The (Dark) "Cloud"

[FlyingClayDisk]

As I noted in another thread, I've been wanting to post this topic for a while here, but never got around to it.  I have a couple other stories (actually quite a few) as well, but I will start with this one first because it is really a 'discussion-starter' more so than anything else.  I will start out by posting some of the initial thoughts and themes and build on this as we move along.  So, here goes...

As many of you know, I work in 'electronic systems', meaning I pretty much eat, drink and sleep technology systems day and night.  And, the systems I work on are in the aviation sector.  Trust that I am fairly well informed regarding 'systems' type discussions pretty much across the board.  However, that said, as many of you also know...my personal life is the almost exact opposite of my professional life (i.e. very simple).  We raise cattle on our ranch.  Now, I don't expect everyone to agree with what I'm about to say.  In fact, I expect some here may even vigorously disagree with what I am about to say, but it needs to be said, and it needs to be discussed...and it needs to be understood by the larger general public who, despite what they may claim, know very little about it.  This subject is...the infamous "Cloud" we all keep hearing so much about.  So, without further adieu, here is the underpinning theme:

The "CLOUD" is a technological ruse so great that it rivals even Algore's "Global Warming" ruse, which in my opinion is one of the greatest deceptions ever perpetuated on society in the history of mankind!  Period.

Whew!  Got that out!  Okay, now here are some reasons why...

1. People hear about "The Cloud" every single day (probably 50 times), but only 1 in 100 people can really tell you exactly what "The Cloud" really means...in a holistic sense.
   
2. The big heavy-hitters in technology sector lost control of "technology", and they started losing billions (trillions) in the process.  The "Cloud" solves this problem for them (but not for YOU).
   
3. The "Cloud" consolidates CONTROL (there's that evil word again..."Control").  But the control the Cloud consolidates is not things which are readily apparent in society (things like how people do business, and what decisions they make, who they deal with, and how often, etc.)
   
4. Think back about when you first started hearing the words "The Cloud"...and what other terms were you hearing a lot of right at that EXACT same time???  You were hearing daily about how Open Source systems like LINUX and many others were gaining traction in the day to day technology sector (no longer were theses things limited to just the computer geeks).  <I'm betting there's some light bulbs lighting up right now!>
   

Now, before I get into too exhaustive of a list here, I want to walk back through history a bit and draw some curious parallels, just for reference. ...

Back in the 60's computers started to become part of the main stream.  Through the 70's and into the early 80's computers got considerably more capable, but in about 1980 something very important happened, and this was the development of the Personal Computer, or "PC" as we know it today.  This was a HUGE technological leap for a variety of reasons, but the biggest one was something which few outside of the technology sector noticed.  The PC took computing OUT of the traditional "Data Center" environments.  At first, the 'computing' being done by PC's was just a tiny microscopic fraction of the total amount of "compute" being done, but the trend had been started.  There were limitations though, and these limitations kept the proverbial TPTB at bay, at least initially.

Early computing was constrained by the lack of effective means for one processor to talk to another.  (Note - I'm covering a LOT of ground here quickly, and glazing over parts, to simplify).  Essentially, computers couldn't 'talk' to each other very well.  Over the years, this problem was solved, albeit very slowly.  The solution?  "Networks".  Networks connected computers together, but early networks were very crude (even up until recently really).  What many people think are 'sophisticated' networks even today are actually pretty crude when it comes to REAL computing...like the important stuff.  (and balancing a checkbook is not one of these, nor is writing a letter to Santa).

In time though, networks improved.  First they improved inside the office environment.  We know these as Local Area Networks or "LANs".  The bigger transport though was in the Wide Area Networks or "WANs", and these were the realm of the Telcos and ISP's.  These not only connected offices together, but they connected entire Cities and even Countries together.

Then along came that PITA little device known as the "Cell Phone", the proverbial 'electronic leash'.  Well, that little cell phone changed a whole bunch of things, not the least of which was how computers talked to each other.  So, a little bit of the Telco lock on the market was lost to the cell phone providers.  Then came the "Smart Phone", and another chunk was lost.  BUT, what people didn't see happening when all this went down was...the cellular providers had installed massive infrastructure networks across this country and the World which rivaled those of the traditional Telcos. 

