00:00:00
Speaker 1: 513-74.
00:00:00
Speaker 2: Oh, sorry. It's Tech Friday. Dave Hatter. Get ready to give the phone number again. Default mode. InTrustIT.com is where we find Dave Hatter and his crew. They are the best in the business, court of business career for all your business computer needs, keeping you out of trouble, engaging in best practices, and unringing the bell of disaster when it hits. Dave Hatter, welcome back to the show, man. I certainly appreciate your company sponsoring this segment.
00:00:24
Speaker 1: Always good to be here, Brian.
00:00:25
Speaker 2: All right. Let's jump right into it. An issue that comes up every election year is concerns about voting machines. Now, I get a pretty good sense here in Ohio that we don't have any hacking concerns. I've been advised that they're not hooked up to the Internet and they can't be tampered with from outside forces. I'll have to take them at their word on this. But some states, well, are at risk. That's what this article says. Anyway, Dave, can you break it down?
00:00:48
Speaker 1: Yeah.
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Speaker 3: So Security Week is a well-known, well-respected magazine in the the cybersecurity, information security space. Timing of this article is kind of unfortunate that they waited until a few days before the election to publish it. But it's a pretty deep dive into this, and I think it's really well done. You know, my concerns with all of this are always, Brian, and we see this sort of thing play out more and more every day, right? I don't think you and I have talked about the recent PHP vulnerability, but The point I've been making for a long time now, and one of the reasons why I got out of software engineering as a professional and into cybersecurity is because anything that has software in it is vulnerable. I've talked about Mikko Hoponen's book before. He's a very well-known, much smarter than me, cybersecurity professional, wrote a book called If It's Smart, It's Vulnerable. I know I've mentioned Bruce Schneier's book, also way smarter than me, internationally renowned cryptographer and cybersecurity guy, wrote a book called Click Here to Kill Everyone. And the whole idea is if it's got software in it, it's vulnerable.
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Speaker 1: OK, period.
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Speaker 3: That's the bottom line point they're making. I believe that's absolutely true. We've seen this PHP thing. We've talked about refrigerators being hacked and so forth. So this article is pretty long, but it goes into and here's the subhead. Unpatched voting machines, unverifiable QR coded ballots and AI driven influence campaigns leave U.S. elections short of secure. Now, that's their words, not mine. You know, they they make some very interesting points in here. There's some great quotes from some pretty well-known cybersecurity experts. They talk about the vote counting and the vote machines and how the machines are certified. But at the end of the day, they have software in them, Brian. And that's part of the problem. They talk about foreign nations trying to influence the vote. But the thing that I thought was the most interesting, again, because there's a bunch of different headlines. There's a whole section securing the integrity of the election, voting and counting. U.S. election voting machines are certified by the EAC. This certificate is designed to ensure their security and applies to both the voting and the counting machines. Shari Bargel, co-founder and CEO at Sequent, is doubtful. There is no direct correlation of the certification process to the four-year election cycle, and the certification can occur in any four years. Certification process may take a year, but probably less than two years. In a worst-case scenario, a voting machine whose certification began in the first year of the electoral cycle will have been sitting untouched for two years.
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Speaker 1: Quote, now this is this guy.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I saw that. Yeah, go ahead. This is the grill. We're kicking out of the stadium here, right here.
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Speaker 1: Yeah.
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Speaker 3: Quote, that's pretty ridiculous, unquote, Comet Sparkle. Quote, software needs to be updated and patched pretty much continuously. In the commercial world, we patch our systems every month, but for elections, we're trusting the software. It hasn't been patched for two years or more. And the final analysis, the EAC certification is pretty much meaningless, unquote. Now, again, that's this guy. They talk about air gapping, keeping machines offline. They talk about voter village at DEF CON. You and I have talked about that over the years where DEF CON is a yearly cybersecurity conference. Thousands of people show up. They have villages where they take things apart and attack stuff and demonstrate stuff. And it says here, you know, machines are often taken to Voting Village, a hands-on election security lab run at DEF CON, gives researchers and election officials and the public legal access to real voting equipment so they can test the security. Some of these machines are still in use in the current election cycle when they're delivered to Voting Village. And the same guy, quote, basically, this is Bargel, every voting machine that has been delivered to Voting Village has been successfully hacked once the hackers have hands-on access, unquote.
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Speaker 1: Hmm.
