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John Lemke

Rep. Goodlatte Slips Secret Change Into Phone Unlocking Bill That Opens The DMCA Up For... - 0 views

  • Because of section 1201 of the DMCA, the "anti-circumvention" provision, companies have been abusing copyright law to block all sorts of actions that are totally unrelated to copyright. That's because 1201 makes it illegal to circumvent basically any "technological protection measures." The intent of the copyright maximalists was to use this section to stop people from breaking DRM. However, other companies soon distorted the language to argue that it could be used to block certain actions totally unrelated to copyright law -- such as unlocking garage doors, ink jet cartridges, gaming accessories... and phones
  • Separately, every three years, the Librarian of Congress gets to announce "exemptions" to section 1201 where it feels that things are being locked up that shouldn't be. Back in 2006, one of these exemptions involved mobile phone unlocking.
  • Every three years this exemption was modified a bit, but in 2012, for unexplained reasons, the Librarian of Congress dropped that exemption entirely, meaning that starting in late January of 2013, it was possible to interpret the DMCA to mean that phone unlocking was illegal. In response to this there was a major White House petition -- which got over 100,000 signatures, leading the White House to announce (just weeks later) that it thought unlocking should be legal -- though, oddly, it seemed to place the issue with the FCC to fix, rather than recognizing the problem was with current copyright law.
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  • While this gives Goodlatte and other maximalists some sort of plausible deniability that this bill is making no statement one way or the other on bulk unlocking, it certainly very strongly implies that Congress believes bulk unlocking is, in fact, still illegal. And that's massively problematic on any number of levels, in part suggesting that the unlocker's motives in unlocking has an impact on the determination under Section 1201 as to whether or not it's legal. And that's an entirely subjective distinction when a bill seems to assume motives, which makes an already problematic Section 1201 much more problematic. Without that clause, this seemed like a bill that was making it clear that you can't use the DMCA to interfere with an issue that is clearly unrelated to copyright, such as phone unlocking. But with this clause, it suggests that perhaps the DMCA's anti-circumvention clause can be used for entirely non-copyright issues if someone doesn't like the "motive" behind the unlocker.
  • Unfortunately, the bill was deemed so uncontroversial that it's been listed on the suspension calendar of the House, which is where non-controversial bills are put to ensure quick passage. That means that, not only did Goodlatte slip in a significant change to this bill that impacts the entire meaning and intent of the bill long after it went through the committee process (and without informing anyone about it), but he also got it put on the list of non-controversial bills to try to have it slip through without anyone even noticing.
John Lemke

New Zealand Spy Agency Deleted Evidence About Its Illegal Spying On Kim Dotcom | Techdirt - 0 views

  • I have to admit that I'm consistently amazed at just how badly law enforcement in both the US and New Zealand appeared to screw up the raid and the case against Kim Dotcom. I've said it a few times before, but it really feels like authorities in both places actually believed the bogus Hollywood hype being spread by the MPAA about how Dotcom was really a James Bondian-villain, and acted accordingly, while ignoring any evidence to the contrary.
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    "I have to admit that I'm consistently amazed at just how badly law enforcement in both the US and New Zealand appeared to screw up the raid and the case against Kim Dotcom. I've said it a few times before, but it really feels like authorities in both places actually believed the bogus Hollywood hype being spread by the MPAA about how Dotcom was really a James Bondian-villain, and acted accordingly, while ignoring any evidence to the contrary."
John Lemke

Video: Sun has 'flipped upside down' as new magnetic cycle begins - Science - News - Th... - 0 views

  • The sun has "flipped upside down", with its north and south poles reversed to reach the midpoint of Solar Cycle 24, Nasa has said. Now, the magnetic fields will once again started moving in opposite directions to begin the completion of the 22 year long process which will culminate in the poles switching once again."A reversal of the sun's magnetic field is, literally, a big event," said Nasa’s Dr. Tony Phillips."The domain of the sun's magnetic influence (also known as the 'heliosphere') extends billions of kilometers beyond Pluto. Changes to the field's polarity ripple all the way out to the Voyager probes, on the doorstep of interstellar space."
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    It is topics like these that Lumpy and Brian often discuss on Tech Net News and Opinion which airs Monday's from 8-10 PM EST. Feel free to join us in geekshed.net IRC in #indienation. We encourage listener participation and having listeners on the air.
John Lemke

The NSA Uses Powerful Toolbox in Effort to Spy on Global Networks - SPIEGEL ONLINE - 0 views

