#Cryptographic

[silpol]

In a first, #cryptographic #keys protecting #SSH connections stolen in new #attack "An error as small as a single flipped memory bit is all it takes to expose a private key."

[nadcablabs9616]

zk-Rollups - How They are Changing Layer 2 Solutions

Key Takeaways

What are zk-Rollups?

zk-Rollups help blockchain handle more transactions by bundling them together off-chain and proving their validity with a special math trick called zero-knowledge proofs. This reduces costs and speeds up transactions.

Advantages and Challenges

Advantages: They make blockchain faster and cheaper by doing more work off the main chain.

Challenges: They're complex to set up and need good data handling to work well.

Comparison with Other Solutions

zk-Rollups are different from state channels and sidechains because they focus on proving many transactions at once, rather than keeping a channel open or running a separate chain.

Nadcab Labs' Role

Nadcab Labs helps improve zk-Rollups by researching, developing tools, and making them safer for everyone to use.

Future Impact

zk-Rollups could change how we use blockchain by making it faster and cheaper. This could lead to more apps and services using blockchain technology.

Lead-In

zk-Rollups are a key invention that could revolutionize Layer 2 scaling in the growing ecosystem of blockchain scalability solutions. By fusing the strength of roll-up technology with the efficiency of zero-knowledge proofs, zk-Rollups presents a viable solution to the current scalability trilemma that blockchain networks face, balancing throughput, security, and decentralization. This game-changing technology is essential to the development of future decentralized applications (dApps) since it not only lowers costs and increases transaction throughput while preserving the trustless nature of blockchain networks. An important turning point in the continuous development of blockchain technology is reached as we learn more about the nuances of zk-Rollups and how they affect the scalability of the blockchain.

What Exactly Are zk-Rollups and How Do They Work?

The zk-Rollups technique is a revolutionary way to execute more transactions on blockchain networks like Ethereum. Instead of processing each transaction individually on the blockchain, zk-Rollups combine multiple transactions off-chain and generate a cryptographic confirmation of their authenticity. Subsequently, this proof is posted on the blockchain, reducing the amount of data and processing power required on the main chain.

How Do They Work?

Transaction Aggregation: Multiple transactions are gathered and processed off-chain.

Proof Generation: A zero-knowledge proof (a type of cryptographic proof) is created to verify that these transactions are correct.

On-Chain Verification: This proof is submitted to the main blockchain (like Ethereum) and verified, ensuring the transactions are valid without processing them all on-chain.

What Are the Downsides and Challenges of Using zk-Rollups?

Technical Complexities

Complex Implementation: Requires advanced cryptographic knowledge.

Resource-Intensive: High computational costs for generating zero-knowledge proofs.

Data Availability Issues

Dependency on Off-Chain Data: Verification issues if off-chain data is unavailable.

Ongoing Solutions: Data availability proofs and committees still in development.

Maturity

Lack of Robustness: Still a relatively new and evolving technology.

Adoption Challenges: Slower adoption compared to more established Layer 2 solutions.

Interoperability

Compatibility Issues: Challenges in achieving seamless interaction with other Layer 2 solutions.

Standardization Needs: Efforts required to standardize protocols and interfaces.

User Trust

Building Confidence: Requires extensive testing, auditing, and transparency.

Steps for Trust: Regular audits, real-world testing, and open communication with the community.

How do zk-rollups help blockchain technology and make transactions faster by being a layer 2 solution?

As a layer 2 solution, zk-rollups improve blockchain technology's scalability by batching several transactions into one smaller transaction that is subsequently validated on the Ethereum mainnet. By drastically lowering transaction costs and expediting processing times, this method improves the effectiveness and economics of blockchain applications.

Transaction Offloading: Transactions are conducted off-chain and only summary data or proofs are posted back to the main chain.

Increased Throughput: By handling transactions off-chain, Layer 2 solutions significantly increase the transactions per second (TPS) capacity.

Cost Reduction: Off-chain transactions usually have lower fees compared to on-chain transactions.

Enhanced User Experience: Faster transaction times and lower fees improve the user experience.

Here are some examples of layer 2 solutions used to improve blockchain scalability?

Payment Channels:

These include off-chain user transactions that ease congestion on the main blockchain, as those made possible by the Raiden Network for Ethereum and the Lightning Network for Bitcoin.

Sidechains:

Sidechains are independent blockchains that run parallel to the main chain and are connected via a two-way peg. They allow assets to be transferred between the main chain and the sidechain, enabling offloading of transactions. Example - Plasma.