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Speaker 3: So, I mean, this goes on and on. I'll post this in the notes. I've shared this with a bunch of people. I strongly encourage people to go read it for themselves. Again, they talk about election influence campaigns. They talk about the idea that, you know, printing something with a QR code where you can't read what it says is basically useless. I try to make this point every day, Brian. You can't look at a QR code and know what it does.
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Speaker 1: True.
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Speaker 3: I never, ever, ever scan QR codes out in public. I don't know what they do. I don't know how they got there. I don't know that some bad guy hasn't come along and put a new QR code over top of a legitimate QR code like in a parking lot. And this has happened, by the way. So, yeah, this is a really interesting article. I am going to send it to Secretary LaRose.
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Speaker 1: I know him. I've done some cybersecurity seminars.
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Speaker 3: For his team, which, by the way, is a huge benefit to residents of Ohio that your secretary of state is out there providing free cybersecurity seminars for small businesses. I'm going to send it to the Kentucky secretary of state. I mean, again, sadly now we're just days out from the election, but it's, it's a very interesting look at this from a, this is, you know, this, and it's not political in any way. It doesn't talk about, this article doesn't talk about politics at all. So yeah, it's, it's pretty useful in my mind.
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Speaker 2: Frightening stuff.
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Speaker 1: It would have been good to have it earlier. Yes.
00:05:48
Speaker 2: LinkedIn.com. Find Dave Hatter and LinkedIn.com. That's where you'll find the articles he speaks of here on the Morning show. Don't go away. More to talk about, including the latest MapQuest update. 55KRC, the talk station. 641-55KRC, the talk station. IntrustIT.com is where you find Dave Hatter and his crew for your business computer needs. Dave Hatter, I like this new feature on MapQuest. At least I think I do.
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Speaker 3: Well, you know, Brian, I'm not a fan of flock cameras. And I always like to remind people, flock has become the coke of mass surveillance.
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Speaker 1: Yeah. or the Kleenex, right?
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Speaker 3: They're not the only company that are building these sorts of mass surveillance capable cameras. They're just the ones that have gotten the most ire. They're the ones that are the most well-known. Seems like in many cases, the public is waking up to this whole mass surveillance thing.
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Speaker 1: And there's been a huge backlash against this.
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Speaker 3: I like to point out that Fort Wright does not and has never had flock cameras.
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Speaker 1: Or anything like this and will not as long as I'm involved in it. But that said, if you, uh, I, I'm not a, I don't use MapQuest. I have an Apple phone. I use the maps on my Apple phone, nothing against MapQuest. Um, but the, the native map app on my Apple phone does what I want it to do.
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Speaker 3: And you know, Brian, I tell people all the time, the less apps you have, the better. So again, I have nothing against MapQuest. This is a useful feature though, in my mind. And I think it just speaks to the backlash. Although it's interesting to see one technology company essentially, um, Let's just say cast aspersions, for lack of a better word, for an FCC compliant way to say this on another tech company. So MapQuest and their latest update will now show you where the automated license plate reader cameras are.
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Speaker 1: Think Flock.
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Speaker 3: Again, other companies, Axon, there are other people doing this, but Flock is the most well-known. So if you use the MapQuest app, you can turn this on and it will show you where the flock cameras are, wherever you are, so that you can avoid them. So if you're someone like me that does not want to be mass surveilled, it's just out minding your own business, trying to live your life, everyday, innocent, average citizen, and you don't want to be surveilled, you don't want to be tracked like this, this is a handy way to let you know how to avoid these things. And it's really interesting because in the screenshot they show in this one article, Now, again, I don't know, Brian, that this particular screenshot is legit or they just made it up for this news story. But assuming that's a real screenshot of a real place, there is an insane amount of flock cameras in that given location.
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Speaker 2: And that was going to be my point. To your point, even if I want to avoid flock cameras, it may be impossible for me to get to point A to point B without having to go past one or multiple of them.
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Speaker 3: I mean, looking at this map, again, assuming it's legit, it would be very difficult to avoid them. But at the very least, you could minimize your exposure to them if you had this.
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Speaker 2: Maybe this is less of a practical feature and more of just the look at the size and scope of the Big Brother reality we live in these days.
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Speaker 1: Well, it certainly is. points that out.
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Speaker 3: And they say in the article, by turning on the surveillance layer in the map options, which I think is a funny way to describe it, by turning on the surveillance layer in the map options portion of the software, the map will reveal each location.
