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Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

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411–420 of 715 posts

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#411
post #138
post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you plug your iPhone into a couple of 30" monitors, and use it as a workstation?

It's not clear that this is thermally possible.

Why not? If it doesn't melt while being maximally used in my hands, why should it be thermally impossible to put it on the table while connected to an external screen?

The processor is more powerful than many old computers, and the 30" screens need no more pixels than the iPhone screen already has.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#412
post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not snarking at all. I'm observing that comments about the NSA are entirely apropos given the current climate we live in. Yes, you're right, at this point, it would take something extremely radical to convince us that the NSA isn't spying on us anymore. Therefore, we should expect comments about the NSA and spying to become a part of the common dialog regarding technology and personal information. Asking them to…

But you are accomplishing absolutely nothing here. Being annoying and ineffective doesn't help your cause. Do you know that Jesus loves you and he wants to save your soul? You might as we'll be discussing religion or politics here. This is not the place. I heard your warning the first ten times.

You called discussing the NSA spying on everyone, subverting the American system as well as the faith in the constitution similar to evangelising that Jesus loves you?

Wow - that has to be hands down the absolute most ignorant, ridiculous and bullshit comment I have ever read on HN.

This is The Best place to be talking about the National Security Agency Technologically spying on everyone, building in parallel infra and forcing the biggest tech companies in the world via court gags and threats to providing them with access to encrypted user data.

Your comment is mind-boggling, to me, how you could even think this is not the place!

Edit: Toned it down a notch.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#413
post #73

Now that we have to consider the iPhones to be backdoored by the NSA, I wonder whether I really want to give them my fingerprint together with the rest of my data. I'm also not so sure whether a fingerprint can't still be easily faked (like it was possible on that Mythbusters episode for example). Personally, I think I'd rather stay with my passcode. Did you btw know that you can turn off "simple passcode" and then u…

So use a passcode - the fingerprint feature is optional. That said, I doubt they are doing anything nefarious with it - if it eventually leaked that fingerprints were being sent to the NSA, the cost to Apple would be incalculable. I would bet, or at least hope, that Apple has designed the hardware involved to be subpoena proof - meaning that the design would make it impossible to remotely collect fingerprints even if…

Do you really believe anything you just said? Apple is cooperating with the NSA in every way, but in this one case they care about user security?

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#414
post #388
post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"subpoena proof" ... hmm Do you believe disabling the reader in a software-setting is enough to be sure it's not working? I don't. With all these NSA concerns going about, having a hardware fingerprint-reader on your smartphone that you can't avoid touching is something to think about.

You could place a sticker over the reader/home button to block covert reading.

you accidentally touch it one time without cover - done. And all the stores where people come and try the devices... (personally as an immigrant i already have my fingerprints on file, so i have nothing to worry about, it is just very amusing to see how another couple of billions would be gathered as well once Android phones replicate the feature :)

Welcome to the Total Information Awareness world.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you care if anybody gets your fingerprint, if you have already decided nobody can be trusted with your fingerprint and thus will never trust fingerprint based authentication? Once you are at that point, it's like your eye color or something. I don't care if other people get my eye color, because I will never use it to authenticate.

I'd hypothesise it's more likely somebody will use your fingerprint to identify you than your eye colour. For example, at a crime scene if your fingerprints are found you can hardly say "oh, I don't trust my fingerprint so I won't authenticate with it, ignore that" - like it or not, it's seen as being at least something to investigate. On the flip side I imagine a witness who reports only "green eyes" won't have thei…

So... what is the fear here? That someone will steal your fingerprints and plant them at a crime scene?

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#416
post #265

I visualize this: husband is sleeping deeply, wife picks up the phone and taps the home button while he's sleeping and unlocks the phone. Release the kraken.

First the NSA, now the wife, what's up with people in HN? Are you all planning a coup with your mistresses? If you're married and your SO can't just ask you for your PIN code - and you will, without even thinking about it, give it to them - you might want to take some time to think hard about your relationship.

I can't imagine why I'd need to ask my SO's PIN or she'd need to ask mine - I actually would, as you say, probably give it without even thinking about it; but if you have a healthy relationship then noone feels any need to check the other's phone/email/diary/whatever.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd hypothesise it's more likely somebody will use your fingerprint to identify you than your eye colour. For example, at a crime scene if your fingerprints are found you can hardly say "oh, I don't trust my fingerprint so I won't authenticate with it, ignore that" - like it or not, it's seen as being at least something to investigate. On the flip side I imagine a witness who reports only "green eyes" won't have thei…

So... what is the fear here? That someone will steal your fingerprints and plant them at a crime scene?

I don't agree with the fear, I'm just saying it's more likely somebody can be nefarious with your fingerprints than other things, regardless of whether you personally authenticate with them. For what it's worth, I don't agree there's an issue - I just don't think it's reasonable to compare fingeprints and eye colour.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are still going with that "it's just a powerpoint, it means nothing" line? I thought we dispensed with that notion months ago.

Yes. There is zero evidence of any type of NSA backdooring your iPhone nonsense. It would be great to read HN (where I thought we were more technically inclined than the rest of the net) for a day without unfounded nonsensical claims.

Backdooring iPhones does sound fantasical but that is not the only means your fingerprint data could conceivably make its way beyond your iPhone. I like that my fingerprint data is on precisely no computer anywhere. You don't have to be a massive conspiracy theory nut to feel slightly uneasy recording your fingerprint on anything.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#419
post #73

Now that we have to consider the iPhones to be backdoored by the NSA, I wonder whether I really want to give them my fingerprint together with the rest of my data. I'm also not so sure whether a fingerprint can't still be easily faked (like it was possible on that Mythbusters episode for example). Personally, I think I'd rather stay with my passcode. Did you btw know that you can turn off "simple passcode" and then u…

You don't _have_ to. You can root your iPhone and log all packets sent from the phone, and block out any stuff going to Apple (turn off iMessage, iCloud and Siri). For downloading apps etc, you can do that through iTunes and sync your iPhone using a cable.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#420
post #73

Now that we have to consider the iPhones to be backdoored by the NSA, I wonder whether I really want to give them my fingerprint together with the rest of my data. I'm also not so sure whether a fingerprint can't still be easily faked (like it was possible on that Mythbusters episode for example). Personally, I think I'd rather stay with my passcode. Did you btw know that you can turn off "simple passcode" and then u…

Urgh. When do we get to the point where I can read HN without a snarky NSA comment being voted to the top?

Never. The claim that the NSA has infiltrated everything has the right amount of truthiness, and pushes all the right buttons, to give the HN/nerd crowd such a sense of unified culture, justness of cause, and "us v. them"-ness that it literally can never be replaced now. It's like asking when Christianity will finally get over this Jesus fellow and his crucifixion. That is the cause that transformed a bunch of heretical Jews into Christians.

HN, similarly, is just going to be the place where a bunch of libertarian-leaning programmers became, from my perspective, conspiracy theorists. But more charitably, maybe, we can say they are now radically opposed to government invasion of privacy.

The Snowden revelation, whatever you think of it, has been one of those events which divides time into before and after for this crowd.

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