Înc-o zi, înc-un email legat de protecţia datelor

Posted by on octombrie 30, 2008
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Am primit azi un email de la BTAM în care mi se mulţumea pentru sesizarea ANSPDCD care „va conduce la sporirea calitatii serviciilor oferite clientilor nostri”. Acu’, nici eu nu-s prost, îmi dau seama ca m-au înjurat aia ca la uşa cortului, dar există câteva părţi bune:

  1. Oamenii de la Agenţie s-au dus peste BTAM în control. Puteţi să-mi ziceţi Toma necredinciosul, dar până acu tot mai aveam îndoieli că o să facă ceva.
  2. Controlul ăsta i-a zdruncinat cât de cât, s-a interesat inclusiv directorul general de afacerea asta (mailul avea CC către el).

În altă ordine de idei, am trimis un mail de avertizare către egazdă. Mi-au răspuns că au reparat greşeala. Dacă se va repeta episodul, se ştie ce se va întâmpla… 😀

Iar despre emailuri

Posted by on octombrie 30, 2008
Fără categorie / 4 Comments

Încă una despre securitatea datelor personale. După episodul BTAM, care s-a lăsat cu plângeri la ANSPDCP, a venit rândul firmei mele de hosting, egazda.ro.

Ia uitaţi ce mail frumos mi-au trimis:

Şi lista tot continua, încă vreo 2 ecrane. Foarte probabil era toată baza lor de clienţi, câteva sute de persoane. Oare când or să fie şi emailurile noastre în siguranţă?

Weekend Trip: Buzău – Meledic, Muddy Volcanoes, Siriu Dam, Eagles’ Lake

Posted by on octombrie 28, 2008
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The road
Map

The quality of the roads on our path are very different. Until Buzău there is a European road, with 1.5 lanes. No problems there, most of the slower drivers go on the emergency lane, so you can overtake them without passing the middle of the road. Beware of the fixed and mobile radars.

From Buzău up until 10 km from the Meledic Plateau, the road is narrow, but in pretty good state. The same can be said about the road to the Siriu Dam.

The rest of the way is bad to desastrous. You have everything from country tracks to (theoretically) paved roads, where the asphalt is just a distant memory. If you want to get to the Live Fire (near Meledic), I strongly recommend a 4×4, even if any car will get you there if you hate it hard enough. 😛

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Accommodation

You can find hotels in Buzău and cabans and local homes on the rest of the road. The prices range from affordable to medium, but the quality is poor to none.

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What to see

Starting from Buzău, you can go to the Meledic plateau, home to some interesting salt formations, several salt caves (which hold some length records) and the only sweet water lake in the world to be formed on a salt mountain.

MeledicMeledicMeledicMeledicMeledic

From there you can go to the Muddy Volcanoes. It’s perhaps the best known tourist attraction in Buzău County. Beware not to fall in one of them. 😛 They’re not hot, so you’ll probably survive (if there is someone to pull you out), but you’ll have to be hosed before the mud dries.

Vulcanii NoroioşiVulcanii Noroioşi

The Siriu dam is one of the biggest rockfill dams in Romania. It’s placed on the Buzău River, near Siriu. From there, you can escalate the Podu Calului, Siriu and Monteoru mountains. It’s also the starting point to the shortest road to the Eagle’s Lake.

Barajul SiriuBarajul Siriu

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Alternatives

A weekend at Horezu, in Oltenia, could be more to your liking.

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Links

Biblioteca metropolitană map

Posted by on octombrie 17, 2008
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A while ago, I discovered the Bucharest City’s Library unofficial blog (now dead). It was written by two guys who wanted to promote reading and borrowing books from the Biblioteca Metropolitană. I wanted to help them, so I made a google map with all the public libraries in Bucharest. The link was in their sidebar for a long time, and I almost forgot about it until a few days ago, when I saw the blog was no more.

I think it would be a shame to just abandon this map, so here is the link to it: the map of all the public libraries in Bucharest / harta sucursalelor bibliotecii metropolitane Bucureşti.

ANSPDCP – instrucţiuni de utilizare

Posted by on octombrie 09, 2008
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Ştiţi ce e ANSPDCP? Probabil că nu. E Autoritatea Naţională de Supraveghere a Prelucrării Datelor cu Caracter Personal. Adică oamenii care ar trebui să se asigure că băncile nu vă vând numerele de cont, siturile nu dau adresele voastre de email, etc…

Nici eu nu ştiam până n-am avut problema asta cu o bancă. Le-am scris eu în iulie că nu sunt mulţumit că toţi clienţii lor mi-au văzut emailul, mi-au răspuns că nu se va mai repeta, dar în august au comis-o din nou.

