This is a megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.
- 1849
- 20
What is this place?
This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a
court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to
optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.
The weekly Culture War threads host the most
controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are
appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy;
if in doubt, post!
Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts.
You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.
Why are you called The Motte?
A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently,
it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey",
originally identified by
philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial
but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens
this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for
the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired
propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."
On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.
New post guidelines
If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it.
A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts
such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a
submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).
Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or
significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.
If in doubt, please post it!
Rules
- Courtesy
- Content
- Engagement
- When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
- Proactively provide evidence in proportion to how partisan and inflammatory your claim might be.
- Accept temporary bans as a time-out, and don't attempt to rejoin the conversation until it's lifted.
- Don't attempt to build consensus or enforce ideological conformity.
- Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
- The Wildcard Rule
- The Metarule
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
Random rumors from the internet:
https://twitter.com/realpepeescobar/status/1711973752924455254
The source is a twitter account named @RealPepeEscobar, so do your due diligence, but if this is true it's absolutely hilarious: Western intelligence agencies spend their time and money breaking into their own side's hardware rather than that of the enemy...
One of the replies to the tweet says he'll go and buy a Huawei now, and to be honest who can blame him, just like how having western rather than Chinese backdoors in your hardware protects you if you're living in China, having Chinese rather than western backdoors protects you if you're living in the west.
It seems very unlikely. The release of various Pegasus/NSO Group stuff shows that they very much weren’t exploiting deliberate back doors (which would have made things much easier) but obscure vulnerabilities in iMessage etc. I find it hard to believe that Huawei phones running on Android or their own weird HarmonyOS (which is cobbled together out of a lot of different things, including a fork of Android 10, and which is pretty new anyway) are more impenetrable than latest model iPhones. All the extensive evidence points to the reverse being true.
They are not. But usually in this world all interesting targets use iphone. And because android could be rooted it could be made more secure.
Random nitpick. It may make sense to root a device to strip away tracking or privacy impacting features. Though some way argue that your attempt to do so itself may be fingerprintable.
For security... doubt it'd do much. If your device maker is releasing poorly secured software why would the hardware/firmware be any better.
This is always the rub.
There is a world of difference between evading detection and evading attention, and depending on the circumstances attempts to evade one will often draw the other. As is often the case, there is a relevant XKCD
More options
Context Copy link
iptables. Those things usually require multi stage install. You highjack something then make request for the exploits, then download the big one. If you only allow minimal processes to have internet connection you may foil the installation itself. Also andoid doesn't have such idiocy as imessage.
Sorry, are you saying you set up iptables rules on your android phone to lock it down in case of malware/spyware/hacking?
Kinda. I just implement very strict firewall. And I suppose that unless the malware is modifying by default - and there is limitation how much logic can you implement in shellcode
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link