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Speaker 1: And it does say in this article.
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Speaker 3: The feature allows users to view the reported locations of license plate readers operated by providers, including Flock Safety, Motorola Solutions, and Axon.
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Speaker 1: So I do.
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Speaker 3: Appreciate the fact that this MapQuest update feature, speaking of software updates, like we talked about in the last Last segment, right? Software updates don't just fix vulnerabilities and bugs.
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Speaker 1: They add capability. Or in our.
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Speaker 3: Increasingly digital world, potentially take away functionality. Oh, well, you like that heated steering wheel in your car?
00:09:36
Speaker 1: Not for you unless you want to pay the subscription fee. Like those heated seats? Oh, your air conditioner? Yeah, that's going to cost extra.
00:09:43
Speaker 2: That's insane.
00:09:43
Speaker 3: Because you're not paying the subscription fee. That's where we're headed with all of this. But, you know, again, back to the election machines and such, software updates are critical because they fix vulnerabilities, flaws that could be exploited. They fix bugs, things that make the software not function the way it's supposed to, but they also, also give you the capability to change the functionality. Today, I certified this, right? And then a software update comes out. Well, unless I recertify it, how can I know for sure there wasn't a change in the software that changed the behavior, a la, in this case, adding new functionality that shows you these surveillance cameras? Hopefully what I'm saying is making sense to folks. Again, In the old days when something was mechanical, right, and you bought it, well, it couldn't just change itself overnight with a software update. It couldn't be your smart refrigerator that bricked itself and ruined the food or burned your house down due to a software update that caused it to overheat or something like things can now. And this is my point that I keep trying to drive home to folks as we make everything digital.
00:10:49
Speaker 1: Everything has software in it.
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Speaker 3: Sometimes you get a benefit like, hey, I can see these surveillance cameras in my MapQuest app now. Sometimes things change and they might tell you, they might not tell you, or it could be hackers that have broken into the source code of that and changed it without even the vendor's knowledge.
00:11:10
Speaker 1: That has happened many times, all well-documented, Brian. So, yeah, that's where we're at.
00:11:16
Speaker 2: That's frightening stuff. Waymo. Robo-taxi operators. There's some new scrutiny over station. 651-55-KRCD talk station. Dave Hatton, Interest IT, doing the Tech Friday. And, well, confirming for me more that I'm not going to do automated vehicles, Dave. I don't think we're there yet. And apparently the federal government's going to start getting involved because Waymo and other robo-taxi operators can't manage, I guess, first responder emergency vehicle interactions. What's going on with this one, Dave?
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Speaker 3: Yeah, there's all kinds of wild stuff, but I want to take just one second to tell you two things, Brian. First off, since I know you're into this sort of thing personally, and I imagine a lot of your listeners are, I belong to the Kenton Game and Fish Association.
00:12:01
Speaker 1: Our annual fall turkey shoot is this Sunday.
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Speaker 2: Oh, cool. Love it.
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Speaker 3: If you or any of your listeners want to come on down, it's open to the public. It begins at noon, Kenton Game and Fish. It's on Locust Pike. You can find it online, and I'll be sharing it in my social media. And if you want to hear me talk your ear off about more of this stuff, you can meet me in person and I'll tell you the stuff we can't talk about on the.
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Speaker 1: Radio, Brian. Then you'll really, really be sorry that you know me.
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Speaker 2: No FCC oversight in offline communications. Anyway, let's get into this. We've got about three minutes to boil down the robo-taxi operator.
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Speaker 1: All right.
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Speaker 3: And then real quick, last thing. Queen City Con Cybersecurity Conference, November 13th through 15th. You all should come. That said, yeah, so Brian, you know me pretty well now after all the years we've been friends. I'm not riding in any autonomous cars anytime soon.
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Speaker 1: Will these things eventually get to the point where they're trustworthy? Probably.
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Speaker 3: But you have a vehicle with a bunch of sensors on it, right? Different types of sensors, cameras, LIDAR, all kinds of different sensors. They've been trained in real-world driving simulations. They've been trained in simulated driving situations. But you keep seeing issues with these things. Now, again, I know the experts and the people who are for this will tell me, oh, well, if you look at the stats over time, they're much better than human drivers.
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Speaker 1: OK, that may be the case.
