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As always, any implication that all closed-source software, regardless of company, suffers from similar issues, is conveniently absent. Just as it was during th

As always, any implication that all closed-source software, regardless of company, suffers from similar issues, is conveniently absent. Just as it was during the VW emissions scandal - it's the cheating that was problematic, not that consumers are effectively in the dark about how most of their products operate, and deliberately prevented (successfully or not) from finding out (personally, or done on their behalf by others).

hellbanner 9y ago
Do you think because the implications of open-source software would threaten the economic model & world that the writer lives in? Or that it's just an oversight and they just want to earn clicks? I think it's the latter, even if it's in effect the former (unintentioally).
- DarkKomunalec 9y ago
  I don't think this writer omitted it intentionally. I think it's because journalists that are too at-odds with corporate (or other dominant narrative) just have a harder time in their career. No-one gets censored, except in rare cases - they just don't have their contract extended. See https://cartoonistsrights.org/u-s-cartoonist-fired-after-criticizing-monsanto-and-dupont/ https://cartoonistsrights.org/u-s-cartoonist-fired-after-cri... , but I imagine it's usually handled more subtly.
  - hellbanner 9y ago
    "In a Facebook post following his firing, Friday wrote that the incident showed “how fragile our rights to free speech and free press really are in the country.”" Indeed.
thephyber 9y ago
I think the Bloomberg reporting goes beyond that. They claim lots of networking hardware comes pre-installed with Kaspersky software that the end-user may not even be aware of. I can't find specific products so I don't know whether this is just Dell-preinstalled crapware that can be wiped with an OS reinstall or some sort of embedded device where the end user has no interface to disable/uninstall it.
- m103forme 9y ago
  Seeing how horrible and intrusive their endpoint AV is, I can't imagine them "sneaking" any of their products into anything.
codedokode 9y ago
Even worse, in some countries disassembling proprietary software to analyse its behaviour can be prohibited (at least they write this in EULA). And modern OS have no protection against backdoors: desktop OS allow apps to do whatever they want, mobile OS like Android have privileges separation but don't allow user to control Internet traffic: you cannot run iptables or ban an app from accessing the network.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

hellbanner 9y ago

Do you think because the implications of open-source software would threaten the economic model & world that the writer lives in? Or that it's just an oversight and they just want to earn clicks? I think it's the latter, even if it's in effect the former (unintentioally).

DarkKomunalec 9y ago
I don't think this writer omitted it intentionally. I think it's because journalists that are too at-odds with corporate (or other dominant narrative) just have a harder time in their career. No-one gets censored, except in rare cases - they just don't have their contract extended. See https://cartoonistsrights.org/u-s-cartoonist-fired-after-criticizing-monsanto-and-dupont/ https://cartoonistsrights.org/u-s-cartoonist-fired-after-cri... , but I imagine it's usually handled more subtly.
- hellbanner 9y ago
  "In a Facebook post following his firing, Friday wrote that the incident showed “how fragile our rights to free speech and free press really are in the country.”" Indeed.

thephyber 9y ago

I think the Bloomberg reporting goes beyond that. They claim lots of networking hardware comes pre-installed with Kaspersky software that the end-user may not even be aware of. I can't find specific products so I don't know whether this is just Dell-preinstalled crapware that can be wiped with an OS reinstall or some sort of embedded device where the end user has no interface to disable/uninstall it.

m103forme 9y ago
Seeing how horrible and intrusive their endpoint AV is, I can't imagine them "sneaking" any of their products into anything.

codedokode 9y ago

Even worse, in some countries disassembling proprietary software to analyse its behaviour can be prohibited (at least they write this in EULA). And modern OS have no protection against backdoors: desktop OS allow apps to do whatever they want, mobile OS like Android have privileges separation but don't allow user to control Internet traffic: you cannot run iptables or ban an app from accessing the network.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]