple, beautiful, and easy.
Not in banking anyway. It is widely used to protect ACH files and many other exchanges between banks (at least in the US).
If I know I have a lot to do I'll sometimes come in early like 6:30 or 7:00 or something..
Interesting how different people work differently. I'm a big believer in flexible work scheduling that allows each person to optimize for themselves.
It's super bad if some bad guy destroys innocent lives with chemical weapons, but totally fine if we drone strike them. Doesn't make much sense, although in this crazy world things aren't as black and white as we'd like.
Looks like an interesting book.
I know that percentage wise, violence has been decreasing. But is it simply that modern governments are bigger, more powerful, and can better contain and direct violence? Or are modern people actually less violent as far as their culture and psychology? I wonder because even in modern times we've seen incredibly developed and cultured societies turn violent and gruesome very quickly.
I could see myself getting started on a big tangent, and the Interviewer listening politely, then responding with "you're over thinking it; a new line is inserted and the cursor moves to the next line."
Plenty of market participants are not actually doing this. Day traders, high speed traders, even index funds come to mind. And even "real" investors are influenced by psychology that has little to do with an impartial analysis of all possible information. (It's not what you know, but what "everybody knows that everybody knows" [1])
[1] http://www.epsilontheory.com/the-fundamentals-are-sound/
Actually this isn't the most important reason for privacy.
Privacy and other basic rights do very little for me as an random law-abiding dude. I don't break laws, so don't have any reason to cover my ass. I don't have much to say, so not being allowed to express my opinion doesn't seem like that big of a deal. Even in the doomsday scenario where evil totalitarian dictator takes over the country and mass-surveils everyone and otherwise stomps on our rights, it probably won't be that big a deal to lowly me.
The most important reason for protecting individual privacy is to protect the future of society and civilization itself. The average dude in Nazi Germany and Pol Pot era Cambodia probably barely noticed his loss of individual rights as far as daily life was concerned. Mass surveillance enables mass control, and the worst atrocities in history have all happened in environments where individual rights - including privacy - were disregarded. It's bigger than just me. It's about protecting society itself and giving my children a decent world to live in.
There's the kind when I'm absorbed in a book. Far from feeling alone, I feel get caught up in the story and sort of feel like a participant in an imaginary world. It doesn't feel like solitude at all.
Then there's the kind when I'm "in the zone" working on something. I loose track of time, people, and surroundings and when I finally figure it out I feel really good.
The rest of the time I'm just alone and lonely, and that's a bad thing.
I understand changes like that would favor the Democrats more than Republicans. Maybe it could be phased in slowly enough to lessen the pain? Anyway, once it was in place I'm sure the balance of power would readjust and then they could solve some real problems instead of shady politicking.
This site gives FB 88.11% currently. Interesting that its trending down slightly:
But anyway, that's an argument for encouraging competition and computer literacy, not for or against free speech.
For regular guys like me, I can't think of any online service more important to protect than my bank account.
I leave it off most of the time, but I have to be on-call for my day job every few weeks and can't really not have a phone then and still keep my job.
It's a shame that phones are so closed and proprietary. I looked into changing a phone's IMEI number, and turns out that's illegal in most places and a serious no-no. How can there even be a law like that??
The Rohingya uprising was just a response to what must be a feeling of helplessness and desperation. They want to be treated fairly, but with the current political and social climate that's not going to happen.
This is true, unfortanatly. I lived in the Ayeyarwady Delta from 2010 - 2014, and saw a level of hatred that was very hard for me to understand. Facebook didn't really start to take off (at least in the rural area I was in) until the end of that period.
I was at a community event were a DVD of mostly raw footage from the violence in Rakine, South Thailand, and I think a few other places, was shown. It was set to a pounding rock soundtrack, and intersperse with fiery Bhuddist monks preaching against Muslims. It had the most horrific shocking footage I'd ever seen or immagined and left me with nightmares for years afterwards. I'll spare you the details.
The room was full of regular village people, elders, and children, cheering it on as if it was a football match. They told me that while the army was still in power, they would have cracked down on these DVDs, but when I was there you could freely buy them on any street corner.
Anyway, my country (the US) and other places have been through this kind of hatred (more or less) in the past too, and we overcame it. I hope that the people of Myanmar can too.