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Speaker 3: All I know is we keep seeing examples where in real world situations where a reasonable human driver would make a different decision like, hey, let's not block the emergency vehicles. Hey, let's not drive into a construction zone. If you look, and I'll, again, post a bunch of these articles in the show notes that show you this, there are continuous problems with these kind of vehicles where they do things, they get stuck. In one instance, they went into a neighborhood and just jammed up the whole neighborhood. People run up and put an orange cone on the hood, and the thing doesn't know what to do. Again, you can argue that in a perfect.
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Speaker 1: World, would a machine be better than a human driver? Maybe.
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Speaker 3: For all the reasons I've stated in the last two segments, these things are full of software. They're connected to other systems. What happens when those systems go down? What happens if a sensor gets covered up?
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Speaker 1: Again, I'm not against this per se.
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Speaker 3: I think like so much of the technology that I rail on all the time, and you know I'm not an anti-technology guy, Brian. This is what I've done for more than 30 years. This stuff is moving way too fast. The incentives for you as a consumer are from a security, both physical and cyber perspective, and your privacy are all wrong for you as a consumer. And we just keep putting more software in things. I've talked about some of the problems. In fact, one of the things I'm gonna talk about at that cybersecurity conference and have talked about a lot recently the abysmal state of software security. As a recovering software engineer that did it for 25 years, there is literally no bad practice I have not personally done because for most of my career, I was not focused on security or privacy.
00:15:04
Speaker 1: Those were not my objectives. I was not incentivized to care about that. I hope this makes sense to you.
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Speaker 3: So when I tell you I don't have a smart refrigerator or a smart coffee maker that can be hacked online and used to burn my house down, these are the reasons why. I know how this process works. Trust me, they are not building this stuff with software in it that is designed for your security and your privacy. And that's why I'm not going to be writing any of these kind of things soon. And I have a lot of concerns about them because even though it doesn't get a lot of press, it is documented out there. And there are many examples where these things don't work right. And yeah, it's not for me.
00:15:47
Speaker 2: Appreciate the message. I've heard it loud and clear, and I follow your directive, Dave, because I know you're right.
Speaker 1: 513-74.
00:00:00
Speaker 2: Oh, sorry. It's Tech Friday. Dave Hatter. Get ready to give the phone number again. Default mode. InTrustIT.com is where we find Dave Hatter and his crew. They are the best in the business, court of business career for all your business computer needs, keeping you out of trouble, engaging in best practices, and unringing the bell of disaster when it hits. Dave Hatter, welcome back to the show, man. I certainly appreciate your company sponsoring this segment.
00:00:24
Speaker 1: Always good to be here, Brian.
00:00:25
Speaker 2: All right. Let's jump right into it. An issue that comes up every election year is concerns about voting machines. Now, I get a pretty good sense here in Ohio that we don't have any hacking concerns. I've been advised that they're not hooked up to the Internet and they can't be tampered with from outside forces. I'll have to take them at their word on this. But some states, well, are at risk. That's what this article says. Anyway, Dave, can you break it down?
00:00:48
Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:00:48
Speaker 3: So Security Week is a well-known, well-respected magazine in the the cybersecurity, information security space. Timing of this article is kind of unfortunate that they waited until a few days before the election to publish it. But it's a pretty deep dive into this, and I think it's really well done. You know, my concerns with all of this are always, Brian, and we see this sort of thing play out more and more every day, right? I don't think you and I have talked about the recent PHP vulnerability, but The point I've been making for a long time now, and one of the reasons why I got out of software engineering as a professional and into cybersecurity is because anything that has software in it is vulnerable. I've talked about Mikko Hoponen's book before. He's a very well-known, much smarter than me, cybersecurity professional, wrote a book called If It's Smart, It's Vulnerable. I know I've mentioned Bruce Schneier's book, also way smarter than me, internationally renowned cryptographer and cybersecurity guy, wrote a book called Click Here to Kill Everyone. And the whole idea is if it's got software in it, it's vulnerable.
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Speaker 1: OK, period.
