http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=6422
DECAF: “Game Over”
December 18, 2009 by Dissent Filed under Other, Surveillance
Earlier this week, this site linked to a news report on DECAF, a counter-COFEE application. Now it appears that DECAF was a hoax. The decafeme.org site now reads:
We want to thank every media outlet, financial supporter, security expert, and forensic investigator that showed us support.
As you probably noticed, your copy of DECAF no longer works. We have disabled every copy of DECAF. [Project step one, turn it back on. Bob] We hope that as you realize this was a stunt to raise awareness for security and the need for better forensic tools that you would reconsider cutting corners on corporate security. Also, governments should not rely on a tool to automate the process of forensics but rather invest in the education of investigators and forensic tool experts. If we were able to assist every government agency in their computer crime investigations, we would. The problem is DECAF is just two people. As a security community at large, we need to band together and start relieving some of the burden off our government by giving back.
The remainder of the message seems to be pretty much Christianity-oriented.
Thanks to Richard Forno of Infowarrior.org for making me aware of this.
Interesting. I suspect we won't see a similar law in the US. Too many companies believe that secrecy is better for business. (They don't really believe patents and copyright protect them.)
Mandatory Use of Open Standards In Hungary
Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Friday December 18, @06:20PM from the you'll-be-open-and-like-it dept.
qpeter writes
"Hungarian Parliament has made the use of open standards mandatory by law in the intercommunication between public administration offices, public utility companies, citizens and voluntarily joining private companies, conducted via the central governmental system. The Open Standards Alliance initiating the amendment aims to promote the spread of monopoly-free markets [I can hear the alarm bells going off in corporate America! Bob] that foster the development of interchangeable and interoperable products generated by open standards, and, consequently, broad competition markets, regardless of whether the IT systems of interconnecting organizations and individuals use open or closed source software. In the near future, in spite of EU tendencies the Alliance seeks to make its approach – interoperability based on publicly defined open standards – the EU norm under the Hungarian presidency of the European Union in 2011. To that end, it will promote public collaboration – possibly between every interested party, civil and political organization in the European Union. What do you think: what would be the best way to cooperate?"
No doubt they expect to lure traveling executives and professionals into range of their gourmet burgers. Quite a turnaround. Instead of shooing idlers out to make room for paying customers, they are actually listening to their customers and making the restaurant customer-friendly! Way to go, Ronald!
US McDonald's Wi-Fi Going Free In January
Posted by kdawson on Friday December 18, @12:23PM from the fries-with-that dept.
Knowzy writes
"After five years behind a paywall, McDonalds plans to stop charging for its Wi-Fi in mid-January in the US. According to the Dallas Morning News, you aren't even required to make a purchase — 'free is free,' a spokesman said. It's also been widely reported that they won't impose time limits on your surfing. With around 20,000 free hotspots between McDonald's and Starbucks (who went free[ish] earlier this year), anyone still charging for Wi-Fi is going to look foolish, if not downright greedy."
These are pretty old-school, but I can see my website students using them for page backgrounds...
Two Sites To Instantly Convert Your Images To Text
By Simon Slangen on Dec. 18th, 2009
Photo2Text Photo2Text quickly converts any picture to ASCII art.
TEXT-IMAGE The next site does more than just convert images to text, it also offers three wholly different varieties; HTML, ASCII and Matrix.
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