Re: Word Of the Subgenius...
--- Neil Johnson [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Sun, 2004-12-05 at 08:46 -0500, R.W. (Bob) Erickson wrote: To be bobbed is never the goal, but bobless fear steers the undifferentiated bob along conventional paths, to the abattoir Where is Tim May when when you need him? :-) Tuning the output stage of his useless eater welfare-mutant oven, in all probability. I think he wants to avoid criticisms from the environmentalists by way of making sure his machinery conforms to Kyoto Protocol expectations. Bonus question: Who is the author of the origin question that inspired the copycats? Regards, Steve __ Post your free ad now! http://personals.yahoo.ca
Re: Michael Riconosciuto, PROMIS
On Sun, 2004-12-05 at 20:58 -0500, Steve Thompson wrote: I've only read vague hints and rumours concerning its implicit design philosophy and architecture from the rare instances where it is mentioned at all. Yes, he code is probably classified (blah, blah, blah), but its actual use must reveal its purpose and function to some degree. And sure, we know that feds and other ne'er-do-wells have a bug up their ass about revealing sources and methods (unlike the public, who have no practical option in that regard) so any information that does leak is bound to be sketchy, but surely there must be _some_ accurate data available concerning its nature, especially considering the fact that it has been under development for two or three decades. Yes, I have found that puzzling too. Articles I have read refer to the original version being in the public domain. You'd think the source code would be out there somewhere. The least Tin Foil Hat (TM) version of the story I found is at Wired http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/1.01/inslaw.html Which gives this description: Designed as case-management software for federal prosecutors, PROMIS has the ability to combine disparate databases, and to track people by their involvement with the legal system. Hamilton and others now claim that the DOJ has modified PROMIS to monitor intelligence operations, agents and targets, instead of legal cases. I find the claims made about this software (it's ability to reconcile data from many different sources automagically ) pretty vague and frankly, a little far fetched, based on what I know about software, databases, etc. (And that's not even including the modifications supposedly made to install a TEMPEST back door in later versions). -Neil
Re: Michael Riconosciuto, PROMIS
On Sun, 5 Dec 2004, Steve Thompson wrote: Does anyone here have a good idea of what the PROMIS code actuall does; what its characteristics and capabilities are in terms of its function as an aid to intellegence analysts, logistics technicians, or consultants? At 07:16 PM 12/5/2004, J.A. Terranson wrote: We had a PROMIS system on our 370 something (168?) back in '81 - ran under SPF/TSO [MVS] IIRC? I always assumed the two were loosely related - I believe it was an early and crude relational DB implementation. But who the hell really knows? There are several different issues related to PROMIS 0 - What size tinfoil hat do you need? (It's probably still worth being paranoid about Echelon, but PROMIS is old hat...) 1 - Feds or somebody basically pirated their copy of the software, back when most mainframe software was expensive, and drove the company into bankruptcy rather than pay up, and they spent a lot of effort covering up their ripoff, possibly including the murder of a journalist. 2 - What are the basic capabilities of the software? I think Alif's got it about right, and remember that back in the early 80s, Codd Date had written some really cool theory about how relational databases could and should work, but most computers didn't have the horsepower for them and the early implementations were mostly either crude or bloated. Also, mainframe software tended to be very customized, particularly if it had to interconnect with other mainframe software like somebody else's non-relational database with a different schema. 3 - What sets of data were the various spooks, feds, and staties _keeping_ in their databases, and how much of it did they share with each other or get from various other sources? If you worked with databases back in the early 80s, remember that a gigabyte of disk used to be pretty big, rather than wristwatch-sized, and a megabyte of RAM was big and cost non-trivial amounts of money, and magnetic tapes held less than 200MB and took tens of minutes to read, and big database projects typically required departments of dozens or hundreds of workers to spend months of budgeting and planning to design schemas and processes that could take months to run, instead of being ad-hoc queries any random employee can run on their desktop over lunchtime if they feel like it, and might be able to run on their pocket computer when riding home on the subway. My department's ~1983 VAX had a 1 MIPS CPU, a gig of removable disk, 4MB RAM, and two tape drives, and cost about $400K. It wasn't big iron - that was typically an order of magnitude bigger. These days, $400 will get you a 3000 MIPS CPU, a gig of RAM, and 100-200GB disk, and database software is free. It's about a million times more cost-effective, depending on whether you care more about CPU, disk, or RAM, and there's an Internet hanging out the back side that will let you use Google's farm of ~100K computers for free.
RE: Word Of the Subgenius...
-Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Neil Johnson Sent: Sunday, December 05, 2004 9:06 AM To: R.W. (Bob) Erickson Cc: Steve Furlong; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Word Of the Subgenius... On Sun, 2004-12-05 at 08:46 -0500, R.W. (Bob) Erickson wrote: To be bobbed is never the goal, but bobless fear steers the undifferentiated bob along conventional paths, to the abattoir Where is Tim May when when you need him? :-) Try scruz.general. Peter
Re: Michael Riconosciuto, PROMIS
At 6:20 PM +0100 12/5/04, Nomen Nescio wrote: PROMIS Beat that horse, scraped it off the floor, sent it to the glue factory. Seven or Eight times. Musta had kin. However, all you have to do is drop that acronym around here, and, sooner or later, like buzzards to a shitwagon, all the usual suspects will come home to roost. To beat a metaphor like a, heh, dead horse... Cheers, RAH Who goes to Eliot Richardson's old church. When he ran for governor on the republican ticket, the boys from Southie made up a bumpersticker that said Vote for Eliot, he's better than you. :-) -- - R. A. Hettinga mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation http://www.ibuc.com/ 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA ... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience. -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
Re: Michael Riconosciuto, PROMIS
On Sun, 5 Dec 2004, Steve Thompson wrote: Does anyone here have a good idea of what the PROMIS code actuall does; what its characteristics and capabilities are in terms of its function as an aid to intellegence analysts, logistics technicians, or consultants? We had a PROMIS system on our 370 something (168?) back in '81 - ran under SPF/TSO [MVS] IIRC? I always assumed the two were loosely related - I believe it was an early and crude relational DB implementation. But who the hell really knows? -- Yours, J.A. Terranson [EMAIL PROTECTED] 0xBD4A95BF Civilization is in a tailspin - everything is backwards, everything is upside down- doctors destroy health, psychiatrists destroy minds, lawyers destroy justice, the major media destroy information, governments destroy freedom and religions destroy spirituality - yet it is claimed to be healthy, just, informed, free and spiritual. We live in a social system whose community, wealth, love and life is derived from alienation, poverty, self-hate and medical murder - yet we tell ourselves that it is biologically and ecologically sustainable. The Bush plan to screen whole US population for mental illness clearly indicates that mental illness starts at the top. Rev Dr Michael Ellner
Word play bobs the literal minded
John Kelsey wrote: From: Tyler Durden [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Dec 4, 2004 8:33 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Word Of the Subgenius... I thought JR Bob Dobbs got beamed up to that comet with those LA Koolaid kooks... No, but I do believe the comet kooks engaged in bobbitization (or perhaps, merely bobbing). -TD --John Word Play is disrespectful to the literal minded who dont appreciate having their self-bobbing exposed. Unauthorized decryption of motives and intentions must be outlawed. The right to privacy and ignorance is paramount.
Re: Michael Riconosciuto, PROMIS
--- Nomen Nescio [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I read a few old email messages I had and stumbled over some interesting material relating to NSA, CIA and one Michael Riconosciuto among other things. [PROMIS] Does anyone here have a good idea of what the PROMIS code actuall does; what its characteristics and capabilities are in terms of its function as an aid to intellegence analysts, logistics technicians, or consultants? I've only read vague hints and rumours concerning its implicit design philosophy and architecture from the rare instances where it is mentioned at all. Yes, he code is probably classified (blah, blah, blah), but its actual use must reveal its purpose and function to some degree. And sure, we know that feds and other ne'er-do-wells have a bug up their ass about revealing sources and methods (unlike the public, who have no practical option in that regard) so any information that does leak is bound to be sketchy, but surely there must be _some_ accurate data available concerning its nature, especially considering the fact that it has been under development for two or three decades. Regards, Steve __ Post your free ad now! http://personals.yahoo.ca
Re: Michael Riconosciuto, PROMIS
Bill Stewart shrieb: There are several different issues related to PROMIS Thanks for your comments. But what about the person Michael Riconosciuto? I did some searches online and I got the feeling that a lot people see him as an extremely intelligent person, a one-in-a-million type of person, being involved and on the front line with such diverse areas as human intelligence, weapons, electronics, computers, cryptography, bio-warfare etc. It's stated online that he has warned US about several terrorist attacks before they ocurred, including but not limited to the al-qaeda attacks. Is this somewhat related to him being jailed? Can he verify that US didn't act on alerts in ways so sensitive that the government simply cannot afford to let him speak up? Does he know things relating to US wanting some wars that the public simply cannot be told? I think I read somewhere that people from NSA or CIA thought of him as simply put a genius. Is it likely that he as such a genius is simply too dangerous for his own good when he decided to speak the truth and that the government is actively trying to shut him down and indirectly speed up his death by denying him medical care for his illness? Why did he come clean and sign the affidavit? He himself stated that he though he risked being killed or harmed in various ways if he went through with it. And indeed, just a week or two afterwards he got arrested! Smells like a government retaliation, set-up and cover-up if I ever saw one! This is almost to good for even Hollywood! There are many interesting questions here. Keep in mind that not all of us were around and active with intelligence/computers/cryptography 10-20 years ago. John Young: Does Cryptome hold any interesting documents involving this case?