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Speaker 3: That's the bottom line point they're making. I believe that's absolutely true. We've seen this PHP thing. We've talked about refrigerators being hacked and so forth. So this article is pretty long, but it goes into and here's the subhead. Unpatched voting machines, unverifiable QR coded ballots and AI driven influence campaigns leave U.S. elections short of secure. Now, that's their words, not mine. You know, they they make some very interesting points in here. There's some great quotes from some pretty well-known cybersecurity experts. They talk about the vote counting and the vote machines and how the machines are certified. But at the end of the day, they have software in them, Brian. And that's part of the problem. They talk about foreign nations trying to influence the vote. But the thing that I thought was the most interesting, again, because there's a bunch of different headlines. There's a whole section securing the integrity of the election, voting and counting. U.S. election voting machines are certified by the EAC. This certificate is designed to ensure their security and applies to both the voting and the counting machines. Shari Bargel, co-founder and CEO at Sequent, is doubtful. There is no direct correlation of the certification process to the four-year election cycle, and the certification can occur in any four years. Certification process may take a year, but probably less than two years. In a worst-case scenario, a voting machine whose certification began in the first year of the electoral cycle will have been sitting untouched for two years.
00:03:18
Speaker 1: Quote, now this is this guy.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I saw that. Yeah, go ahead. This is the grill. We're kicking out of the stadium here, right here.
00:03:25
Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:03:26
Speaker 3: Quote, that's pretty ridiculous, unquote, Comet Sparkle. Quote, software needs to be updated and patched pretty much continuously. In the commercial world, we patch our systems every month, but for elections, we're trusting the software. It hasn't been patched for two years or more. And the final analysis, the EAC certification is pretty much meaningless, unquote. Now, again, that's this guy. They talk about air gapping, keeping machines offline. They talk about voter village at DEF CON. You and I have talked about that over the years where DEF CON is a yearly cybersecurity conference. Thousands of people show up. They have villages where they take things apart and attack stuff and demonstrate stuff. And it says here, you know, machines are often taken to Voting Village, a hands-on election security lab run at DEF CON, gives researchers and election officials and the public legal access to real voting equipment so they can test the security. Some of these machines are still in use in the current election cycle when they're delivered to Voting Village. And the same guy, quote, basically, this is Bargel, every voting machine that has been delivered to Voting Village has been successfully hacked once the hackers have hands-on access, unquote.
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Speaker 1: Hmm.
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Speaker 3: So, I mean, this goes on and on. I'll post this in the notes. I've shared this with a bunch of people. I strongly encourage people to go read it for themselves. Again, they talk about election influence campaigns. They talk about the idea that, you know, printing something with a QR code where you can't read what it says is basically useless. I try to make this point every day, Brian. You can't look at a QR code and know what it does.
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Speaker 1: True.
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Speaker 3: I never, ever, ever scan QR codes out in public. I don't know what they do. I don't know how they got there. I don't know that some bad guy hasn't come along and put a new QR code over top of a legitimate QR code like in a parking lot. And this has happened, by the way. So, yeah, this is a really interesting article. I am going to send it to Secretary LaRose.
00:05:11
Speaker 1: I know him. I've done some cybersecurity seminars.
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Speaker 3: For his team, which, by the way, is a huge benefit to residents of Ohio that your secretary of state is out there providing free cybersecurity seminars for small businesses. I'm going to send it to the Kentucky secretary of state. I mean, again, sadly now we're just days out from the election, but it's, it's a very interesting look at this from a, this is, you know, this, and it's not political in any way. It doesn't talk about, this article doesn't talk about politics at all. So yeah, it's, it's pretty useful in my mind.
00:05:45
Speaker 2: Frightening stuff.
00:05:46
Speaker 1: It would have been good to have it earlier. Yes.
00:05:48
Speaker 2: LinkedIn.com. Find Dave Hatter and LinkedIn.com. That's where you'll find the articles he speaks of here on the Morning show. Don't go away. More to talk about, including the latest MapQuest update. 55KRC, the talk station. 641-55KRC, the talk station. IntrustIT.com is where you find Dave Hatter and his crew for your business computer needs. Dave Hatter, I like this new feature on MapQuest. At least I think I do.
00:06:15
Speaker 3: Well, you know, Brian, I'm not a fan of flock cameras. And I always like to remind people, flock has become the coke of mass surveillance.
00:06:23
Speaker 1: Yeah. or the Kleenex, right?
00:06:25
Speaker 3: They're not the only company that are building these sorts of mass surveillance capable cameras. They're just the ones that have gotten the most ire. They're the ones that are the most well-known. Seems like in many cases, the public is waking up to this whole mass surveillance thing.
00:06:41
Speaker 1: And there's been a huge backlash against this.
00:06:44
Speaker 3: I like to point out that Fort Wright does not and has never had flock cameras.
