Photo of Terence Eden. He has a beard and is smiling.

Terence Eden’s Blog

It has never been cheaper to commit a crime

· 4 comments · 400 words

Screenshot of legislation showing the fines.

The UK has what is known as a "Standard Scale" of fines for criminal acts. For example, breaking the law may incur "a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale". Part of the reasoning behind this, so I understand, is to make it simpler for the Government to update the value of those fines. Rather than having to change every law in the land - and have tedious votes on them - it's possible to change one law and have its provisions cascade down to all others. Efficient! The modern…

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Cryptography and the Coventry Problem

· 2 comments · 350 words · read ~830 times.

Photo of an Enigma machine at Bletchley Park.

There's an ethical conundrum which is often posed to military strategists and philosophers alike. In 1940, the Nazi's communications encryption had been broken by the British. Military Intelligence were able to decrypt a signal which indicated that the city of Coventry was to be bombed. The military chiefs took this information to the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill. If he ordered the evacuation of the city, he would save hundreds of thousands of lives - but the enemy would know that their …

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