This is Addressed to Geoff Taylor

Of The BPI (British Recorded Music Industry)

Still in his job [sigh].

VUPEN Pwns Windows 8 & IE10

Windows 8 (used with permission from Microsoft)

Windows 8 is pwned. IE10 is pwned.

Yes, already. But you're unlikely to hear much in the way of detailed descriptions of the multiple, preexisting zero-day vulnerabilities chained together to effect these new ones. That's because their discoverer is essentially a black hat: the French security firm VUPEN.

With all the talk about cyber security, cyber wars, and preemptive legislation coming from ploiticos east and west, you might have thought that governments would be among the first, and most willing, to condemn and criminalize a company like VUPEN. This is an organization whose business model is to discover security holes in the products of giants like Microsoft, Google, or Apple, then rather than disclose these flaws for patching, sell the information to the highest bidder for use in arbitrary attacks.

Follow The Money

Patching would make everybody safer, and increase our confidence in the various devices and services we have to use every day, but it doesn't carry the same high financial rewards as selling your knowledge to whomever wants to exploit it most. Meanwhile, those governments we rely on to make the best choices for us, to legislate and protect us, yada yada... well it turns out, those are exactly the kind of people who most desire the ability to intercept, spy on, record, even to corrupt or otherwise modify, our communications, activities, and sundry interactions with others. And, of course, they have the resources to get themselves into that highest bidders' club.

So today, we learn that Microsoft's best, most advanced and up to date security features are broken. VUPEN is already advertising and selling malware kits offering the buyer exclusive access to everything on your Windows 8 machine. Worst of all, Microsoft will probably remain unable to patch these vulnerabilities, whose nature is so closely guarded by the baddies. On the other hand, that does limit the number of agents able to exploit these holes - you might see that as a kind of mitigation.

Hat tip: TheNextWeb

Everything is a Remix

New York-based film writer, director and editor Kirby Ferguson's brilliant little set of four 10-minute videos, Everything is a Remix, produced over the course of two years, reminds us of the original motivation behind copyright and patent law. Namely, to create a short period of controlled monopoly, allowing inventors and creators to recoup their development costs. And emphatically not to allow those rights holders to continue to profit almost indefinitely from their creations, while preventing others from doing anything similar or related.









Hat tip: Neurobonkers.

Risk Shift

The Trouble With Politics?

In the LA Times just over a week ago, there was an interesting report about a recent study of teenage drivers:

http://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-teen-driver-laws-20110914,0,7056006.story

Basically, the situation in all the states (California being no more than a particular case in point) has been, for over a decade, that the newest drivers, which is to say 16-17 year olds, have been subjected to various restrictions on their ability to (a) carry passengers, and (b) drive at all during certain times of day. There have also been other restrictions adopted by certain states, such as driving without supervision, or the ability to use mobile phones while driving, but these two have been the main and most popular ones in every state since the first of these so-called "graduated driver licensing programs" was originally introduced in Florida in 1996.

What the study has revealed is that the anticipated - and indeed observed - reduction in fatal accidents involving 16-17 year old drivers, has been "almost exactly matched" by a corresponding increase in fatalities involving 18-19 year olds. In other words, the carnage has merely been pushed two years into the future.

(According to my reading of the evidence, the increase is actually closer to half the earlier reduction, but we'll let that go for now.)

Hot Potato

It's obvious with hindsight, that what these programs have done is to mask the immaturity and inexperience of new drivers for a year or two. By preventing them from being exposed to certain driving situations and environments, the restrictions have of course done nothing to prepare them for such eventual exposure.

Politically, this has become a very awkward truth. During the first couple of years of every such program, public officials have been able to point to a real reduction in young driver related fatalities, and boast with confidence that their policies have been saving lives. Now that it turns out in general not to have been the case, what are the chances that these programs will be cancelled overnight?

Absolute zero, obviously. But for more than just the usual reasons, i.e. short elected terms, and blissful ignorance of the actual evidence. This will not become just another case of badly thought out laws surviving through inertia. For if these programs were discontinued, there would be a bow wave of doubled fatalities lasting for as long as the initial reduction, namely two years, as today's pre-existing 18-19 year olds meet the newly liberated 16-17 year old wave of fresh idiots.