00:06:49
Speaker 1: Or anything like this and will not as long as I'm involved in it. But that said, if you, uh, I, I'm not a, I don't use MapQuest. I have an Apple phone. I use the maps on my Apple phone, nothing against MapQuest. Um, but the, the native map app on my Apple phone does what I want it to do.
00:07:07
Speaker 3: And you know, Brian, I tell people all the time, the less apps you have, the better. So again, I have nothing against MapQuest. This is a useful feature though, in my mind. And I think it just speaks to the backlash. Although it's interesting to see one technology company essentially, um, Let's just say cast aspersions, for lack of a better word, for an FCC compliant way to say this on another tech company. So MapQuest and their latest update will now show you where the automated license plate reader cameras are.
00:07:37
Speaker 1: Think Flock.
00:07:37
Speaker 3: Again, other companies, Axon, there are other people doing this, but Flock is the most well-known. So if you use the MapQuest app, you can turn this on and it will show you where the flock cameras are, wherever you are, so that you can avoid them. So if you're someone like me that does not want to be mass surveilled, it's just out minding your own business, trying to live your life, everyday, innocent, average citizen, and you don't want to be surveilled, you don't want to be tracked like this, this is a handy way to let you know how to avoid these things. And it's really interesting because in the screenshot they show in this one article, Now, again, I don't know, Brian, that this particular screenshot is legit or they just made it up for this news story. But assuming that's a real screenshot of a real place, there is an insane amount of flock cameras in that given location.
00:08:23
Speaker 2: And that was going to be my point. To your point, even if I want to avoid flock cameras, it may be impossible for me to get to point A to point B without having to go past one or multiple of them.
00:08:32
Speaker 3: I mean, looking at this map, again, assuming it's legit, it would be very difficult to avoid them. But at the very least, you could minimize your exposure to them if you had this.
00:08:45
Speaker 2: Maybe this is less of a practical feature and more of just the look at the size and scope of the Big Brother reality we live in these days.
00:08:53
Speaker 1: Well, it certainly is. points that out.
00:08:56
Speaker 3: And they say in the article, by turning on the surveillance layer in the map options, which I think is a funny way to describe it, by turning on the surveillance layer in the map options portion of the software, the map will reveal each location.
00:09:07
Speaker 1: And it does say in this article.
00:09:08
Speaker 3: The feature allows users to view the reported locations of license plate readers operated by providers, including Flock Safety, Motorola Solutions, and Axon.
00:09:16
Speaker 1: So I do.
00:09:17
Speaker 3: Appreciate the fact that this MapQuest update feature, speaking of software updates, like we talked about in the last Last segment, right? Software updates don't just fix vulnerabilities and bugs.
00:09:27
Speaker 1: They add capability. Or in our.
00:09:30
Speaker 3: Increasingly digital world, potentially take away functionality. Oh, well, you like that heated steering wheel in your car?
00:09:36
Speaker 1: Not for you unless you want to pay the subscription fee. Like those heated seats? Oh, your air conditioner? Yeah, that's going to cost extra.
00:09:43
Speaker 2: That's insane.
00:09:43
Speaker 3: Because you're not paying the subscription fee. That's where we're headed with all of this. But, you know, again, back to the election machines and such, software updates are critical because they fix vulnerabilities, flaws that could be exploited. They fix bugs, things that make the software not function the way it's supposed to, but they also, also give you the capability to change the functionality. Today, I certified this, right? And then a software update comes out. Well, unless I recertify it, how can I know for sure there wasn't a change in the software that changed the behavior, a la, in this case, adding new functionality that shows you these surveillance cameras? Hopefully what I'm saying is making sense to folks. Again, In the old days when something was mechanical, right, and you bought it, well, it couldn't just change itself overnight with a software update. It couldn't be your smart refrigerator that bricked itself and ruined the food or burned your house down due to a software update that caused it to overheat or something like things can now. And this is my point that I keep trying to drive home to folks as we make everything digital.
00:10:49
Speaker 1: Everything has software in it.
00:10:51
Speaker 3: Sometimes you get a benefit like, hey, I can see these surveillance cameras in my MapQuest app now. Sometimes things change and they might tell you, they might not tell you, or it could be hackers that have broken into the source code of that and changed it without even the vendor's knowledge.
00:11:10
Speaker 1: That has happened many times, all well-documented, Brian. So, yeah, that's where we're at.
