Infornography

The Net (1995 film) / 2021-10-07 T 05:30

I watched “The Net” (1995) (not for the first time). We all know that it ain't the greatest, but it doesn't suck. A few interesting things about the film this time this time include:

• It shows how she keeps mostly to herself, in her home, has things delivered. In 1995, it was possible but rare. Since Covid, not so rare. (Movie predicted the future.)
• They make an explicit point that someone was able to mess with her because all the information is “in a computer”, but I'm thinking that's not quite right. Electronic form is a more malleable medium than paper in a file cabinet (or paintings on a temple wall), but what a civilization knows is what's in the official records, regardless of how they are stored. Control them & you control everything. Computers didn't make that reality, but people became aware of that reality as our civilizatoin's memory migrated into electronic form.
• When she uses a computer, it's often via colourful menus. Unrealistic it is, I now realize that movies work by showing, & colourful menus are a valid way of letting the audience see what she's doing with a computer.
• When she's being chased on a merry-go-round, I suspect it's a visual homage to the end of “Strangers on a Train”. If the scene had someone crawling under the merry-go-round, I'd be certain it was an intentional reference to that movie.
• When she confronts the main guy who's been chasing her, on a scaffolding, I could swear it's a visual homage to the end of “The Parallax View”. Come to think of it, that movie & this one might go back-to-back well.
• Has me wondering what other references I overlooked.

Brute force password attacks + your router's guest wifi / 2021-09-19 T 09:03

According to Kaspersky, even as late as the year 2020, most of the incidents they ivestigated involved brute force password attacks.[kaspersky]

Reminds me of telling someone to use a password manager & not to “have a system” for making memorable passwords. Even in the year 2020, they reply “I have a good system” which they then describe to you because it's so clever[sarcasm].

This is why your router offers a guest wifi network & why even your {girl, boy, whatever}friend gets that passcode, not the one to your real network.

When to use the Tor browser / 2021-09-03 T 08:22

Don't ask “When should I use the Tor browser?” That's the wrong question. f2byk.html

another blog entry / 2021-09-02 T 20:52

Nothing to see here unless it's an error message. Move along (but thank you for peeking).

start a blog / 2021-09-02 T 12:24

Let's reorganize this, my ancient web site. Short blog(?) entries that say short things or link to longer things. And longer things in their own files (as they already are).