| Monday
July 22, 2002
Considerable mail on Homeland
Security...
There is considerable mail with this
message:
Just a quick note. Giving the U.S.
military domestic police powers is a very bad idea. I can't see how any
patriot, or conservative could be in favor of such a thing. We would be no
different than the average banana republic or dictatorship. Similarly, The
FBI should have sole domestic surveillance authority. If the CIA traces a
terrorist to US territory, then the case should be turned over to the FBI.
Civil liberties and our freedom is not the sole domain of the democrats. We
should not sacrifice our freedoms, as currently written into law, in favor
of a nebulous, perceived increase in security. If we do, then Bin Lauden has
started to win.
This from Stanley, but it echoes
many others.
It's always a delicate question: the
first duty of a state, and some would argue that really the only duty of a
state, is to protect its citizens: it's a kind of union with solidarity
forever and such.
How far the state must go to do that
is always a matter of tension, and involves levels of expertise.
The Constitution puts much of that
primary responsibility on the states, and makes the Congress the peculiar
instrument for determining what measures are needed. One of the problems
in recent years is that Congress has abdicated that responsibility, and
has also diluted it by being concerned with things that are none of its
business. The Courts have then stepped in to do Civil Rights jobs that the
Congress wasn't willing to do, and became themselves a sort of super
legislature.
Before we start parceling out
responsibilities to agencies we need a longer and harder look at what the
Federal Government ought to be doing. We won't get that, and we'll stumble
on to empire, eventually looking to a Great Man to save us. I may live to
see that.
On computerish matters:
Jerry,
I think this article reinforces my long-standing
belief that the popularity of Windows OSs and IIS as targets for hackers
is due more to their dominant position in the market than to deliberate
disregard for security on Microsoft's part.
Just put matters into perspective...
Edupage, July 15, 2002
STUDY SHOWS INCREASE IN LINUX ATTACKS, DECREASE FOR
MICROSOFT A new study from U.K. company Mi2g shows a significant increase
in successful attacks on Linux systems for the first half of the year,
compared to a 20 percent decline in successful attacks against systems
running Microsoft's Internet Information Server. Mi2g's data showed an
increase of more than 30 percent, from 5,736 to 7,630, in successful Linux
attacks and an overall increase in attacks of 27 percent. The study is
based on Mi2g's coverage of more than 600 hacker groups and 60,000 hacking
attempts since 1995, including data from the Computer Security Institute
and the FBI. The study also shows significant declines in successful
attacks against U.K. and U.S. governments, attributing the change in part
to increased security efforts since September 11. ZDNet, 15 July 2002 http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-943879.html
--John Emmerling
Indeed.
And Eric notes the cost of going it alone:
http://denbeste.nu/cd_log_entries/2002/07/MegahertzMyth.shtml
The Captain of the USS Clueless discusses some
benchmarks that don't bode well for Apple. They especially point to the
problem of being your own sole supplier of chipsets instead of letting an
open market compete to have the latest technology living under your OS.
Eric Pobirs
And see below
While on the Wintel Licensing Front:
The latest installment of your Byte column made me
think of something I had seen earlier in the day in the ACM Risks-Forum
Digest. The current digest is archived as http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/22.16.html
Towards the end of the digest there is a message
titled "Re: EULA" from someone who is in the healthcare
industry. His opinion not being a lawyer of the WinXP EULA is that they
need to move it from their 'we don't support this' category to the
"this is explicitly forbidden" category because the things that
the EULA allows Microsoft to do are in conflict with the confidentiality
rules that the healthcare industry operates under.
Also in the issue of the Risks digest is a
discussion of content-based email filtering sparked by pieces in the last
two TidBits columns (www.tidbits.com) (A very excellent newsletter
covering the Macintosh world).
John
PS: The Outlook XP spell checker wanted to change
WinXP to Wimp!
And Monty reminds us of something we
already know:
Subj: Gold and programmers
One of your correspondents recently mentioned that
Microsoft have $36 billion in cash.
That reminded me of your saying (from Machiavelli?)
that "Gold will not get you good soldiers, but good soldiers can
always get you gold."
I wonder whether there is a corresponding truth
about programmers and gold? 8-)
Rod Montgomery == monty@sprintmail.com
Indeed.
