torpid (u/torpid) - Readit News

torpid commented on Notepad++ hijacked by state-sponsored actors notepad-plus-plus.org/new... · Posted by u/mysterydip

torpid · 6 days ago

Long ago, Canonical did some shady stuff with the now-deprecated apt-key "net-update" signing validation for updating of GnuPG keys over the network, an exclusive Ubuntu "feature" Debian didn't even adopt that in theory allowed the same thing.

First I thought CVE-2012-3587 was incompetence... but then seeing CVE-2012-0954 after it, I couldn't help think something more was at bay as something connected to a nation state. It does not surprise me in the least to see nation state attackers exploiting N++. Because I've also on very sensitive enterprise PAM systems in F500/research/academia, and about 10% of the time it felt like I'd see Notepad++ on internet-connected systems used for security tooling because vanilla notepad is indeed garbage. It does not surprise me at all this has been used as an attack vector.

torpid commented on Cloudflare CEO on the Italy fines twitter.com/eastdakota/st... · Posted by u/sidcool

dependsontheq · a month ago

Let's be a bit more honest here, I think the Italian law is badly defined, but I also think the american perspective is wrong.

We (all tech people everywhere me included) argued for a lot of time for free speech on the internet, but the result currently is that we built a system that is free speech for Russian and Chinese bots and actors. In Europe we are under daily attack from Russian accounts that spread massive amounts of desinformation, deep fakes, just emotional appeals with the goal of destroying liberal democracy. The US government is actively trying to support them by fighting against any kind of European rules and spreading their part of desinformation.

This is not about normal politics, Europe is under siege.

torpid · a month ago

If you cannot tolerate “Russian bots” or “Chinese bots,” then you do not truly stand for free speech. It really is that simple. Free speech, by definition, exists to protect speech that someone finds offensive or objectionable. If everyone only said things that others agreed with, there would be no need for free speech protections at all. In a genuine marketplace of ideas, it is astonishing that anyone would claim the right to censor others, or to strip them of their humanity by dismissing them as mere robots or agents rather than people with sincere views.

Yet we are increasingly binding ourselves (and even “authorized” bots) in chains of verified identity, deliberately suppressing anonymity. Imposing a “zero-trust” architecture on society inevitably leads to totalitarianism.

The right to express ideas without personal attribution has always been a cornerstone of free speech and a free society. It is now being redefined and demonized as mere “bot activity.” While real bots certainly exist (as they have since the days of spam) many accounts labeled as bots are simply human beings who choose anonymity because they hold controversial opinions they do not wish to have traced back to them.

Companies like Cloudflare are among the leaders in this shift by building frameworks ostensibly to monetize AI bot traffic. The consequence, however, is the effective end of online anonymity. When anonymity is forbidden, freedom itself disappears.

torpid commented on Bitchat – A decentralized messaging app that works over Bluetooth mesh networks github.com/jackjackbits/b... · Posted by u/ananddtyagi

Dr4kn · 7 months ago

If your country shuts off Internet access for demonstrations this would work great.

torpid · 7 months ago

If your country shuts off internet access they are probably going to jam bluetooth and wifi at any large demonstration, too.

torpid commented on Flame – BBS and MUD ucc.asn.au/services/flame... · Posted by u/shakna

torpid · 10 months ago

This isn't new at all - MajorBBS/Worldgroup had a module called Hoteleconference that did this, which if I remember correctly, you could do "world building" to design rooms, descriptions, actions, etc. much like a mud but with a more social context.

torpid commented on Zelensky leaves White House after angry meeting bbc.com/news/live/c625ex2... · Posted by u/yakkomajuri

Animats · a year ago

On the minerals front, the US doesn't need anything from Ukraine. Most of the minerals mentioned, except titanium, are un-mined deposits. Or things the US has plenty of already, such as oil, natural gas, coal, and iron.

Here's a rundown:

- Rare earths:

I've mentioned the MP Minerals, Mountain Pass, CA mine before. The US doesn't have enough rare earth refining capability, and China won't export the technology. So US ore goes to China for processing. Or did, until DoD paid for a separation plant at Mountain Pass. That problem is close to being solved. That new separation plant is running. A plant for the final step, making magnet-ready metal, has been built in Texas, again by MP Minerals, and it's about ready to open.

What's happened with rare earths is not that they're rare. It's that China undercut US prices so much that the Mountain Pass mine went bankrupt. Twice. In 2015, there was a rare earths glut. Look at WSJ rare earths articles back to 2011.

There are large un-mined rare earth deposits in Colorado and Wyoming, with startups talking about mining them. Whether this makes economic sense is unclear. If all those start up, the price will crash again and they all go bust.

Three years ago, the US rare earths situation looked bad. Not today.

- Uranium

The US has plenty of uranium resources. Canada and the US are historically the biggest producers.

- Titanium

Titanium ore has supposedly been discovered in Tennessee. See https://iperionx.com/ Are those guys for real? Not clear.

- Lithium

The US produces about 75% of the lithium it uses. New deposits have been found in Arkansas:

https://www.usgs.gov/news/national-news-release/unlocking-ar...

