Closing borders to stop corona

ARGH!

The thing is, closing borders doesn't work! It is counter productive!

Yes, social distancing works, but it is not the same as closing borders.

If you don't trust me, trust WHO (World Health Organization). They should know, right? They say that it actually counter productive: WHO statement

And we've seen this in action: the authorities are chasing in Ticino people who try to circumvent the closure, instead of doing something else (which would actually work, like helping with social distancing). And since borders are closed, the flow of goods is affected. The truck drivers don't want to cross the border as they're afraid of getting stuck or quarantined. There are numerous examples of this.

Yes, social distancing works.

But border closure does not. It may be effective to delay the outbreak a couple of days, buying the country a bit time to prepare better, but it when the disease is already in, no use in closing the borders.

But closing borders appeal to the people as it is a knee-jerk reaction, and politicians are happy to oblige so that their re-election changes are better. They're strong as they took definite action, right?

No, they're not. They're not listening the specialists!

Rants about corona

I'm sooo fed  up with some of the stuff that goes around corona at the moment so that I decided to revive this dead blog.

There will be rants about the claims around corona, handling of corona, the behavior etc.

I'll put them one topic per post, so that you can enjoy a bit longer! You don't have anything to do anyway, sitting there home in quarantine or doing just social distancing.

In the series scaremongering, now this report

Ok. Apps can have security holes, or they may even exploit the information intentionally.

But a security company publishes a report about security of those apps, saying that more than half of the apps it checked have security problems. 

You might think that this is a bit worrisome, and it would be if they provided some details. As they're a security company, they do have  incentive to list as many findings they can as security problems. Otherwise people might not find their services worth the money!

A threat assessment of 7 million iOS and Android apps

Come on, guys! This sounds a bit like a program from the past which reported each and every cookie as a privacy problem!

Scare mongering

As we all know, publications NEED good headlines to get themselves read, so that they get revenue.

The headlines need to raise the interest. Scaring people is a sure way to get people read the article.

This is one of those articles

How public Wi-Fi puts unprotected users at risk

 Yes, back in the time of gas lamps, the sensitive applications didn't always use encrypted connections (HTTPS et al). But those days are past, the programmers have learned this lesson, at least, and the apps use SSL.

But that wouldn't make an interesting headline, would it?

Removing a selectable option in a selection box/warning causes people not selecting the removed option? DUH!

Great news: Google has been able to make users of Chrome to heed the warning about security certificates.

 

Earlier about 70% of the users went ahead and proceeded to the website anyway, now only about 40% do the same.

Great results, eh?

Well, if you look a bit closer, they removed the "Proceed to the website" button. I guess they hid it behind "Advanced" options.

It is actually surprising that the 40% of the users were able to proceed to the website! The 30% who didn't find it must be frustrated ;)

Here's to the article in "Help Net Securit": Browser security warning redesigned with partial success

 

Swiss initiative to limit immigration might run into legal problems

On 9th of February 2014 Swiss voters accepted a referendum to limit immigration. This included also EU citizens, which conflicts with the international agreements Switzerland has made. The vote was very close, only 50.3% of the votes was for accepting. 9000 votes would've tipped the scales.

The campaign was fierce, SVP leading the initiative. As a foreigner living in CH, the campaign looked very shady. Hate mongering against immigrants was constantly happening.

Now the courts will have a look if the campaigning was racist, and whether the referendum should be declared invalid. Article inTagesAnzeiger

Let's see how SVP will spin this. Certainly they start screaming "the will of the people", but I really hope this will set some limits on how racist the campaigns can be.

Xmas blues

It is this time of the year again: Xmas. As a kid is was much waited for. In Finland the Santa visits the families on the 24th in the evening. The kids get to sing to the Santa, and even sit on his lap. Smaller kids start to cry as they're afraid of this strange man who brings presents, but who also CAN bring twigs if the kids haven't been nice.

No matter if the Santa sounds a bit like uncle Oiva who lives next door, you believe in the real Santa anyway. If you don't, you might not get presents!

Anyway, as the time passes, things change, and although Xmas is still very special time of the year it comes with the Xmas blues. At least to me it does.

You notice that yet another year is gone, and your spare tire is still on your hips despite your decision in the beginning of the year. And no, you didn't get that personal project done. 

And if you live abroad like I do you're not still fully integrated within the local populace. You do have social contacts, but your relatives and closest friends are often so far away that a quick visit isn't really an option.

 

Oh well.

 

At least it is not cold over here (thus, no skiing this Xmas, either)...

 

But, at 3km there is snow. Not much, but anyway (this from last Sunday)