Advice to Linux. Good advice to
Linux:
"The real problem with such diverse issues as
gun control, cyber vandalism and "digital rights" enforcement
isn't so much that most people agree that there should be limits, but
rather the fear that there
are ulterior motives involved. ..."
I agree with you that not only is GNU/Linux still
"not there yet" for Aunt Minnie, and that the "cost"
(time, effort, learning curve) of switching to Linux is still unacceptably
high for most technically advanced users. It seems to me though that the
"ulterior motives" issue for digital rights enforcement,
Palladium style computer security measures etc. may just be the killer
app. that drives Linux into the mainstream.
Virtually all of the objections I've seen to
proposals for "securing" computers/intellectual property are
based not on what the proposals are supposed to accomplish, but on fear of
what the implementation will end up being. I suggest the following
terminology.
A "Secure" platform is what Microsoft
wants the end users to think Palladium will be like. An extension of the
UNIX world's "run at the lowest level of privilege you can get away
with. It'll not only minimize the damage that anyone who hacks your
account can do, but will also minimize what you can do to yourself if you
click on OK before putting your brain in gear" to the device driver
and hardware levels.
An "Encumbered" platform is what most
people (or at least the most vocal participants in Web discussions) are
afraid that Palladium will be like. A system where "protect the data
on the user's machines" is a code phrase for "locking the user
out of their own hardware" to the benefit of intellectual property
owning corporations and the detriment of everyone else.
Although Microsoft's reputation makes it an easy
target, from what I've seen, every proposal to improve security on PC's
triggers the same sort of concerns. That there is a widespread belief that
no company or organization will be able to resist the temptation of
"owning" hardware level security on end user systems and that
any such product will wind up being (based on the definitions above)
Encumbered rather than Secure. The reactions to Microsoft's (very
preliminary) proposal also suggest that nothing short of government
intervention will keep Encumbered systems from being a complete flop in
the marketplace.
Open source development may prove to be the only
approach immune to the lure of Encumbered platforms, since every open
source developer will insist on having complete control of their
environment and design their system accordingly. The side effect of this
being that anyone else who uses their work will be able to obtain the same
level of control. And of course, if anyone has any doubts, they can review
the code, or solicit the opinions of someone qualified to review the code,
and find out what's really going on in there.
If you accept this premise, and assuming the IP
interests don't manage to stampede the government into doing something
spectacularly stupid in the way of IP protection laws, then, not unlike
Microsoft in the 80's and early 90's, Linux/Open Source may succeed. Not
by being the first, fastest, or best, but simply by staying focused and
plugging away while the competition falls victim to self inflicted
massacres.
C Jervey, userchj@conterra.com
Don't panic, and always keep track
of your towel and spoon...
Hello Jerry,
Just a thought on Palladium and the
"Fritz" system. If implemented, it would just make imported
hardware and software the product of choice. I don't see how U.S. laws can
dictate non-U.S. made materials. Non-Palladium motherboards might become
illegal, (but only in the U.S.) but that would only create a huge black
market. In the same way, versions of LINUX, or whatever operating system
could be developed outside of the U.S. and not subject to our laws. Most
people would download and use such systems. I doubt even "Homeland
Security" issues would allow the government to monitor downloads from
hundreds of thousands of users, to determine whether or not
"illegal" operating software is being downloaded. (Then again,
there IS Carnivore... Maybe monitoring everyone?) I hope you are wrong
about the "Fritz" system and Palladium. It still scares me.
Thanks for hearing me out. Yours truly,
Larry J. Rolewic lrolewic@earthlink.net
Don't panic, but do pay attention.
And reaction to last week's column:
Dear Dr Pournelle,
"I have never thought UNIX could be made
user friendly but perhaps they have achieved it."
I have a mortal fear of sending my credit card
number over the net. Guess I'll have to find how to send a money order, or
perhaps I can talk to my local bank manager and see if she has any ideas.
"I have never thought UNIX could be made
user friendly but perhaps they have achieved it."
I'm not sure either. But last month I bought a new
G4 Mac for one of our diehard Mac staffers. Of course it came with OS/X.
There is no question about the beauty and simplicity of the interface, nor
its underlying power, but for long-time Mac or Unix users there are a few
"gotchas"- see below; I did it so you don't have to
<grin>.
In any event make absolutely sure you download or
otherwise procure:
The new XFree86 distribution (because a lot of
really useful stuff only runs under that including Linux apps). Get it
from here: http://www.osxgnu.org/software/Xwin/xonx/
. Unlike earlier versions it runs 'rootless', that is without getting in
the way of the lovely Aqua interface.