  • According to internal NSA documents viewed by SPIEGEL, these on-call digital plumbers are involved in many sensitive operations conducted by American intelligence agencies. TAO's area of operations ranges from counterterrorism to cyber attacks to traditional espionage. The documents reveal just how diversified the tools at TAO's disposal have become -- and also how it exploits the technical weaknesses of the IT industry, from Microsoft to Cisco and Huawei, to carry out its discreet and efficient attacks. The unit is "akin to the wunderkind of the US intelligence community," says Matthew Aid, a historian who specializes in the history of the NSA. "Getting the ungettable" is the NSA's own description of its duties. "It is not about the quantity produced but the quality of intelligence that is important," one former TAO chief wrote, describing her work in a document. The paper seen by SPIEGEL quotes the former unit head stating that TAO has contributed "some of the most significant intelligence our country has ever seen." The unit, it goes on, has "access to our very hardest targets."
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    Page One of a good three page read on just how extensive the government's illegal spying operations actually are... the worst part is it is just how extensive the portions of it we know about are!
John Lemke

OverDrive Dumps WMA, Announces all Audiobooks Sold to Libraries Will be in MP3 Format - 0 views

  • The MP3s do not have DRM (Digital Rights Management), as the WMA formatted books do.
  • OverDrive told librarians that it will work with them to get libraries' old WMA format books converted for free.
  • This is in response to user preferences,
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    Quote "This is in response to user preferences" ... also of note they are going to work with libraries on getting the old WMA converted.
John Lemke

File-Sharing Boosts Creation of New Hit Music, Research Finds | TorrentFreak - 0 views

  • It is clear that file-sharing encourages the distribution of existing music, and in a paper titled “A Case Study of File Sharing and Music Output” the professor examines what the connection is between music piracy and the creation of new music.
  • The paper provides empirical evidence that file sharing did not reduce the creation of new hit songs. Instead, more new music entered the hit charts, an effect that’s driven by existing artists.
  • The data shows that the output from existing artists increased, while new artists appeared less frequently in the hit charts. However, since the new material from existing artists was greater than the loss from new artists, the “creation” of new music increased overall.
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  • “Specifically, the [result] suggests that the 58.92 percent decline in record sales would be associated with a net increase of 20.6 new songs in the study’s sample annually, all else constant,” Professor Lunney writes.
John Lemke

YouTube Hurts Music Album Sales, Research Finds | TorrentFreak - 0 views

  • The researchers estimate that for the top albums the total in lost sales because of YouTube equals roughly $1 million per year. This is a significant percentage of the label’s total revenue. It is hard to say, however, that YouTube is hurting overall revenue, as the advertising revenue it receives from Google also brings in a significant sum of money.
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    I am not so sure I agree but quoting the article, ""Our findings suggest that sales displacement effect can be real without a promotional effect. That is, the people listening on YouTube appear to be, to some extent people who would know about this album anyway, but may not buy it because of YouTube," the researchers conclude."
John Lemke

Snowden hints at new revelations of industrial espionage by the NSA | The Verge - 0 views

  • "I don't want to pre-empt the work of journalists," he said, "but there's no question the US is engaged in economic spying. If there's information at Siemens that they think would be beneficial to the national interests (not the national security) of the United States, they'll go after that information."
  • While evidence shows the NSA has spied on Brazil's Petrobras oil company, the US government has never been conclusively linked to the surveillance or theft of trade secrets on an international stage. If true, the revelations would have a grave diplomatic impact, particularly the government attempts to regain the trust of allied nations.
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    Honestly, should we be shocked?
John Lemke

Daft Punk wins Album of the Year at the Grammys | The Verge - 0 views

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    Nice
John Lemke

Iron Maiden makes millions of dollars by playing live for pirates | The Verge - 0 views

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    The only thing the article got wrong is that they are not "pirates"... they are fans.
John Lemke

Acoustic cryptanalysis - 0 views

  • Here, we describe a new acoustic cryptanalysis key extraction attack, applicable to GnuPG's current implementation of RSA. The attack can extract full 4096-bit RSA decryption keys from laptop computers (of various models), within an hour, using the sound generated by the computer during the decryption of some chosen ciphertexts. We experimentally demonstrate that such attacks can be carried out, using either a plain mobile phone placed next to the computer, or a more sensitive microphone placed 4 meters away.
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    When I first read the article, I though it would take some sensitive mics but, quoting the article "Here, we describe a new acoustic cryptanalysis key extraction attack, applicable to GnuPG's current implementation of RSA. The attack can extract full 4096-bit RSA decryption keys from laptop computers (of various models), within an hour, using the sound generated by the computer during the decryption of some chosen ciphertexts. We experimentally demonstrate that such attacks can be carried out, using either a plain mobile phone placed next to the computer, or a more sensitive microphone placed 4 meters away."
John Lemke

Recent News | Automotive Grade Linux - 0 views

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    This will likely be a topic on the next news show. Be sure to join #indination on geekshed.net IRC to find out how you can get on the air with us.
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