I don't think I could respond to this any better then Decius has:

] This is a significant test for the entire community
] because if the community can't find a way to introduce
] new services while reaching a resolution on technical
] matters that might arise, then the Internet
] infrastructure will never improve. It's tantamount to
] saying that the Internet world is flat and therefore
] there is no need for further exploration.

Look asshole, if you were interested in reaching resolution on the technical matters that might arise, you would have proposed your change to the community rather then making a unilateral decision. You would have pre-announced a date for the cutover so that people would be prepared to make any changes that they needed to make beforehand. The only people who are buying into your bullshit are people who own stock in your company and have a vested interest in beleiving in you. The rest of us are simply more and more sure that we are never going to do business with you for any reason. The rest of us aren't your shareholders. We're your customers. And you can rest assured that we are quite capable of continuing to deploy innovative services on the Internet without you.

Tell me why I should do business with a company that was not just forced to settle in a fraudulent marketing scheme, but also made significant, unannounced changes in a critical infrastructure service in violation of your contract without prior notification? Your business is about TRUST, and I'd be CRAZY to TRUST you after pulling a stunt like this!

Innovation and the Internet | Verisign Speaks to the technical community

] Seriously, though, I'm interested in figuring out how we
] can build a Net that is a lot less prone to viruses and
] spam, and not just by putting in filters and setting up
] caches to test things before they get into your computer.
] That doesn't really solve anything. We need an
] evolutionary step of some sort, or we need to look at the
] problem in a different way.
]
] I'm not convinced there's not something modest we can do
] that would make a big difference. You have to find a way
] to structure your systems in a safer way. Writing
] everything in Java [a programming language created by
] Sun] will help, because stuff written in antique
] programming languages like C [a widely used language
] created by Bell Labs in the early 1970s] is full of
] holes. Those languages weren't designed for writing
] distributed programs to be used over a network. Yet
] that's what Microsoft still uses. But even Java doesn't
] prevent people from making stupid mistakes.

Juicy intervew with Bill Joy

] VeriSign Inc., the firm that operates a key piece of the
] Internet's address system, said it would temporarily shut
] down a new service that makes money off the typos of Web
] users after the Internet's oversight body threatened to
] take legal action against the company.

Thats great!

However, at the time I blogged this, the gtld's were still sending me to sitefinder..

VeriSign Freezes Search Service (TechNews.com)

This is a very interesting article on using editing techniques to speed up the WPM of audio recordings without loosing tonality. Its like speed reading a lecture. I wish NPR preprocessed all their audio programming this way.

If PVR's like MythTV had this capability, it could make channels like c-span a little less mind-numbing.

Now Hear This, Quickly

] VeriSign, Inc. , the leading provider of critical
] infrastructure services for the Internet and
] telecommunications networks, today announced that it has
] been selected by Accenture to provide hosting, security
] consulting, authentication services and Managed Public
] Key Infrastructure (MPKI) services for the Department of
] Defense's Secure Electronic Registration and Voting
] Experiment (SERVE.) Upon full deployment, SERVE will
] enable absentee uniformed services members and overseas
] United States citizens from eight participating states to
] cast absentee ballots via the Internet for the 2004
] primary and general elections.

Now THAT is a perfect storm...

VeriSign Selected by Accenture to Secure Department of Defense E-Voting System

] EFF last week called on IEEE members and other citizens
] to voice their concerns about the standard. Nearly five
] hundred people wrote to IEEE leadership pointing out
] flaws in the draft standard. On September 22, the first
] working group ballot on the draft failed overwhelmingly,
] causing the simultaneous ballot at the sponsor level to
] fail as well.

EFF: Flawed E-Voting Standard Sent Back to Drawing Board

ICANN has set up a clearing house for information about the Verisign incident. There are some documents up here that are new.

ICANN | Information Page: Verisign's Wildcard Service Deployment

] Activists have also questioned the political affiliations
] of the leading voting companies. Late last year, Harris
] found that Sen. Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican, used
] to run the voting company that provided most of the
] voting machines in his state. And in August, the
] Cleveland Plain Dealer reported that Walden O'Dell, the
] CEO of Diebold, is a major fundraiser for President Bush.
] In a letter to fellow Republicans, O'Dell said that he
] was "COMMITTED TO HELPING OHIO DELIVER ITS ELECTORAL
] VOTES TO THE PRESIDENT NEXT YEAR."
]
] But the problems Harris found in Diebold's system are
] perhaps the best proof yet that electronic voting systems
] aren't ready for prime time. Indeed, the vulnerabilities
] in the software, as well as the internal memos, raise
] questions about the legitimacy of the California recall
] election. In its ruling, the 9th Circuit Court put the
] election on hold until the six counties that currently
] use punch-card systems -- six counties that comprise 44
] percent of the state's voters -- upgrade their systems.
] On Monday, 11 judges on the 9th Circuit reheard the
] recall case; they may very well allow the election to go
] ahead on Oct. 7. If the recall vote is put on hold until
] March, however, many may wonder whether to trust the
] results: Four of the six punch-card counties -- including
] the largest, Los Angeles and San Diego -- have plans to
] upgrade to Diebold machines by March.

(Comments from Decius)

Very good article, with links to Diebold's internal memos, on the electronic voting systems.

I think that Harris is a conspiracy theorist. Certainly if the elections in Georgia were stolen that would be a historic fraud, a great mar on our history. However, it is not appropriate to allege that unless you've got proof. Saying "Oh, oh, oh, this might have occured..." simply serves to rile up people's emotions and it contributes to the ignorance and confusion that surrounds this issue. The quotes in the Diebold memos about "King County" are obviously not in reference to election fraud. Later in the same memo the same person discussess the concerns that Texas has about the use of this capability for such a purpose.

On the other hand, the Diebold memos demonstrate a complete lack of computer security clue on the part of the engineers. The fact that you have a password on your .mdb file isn't going to keep me out of it, in particular when you've handed me software that has access to it. Furthermore, the fact these morons are confident enough of their clue level to be poking fun at the "technical wizards" in the certifying companies is enough to turn the stomach.

All of these people simply seem to be in way the hell over their heads, and none of them seem to realize it.

Salon.com Technology | An open invitation to election fraud

] In response to widespread expressions of concern from the
] Internet community about the effects of the
] introduction of the wildcard, ICANN has requested
] advice from its Security and Stability Advisory
] Committee, and from the Internet Architecture
] Board, on the impact of the changes implemented
] by VeriSign. ICANN's Security and Stability Advisory
] Committee is expected to release an objective
] expert report concerning the wildcard later today.
]
] Recognizing the concerns about the wildcard service,
] ICANN has called upon VeriSign to voluntarily
] suspend the service until the various reviews
] now underway are completed.

ICANN Speaks!

] VeriSign/Network Solutions' recent actions to effectively
] "hijack" all unused domain names in the ".COM" and ".NET"
] TLDs (Top Level Domains) for their "Site Finder" service,
] unilaterally and without prior warning or consultation
] with the Internet technical or policy communities,
] represents an arrogant and dangerous abuse of their
] vested, dominant, special position, and have vast policy,
] legal, and technical implications.

Lauren Weinstein, Peter Neumann, and Dave Farber rip Verisign a new asshole. 'Bout damn time someone did it. This is an undercovered story.

PFIR Statement on VeriSign/NSI