Miscellaneous Tech News

McAfee thinks his wallet product is unhackable. If there is one thing thing guy knows nothing about, it's security.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-45368044

Nobody was able to get the coins... which was the whole point.

But unhackable is a dumb term to use.

scottalanmiller

@obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

McAfee thinks his wallet product is unhackable. If there is one thing thing guy knows nothing about, it's security.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-45368044

Nobody was able to get the coins... which was the whole point.

No one knows that that is the case. No one GOT the coins, so he claims. His claim that no one took coins is in no way suggestive that no one COULD have taken them.

I've left cash by the register at the gas station and had the person chase my down the road to give it back to me. According to John McAfee, that guy could not have kept the money, because he didn't.

That's not how "could have" works.

scottalanmiller

We also don't actually know that coins weren't taken. We only get one raving lunatic that we already know is a liar claiming that they didn't. If someone was able to take them money, why expose themselves for a bounty, when they could stay quiet, force John to keep claiming that it is unhackable, and steal from lots of other people?

John's own logic of what "has to happen" when one can do something, would extend to doing more with that knowledge.

Obsolesce

@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

McAfee thinks his wallet product is unhackable. If there is one thing thing guy knows nothing about, it's security.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-45368044

Nobody was able to get the coins... which was the whole point.

No one knows that that is the case. No one GOT the coins, so he claims. His claim that no one took coins is in no way suggestive that no one COULD have taken them.

I've left cash by the register at the gas station and had the person chase my down the road to give it back to me. According to John McAfee, that guy could not have kept the money, because he didn't.

That's not how "could have" works.

Nobody took the coins. That's what the point of it was. The fact that nobody did, means it's all just "claims". You don't know, I don't know. Could have they? Some claim yes, some claim no. But it's unknown.

All we have to go by is that the coins were not touched. Going by that, it's leaning towards it wasn't possible to take them. That's what we DO know. I haven't seen anything showing it was possible to take the coins.

Obsolesce

@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

We also don't actually know that coins weren't taken.

I've not heard of anyone claiming to have taken the coins. Have you?

scottalanmiller

@obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

We also don't actually know that coins weren't taken.

I've not heard of anyone claiming to have taken the coins. Have you?

Why would we have heard that? If someone had taken the coins, there is absolutely no reason that 1) they would have claimed so and 2) even if they did that we would have heard about it.

We've only heard about the challenge at all because of the absurd claim that it is unhackable. For all we know, the thing doesn't even exist.

scottalanmiller

@obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

McAfee thinks his wallet product is unhackable. If there is one thing thing guy knows nothing about, it's security.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-45368044

Nobody was able to get the coins... which was the whole point.

No one knows that that is the case. No one GOT the coins, so he claims. His claim that no one took coins is in no way suggestive that no one COULD have taken them.

I've left cash by the register at the gas station and had the person chase my down the road to give it back to me. According to John McAfee, that guy could not have kept the money, because he didn't.

That's not how "could have" works.

Nobody took the coins.

How could you possibly know that no one has taken the coins? How are you auditing that? All we know is that one guy that we know is lying for self benefit about this specific thing claims no one has. That's not much to go on, it's roughly nothing to go on. That he even needs to claim it suggests to some degree, that he's covering.

Obsolesce

They why post an article that has absolutely zero credit in every aspect? One that is just completely unknown? Troll post?

scottalanmiller

@obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

All we have to go by is that the coins were not touched. Going by that, it's leaning towards it wasn't possible to take them. That's what we DO know. I haven't seen anything showing it was possible to take the coins.

I sure dont' know that.

What I know is that we have one guy lying and other people that produced some evidence that they could have stolen money and just chose to be good guys. They, at least, supposedly have produced some documentation.

Things we know for sure...

The only person making claims about nothing be taken is a known liar and lunatic.
That that same person has a financial interest in making the product seem more secure than it is.
That having taken or not taken coins would tell us nothing.
That the contest was set up in such a way that the people who would report, won't likely do it.
That anyone who could take the money has more to gain by not reporting that they did it than in claiming that they did.

scottalanmiller

@obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

They why post an article that has absolutely zero credit in every aspect? One that is just completely unknown? Troll post?

There is a lot of credit in it, you are just reading it backwards. You are looking for the credit to be with McAfee, but he isn't the kind of guy to get credit. The point is that the journalist uncovered him trying to scam people.

Obsolesce

@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

They why post an article that has absolutely zero credit in every aspect? One that is just completely unknown? Troll post?

There is a lot of credit in it, you are just reading it backwards. You are looking for the credit to be with McAfee, but he isn't the kind of guy to get credit. The point is that the journalist uncovered him trying to scam people.

I thought the point was to hack in and take the coins. Not provide a theory that it's possible.
I still don't see anything solid on either side. The coins are still there, so we're told, and we have nothing solid showing PoC, except someone saying there may be evidence someone could have.

scottalanmiller

@obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

They why post an article that has absolutely zero credit in every aspect? One that is just completely unknown? Troll post?

There is a lot of credit in it, you are just reading it backwards. You are looking for the credit to be with McAfee, but he isn't the kind of guy to get credit. The point is that the journalist uncovered him trying to scam people.

I thought the point was to hack in and take the coins.

That's what John's trying to sell, yes. But that's smoke and mirrors. He can't define what the point of proving a vulnerability is. The point of security research is protection, not to take money. He made some contest so that he could make crazy claims and have some seemingly plausible excuse for the crazy things that he says. That he made up some potentially fake contest and uses it to discredit normal vulnerability reports in no way negates those reports.

Imagine if every vulnerability report from Microsoft or Linux that was found was discredited because they made up some requirement of their own for it to be real. "It's not a REAL hack if you don't put poetry on my outgoing emails and send it to my mom." As the person being hacked, making up a requirement doesn't change that you were hacked. That is what Mcafee is trying to do, make normal vulnerability reports be discredited under false pretenses.