Rollups:

Rollups batch multiple transactions into a single transaction processed off-chain. The batched data is then submitted to the main chain, reducing data and computational load. Types of rollups include:zk-Rollups (Zero-Knowledge Rollups) & Optimistic Rollups.

State Channels:

such as those found in systems like Perun and Celer Network, which let several   parties carry out transactions off-chain and only resolve the ultimate state on the main blockchain.

What Are the Challenges and Limitations of Layer 2 Solutions?

Complexity : Developing and maintaining Layer 2 solutions can be technically challenging.

Security : Ensuring the security of off-chain transactions and their connection to the main chain is crucial.

Interoperability : Achieving seamless interaction between different Layer 2 solutions and with the main chain can be difficult.

User Adoption : Educating users and developers about the benefits and usage of Layer 2 solutions is essential for widespread adoption.

How do zk-Rollups improve the efficiency of decentralized applications in blockchain ecosystems?

Blockchain's Layer 2 solutions are enhanced by zk-Rollups, which significantly increase scalability and lower transaction costs. They accomplish this by compiling off-chain transactions into a succinct proof (zk-Rollups), which is subsequently added to the main chain. This method increases the effectiveness and affordability of decentralized applications while preserving security through cryptographic proofs. zk-Rollups are also compatible with many blockchains, which increases their usefulness for a range of applications, including decentralized exchanges and gaming sites. All things considered, they successfully tackle the two main issues with blockchain technology: cost and scalability.

How does Nadcab Labs Contribute to the Advancement of zk-Rollups and Layer 2 Solutions?

One prominent player in blockchain technology, Nadcab Labs, has been actively working on developing and improving Layer 2 solutions, such as zk-Rollups. Their efforts are concentrated on maximizing security and scalability to guarantee safe and effective blockchain operations. Contributions from Nadcab Labs include:

Research & Development: Developing zk-Rollups technology to reduce costs and latency while improving transaction speed.

Implementation Support : Offering strong frameworks and instruments to incorporate zk-Rollups into different blockchain applications..

Security Enhancements : Improving the zk-Rollups' cryptographic methods to guarantee user confidence and data integrity.

Final Thoughts

zk-Rollups, blockchain scalability has advanced significantly and there's finally a workable answer to high fees and sluggish transaction speeds. Scalability, privacy, and security combined with zk-Rollups' potential to revolutionize Layer 2 solutions will allow the next generation of decentralized applications to flourish and create a more inclusive and productive decentralized future.

Author Profile:

Nadcab Labs - A Leading Blockchain Developers With over 8+ years of experience in Custom Blockchain Development, Smart Contract Development, Crypto Exchange Development, Token Creation and Many More Services.

[dencyemily]

Cardano Ascends with Plutus V3: Advanced Cryptography and Enhanced dApp Performance

The impending Chang hard fork heralds a transformative phase for Cardano with the introduction of Plutus V3. This significant upgrade is set to redefine the decentralized applications (dApps) landscape on Cardano, focusing on the integration of advanced cryptographic capabilities to align with current industry standards.

Plutus V3, a pivotal feature of the upcoming hard fork, introduces state-of-the-art cryptographic functionalities, revolutionizing the blockchain's capabilities. The utilization of sums of products (SOPs) and robust bitwise primitives represents a substantial leap forward in enhancing security, efficiency, and overall performance.

The upgrade not only aims to optimize the development environment for dApps but also showcases Cardano's commitment to interoperability. Building on the groundwork laid by the Valentine upgrade, Plutus V3 introduces cryptographic primitives adhering to industry best practices. This empowers developers with tools to employ well-established and efficient cryptographic algorithms, supporting the porting of smart contracts from Ethereum and the creation of sidechain bridges.

A standout feature of Plutus V3 is its support for sums of product encoding, promising reduced script sizes and lower execution costs. This advancement optimizes the representation of diverse data types, enhancing both developer efficiency and user experience on the Cardano blockchain.

Additionally, the upgrade introduces CIP-58 bitwise primitives, providing developers with sophisticated capabilities for precise bit-level manipulations. This not only contributes to higher computational efficiency but also ensures tailored security for specific applications.

As ADA, Cardano's cryptocurrency, exhibits bullish momentum, surpassing resistance at $0.55, Plutus V3 becomes a pivotal element in Cardano's evolution. With a current value of $0.5474 and a trading volume of $425.7 million over the past 24 hours, Cardano holds the 8th position on CoinMarketCap with a market capitalization of $19 billion.

In conclusion, Plutus V3 represents a significant step towards transforming Cardano's dApp landscape, offering advanced cryptographic capabilities that enhance security, efficiency, and overall blockchain performance.