Re: Word Of the Subgenius...
From: Tyler Durden [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Dec 4, 2004 8:33 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Word Of the Subgenius... I thought JR Bob Dobbs got beamed up to that comet with those LA Koolaid kooks... No, but I do believe the comet kooks engaged in bobbitization (or perhaps, merely bobbing). -TD --John
Re: Michael Riconosciuto, PROMIS
At 9:57 PM -0600 12/5/04, Neil Johnson wrote: is that with a staggering 570,000 lines of computer code, Oh, please... Try googling the line-count of any major piece of software, particularly in an age of object-oriented code... Cheers, RAH -- - R. A. Hettinga mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation http://www.ibuc.com/ 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA ... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience. -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
Re: Michael Riconosciuto, PROMIS
One the claims I have problems with (from the WIRED article): But the real power of PROMIS, according to Hamilton, is that with a staggering 570,000 lines of computer code, PROMIS can integrate innumerable databases without requiring any reprogramming. If this were true, I can guarantee that there would lots of companies clamoring for it. -Neil
Re: Michael Riconosciuto, PROMIS
On Sun, 5 Dec 2004, R.A. Hettinga wrote: At 9:57 PM -0600 12/5/04, Neil Johnson wrote: is that with a staggering 570,000 lines of computer code, Oh, please... Try googling the line-count of any major piece of software, particularly in an age of object-oriented code... OOP is a fairly recent phenomena when we are talking about code from the '70s you know ;-) In 1980, a half million lines of code was pretty hefty. Cheers, RAH -- Yours, J.A. Terranson [EMAIL PROTECTED] 0xBD4A95BF Civilization is in a tailspin - everything is backwards, everything is upside down- doctors destroy health, psychiatrists destroy minds, lawyers destroy justice, the major media destroy information, governments destroy freedom and religions destroy spirituality - yet it is claimed to be healthy, just, informed, free and spiritual. We live in a social system whose community, wealth, love and life is derived from alienation, poverty, self-hate and medical murder - yet we tell ourselves that it is biologically and ecologically sustainable. The Bush plan to screen whole US population for mental illness clearly indicates that mental illness starts at the top. Rev Dr Michael Ellner
Re: Word Of the Subgenius...
Bonus question: Who is the author of the origin question that inspired the copycats? Well, I remember May posting it but I don't think he was the ultimate author. I suspect whoever posted it recently in fact dug it out of the archives and re-posted it, a particularly lame maneuver if so. OR...perhaps ole' May is gettin' a little lonely out there! -TD
Re: Michael Riconosciuto, PROMIS
--- Neil Johnson [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Sun, 2004-12-05 at 20:58 -0500, Steve Thompson wrote: [PROMIS] Yes, I have found that puzzling too. Articles I have read refer to the original version being in the public domain. You'd think the source code would be out there somewhere. If that's true, then the government couldn't have stolen it. However, I suspect that mainfraim code of any sophistication is rarely released into the public domain. I imagine the author would be able to clear that up, assuming he has no financial reason to falsify its history. The least Tin Foil Hat (TM) version of the story I found is at Wired http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/1.01/inslaw.html Which gives this description: Designed as case-management software for federal prosecutors, PROMIS has the ability to combine disparate databases, and to track people by their involvement with the legal system. Hamilton and others now claim that the DOJ has modified PROMIS to monitor intelligence operations, agents and targets, instead of legal cases. Interesting. I find the claims made about this software (it's ability to reconcile data from many different sources automagically ) pretty vague and frankly, a little far fetched, based on what I know about software, databases, etc. No kidding. Databases are _hard_ to write efficiently, let alone to arbitrarily integrate. (And that's not even including the modifications supposedly made to install a TEMPEST back door in later versions). Perhaps I am stupid. I don't know how one would go about modifying application software to include a 'back door' that would presumably enhance its suceptibility to TEMPEST attacks. Isn't tempest all about EM spectrum signal detection and capture? Regards, Steve __ Post your free ad now! http://personals.yahoo.ca
Re: Word Of the Subgenius...
