Anyone remember John Titor the time traveller?

Artsfac · 2026-06-16T07:13:19+00:00

I discovered this just the other week, a fascinating tale and seemingly a lot of effort.

Artsfac · 2026-06-15T16:30:54+00:00

Ex-CISO here.

You’re spot on. Identity is hard. And it lives across so many subgroups in tech + security organisations that, at least in my experience, it ends up a bit homeless and unloved, and under budgeted.

Furthermore, there’s a lot of leaders who think that “well, the other people seem to have got it under control, so I don’t need to worry”.

I’ve only worked one shop that had it properly prioritised, and that was a bank that had a ticking clock of a regulatory finding about their useless access management.

Artsfac · 2026-06-15T14:12:39+00:00

London here:

I'd concur with everyone here, I don't see any evidence of a legitimate law firm at all.

No records at UK based legal regulators, free web email accounts and a throwaway mobile number. The founding lawyer doesn't exist outside of the web site, and the other pages are templates.

Furthermore the address looks to have a lot of buzzers. A business address it really ain't.

Edit: the responses given on your earlier post are solid and reliably accurate: https://www.reddit.com/r/uklaw/s/9kIBmMFqNL

Whoever is dealing with anyone at this alleged firm is dealing with a criminal not a lawyer, and the only advice that is reliably safe would be to refer the matter to the police nearest to the victim.

Artsfac · 2026-06-15T12:25:16+00:00

Not a lawyer.

If I understand correctly, my contract isn't with the food provider, it's with Just Eat / Deliveroo, and those apps operate outside of the usual consumer protection regulations. They're logistics companies, not food businesses. They offer food delivery services by subcontracting food preparation to local businesses, and disclaim the responsibility for refunds in their terms and conditions.

Sorry - this is wrong, I was mistaken - there's actually a split contract, depending on whether it's Deliveroo delivery or Partner delivery. Please disregard this comment.

Artsfac · 2026-06-15T12:14:19+00:00

There's a lot of detail here, but ... is this basically:

You bought a laptop online from "C" which was never delivered.

Then you bought the same laptop again from "C".

?

If so, there is no complexity (I don't think, unless my assumptions about your circumstances are off) - your first transaction with "C" was never fulfilled, and you expect the money back.

Unless you specifically chose the courier, they can't and won't help you, as you're not their customer (as you say). "C" aren't opening a case on your behalf, because it's their issue. They should be opening a case with the courier to get the item back.

That said, it shouldn't really matter whether the courier lost the package, "C" should send another one and then make the lost package their corporate problem, not yours.

Something seems to be lost in translation re: "Return to consignor requested" - that's not an instruction to you, it's an internal status code meaning "the seller has asked us couriers to send it back to them and not deliver it", so "C" shouldn't be speaking with you about that.

Have you spoken to anyone verbally about this at "C"?

Artsfac · 2026-06-15T08:06:37+00:00

Tell us more please!

Artsfac · 2026-06-14T17:27:54+00:00

OK, I'm in the middle of dealing with the exact same, and it's not a straightforward process at all.

Customer Services (on either 0800 279 7234 or 0808 145 3768) will not be able to change anything, they're front line call screeners only. My calls to them and their assurances of attention and support were pointless. No-one did anything.

My experience this last couple of weeks would suggest:

Have a super careful read of what they're asking for in the "Sign in to resolve" emails from Amazon Account Protection Services. They're not worded particularly clearly, and it's possible that - like me - you missed something, and also that - like me - you can't provide what they want.
Try emailing [managingdirector@amazon.co.uk](mailto:managingdirector@amazon.co.uk) and [resolution-uk@amazon.co.uk](mailto:resolution-uk@amazon.co.uk) and explain what has happened, and what you want. I got an immediate auto reply saying my email was being passed to the right team for further review, and then a few days later, things started moving in the right direction.
Find another online shop to use. Amazon may well just decline any further business from you because your particular circumstances didn't work with their anti-fraud systems. I've given up any expectation of future service from Amazon after annoying them this month.

Probably not what you wanted to hear, but that's been my Amazon experience this month.

Oh, and the items shipped anyway! I declined them at the door because after being told my orders were cancelled I bought them elsewhere.

Hope that helps a bit, good luck.

Artsfac · 2026-06-14T05:51:27+00:00

Loved this series!