[grunklefordpines]

Boo! ▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲▲ Ha, got you <3

Love, @cryptographs-and-casinos

Got me how?

With a shape?

Haha! Nice try!

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Async mugwump linkdump

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me TOMORROW in ANAHEIM at WONDERCON: YA Fantasy, Room 207, 10 a.m.; Signing, 11 a.m.; Teaching Writing, 2 p.m., Room 213CD.

For 20+ years, I've processed all the information that came over my transom by blogging – mulling on why something I saw in the world caught my attention and trying to summarize it for strangers. This turns out to be a very powerful way to do a lot of different kinds of mental work:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/09/the-memex-method/

With Pluralistic, the solo blog I founded 4 years ago, I've moved into longer, more synthetic essays that try to connect the things that caught my attention today with all those things I've written about for the past two decades. That's also proven very fruitful:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/20/fore/#synthesis

But this move to longer works has a downside: sometimes I'll arrive at the week's end and have a list of things that caught my attention without there being any obvious way to connect them, and when that happens, I devote a Saturday edition to a linkdump. There's been 15 of these so far:

https://pluralistic.net/tag/linkdump/

Welcome, then, to the 16th Pluralistic linkdump, and a warning, this one starts with an obituary.

Ross Anderson was one of the heroes of the cryptographic revolution, a brilliant scientist and communicator, a fantastic activist, and a scorching curmudgeon. Ross died this week. He was 67, and had chronic heart issues as well as long covid:

https://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/2024/03/29/rip-ross-anderson/

There's so much that's been written about Ross and his legacy already, and there's doubtless more to come, but I've picked out two pieces to point you to. The first is from Danny O'Brien, who was also the guy who talked me down off the ledge the first time Ross flamed me on a public mailing list, leaving me bleeding and furious:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39868983

As Danny says, Ross was "the model of a politically and socially involved computer scientist," a man whose blazing intellect, fierce moral center and relentless curiosity inspired a generation of technologists to think about politics, and a generation of political activists to think about technology. Few of Ross's eulogizers (thus far) have mentioned how Ross's passion came out as fury, and – as someone who counted Ross as a friend and inspiration – I think this is a serious omission. It's hard to imagine Ross doing all that he did without understanding the anger that – along with his ethics – fueled his passion.

(Compare with @neil-gaiman's classic essay on the anger of Terry Pratchett:)

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/sep/24/terry-pratchett-angry-not-jolly-neil-gaiman

The other obit that I want to point you to comes from Bill Buchanan, one of Ross's closest collaborators. Buchanan's memorial for Ross does a superb job of rounding up Ross's technical contributions to the field of security engineering:

https://medium.com/asecuritysite-when-bob-met-alice/ross-anderson-rip-59233c75fadf

Buchanan embeds videos for some of Ross's best speeches, links to his key papers (including the classic "Programming Satan's Computer," on "programming a computer which gives answers that are subtly and maliciously wrong at the most inconvenient moment possible), reminiscences of Great Moments In Ross Anderson, and terrific, lay-friendly breakdowns of some of Ross's key mathematical work.

As an unreasonable, angry person, I take great inspiration from people who channel their unreasonable anger to socially beneficial conduct – like whistleblowers. After Baltimore's Francis Scott Key Bridge was totaled by the 95,000-ton cargo ship MV *Dali(, a vast cohort of instant experts in structural engineering, sea freight and shipbuilding has taken to the internet with a slurry of takes on the Meaning Of the Bridge.

Some of these are very stupid indeed, like the idea that somehow "DEI" caused the collision. But you don't have to be an expert in maritime issues or civil engineering to understand the importance of this report from The Lever about shipping giant Maersk's culture of retaliation against whistleblowers:

https://www.levernews.com/feds-recently-hit-cargo-giant-in-baltimore-disaster-for-silencing-whistleblowers/

Maersk is the company that chartered the MV Dali; Maersk is also a key player in the cartel that controls the world's shipping. Maersk was just sanctioned by the Labor Department for retaliating against a whistleblower who complained of unsafe conditions on the ships that Maersk chartered:

https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/OPA/news%20releases/Maersk-Sec%20Findings%20-FINAL%20071423_Redacted.pdf

Maersk's policy required employees to bring concerns to their supervisors before alerting the Coast Guard or others. This is not how that stuff is supposed to work. OSHA called this policy “repugnant” and a “reprehensible and an egregious violation of the rights of employees,” which “chills them from contacting the [Coast Guard] or other authorities without contacting the company first.”

