Truth - Magna est veritas?

There is Truth and There is What We Do To It

Magna est veritas et prævalebit ("The truth is great and it shall prevail").

Esdras 4:41

Truth is great and will prevail if left to herself, that she is the proper and sufficient antagonist to error, and has nothing to fear from the conflict, unless by human interposition disarmed of her natural weapons, free argument and debate; errors ceasing to be dangerous when it is permitted freely to contradict them.

THOMAS JEFFERSON

When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE, The Sign of Four*

As lofty as these seem, equally notable historical figures have a slightly different take, perhaps tempered by reality, on the truth.

Truth will ultimately prevail where there are pains taken to bring it to light.

GEORGE WASHINGTON

Truth is mighty and will prevail. There is nothing the matter with this, except that it ain't so.

MARK TWAIN, Mark Twain's Notebooks

What people believe prevails over the truth.

SOPHOCLES, The Sons of Aleus [fragment]

Let’s add a few more, less articulate, more earthy, and equally accurate.

Truth is great but there are many working hard toward her demise.

Truth  is great, is quotable, is sobering, is enlightening and celebrated – only when you agree with it.

Truth may be hard to kill, but it can be ignored, twisted, tormented, corrupted, and sedated.

There are many truths presented about how mankind should live, but they have been corrupted by the Utopians.  We never ask our dog to be other than a dog, but we do ask ourselves to behave as a species it is not.

*Some of the quotes herein can be found at  http://www.notable-quotes.com/t/truth_quotes.html#TcWHiUBTyPxoIgVK.99

Hacking In

Tragic to many are the numerous hacking of mercantile websites.   Credit cards and debit cards must be replaced or at least re-keyed with a new pass-code.  Inconvenience, loss of identity, and loss of treasure are three of the consequences.  Distrust of online in-store transactions is a collective consequence.

I have wondered how big companies, say like Target, can be so vulnerable to these ubiquitous hackers.  After all, they do pay talented people to keep records secure.  Are these folks lax, lazy, or incompetent?  Are the hackers that much more talented?

So, I ask three questions.
A.  Who is the best hacker?  Answer.  The one who's hacking doesn't get noticed; the one who doesn't get greedy; the one who remains off the radar screen of big activity.
B. Are there hackers from the outside that enter from the inside?  Consider the CTO, Chief Technology Officer, of some company - or even some programmer with high level access.  Suppose that person were compromised, personally or financially, in some way, and want the captured secret hidden.  Might this person not be willing to give the inside access to the outside visitor?  What is your guess?
C. What companies (or governments) have been hacked but don't even know it - for whatever reason.

Update.
The latest from Target (1/17/14) and their hacking debacle is that it has been determine the code was Russian based.   Blaming it on those nasty and tricky  Russians sells. It's believable.  It resolves some aspects of the problem.  Goodness, if it was Russians... what then else have they hacked into?    But I wonder, really wonder.  Some intruders cover their tracks. Some cast aspersions elsewhere. Some deflect the problem.  My gosh, it was only yesterday when the Communists were blamed for a spectrum of problems.   Some politicians turned this blame-game into a career.