Regular readers will have noticed I haven’t ranted and raved about patent trolls of late. What, all’s quiet on the troll front – they’ve stopped being trolls and started doing something useful and honest instead? You guessed it: no. Alas, every day, stories about their audaciously outrageous stunts can be found in the news if you look in the right places. It’s business as usual for the trolls; it just doesn’t make headline news.

Sometimes the news comes to you – at least, to us: just the other day we received a lawsuit from WETRO LAN for alleged infringement of a patent on filtration of data packets, or, to be more precise – a firewall. WHAT?

So, what they’re saying is, you can patent a widely-known, universally-applied device, er, which was invented more than a decade ago? Just in case you missed that: the tech had been around for ages BEFORE this patent appeared! And now they demand a fee for use of their patented tech! Hold on… WHAT?!

Yes that’s what they’re doing: since 2015 they’ve brought lawsuits to 60+ companies, many of which developed firewalls long before the patent existed. But the industry is taking the lawsuits in its stride; it even name the patent Stupid Patent of the Month.

Equally absurd is their targeting us with a claim. We’re not ‘easy pickings’ by far for an attack, since we always stand our ground and never give in to patent trolls. And we never settle out of court either – as there’s never anything to settle, as we ain’t done nuttin. The only thing we do is return fire occasionally. Well, why not? Their patents will be invalidated sooner rather than later – so we strike while the iron’s still hot there’s still an iron. And no matter what, we’ll continue the good fight – until the last bullet – their bullet.

But all this talk of fighting – no matter how necessary it is – it’s still a bit lot of a mood spoiler. So, to lighten the spirits and stay positive and optimistic, I decided to blow the dust off the archives to come up with a collection of the strangest, craziest, maddest and most paradoxical patents ever. If anything, just so you’ll know where they may bite you in the future for ‘gross violations of patent law’ :).

OK, off we go…

The Superlatively Subjective Top-5 Most [insert the appropriate] Patents Ever

No. 5: The guillotine – the best remedy for a headache.

Warm, sunny, summer weather has its downside. Of course, summer should be all about the beach, pinacoladas and swimsuits, but for that one has to be in good shape. But how can one be in good shape after a fall, winter and spring of non-stop gorging on high-calorie foods? One simply can’t! Well, one could – with a decent diet and exercise – but how unoriginal and folksy and old-fashioned is that? There had to be a hi-tech solution; after all, the 21^st century was just around the corner. Therefore…

Folks, meet US patent 4344424 – the ‘anti-eating face mask’. Hannibal Lecter – move over!

PS: Makes sense to ‘invent’ and patent anti-eating handcuffs too – to chain you to the radiator with so you can’t reach the fridge. In just two weeks you’d have that beach-bod you’d been after :).

Read on: Always ask for a top-up in the pub…

Phew. That was a tough two days in the UK capital. Herewith, a few words and a lot of pics of those two days…

It was two days of rising at the crack of dawn and getting to bed late. Three conferences + three speeches thereat + lots of meetings + lots of interviews + lots of traffic jams + lots of walking (to avoid the traffic jams) + nothing else! I mean – nothing non-work interesting or touristic. Boo. Still, did manage to take a few snaps over the two days:

A murky Thames:

Read on: A deluxe surprise…

Rome. Without a doubt – one of the most… significant cities in the world; 100% must-see. I’ve been to the city many times, toured the different parts of the center on foot several times, prodded, tasted, tried on, and took lots of pics of practically everything. And ‘practically everything’ of course includes St. Peter’s Square, including pics from the top of the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica, taken on three or four separate occasions. But this was the first time I viewed the square from this angle:

And seeing this person in the flesh – that was also a first!

Read on: Palm trees and monuments…

My recent meet with the Pope jogged my memory about the existence of such forgotten gadgets as the arithmometer. The device being used may still be remembered by some in my generation, while to younger generations the ‘contraption’ is an antique – a relic from eons ago – when there was no Facebook (imagine?), and not even any Internet (WHAT?!).

But on this pre-digital analog bit of kit once the accounting of the whole world depended, and more besides. Therefore, this post is all about arithmometers, because history is worth knowing – especially when it’s as intriguingly quaint as this :).

What an invention! Of course, you could read all about it on Wikipedia, but here I’ll give you a summary of what are, IMHO, the highlights.

Mechanical calculators appeared… more than 2000 years ago! The ancient Greeks used them! What, didn’t you know? I kind of did, but – once again (eek!) – my memory later failed me. So I looked up the details to refreshen those synapses.

Aha – here she is, the beut! The Antikythera mechanism – originating one or two centuries BC; that is – 2100+ years ago!

The Antikythera mechanism is an ancient analog computer and orrery used to predict astronomical positions and eclipses for calendrical and astrological purposes, as well as the Olympiads, the cycles of the ancient Olympic Games.