Obviously there's a lot that can be done, in terms of education and training, to defuse these unintended consequences and arrive at a program that does make sense. Still, it's an interesting study, and a good reminder of how shortsighted, wilfully or otherwise, we and our politicians can be.

Hannes Bok

The Futurian Artist in Chief

Inveterate name dropper Fred Pohl's first hand reminiscences on the early history of SF, memories from the elder half of the previous century, continue to amaze me with their depth and clarity. Meanwhile his blog sparkles too with pithy one-liners and snarky, short form, political comment. ♥

This weekend's treat: part one of a biographical sketch of Hannes Bok (real name Wayne Woodard), the only member of the pro-crashed fan club Futurians of New York ever to win a Hugo for illustrative drawing and painting. The story covers his fortuitous early association with one aspiring writer named Ray Bradbury, and the role played by the first ever World Science Fiction Convention (WorldCon).

Update (Sep 7):

1. Futurian Artist in Chief
2. The story with the unhappy ending
   

Mission Accomplished

Ten Years After

Note: written on the day Osama Bin Laden was killed.

There's no doubt over the main news story this week: after a decade of planning, attempted operations, rhetoric, minor victories, apparently endless cold trails, dashed expectations and anticlimax, the operation was finally given the green light last weekend. To enter an impoverished strip of land, an isolated state ruled by an Islamist group regarded by some as being more than merely sympathetic to terrorism. A seemingly impossible border crossing, finally if indirectly negotiated by just over two dozen brave and dedicated professionals. A single determination and fixity of purpose, in an operation which had to be co-ordinated in utter secrecy until eventually, success was made certain, and the word was out.

Daniel Barenboim, co-founder of the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, led an orchestra of European musicians in a "peace concert" performance in Gaza.

Daniel Barenboim, Vienna, 2008. Picture: Wikipedia.

Guerrilla Performance

Since its inception in 1999, millions have followed and been entertained, educated and inspired by the history, the example, and the performances of the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra. The brainchild of Barenboim, an Argentina-born Jew who today holds Palestinian citizenship, and his friend, the now deceased Palestinian literary scholar Edward Said, it was intended from the start to bring together young musicians from Israel and Arab countries, seeking to enable dialogue between the various cultures of the Middle East, and promoting peace and co-operation via the making of music together. Today, still featuring both Jewish and Palestinian musicians, the orchestra has members drawn from Egypt, Iran, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria, and boasts an international reputation for the quality of its performances.

First time I watched Paul Smaczny's multi-award-winning 2005 movie about the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, Knowledge Is The Beginning, it was mostly with my jaw on my lap. I recall saying to Linda, "This wee guy's saving the world!" and also if I remember correctly, there was a wee bit of dust or some such bloody thing in my eye at the time.

The West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, Pilas, Sevilla, 2005. Picture: Wikipedia.

This latest victory against the forces of fear, ignorance and intolerance once again shows the maestro continuing from strength to strength. Israeli citizens are prohibited by law from entering Gaza, however the new Egyptian military leaders have plans to open the border at the Rafah crossing. Barenboim entered Gaza via Egypt, together with 25 other musicians. Then they played some Mozart.

~

Update (June 25): Well whaddayaknow, Danny boy's only gone and got himself an honorary knighthood from Her Maj. Or rather, from the British ambassador to Berlin, at a gala dinner in the German capital. He is now a KBE - Knight of the British Empire - the highest honour said empire can bestow upon mere foreigners.

I've also learned that there are two versions of Paul Smaczny's film Knowledge Is The Beginning in circulation. The one currently showing on British Sky TV is the original, and ends when the dream of a Ramallah concert seems lost. Paul yelled out Cut! and Print! then spliced in some other live performance footage to round off the work... a matter of mere days before it became clear, towards the end of the tour, that in fact the troublesome security issues had been resolved; Ramallah was going ahead.

The edition on the 2DVD set is a revised and updated version. It shows the different factions entering the West Bank, all under their Spanish diplomatic passports, but separately and at different times (the Israeli musicians not arriving until the day of the performance). This is followed by some actual footage of the Ramallah concert, and rounded off by one of (Sir!) Daniel's amazing humanitarian speeches. The second DVD is, of course, that entire concert.

