Sep 05 2006

Loose Lips…

Published by at 9:49 am under All General Discussions

People need to stop trying to show off their technical knowledge on open forums and the like. I deliberately keep details off this blog that could help a terrorist avoid detection. But it seems others are not so well disciplined. Since this is out might as well use it as an example of what NOT to do. Come on folks, what is more important? Showing off or protecting lives?

3 responses so far

3 Responses to “Loose Lips…”

  1. For Enforcement says:

    yea, and something else that bothers me is Homeland Security telling terrorists what they can take on an airplane. A liquid prescription or baby formula are examples. So just run out and get a prescription for cough syrup and you (I guess) can take a bottle of anything if it has a pharmacy label. Try to keep them in the dark or at least guessing.

  2. pull says:

    “People need to stop trying to show off their technical knowledge on open forums and the like.”

    I work in a security research field.

    This is how things operate. It may seem cut and dry argument to guys outside of these fields, but it is not.

    For instance, was VOIP designed to be secretly weak so as to trap terrorists? News to me. Who else is depending on this? A lot of people in China use VOIP. What if these dissidents were depending on this kind of technology? Keep silent so they can die in hopes some terrorists might use it?

    Also, because people do not openly discuss threats they do not figure out better ways to handle threats. What we end up relying on, therefore, is the government entirely. There ends up being no public debate on what is secure and what is not secure.

    I don’t know… I could see how this could appear to be good to non-researchers… consumers… but, it isn’t.

    It is really, really bad.

    For far too many reasons to list.

    It is a basic principle of open forums.

    There are limitations to these things. Some things just should be kept quiet on. But you are conceited it you think only you could come up with such a secret. And while you keep such a secret yourself you are wrong to believe the government would already know it and the terrorists wouldn’t.

    Truth be told it very may well be the terrorists figure it out before the government.

    Government is not very effecient whatsoever for such things.

  3. pull says:

    “For Enforcement “:

    That is a good idea. I, personally, had not heard of that before. I didn’t know there were allowed liquids, though, as I do not fly. Being a researcher, I don’t have to.

    I disagree all things should be quiet on. This means we can’t speak out about problems. This means we have to wait on guys who live on creating red tape… to figure out the problems.

    There are limitations, of course. If you think of something no terrorist is likely to ever think of in a million years… keep quiet on it.

    But, how do you judge that? Really?

    We can very easily believe our ideas to be one in a million. Truth is, they may be one in a million. But, there is no way to prove that. They may be one in ten and we may just be conceited. It happens.