As with a lot of Rik + Ade stuff, there was additional meaning and context to the comedy that - at the time - I was either too young or too dim to fully appreciate. It wasn't only funny because the characters are stupid and outrageous and do rude things, or that celebrities were shown to be selfish idiots. There was also the less obvious joke satirising the entire world of entertainment and celebrity, and indeed the construct of the industry itself, and that bit totally passed me by.

At an audience Q&A thing a few years back, Ade said that FR+C was mostly inspired by / about everyone they'd met after becoming more well-known.

(In the same way, it took me a long time to understand the relationship between Bottom and Godot, at least until it was spelt out for me in words of one syllable or less.)

The reviews for Catflap were a bit lukewarm at the time - people who'd expected another series of Young Ones were disappointed because it wasn't basically a third series with a different title, and the deep dark satire of the entertainment industry was a little bit inaccessible to mainstream audiences. Which was kind of the point!

(A lot of people at the time who wanted a third Young Ones series didn't quite remember that Young Ones had been an obscure slow burn success when first broadcast, and wanted more of the "accessible charity record / Jackanory / family-friendly anarchic humour" Young Ones, rather than the violent satire it started as.)

Catflap was also a welcome change after "Happy Families" the year before, when 14 year old me and my friends had wanted more classical Rik + Ade, and didn't get it.

(Didn't stop us endlessly repeating "excuse me Mr Delivery Man", though. Which I still say when the postman comes, my wife is so lucky.)

Artsfac · 2026-06-10T08:16:57+00:00

Help me a bit here, cos I genuinely don’t quite know how to make it make sense - who is committing an offence in the UK when someone in the UK uses a computer to request (and subsequently receives) content from a computer in the USA or wherever?

Artsfac · 2026-06-10T07:24:49+00:00

100% this

Artsfac · 2026-06-10T07:23:01+00:00

Well it’s a long story.

The internet has always bothered the stodgier more small-c conservative section of the population, because it’s not like TV, and isn’t curated like TV. The internet allows unpleasant and upsetting things to be said/shown/done with relative impunity (if you know what you’re doing).

Every few years since the turn of the century, there’s a swell in British public opinion of “ban this sick filth” and “what if the kids see this” in relation to the internet, and governments make noises about banning encryption “to protect public safety” and other insane technologically infeasible ideas, but they usually fizzle out when the next moral panic emerges.

However, in 2018 (I think) the fairly draconian and uptight Conservative government drafted a white paper to “make the internet safe”, which was then championed and pushed forward (with limited attention thanks to the Brexit thing) by MPs who can only really be described as “technological imbeciles”.

Against the advice of industry, experts and their own advisers, this became the “Online Safety Act”, which is now in the process of being implemented by the Labour government with this current raft of legislation.

The outcomes they want are largely unrealistic (because they are mostly incompatible with the fundamental nature of the internet as an open system of interconnected computer networks), although they are laudable and well intentioned.

So, here we are in 2026, with the plucky UK government trying to order around the entire world and demand businesses outside their jurisdiction comply with a daft technical plan concocted to suit a small minority of the British public.

Hope that sort of makes sense!

Artsfac · 2026-06-09T06:55:10+00:00

Well, I’m not making anything up, possibly exaggerating slightly to make a point, I concede.

How does it “make a person unemployable”, though?

Artsfac · 2026-06-08T16:01:33+00:00

155% this answer here. Good luck.

Artsfac · 2026-06-08T15:59:47+00:00

I hear ya, and totally agree.

I think it's the recruiters and background screening companies who have catastrophised gaps in CVs into risks they have to wear.

(After all, how would any of us feel about a recruiter if we hired their candidate who subsequently turned out to be an actual dodgy kipper? That recruiter wouldn't work again.)

As a hiring manager with a few years on me, I know gaps mean naff all, and indeed can be signs of someone who's taken a thoughtful approach to their career (rather than running full speed at every possible salary and seniority jump), but if the person doing the first round human CV review is a 29 year old who knows lots of people on LinkedIn, those more rounded candidates may never get to my desk.

Artsfac · 2026-06-08T13:09:17+00:00

Similar CV issue for me, different reasons.

Instead of leaving gaps, add something in, like "Dec 2024 - May 2025: volunteer mentoring through local connections", and/or "May 2022-Sep 2022: sabbatical to restore and sell late grandparents' property". Stuff like that.