The "Fink" libraries which put up a fairly
standard GNU development system and other nice tools, from http://fink.sourceforge.net/
.
The Darwin tools. I bought the CDs because included
on the second CD was the Darwin port to Intel - more on this below.
[Optional] The "Bochs" Intel emulator,
from http://www.osxgnu.org/software/Xwin/Applications/Bochs/
. Not the fastest thing in the world but it does permit an Access database
to be run.
The staffer in question has a PC which does nothing
but run an Access database, since he flatly refuses to consider changing
his ways. Apparently it's the job of technology to adapt to humans, not
vice versa. Neither of us quite realized just how different OS/X was from
earlier versions. Perhaps a few bulleted points on our experiences might
help
First thing to do was make his old stuff run. OS/X
came with a "Classic Mac" environment pre-installed on a 40GB
hard drive. I plonked the contents of his old machine (~2GB) in a
subdirectory. It had a three-button mouse for running remote X-windows
stuff. First thing I did to the new machine was put the nice but
single-button Mac mouse away and attach a conventional generic USB
three-button wheel mouse.
Most of his important applications, including
Endnote (a Bibliographic database) and Textures v2 (a very user-friendly
TeX) didn't work. Upgrading to Endnote 5 fixed the former. Similarly for
Microsoft Office (there is a new Office for OS/X). But Blue Sky Inc.
advise that an OS/X-ready version of Textures is still under development.
This turned out to be true for a significant number of other specialised
applications also. Lesson learned:
If you have legacy Mac stuff, be prepared to spend
significant amounts upgrading. One way around this is to use the 'Classic'
environment, essentially Mac OS 9.1 but running as a shell underneath
OS/X. (Or one could install OS9.1 as a stand-alone environment. I tried
that and don't recommend it). This started a recursive set of fixes
detailed below.
Problem one Classic mode programs had a common
problem: they were expecting to find themselves on hard drives labelled
either "Macintosh HD" or, say, "Data". Since they were
in subdirectories instead, aliases didn't point to the right places.
Anything which read a configuration or preferences file couldn't find
itself.
The fix was easy, I thought: connect the old hard
drives to the new machine either directly or by network and use the
"Disk Copy" program to create read/write uncompressed disk
images (files with extension .img which are a bit-for-bit copy of a Mac
partition). These could then be mounted as 'virtual drives' under Mac OS/X
by double-clicking on them.
Well, that worked up to a point. Some things still
didn't run. The staffer had taken the manuals home so I had to follow my
nose.
Problem two The new Mac's hard drive was also
labelled "Macintosh HD", so on the desktop there were now two of
them visible. Some programs became very confused. (Most, interestingly,
did not, and none of the OS/X tools). Solution: rename the Mac OS/X hard
drive from "Macintosh HD" to (say) "MacOSX". This
immediately brought me up to -
Problem three I couldn't change the hard drive label
even though I was set up as an "Administrative user". The dialog
box which the help system directed me to had the relevant entry 'greyed
out'. This arises because the authorization scheme of OS/X does not come
from Unix. It has its roots (pun) in NextSTEP. Actually it's a very good
scheme but takes getting used to. One is expected to use 'sudo' a lot. I
did not feel I had time to learn. Perhaps I should have, for this brought
me to -
Problem four It is necessary to be the 'root' user
to change a hard drive label. By default there was no root user presented
in the login window. By using the 'System Preferences' tool I was able to
get a simplifed login box which asked for user ID and password, but I
still didn't know the root password.
Problem five In the end to change the root password
the help system directed me to boot from the installation CD and begin the
Mac OS/X setup all over again, at which time I would have the opportunity
to reset the password. This worked and was actually fairly painless, but
whew.
Once all of the visible mounted disks (one real hard
drive and two disk images) had suitable names, things worked swimmingly,
though there is surely an easier way to get around the above
idiosyncrasies of OS/X.
Even the included Unix materials worked, including
SSH which is how we communicate with some of the University's databases.
Compiling one's own Unix materials however, so that one would have access
to the usual suite of Linux tools, was not that easy. This is important
because, for example, the software driving the built-in CD Writer is not
multisession capable, but it is possible to compile a Linux equivalent -
gtoaster perhaps, or a later version of xcdroast.
