On the internet, no-one knows you’re a fridge

On the internet, no-one knows you’re a fridge | Consult Hyperion

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When my fridge negotiates with Waitrose to buy some more milk, what is really happening is that the virtual identity of my fridge is interacting with the virtual identity of Waitrose. That seems perfectly reasonable to me, and working out ways for the these virtual identities to transact is going to be part of the business strategy for a fair few of our clients over the next couple of years. The virtual identity of the fridge may have a number of attributes associated with its identifier, such as a credit limit for a delivery address or whatever, but the one attribute that it will not have is “IS_A_PERSON”. As I have claimed many times before, this might well turn out to be the most valuable attribute of all.

From On the internet, no-one knows you’re a fridge | Consult Hyperion

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Websec Canada: Launching replay attacks against the Wells Fargo Wallet service

xxx This white paper is a shortened version of the actual research. Unfortunately, the exploitation bug is not fixed yet. The company was notified and informed about the issue. However, the bug is not fixable (at the moment). From Websec Canada: Launching replay attacks against the Wells Fargo Wallet service . xxx

There is no excuse for not taking cards

So we went to the pub. For lunch. Seven of us. Say £20 per head. £100+ quid. Say £50 quid gross for the pub. Colleague goes to order food and drinks and pay at the bar. Apologetic barmaid comes over to explain that their “card machine” is down, so she can only accept cash. Under normal circumstances I would have simply walked out, feeling it wholly inappropriate to reward such a poorly managed establishment and, as a functioning actor in a capitalist economy, done my duty to depress their lunchtime takings. Here’s what we wanted to say: This is absurd. This is 2016 not 1916. Your card machine is down? Well, so what! Are you seriously telling me that mein host has no mobile phone number capable of registering for PingIt or PayM? That none of the staff or the pub itself have a PayPal account that I can send the money to? That neither the owners nor managers not contingency planners thought to tuck an iZettle behind the bar to use when the clunky and expensive GPRS terminal fails for o...

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