OK This shows Microsoft is 'Big Brother's Handservant'... Outrageous! LINK

[Blackhatjack]

THis is WRONG on so many levels, and the danger presented cannot be overestimated.


http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article3193480.ece

January 16, 2008

"Microsoft seeks patent for office 'spy' software"
Alexi Mostrous and David Brown

"Microsoft is developing Big Brother-style software capable of remotely monitoring a worker’s productivity, physical wellbeing and competence.

The Times has seen a patent application filed by the company for a computer system that links workers to their computers via wireless sensors that measure their metabolism. The system would allow managers to monitor employees’ performance by measuring their heart rate, body temperature, movement, facial expression and blood pressure. Unions said they fear that employees could be dismissed on the basis of a computer’s assessment of their physiological state.


Technology allowing constant monitoring of workers was previously limited to pilots, firefighters and Nasa astronauts. This is believed to be the first time a company has proposed developing such software for mainstream workplaces.

Microsoft submitted a patent application in the US for a “unique monitoring system” that could link workers to their computers. Wireless sensors could read “heart rate, galvanic skin response, EMG, brain signals, respiration rate, body temperature, movement facial movements, facial expressions and blood pressure”, the application states."

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[The Straight Story]

1. If they monitor me I will whack off and see what happens

:rofl: their monitors will be going wild!

[formercia]

8. That and a web cam and you're all set.

New-age orgasmatrom.

Next thing, they will be showing up as carnival games.

Step in to the booth please and have a seat.

[IdesOfOctober]

11. "Off the Richter! Off the Richter! Off the Richter!"

[jojo54]

2. "Big-brother style" says it all.

There was a movie, an Outer Limits episode, Twillight Zone, something to that affect and the story line was that everybody was literally wired to their computers. Is this what we're headed for?

[Blackhatjack]

3. There won't be any such thing as privacy, and kiss your health information privacy goodbye.

[VenusRising]

4. That's just fucked up.

And you know they would use that technology to decide whom to fire based on the monitoring of biofeedback. It will be an easy way for the companies to spend less on employee healthcare and keep the productivity as high as possible. It measures facial expressions, fer cryin' out loud!!!

Disgusting.

[Blackhatjack]

5. IF this goes through, everyone will have to adopt expressionless compliance to keep their job...

And those 'monitoring' you will have power over you that is unimaginable.

Corporate/Businesses would jump on this in a heartbeat.

Forget Unions -- it will be assimilation into the Borg.

[VenusRising]

6. Borg or Stepford.

Either choice is going way too far.

[fed-up]

7. only two recs in an hour??? nt

[Recursion]

9. For fun, type "Bush hid the facts" into notepad

(Don't include the quotes).

Save it as a .txt file, and reopen it.

[EnviroBat]

10. That is bizarre!

I can't get my brain around that... Why Microsoft? Why?

[alfredo]

12. They are by nature very paranoid. It's in their corporate culture.

I'm glad this is a Microsoft free house and it will remain MS free.

[EnviroBat]

14. Nah, it's a "character" flaw in Notepad.

If you type any 5 character, 3 character, 3 character then 5 character sentence structure, the same thing will happen. Foe example, type

Long are the turds

Save this and reopen it. You'll see the same thing...

[alfredo]

19. What is the same thing you mention?

[Recursion]

22. That's crappy programming, not conspiracy

Well, in fairness, it's a problem with no silver bullet: with a bare text file, how do you determine the encoding (ie, Latin alphabet, cyrillic, Greek, Chinese, etc.)? Notepad (and Windows programs in general) just look at it really quick and "guess" what encoding it looks most like. For a short enough text file, it can "guess" wrong -- there is a Chinese character that is represented by the same sequence of 0's and 1's that "Bu" is, and so on.

[alfredo]

13. I don't have MS products, what does it say?

[EnviroBat]

15. It just shows up as unicode squares...

This will explain it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bush_hid_the_facts

[alfredo]

20. Thanks.

[Initech]

18. Whoa, what the fuck? That is weird on so many levels!

:scared:

[Recursion]

21. It's just a flaw in Micro$loth's Unicode-detection routine

But it's still funny.

[Initech]

16. And that is why I will NEVER work for a publically traded company, ever.

[kineneb]

17. come to the light side, young Jedi, use Mac or Linux

this item, added to the problems with Vista does not make for happy customers...

[UncleSepp]

23. Has submitted a patent application is developing

Most likely, this was someone's project in the research labs. They got far enough along to apply for a patent, so they did. Having patents helps your pay and standing.

I see this as having potential as a way to keep someone else from selling such intrusive software. If someone else productizes this, MS as the patent holder can kill it. I'd rather have this in Microsoft's hands than in Oracle's. Oracle would actually use it.