1. I’m not “painting” you as a nut. You’re doing a jolly good job of that yourself. Your many comments on this thread read like the crazy ramblings on the back (and front, and sides) of a Dr. Bronner’s bottle.
2. This is a public forum. I don’t need your permission (or “prior warning”) to reply to a discussion, never mind one I joined long before. Not that I feel any obligation to receive education on how to work the internet from someone who can’t even follow how a web forum works, and replies to people based on things they did not say.
3. You STILL did not understand my original reply. If you are seeing it as purely support for Mk14’s POV, then you haven’t understood it. My comment neither refuted nor confirmed either side: it simply explained that the Bloomberg story isn’t plausible. I didn’t say it’s impossible, and I didn’t say we should stop studying it!
4. Learn. To. Read. Carefully. You are repeatedly responding to arguments that are simply not there. You cannot interpolate things and then respond to your own interpolations. Just respond to what’s actually there.
5. Oh, you think you haven’t been employing personal attacks? You’ve been using them since long before my first reply to you. That you used them so liberally is why I have not held back with you. You forfeited the right to complain about name calling long ago.
I have enough trouble dealing with the offenses I'm guilty of, and those I've already admitted to and tried to be fair. I refuse to be held responsible for the ones you've imagined. What you're saying amounts to this:
"I didn't shove the stick in the hornets nest, that was another guy. I was just passing by and tripped over it a little. Those hornets have no right to be pissed off at me!"
You led out of the gate calling me names and speaking in a belittling manner, and you did so while interjecting into a mostly polite disagreement between two other people.
Not only that, but you continue to do so, all the while blaming me for your belittling tone. Get over yourself, man.
You earned that response; suck it up buttercup. <~~~ See that right there? THAT was me being deliberately offensive, because you pissed me off.
And I'm NOT going to apologize for it, because you earned that one too.
Ah yes, “suck it up, buttercup”: the rallying cry of the conservative right when it’s decided “I’m not going to attempt to be polite any more, and with this magic incantation, I can gaslight the recipient into thinking that they’re being oversensitive, rather than acknowledge that I’m wrong.”
It is in fact a worse kind of ignorance; the willful kind that permits a white trash racist, rapist, misogynist, pathological liar career deadbeat sociopathic felon to squat in the White House and there's jack shit We The People can do about it.
Maybe my cynicism has reached critical mass, I dunno.
I'm sorry if I seem too hostile, when people start mentioning (conspiracy ..) stuff. Some of which, might be right.
But, asilly(conspiracy ..) theory, can be created, in some 60 seconds,while not thinking straight,but it might take experts, many hours, days, weeks or even longer to robustly disprove those theories.
Which are likely to either be ignored or disbelieved by the creator(s) of the (conspiracy ..) theories.
Or they will just carry on, and 60 seconds later, produce even more (conspiracy ..) stuff.
MK14 saying about this:
"Conspiracy theories are like foolish people, who spend seconds starting crazy fires, which take firefighters, days to put out"
(SNIP Lots and lots of reiterations of the same exact shit over and over again-mnem)Quote from: mnementhAnd I'm NOT going to apologize for it, because you earned that one too.You wouldn’t apologize even if you realized you were wrong.
Of course you’re so convinced that you know the truth and that everyone else is sheeple that you’ll never realize when you’re wrong.
mnem
Wait for it... wait for it...
A video on Computerphile. Nothing new, but the interesting idea that such a chip could be hidden inside the PCB itself between the layers. This would be really difficult to detect, if you don't x-ray the PCBs and carefully examine and compare the images.
MK14 saying about this:
"Conspiracy theories are like foolish people, who spend seconds starting crazy fires, which take firefighters, days to put out"
The world around us is full of real conspiracy. Every day we find real evidence of some business, celebrity, or politician (usually more than one) involved in some heinous act and trying to cover it up. It is far more dangerous in this age to think that just because something sounds like a conspiracy theory that it is nuttery than that there is some grain of truth to it. You do so at your own peril.
