I've been waiting to see how the scraping space moves forward in a post-selenium world. I cut my teeth at startups writing scrapers that walked private facebook groups. It's been curious to see a few interesting innovations that you can read publicly - like containerized "workers" and clever networking hacks to scale. This guy who wrote an only-fans scraper to judge the income disparity of OF creators was pretty interesting [0]
It's odd to see something this naive published by Microsoft. Software arms-dealers currently operate in very similar ways and have equivalent relationships with government that physical arms dealers do. They provide value and provide services that unfortunately are a necessary evil for nation states, the ability to strike and harm their adversaries via software. Sure, I disagree with the ethics of the situation (as much as I do with the free-agency of arms-dealers who sell AK's to african war lords and missiles to terrorists), but to say they "don't deserve a free pass" is really just a cheap take from Microsoft and largely it's never going to even be Microsoft's decision.
The even more cynical alternative take of the publication is that Microsoft wants governments to prosecute groups who profit from their sloppy work. Which is ironic, since the only reason they write windows exploits is because Microsoft has a de-facto monopoly on government / consumer operating systems.
If we look at operating systems in a Thomas Hobbes Leviathan kind of way, then Microsoft, through its monopoly on spying on your computer and dominating your system, is imbued with a vested interest in preventing anyone else from doing the same since Microsoft wants to conserve that power for itself. So in effect you get one big bad guy rather than thousands of them. Well, at least that's how it should work.
You're wrong to compare these hacking tools to arms dealing. That's a terrible analogy because international arms dealers and their customers aren't going around interfering with the daily home and office life of ordinary Americans. Microsoft talks a lot about NSO Group, which makes tools that sound like highly targeted arms dealing. But let's not forget there's 10x as many smaller companies from that same country, which sell the tools for surveillance and hacking of ordinary people and businesses.
Just the other day I was reading about one called Komedia which sells Layered Service Providers that are used for things like building pre-installed lenovo laptop software that decrypts your https and routes it through some service which injected ads and broke nodejs. It's in my opinion criminality on a scale 100x worse than anything Aaron Swartz ever did (RIP) and for some reason "businesses" that do things like that are becoming increasingly normalized.
As I underderstand it "sells 0day to gov" and "sells 0day for crime" are distinct brokers, even though in some cases they purchase exploits from the same suppliers.
TFA is really only talking about the first group because (for obvious reasons) regulating brokers who sell exploits or tools for criminal purposes is not going to work. That's already illegal.
Insecure spyware/crapware is a distinct (commercial) market which doesn't overlap much with the other two and doesn't rely on "0day" at all.
Broadly I agree with your analysis re: Microsoft's motives here.
However I believe the OP's analogy holds if you don't overextend it beyond exploit sales to government.
Why would anyone with a "real" job want to live in CA or god forbid move to CA? I'm honestly stunned? Does CA understand how basic economics work? You can hate rich people all you want, but at the end of the day they're the ones starting companies and employing people. When are they going to start thinking about limiting spending instead of just finding more ways to wring dough out of people who make an honest living.
For those who disagree with me, please make an argument that in the U.S. making $120k is not an "honest" living...
I wonder how they'll feel about amazon's use of bots to scrape the internet for other retailers using the same UPC codes registered to sellers items on amazon. Amazon penalizes sellers who offer their amazon items for less on other online retailers.
Also, UPC codes are entirely controlled by a single company called GS1, start at $25 each. It's also worth noting that GS1 has been compromised multiple times, allowing overseas hackers to list "copycat" products with cloned UPC's defrauding legitimate sellers. Ironically, invalidating the whole reason UPC codes were invented in the first place.
Sure, thing. It's hard to find info about this because most info about listing things on Amazon is hidden behind hoards of information from course sellers and "get rich quick with amazon FBA" content.
Essentially, Amazon either wants you to A) register a trademark and your brand (the only way to list things without UPC's and use amazon's internal "fxn" label scheme) or purchase UPC's for each product you sell. UPC's are intended to be the same for your product wherever it ends up on the web and are intended to uniquely identify your products. Technically you could purchase a new UPC for each place you list your items, but that can get expensive. Amazon leverages UPC's to identify items in their warehouses and more importantly trace counterfeit items or food items that could require a recall. It used to be common for people to re-sell existing UPC's but recently amazon has started banning sellers for this practice. Having expensive UPC's is also a way to make the barrier to entry higher, making sellers on Amazon really have to want to sell on amazon.
The game theory and psychology of it all is pretty interesting.
I've gotta' be honest, this post makes me miss my time living in the Bay Area, Los Altos specifically.
I don't think I'll ever live anywhere else again where one neighbor couldn't fit his new McLaren 720s in his 70's ranchburger garage after a brief drizzle or my other neighbor who no joke - had a red VW bug with a bumper sticker that read "Ham Radio Saves Lives".
The fact that people are flagrantly supporting her as a "victim" is truly troubling, it's clear she is both the aggressor and abuser. In what world is a PHD / professor publicly shaming and lamenting graduate students over seeming ideological differences not a fucked up situation? The replies to this tweet are golden, most "asking to be added to the list". Our boy @paulg even got in on the action.
One should be aware that these wavelengths might not be particularly healthy for your skin and can result in sunburns without causing the usual red skin symptoms. You should also not look into the light source and wear special glasses if you handle UV light.
Agreed. Safer would be 222nm UVC as it can't penetrate the outer layer of the eye. This is what medical facilities actually use. Unfortunately no LED's exist that can emit in this range at a useful output power. This is still limited to excimer lamps. There are LEDs in this range, but they can't emit high enough output to break down genetic material.
There are some devices with mercury vapor lamps for applications that require a broader spectrum. True though that LED have mostly just one peak and then open up in visible wavelengths again.
Theoretically it should be safe, but I would still use glasses, since even outer layers of your eye are probably photosensitive, not only your retina.
But yes, UVA specifically is dangerous for skin too, since it travels deeper without causing sunburn symptoms but still damaging the tissue, so a shorter wavelength might even be preferable.
The problem with mercury vapor lamps with a broader spectrum is that they produce ozone gas. I've observed this first hand with a philips UV bulb I purchased. Even though this lamp supposedly has a "doping" agent to help block unwanted wavelengths that produce ozone.
Yeah, far UVC is great for the exact reason that it's far less harmful to human skin. However, "far uvc" (207-222nm) leds are even more expensive. Many far uvc devices aren't available to general consumers (to control demand). The units that are available to the general population are incredibly expensive, at least $2k for a lamp large enough for use in a small bedroom.
0 - https://www.xsrus.com/writing/explain/onlyfans/