[deleted]
Lavabit SSL Cert Revoked
111–120 of 321 posts
Re: Lavabit SSL Cert Revoked
#112I'm so sick of being sickened. I hate that this is becoming the norm and we can't do anything about it. I hate to spit cliches, but is this where my tax dollars go? For me, govt and internet should almost be like church and state. Where is the data around foiled terrorist plots? I just can't stomach the obtuse logic that we need to pay our taxes to employ these virtual minders. This is not what the internet is about.…
I have mocked-up a system for policy creation. The project is open; please contribute your thoughts. People say "it has flaws" but never explain the flaws, nor how to address them. https://bitbucket.org/djarvis/world-politics/ Would greatly appreciate constructive criticism. The system serves to educate everyone (openly and transparently) on implications of existing and upcoming policies. If the idea intrigues you, c…
I created a kind of micro discussion/decision making system that didn't generate much interest from people I talked to and perhaps shares a flaw with this concept.
Basically if you look at what people use text for online it usually isn't anything serious, even these discussions don't have all that much gravity and HN is probably the most serious site I've seen.
Text also has less emotion and involvement attached and I think a lot of people won't connect with a text based system like this or won't feel comfortable contributing.
An idea for a way to feed peoples passions would be some kind of automatically generated video conference setup to split people into random think tank groups based on availability for each policy they indicate they want to be part of. Then perhaps one person, presumable someone that indicates they feel comfortable writing could contribute on behalf of their group to the text based policy page.
Re: Lavabit SSL Cert Revoked
#113Can someone weight in on what this means or why it is an issue?
Ladar Levison was forced to give Lavabit's SSL private key to the feds, so it is no more secure. That's why he (or GaDaddy, the issuer) revoked the certificate.
If the Feds seized the server why would it be a surprise that the SSL certificate has been compromised? The server is where the private key lives...
Re: Lavabit SSL Cert Revoked
#114I'm so sick of being sickened. I hate that this is becoming the norm and we can't do anything about it. I hate to spit cliches, but is this where my tax dollars go? For me, govt and internet should almost be like church and state. Where is the data around foiled terrorist plots? I just can't stomach the obtuse logic that we need to pay our taxes to employ these virtual minders. This is not what the internet is about.…
The basic problem is an impedance mismatch. Some people see the internet as this noble grand thing (like you, comparing it to the church). The government, like most voters, sees it as just a place to look at cat pictures and buy crap on zappos. The government treats the internet like it treats meat space things. Nobody complains that they can Public Storage to open storage units with a warrant, so why should the inte…
As long as the engineers who design and build the internet care, we can do ok.
If the protocols that run the web are so easily compromised, it raises all kinds of problems with the underlying, somewhat invisible, functions to how the world works. That manifests itself as a liability to for-profit corporations. It also is something that the cat pictures people care about -- how many of them want their webcams capturing video of them walking around their rooms naked or wake up one morning and notice their brokerage account is empty? Very few.
It is quite an irony that governments demand one set of standards for privacy and security while attempting to compromise them for their own benefit (European countries carry just as much blame here.)
Re: Lavabit SSL Cert Revoked
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
That just sounds like fearmongering. I can't see any way that helping to fund someone's court case can be considering a crime, even if he were completely in the wrong. I strongly suspect that there are favourable legal precedents, even.
Non-citizens can be turned away at the US border for any reason, or no reason at all. Considering that a person's ability to travel to the US is so professionally important in this industry (for conferences, business meetings, etc.), I do not believe this is fearmongering. Remember the case of the man refused entry after a misinterpreted Tweet about 'destroying America'? [1] It seems clear NSA surveillance informs CB…
If you really believed that kind of fear were justified, why would you post a comment like this? It seems a lot more like you are just making up excuses to support your already-formed decision to not donate.
Re: Lavabit SSL Cert Revoked
#116Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have mocked-up a system for policy creation. The project is open; please contribute your thoughts. People say "it has flaws" but never explain the flaws, nor how to address them. https://bitbucket.org/djarvis/world-politics/ Would greatly appreciate constructive criticism. The system serves to educate everyone (openly and transparently) on implications of existing and upcoming policies. If the idea intrigues you, c…
I love the idea, but I don't think people should be allowed to have unlimited up or down votes. That would encourage whimsical opinions, and would make the site reflect the opinions of the most active and opinionated users instead of the average person. I think there needs to be a way to limit the voice of each user so each person has the same amount of influence. One idea I like is to give each user 100 points to di…
[deleted]
Re: Lavabit SSL Cert Revoked
#117Almost on display: heavy-handed web-browsers that won't let us visit a site, for our own good.
Unfortunately the way cookies, etc. work it's nontrivial for a browser to just visit a site that's offering a compromised certificate without undermining past and future security.
A revoked certificate being offered doesn't have any innocent explanations, you would want to use a specialized tool not a general-purpose web browser to analyze it.
Re: Lavabit SSL Cert Revoked
#118This is not new people! We've known for many years that MiTM was "normal" in surveillance circles. We've been saying for years that CAs are probably compromised as well. Why does it take some "revelation" to make people PAY ATTENTION?
This is not a technical issue. It's a rights issue. Solving it by technical means only kicks the can down the road by an exceedingly small amount of time. Fix the system first.
Re: Lavabit SSL Cert Revoked
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ladar Levison was forced to give Lavabit's SSL private key to the feds, so it is no more secure. That's why he (or GaDaddy, the issuer) revoked the certificate.
If the Feds seized the server why would it be a surprise that the SSL certificate has been compromised? The server is where the private key lives...
They didn't seize the server.
Re: Lavabit SSL Cert Revoked
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have mocked-up a system for policy creation. The project is open; please contribute your thoughts. People say "it has flaws" but never explain the flaws, nor how to address them. https://bitbucket.org/djarvis/world-politics/ Would greatly appreciate constructive criticism. The system serves to educate everyone (openly and transparently) on implications of existing and upcoming policies. If the idea intrigues you, c…
I created a kind of micro discussion/decision making system that didn't generate much interest from people I talked to and perhaps shares a flaw with this concept. Basically if you look at what people use text for online it usually isn't anything serious, even these discussions don't have all that much gravity and HN is probably the most serious site I've seen. Text also has less emotion and involvement attached and…
Initially, I was thinking the system would be more useful not for the general public, but for politicians. It could be used at federal, provincial, and municipal levels, for example.
I agree with you that text is too impersonal. The support page aims to address that somewhat by allowing video content: https://bitbucket.org/djarvis/world-politics/wiki/Supporting...
I like the idea of video conferencing. That's a rather forward-looking application. You could use speech-to-text systems for automatic dictation. An issue with video conferencing is scheduling people for simultaneous discussion.