Freedom House Report

UK: Worst of a Good Lot

Sponsored by the United Nations Democracy Fund (UNDEF), Freedom House just published the report Freedom On The Net 2011.

The good news: UK narrowly escapes relegation from the first division, retaining its Internet freedom status designation of "Free" (up to 30 points) with a nail biting 25 bad boys - up from 2009's (adjusted) total of 23 strikes. Only Italy and South Africa, at 26 points each, fare worse in this division.

Trajectory: Slight Decline

The full league tables are here:

http://www.freedomhouse.org/images/File/FotN/MainScoreTable.pdf

The most worrying aspect, for user rights activists anyway, emerges when these scores are analysed by the three broad UNDEF categories: obstacles to access, limits on content, and more disturbingly than those, violations of user rights.

1: Obstacles to Access

The first category assesses barriers to access, both infrastructural and economic; governmental blocking of apps and/or tech; and control over access providers. Clearly there is some room for mitigation in this category, as not all of a network's shortcomings are necessarily planned to be such. The UK however makes no capital of this mitigation, scoring but a single point here - the best performance in fact among all of the (now 37) nations covered by this year's report.

2: Limits on Content

Next the survey considers "content limits" - all forms of censorship, including website filtering and blocking, content manipulation, and the availability, diversity and usage of digital media for social and political activism and news. Here we find the UK scraping its arse along the bottom of the channel, tying with Italy on 8 points, only South Africa worse on 9.

The Internet Watch Foundation comes under particular and extensive criticism for its persistent technical incompetence, absence of clarity and transparency in its blocking and removal criteria and actions, its inadequate appeals process, and lack of any judicial (or even governmental) oversight.

3: Violations of User Rights

That just leaves legal protections, restrictions and prosecutions, surveillance, privacy, imprisonment, and harassment including physical attacks. No surprises here, with the UK emphatically at the bottom of the division on 16 points (second worst is Italy on 12).

The disastrous Digital Economy Act is highlighted, although the interim conclusion on that score states "In a positive development, the newly elected coalition government has promised to review and repeal a number of laws that negatively affect online free expression and privacy." As we have now seen this fail to happen, there must be doubt over the UK's overall "Free" status today.

Conclusions

Internet freedom in the UK is measurably deteriorating year by year, as evidenced by the decline in the "free" status reported by successive Freedom House biennial surveys. The country specific report provides the details:

http://www.freedomhouse.org/images/File/UK2011.pdf

Many of these reasons have already been well publicised, for example:

• The expansive restrictions of English libel law are identified as having "...a significant chilling effect on both content producers and ISPs."
• Further high profile cases, illustrating the frequently ass like nature of the law, are included; such as freedom to tweet your frustration about airport closures through the medium of mad parody, and police sanctioning of cybercafe snooping by proprietors.

It's hard to escape the conclusion that we have already seen the UK's final days at the top table of Internet freedom.

Orphaned Land

"Abraham" I Replied

Linda had just started a random game of Who would you like to meet from history? The figure of Abraham, the father of the people of Israel, standing at the visible confluence of all the world's great monotheistic religions - Christianity, Islam, Judaism - is a man whose opinions on certain subjects I thought I'd surely like to hear. How would he feel about these systems of belief, their various sacred texts, with all his links to them, to the billions who have followed them, and the millions slaughtered and maimed in their names over these millennia?

But at least we know who his favourite Progressive Metal band would be! That would be Orphaned Land, an Israeli outfit with a huge and devoted following among Muslims and Arabian people.



The band's name refers of course to the holy land, and their fourth and latest full length masterpiece studio album, five years in the making, The Never Ending Way of ORwarriOR (which means Warrior Of Light)...

...is a sophisticated concept album taking ORPHANED LAND’s unique brand of exotic, heavy music to soaring new heights in terms of complexity and catchiness.

