Bruce’s blog on November 2 linked to an essay by Dan Geer called “Cybersecurity and National Policy” and he called it “Worth reading”. This was my response:

It is so well written I am tempted to believe some of what he says; unfortunately the gaping philosophical errors pain me to do so.

Take, for example, he says “when you do not know where you are going, any direction will do”.

This is not true. You might also decide no direction is acceptable without knowing where you are going. Resistance is an option. Another option is to define “knowing” as a degree rather than absolute. You don’t know where exactly you will end up (completely secure or insecure) but you can estimate higher and lower increments.

Yes, I just used security as an end and not just a means. I would say Geer does too. Although he writes “First, security is a means, not an end” he also gives us three ends: Freedom, Security and Convenience. Am I missing something? The start and end to the essay are a giant contradiction.

He also cherry-picks five quotes about fear from history and calls them “the worry over fear”. I could pick another five quotes from history that oppose his. Why are his five the only perspective worth citing? He does not say.

Examples of those who say not to worry:

“While F.D.R. once told Americans that we have nothing to fear but fear itself, Mr. Ashcroft is delighted to play the part of Fear Itself, an assignment in which he lets his imagination run riot.” – Frank Rich

“Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear.” – Mark Twain

“Men fear death as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased by tales, so is the other.” – Francis Bacon

Geer leaves out the obvious counter-points and takes no time to explain why, although sensible, they do not interfere with his overall hypothesis.

I guess I should write a full and detailed response but let me also just say I see many examples where technology provides freedom, security and convenience together. The automobile. The mobile phone. The fact that we give away something does not mean we have to give it up. It seems to be more about choices than a requirement or an immutable law. Geer’s work thus leaves me with the impression he really is just upset about decisions being made and his essay is a critique of the market and consumers disguised as a study of natural forces.

An agency responsible for parking tickets has a budget deficit. What will they do to balance the books for the year? The San Francisco Examiner says the SFMTA is about to go on a meter warpath.

[Chief Operating Officer John] Haley said the agency, which has a total budget of $775 million, will be putting together a recovery plan to see if it can still meet its projections for the year, which would require more tickets to be issued during the next several months than planned.

I find it funny that they just come out and say they are going to issue more tickets to meet their budget. This is always a possibility but I usually thought it was conspiracy and cynical at best.

The article also gives several possible theories about the cause of the problem such as staff shortages (which saves money, no?), construction work (for which they are reimbursed) and issuing fewer tickets while helping with special events (like Baseball games, also reimbursed).

The Germans have convinced Google to “blur” homes to create privacy in Street View. A test run has not been successful. Deutsche Welle says Google has already admitted an imaging error.

Just two days after Web giant Google introduced the first images of Germany in its Street View mapping feature, the company partially shut the service down due to an error that temporarily allowed some blurred-out houses to be clearly viewed.

At least this type of error is easy to see.