Sunday 21 August 2011

Cheap Chips and Network Security

(Via Charlie Stross)

In 1980 two eminent computer scientists were discussing trends in microprocessor production. One objected to the other's claim, "But there's no market for such cheap chips! What are you going to do, embed them in door handles?"

Five years later, checking into a hotel, he suddenly realized he was using a magstripe card to open his room door. There was a microprocessor in the door handle.

This piece is an extension to Charlie's brilliant, speculative USENIX 2011 Keynote: Network Security in the Medium Term, 2061-2561 AD. Both articles are highly informative and entertaining, written by one of our greatest living Science Fiction novelists - who also happens to have penned the first published "mainstream" technical review of Linux (in 1994), among scores of similar articles during his tenure at Computer Shopper. And both are, of course, highly recommended reading.

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