--- Steve Thompson [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- Tyler Durden [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Bonus question: Who is the author of the origin question that inspired the copycats? Well, I remember May posting it but I don't think he was the ultimate author. I suspect whoever posted it recently in fact dug it out of the archives and re-posted it, a particularly lame maneuver if so. Wrong. The origin quote is Who is Socrates, now that we need him written by Richard Mitchell as the title of chapter one in The Gift of Fire. Mitchell may have cribbed the line from another source, but in this context it is the origin quote. Ms. Harsh is in posession of the original physical vector, having stolen it, but only the spooks will be unofficially aware of that facet of the context. On further reflection, I think it is necessary to go out on a limb and suggest a correction to my comment above. I verified the original quotation from a quick google search. That was probably not enough. My recollection suggests that the original quote should be where is Socrates now that we need him. I rather suspect that the people who 0wn the upstream pipe from my points of access are toying with their ability to interpose their data in place of quasi-authoritative texts. I cannot consult the physical document owing to the fact that its rarity is such that there are no copies available at either the Metro Central Reference Library, and I have no access to the stacks at the University of Toronto Robarts library. Someone who does may consult the book themselves with its call number: B72 .M55 1987. Further, Ms. Harsh may be said to posess the probable physical vector. I cannot say what level of participation she has had in this travesty owing to the fact that after she perjured herself in court in 2001, she has entirely avoided using her actual identity online. However, she could answer the question with her copy of the book in principle if there were any way to compel her testimony. It is possible that the quote is being used as a source by online spooks by virtue of the text's presence in their funky everything database. Any way you look at it, the phrase tax money well spent would seem to apply here. Regards, Steve __ Post your free ad now! http://personals.yahoo.ca
Kerik, Homeland Security Czar - Scathing article from The Register
The Register has a really friendly article about Kerik, Giuliani's buddy who's proposed for Homeland Security Czar. (El Reg is primarily an online technology newswire, but they do comment on other issues, especially if they have technical aspects - they especially rag on the UK's Home Secretary Blunkett's National ID Card proposals.) http://www.theregister.com/2004/12/06/kerik_homeland_security_secretary/ High-school drop-out to become Homeland Security Czar By Thomas C Greene Published Monday 6th December 2004 11:07 GMT President George W. Bush has nominated former New York City Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik to replace Tom Ridge as Homeland Security Secretary, marking a significant departure from his tendency to choose educated, Patrician types for his Cabinet. Kerik, a high-school drop-out abandoned at age four by his prostitute mother in the gritty town of Patterson, New Jersey, served as an Army MP in South Korea, and later worked in private international security rackets, most interestingly in Saudi Arabia. He joined the New York City Police Department in 1985. He followed that with a stint as Warden of the Passaic County Jail in New Jersey, and became the Training Officer and Commander of the Special Weapons and Operations Units. In 1998 he was named New York Corrections Commissioner, and established an ironclad, head-cracking discipline in the City's notorious detention facilities. A favorite of former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, Kerik had the honor of seeing the Manhattan Detention Complex, known to locals as the Tombs, re-named the Bernard B. Kerik Complex by then-mayor Giuliani. Kerik left a minor cloud of corruption behind, with allegations that one of his lieutenants used correctional staff to work illegally in Republican campaigns. In 2000, Giuliani named Kerik Police Commissioner, to assist him in a vast anti-crime crackdown, where the chief tactic was for police to pounce aggressively on even the most chickenshit offences, such as spitting on the sidewalk. Upon his retirement from City politics, Giuliani decided to cash in on post-9/11 security hysteria by founding his own security outfit, Giuliani Partners LLC. Kerik has served as senior vice president at Giuliani Partners, and CEO of Giuliani-Kerik LLC, a vendor of law-enforcement performance systems. Meanwhile, Giuliani has founded several spin-offs, such as Giuliani Capital Advisors LLC, and the Rudolph W. Giuliani Advanced Security Centers (ASC), a cyber-security outfit formed in connection with Ernst Young. Recently, Kerik shipped out to Iraq to train the local policemen who are routinely blown to pieces by insurgents and terrorists. There, he enjoyed the snappy titles of Interim Minister of the Interior, and Senior Policy Advisor to the US Presidential Envoy to Iraq's Coalition Provisional Authority. Kerik lasted only four months, and the Iraqi police are still as incompetent, weak, and corrupt as when he arrived in country. Kerik began making his transition from local to national politics by campaigning for President Bush's re-election, alongside his political patron and business partner, Rudy Giuliani. Kerik has been a devoted booster of the so-called Patriot Act, having given several speeches in its support while campaigning for Bush. In anticipation of his rise to national office, Kerik recently sold his $5.8m in shares of Taser International, makers of absolutely safe police stun guns that are now routinely used against old women and children. He is expected to be confirmed by the Senate without difficulty. ®