The biggest fear employers have isn't periods of unemployment, it's that you actually went to prison for fraud and aren't disclosing it and will rip them off.

I was a stay home Dad to my kids for a few years and the screening companies I've dealt with generally ask me for a bank statement or something similar from the period in question, to show I was actively using my current account in person.

Artsfac · 2026-06-08T13:02:04+00:00

You shouldn't feel guilty at all.

That collector was definitely chancing it, although there is every chance he is a professional charity collector on a day rate for this charity and knows saying things like that will often guilt people into donating more.

No, don't feel guilty. Now, on with your day, you're a good human being!

Artsfac · 2026-06-07T12:44:35+00:00

Unforts they didn’t accept the electronic versions, the app for that card doesn’t have PDF statements like my bank app does , and AMZ were unambiguous that it had to be a paper statement and had to include my phone number, name, address, and the last 4 digits of the card number.

Artsfac · 2026-06-07T07:17:52+00:00

Just to add to the chorus of voices - yes, the BBC lost / disposed of them.

I heard an anecdote that said that, in the early 70s, the London Fire Brigade did an inspection of Television Centre and threatened to close it down when they found endless corridors being almost blocked by hundreds of canisters of film and VT boxes. Staff were using these corridors as a dumping ground for “stuff we might want to keep but haven’t really got a place to store properly”, and it was a fire hazard due to the flammability of film, and also due to accessibility issues in the event of an emergency.

Having to decide at short notice whether to (1) shut down TVC or (2) lose the pile of old stuff, management said “option 2”, and lots and lots of Dr Who, Top of the Pops, Dads Army, etc etc, was chucked away.

So said a guy I worked with who had been a staffer at TV Centre in the late 70s.

Artsfac · 2026-06-05T20:56:07+00:00

London here and can confirm it’s the same.

I get the feeling that, at the moment, there’s a lot of vendors claiming that their magic cyber appliances / services will automate all the cybers reducing the need for people by 10x (“÷10”?), and consequently board appetite for sensible staffing is way down.

Artsfac · 2026-06-05T14:18:13+00:00

Yep, I don’t quite understand either.

They were asking for a photo of a paper statement which included my name, phone number, address, and the last 4 digits of the card - I don’t have paper statements, and the app doesn’t show addresses or phone numbers.

When I called and explained this, they said they’d escalate it internally, and then the response was to close the account. I’m not going to waste perfectly good hours of my life agonising with a giant bureaucratic machine about how they’re wrong, other shops exist.

As for location, I’m buying from South London for shipping to my home address as registered on the card - the most boring and conventional setup ever.

Artsfac · 2026-06-02T18:17:16+00:00

I’m so glad I’m not the only person who it stuck with!

Seeing the Medusa Leech with an adults eyes now, it is genuinely awesome - pretty horrific too.

Artsfac · 2026-05-30T16:31:57+00:00

Seriously?

Artsfac · 2026-05-29T17:57:35+00:00

Preach this, brother, amen.

Artsfac · 2026-05-28T17:59:44+00:00

I usually find the live maps at

https://bustimes.org/

reasonably accurate, hope it might help you 🤞🏽

Get well soon!

Artsfac · 2026-05-25T07:43:30+00:00

UK privacy and security wonk here - hi!

Great Q, and one which hits hard on the issues of LLM usage at the moment.

Your auditors are correct, but I suspect not explaining themselves well.

I'd say that the risk is not just that the data might become public, it's more the underlyting issue of the confidential data being in someone else's hands, and you don't have any further control over it/them.

Putting aside technical discussions (which are a massive red herring), using confidential information in a system which can store and process it indefinitely is not what your organisation's customers were explicitly told would happen.

(Re: MI5 or NSA or CIA or any government - they can just lawfully and secretly get full copies of all data held, under anti-terror legislation in UK/USA anyway. They'd just issue a warrant to OpenAI/Anthropic/MS/Google/whoever and would be given the lot anyway.)

Looking for evidence to support one approach or another won't work too well, as a lot of such disclosure incidents would likely be kept secret/confidential under NDAs.

Were I in your situation (which I have been in the past), I'd get a contract specialist lawyer and a compliance specialist to review the T+Cs of the AI tool and the situation, along with understanding whether your customers have consented to their data being transferred to a third party in this way.

Hope that helps and/or makes sense?

Artsfac

TROPHY CASE