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[davkol]

CrowdSuck

How did software designed to protect customers from paralyzing system disruptions instead cause what may be the most destructive software glitch in recorded history? A 2018 antitrust case holds some clues.

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According to the lawsuit, in a pique of damage control, CrowdStrike allegedly colluded with some competing software developers and a nonprofit standards organization whose leadership they controlled to blackball a group of independent third-party software testing outfits that specialized in testing and identifying defects in so-called “endpoint protection” software, a variety of cybersecurity software CrowdStrike pioneered. The complaint says that, through the nonprofit Anti-Malware Testing Standards Organization (AMTSO), the companies had promulgated a bogus new set of narrow parameters by which third-party testing shops were allowed to test their products—essentially, a Mutual Enshittification Pact—and promised to boycott and/or sue any third-party testing shops that lobbied for more expansive or rigorous testing standards.

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Maureen Tkacik
July 25, 2024
The American Prospect

[davkol]

Holy CRAP the UN Cybercrime Treaty is a nightmare

"Cybercrime" is "anything any government dislikes" and every government will have to help every other government fight it.

Cory Doctorow
July 23. 2024
Pluralistic

EFF, International Partners Appeal to EU Delegates to Help Fix Flaws in Draft UN Cybercrime Treaty That Can Undermine EU's Data Protection Framework

With the final negotiating session to approve the UN Cybercrime Treaty just days away, EFF and 21 international civil society organizations today urgently called on delegates from EU states and the European Commission to push back on the draft convention's many flaws, which include an excessively broad scope that will grant intrusive surveillance powers without robust human rights and data protection safeguards.

The time is now to demand changes in the text to narrow the treaty's scope, limit surveillance powers, and spell out data protection principles. Without these fixes, the draft treaty stands to give governments' abusive practices the veneer of international legitimacy and should be rejected.

Letter below:

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Katitza Rodriguez, Karen Gullo
July 17, 2024
Electronic Frontier Foundation

If Not Amended, States Must Reject the Flawed Draft UN Cybercrime Convention Criminalizing Security Research and Certain Journalism Activities

The latest and nearly final version of the proposed UN Cybercrime Convention—dated May 23, 2024 but released today June 14—leaves security researchers’ and investigative journalists’ rights perilously unprotected, despite EFF’s repeated warnings.

The world benefits from people who help us understand how technology works and how it can go wrong. Security researchers, whether independently or within academia or the private sector, perform this important role of safeguarding information technology systems. Relying on the freedom to analyze, test, and discuss IT systems, researchers identify vulnerabilities that can cause major harms if left unchecked. Similarly, investigative journalists and whistleblowers play a crucial role in uncovering and reporting on matters of significant public interest including corruption, misconduct, and systemic vulnerabilities, often at great personal risk.

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Katitza Rodriguez
June 14, 2024
Electronic Frontier Foundation

The UN Cybercrime Draft Convention is a Blank Check for Surveillance Abuses

The United Nations Ad Hoc Committee is just weeks away from finalizing a too-broad Cybercrime Draft Convention. This draft would normalize unchecked domestic surveillance and rampant government overreach, allowing serious human rights abuses around the world.

The latest draft of the convention—originally spearheaded by Russia but since then the subject of two and a half years of negotiations—still authorizes broad surveillance powers without robust safeguards and fails to spell out data protection principles essential to prevent government abuse of power.

As the August 9 finalization date approaches, Member States have a last chance to address the convention’s lack of safeguards: prior judicial authorization, transparency, user notification, independent oversight, and data protection principles such as transparency, minimization, notification to users, and purpose limitation. If left as is, it can and will be wielded as a tool for systemic rights violations.

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Katitza Rodriguez
June 14, 2024
Electronic Frontier Foundation

UN Cybercrime Draft Convention Dangerously Expands State Surveillance Powers Without Robust Privacy, Data Protection Safeguards

As we near the final negotiating session for the proposed UN Cybercrime Treaty, countries are running out of time to make much-needed improvements to the text. From July 29 to August 9, delegates in New York aim to finalize a convention that could drastically reshape global surveillance laws. The current draft favors extensive surveillance, establishes weak privacy safeguards, and defers most protections against surveillance to national laws—creating a dangerous avenue that could be exploited by countries with varying levels of human rights protections.