Found housed in a 340 millimeters× 180 millimeters× 90 millimeter wooden box, the device is a complex clockwork mechanism composed of at least 30 meshing bronze gears. Its remains were found as one lump, later separated into three main fragments, which are now divided into 82 separate fragments after conservation works. Four of these fragments contain gears, while inscriptions are found on many others. The largest gear is approximately 140 millimeters in diameter and originally had 223 teeth. (Wikipedia)

Oh those Greeks!

Fast forward some 1600 years, and the next example of a mechanical calculator gets drawn by Leonardo da Vinci. That device was a 16-bit adding machine with 10-tooth cogs.

Another long pause – of 120 years…

Surviving notes from Wilhelm Schickard in 1623 report that he designed and had built the earliest of the modern attempts at mechanizing calculation. His machine was composed of two sets of technologies: first an abacus made of Napier’s bones, to simplify multiplications and divisions first described six years earlier in 1617, and for the mechanical part, it had a dialed pedometer to perform additions and subtractions.

Two decades later…

Blaise Pascal designed [a] calculator to help in the large amount of tedious arithmetic required; it was called Pascal’s Calculator or Pascaline. 

30 years later – the ‘stepped reckoner’… 

– A digital mechanical calculator [was] invented by the German mathematician Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. It was the first calculator that could perform all four arithmetic operations. Its intricate precision gearwork … was somewhat beyond the fabrication technology of the time.

And after that, a veritable arms calculator race ensued…

[In 1674 came] Samual Morland’s ‘arithmetical machine’ by which the four fundamental rules of arithmetic were readily worked “without charging the memory, disturbing the mind, or exposing the operations to any uncertainty” (regarded by some as the world’s first multiplying machine).

In 1709…

[Giovanni] Poleni was the first to build a calculator that used a pinwheel design.

And here come the warm jets real arithmometers, not their precursors…

Thomas de Colmar‘s [arithmometer] became the first commercially successful mechanical calculator. Its sturdy design gave it a strong reputation of reliability and accuracy and made it a key player in the move from human computers to calculating machines that took place during the second half of the 19^th century.

Its production debut of 1851 launched the mechanical calculator industry, which ultimately built millions of machines well into the 1970s [!!!!]. For forty years, from 1851 to 1890, the arithmometer was the only type of mechanical calculator in commercial production and it was sold all over the world. During the later part of that period two companies started manufacturing clones of the arithmometer: Burkhardt, from Germany, which started in 1878, and Layton of the UK, which started in 1883. Eventually about twenty European companies built clones of the arithmometer until the beginning of WWII.

Meanwhile in Russia, in the same decade (1850-1860), Pafnuty Chebyshev made the first Russian arithmometer.

Less than a generation later, another resident of Russia (a Swedish immigrant engineer) began line manufacture of the Odhner Arithmometer…

From 1892 to the middle of the 20^th century, independent companies were set up all over the world to manufacture Odhner’s clones and, by the 1960s, with millions sold, it became one of the most successful type[s] of mechanical calculator ever designed.

Fast forward to September 28, 2016, and a certain Eugene Kaspersky gives Pope Francis one such Odhner Arithmometer:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BK6AsyGguNu/

Its industrial production officially started in 1890 in Odhner’s Saint Petersburg workshop.

Read on: A bit of subjunctive mood…

We’ve been ‘saving the world’ for, hmmm, now let me see, a good 19 years already! Actually it’s several years longer than that, but 19 years ago was when we registered KL as a (UK) company.

Alas, ‘saving the world’ once and for all and forever just ain’t possible: cyberthreats are evolving all the time, with the cyber-miscreants behind them forever finding new attack vendors across the digital landscape, meaning that landscape will never be 100% safe. However, hundreds of millions of folks all around the world, on different devices and in different life situations, each day have the possibility to protect their privacy and data, safely use online stores and banking, and protect their kids from digital filth, cyber-perverts and con-artists.

And on our side – the ones doing the protecting – there’s plenty of raison d’être for our experts: each photo rescued from ransomware, every blocked phishing site, each shut down botnet, and every cyber-bandit sentenced to prison: each one = cause for professional satisfaction and pride. It means all the hard work wasn’t for nothing; we really are doing good.

In the struggle against cyber-filth, cyber-perverts and cyber-crooks, we’ve got for you a range continually improved tools.

Read on: Sharper than a Valerian steel sword…

Hi all, from Krakow, where last week a modest though oh-so important event took place – important in different ways. The main way: it marked 15 years of the KL Poland office!

What? Little 15 Big 15 already? But, it was just the other day we were in Warsaw for the 10^th b-day bash. Oh my Gdansk. How time flies…

Read on: UNESCO recommended salt mine…

Yichang is a relatively small provincial city (a ‘prefecture-level city’) in the Hubei province with a population of just over four million, but it’s several times larger than London! It’s famous mostly for its Three Gorges Dam, which I told you about yesterday. The view of it from my hotel room looked like this:

Read on: Oh my Greek!…

Let’s continue the electricity theme…

Actually, more specifically, in this post it’s a hydroelectric theme; more specifically about a hydroelectric power station; more specifically – the largest hydroelectric power plant in the world. It’s so gigantic you can stare at it for hours, hypnotized: massive majestic concrete walls, vast open spaces… extraordinary in the extreme. And the best bit is the flowing water – which acts as a magnet for the attention of Homo Sapiens.