The preinstalled factory Mac OS/X that came with our
G4 did not have a cc compiler, which all the documentation says it should
have had. I was tempted to wipe the system and reinstall from scratch -
the materials are on the distribution CDs - haven't been that brave yet.
Meanwhile for most purposes the Fink gcc-based tools work well.
To me the most interesting part of the exercise has
been playing with the Darwin port to the Intel architecture. It has some
restrictive hardware requirements (eg. PIIX4 motherboards, Intel CPUs and
network cards only) but its mere existence constitutes a fascinating
statement of intent by Apple.
Regards, TC
-- Terry Cole BA/BSc/BE/BA(hons) (tcole@maths.otago.ac.nz)
System Administrator, Dept. of Maths. & Stats., Otago Uni.
And something else that should have
been up last week:
Jerry:
We apparently can now make mice with bigger brains.
As a molecular biologist, I'm delighted. At the same time, I'm wondering
how people will feel if it turns out the mice are really smarter...
http://www.msnbc.com/news/782312.asp
--Erich Schwarz
And I don't know what to make of
that. The dry weather is driving field rats into houses in California.
They are cute little guys but to my wife they are rats, RATS, RATS,
and must be trapped, driven out, GET THEM OUT OF MY HOUSE. Alas the dog is
too old and our cat died years ago. I may have to get another cat and
dog., because I am unable to outsmart these cute little grey and white
field rats...
Jerry,
You may be cheered to know that you're not the only
one who thinks that keeping smallpox vaccines from the public is a Bad
Idea:
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/162282799v1
I don't know if this will have any effect on the
current don't-vaccinate orthodoxy, but at least the case is being made.
--Erich Schwarz
I am always cheered to realize that
I am not the only one who can think things through. Alas the news doesn't
cheer me as often as I would like.
And St Onge
replies to an earlier mail:
From: Stephen M. St. Onge saintonge@hotmail.com
Subject: Jam at LAX
Dear Jerry:
Rick Hellewell refers
to the latest airport shutdown story ( http://www.sacbee.com/state_wire/story/3586491p-4612550c.html
) suggests we " consider it from the 'it's happening right now'
perspective: you are a security screener, and you see a suitcase x-ray
with an image of several tubes of something, all packed up in neat rows
(probably at least two rows of two tubes). And perhaps there are other
images in there that look like small wiring."
Well, back in the early eighties, I saw a screener
faced with a similar suspicious item on an x-ray. She asked what it was,
and was told a set of chop sticks. So she opened the bag, and, it was chop
sticks. Inconvenienced us for about thirty seconds.
Or I might mention the time they were suspicious of
my anti-sleep apnea machine: they asked me what it was, and made me take
it out of the bag and turn it on. Again, no big problem.
Mr. Hellewell's position seems to be that we should
ignore experience: despite the fact that very few people have ever
attempted to sneak a bomb through the x-ray, we should make the working
assumption that anything the screener is unsure of is a bomb. I disagree.
Best, Stephen
No they make the assumption that
they can be arrogant as they please and no one including the former Vice
President will say or do anything; and that they can in effect destroy the
airlines in order to assure themselves of jobs. Does anyone for a moment
suppose we are safer for all this?
We also have:
From: Stephen M. St. Onge saintonge@hotmail.com
Subject: The Consitution, may it rest in peace
Dear Jerry:
Concerning the courts creating rights: the judges
who proclaim new rules of this type are usually indifferent to procedure
in all cases except perhaps trials. Chief Supreme Warren was supposedly
known for asking about legal results "Is it right? Is it fair? Is it
good?". If it wasn't, then it must be unconstitutional.
Arguments with this kind of person about the duty of
judges to respect the Legislature's powers is pointless.
So why do we put up with it? Because we don't take
the Constitution seriously. People refuse to allow the state to be run on
the basis of "Things we consider necessary and important can be
blocked by the words on a piece of parchment." E.g., the Louisiana
Purchase.
Further, many people are determined to get their
way, regardless of what the Legislature does or doesn't do, and judicial
lawmaking gives them another avenue for success.
I think we'd do better to face this seriously, and
stop pretending we have constitutional govt.
Best, Stephen
Well sometimes the results are good.
Such as Louisiana Purchase. The important thing is to make these great
constitutional questions exceptional and rare. Earl Warren made them
routine. There is a difference.
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