Posted on 09/16/2009 12:59:24 PM PDT by Clint Williams
sholto writes
"US intelligence agencies are advising top US IT executives to weigh their laptops before and after visiting China as one of many precautions against corporate espionage. Symantec Chief Technology Officer Mark Bregman said he was also advised to buy a new cellphone for each visit and to throw it away after leaving. Bregman said he kept a separate MacBook Air for use in China, which he re-images on returning, but claimed he didn't subscribe to the strictest policies. 'Bregman said the US was also concerned about its companies employing Chinese coders, particularly in security.'"
Gee... I dunno about this one... anyone know much several lines of code weight?
Sounds to me like the State Department is “racial profiling”. Someone alert the ACLU!!!
/sarc
It’s not the code persay, rather it’s taking all of those nice skinny 1’s and turning them into fat 0’s.
This is looking for surreptitious hardware, not software.
Dude... buy some humor... it was a joke. :)
Reminds me of an anecdote about the moon mission:
Since “software” was listed on the manifest for the lunar mission, the payload specialist went to ask the programmers how much it weighed. The programmers told them that software doesn’t weigh anything.
The payload guy went off a bit confused, but showed up later with a stack of punch cards. “They told me that this was the software! This could have significant weight”.
The programmer said, “oh, the software is in the holes”.
It is possible though unlikely, to add a board that runs code in parallel. Further possible to change bios chip sets, HDs etc so that they function the same to the user but adds intelligence gathering capabilities.
However, you point is correct. The greater threat is to software.
Gee, that's a tough one because tight, terse code is much denser so it can be much heavier than it appears.
True. An executive who carries laptops, sync’s their iPod/iPhone and connects to a Chicom network could be in risky territory. You just know the Chinese government is sniffing packets looking for any interesting information.
I’m sure they have quite a few engineers designing software to spy on foreign systems, not to mention the social engineering of a friendly corporate type who wants an excuse to show a product demo and gets you to play his “CD” or download his “PowerPoint” presentation.
>> it’s taking all of those nice skinny 1’s and turning them into fat 0’s.
Nah, zeroes are empty in the middle. They look fatter but they’re mostly... well, mostly *nothing*.
1’s pack together much more densely.
>> anyone know much several lines of code weight?
BASIC or C?
Since the phones and computers were made in China, why would the Chinese wait for the device to return before putting the spy stuff on it.
Gee... I dunno about this one... anyone know much several lines of code weight?
I've worked on some pretty heavy code in the past, but don't know the exact weight. I just assumed it was counter-balanced by the bloatware in the OS.
>> anyone know much several lines of code weight?
You mean like how many lines per gram?
It all depends on how much company you have...
weigh their laptops before and after
Gee... I dunno about this one... anyone know much several lines of code weight?”
I would like to know that, also.
LOL
That’s similiar to a question I ask my high school physics class...
“What’s the difference in the mass of a blank CD and one that’s full?”
They get it.
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