And in Nevada:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCWeZiVsotc

- Graphite

China is the leading producer, but Canada and Norway are ramping up. There hasn't been US production of natural graphite since the 1950s. US production of synthetic graphite satisfies most US demand. (https://pubs.usgs.gov/publication/pp1802J) Several new synthetic graphite plants are being built in the US.

As we've seen in rare earths, when the cheaper sources raise their prices, domestic production increases. It seems to take about three to five years to get a big mining operation going.

Quietly, during the previous administration, there was funding for US mineral projects in rare earths, graphite, and lithium. It's no secret, but most coverage is from sites that cover mining and minerals.

torpid · a year ago

That's not the point. The point is making Ukraine pay off the defense contractors rather than the American taxpayers. Trump made a campaign promise to end the war, and was overwhelmingly reelected on those promises, and has so far kept them.

torpid commented on Israel reportedly used fake social accounts to garner support from US lawmakers haaretz.com/israel-news/s... · Posted by u/frob

bostik · 2 years ago

And let's keep in mind that the term "Public Relations" was explicitly chosen as a Newspeak-term because Edward Bernays realised that the actual term for a war time methodology, "propaganda", was too loaded.[0] And honest.

Internet is a communications medium. It was destined to be flooded with propaganda, whatever you try to call your particular flavour.

Or as I have been saying since the 1990's, the only difference between marketing and propaganda is that with marketing at least you are trying to peddle a product instead of an ideology.

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Bernays

torpid · 2 years ago

The Century of the Self documentary by Adam Curtis does an incredible job of covering that and is well-worth the watch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Century_of_the_Self

torpid commented on ICQ will stop working from June 26 icq.com/desktop/en#window... · Posted by u/Uncle_Sam

jedberg · 2 years ago

This makes me sad. I mean, I haven't logged in in about 20 years now, and couldn't if I wanted to (don't have the password or access to the email address).

But I had a low five digit user number, and built a lot of relationships on ICQ (some of which continue today!). It was my main method of electronic communication in college. I had romantic relationships live and die on ICQ.

Another reminder of how things change over time.

torpid · 2 years ago

I wonder how many people went to icq.com and first provided their phone number thinking it was mandatory, then realized there was a "Login with password link", then went back, put in their ICQ UIN, and tried every last password they've used for the past 20 years before finding the one that worked? Neat trick, Russia!

In any case, I've actually logged in from time to time and only 1 of my 9 friends from the late 90's as nerdy and nostalgic as I actually logged in the past decade and left me a message.

torpid commented on Nine US states are teaming up to accelerate the adoption of heat pumps wired.com/story/these-sta... · Posted by u/Bender

jrockway · 2 years ago

Emergency heat was under-installed. In the midwest, you have to have it, and it will suck down a ton of electricity for the handful of days a year you need it. Being entirely reliant on mini-splits without resistive emergency heating is a very strange choice, and it's not what heat pump advocates are recommending.

The idea behind heat pumps is to eliminate the need for the natural gas distribution infrastructure. As the infrastructure ages, more pipes will crack (emitting greenhouse gasses, not to mention blowing up), and the cost will go up. Meanwhile, more renewable electricity is coming online, driving the cost down. (It is a much harder problem to replace every gas furnace in the US versus replacing every power plant in the US. That's why the process is starting early with "hey, maybe you don't want to replace your furnace".)

Right now, it probably doesn't make a lot of sense to have a heat pump for the average midwestern house unless you have a pretty big solar installation. But in the future, the day will come where "we're going to pipe explosive gas into your house" is simply not done anymore. That will come in the form of gas companies not being able to maintain their infrastructure at the prices they charge, declining fossil fuel reserves, international demand to lower emissions, etc. It's not a crisis today, but today is not a bad day to start looking towards the future.

(I'm looking forward to replacing my gas stove with an induction stove. CO2 levels are through the roof whenever I cook to the point I have to open windows. I don't need to be breathing all of that.)

torpid · 2 years ago

We have natural gas running into the building but not for the residents. All the first floor commercial tenants, and the hallways have the luxury of forced air. Just the apartment units that are cold.

There's several apartments with broken mini split head units, and last I heard the other adjacent building, they've been working to connect the apartments to the forced air ducts in the hallways they think will take the load off.

torpid commented on Nine US states are teaming up to accelerate the adoption of heat pumps wired.com/story/these-sta... · Posted by u/Bender

kccqzy · 2 years ago

OP said "for 11 years" in their post. So I assume they have a unit that's at least 11 years old. Not really comparable with a modern unit.

torpid · 2 years ago

This building opened 11 years ago and I've been a tenant since then. The HVAC is 2013. Each floor has ~20 apartments and each floor connects to a rooftop unit. The hallways are forced air and stay toasty, it's just the apartments that are on mini splits.

torpid commented on Nine US states are teaming up to accelerate the adoption of heat pumps wired.com/story/these-sta... · Posted by u/Bender

jackson1442 · 2 years ago

I imagine the ban on space heaters refers more to their fire risk, since emergency heat would be permanently installed in a location where there’s not any flammable materials but a space heater can be placed right next to any number of flammable things.

torpid · 2 years ago

It's one step better than people turning their stoves on.

And hilariously, if too many people artificially heat their apartments, it actually crashes the system somehow because if too many zones in the mini split have heat, it flips to AC mode.