Now there was competition!

Up to this point has probably been some easy remedial reading for many.  From this point forward, I'll start getting into some more complex subjects which glue these pieces all together and illustrate what an absolutely unimaginably massive mind-game has been played on society and the World. 

So, I will call this the end of "Part I - The (DARK) Cloud"

<End PART 1>

---To be continued---   (and I haven't even gotten started yet!!!)

[FlyingClayDisk]

----------------------- PART II - The (DARK) Cloud --------------------------

Every one of us reading this watched what happened next.  Maybe not the whole time, but certainly parts of it.  It was just like buying a PC or a laptop...by the time you got it home and unboxed, there was a new model already out.  In other words, technology advanced at a seemingly rapid rate.  The same advances happened in the networking world.  Why?  Because as computers became more powerful, people could do more with them, and when people could do more they needed to share more...and so on, and so on.

Now, I haven't skipped over, or forgotten about, ol' Algore creating the Interwebz, but really the Internet was just another form of networking so if good ol' Al hadn't personally invented the internet himself (all by his lonesome self, with no help from anyone else on planet Earth...AT ALL!), well, someone would have.  This is how we all (should) know that Algore really DIDN'T create the Internet.  The Internet is really just a logical networking conclusion.  A solution to a problem.  Despite what others may suggest, this is all the Internet is, just a means of connecting one device to another.  Oh sure, there were some very clever inventions in addressing and networking technology (that Algore also did NOT invent), and there are even some continuing today.  And, these will continue in the future...oh boy, will they!!  Bottom line, the "Internet" is just a subset of the networking discussion as a whole (and this is important to remember for later).

Anyway, the point is; computers got more powerful, and networking got more powerful, and with the advent of cellular technology, networking infrastructure grew exponentially.  It's what happened next that TPTB did NOT expect.

One day, somebody somewhere asked the question..."Ummmm, let's just say, hypothetically of course, I wanted to shut the whole Internet down...how would I go about doing this?"  Of course, it wasn't just one person, and it wasn't just one question; there were actually millions of positive and negative questions like this.  Things like..."How would we PREVENT the Internet from being shut down?"...and many millions of others.  The point here is, there was a point in time where it became apparent that no one person over government had "control" of what we call the Internet now days.  It was resilient, just as office networks were, just as WANs were, and it was all growing at an exponential pace.  In fact, compute and networking was growing at such a rapid pace that it quickly became apparent that 'compute' power and networking were no longer the bottleneck in the information age...storage was.

Now, the topic of storage is a very complex topic because when we start talking about the quantities of data in play it's no longer just another RAID storage array, or even 1,000 of them...or even 1,000,000 of them.  Storage quickly becomes an absolutely massive problem, and there is no easy solution.  Why?  Well, storage is big, and storage is heavy, and storage is hot, and storage is very, very, expensive!  Compute becomes easy, and networking becomes easy...and storage becomes very HARD!

So, what was the industry's solution?  LOL...it was very inefficient, and everyone reading this has experienced it (just not on the same scale).  The solution was to store the same thing more than once.  (How many of you have the same picture stored more than once on your computer, or phone, or on your phone AND your computer, AND backed up on some storage media, AND copied to some flash drive...AND posted to social media...AND, AND, AND!

The same data is being stored over and over again.  This causes huge, and expensive, and <GASP> environmentally UN-friendly equipment to grow gargantuanly large.  Today, people have RAID arrays in their houses, when just 10 years ago 99% of people didn't even know what a RAID array even was!  Now scale these discussions up to a City level, a County level, a State level, a National level and...a Global level.  I'm sure I don't need to say more.  It's an obvious and HUGE problem.  Unfortunately, this hasn't even scratched the surface!  And here's why...

