Recent Cloud Hacks

The photos of Jennifer Lawrence are interesting. Why an actress of her stature would take nude and near nude photos of herself with a cell phone is beyond my comprehension.
--
Tom

Look at the picture, not the pixels
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Misuse of the ability to do 100% pixel peeping is the bane of digital photography because it causes people to fret over inconsequential issues.

iOS 7 does that as well. It is not new with 8. It is easy to turn off under settings, iCloud.
--
Tom

Look at the picture, not the pixels
------------
Misuse of the ability to do 100% pixel peeping is the bane of digital photography because it causes people to fret over inconsequential issues.

tbcass said:

The photos of Jennifer Lawrence are interesting.

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Understatement of the year award goes to.. tbcass!
(thunderous applause)

tbcass said:

Why an actress of her stature would take nude and near nude photos of herself with a cell phone is beyond my comprehension.

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I have no idea either, but a lot of people guys are gonna be really happy she did.

Under Settings, Passcode Lock. Turn Simple Passcode off.

Couple of questions

Does the use of encryption add extra steps to every file you save and open?

Is it advisable to encrypt data on external HDD's?

Does it slow you down? Is that a necessary trade off?

Can encryption fail in a way that even authorized users cannot access their own data?

Thanks.

Nobody wants your photo's, so don't sweat it, unless you are a hot girl with nudes? Are you?

Pontoneer wrote:

Pontoneer said:

I've been using mine since the early days of dotMac . Within the Apple system prefs it is very easy to select which items you want backed up ( and synced to your other devices ) and which you do not .

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No doubt - but that wasn't my point.

I was trying to be polite. This is a public forum after all. ;-)
--
Tom

Look at the picture, not the pixels
------------
Misuse of the ability to do 100% pixel peeping is the bane of digital photography because it causes people to fret over inconsequential issues.

Kasra A said:

That's true, but don't you get several notifications since months before they shitdown? I never remember being notified before my hard drive fails!

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I think that hard drives do now give you warning. About 5 years ago my Dell computer warned me that one of the drives was at risk of failure and that gave me type to back it up and replace it. I assume that the hard drive's operating system keeps track of rates of read/write failures and bad sectors and gives a warning if they exceed a certain threshold.

AnthonyL said:

Not my idea of fun at all . Every site I've been to trying to find these photos has had them deleted or is shut down. A wasted morning.

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I'll save you some trouble: all of those celebrities are actually naked underneath their clothes. Since there are millions of photos of naked people on the internet, just paste the head of your favorite onto someone of a similar body type and save time.

tbcass said:

Why an actress of her stature would take nude and near nude photos of herself with a cell phone is beyond my comprehension.

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Probably the same reason many other women her age do so: because she is often apart from her significant other and wants to send him/her some sexy pics.

jfelbab said:

A couple points RE: Apple's icloud...

Initially fingers were pointed at Apple's iCloud for the leak of embarrassing photos of celebrities but now the poster who released the images has admitted that they came from a variety of sources.

iCloud data, photos or files, are encrypted (minimum 128bit DES) prior to transit and are stored in that manner on redundant servers, making them more secure than that same data saved on your computer. iCloud offers the ability to use two step authentication but I suspect few likely are using it.

I plan to utilize iCloud to facilitate a safe and secure, redundant off-site back-up of my important files and images and will not be at all worried about their security. On my local drives, all files are encrypted. It's a feature of the OS that again, I suspect few are using.

This latest hack points to the weakest link, the users involved. Lax security practices, poorly chosen passwords and/or unwise sharing of photos are the most likely source for the recent incident.

Technology is a wonderful thing if used intelligently.

--

Jim
'There are no rules for good photographs, there are only good photographs.'
-- Ansel Adams

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Love systems where you need to be the design engineer or at least an engineer to safely use it.

"What? You weren't born with the knowledge that keeping your important info from being broadcasted, is an option found 7 menus down, under the Display options tree?"

Not like these designers don't purposely hide options so you have to use (by inaction) whatever risky feature their parent company is pushing. Set aside your busy life for the next week while you read up on how your new computer is going to try to burn you.

--
"Very funny, Scotty! Now beam me down my clothes."

ultimitsu said:

GodSpeaks said:

davids8560 said:

<snip>

Any comments about how you use the cloud, or why you too do not?