ORPHANED LAND spent over 600 hours in the studio cooperating with The Arabic Orchestra of Nazareth, using multilingual vocals (e.g. English, Hebrew, Arabic, Yemenite), countless Oriental as well as other traditional instruments such as: saz, santur, arabian flutes, middle-eastern percussions, cumbus, bouzouki, violins, various kinds of guitars, piano...

http://www.orphaned-land.com/band.html

Although no one in the band is religious, they cannot equally claim to be apolitical, as their music campaigns consistently for peace between Israel and the Arabian world. Even the calligraphy on the new album combines letters from Hebrew and Arabic, moulding them "to create a symbol of peace".

The insensibly prolific Steven Wilson, Porcupine Tree's captain, plays keyboards on this release. He also mixed the album at his own Hemel Hempstead studio, No Man's Land. The collaboration is no surprise to PT/SW watchers; Steven has a side project Blackfield, with Israeli rock star Aviv Geffen, and at one time also collaborated with Bryn Jones (Muslimgauze).

A Plea For Perspective

This started out as a reasoned argument about the benefits of good copyright law, the nature of infringement, the relation of preventative measures to criminal penalties and civil reparations, proportionality, and human rights. Then the words started moving around the screen, crossing lines and joining up in ways I never intended. Rhymes and rhythms appeared from nowhere. Now all that remains of my rational critique is the title. Everything else has somehow morphed into an old fashioned protest song. It's irrational, unreasonable and untidy. Worse, it's no longer even aimed at the correct target. I'm just glad I didn't write it.

Horse theft was once a hanging offence, for the arguably excellent reason that in pioneering days, taking a man's method of transport was precisely equivalent to taking away his right to life. Today's inner cities throughout the world harbour rings of corruption and vice, with similarly protective and extreme codes of retribution. And then there are those in the entertainment industry, who view copyright infringement as on a par with horse theft. Their livelihood is threatened; they smell blood; no penalty is too severe. Internet access might by now be a basic human right, but no matter. They'll continue to press for ultimate power over their victims, to demand disconnection from all aspects of life, for an act precisely as innocuous as lending a friend a book.

Anyway, here's the song, clean version. The original as mentioned above more or less writes itself; you should have no trouble reconstituting it with a packet of F-bombs. It's dedicated to all the music and other entertainment industry lobbyists out there, who lobbied hard and lobbied in secret, paid in gold and silver, to get the dreadful Digital Economy Bill forced through its crucial third reading in the House of Commons. You are a parcel of rogues.

Entertainers!

You're entertainers!
You're an actor or a singer or you maybe play guitar
You're entertainers!
But you've got some big ideas of who the hell you think you are

For you would kick us off internet if ever we're accused
Of taking copies of your work from sites we've never even used
And you would love to see our innocents and families deprived
Of their resources and of services that are their human rights

You are not teachers!
Not a surgeon nor a doctor nor a fireman nor a cop
You're entertainers!
But your sense of self importance has no notion where to stop

And the power you demand's like disconnecting our supply
Of electricity or air or making water taps run dry
You'd prevent us online shopping you'd disrupt our education
And our private mail and messages and all communication

You're entertainers!
Or you push the pens and count the beans of those who make that claim
You're entertainers!
And you're a little bit deranged if you believe you're not to blame

Just as voters are responsible for all their countries' wars
So you're every bit as guilty as the suits who fight your cause
Did you ever stop to think the prosecutions you pursue
Are all against the very people who contribute most to you

You're entertainers!
You're a dancer or a writer or you make computer games
You're entertainers!
But it looks like you forgot the very streets from which you came

Did you seriously think we'd all lie down while you unfurled
Our basic fundamental rights to interact with all the world
Well if copyright infringement disconnects us through the courts
I'll tell you I can dance and I can sing and you can eat my shorts

Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 2.5 licence. This means you're free to copy and share the song but not to sell it.

Metapolitik

Electoral Reform

Gordon Brown is keen to scrap Britain's "first past the post" voting system if Labour wins the next general election.

At this stage, looking at all the available opinion polls, you might find it hard to escape the conclusion that any voting system, which can manufacture a Labour victory out of this deep hole, needs quite urgently to be replaced - as a matter of some national emergency. But that's a post for another day...

The proposed change, the alternative vote system being considered, is of a kind known technically as an 'alternative vote' system.

