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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 16th, 2023

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  • perhaps take a look at the comment votes once in a while and do some self-reflection on your communication style, if not the correctness of your statements and either say: sorry, i’m clearly miscommunicating, or sorry you’re right

    So, it turns out there are people here who believe that comment votes somehow track truth, or at least something other than the prejudices and confirmation bias of those doing the voting.

    The naivety is sad enough (internet forums have existed for 30 years - have we learned nothing?). But it’s worse than that, because it suggests that you would put aside your reasoned views, your values even, in order to fit in with whatever the mob around you thinks. No democracy can work if everyone does this. Let’s hope you’re an exception.

    Apologies for the condescension but there was no alternative here.










  • Oh FFS. Please stop abusing the word “Nazi” for every tiny transgression against 2025-era US progressive biases. Why do Americans do this - do you not learn anything at school? Words have meanings. Whatever the reason, to compare someone who isn’t “fighting for a more just and equal society” to a “Nazi” just makes you look like a know-nothing ignoramus. It discredits whatever you have to say.

    Response to the predictable justifications. Are you all aware that Putin calls democratic Ukraine “Nazi” for exactly the reasons you’re all calling Trump one - namely, that it’s a big powerful word? Yes, I’m aware of Trump’s provocations and impulses. In other times Trump would probably have been more Mussolini than Berlusconi (i.e. a fascist). But “Nazi” is on a whole other level: it implies an apocalyptic, totalitarian, genocidal subversion of what most people consider civilization. This was actually a thing and it bears almost no connection to Trump’s brand of chaotic reactionary populism. If you know anything about history then you should know this already. To insinuate that Trumpism is Nazism is insulting to intelligence.







  • Yep. But typing in a password at boot is no big deal and you do then get some of the benefits of encryption. The problem, as you seem to be hinting, is the lockscreen issue. A screenlocked OS without the hardware encryption module is not actually locked down whereas Android, for instance, is. Is that right? I’ve wanted to ask how Android does this - basically, it loses the key and then regenerates it based on biometrics or whatever, each time you unlock, is that it?





  • is it’s usually not a one-click process

    It is, these days. Ubuntu and Fedora, for example. But you still have to select it or it won’t happen. PopOS, being explicitly designed for laptops, has it by default.

    If the government gets my drives I assume they’ll crack it in no time.

    Depends on your passphrase. If you follow best practice and go with, say, a 25-character passphrase made up of obscure dictionary words, then no, even a state will not be cracking it quickly at all.

    If a hacker gets into my PC or a virus I’m assuming it will run while the drive is in an unencrypted state anyway.

    Exactly. This is the weak link of disk encryption. You usually need to turn off the machine, i.e. lose the key from memory, in order to get the full benefits. A couple of consolations: (1) In an emergency, you at least have the option of locking it down; just turn it off - even a hard shutdown will do. (2) As you say, only a sophisticated attacker, like the police, will have the skills to break open your screenlocked machine while avoiding any shutdown or reboot.

    Another, less obvious, reason for encrypting: it means you can sell the drive, or laptop, without having to wipe it. Encrypted data is inaccessible, by definition.

    Encryption of personal data should be the default everywhere. Period.