Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2017 July 24

= July 24 =

Question about symmetric NAT
Dear Wikipedians:

Are the designers of symmetric NAT absolutely dumb? Do they not realize that there are all sorts of P2P applications out there that will be broken by their NAT design? Do they not play video games and realize that a PlayStation 4 cannot work behind a symmetric NAT?

70.54.133.150 (talk) 00:51, 24 July 2017 (UTC)
 * You can also read https://www.think-like-a-computer.com/2011/09/19/symmetric-nat/ . Use of NAT was in place long before P2P gaming applications. Firewalls are also very likely to block such connections. Game developers could used other widely used protocols such as Real-time Transport Protocol that firewalls and natters understand. Instead many apps come up with their own protocols, and the firewalls don't know if they can be trusted or if it is some kind of malware. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 07:13, 24 July 2017 (UTC)


 * I see. Thanks. So the balance between connectivity and malware must be balanced. 70.54.133.150 (talk) 12:34, 24 July 2017 (UTC)

Wireless Presidential Alerts
At https://www.verizonwireless.com/support/wireless-emergency-alerts-faqs/ question 14 (Can I opt out of receiving Wireless Emergency Alerts?) it says:

"Yes, you may change your device’s settings to opt out of Imminent Danger and AMBER Alerts, but you can’t opt out of Presidential Alerts. These are the three types of Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA): Presidential Alerts: About news of national authority concern Imminent Danger Alerts: Severe and Extreme alerts about weather events and threat levels AMBER Alerts: About the disappearance of persons (minor or otherwise)"

Background: This is in the US. I use a Kyocera DuraXV+ cellphone with Interenet, Instant Messaging, Voicemail, call waiting, etc. disabled. I want it as far as is possible to be a phone and nothing else. You dial my number, I talk to you. That's it. So why can’t I opt out of Presidential Alerts? Was some sort of US law passed, or is this just Verizon being a nanny?

Has a presidential alert ever been sent? I can see a potential for abuse here. I can imagine a president deciding that "vote for me" is a message that everyone should hear... :(   --Guy Macon (talk) 03:59, 24 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Is there some reason Wireless Emergency Alerts doesn't at least answer part of this question? Nil Einne (talk) 04:21, 24 July 2017 (UTC)
 * As for whether presidential alerts have ever been sent well [//www.atlasobscura.com/articles/why-youll-never-be-able-to-block-a-presidential-alert] suggests no. It's from September 2016 but I think it would have been all over the news if one had been sent in the dying days of the Obama presidency let alone early days of Trump (I mean covfefe). Even if it was just a "Bye-bye dudes and good luck, Obama out!" or "Yo, Donald J. Trump is in the house! White House that is.... I mean I'm president now!". So after a 5 second internet search, even someone from NZ can conclude the answer is no. Nil Einne (talk) 04:31, 24 July 2017 (UTC)
 * P.S. If you want the system to be changed somehow, maybe the best solution is to make sure some president is aware it exists. Someone we all suspect probably isn't going to know about it despite being president. You can throw in the Emergency Alert System for good measure. I don't know about "vote for me" messages. I think you wouldn't need to go that far, just find someone who may like to send asinine messages on it and isn't going to care that it isn't what the system was meant for. The evidence suggests the later part isn't going to be hard. The former quite a bit more, maybe just talk about it enough on Twitter and Reddit and hope for the best. Or you could try the John Oliver solution [//www.washingtonpost.com/video/entertainment/a-running-list-of-john-olivers-catheter-cowboy-ads/2017/04/10/21f7a528-1e17-11e7-bb59-a74ccaf1d02f_video.html]. Nil Einne (talk) 04:56, 24 July 2017 (UTC)


 * "WARNING ! THIS IS NOT A DRILL.  TAKE COVER IMMEDIATELY.  THE PRESIDENT IS ABOUT TO TWEET !" StuRat (talk) 05:37, 24 July 2017 (UTC)
 * "Ini-mini-chili-bini!" —Tamfang (talk) 07:54, 25 July 2017 (UTC)


 * A little searching suggests that it is possible to turn off the presidential alerts if you root your phone. Of course it's pretty hard to test whether it's working, if there's never been such an alert.  I like the idea that I can turn it off, if I want to, in principle, but I probably won't bother until the first time someone abuses the system, with the definition of "abuse" being in my sole discretion. --Trovatore (talk) 20:06, 26 July 2017 (UTC)
 * I somehow don't thinking rooting your phone really works for the sort of phone the OP referred to. They seem to be fairly technically competent but my guess is the firmware for the phone is closed source so modifying that is likely to be difficult. BTW although the Wireless Presidential Alert is only a few years old, our Emergency Alert System article suggests it and earlier systems as of 2002 hadn't been used in over 50 years. I'm pretty sure this continues to this day. There are key differences namely with the EAS and earlier systems you were likely already watching or listening to a service which was probably already carrying the news. And as our article says, the EAS may actually cover whatever it is worse (although some will question whether this could be worse than anything the president presented [//www.theguardian.com/media/video/2015/jan/06/cnn-end-of-the-world-doomsday-video]). But with a phone you may very well have no idea what's happening (realisticly probably not in the modern social media smart phone age for most people) and the president's alert may be the first you hear about it and is only likely to interupt you keeping updated with the actual news minimally. Still, I can't help thinking the trend will be the same. Although as I said above, you never know with certain unpredictable people. Except I don't know why anyone would want to alert people they're about to tweet when they could just send the the tweet as a presidential alert. Nil Einne (talk) 12:40, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
 * The problem is that it is fundamentally impossible to design a system that allows the President to bypass all user filtering and send everyone in the US an emergency alert whether they want one or not without allowing a skilled hacker to do the same. Before I turned it off, the Amber Alert system would occasionally wake me at 4AM here in Southern California with an really loud alert from somewhere in Northern California.
 * I do know how to root a smart phone, but all available military specification flip phones which survive being dropped into water, run over by a truck, dropped 20 feet unto concrete, etc. are (somewhat) dumb flip phones. If you want a phone that just makes phone calls, never breaks, and runs a long time between recharges, I highly recommend a Kyocera DuraXV+. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:19, 27 July 2017 (UTC)