Aşa am ajuns eu să caut eu ANSPDCP pe net. După ce am citit la legislaţie de mi s-a acrit, am găsit şi pagina care descrie cum se fac plângerile şi, mai important, am aflat că le pot trimite şi prin mail. Găsiţi acolo modele de plângeri pentru dreptul de acces şi intervenţie la datele personale.

Dacă aveţi însă probleme cu înstrăinarea datelor personale (cazul meu) sau orice altceva legat de datele personale, you’re out of luck – trebuie să vă faceţi singuri cererea. 🙂

Plângerea mea arăta aşa:

Către
AUTORITATEA NAŢIONALĂ DE SUPRAVEGHERE
A PRELUCRĂRII DATELOR CU CARACTER PERSONAL
Str. Olari, nr. 32, sector 2, Bucureşti

Subsemnatul …………………….. cu domiciliul/reşedinţa în ……………, str. …………………………….. nr. … bl. ……. sc. … ap. … telefon ……………….., adresa de e-mail ………………………………………., în temeiul art. 25 din Legea nr. 677/2001 pentru protecţia persoanelor cu privire la prelucrarea datelor cu caracter personal şi libera circulaţie a acestor date, vă aduc la cunoştinţă următoarele:

B.T. Asset Management S.A.I. S.A. (BTAM), cu domiciliul/sediul în Cluj-Napoca, Maestro Business Center, B-dul 21 Decembrie 1989 Nr. 104 Etaj 4, a prelucrat ilegal datele mele personale: Nume, Prenume, adresa de email, în următoarele împrejurări: BTAM trimite zilnic, prin email, un raport cu evolutia fondurilor sale de investiţii. Rapoartele din datele de 24.07.2008 si 18.08.2008 contineau la adresa destinatarilor (campul TO al mesajului) toate numele si adresele de email ale destinatarilor, inclusiv numele, prenumele si adresa mea de email. Aceste date pot fi vazute de orice persoana care are acces la acest email. Mentionez ca exista posibilitatea tehnica de a ascunde aceste date, asa cum se intampla in cazul rapoartelor din alte date. In plus, compania nu a mentionat pe niciunul dintre documentele trimise si nici pe situl sau numarul de inregistrare ca operator de date personale.

Declar pe proprie răspundere că obiectul prezentei plângeri nu face obiectul unei acţiuni în justiţie.

Precizez că m-am adresat în prealabil operatorului cu scrisoarea din data de 24.07.2008, însă răspunsul primit nu îl consider satisfăcător din următoarele motive: am fost asigurat ca aparitia adreselor de email in raportul din 24.07.2008 se datoreaza unei erori si ca evenimentul nu se va mai repeta, fapt care in mod evident nu s-a produs.

În dovedirea celor afirmate depun, în copie, următoarele acte: mesajul electronic din 18.08.2008 ce contine datele personale reclamate (fisierul atasat numit „Raport zilnic BTAM 18 august 2008.eml”), precum si mesajul trimis in data de 24.07.2008 si raspunsul primit (de asemenea prin prin posta electronica – fisierul atasat numit „Raspuns BTAM.eml”).

Faţă de cele de mai sus, vă rog să dispuneţi măsurile legale pentru apărarea drepturilor ce îmi sunt recunoscute în baza Legii nr. 677/2001.

Semnatura
Data

ATENŢIE! Trebuie să completaţi în totalitate cererea, mai ales datele personale, altfel ar putea fi considerată anonimă şi clasată. Părţile scrise cu italic sunt specifice cazului meu şi trebuie înlocuite cu problema voastră.

După ce terminaţi de completat, ataşaţi dovezile (scanări ale scrisorilor expediate prin poştă sau fişiere eml în cazul emailurilor) şi trimiteţi mesajul la adresa anspdcp@dataprotection.ro.

Teoretic ar trebui să vă răspundă în 30 de zile, dar cel mai probabil asta nu se va întâmpla. Eu mă resemnasem că nu au acceptat plângerea prin email, dar spre surprinderea mea, azi am primit primul semn: o scrisoare în care sunt informat că plângerea mea a primit un număr de înregistrare în august şi a ajuns de-abia acum la Serviciul Investigaţii, care o va analiza. Acum aştept răspunsul final, să vedem dacă se vor lua ceva măsuri.

Morala: Ştiu că birocraţia din România e criminală, dar câteodată merită să te baţi cu ea 🙂 Dacă aveţi probleme cu datele personale, încercaţi să trimiteţi o plângere prin email – nu vă ia mai mult de jumătate de oră şi cine ştie, poate îi învăţaţi minte pe oamenii pentru care intimitatea voastră nu valorează mare lucru.