00:11:16
Speaker 2: That's frightening stuff. Waymo. Robo-taxi operators. There's some new scrutiny over station. 651-55-KRCD talk station. Dave Hatton, Interest IT, doing the Tech Friday. And, well, confirming for me more that I'm not going to do automated vehicles, Dave. I don't think we're there yet. And apparently the federal government's going to start getting involved because Waymo and other robo-taxi operators can't manage, I guess, first responder emergency vehicle interactions. What's going on with this one, Dave?
00:11:48
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's all kinds of wild stuff, but I want to take just one second to tell you two things, Brian. First off, since I know you're into this sort of thing personally, and I imagine a lot of your listeners are, I belong to the Kenton Game and Fish Association.
00:12:01
Speaker 1: Our annual fall turkey shoot is this Sunday.
00:12:03
Speaker 2: Oh, cool. Love it.
00:12:04
Speaker 3: If you or any of your listeners want to come on down, it's open to the public. It begins at noon, Kenton Game and Fish. It's on Locust Pike. You can find it online, and I'll be sharing it in my social media. And if you want to hear me talk your ear off about more of this stuff, you can meet me in person and I'll tell you the stuff we can't talk about on the.
00:12:22
Speaker 1: Radio, Brian. Then you'll really, really be sorry that you know me.
00:12:26
Speaker 2: No FCC oversight in offline communications. Anyway, let's get into this. We've got about three minutes to boil down the robo-taxi operator.
00:12:33
Speaker 1: All right.
00:12:34
Speaker 3: And then real quick, last thing. Queen City Con Cybersecurity Conference, November 13th through 15th. You all should come. That said, yeah, so Brian, you know me pretty well now after all the years we've been friends. I'm not riding in any autonomous cars anytime soon.
00:12:49
Speaker 1: Will these things eventually get to the point where they're trustworthy? Probably.
00:12:53
Speaker 3: But you have a vehicle with a bunch of sensors on it, right? Different types of sensors, cameras, LIDAR, all kinds of different sensors. They've been trained in real-world driving simulations. They've been trained in simulated driving situations. But you keep seeing issues with these things. Now, again, I know the experts and the people who are for this will tell me, oh, well, if you look at the stats over time, they're much better than human drivers.
00:13:20
Speaker 1: OK, that may be the case.
00:13:22
Speaker 3: All I know is we keep seeing examples where in real world situations where a reasonable human driver would make a different decision like, hey, let's not block the emergency vehicles. Hey, let's not drive into a construction zone. If you look, and I'll, again, post a bunch of these articles in the show notes that show you this, there are continuous problems with these kind of vehicles where they do things, they get stuck. In one instance, they went into a neighborhood and just jammed up the whole neighborhood. People run up and put an orange cone on the hood, and the thing doesn't know what to do. Again, you can argue that in a perfect.
00:14:00
Speaker 1: World, would a machine be better than a human driver? Maybe.
00:14:06
Speaker 3: For all the reasons I've stated in the last two segments, these things are full of software. They're connected to other systems. What happens when those systems go down? What happens if a sensor gets covered up?
00:14:17
Speaker 1: Again, I'm not against this per se.
00:14:20
Speaker 3: I think like so much of the technology that I rail on all the time, and you know I'm not an anti-technology guy, Brian. This is what I've done for more than 30 years. This stuff is moving way too fast. The incentives for you as a consumer are from a security, both physical and cyber perspective, and your privacy are all wrong for you as a consumer. And we just keep putting more software in things. I've talked about some of the problems. In fact, one of the things I'm gonna talk about at that cybersecurity conference and have talked about a lot recently the abysmal state of software security. As a recovering software engineer that did it for 25 years, there is literally no bad practice I have not personally done because for most of my career, I was not focused on security or privacy.
00:15:04
Speaker 1: Those were not my objectives. I was not incentivized to care about that. I hope this makes sense to you.
00:15:10
Speaker 3: So when I tell you I don't have a smart refrigerator or a smart coffee maker that can be hacked online and used to burn my house down, these are the reasons why. I know how this process works. Trust me, they are not building this stuff with software in it that is designed for your security and your privacy. And that's why I'm not going to be writing any of these kind of things soon. And I have a lot of concerns about them because even though it doesn't get a lot of press, it is documented out there. And there are many examples where these things don't work right. And yeah, it's not for me.
00:15:47
Speaker 2: Appreciate the message. I've heard it loud and clear, and I follow your directive, Dave, because I know you're right.
