[LINK] faux-privacy ? (was: It's Queensland - (sorry to Qlders))

[eric scheid]

On 20/5/11 1:54 PM, "Jan Whitaker" <jwhit at melbpc.org.au> wrote:

> At 01:47 PM 20/05/2011, eric scheid wrote:
> 
>> For starters, is Facebook on shaky ground by saying they're protecting your
>> privacy but then making all your private stuff so publicly available? Are
>> they promising something they are failing to deliver on?
> 
> The brute force access on this case reminded me of a similar
> situation a few years ago (probably discussed on Link at the time) of
> a person guessing URLs for bank accounts or some other similar type
> of 'secure' system. Does anyone recall what that was? If the URL is
> guessable, then it's not really secure, is it? Patterns are
> guessable. It wouldn't surprise me if that approach wasn't used a lot
> for just mucking about by bored high school/middle school/uni students.

I don't recall that example, but wouldn't be surprised if it did occur.

Another tangential thought ... if someone were to _systematically_ search
through the nooks and crannies of public space for private objects, thus
defeating security by obscurity ... could they then be at risk of being
charged with the crime of _stalking_? (but certainly not _trespassing_ or
_theft_)

e.