Not all Linux distros "spy" on their users. Slackware is actively paying attention to the spying aspect and PV/Alien Bob and crew refuse (as far as I know) to put that junk in the distro. Also Linus has told the NSA to jog on. BSD is far more secure IMO. That opinion is based on how the OS itself is set up using jails and the zfs file system.
I believe that the BSD community has recognized the problem and are addressing it, for OpenSSL. There is a lot more going on that is not the community though, it's the corporations like Canonical that are the issue. It takes money to operate a corporation, and where do you get it if your software/OS is FOSS? They cant rightly justify making people hundreds of dollars like MS does, and obviously they are not making it supporting the software/OS, so what's the next step?
There's were the debate begins, and it's ongoing and isn't ending anytime soon. The simple answer is no, that's not what the NSA is supposed to do. Instead of foiling terror attacks, the NSA is there for the purpose of giving FBI and CIA data for domestic law enforcement (parallel construction). The NSA program undermines the US constitution and is 100% illegal. Keeping people monitored 24/7 is exactly what the Stasi did, and the technology of today would be the Stasi's dream come true. I think so many people are so apathetic and conditioned to being bugged 24/7, that Microsoft saw this and decided they could go way overboard with designing Windows 10 to spy on the user. NSA, FBI and CIA also most likely had influence over every OS Microsoft has released since Windows 95.
I had a gut feeling that BSD won't take the bait. It's a nice surprise that Slackware also showed them the finger. I'm going to lurk around in my Kanotix installation to see if there are those 2 "apps" and if that's the case...I'm moving to Slack or BSD. @Skaendo: does Slackware have a package maintainer that also installs the dependencies of a program or...?
Can't someone who is extremely opinionated say the same for the BSD folks? What is actually driving them? Isn't that possible that BSD is just another big facade for NSA to spy on people with heightened sense of security/persecution? To me, greed is good. I'd trust folks who are more foreright and accept that financial motives are behind whatever they are doing, rather than folks who say that they are here for good of humanity. Just a opinion, though! Isn't NSA by virtue of protecting people by whatever means necessary from enemies, within and without, upholding the basic ethos of US constitution? What's more "patriotic" and "constitutional"" than that? May be my views are reflection of my status in my own country. I'm "the majority" in my country. As such, more often than not, my views are almost always more aligned with the majority's and the government that's elected(always by majority) to protect the people(majority, I presume). I wouldn't rebel against my country/government/system/whatever because I've got more to lose than minorities, fringe or otherwise. Again just a opinion, though!
??? They will shove it up pretty civilized. They will do it so civilized that you'll be all queuing for it. They'll even give you rewards.
This thread serves no purpose other than to rile up people on information that is inaccurate and always changing. Most people are so out of touch they get hear-say information. This thread should not serve as a place to get information seeing as there is a perfectly get repo stickied for such things. This thread merely exemplifies everything wrong with the Windows 10 forum. It stokes FUD as it marches ever closer to conspiratorial theories. Congratulations you have finally descended from rational thinking to believing everything you read in a small chunk of the web.
Greed is not good. That is what has brought the USA to where it is now. There is a new revolution brewing and those who can't see it will be out of luck. If you don't believe me, just look at the popularity that Trump has right now, and it's not just the GOP and republican voters, democrats are joining as well. MicroShaft and the other "too big to fail" corporations are in for a big awakening. People are starting to vote with their dollars and not their political views. The NSA has not protected anything but "Corporate America" from the people. There has not been one documented instance where the NSA has done anything for "National Security". IMHO, the NSA needs to be shut down. There is already too many government agencies that don't do anything for the protection of US citizens. Most US citizens seem to agree with me, and if you don't believe me, take a look at gun sales since obummer has been pushing his gun control agenda. Then look at democrat controlled areas, Chicago, New york, DETROIT, Los Angeles, Austin. All of them have STRICT gun control policies, yet they have the highest homicide rates. Coincidence? I don't think so. Those cities also have high Muslim/Islamic communities in them. I'm all for freedom of religion, but if your religion makes you murder other religious people then it's not religion anymore. It's murder and needs to be dealt with as the old saying goes.... an eye for an eye?
It's near impossible. And yeah, technically somebody could flip a coin for 5 years and get nothing but tails. If the source code is open, not only would an NSA employee or contractor be more hesitant about posing as a legitimate dev and attempting to hide a backdoor in the code, but it would eventually be caught. Hacking into a Linux box is different, such as performing a zero-day exploit. That's a completely different topic, and that is doable by NSA but it wouldn't be easy depending on how secure the system is. NSA's efforts are better met by subverting closed source systems, where not only is it extremely easy to weaken encryption in closed source systems (as I posted above regarding BitLocker) and hide backdoors in the code, but you have Microsoft that works very closely with NSA and FBI. Strong trustable crypto is always open source. You can't trust it if it's closed source. The same goes for operating systems.
In regard to SSL, it is a tricky situation. Limited number of people developing it (6) compared to "speculatively" one HIGHLY PAID person at the NSA looking for an hole, is unfair. If there were more people involved in the development of OpenSSL then the exploit may (or may not) have been caught earlier.
America post 1960-1970 or pre 1960-1970? Trump is just selling dreams, just like current POTUS did. Couldn't have agreed more, especially with the last couple of sentences. But you'd agree that enemies are within the boundaries, too, right? And that they need to neutralized before they act, right? So, how are sleuths supposed to do that without well, let's say, some overreach?
if I remember correctly somebody did catch the hole in OpenSSL like a decade or more ago but just left it there, probably due to the funding problem.
Hypothetically, let's say somebody tells you 10 things in a few paragraphs and 4 of them are lies. Are you going to be able to discern that the exact 4 things out of their mouth were lies yet the other 6 were dead on honest? No. You would pretty much write the person off as a "liar" and not believe anything they say at all, because that would be the only logical choice. So, when it comes to NSA and them exploiting OpenSSL for years, let's take a look at these two paragraphs from a reputable news agency: The NSA has just about zero oversight and they are not audited. They have turned into a rogue agency that subverts the U.S. constitution and undermines software security, encryption, and the communications of U.S. citizens. The tried and true scare tactic of making people afraid of a needle dropping because of "terrorism" is greatly starting to lose momentum.