The question then becomes "just how assache are you willing to put into a specific theory". That of course is always a case by case basis; both the person and the theory involved. I try to give a LITTLE more latitude; but then, I enjoy the occasional mental exercise. And that, BTW, is why I came into this thread specifically devoted to a conspiracy theory. Again... This is THE PLACE for this kind of discussion. Why would you come in here and NOT expect people to want to discuss conspiracy theories?
Oh, BTW... (Raises hand) REAL firefighter here. (Retired) You wanna have a side conversation about Draeger Pacs and BLEVEs? I'm your guy.
Analogy on why conspiracy theories produce way too much noise, and too little signal, to regularly take notice of them:
[snip]
So my default behavior, is to treat most conspiracy theories, as if they are FALSE, until there is sufficient evidence, to give them some merit.
A video on Computerphile. Nothing new, but the interesting idea that such a chip could be hidden inside the PCB itself between the layers. This would be really difficult to detect, if you don't x-ray the PCBs and carefully examine and compare the images.
Why bother putting something in between the flash and BMC? Just make your own flash chip instead. Designing the tiny interceptor and hiding it in the PCB is harder than just putting it directly in the flash IC.
Analogy on why conspiracy theories produce way too much noise, and too little signal, to regularly take notice of them:
[snip]
So my default behavior, is to treat most conspiracy theories, as if they are FALSE, until there is sufficient evidence, to give them some merit.You hit the nail on the head: signal to noise ratio. Love your analogy!
Analogy on why conspiracy theories produce way too much noise, and too little signal, to regularly take notice of them:
[snip]
So my default behavior, is to treat most conspiracy theories, as if they are FALSE, until there is sufficient evidence, to give them some merit.You hit the nail on the head: signal to noise ratio. Love your analogy!
Analogy on why conspiracy theories produce way too much noise, and too little signal, to regularly take notice of them:
[snip]
So my default behavior, is to treat most conspiracy theories, as if they are FALSE, until there is sufficient evidence, to give them some merit.You hit the nail on the head: signal to noise ratio. Love your analogy!
Thanks!
EDIT:
It is difficult putting a message here, because it will be read by everyone.
But, people who strongly believe in many/all conspiracy theories, (in my experience) tend to also be people, who extremely (impossibly) stubbornly, won't listen to logical/scientific/sensible/evidence. How ever long you patiently spend, trying to explain it to them.
So, don't get annoyed with them. I find they can be nice people, in other respects.
You do realize that you've just "discovered" a boorishly common analogy that literally dates back to UseNet and the days of dialup, right?
I was probably using the term in alt.sci.repair when you lot were in diapers.
As the saying goes, keep an open mind, but not so open that your brains fall out.)
I remember an example at a partner company to where I worked where data was transmitted by issuing DNS queries from a compromised system using the DNS infrastructure as a very slow semaphore.
How was this detected? I guess if you fully control the server, you could monitor the internet traffic and then compare all internet traffic with the installed programs. But if it is something like an Amazon cloud server, you would need to analyze every customer application. So it would be impossible to detect hidden traffic, except by detecting the hidden program itself. This makes it again more plausible to install something in the hardware, which can initiate network traffic outside of the core CPUs itself, because hidden programs with high privilege, which has suspicious network traffic, might be easier to detect. Of course, would be much better to install a modified BMC chip instead of an extra chip, maybe with 2 layers, like running the transferred firmware in the normal layer, but one hidden layer above an additional spy firmware. But would be much more expensive, if they need to change the die for it.
Good article on this story from a Cambridge security researcher here: https://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/2018/10/05/making-sense-of-the-supermicro-motherboard-attack/
BTW I’ve spent most of my week trying to get hold of the proposed Supermicro B1DRI blades and I can’t get one anywhere. Thought it might be interesting. Boo hiss. Everyone is using HP or Dell blades and said “why would I buy Supermicro blades?”. Supermicro appears to have the niche of 1U shite pushing boxes and I doubt the bottom end boards are compromised. Doesn’t seem like a valuable target.