In Umberto Eco’s 1988 novel Foucault’s Pendulum, the protagonist tries to access a friend’s computer only to come up against the prompt, “Do you know the password?” After umpteen unsuccessful attempts, the exasperated protagonist types, “No.” Which unlocks the computer. You might think, Get real, Umberto, what kind of nitwit uses an easily-guessed password like […]
DESPITE THE DAWN of the 21st century in most places, it’s not unusual for government offices to require documents by fax, as if anyone besides government offices has fax machines any more. Ask if a PDF will do only if you’re prepared to explain what a PDF is. So, when the United States Department of Agriculture goes digital […]
Six weeks ago, mild-mannered, 28-year-old Edgar Maddison Welch, father of two, entered a Washington D.C. pizza parlor and fired three rounds from an AR-15-style rifle. His objective was to liberate children he believed were being held captive there by a ring of abusive pedophile conspirators. Fortunately, no one was injured. Welch’s rounds struck only a wall, […]
Shortly before New Year’s Day, Michael McLeod spotted a curious ad on Gumtree, a UK-based online classified advertising site. A private seller was offering, at full retail price, a brand-new 12W2F Workout Station, the most expensive product made by McLeod’s employer, The Jim Bradley Speedball Company, a small sports equipment manufacturer in Melbourne, Australia. To […]
To an extent, whether the EMV chip migration glass is half-full or half-empty depends on how you want to look at it. The glass is half-full EMV chips are taking hold, now gracing 47 percent of issued Visa cards. An announcement from Visa reports: More than 1.7 million merchants representing more than a third of […]