4 ms·

I find it kinda amusing that the New York Times lead reporter on cybersecurity has a book out literally called "This is How They Tell Me the World Ends" and we'

I find it kinda amusing that the New York Times lead reporter on cybersecurity has a book out literally called "This is How They Tell Me the World Ends" and we're on the worlds premier hacker forum pondering about the point of safety in software languages.

skybrian 5y ago
Have you read it? Is it good? Maybe submit a link to a review?
PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
You seem to be trying to make the point that is should be completely obvious what the point of safety is. And yet so much (not all, but a substantial part) of what that book is about has very little relationship to language safety. Rust will not protect you if there's a backdoor left in the system. Rust will not protect you if there's no password, or absurdly weak passwords. Rust will not protect you if your entire system design is predicated on a perimeter defense with no internal checks. Etc. etc. Now, I'm not so stupid as to believe that we shouldn't do all we can, and that can include language safety. But by itself, that doesn't have a lot to do with the huge end goal laid out in the book, which might be summarized as: be able to build computational systems and networks that are extremely resistant to unintended access, utilization and modification in pursuance of personal, political or national goals".
- 3pt14159 5y ago
  > And yet so much (not all, but a substantial part) of what that book is about has very little relationship to language safety. Yes, yes. I know that. But we literally have a book floating around around THE END of the WORLD and us nerds can't justify even the first step around fixing these systems. It's like someone asking what good fire hydrants are since they won't help with battery fires.
avgcorrection 5y ago
I can’t believe people care about cybersecurity when climate change is a bigger threat to us all ad nauseam.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
  They don't need to be mutually exclusive. They operate on different time scales too (or can). And the nature of the solutions is fairly different in each case. Were someone actually able to hack into a power generation plant and destroy it, they might actually intersect in some way.
  - avgcorrection 5y ago
    Meanwhile PL design (in particular memory safety) doesn’t impact cybersecurity? That seems to be the indirect implication (going by GP).
    - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
      My point about PL design was that it may not be the most important issue with cybersecurity, and that even if it was, there are still many other important issues that it does not impact.

skybrian 5y ago

Have you read it? Is it good? Maybe submit a link to a review?

PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago

You seem to be trying to make the point that is should be completely obvious what the point of safety is. And yet so much (not all, but a substantial part) of what that book is about has very little relationship to language safety. Rust will not protect you if there's a backdoor left in the system. Rust will not protect you if there's no password, or absurdly weak passwords. Rust will not protect you if your entire system design is predicated on a perimeter defense with no internal checks. Etc. etc. Now, I'm not so stupid as to believe that we shouldn't do all we can, and that can include language safety. But by itself, that doesn't have a lot to do with the huge end goal laid out in the book, which might be summarized as: be able to build computational systems and networks that are extremely resistant to unintended access, utilization and modification in pursuance of personal, political or national goals".

3pt14159 5y ago
> And yet so much (not all, but a substantial part) of what that book is about has very little relationship to language safety. Yes, yes. I know that. But we literally have a book floating around around THE END of the WORLD and us nerds can't justify even the first step around fixing these systems. It's like someone asking what good fire hydrants are since they won't help with battery fires.

avgcorrection 5y ago

I can’t believe people care about cybersecurity when climate change is a bigger threat to us all ad nauseam.

PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
They don't need to be mutually exclusive. They operate on different time scales too (or can). And the nature of the solutions is fairly different in each case. Were someone actually able to hack into a power generation plant and destroy it, they might actually intersect in some way.
- avgcorrection 5y ago
  Meanwhile PL design (in particular memory safety) doesn’t impact cybersecurity? That seems to be the indirect implication (going by GP).
  - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
    My point about PL design was that it may not be the most important issue with cybersecurity, and that even if it was, there are still many other important issues that it does not impact.