You see, there's also these sneaky little people who want to know what everyone has on their computer, and in their storage, and in their emails and in their databases...and everywhere else.  They don't want to have to sort through the same picture of Mom & Dad's 35th Wedding Anniversary photos sixty-seven time to know what's on your computer...they want to do it once!

HEY, HEY...HAVE WE GOT A SOLUTION FOR YOU!!!  It's this new thing we call...THE CLOUD!

I think I'll end Part II right here.  I'm pretty sure y'all are getting the idea of where this is headed, and my fingers are getting tired.  So I'll just stop now and we'll pick up were we left off in the next episode of...Part III - The (DARK) Cloud.

----------------------------------  END PART II -----------------------------

To be continued...

[FlyingClayDisk]

I'm not going to write Part III right now, but I would like to throw out some terms to get some of the "wheels" turning and the "juices" flowing on this subject.  So, put your Paranoia hat on for just a moment and follow along with me.  I'm betting when we get done you're going to be renaming that hat!

These are all terms you may have heard at some point in your computer travels, and there's a pretty high (extremely high actually) probability that wherever you heard these terms whoever said them was also saying these are "Good" things, and positive things and more secure things.  And, in some respects they 'can' be and ARE good things, BUT they also 'can' have far more sinister uses!

Terms

1. Meta-Data
   
2. Cloud Storage
   
3. Virtual Networks
   
4. Virtual Servers
   
5. Virtual PC's
   
6. Desktop Virtualization
   
7. 2 Factor Authentication
   
8. Voice over IP (VOIP)
   
9. Power over Ethernet (POE)
   
10. Smart card technology
    
11. EXIF data (really the same as Meta-Data by another name)
    
12. Biometrics
    
13. Quantum computing (LOL!  I had to plan that...so it would be #13!  Oh boy, if the world only knew!)
    

All of these things (and many more) are generally 'advertised' as being good things.  And, when utilized by people with good intentions, they ARE good things...for the most part (or at least they can be).  However, what's the one thing all of these trendy buzz-words have in common?  And, what is new about these technologies which didn't exist (for the most part) from the late 60's until today?

Answer - They all require a "Host". 

Think about this one for a moment. ...

Your PC didn't require a host.  Your HDD didn't require a host.  One 'network' didn't require a traffic cop (host) to determine which data belonged on which network.  Your desktop didn't require a host (it was your PC).  You didn't require a host to login to your PC (you just typed your password).  Your telephone didn't require a host (to covert analog to digital and back to analog again).  The lights in your office didn't require a host (a (very smart) Ethernet switch) to turn on.  Your trip to the gas station didn't require a host to validate your credit card (yes, authorizations aren't new, but chips are!  The ones that connect YOU to the purchase!).  Your fingerprint reader didn't require a host (but it does now!).  And then there's "Quantum computing"....where not even the processor is real...and there are hosts out the butt there! 

So...who exactly IS this ever so gracious "host"?  

Sure, we know it's not one 'guy', or even one entity, but just imagine for a moment how much easier it just got to aggregate all those colossal Mt. Everests of data into much more manageable subsets for maybe a little closer scrutiny.  I mean, surely no one believes that Google just does all that fancy search results presentation for free, right?  And, where did they get all that data anyway?  But...it's not nearly enough, not even close!  Nope...now we need the "Cloud" to keep it all straight?

Still like the name of your hat?

Maybe a better name might be..."Oh shit, all these dots are connected, aren't they!?!?!  Every single last one of them!  I wonder why?"

Inquiring minds want to know.

....And we haven't even started with Part III yet!

[FlyingClayDisk]

And just on a side note, a kinder and gentler, less paranoid and more upbeat side note....

Can good things come from the "Cloud"?

Absolutely they can!!  Want an example?  You are seeing the words I type because of the Cloud.  If I'm not mistaken, this forum exists because of the Cloud. 

So, absolutely, good things can definitely come from the Cloud!!  Fantastic things even!

