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Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

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Re: Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

#111

Post by DocTomoe »

WalterBright wrote: post #102
onion2k wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Will we pretend that the usage of floppy disks is normal in almost 2022? What's wrong with them? They're reasonably robust for short term shortage, easily copyable, and you can design your own format if you want to. The space limitation is only a problem if you need to actually store more than 1.4MB or so. And if you want to lock down an environment so USB devices can't be used there aren't many other portable storag…

USB sticks are better in every respect.

USB sticks also require an open USB port which can be used for all kinds of attack vectors that you just don't have to remember hardening against with a floppy.

Re: Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

#112

Post by anigbrowl »

The Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) has lost two floppy disks containing personal information on 38 people

Amateurs. In the USA we can do that kind of thing for 38 million people. with the advances in private sector we're on track to do so for 3.8 billion any day now.

Re: Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

#113

Post by tadfisher »

WalterBright wrote: post #102
onion2k wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Will we pretend that the usage of floppy disks is normal in almost 2022? What's wrong with them? They're reasonably robust for short term shortage, easily copyable, and you can design your own format if you want to. The space limitation is only a problem if you need to actually store more than 1.4MB or so. And if you want to lock down an environment so USB devices can't be used there aren't many other portable storag…

USB sticks are better in every respect.

Except security. Floppies can't do anything other than storage, but USB devices can be just about anything.

Re: Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

#114

Post by serf »

WalterBright wrote: post #102
onion2k wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Will we pretend that the usage of floppy disks is normal in almost 2022? What's wrong with them? They're reasonably robust for short term shortage, easily copyable, and you can design your own format if you want to. The space limitation is only a problem if you need to actually store more than 1.4MB or so. And if you want to lock down an environment so USB devices can't be used there aren't many other portable storag…

USB sticks are better in every respect.

I never had a floppy fake an HID.

Re: Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

#115

Post by alerighi »

onion2k wrote: post #63
egeozcan wrote: post #6

Will we pretend that the usage of floppy disks is normal in almost 2022? Or perhaps the news value comes from this fact, but then, they don't make any comment on it... Weird. I also love that they seem to be taking this seriously, even when it's just 38 people, while all over the world, governments (cough Turkey cough) don't even apologize when they leak the personal details of ALL of their citizens. Well.

Will we pretend that the usage of floppy disks is normal in almost 2022? What's wrong with them? They're reasonably robust for short term shortage, easily copyable, and you can design your own format if you want to. The space limitation is only a problem if you need to actually store more than 1.4MB or so. And if you want to lock down an environment so USB devices can't be used there aren't many other portable storag…

They are not reliable at all.

And if you don't want to use USB... well good luck finding a modern motherboard with a floppy disk interface. These days you obviously have to use a USB floppy disk readers. The argument of not using USB doesn't make a lot of sense, USB is not dangerous, it's how the OS is configured. Also how do you plug in mouse and keyboard, with PS2? And by the way, if you don't want to use USB at all you can use an SD card (you can find readers that are PCI express and thus don't require USB), or a CD ROM with a SATA reader, or a SATA HDD with an hotswap caddie, etc.

Re: Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

#116

Post by C19is20 »

woudsma wrote: post #60

I use floppy disks for my Akai S2800 sampler :) Originally built around 1992 it still works (and sounds) great! Modding it to support USB is too expensive, and I quite enjoy some of the limitations it brings. You have to get creative for some things.

I somehow remember some way of getting them to be read on an atari.

Re: Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

#117

Post by howdydoo »

egeozcan wrote: post #6

Will we pretend that the usage of floppy disks is normal in almost 2022? Or perhaps the news value comes from this fact, but then, they don't make any comment on it... Weird. I also love that they seem to be taking this seriously, even when it's just 38 people, while all over the world, governments (cough Turkey cough) don't even apologize when they leak the personal details of ALL of their citizens. Well.

I think using floppies is a great way to safeguard privacy. Even if someone finds those disks, they won't be able to read them

Re: Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

#118

Post by cosmodisk »

egeozcan wrote: post #6

Will we pretend that the usage of floppy disks is normal in almost 2022? Or perhaps the news value comes from this fact, but then, they don't make any comment on it... Weird. I also love that they seem to be taking this seriously, even when it's just 38 people, while all over the world, governments (cough Turkey cough) don't even apologize when they leak the personal details of ALL of their citizens. Well.

From what I remember, Samsung killed off floppy disk manufacturing when it was still bringing $70M annually. Not surprised some places still use them. Considering how dated it is, it's probably safer than having a USB dongle because nobody can read it

Re: Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

#119

Post by grishka »

egeozcan wrote: post #6

Will we pretend that the usage of floppy disks is normal in almost 2022? Or perhaps the news value comes from this fact, but then, they don't make any comment on it... Weird. I also love that they seem to be taking this seriously, even when it's just 38 people, while all over the world, governments (cough Turkey cough) don't even apologize when they leak the personal details of ALL of their citizens. Well.

Also — name, date of birth, and sex are considered highly guarded top-secret personal information. Most people would voluntarily publish this and more on any social media platform without giving it a second thought.

And I don't see anything wrong with floppies, besides them and drives no longer being produced. USB sticks are too expensive, and optical media are too delicate, often single-use and an overkill for this purpose.

Re: Tokyo police lose 2 floppy disks containing info on public housing applicants

#120

Post by crispyambulance »

onion2k wrote: post #63
egeozcan wrote: post #6

Will we pretend that the usage of floppy disks is normal in almost 2022? Or perhaps the news value comes from this fact, but then, they don't make any comment on it... Weird. I also love that they seem to be taking this seriously, even when it's just 38 people, while all over the world, governments (cough Turkey cough) don't even apologize when they leak the personal details of ALL of their citizens. Well.

Will we pretend that the usage of floppy disks is normal in almost 2022? What's wrong with them? They're reasonably robust for short term shortage, easily copyable, and you can design your own format if you want to. The space limitation is only a problem if you need to actually store more than 1.4MB or so. And if you want to lock down an environment so USB devices can't be used there aren't many other portable storag…

> [...] and you can design your own format if you want to.

Is the Tokyo police going to "design" their own floppy format? Why!?

This is most likely the effect of some luddite in a leadership position that simply can't handle change but has been able to force everyone to comply for decades. Floppies in 2020? Really? Maybe this will be embarrassing enough that they'll upgrade.

It happens though, there was a story some years back about an HVAC filter company (Sparkle) that ran much of their business operations on late 1950's IBM hardware that used plug-boards. Plug-boards! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14121527

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