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Katitza Rodriguez, Cindy Cohn
July 17, 2024
Electronic Frontier Foundation

[Jan.Priessnitz]

Tady je konečně nějaká definice fenovému "Woke", která vzhledem k tomu, že je od britského Guardianu, je možná něčím, s čím by se dalo i pracovat:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... king-class

Vlastně jde o převyprávění songu "Easy to by Hard" z muzkálu Hair

[qnx]

В окружении в Курской области оказались около 30 офицеров из стран НАТО
https://ria.ru/20250316/okruzhenie-2005316102.html

[davkol]

The American Prospect June 2025 Issue: Golden Age of Scams

The Golden Age of Scams

How Trump’s second term will unleash dishonesty and abuse across the economy.

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The first Trump administration didn’t pay much attention to white-collar civil and criminal enforcement, but this term is off the charts. Investigations into any business executive with even a passing relationship to Trump have been scotched, with beneficiaries ranging from the richest man in the world to the husband of the education secretary. Over 100 active enforcement actions have been either paused or dropped across the executive branch. In March, Trump donor Trevor Milton was pardoned after being sentenced for lying to investors; in April, Trump issued a corporate pardon to BitMEX, a crypto exchange that had pled guilty to failing to prevent money laundering.

Entire areas of the law, from prohibitions on U.S. companies bribing foreign countries to crackdowns on public corruption to bans on workplace discrimination, have essentially vanished. An orgy of deregulation, mainly benefiting corporate activities, is being planned. About $50 million in donations for Trump’s inauguration festivities came from companies under active federal investigation or lawsuits, and it’s hard to believe that any of those cases will see the light of a courtroom, or that any of those executives will be held accountable.

Most importantly, anyone who buys a product or secures a loan has been abandoned by their government. The consumer protection unit and (literally) the kleptocracy unit of the Justice Department will both be disbanded; the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has been defanged (even if 1,500 of its workers have been temporarily saved by court orders); and two Democratic commissioners of the Federal Trade Commission were illegally fired.

Busting up the safeguards against rapaciousness and greed means that the bad money will drive out the good. Trump’s second term has sent up a giant flashing signal to every miscreant, thief, and bad actor in America that their moment is now. “All signs point to open season on anyone who would have relied on these kinds of protections to soften the invisible hand,” Rick Claypool, research director at Public Citizen, told me.

But where will the bad money lurk? What will it target? Who is at risk? We wanted to explore what to watch out for in a golden age of scams, what innovations will emerge in the exciting industry of parting people from their money. In this issue, we detail different critical segments of the economy—health care, higher education, energy efficiency, small-business sustainability—where financing is a hurdle and desperation can create opportunity. And we pay special attention to the most powerful beneficiary of a country without financial watchdogs: the president himself, who is now less the commander in chief and more of a crypto mogul and meme coin hype man who just happens to be able to sign bills into law.

It’s important to document where the next scams will originate, because unrestrained corporate misconduct has historically fueled larger catastrophes. “We have seen this movie before, when the mortgage crisis ripped a hole in the world economy,” Seth Frotman, former general counsel of the CFPB, said in a congressional hearing in March, “and the sequel may well be much worse than the original.”

Let these stories be both a warning and a call to action, to help avoid abusive practices and to learn about the presidential directives from whence they spring.

David Dayen
May 27, 2025
The American Prospect

• Pyramid Schemes Are Eating American Capitalism Multilevel marketing companies helped produce President Trump, and he is ruining everything.

• Three Coin Monte The Trump administration is removing every financial guardrail from crypto, in order to enrich the first family and its tech and finance allies while destabilizing the economy.

• Borrowers Besieged Student debtors are under attack on all sides. Government contractors make their life miserable, and financial predators are poised to capitalize.

• Predatory Lenders in the Operating Room Medical credit cards have gone mainstream, preying on sick people at their most vulnerable.

• Sunburnt How door-to-door solar salespeople can scam homeowners, and what the government could do to stop it.

• Usury in the Water There’s never been a better time to be a loan shark for small businesses.