heroes always get remembered, but you know legends never die

Oh, look, the very very bad idea of deliberately breaking cryptological programs has surfaced again. And as the writer of that article says, this is such a staggeringly flawed idea precisely because it demonstrates both a complete misunderstanding of the internet, and a complete misunderstanding of digital security.

But I'll repeat it here: if governments want effective security to protect their own interests, they want that security tight. Insisting that everyone else accept broken security will do two things: first, it will cause general resentment from everyone (if not outright rebellion when corporations say the hell with that nonsense and pull for working security anyway), and second, it will inspire people to break government security. For the value of the information, for spite, just for the hell of it--the why won't matter. The fact that it will happen does.

Moreover, as the writer also pointed out, there is no cryptographic system on the PLANET that hasn't been broken. There are codes that haven't been broken, but as far as digital security goes, the best we can say is "it hasn't been broken yet."

And that really should daunt governments that keep proposing this ridiculousness. Every country who's actually passed something like this has been hacked. And guess what--every country has been hacked anyway, whether they employ broken security or not. Corporations have been hacked. Individuals have been hacked. There is no privacy. And we need to realize that.

The best cryptography on the internet? Is NEVER TO PUT IT ON THE INTERNET.

At the Tres Chic event recently, since it had just opened, I knew it would be lagged; so I turned down my settings and put jellydolls showing up at anything over 24K. And saw this:



Did she really have four arms, or was it just the mesh glitching?



It looked like she had four arms. I admit I was intrigued.



She did have four arms.



Very articulated arms, though I was beginning to wish that most of Tres Chic wasn't so stark white; it occluded much of her outfit, her robotic attachments, and her hair.



I'm pretty sure they were Bento-rigged, because yes, her robotic arms moved with her real ones.



They even changed hand positions.

I was enthralled, to the point that I didn't even try to find out from whence she acquired these marvelous arms. But it was a great look. Really well done, highly impressive.