It’s called the Three Gorges Dam. It’s around 30km from the city of Yichang, and around 300km – or 2½ hours on a train – to the west of Wuhan.

A dam more than two kilometers (2300m!) long, 180 meters high, with a width of the dam wall at the top of 50 meters, and at the base – 120m (as we were told by the girl who was our excursion guide for the afternoon). I mean – just how much concrete was needed for all that?! Oh my gorges.

Read on: More crazy numbers…

Ready? Rant begins – NOW!…

After the Chinese Rail Non-Fail the day before, I could not berliiieeeeeeeve the total fail in a Chinese airport the next day. And not just any old Chinese airport, but the main international airport of China’s capital, no less! The fail was an Internet fail, folks. And the fail was catastrophically, categorically total.

Now, the airport’s immense, beautiful, and just super all round (despite the inevitable Chinese petty tortures/mess-ups), with all its stores, escalators, fountains, sculptures… everything done contemporarily, tastefully and expensively. Everything great except for one thing: no proper Internet! Even mobile Internet ain’t happening, even with a foreign SIM, i.e., with a foreign (not Chinese) number, which doesn’t fall under the Great (Fire)Wall of China. I mean, there is some signal but it’s so weak you might as well not bother.

And I wanted to connect to my blog to write a few ‘on the road’ notes as I like to do, or some ruminations on matters of great importance, plus upload some photos as I like to do, but no – it wasn’t to be. What’s the Chinese for ‘Where’s the Internet, dammit?!’ Please let me know someone. I’ll have it printed on a t-shirt and wear it next time I’m there.

And the ruminations on matters of great importance this week were as follows:

Let’s talk about something that’s so essential to everything that, well, everything – or at least a great many things – wouldn’t exist or be possible. Something so vital that without it life would lose much of its meaning and would become unbearably dull and sad. Something that forms the basis of almost all our modern activities, without which all noble intentions, the reaching of worthy goals, and the securing of a reasonable amount of happiness of various calibers – everything! – would not be possible.

You guessed it yet?

Yep: electricity! What did you think I meant? (Answers > the comments; and keep it clean!)

Just imagine for one minute what would happen if all of a sudden there’d be no more electrical current coming through the sockets – forever! I mean, really: no more, finito, kaput, for ever more!

It would be bad, of course. Real bad. But it wouldn’t be apocalyptic, quite. Life would go on; only – by candlelight and be horse-drawn and with sails!

ATTENTION – QUIZ-QUESTION! PRIZES GUARANTEED FOR THE FIRST RIGHT ANSWER! 

What’s the name of that sci-fi flick where unfriendly invisible aliens that live on electricity land on earth? Who then consume all the electrons in all the cables and even in natural phenomena like thunderstorms? Where at the end the protagonist, by the light of a candle, bemoans how the thunder’s pealing and the rain’s pouring down but there’s no lightning, and probably never will be?

Update/PS: Further to my emotional rant regarding Beijing’s main airport, a few pics for your viewing pleasure (I finally reached a country that provides good Internet; imagine?! So radically technologically progressive!!).

And here’s pic I took from the plane: morning dead calm, and a column of smoke (or steam) rising up from the middle of a cloud.

It’s just the way it is: the human being is a lazy creature. If it’s possible not to do something, we don’t do it. However, paradoxically this is a good thing, because laziness is… the engine of progress! What? How so? Well, if a job’s considered too hard or long-winded or complex for humans to do, certain lazy (but conscientious) humans (Homo Laziens?: ) give the job to a machine! In cybersecurity we call it optimization.

Analysis of millions of malicious files and websites every day, developing ‘inoculations’ against future threats, forever improving proactive protection, and solving dozens of other critical tasks – all of that is simply impossible without the use of automation. And machine learning is one of the main concepts used in automation.

Automation has existed in cybersecurity right from the beginning (of cybersecurity itself). I remember, for example, how back in the early 2000s I wrote the code for a robot to analyze incoming malware samples: the robot put the detected files into the corresponding folder of our growing malware collection based on its (the robot’s) verdict regarding its (the file’s!) characteristics. It was hard to imagine – even back then – that I used to do all that manually!

These days however, simply giving robots precise instructions for tasks you want them to do isn’t enough. Instead, instructions for tasks need to be given imprecisely. Yes, really!

For example, ‘Find the human faces on this photograph’. For this you don’t describe how human faces are picked out and how human faces differ from those of dogs. Instead what you do is show the robot several photographs and add: ‘These things here are humans, this is a human face, and these here are dogs; now work the rest out yourself’! And that, in a nutshell, is the ‘freedom of creativity’ that calls itself machine learning.

Image source

Read on: ML + CS = Love…