Yup you heard that right and Mayor Bloomberg said he was
going to enroll and learn a little bit about code, so I ask the question, how does a high level hi-tech crime like this get a fair and impartial jury with enough knowledge to make a decision? What was that code? Who’s going to make that presentation? Again I’m not saying innocent or guilty here but just want the facts and an honest and true conclusion. What’s that you say today <grin>.
In big bull pens as such with a number of developers they have to “check out” the code and there are some serious audit trails in place and again I go back to a file 32kb large? What do the SVN subversion records show? Sure that’s enough to contain some text, but how much? Did it have any value as a stand alone? Probably not and so much of the code used today is open source so you have some code that is proprietary mixed in with the open source base code used. All trading software basically has the same desired outcomes so it’s just a matter of the SQL language that is used along with expressions and so forth. Was there any code in there from any other software from other banks that anyone else brought in or developed? Who knows? How much code does CEO Lloyd know?
You can read the embedded case statement below with the dramatics added “this code is so highly confidential that it is known as the firm’s secret sauce” so that statement alone kind of makes me wonder a bit. It’s algorithms so let’s cut the Pig Latin here and all talk the same language. <grin>.
There is one way to work out of some of these
situations and that is to devaluate the algorithms..hmmm…great idea me thinks. In addition to trading look at the billions of dollars that banks, companies and others make on selling data, the stuff about us…data for nothing and profits for free. These folks should be paying some heavy excise taxes for what they get off the backs of consumers.
“Devaluate the Algorithm” And “Tax the Data Sellers”–A Cure for Both Healthcare and an Economy Based Heavily on Intangibles–We’ve Lost Our Balance
We talk about the need to revive manufacturing? How is that going to happen when companies can grab a few programmers, get a cloud and write some data mining code to capture? Sure software and algorithms have value but not inflated to where it is today.
How about this guy not too long ago that was busted by the SEC, where did his code come from that was not working and shorting clients?
SEC Sues Quant–Undisclosed Error in Trading Algorithm- Miscalculating “Risk”-Healthcare Software Evaluates This Factor Too
“When I read the part about only transferring less than 32 megabytes, just common sense would tell me this is indeed only a portion of what would be required, however it could be a module that could be used elsewhere, as I used modules written by others in some of my projects, which by itself was pretty useless as it only did one or two things, and of course a full program like an EMR needs lots of modules and SQL (structured query language) statements. On the other hand too, I could see a programmer accidentally scooping up some code accidentally if multi-tasking with other items on the computer he’s working on.”
I continued on to still question here as again the file size was so small which would indicate just a code module. Here’s a couple back links for history on the federal case.
Goldman Code-Theft Trial Begins–Did The Stolen Code Have The Potential to Create Algorithms for High Frequency Trading
Goldman Sachs Programmer Who Went to Jail for Stealing Code Has His Conviction Overturned–You Can’t Get A Jury of Peers Off the Street for Crimes With High Tech Algos
Send those jurors off to CodeAcademy so we get a fair trial here ok? BD
Aug 9 (Reuters) - A former Goldman Sachs Group Inc computer programmer who was cleared of federal charges in February faces new charges of illegally using and copying the firm's high-frequency trading code, according to an arrest warrant filed in Manhattan criminal court.
The charges, brought by the office of Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance, are a new twist in a case first brought by U.S. federal prosecutors in July 2009.
DA press release on Aleynikov charges
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/09/goldman-programmer-charges-idUSWEN697020120809
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