Monthly Archives: December 2015

Dark Horse Brian Forde Tops CoinDesk's 2015 Influencer List

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Brian Forde with phallus near mouthIn the CoinDesk ranking of "most influential" people "in Bitcoin and Blockchain" allegedly determined through a reader vote, dark horse candidate Brian Forde won by coming in second only to obligatory first place winner Satoshi Nakamoto (archived). Forde is the director of MIT's Digital Currency Initiative, the Ford Edsel (archived) of organizations orbiting and trying to subvert Bitcoin.

Forde's tenure at the MIT Digital Currency Initiative precedes that of Gavin Andresen by only a week with Forde arriving on April 15th while Gavin joined up a week later. Prior to arriving in this corner of the MIT Media lab Forde worked in the White House for the Hussein Bahamas administration where as per his MIT biography: Continue reading →

Judge Nevin Dawson: Dotcom Can Be Extradited To United States

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New Zealand District Court Judge Nevin Dawson has ruled that Kim Dotcom can be extradited to the United States (archived). Dotcom's extradition hearing began in September with Dotcom finally presenting his defense back in October. Dotcom plans to appeal the decision and has in the past received markedly more favorable outcomes from New Zealand appellate courts, including a rebuke of the asset forfeitures imposed upon him. The lower courts however have consistently ruled in a manner favorable to the United States Department of "Justice" which seeks to prosecute Dotcom in spite of Dotcom having never been a United States Person under any reasonable definition. Dotcom and his alleged co defendants will continue to reside in New Zealand on bail while the Appeal moves forward, but because this ruling "increased their flight risk" they now have to comply with more onerous demands including twice weekly reports at police stations.

Desperate United States Revives Plutonium-238 Production

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Oak Ridge National Laboratory operated by the United States Department of Energy has issued a press release announcing the resumption of Plutonium-238 production in the United States (archived). Since the United States ceased production in the late 1980's they have filled their appetite for the isotope through foreign purchases supplemented by their dwindling stockpile. The increasingly frosty relationships between the United States and developed countries that maintained Plutionium-238 production capability has forced the United States into independently producing the material again at great cost. Plutonium-238 is used as a radio thermal power source in medical and space related applications. The ongoing decline of relations between the United States and the developed world is likely to continue injuring the ability of the United States government to participate in international markets.

Payment Card Industry Clings To SSLv3 And TLS 1.0 For Two More Years

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Yesterday the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) announced it has decided to extend its deadline for the fiat payment card industry to abandon SSL version 3 and TLS version 1.0 all the way into June of 2018 (archived). Back in April they had tried to set a June 2016 deadline parties handling fiat payment cards to move up to at least TLS version 1.1 or higher in light of POODLE, SHA1 weakness, and other protocol level attacks. General Manager Stephen Orfei of the PCI SSC blames "business issues" for the extension. These extra two years create the potential for massive fraud involving intercepted payment card information, but massive fraud is an inherent part of the fiat system.

CMU Tor Attack Implicated In Mannion Arrest

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In one of the more bizarre stories arising out of Operation Onymous and the Silk Road 2 takedown, Neil Mannion who was initially arrested back in November 2014, released, had news of his arrest retracted, was rearrested, and was now sentenced to six and a half years in prison has recently been fingered as a victim (archived) of Carnegie Mellon University's attack on the Tor network. The hazards of using the Tor Network for safety critical communications have been addressed previously on Qntra.

Fake Star Wars Torrents Already Popping Up On Trackers

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With the release of the new Star Wars film numerous fake torrents are being uploaded that claim to be the film. Many can be superficially spotted by checking file extensions and employing healthy caution about claims of quality. For such a new release legitimate torrents will likely emerge advertising CAM, HDCAM, and Telesync quality. BDRIP and HDRIP will be unlikely until the film nears home media release. Several fake Star Wars torrents spotted so far came from uploader accounts which appear to have been farmed with some effort having previous credible uploads in a social engineering effort to avoid the superficial appearance of spreading malware or harvesting IP addresses for litigation. Remember to exercise caution and let people with less impulse control handle the dirty work of identifying the actual film torrents when they appear.

Police Department Thanks Pedophile Officer For Service

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The late Detective Edward Abbott of the Manassas, Virginia police department shot himself in his home when other detectives arrived to arrest him for sex crimes against children. Abbot was also a youth hockey coach and once made the news for his desire to photograph a minor child's erect penis (archived) while investigating a "sexting" case. A search warrant to have that child taken to the hospital for injection with an erection inducing drug followed by photography was approved by a judge in that case. Abbott sued the child's lawyer for defamation when the lawyer relayed information to the public like (archived): Continue reading →

Corpse of Vessenes' Fundnation Expels Janssens From Board

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Oliver Janssens reported on Social media today that his fellow board members at the Vessenes' Fundnation expelled him from the board (archived). The circumstances leading to the expulsion followed a failed vote to disband the Vessenes' Fundnation in light of their breakneck march to insolvency. While this drama plagues the Vessenes' Foundation, the actual Bitcoin Foundation's work continues in providing stewardship over a reference Bitcoin codebase. Meanwhile other fiat backed groups incorporating words like "Digital Currency", "Council", "Blockchain", "R3", and "Chamber of Commerce" in their names have emerged trying to fill the void left by the late Vessenes' Fundnation in promoting scams and trying to subvert Bitcoin to fiat.