Yeah no. Other people being able to access my archives and backups is a feature, not a bug.
If you want to share something, share it on YouTube or Flickr or whatever. Letting someone access your backups read-only is also fine, since that's just sharing. Letting a trusted person have write access with proper authentication is fine too, but you aren't even authenticating yourself. You're giving anonymous write access to the whole world. A backup that anyone in the world can delete or rewrite is not a safe backup.
Giving to the whole world... Or those who are already in my house, know where I keep the hard drives, and gives a shit.
Look, last month someone broke into the cellar in my apartment building. They stole my two old guitars and the Canon strobe for my DSLR, which shouldn't even have been there but ID just moved house and hadn't sorted out where everything was yet.
In a box was about 8 hard drives. Did they steal them? No. Did they move them? No. If they had, they might have even seen one was a spare Time Machine drive. Thieves just don't give a shit. This is the world I love in. People just don't give a shit.
I heavily secure the few things that could truly fuck me over, and practice some minimum due-diligence in everything else.
So no, the GeekNights archives are not encrypted, nor are any of my hard drives. My phone isn't even encrypted (though I will switch that on if I ever think it prudent).
Even people from Western Australia don't go to PAX Aus.
WTF lol, I live in West Australia and make it to every PAX Aus. I also know 10 other people just in University who make the multi thousand dollar pilgrimage. If these students can do it then there must be some geeky adults that do it too.
I've got to agree with everything Scott says so far on software security. The simile to a physical locked house and someone testing houses is silly. Most of the basic attacks would be closer to a thief trying a basic lock pick on thousands of houses simultaneously.
Plus most good OSes will recommend separating a root / administrative account from your every day account so that there is at least a second level of security in case someone breaks the user's account, I use this method on all main computers (even on virtual machines).
It's so easy to have a separate password for every site you go to, every machine you run. Unless you're a gold fish there is no reason not to.
Also can't tell if iMessage is still insecure (uses encrypt then sign instead of the logical sign then encrypt to avoid man in the middle attacks, you learn this shit in University and multiple engineers passed this as a secure system. Apple can't fix it without disconnecting everyone who uses iMessage and migrating them to a new platform.
I heavily secure the few things that could truly fuck me over, and practice some minimum due-diligence in everything else.
So no, the GeekNights archives are not encrypted, nor are any of my hard drives. My phone isn't even encrypted (though I will switch that on if I ever think it prudent).
With regards to talking to one's phone, physical context is everything.
If I'm on a subway, why bother? I can just pull it out and poke at it. The subway is also loud (Boston).
If I'm on a bike and have an earphone with a mic on the cord, I can long-press the cord button to get Siri. Almost exclusively this is “read me that text/notification”.
If I'm driving, my phone is connected the car stereo for podcasts and music. “Hey Siri” doesn't work as well, but I can grab it (blind), hold down the home button, and make directives: “Rewind one minute, read me that text/notification, driving directions to Home Depot, etc.”
In bed, “Hey Siri set my alarm for 8 / cancel my alarm / what time is my alarm set to?”.
Walking around town is like the subway—easier to just pull it out and poke.
“Hey Siri” in the kitchen is pretty great: “What's 12 fluid ounces in cups?” “Add onions to my shopping list” (a shared Reminders list named shopping).
At work is usually “Remind me about a meeting at 3:55” and the like.
As is on iOS 9, I can reply to texts while the phone is unlocked, but I can disable that.
Hangouts are an ok group solution but are not as useful to me as Messages. Hangouts don't have fine-grained notification/alert support—a conversation is either muted (everywhere!) or not.
If I'm on a bike and have an earphone with a mic on the cord, I can long-press the cord button to get Siri. Almost exclusively this is “read me that text/notification”.
Quite a few of your uses were "read me that notification." Smart watch makes that pointless.
Not on a bike.
Why not?
Indeed, why not?
Glancing at my watch is about the same level of "inattention" as glancing at my dashboard indicators or GPS in a car. It's a hair worse than glancing at Google Glass at most.
Also, how will you hear your answer on a bike? You'd better not be wearing an earbud.
When I used to get phone calls while riding my bike, I would pull over and take the phone out. Now I can just look at my watch at the next stop sign/light/
Also, how will you hear your answer on a bike? You'd better not be wearing an earbud.
Wearing one (never two!) earbud > looking down at your watch. Then again, my bike commute is almost entirely on a long, straight, flat, sparsely populated bike path with few surprises or serious hazards. I can see the calculation going a slightly different way if I was cycling in the heart of a great metropolis. But in either case, constant visual scanning seems way more important, even if just for the sake of habit forming.
