Cones
BY Abner Isom
[Editor’s note: This is just a short story, and maybe not a particularly good one. The important thing is that this is fiction, and not suggesting anyone actually do these things.]
She just wanted to see what would happen. Some day, she figured, they were going to do something horrible and over the top — drop a nuke on someone, or start mass arrests, or maybe just that the war would become intolerable to enough people that such an action would be supported. Then this could come in handy, this little technique, and if it were replicated all over the country, it would cost the system billions and billions of dollars each day.
For now, she just wanted to test her hypothesis.
Audrey:
When we were in the caravan for the gulf march, there was a day when we got snarled up in a bit of traffic; I don’t remember exactly what the specifics were. A passenger from the car ahead of us hopped out, wearing one of our orange road guard vests. She began directing traffic – not just the traffic in our group, but the traffic from unrelated vehicles as well. Not a single driver disobeyed her, even though they had clearly seen her jump out of a privately owned vehicle.
That scene stuck in my head because Claire and I suddenly looked at each other with squinty eyes when that happened. We didn’t even have to say anything – we both realized in that moment, and knew that the other realized as well, that we’d just figured out something about human nature, and about how cheap road vests are.
27 February 2007, 11:17 pmDeAnander:
I’ve heard it said that with a hardhat, a clipboard, and a windbreaker with some kind of logo on it you can walk into most anyplace and get away with most anything, except in consciously “secured” environments where a faked nametag might be required.
btw speaking of “secured” environments, from slashdot this day:
for those who don’t immediately grok the implications: RFIDs are microchips that broadcast an ID code which can be “captured” and recognised (or not) by a nearby scanner. they come in different ranges (both scanners and rfids) to enable detection at only a few inches, or distances up to several yards. many — many — “secured” facilities now use door locks with “wave cards” in which a receiver in the powered lock mechanism recognises the ID code in an RFID keychain dongle or card-like format when it comes within a foot or two, thus unlocking the door for authorised personnel.
the thing about RFIDs is that they are always broadcasting, or can be made to broadcast by “tickling” them with a signal. and the employees of these secure financial and federal and state sites are sitting in bars and restaurants, on subways and buses and trains, in toilet stalls etc, within scanner range of any hacker who wants to collect their codes. programming an RFID with a captured code is not rocket science, though you may have to break some cryptography…
anyway, the point of the story is this: the people who buy this technology think it’s big magic technomana that makes them safe and secure. but now a talented hacker figures out how to walk right around the patented “secure” door lock owned by the company that took all those fools’ money. so does the company upgrade their crypto, or recall their locks, or otherwise fix the problem? no, it waves its lawyers at the tech conference where the hacker was going to publish his results, to prevent him from publishing. the conference organisers don’t have the cash to stand up to the corporation’s lawyers so they pull the paper from the roster.
however, you can bet that this paper is going to spread like wildfire through unofficial channels. so the company has achieved absolutely nothing except to keep their customers dumb and happy and clueless, unaware of the fact that their “secure” locks are now about as secure as the original model Kryptonite bike lock, which can be opened with the body of a certain type of ballpoint pen.
thus intellectual property rights improve the world and advance our understanding.
the only real security is in community: face2face recognition and personal trust. all attempts to replace this with bolts&bars or artificial stupidity result in reduced, not enhanced, security. this I think is one of a series of axioms I should start writing down as “DeAnander’s Rules of the Game” or something like that.
28 February 2007, 12:51 amDeAnander:
apropos of all this, I highly, highly recommend this web site
28 February 2007, 12:53 amBikeSummer!:
Very nice post, Stan.
Here are some more messages of peace and hope for these dark hours:
http://bikesummer.org/CanRAND.html
A brief background on the current financial collapse in progress, and suggestions for investing in your community’s future, can be read under the section titled:
“Breaking…Signs BushCo. Is Imploding…”
Thank you for your years of fine work and dedication.
28 February 2007, 5:43 amCharles:
Evidently, Karen Kwiatkowski Lt. Col. ret
was calling for traffic disruption! ??? and also soldier desertion *if* it
is the case that the country is no longer a constitutional republic.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/kwiatkowski/kwiatkowski175.html
http://www.truthdig.com/interview/item/20070227_pentagon_whistleblower_on_the_coming_war_with_iran/
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1 March 2007, 5:05 pm