The whistleblower – chief mate on the Safmarine Mafadi – complained of "unrepaired leaks, unpermitted alcohol consumption onboard, inoperable lifeboats, faulty emergency fire suppression equipment, and other issues." We don't know (yet) what happened on the Dali, but it's obvious that a company that retaliates against whistleblowers, rather than heeding their warnings, is prioritizing covering its ass, not operating safely.

Which brings me (inevitably) to Boeing, and to poor John "Swampy" Barnett, the Boeing whistleblower who took his own life earlier this month. Barnett's suicide has stirred up similar low-yield online chatter focused on whether Boeing assassinated Barnett, a question that categorically cannot be answered through the method of arguing with internet strangers.

But there is a lot to say about Barnett: in particular, there's the substance of his whistleblowing, the specifics of his complaints about Boeing. For that, we can turn to the always-fantastic Maureen Tkacik, whose American Prospect piece "Suicide Mission" is definitive:

https://prospect.org/infrastructure/transportation/2024-03-28-suicide-mission-boeing/

Tkacik does a great job of painting a picture of Swampy as a member of the tribe of unreasonable and angry people who refuse to sideline principle in order to get along. More importantly, Tkacik shows us what made Swampy so angry: a company that was hell-bent on lobotimizing itself by forcing out any technical expert who might point out inconvenient truths about the safety risks of high-profit strategies.

As Tkacik writes, Boeing once thought about "knowledge" in terms of expertise that could be brought to bear on the unimaginably complex task of making reliable, airworthy jets. But under the "value-engineering" financialized culture that arose after the McDonnell-Douglas merger, the company viewed knowledge as "intellectual property, trade secrets, and data." In other words, the point of knowledge was rent-extraction, not safety.

At the root of this transformation was the Jack Welch protege Jim "Prince Jim" McNerney, the former 3M CEO who took the helm at Boeing. McNerney was openly contemptuous of the company's senior engineers, branding them "phenomenally talented assholes" and rewarding managers who found ways to force them out of the company. It was McNerney who decided to produce the 787 "Dreamliner" in non-union shops, far from Seattle and its phenomenally talented assholes. Instead of these engineers, McNerney turned to Boeing suppliers to do the major engineering work on the 787 – despite the fact that many of these suppliers "lacked engineering departments."

The 787 was, infamously, a $80b-over-budget boondoggle, haunted by technical failures. Swampy was part of the "cleanup crew" that tried to salvage the 787, and witnessed first-hand how the company purged all the engineers who managed to ship the 787 despite McNerney and his "value engineers" and retaliated against workers who tried to unionize the South Carolina facility.

In particular, it was safety inspector who came in for the most savage punishment. When the FAA decided to let Boeing mark its own homework – hiring in-house safety inspectors to replace government inspectors – they pretended to believe that these Boeing-payrolled inspectors would be able to operate independently of Boeing's leadership. The inspectors tried to operate this way (not least because they were criminally liable for oversights that occurred on their watch) and McNerney's Boeing came down on them like a ton of aviation-grade aluminum.

To further neuter these inspectors, Boeing management ordered the inspectors to outsource their work to the mechanics they were supposed to be supervising – that is, the FAA outsourced safety checks to Boeing inspectors, and the inspectors outsourced those checks to the mechanics themselves. Tkacik: "Swampy believed relying on mechanics to self-inspect their work was not only insane but illegal under the Federal Aviation Administration charter."

Swampy kept careful records of every way in which this system produced unsafe aircraft and an unsafe workplace – including the day he discovered that someone had removed 400+ defective parts from the rejects box and installed them in aircraft in order to meet deadlines. Swampy's reports were key to establishing that the company's much-trumpeted "improvements" in safety reports were down to a culture of "bullying" – not any improvement in safety itself.

When Boeing went to war against Swampy, they barely bothered to pretend that they were playing by the rules. He was told one day that he was four-weeks into a 60-day "corrective action" that no one had told him about. The "corrective action" paperwork had a blank for Swampy's comments. He wrote, "Leadership wants nothing in email so they maintain plausible deniability. It is obvious leadership is just looking for items to criticize me on so I stop identifying issues. I will conform!"

Shortly thereafter, he was forced out altogether. Managers who tried to bring him on their teams were told that no one was allowed to hire John Barnett. His name appeared on a secret internal memo entitled "Quality Managers to Fire." Meanwhile, the value of Boeing shares had tripled.