With the single earbud I can instantly tune it out whenever something (usually a visual cue) demands my attention. In fact, I fairly often stop and rewind my podcast or audio book when I realize I have no idea what has been said for the last 10 minutes because I've been paying attention to the road instead.
The claim that Google Glass is less distracting than a single earbud simply doesn't align with my experience at all; in fact emphatically the opposite. And I work on Google Glass.
Now jerks that ride with two earbuds in on the other hand, screw those fools! That's just reckless.
Also, how will you hear your answer on a bike? You'd better not be wearing an earbud.
Is a single earbud really that dangerous?
I would never ride my bike with something obstructing my hearing. You won't have your stereo hearing and won't be able to place sounds in space around you. You're blocking a huge aspect of situational awareness.
In my experience wearing headphones while biking in Seattle is not a big issue. But then again I've noticed compared to other cities Seattle makes A LOT of accommodations to bikers. There are at least two dedicated bike lanes that I can think of. What I mean by that is a physical separation from road traffic and sidewalk traffic.
Comments
Look, last month someone broke into the cellar in my apartment building. They stole my two old guitars and the Canon strobe for my DSLR, which shouldn't even have been there but ID just moved house and hadn't sorted out where everything was yet.
In a box was about 8 hard drives. Did they steal them? No. Did they move them? No. If they had, they might have even seen one was a spare Time Machine drive. Thieves just don't give a shit. This is the world I love in. People just don't give a shit.
So no, the GeekNights archives are not encrypted, nor are any of my hard drives. My phone isn't even encrypted (though I will switch that on if I ever think it prudent).
I've got to agree with everything Scott says so far on software security.
The simile to a physical locked house and someone testing houses is silly. Most of the basic attacks would be closer to a thief trying a basic lock pick on thousands of houses simultaneously.
Plus most good OSes will recommend separating a root / administrative account from your every day account so that there is at least a second level of security in case someone breaks the user's account, I use this method on all main computers (even on virtual machines).
It's so easy to have a separate password for every site you go to, every machine you run. Unless you're a gold fish there is no reason not to.
Also can't tell if iMessage is still insecure (uses encrypt then sign instead of the logical sign then encrypt to avoid man in the middle attacks, you learn this shit in University and multiple engineers passed this as a secure system. Apple can't fix it without disconnecting everyone who uses iMessage and migrating them to a new platform. I don't know why you wouldn't it's good practice.
- If I'm on a subway, why bother? I can just pull it out and poke at it. The subway is also loud (Boston).
- If I'm on a bike and have an earphone with a mic on the cord, I can long-press the cord button to get Siri. Almost exclusively this is “read me that text/notification”.
- If I'm driving, my phone is connected the car stereo for podcasts and music. “Hey Siri” doesn't work as well, but I can grab it (blind), hold down the home button, and make directives: “Rewind one minute, read me that text/notification, driving directions to Home Depot, etc.”
- In bed, “Hey Siri set my alarm for 8 / cancel my alarm / what time is my alarm set to?”.
- Walking around town is like the subway—easier to just pull it out and poke.
- “Hey Siri” in the kitchen is pretty great: “What's 12 fluid ounces in cups?” “Add onions to my shopping list” (a shared Reminders list named shopping).
- At work is usually “Remind me about a meeting at 3:55” and the like.
As is on iOS 9, I can reply to texts while the phone is unlocked, but I can disable that.Hangouts are an ok group solution but are not as useful to me as Messages. Hangouts don't have fine-grained notification/alert support—a conversation is either muted (everywhere!) or not.
Glancing at my watch is about the same level of "inattention" as glancing at my dashboard indicators or GPS in a car. It's a hair worse than glancing at Google Glass at most.
Also, how will you hear your answer on a bike? You'd better not be wearing an earbud.
With the single earbud I can instantly tune it out whenever something (usually a visual cue) demands my attention. In fact, I fairly often stop and rewind my podcast or audio book when I realize I have no idea what has been said for the last 10 minutes because I've been paying attention to the road instead.
The claim that Google Glass is less distracting than a single earbud simply doesn't align with my experience at all; in fact emphatically the opposite. And I work on Google Glass.
Now jerks that ride with two earbuds in on the other hand, screw those fools! That's just reckless.
Ears are almost as important as eyes for a biker.
I love my watch for biking for turn by turn directions tapping me on the wrist. Also for notifications.