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Mid-Book Audiobook Review: “How Spies Think” by David Omand
Christ, I’m having a hard time with this book, and I’m not even done / he hasn’t even gotten onto the “tech industry” parts yet. I seek greater understanding of the mindset of how Sir David Omand, GCB, former head of GCHQ, got on stage at an event I attended in 2015* and said words
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I swear the #Eurovision song contest is the single best argument / thought-experiment against Messenger #interoperability under the EU Digital Markets Act
Imagine you have a single messenger app which brings together SMS, WhatsApp, Messenger, Telegram, and one or two other chat apps; what would it really be like to have the same conversation 3-to-5 times over in 3-to-5 different “places” in the same interoperable “app”, but with different “platform” backends? It would be bedlam, because… …because each
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Google Online Security Blog: Advanced Protection: Google’s Strongest Security for Mobile Devices
I think I’ll give it a go: Whether you’re an at-risk individual – such as a journalist, elected official, or public figure – or you just prioritize security, Advanced Protection gives you the ability to activate Google’s strongest security for mobile devices, providing greater peace of mind that you’re protected against the most sophisticated threats.
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Lol that @triclassified podcast has used a banner picture of @runasand in the 4th episode Re: @snowden, which so far has focused on personalities rather than impact, and…
…and for my taste has (so far) entirely ignored the positive benefit of Snowden’s impact on online security and safety. We would have: no WhatsApp or Messenger end-to-end encryption, no mainstream (e.g. BBC) “darkweb” sites, no/delayed TLS 1.3, no “Schrems” laws, reduced drive for PQ algorithm adoption, we would probably still be using RSA rather
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The Mastodons are inventing “Algorithms”
I wonder how long before we see advertising?
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Wikipedia challenging UK law it says exposes it to ‘manipulation and vandalism’ | Wikipedia | The Guardian
Personally I’m disappointed that Wikipedia is not challenging the whole thing, but this is better than nothing: The foundation said it was not challenging the act as a whole, nor the existence of the requirements themselves, but the rules that decide how a category 1 platform is designated. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/may/08/wikipedia-challenging-uk-law-it-says-exposes-it-to-manipulation-and-vandalism
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A “Duck Test” for End-to-End Secure Messaging
This is my technical definition of End-to-End Encryption* which can also be summarised as: “there are ends; respect them” …but this version has the advantage of being measurable. I don’t believe I’ve previously posted this as a standalone blog post; the embedded video is my test run for the presentation which I subsequently gave at
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US Gov’t Signal-clone with backdoor for message retention, hacked, messages leaked | …I really hope #Ofcom are watching re: the impact of proposed client side scanning
Data includes fragments of live communications, including sensitive discussions about pending crypto legislation. Thread: https://x.com/mattjay/status/1919457030793732281 Source: https://www.404media.co/the-signal-clone-the-trump-admin-uses-was-hacked/
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ICYMI: “Every TWINSCAN EUV ships with ~45 million lines of code […] Bugfixes and features start out as *word documents* sent to a series of review boards…”
Remember, kids: all this security nightmare can be fixed through the simple act of regulators demanding that security be implemented “by design”. Or not. Because “security by design” doesn’t mean anything. These are the machines which fabricate all the world’s major CPUs:
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Mike Waltz Accidentally Reveals Obscure App the Government Is Using to Archive Signal Messages | Sigh, but at least I suppose they are shooting in the right direction…
A photograph of Trump administration official Mike Waltz’s phone shows him using an unofficial version of Signal designed to archive messages during a cabinet meeting. https://www.404media.co/mike-waltz-accidentally-reveals-obscure-app-the-government-is-using-to-archive-signal-messages/
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How a 20 year old bug in GTA San Andreas surfaced in Windows 11 24H2 | Silent’s Blog
A fascinating delve into an old “uninitialised variables on stack because of inadequate input validation”-bug, which managed to survive two decades in the wild before detection. https://cookieplmonster.github.io/2025/04/23/gta-san-andreas-win11-24h2-bug/
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