After Boeing's 737 Maxes started falling out of the sky, Swampy's painstaking documentation of the flaws in the 787's production took on a new urgency. A program of random inspections of 787s found major defects in all of them ("Boeing Looked for Flaws in Its Dreamliner and Couldn’t Stop Finding Them" –WSJ). An Aviation Week diagram of problem spots with the 787 marked red arrows over "every single section, from the tip of the nose to the horizontal stabilizers":

https://aviationweek.com/air-transport/new-boeing-787-fix-details-reveal-extent-gap-check-challenge

Boeing's war on "brilliance" did its work: after everyone who understood how to make a safe aircraft was forced out of the company, financialized CEOs were able to cut corners on safety, triple the share-price, scoop up billions in government subsidies and bailouts, all without those pesky "phenomenally talented assholes" pointing out that they were going get (lots of) people killed.

Tkacik closes by saying that Swampy's former work colleagues refuse to believe he killed himself. A former executive told her "I don’t think one can be cynical enough when it comes to these guys…It’s a top-secret military contractor, remember; there are spies everywhere." I confess that I don't know what to make of that, but I'll say this: if Boeing killed Swampy, that's just one of hundreds of murders they committed. Whether or not Swampy's death was their fault, the deaths of everyone who went down on the 737 Maxes that crashed is on their hands.

That's what "profits before people" means, after all: sacrificing human lives to make yourself richer. It's the foundational tenet of the conservative movement, though that impulse is often checked by other factors, like human decency. It's only when sociopaths get a sustained run at leadership that you see what they really want.

Which brings me to the UK, which has been governed by the Conservative Party for 14 years. The Tories are tipped to get destroyed in the next election, and a long article in the New Yorker by Sam Knight catalogs the many ways in which Tory rule has devastated the UK:

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/04/01/what-have-fourteen-years-of-conservative-rule-done-to-britain

The thing is, after 14 years, it's impossible for the Tories to blame anyone else for the state of the UK. With strong Parliamentary majorities, Conservatives were able to govern as they pleased – the only compromises they made were between their own internal factions. The ideological commitment to making the rich richer, privatizing everything, subordinating governance to market forces – that's all them.

It's all them: the worst period for wage growth since the Napoleonic Wars, on them. The catastrophic traffic, housing, jobs market, and precarity, on them. Plummeting health, on them. The austerity, on them. The withering of the country's courts and prisons and police, its wilderness, its programs for young people and pensioners, its public health, its diplomatic corps, its road maintenance – on them.

A country where the police can't afford to prosecute burglaries – on them (4% of burglaries are prosecuted). The 2.5 year delay between a rape arrest and its trial? On them. Mass closures of schools that are literally crumbling? On them.

43% of the countries courts have closed. On them. Cuts to prison funding, coupled with longer sentences? On them.

And of course, Brexit – on them. Every part of it. The referendum. The referendum question. The failure to negotiate a deal with the EU. All on them. The collapse in British living standards, all on them. The fact that the 20% richest households in the UK have been untouched by all this? Also on them. But you might not notice it in London, where people earn an average of 400% more than people in Nottingham.

The only growth sector outside of London are the Citizens Advice Bureaux, whose client rosters are growing even as their funding is cut. Where the CAB once primarily catered to people who couldn't make ends meet due to disability, unemployment and other reliable predictors of economic distress, today, CAB advisors are seeing homeowners, people working two jobs. Desperation is "like a black hole, dragging more and more people in,"

More Conservative growth: Tories presided over a doubling in the rate of NHS antidepressant prescriptions, and a 20% rise in long-term health conditions. No wonder Tory Britain had the world's worst pandemic outcomes for a wealthy nation – that's on them, too.

Knight's article closes with a Tory MP who believes that "the key thing for the Conservatives now is to be more conservative…Toryism must have its day again."

We can't count on oligarchs to rescue us from oligarchy – not even when oligarchy's failures push society to the breaking point. There's always a rationalization explaining why we just had to lean harder into oligarchy.

You hear echoes of this in the pro-monopoly choir, whose squeals of outrage at the rise of a new anti-monopoly movement grow louder even as monopolism's failures grow clearer. One of the more tangible expressions of monopoly's failures is the Ticketmaster/Livenation octopus, which controls the entire live music industry – key venues, promotions, and ticketing. Ticketmaster fucks over music fans, but it also cheats famous musicians, the kinds of people with big microphones, so we know a lot about how bad it is:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/20/anything-that-cant-go-on-forever-will-eventually-stop/

Of course, the fact that Swifties hate Ticketmaster lets the pro-monopolists dismiss critics as foolish young girls, not Very Serious People Who Understand Economics and thus can see that Ticketmaster's monopoly is Good, Actually.