3rd Anniversary of openSUSE

Posted by on octombrie 07, 2008
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Yesterday, openSUSE turned 3. 🙂 On October 6th , 2005 the community launched Suse Linux 10.0.

Happy birthday and many more releases. 🙂

Weekend Trip: Transfăgărăşan and Bâlea

Posted by on octombrie 04, 2008
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Versiunea română aici.

The road
Map

The fastest way to get to Bâlea from Bucharest is through Piteşti, Curtea de Argeş and Transfăgărăşan (DN67). However, we wanted to go all the length of the Transfăgărăşan, so we went through Braşov, then on DN1 to Sibiu, and we turned left on DN67 near Cârţişoara.

To return from Bâlea, we continued over the mountains to Curtea de Argeş, Piteşti and finally Bucureşti.

The roads are all right, if we ignore the never-ending works on DN1 between Braşov and Sibiu. DN67 is in excellent condition considering the fact that it’s a mountain road closed for 5 month a year.

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Accommodation

If you want to sleep at Bâlea, your best chance is to bring a tent with you and hope it doesn’t rain. If you’re not the nature type, there are 2 cottages at the lake and 1 hotel at the waterfall.

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What to see

Some of the trails can be dangerous, and some are closed during winter. You should always have proper equipment and respect the warnings signs. It’s for your own good! If you need help, you can call 0-SALVAMONT (0725826668 – the mountain rescue HQ) or 112 (emergency services).

If you come from DN1 like us, you can leave your car at the Bâlea Cascadă hotel (you can’t miss it, there are lots of cars around). From there you can go to the lake by foot (only if you’re in good shape) or by cable. The ticket is 15 lei. By foot, there are 3 different routes: 2h30, 3h30 and 4h30 long.

Once you get to the top (over 2000m), you can admire the glacial lake and the impressive mountains around it. If you still feel up to it, you can go on another trip, for example to the Capra (Goat) lake.

When you’re done exhausting yourself, you can continue through the tunnels to Muntenia. If there is still time, you can stop in Curtea de Argeş to see the remains of the first capital of Valachia.

BaleaBaleaBaleaBaleaBaleaBaleaBaleaBalea

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Alternatives

From Râmnicu-Vâlcea you can go left in DN67 to Târgu Jiu and visit some monasteries and some caves.

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Links

Weekend Trip: Sibiu and the Olt Valley

Posted by on septembrie 23, 2008
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Versiunea română aici.

The road
Map

To get to Sibiu from Bucharest you need to follow the A1/E81 to Piteşti (115km), pass on the newly built ring road and continue on the E81 to Râmnicu Vâlcea (68km), Cozia (17km) and finally Sibiu (90km), for a total of about 200km. The road is quite good, except for some parts of Dealu Negru where the road has collapsed and is currently being rebuilt. From Cozia to Sibiu there are another 100km of not-so-good roads. There are also some sections where the circulation takes place on 1 lane, controlled by traffic lights.

The trip takes about 4 hours without speeding. You could probably do it in 3h15-3h30 with a radar detector.

If you go by train, the trip takes about 5h30 and costs from 45 to 60 lei.

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Accommodation

Accomodation in Sibiu is expensive and quite bad. I can’t really recommend any place, except the Old Town Hostel. It would be much better if you searched for hosting in the villages near Sibiu. You could try getting some hosting from Antrec, the Romanian branch of Eurogites.

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What to see

The pedestrian area of Sibiu is interesting. You can see numerous old houses from the 16th and 17th centuries. Piaţa Mare and Piaţa Mică (The Big and Small squares) are linked by small streets and stairs. In the same area you can find the famous Podul Minciunilor (The Liars Bridge).

All the city’s museums are there: the Bruckental Museum, the historical museum, the Lutheran Church, etc. The Towers and citadel, which limit the old town are also nice to visit.

If you’re in town for a little longer, you might want to visit the Astra Museum, near Sibiu.

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Alternatives

From Râmnicu-Vâlcea you can go left in DN67 to Târgu Jiu and visit some monasteries and some caves.

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Links

Weekend Trip: Lyon

Posted by on august 21, 2008
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Versiunea română aici.

Transport
Map

There are TGV trains from Paris to Lyon every hour or so. You also have planes and a highway between the two cities.

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Accommodation

There are many low-cost hotels in the city, including in the city center. Because we were three, we chose one of the low cost hotels (Premiere Classe or Etap). With the city tourism fee, this got as to 22 euros/person for a modern, air-conditioned room in downtown Lyon. This solution has only one disadvantage: one of the three beds is above the other two.