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Like you, I refuse to use 'Cloud' storage, for 3 reasons...

1: Security

2: How reliable is cloud storage?

- Will it be there/available when you need it... every single time, without fail?

- Will it just be there? Or will it simply disappear without prior notification.

3: Cost. NOTHING is FREE

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Concern 2 and 3 are unfounded.

...

Cost is a non-issue as well, most cloud services are free until you exceed a certain drive space. If you only use cloud for things that you actually want to keep then the free spaces are generally very much sufficient. apple offers like 5GB and xiaomi micloud offers 10GB.

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There's also the bandwidth cost, something you worry about having a monthly cap. If I need files with me I'll take a hard drive or USB key (I take a hard drive with me to work every day so I can continue to work when I get home, plus it doubles as off-site backup UNDER MY CONTROL).

I HATE the idea of programs that HAVE to use the internet in order to operate. People developing these programs have no concept of the cost of bandwidth since they have big corporate accounts.

Kasra A said:

AnthonyL said:

GodSpeaks said:

ultimitsu said:

I dont actually understand the need for explicit photos. I thought it was a lack of confidence thing but when Kate upton and Jenifer lawrence takes them too that cannot be it. What is the motive?

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Fun :-D

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Not my idea of fun at all . Every site I've been to trying to find these photos has had them deleted or is shut down. A wasted morning.

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Seems like your idea of "fun" is looking at them having "fun"!

(Just jokings )

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Ha ha, yes good. I love getting sexy photos from girls I know. The smartphone has been a major boon for this kind of activity. One of the few things I actually like about smartphones. ;-)

ultimitsu said:

GodSpeaks said:

davids8560 said:

<snip>

Any comments about how you use the cloud, or why you too do not?

Click to expand...

Like you, I refuse to use 'Cloud' storage, for 3 reasons...

1: Security

2: How reliable is cloud storage?

- Will it be there/available when you need it... every single time, without fail?

- Will it just be there? Or will it simply disappear without prior notification.

3: Cost. NOTHING is FREE

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Concern 2 and 3 are unfounded.

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Really?

ultimitsu said:

Reliability has not been an issue for large scale internet services. When was the last time hotmail or Gmail or google or ebay or paypal stopped working? pretty much never. Also cloud isnt meant to be the only storage, you are not suppose to delete your copy of the files once you saved them to the cloud; the cloud is suppose to be the easily accessable backup.

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There have been instances of cloud services ceasing to do business, sometimes without warning. As for availability, the internet is not only not secure, it is also not reliable. There are constant outages across the globe. Sometimes the outage only lasts minutes, other times it is hours, or maybe days.

Additionally, you have heavy handed action by ISPs limiting your bandwadth, or governments deciding what you can, or cannot, access. All in the name of 'National Security', of course.

ultimitsu said:

Cost is a non-issue as well, most cloud services are free until you exceed a certain drive space. If you only use cloud for things that you actually want to keep then the free spaces are generally very much sufficient. apple offers like 5GB and xiaomi micloud offers 10GB.

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If you are only using what they provide for free, then you are just using the 'cloud' as temporary storage and not relying on it.

Do you really think Apple, Microsoft, Google or anyone else will provide free storage forever? No, the game plan is to get you hooked on it, then eventually they will start charging a monthly fee for any truely useful sized storage.

It's the same game plan as the rental software Adobe is pushing at the moment. A monthly fee means a constant revenue stream to the companies involved. It's coming, trust me.

Kasra A said:

Russian Consortium said:

ultimitsu said:

GodSpeaks said:

davids8560 said:

<snip>

Any comments about how you use the cloud, or why you too do not?

Click to expand...

Like you, I refuse to use 'Cloud' storage, for 3 reasons...

1: Security

2: How reliable is cloud storage?

- Will it be there/available when you need it... every single time, without fail?

- Will it just be there? Or will it simply disappear without prior notification.

3: Cost. NOTHING is FREE

Click to expand...

Concern 2 and 3 are unfounded.

Reliability has not been an issue for large scale internet services. When was the last time hotmail or Gmail or google or ebay or paypal stopped working? pretty much never. Also cloud isnt meant to be the only storage, you are not suppose to delete your copy of the files once you saved them to the cloud; the cloud is suppose to be the easily accessable backup.

