[porphyrogene]

This is an interesting and innovative approach. It is essentially a grey hat operation carried out by the government to raise individual awareness about cybersecurity. Considering that the article mentions a "constitutional right to privacy" I'm assuming that citizens would have significant recourse if one were to prove that one's data were leaked. It is ethically dubious but as an American whose phone calls can be tapped at any time without a warrant I am open to the idea that it is time for radical measures to improve privacy.

[ganzuul]

Have you ever had a device responding to ping that documentation says runs an old version of Windows NT, while the last version was released 10 years ago, and you have no idea where the machine is physically located?

I could imagine a lot of businesses will open a closet to find the source of that infernal beeping, and discover a computer they forgot about.