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What to see

The first thing to see is the Fourvière hill, part of Unesco’s World Heritage Sites. You can take the funicular to the Roman amphitheater or to the XIXth century cathedral. At the bottom of the hill you have the Old Lyon (Vieux Lyon) – famous for its traboules (small passageways between buildings). A guided tour could be useful here, because you can easily get lost or miss some cool traboules.

Near the old city there is the Presqu’île, home to the shopping quarter, the city hall, opera and some museums.

Another hill worth seeing is the Croix Rousse, home to the world famous painted walls. If you are at the right distance, you might even mistake them for a real street. There is an interesting story about respect between taggers and the painters who made the walls. In one of the walls there was a real postal box that integrated in the painting. After a month from the inauguration, the box was full of graffiti, but the wall was clean – and it still is. It’s a good example of how modern art can prevent degradations in the modern cities.

If you have time, don’t miss the Film Museum – Lyon is the city were the Lumière brothers projected the first movie over 110 years ago.

If you want more info on what to see and where you can find good food, check out the second link below.

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Alternatives

Think Bruxelles, Toulouse, Marseille or Strasbourg.

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Links

Extended Weekend: Côte d’Azur

Posted by on august 14, 2008
Fără categorie / 3 Comments

Versiunea română aici.

Transport

Map

The Côte d’Azur is far from Paris (about 1000 km), so if you leave by car, make sure you have 2 drivers. A much easier way is to go by train – 6 hours by TGV or 10 hours by night train. I chose the latter solution as it allowed my to save a day.

Between the resorts you have bus services (slow but cheap – 1 euro) or local trains (more expensive but much quicker). For instance, between Cannes and Antibes you make almost 1h by bus and 12 minutes by train.

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Accommodation

You can find accommodation for all budgets on the Côte d’Azur. However, you should consider booking at least 2 to 4 weeks in advance during the summer, as there are many tourists in the area.

If you’re looking for a low budget restaurant, don’t bother looking near the beach. Instead, try near the fishing ports – you might have pleasant surprises. 🙂

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What to see

Cannes, Antibes and Nice are all alike, except for the „Croisette”. The „Croisette” is almost the ultimate in showing off. In one end you can also see the famous „Palais des Congres” where the film festival is held. Further down the street, you have the 4* and 5* hotels on one side, the private beaches of those hotels on the other side, and in the middle, 100k+ euro cars. 🙂 However, you can also find some lower-budget restaurants on the beach, but their prices are still above average. The beach is from sand, which is very unusual in France. This is not the case in Nice and Antibes, where you have to stay on rocks.

The rest of Cannes is just an ordinary resort, with shops, hotels and all the rest. There are some museums, like the Musée de la Castre, sitting in the former Castle of Cannes (photo 1) or the Musée de la Mer (Sea Museum). From the tourist port of Cannes you can visit the Lérin Islands, that were protecting the port in the Middle Ages – Saint Marguerite and Saint Honorat. I went to the larger one, Saint Marguerite (photo 3 and 4). It’s covered with a pine forest and hosts a village and the Fort Royal, home to the Sea Museum and a youth hostel. The museum is not very large nor very interesting. The good part is that it’s free for students. If you missed the last morning boat and need to spend some time on the island, you can visit the natural reservation on the eastern side of the island or the WWII bunkers.
Chateau de CannesDSC04613DSC04662DSC04654

Nice is known for the half-moon shape of it’s beach. I can’t really understand the fun in spending the day laying on rocks, but hey…France is a free country 🙂 The main attraction except the beach is the Colline du Château, a mountain top at the end of the Angel’s Bay where the town’s castle and cathedral once stood. From the top, you can see the port, with the ferries to Corsica (photo 5) as well as the whole bay, as far as the airport (photo 6).

The pedestrian district, comprising the Promenade and several inland streets is home to some interesting buildings like the enormous Acropolis convention center/multipurpose hall and the very odd Louis Nucéra Library (photo 8). Another place to visit in Nice is the Garibaldi Place.
NisaNisaNisaNisa

Antibes was once as important as Cannes or Nice. Nowadays it seems a little „sleepy”, the main interest spot being the port.

Even if Monaco is generally considered as a single city, that’s not true – the northern part is called Monte Carlo, while to the south there are other cities. Due to the lack of time, we only made a half-day walk in the country, looked at the Prince’s Palace then left back for Antibes.
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Alternatives

If you don’t have 3 days, you might consider going from Paris to the Atlantic Ocean. Another destination could be the Northern Sea or even the African seaside if you go by plane.

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Links