Cost is a non-issue as well, most cloud services are free until you exceed a certain drive space. If you only use cloud for things that you actually want to keep then the free spaces are generally very much sufficient. apple offers like 5GB and xiaomi micloud offers 10GB.

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Symantec, Nirvanix and Ubuntu One have all shut down their cloud service, , as has AOL (Xdrive and AOL Pictures), Hewlett-Packard (Upline), Sony (Image Station), and Yahoo (Briefcase). Plenty of lesser-known online storage firms also have kicked the bucket, including Digital Railroad. Dell is shutting down DataSafe next year. These were all "voluntary shutdowns of service", and don't address what happened to Megaupload, which was shut down by the US justice department.

Cloud storage is simply not a safe place to keep anything you want kept, and certainly not a safe place to keep anything you don't want public.

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That's true, but don't you get several notifications since months before they shitdown?

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Not always.

Kasra A said:

I never remember being notified before my hard drive fails!

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SMART monitoring.

Austinian said:

whvick said:

USA today article this morning said that the new IOS will automatically upload all pictures to the cloud. I hope there is a way to turn that off.

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I hope there is also, but given that Apple seems to be the default system for medical organizations (so I've been told) I expect there will be a way for that to be turned off easily. I think the default setting should be 'off', frankly. Assuming there is a setting.

Austinian said:

Austinian said:

1. it would make people who take a lot of pictures have to buy extra space on the cloud that they may not want.

2. Doctors are using their smartphone to quickly take and share pictures for diagnostic purposes. It is extremely helpful to get a second opinion in minutes rather than days. But will this create a breach of privacy if it is put on the icloud?

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The HIPAA regulations are very complex, and that is not my field. But my understanding from talking to people in health care is that the penalties for medical privacy violations can be severe.

That doesn't mean it hasn't happened, or won't in the future, online or not. ;-)

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I work in IT in healthcare. Fortunately my systems are business-related (accounting, payroll etc.) and don't contain patient data, but I am totally leery of putting ANYTHING on 'the cloud' where all you can do is trust and hope that the data is secure. Who can tell if it is or isn't? Look at what Google can do with the 'web - just a phrase of a few words can bring up one single web page out of how many billions there are. Imagine what could be done plowing through medical data? And I don't care if it's encrypted, I don't trust it just placed on 'the cloud'. One virus or trojan could corrupt or destroy staggering amounts of data including corrupting the backups as well.

Yet I see organizations in healthcare racing to put their data in 'the cloud' and I think that is just plain crazy. The savings are far outweighed by the dangers. I'm not posting naked photos on the cloud (or anywhere else) but those would be small potatoes indeed compared to the risk of having patient medical info hacked.

Kasra A said:

That's true, but don't you get several notifications since months before they shitdown?

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I sure hope so!

When The Cloud first became available, I did not have unlimited data on my provider contract. This made The Cloud more expensive than a new hard drive.

In my home network, I have no sharing of storage devices, yet my antivirus program constantly signs me out of sites I have permanently logged in. This implies there are attempts to get into my drives via the upload paths I am using.

So why would I exacerbate the problem by using The Cloud?

Henry

Russian Consortium said:

Russian Consortium said:

Reliability has not been an issue for large scale internet services. When was the last time hotmail or Gmail or google or ebay or paypal stopped working? pretty much never. Also cloud isnt meant to be the only storage, you are not suppose to delete your copy of the files once you saved them to the cloud; the cloud is suppose to be the easily accessable backup.

Click to expand...

Symantec, Nirvanix and Ubuntu One have all shut down their cloud service, , as has AOL (Xdrive and AOL Pictures), Hewlett-Packard (Upline), Sony (Image Station), and Yahoo (Briefcase). Plenty of lesser-known online storage firms also have kicked the bucket, including Digital Railroad. Dell is shutting down DataSafe next year. These were all "voluntary shutdowns of service",

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The issue was over reliability, As you and another poster noted, these services did not break down as an outage.

Russian Consortium said:

and don't address what happened to Megaupload, which was shut down by the US justice department.

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Megaupload was never a cloud service as such, it was more like an online large file storage designed for file sharing. And it too did go down due to technical reliability issue, as you correctly noted.