But that's the whole idea, right?  If the Cloud had no benefit to anyone, no one would trust it, so there has to be value.  AND...most importantly, the Cloud itself isn't evil, but some of the people who want it the most very much are evil!  And, they will stop at nothing to control all of our worlds.  (and we will see some of these things in Part III and beyond)

We cannot live in or even create a pure utopian world.  There always has to be balance.  The key word though is just that, "balance".  In a fully informed world there is better balance than we have today, where 'some' people walk around in an apathetic state thinking these issues are so much larger than they are that there is no hope in having control over their own destiny.  This, is what must change.  When the majority believes those things there is no "balance", and it's easy to take advantage of the masses.

I'm overwhelmingly confident the owners and administrators of this very forum are acutely aware of the balance I am speaking of.  And, my hope is to help shed light upon issues we face in society today, not to the owners and administrators here, but to the larger public who may not see that there truly is hope in controlling our destiny.  But that hope comes in the form of understanding...even complex things. 

That is my hope, and my goal.

Peace and Health!

FCD

[727Sky]

[NightskyeB4Dawn]

You have given me a lot to think about.

I am not a computer whiz, but my first computer was an IBM AT. I have been playing around with computers from the mid 80s, and my first internet connect was through "The Well".

I know there is absolutely nothing that is connected or routed through the internet that is exclusively under our control. Hell I might be able to say the same thing about the electric smart meters connected to our houses, some TV sets, dishwashers, and refrigerators.

I don't know all the complexities, but I find it extremely interesting. I am willing to learn, and I thank you for all the time, effort, information, and thought that you put into this post.

[Michigan Swamp Buck]

I can't integrate a new larger volume disk drive into my older computers, so I've apparently been intuitively creating a RAID array of sorts from older drives. They aren't technically a RAID array, but they effectively are acting like that for me.

In my private LAN, I do have redundant data stored around my network, with a copy of it in "the cloud", but only so I can access the information outside of my private LAN and have an extra backup. I have 5 drives in the network, and some SDs and thumb drives to have on the run if I have to bug out. I've also sent copies of some of that data to four other people outside of my private network.

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Hi FCD. Wow, you always write in this style? Excellent informative story telling posts! Guess I never acquainted myself with your former threads on ATS, but I like what you have conveyed thus far. I was a network engineer for years, managed R&D Labs, and network protocol analysis and validation & verification was my expertise for Ethernet, PPP, ATM, DSL, WiMAX, WiFi. Also, did validation on chipset backdoors, but that is a long story in of itself. I was a long standing member of IETF, IEEE, ITU, DSL Forum, WiFi Alliance. I was one of the pioneers in proto-typing xDSL for the telco's to roll out in the US, UK, Spain, France, Germany.

Assisted in the design, development, & certification of the world's first desktop WiFi chip & card that was it's own host. Unfortunately, due to an internal battle royale with Microsoft it was never released. Million$ down the shitter.

I've always been fascinated with year 1983 and alot happened. Motorola released the first consumer cell phone that year. Comdex 1983 in Vegas is where my dad met Bill Gates and 5 years later made a small fortune off Microsoft. Wish I had his foresight.



1983::

Apple released the Apple IIe with a 1.023 MHz processor, 64 KB of memory and the ProDOS operating system in January 1983.

The IBM XT was first introduced on March 8, 1983.

IBM announced the PCjr (PC junior)

DNS was introduced.

Microsoft Windows version 1.0 was announced on November 10, 1983.

Ping utility released.

Compaq introduced the first 100% IBM compatible computer the "Compaq Portable"

Novell introduces Netware, the first NOS (network operating system) 

MS-DOS 2.0 released.

Introduction of the first 3.5-inch size hard drive, developed by Rodime. It had a storage capacity of 10 MB. WoW.

Old fav - The movie WarGames released on June 3, 1983.

TIME magazine nominates the personal computer as the "machine of the year" December 26, 1982, the first non-human ever nominated.

We live in a duality world so will always be a dark side to technology, but like you said the problem is balance, which we're way outta wack today. I keep just about everything stored locally...hard drives, discs, and a shoe box full of USB pen drives.