Last week, Congressman Bill Pascrell dumped a ton of litigation documents related to Ticketmaster's sleaze, and Matt Stoller broke them down:

https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/explosive-new-documents-unearthed

The docs reveal how Ticketmaster's system of (formerly) secret kickbacks let it choke out any competitor, so that it could charge fans more and pay artists less. The mechanics of the scam are beautifully laid out in Stoller's post – as is the many ways in which it violated both the law and Ticketmaster's numerous consent decrees arising from its previous lawbreaking.

This kind of scam breakdown is essential. It's easy to think that we, as mere normies, can't hope to understand the machinations of the corporations that prey on us. But once you pierce the veil of performative complexity, what's left behind is a set of crude tricks and transparent ruses.

Here's one of those transparent ruses: Discord's terms of service require Discord users to actively opt out of its "binding arbitration" system. Binding arbitration is when you sign a contract saying you can't sue the company no matter how much it harms you – instead, you promise to have your disputes heard by an "arbitrator" (a fake judge paid by the company that screwed you). Unsurprisingly, these fake judges are awfully tolerant of their employers' crimes.

Discord says that once you click through its garbage legalese novella, you have just a few days to opt out of this binding arbitration clause – if you happen to miss that fine print, you have "consented" to giving up your legal rights.

But every time Discord changes its ToS, the clock for opting out starts ticking again, and Discord has just changed (that is, worsened) its ToS again:

https://discord.com/terms

That means that if you send an email right now to arbitration-opt-out@discord.com with "I am confirming that as of the date of this email, I am choosing to opt out of binding arbitration to settle disputes with Discord" in the body, you can escape this consent theater:

https://mamot.fr/@trishalynn@mastodon.sandwich.net/112175832989845038

Consent theater is a particularly galling corporate ruse – the idea that we chose to allow them to abuse us. Consent theater gets more outrageous by the day. Take Soofa, who operate streetside digital kiosks that identify you by grabbing your phone's unique wifi and Bluetooth identifiers:

https://gizmodo.com/digital-kiosks-snatch-your-phones-data-when-you-walk-by-1851368948

Soofa sells this data to advertisers – claiming that by walking down a public street, you "consented" to being tracked and sold.

The only reason this flies is that the US hasn't passed a federal consumer privacy law since 1988's Video Privacy Protection Act, which bans video-store clerks from telling people which VHS cassettes you took home. Congress keeps on failing to pass a privacy law, despite garbage companies like Soofa.

But that hasn't stopped the administrative agencies from acting to defend your privacy! The FTC just dropped its latest Privacy and Data Security Update, a greatest hits list of the actions the Commission took while Congress failed:

https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/2024.03.21-PrivacyandDataSecurityUpdate-508.pdf

One of the best things about the current administration is the number of extremely competent regulators who know exactly how much power they have and aren't afraid to use it to help the American people:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/18/administrative-competence/#i-know-stuff

The new FTC report, which details how the Commission's existing powers let it go after the commercial surveillance industry from smart doorbells to review fraud, from kids' programming to medical data, from lax security to data-breaches, is a bright spot in an otherwise grim week.

One more bright spot, then, before I wind up this linkdump. All week, I've been humming a half-remembered lyric, "come on baby/you're a link in this chain/put your hands together/and get free of the pain." For the life of me, I couldn't place it.

Last night, I searched for it (using Kagi, the post-Google search engine I've been paying for for the past month, and which I'm loving) and discovered that I had somehow completely forgotten a whole-ass band that I once loved: Toronto's Bourbon Tabernacle Choir, whom I saw live on many occasions.

The mystery lyric came from "Death is the Great Awakener," a fucking banger of a post-gospel track that I've been listening to on nonstop repeat as I wrote this. It's a hell of a tune and I'm intensely grateful to have it back in my life:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6RUb63Tx3w

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/30/dewey-502/#rip-ross-anderson

Image: Waffleboy https://www.flickr.com/photos/waffleboy/28198395465/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

[cryptographs-and-casinos]

dude are you trying to fuck ford??? ur being wayyy too aggressive to stan then a normal person would, shouldn't gamblers stick together?????

Alright, kiddo. I'll help break it down for you, because clearly some electrons aren't firing in your brain- Steve Pinington is a horrendous gambler and should be ashamed of how shit he is. I came across him in one of the casinos is Idaho and by the Lord of Codex, an infant with a broken hand would be better at craps then him. He deserves nothing <3

Secondly, romance is for fools who believe in things like 'morality' and 'guilty conscience's'. We humans have one life, and to spend it being miserable is proof that you don't deserve the Eternal Party. If love is getting you down, just use them as a backscratcher! Simple as that.

To answer your last question, I don't go after older guys. Especially weird, nerdy, freakish shutins, m'kay? Cheers!