According to BBC News, Mr Brown "... is said to have secured agreement from senior ministers for a vote by MPs on electoral reform next week and will be seeking the approval of his Cabinet this morning."

In other words, he and his senior ministers have essentially voted, to have another vote today, to decide whether or not to have a vote next week, to decide whether or not to have a vote, after the next general election (and assuming, of course, that vote goes his way), to decide exactly how we shall all vote - in future general elections.

The Aristocrats.

Power Corrupts!

Updated Nov 26^th 2009 to add: Today I'm an Independent, because today's Scottish National Party, financed by a homophobic religious fundamentalist, fails to convince me of its commitment to the separation of church and state - a commitment essential to the health and survival of our multicultural and multi-ethnic society.

"Imbeciles"

That's the heading provided by Charlie Stross in his rantlet against the Digital Economy Bill published this week. But whilst that bill is certainly something to get worked up about, and for a host of reasons, Charlie on this occasion very wisely puts his health first; links to Cory Doctorow's exposition of the latest Mandelson scandal; and asks others to step up.

Well, this time I did. Firstly, by joining - at last! - the flood towards the Open Rights Group, and setting up a direct debit to support them. And secondly, by picking out what I regard as the single worst infraction of human rights contained in these proposals, and writing a letter to my MP:

Dear John Mason,

We have been utterly shocked and dismayed, almost beyond our powers of expression and protest, by the recently revealed ultimate form and content of the Westminster government's Digital Economy bill.

Can you please assure us that the SNP regards Internet connection as a basic human right, as do a growing number of European nations (Finland, Spain); that the Party in the House of Commons, with the vocal support of the Scottish Government, will not tolerate, nor indeed contemplate, for any reason whatsoever, the degradation of service and/or disconnection of an entire family from the full range of vital services provided by the Internet; that in particular, such or similar sanctions should never be countenanced on the basis of a copyright infringement or related accusation, against any one family member; and finally, that the Party's resolve on this issue stands ready to challenge the relevant provisions of the bill through, and to the exhaustion of, all possible available avenues of blocking and appeal, both in the UK and in a European context.

We write to you as long time active members and supporters of the SNP, both as office bearers and as canvassers / leafleters, who have worked hard over many years to help bring the Party to its currently successful milieu. Throughout all those decades of campaigning, the one indispensable principle of our activism, from before the Poll Tax to free prescriptions on the NHS and beyond, has been the fundamental and special humanitarianism, the blessed sense of fairness, of the Scottish people.

There is much that is rotten, corrupt and foul in the provisions of Mandelson's bill, but Internet disconnection surely rates as the most pernicious and abhorrent suggestion, an affront to the sensibilities of our national psyche.

I trust that we can count on your support against the despicable measures being considered in this proposition.

Yours sincerely,

John M. Kerr
Linda M.G. Kerr

Political corruption knows no bounds, and is more than happy to form opportunistic coalitions with apathy, gullibility, stupidity and his dog. Peter Mandelson has perhaps the most impressive record of aggressive impropriety and power grabbing avarice, of any UK politician active today. In his most brilliant and terrifying piece of duplicity to date, he recently indicated that he'd be equally happy to work with a Conservative government.

He is immune to the intentions of an electorate that never did vote for him, and never would.

Mandelson was a serially unelected minister, originally without portfolio, and as we now see, without loyalty to any party, or visible principles of any kind. Yet he wields such power at Westminster, in the House of Lords, wholly because of the extreme weakness of this Labour government. Having been repeatedly forced to resign over this and that scandal, nevertheless he has managed to find, in Gordon Brown's dismal desperation, a way to insinuate himself back into the centre of UK politics and power, and once there, to coat himself with Teflon.

This is a time for protest, but this time, your vote alone won't cut it. We need a new wave of activists, ready to go into battle with pens and voices raised. Fit and willing to engage the enemy in a dirty fight for the survival of intellectual and creative freedom, yes, and for basic human decency. We need you!

Because I'll only be 50 for another day or two, and this rousing blog article is the third activist-y thing I've done today. Seriously, I need to lie down now.

Please join the Open Rights Group. We have to start somewhere.