Ok, enough of the past. I'll await your part III before commenting on the "Cloud" to see if you cover what I have in mind.

[FlyingClayDisk]

@"EndtheMadnessNow" - Great contribution!

I wish you could have seen my face chuckling as I was reading through all of what you wrote!  And yes, I remember all of those things, in 'painful' detail...and even more.  Remember how the next generation of everything was supposed to be the end-all, be-all, for everything before it, and how many times we saw those things fail.  Things like ATM (asynchronous transfer mode) , and more recently UC (unified communication)?  And how many evolutions have there been in database technology, or storage, or cabling.  HA!...remember "CAT-7"???  That one still cracks me up!  Everyone was still marveling over CAT-5"E" from the CAT-5 world, and Anixter was running around talking about their new CAT-7 product.  (and before you say it...no, CAT-7 was never even a ratified standard under IEEE, it was just some trade-name Anixter came up with to sell cable, but it "sounded" cool to the uninformed!)  And I forget now what the exact bandwidth and frequencies were, but I want to say they were claiming something like 750mbps and like 450MHz.  I remember cracking up at some sales dude who was trying to educate this physicist (me) about it.  I asked him why I would ever want 750mbps when Cisco switches jumped from 500mbps straight to 1gbps???...who would ever benefit or use it?  <crickets!>  LOL!!!  It was like making a "revolutionary" new fire hose which was 2.5" in diameter...in a world where there were already 1" garden hoses, and 4" fire hoses (on all fire trucks) already.  It made exactly zero sense!  Who was ever going to use it?  Not the homeowner because their spigot was only 1", and not the Fire Dept because they already pumped 10x as much water through 4" hoses.  It was one of those moments that make you go..."Hmmmmm"  LOL!!  But I'm digressing into the weeds of techno-jargon myself (something I hope to avoid here, at least in this thread).

<Note - To the other folks reading this...this reply is not Part III of my OP, so please don't let it distract you.  This reply is my reply to the esteemed EtMN, and is a bit more technical.  I promise I will get to posting Part III of 'The (Dark) "Cloud" ' here shortly, so stay tuned.  So please forgive my little excursion here with EtMN.  You can ignore the rest of this reply unless you're into the techno stuff>

Joking aside, given your familiarity with technology, EtMN, here's something related which is germane to the OP (albeit more technical).  Remember the debate between Active-Active and Disaster Recovery (DR)?  This subject is one of the major factors in why people are attracted to the "cloud".  In an Active-Active environment we need extreme bandwidth, far higher than any networking QOS will allow for.  In fact, there can be no QOS rules at all, it has to be 100% dedicated.  Of course, this means those A-A connections are going to have to be out-of-band, right?  (no "networking" allowed, except for maybe dedicated hi-bandwidth Fiber-Channel (or equal) links).  Well, if an entity was at that level, then they also were already Uptime Tier III (or higher) certified and practicing physical diversity.  So, to get those connections they either had to install the terrestrial links themselves, or lease the dark-fiber from the Telcos.  So on the one hand they had a massive CAPEX cost, or on the other they had a massive OPEX cost, AND in order to really do A-A they had to pick one or the other.  THIS is why DR stayed around as long as it did (and still does).  Active-Active is incomprehensibly expensive, especially over time.  So, what was the next alternative?  DR, right?  (now hold onto that thought for a second while I hit another point). ...

So, DR is cheaper, but it's slow (like "days" compared to "seconds", kind of slow).  However, DR has an interesting selling point, and we've just seen examples and read about it all over the media recently with the catastrophic Kronos debacle, right?  With DR, there is nearly zero vulnerability / risk posture because (in theory anyway) your backup is off-line.  So, (again, in theory) you should be able to recover from a catastrophe (unless you've contaminated your DR backup before you realized the problem).  How long has Kronos been down?  4 months?  How many millions of users are there (probably 250m or more)?  But you see, a system like that can't be DR; it has to be A-A because of the nature of what it does (timekeeping and payroll, fundamentally).  Therein lies a paradox.