[papyrjam]

happy birthday to @the-cryptographer from @rainstormcolors who had this piece commissioned just for you! 🎂

[borrelia]

i need to get a nerd to clean up my computer it's STRUGGLING

[in-the-stacks]

We discuss The Last Twelve Miles, our MyLibrarian June 2024 Book Club pick, with the author, Erika Robuck.

https://www.inthestacks.tv/2024/06/author-chat-the-last-twelve-miles

[cabfarewell]

EBONMOSSBACHRACH PLAYED DAVID AS A LINGUIST IM GOING TO SHOOT MYSELF

[autogeneity]

Hi, I was looking into computer science and I wanted to ask you what drew you to it and how you feel about it as a career choice?

I don't think my reasons for getting into it are likely to be very helpful to anyone else because they are very specific to my life at the time and not actually much about computer science at all. Skip to the last section for more relevant things.

But here is my story —

I went into university with a starry-eyed idea of understanding the True Fundamentals of Everything and was majoring in maths, physics, and philosophy. also my brain was broken and I had a very fuckd't relationship to reality as a concept (mega derealisation with substantial perceptual distortions and potentially some delusional features) and some part of me saw this as Deep Philosophical Insight, while another hoped getting The Answers would solve it.

after a year it became apparent that this was probably at least a little silly and not going to happen, and I didn't actually see myself being a professional physicist irl.

additionally, I felt more drawn to doing something with more tangible outcomes in the real world rather than chasing maximum abstraction. I had a growing interest in neuroscience and AI and simulation, but also could maybe see myself becoming a professional mathematician. so I kept the maths and switched the others to computer science and psychology.

I guess the specific CS appeals were: I already knew some programming and had found it basically trivial to learn, so I sort of figured it is probably a good match for my brain. and I like puzzles (actually when I first got to uni all the departments were doing little recruitment speech thingies and the CS department actually gave us puzzles! I somehow imagined this would be representative of literally anything (it is not)). I still find those, like, code challenge type problems a lot of fun though.

the final thing that sealed the deal was the availability of a scholarship for maths+cs major, and the fact that it could provide a backup plan if my academia plans failed.

---

As for how I feel about it — well, my academia plans did fail so I am very glad I had a backup in place. Even if they hadn't gone wrong at the time, it's pretty clear to me now that the many mental health issues I continued to deal with in the time since would have led to me fucking up in academia sooner or later in a way they did not in my job. There is much, much more latitude here.

And it's pretty alright as a job; I'm not ecstatic about it but I don't really mind overall and it is sometimes fun. I actually like bug-fixing, lol — the kind where there's an immediately-obvious mistake and I just gotta correct it is boring but the hunt is fun. In general I dislike the amount of small, tedious tasks where I just gotta do some obvious thing, but I like it when I get to build something more substantive that requires more figuring out. I am somewhat fond of the way the shape of the things feels in my brain (not sure that makes any sense lmao). Albeit there are not really many puzzles. :(

But I'm not intending to stay in my current work. I worked briefly in data science and found it much more engaging. I plan to move towards that and/or stuff in the direction of bioinformatics or scientific computing or computational neuroscience. Which is all still computer science but not. software development.

---

Which is probably the biggest thing I would want to highlight for someone considering computer science. In general working in software development (the most typical career path) is very different to working in computer science. Very often someone interested in the one will not be very happy with the other. I would encourage identifying which is your interest, and seeing what they both actually entail, before pursuing anything.

Because like, if you want a run-of-the-mill programming job, in many places it might be worth considering just doing some sort of bootcamp and projects. The company I work at gets probably like 20% of their graduate hires from that stream. Much cheaper and faster than a degree! Or for various other types of work certifications might be a good approach.

If you like mathy things, you probably want computer science proper. If you like engineering, tiny technical details, performance focus, etc, you probably do want formal education and may want to look at things requiring low-level languages, e.g. embedded software. I think people who like twiddling and configuring enjoy cloud shit? or infrastructure and ops work more generally but I think these days most places that looks like cloud shit. If you like the big picture, modeling, and the human side, you may be interested in systems analysis (I find this Very Shaped tbh but am not up for the human side and honestly don't like making big judgement calls).

