Do not go to Cars.gov

[BuzzKillington]

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[knowledgegranted]

chaskq showed me this a few days ago, I had a few security analysts look at it and it doesn't seem that it injects anything onto your computer. I have no idea why they make this claim.

[BuzzKillington]

What level security analysts? Are we talking high school kids? Or do you have family that works for someone that knows their ****?

[knowledgegranted]

The team I know works for ESSVote. They have to know their **** otherwise the worlds' government systems all go down the toilet.

[Zephik]

Anyone want to try this or offer some kind of more credible proof aside from Fox News?

[x88x]

chaskq showed me this a few days ago, I had a few security analysts look at it and it doesn't seem that it injects anything onto your computer. I have no idea why they make this claim.

They're Fox News, that's why they make that claim. They base their business on frightening people as much as possible. I must say though, it's a rather entertaining video, in a morbid sort of way. Just for kicks, I might try that later with system monitoring tools running, see what really happens.

[OvRiDe]

That aired over 2 weeks ago. Since then the offending Terms and Conditions statement has been removed. It did not install anything on your PC, and it was intended for Dealer Support users and Enterprise Service Center accounts, not the Consumer.

http://www.snopes.com/computer/internet/clunkers.asp

[BuzzKillington]

Regardless of it actually doing anything, the disclaimer shouldn't give them those kind of rights. They may as well say "accessing this sites gives government officials the right to rape your mother."

Will they all come rape my mom? No. But I'll be damned if I accept an agreement giving them that "right."

[x88x]

Nice, I didn't even think to look it up on snopes. Thanks for the link.

[OvRiDe]

Regardless of it actually doing anything, the disclaimer shouldn't give them those kind of rights. They may as well say "accessing this sites gives government officials the right to rape your mother."

Will they all come rape my mom? No. But I'll be damned if I accept an agreement giving them that "right."

Did you read the article?



According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), even consumers who may have inadvertently stumbled across the notice and mistakenly clicked on it were not in danger of having the "government take all the information on their computers":
Clicking "continue" on a poorly worded Terms of Service on a government site will not give the government the ability to "tap into your system ... any time they want." The seizure of the personal and private information stored on your computer through a one-sided click-through terms of service is not "conscionable" as lawyers say, and would not be enforceable even if the cars.gov website was capable of doing it, which we seriously doubt. Moreover, the law has long forbidden the government from requiring you to give up unrelated constitutional rights as a condition of receiving discretionary government benefits like participation in the Cars for Clunkers program.


The Click through was mistakenly put in the wrong place.. it should have only appeared to the entities that actually login to the system, and poorly worded as well.

It was a dumb ass mistake, but never the less just a mistake.

[Zephik]

Just another reason to not like Fox News. Someone should create a website with all the reasons to like and dislike Fox News, just so I can have somewhere to point people who think their worth the time to watch.

[OvRiDe]

There is plenty to not like about all the news media, so no point in singling out them. I watch Fox News mostly, but the key with any news, is to do your OWN research, and see what the whole story is.

If you really think that your going to get the whole story from any News outlet, then your "sheep" and they have got you right where they wanted you. :D

[Zephik]

There is plenty to not like about all the news media, so no point in singling out them. I watch Fox News mostly, but the key with any news, is to do your OWN research, and see what the whole story is.

Agreed.

[Omega]

If you really think that your going to get the whole story from any News outlet, then your "sheep" and they have got you right where they wanted you. :D

this.

Fox might be retarded, but find me ANY news outlet that doesn't sway the story one way or another...

[Crazy Buddhist]

This amounts to a contractual term that, although under normal "consumer" circumstances would be seen as potentially non-actionable, is very heavy handed. That it was aimed at a professional audience involved in a Govt scheme probably does make it actionable in court as a matter of fact, therefore ..

Car dealers agreeing to the terms probably did legally give ownership of the computer to the government.

My personal suspicion is that this is not some massive attempt to rip off people's private information but the something completely different:

I suspect the point behind this, as it is meant for the dealers not the public ... dealers involved in giving away Govt cash .... is to protect said Govt cash (i.e. your taxes) from fraud.

In situations like where a certain subset of people gain a temporary right to hand out Govt cash people often are bettered by their own greed. My belief is that the Govt wanted a way to audit participating dealers to ensure compliance and that fraud was not taking place. I suspect they would only have swung into action where there was probable cause.

It was still a pretty dumb way of doing that, frankly .. there are better ways ... but if that was the rationale I can understand where the thinking came from, even if the implementation was dumb as ****.

After all ... you wouldn't want dodgy car dealers ripping this system off and stealing Govt cash would you? .. and, without wishing to offend, along with real estate agents and lawyers, car dealers have a pretty poor reputation for ... not always doing things the right way.

CrazyB

[Omega]

I think CrazyB has got it right.

My aversion to the CARS program to begin with aside, what they intended was fine, but how they went about it may have been a little "heavy-handed".

Well, no harm no foul. Heavy-handed, maybe, but nothing bad has come of it yet.

[billygoat333]

There is plenty to not like about all the news media, so no point in singling out them. I watch Fox News mostly, but the key with any news, is to do your OWN research, and see what the whole story is.

If you really think that your going to get the whole story from any News outlet, then your "sheep" and they have got you right where they wanted you. :D

I agree with this. after watching all the news networks, I find Fox to be the most entertaining. (entertaining, note, not the most informative.)

[Crazy Buddhist]

I agree with this. after watching all the news networks, I find Fox to be the most entertaining. (entertaining, note, not the most informative.)

Fox, strangely do provide an incredibly informative show - perhaps one of the most informative: "Freedom Watch", with Judge Andrew Napolitano - but it is only aired via the internet.

CB

[BuzzKillington]

Did you read the article?


I was typing during the time the post before me was posted so at that time, no I had not read the second link.

Although the agreement has been removed, my opinion still stands. I wouldn't care what the news source was... they demonstrated the agreement live which was enough for me to post this thread. Now, if they were to have just read it aloud without demonstrating it, I would have felt the need to dig deeper but because I saw it with my own eyes, it was more than enough for me.

[x88x]

Yeah, I'm with CB. Unfortunately, finding the balance between reigning in the people trying to exploit a system and giving the legitimate users free access is often a very difficult problem....one which they seem to have botched the first go-around here.

However, if data were pulled off a system, I'm pretty sure that unless there were other, extenuating circumstances (ie, the dealer exploiting the program), that disclaimer would not have held up in court. We do still have some privacy in the digital world.



I was typing during the time the post before me was posted so at that time, no I had not read the second link.

Although the agreement has been removed, my opinion still stands. I wouldn't care what the news source was... they demonstrated the agreement live which was enough for me to post this thread. Now, if they were to have just read it aloud without demonstrating it, I would have felt the need to dig deeper but because I saw it with my own eyes, it was more than enough for me.

Well, I do feel obligated to point out that it actually wasn't shown live in the video, because the site was taking too long to load. They showed the text from a prior loading of the page.


Also useful to point out that they went to the dealer portal, not the consumer portal.