Enter, the "Cloud".

Now the host --> host comms is no longer a direct problem for the system owner.  It's all just money (which is ultimately what all this boils down to anyway).  Now, their hardware CAPEX stays the same regardless if they choose A-A, or DR.  Their OPEX may change (and likely will)...and this is where some of the "smoke" starts coming in related to the "Cloud".  People are confusing the 'smoke' for the "Cloud" (and when I say 'smoke', I mean it in the context of "Smoke and Mirrors"!)

Note - I hate to say this, but my battery is dying and I'm going to have to stop here.  But, I think you get the idea of where I am headed with my response.  The Part III of this is a much larger picture, and I will get back to that, but I wanted to reply to you directly, hence this response.

[BIAD]

Wow! Great thread, but many of the terms are way above my pay-grade!


Luckily, I belong to the generation who sees the 'world-wide web' as merely a tool to entertain via information-gathering
and a place to chat to people we'll probably never meet. I've always perceived the situation as one's device can be switched
off and other more 'reality-focused' things can be approached.

Looking forward to Part III.


(Note to @"EndtheMadnessNow" : You missed that in 1983 Jim Henson's Fraggle Rock was launched too!)

[FlyingClayDisk]

Wow! Great thread, but many of the terms are way above my pay-grade!


Luckily, I belong to the generation who sees the 'world-wide web' as merely a tool to entertain via information-gathering
and a place to chat to people we'll probably never meet. I've always perceived the situation as one's device can be switched
off and other more 'reality-focused' things can be approached.

Looking forward to Part III.


(Note to @"EndtheMadnessNow" : You missed that in 1983 Jim Henson's Fraggle Rock was launched too!)

Who could ever forget..."The TRAaaSH HEEEEEEEeeeeeep!!"

Loved that show!  (and I was out of HS by then, and still loved it!)

[FlyingClayDisk]

I've thought a good deal about how to approach Part III of this OP.  One option was to continue building on what I'd written up to Part II.  The other option is to start from the end, and work backwards to where I left off in Part II.

I am thinking, in the interest of retaining interest and focus, it might be best to choose the latter of those two options.  This, so the end-game is in better focus earlier, and the remaining parts just fill in the blanks.  This also saves me from having to be very careful about my wording leading up to the 'big reveal', and affords more latitude to respond to questions and comments people may have.

So, unless there is any objection, this is the way I will proceed.

[Ninurta]

Excellent presentation, which gets the meat across without overburdening it with the bones!

I usually tend to simplify it much further, by just saying "there is no 'cloud' - the cloud is just computers, but they are OTHER PEOPLE'S computers, so storing YOUR stuff in 'the cloud' is really just giving up operational control of YOUR stuff to someone else, and giving them defacto ownership of YOUR data creations."

When the cloud was first a thing, I did store some encrypted containers on it, but never mounted them across the network - I would download them, make the changes locally, then re-upload them again to avoid sending secure keys across the network for security. You can imagine how cumbersome that was with larger containers, so I stopped doing it, as it was not worth the effort.

Now, with local storage as cheap as it is, I just store everything locally and avoid the pitfalls altogether.

.

[guohua]

Excellent presentation, which gets the meat across without overburdening it with the bones!

I usually tend to simplify it much further, by just saying "there is no 'cloud' - the cloud is just computers, but they are OTHER PEOPLE'S computers, so storing YOUR stuff in 'the cloud' is really just giving up operational control of YOUR stuff to someone else, and giving them defacto ownership of YOUR data creations."

When the cloud was first a thing, I did store some encrypted containers on it, but never mounted them across the network - I would download them, make the changes locally, then re-upload them again to avoid sending secure keys across the network for security. You can imagine how cumbersome that was with larger containers, so I stopped doing it, as it was not worth the effort.

Now, with local storage as cheap as it is, I just store everything locally and avoid the pitfalls altogether.

.

Yes, I agree with @"Ninurta"  I like the presentation and how you presented the thread.