Somehow I don't actually know what the people who like everyday application development actually like about it specifically lmao? even though they are surely the majority. But ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[thoughts-and-gayers]

hey i think i might have found something new in journal 3

this is the image ford draws as an example of ancient fortune telling:

this is an image ford draws under bill's influence (and also the key for bill's cipher in the journal.):

this is the fortune telling wheel rotated and overlayed onto the key:

and just the rotated wheel:

pretty neat, huh?

but wait. heres an image drawn on the 'codes' page:

see any similarities to the other wheels?

i propose that this wheel is displaying alternate symbols for letters. we can see some of the symbols from this wheel are in some (as far as i can find) unsolved codes in the journal:

what if we can solve said codes by using these wheels to find correspondences? like this:

i dont have this idea fully formed yet but i think i might have started cracking something no one else has yet!

or im just going insane and seeing patterns that arent there lmao

[mildmanneredking]

Quick doodle of Luis and my re4 self insert~

[cryptographs-and-casinos]

Do you know a Stanley Pines??? You seem very interested in the dude's brother

I know of a Panley Stines. I know of a Stetson Pinefield. I know of a Hal Forrester. I know of an Andrew '8-Ball' Alcatraz. All of them well-renowned in the gambling community, betting on losing dogs while making mediocre products. I know all of them, and I know all the men who'd kill to bite into his jugular and rip out his guts to take a bite and leave them for dead. But I don't think that's what you were referring to, was it? <3

[nameificationart]

Vienna Ellis, Eyeblight Cryptograph

"Vienna skates to work and while that sounds like everything you need to know, trust me it isn't. I think they work at the library but whenever I've tried doing a Break on their sigil I never got an answer." -Ellesle May, about Vienna Ellis

"Yeah we play games together with the others every friday. Vienna's been real busy though, but they said they could make it this week." -DannyMan73 (onine) about Vienna Ellis

[chocochipbiscuit]

🍭🌿🪄 for the writing meme if you'd like

🍭why did you start writing?

I'm going to start with why I stopped: I used to write a lot when I was younger; I loved making little books and stapling them together and wrote poetry and outlining ideas for the novel I was sure I was going to write someday. But somewhere around middle school, I was (very gently, very lovingly) encouraged by my parents to pick a more 'practical' career option. My dad pointed out that a lot of our favorite writers (I inherit my love of science fiction from my father and many of his favorites, even though my tastes have shifted over time) had backgrounds in science fiction, and at one point said something like "writers who only focus on writing aren't usually as interesting as writers who focus on living. Learn science, math, and other things, and you can always write on the side" along with pointing out that very few authors are able to make a full-time living 'just' writing.

(I want to repeat, again, my parents were very loving and supportive. They took me to art classes, museums, workshops, and gave me a lot of fun and exciting experiences. But that love also meant they wanted me to be successful and happy, and they thought that financial success might not guarantee happiness but at least it could guarantee comfort. They were doing what they thought was best, and I did what I thought was best at the time.)

So I basically stopped writing for about ten years. I did some play by post roleplaying forums and did on and off journalling and occasional poems but not much more.

Then in my mid-twenties, I was...honestly, pretty depressed and isolated. I had failed a class and had to take a year out of school. I was working. When I went back to school, I was working 20-30 hours a week on top of a demanding course load and rarely had time to see my friends, and even when I did see them, there was always a tiny bit of envy (that I worked very hard to control, because my friends didn't deserve that bitterness) that my old friends were all a year ahead of me and moving on with their lives. One of my new classmates sexually harassed me until I reported him to my academic advisor. Another of my classmates plagiarized my work. (The professor who caught it was incredibly kind; I had sent her an earlier draft because I wanted her feedback on it, and she realized that my classmate's submission essentially C&P chunks of text from mine.)

I self-soothed with fanfic. I didn't have time or energy to invest in 'new' media, or even to play a lot of video games, but fic was easy to read and devour. I started writing fic. And when I graduated and started a job when I worked graveyard shifts (thus continuing some of that isolation) readng and writing fanfic continued to be a way that I could connect to community and provided a much-needed creative outlet.

I started writing because I wanted to distract myself. I'm continuing to write because I've fallen in love with the process, the way it makes me think and re-evaluate characters and settings. (I'm even writing some non-fanfic things now because I want to experiment, to dabble and play with words in ways that aren't solely based on pre-existing media.)

🌿how does creating make you feel?

Happy! Sometimes emotionally drained (in a good way). I'm the kind of person who believes in making my own inspiration; if I only wait until I 'feel' like writing to sit down and write, I would hardly ever write! But if I have the time and energy, sometimes sitting down and trying to write a few words (usually with a 25 minute timer, go Pomodoro!) will be enough to start the flow.

🪄what is your post-writing/sharing aftercare? How do you take care of yourself or celebrate yourself when you've finished a fic?

Usually I want something sweet, then take a nap!

Thank you for the asks, I had fun! :D

(Asks are from this ask meme!)