Rob Slade is a computer security specialist who regularly reviews security-related books on comp.risks and elsewhere. He recently reviewed Kim, by Rudyard Kipling, and had this to say:
Within the first twenty pages we have authentication by something you have, denial of service, impersonation, stealth, masquerade, role-based authorization (with ad hoc authentication by something you know), eavesdropping, and trust based on data integrity. Later on we get contingency planning against theft and cryptography with key changes.I read his reviews all the time, and they generally seem reasonable, but this one tripped my BS-ometer. So I found Kim at online-literature.com, and lo and behold:
And there was that on Mahbub Ali which he did not wish to keep an hour longer than was necessary - a wad of closely folded tissue- paper, wrapped in oilskin - an impersonal, unaddressed statement, with five microscopic pin-holes in one corner, that most scandalously betrayed the five confederated Kings, the sympathetic Northern Power, a Hindu banker in Peshawur, a firm of gun-makers in Belgium, and an important, semi-independent Mohammedan ruler to the south. This last was R17's work, which Mahbub had picked up beyond the Dora Pass and was carrying in for R17, who, owing to circumstances over which he had no control, could not leave his post of observation. Dynamite was milky and innocuous beside that report Of C25; and even an Oriental, with an Oriental's views of the value of time, could see that the sooner it was in the proper hands the better.
There's a lot more, but you get the idea. So I guess I need to get my BS-ometer recalibrated.
Posted by Chris at December 14, 2006 07:04 PM