Archive for the 'Dictatorship' Category
Microsoft Goon: The Internet is Dangerous – Tax It
March 4th, 2010Oh sure. Via: The Hill: A top Microsoft executive on Tuesday suggested a broad Internet tax to help defray the costs associated with computer security breaches and vast Internet attacks, according to reports. Speaking at a security conference in San Francisco, Microsoft Vice President for Trustworthy Computing Scott Charney pitched the Web usage fee as […]
U.S. Will Determine Who Can Board Some Canadian Flights
March 4th, 2010Via: Montreal Gazette: Starting in December, some passengers on Canadian airlines flying to, from or even over the United States without ever landing there, will only be allowed to board the aircraft once the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has determined they are not terrorists. Secure Flight, the newest weapon in the U.S. war on […]
Narus Develops a Scary Sleuth for Social Media
March 4th, 2010This is a jewel encrusted Magic 8 Ball. It looks like they used some of my paranoid ramblings for inspiration, then smoked a pound of crack and channeled Lavrentiy Beria with a Ouija board to devise the feature set. Via: Computerworld: Narus is developing a new technology that sleuths through billions of pieces of data […]
Greenhouse Gas Taxes to Push Gasoline to $7 a Gallon?
March 3rd, 2010Via: New York Times: To meet the Obama administration’s targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions, some researchers say, Americans may have to experience a sobering reality: gas at $7 a gallon. To reduce carbon dioxide emissions in the transportation sector 14 percent from 2005 levels by 2020, the cost of driving must simply increase, according […]
European Court Set to Give Public Figures Chance to Gag Press on Damaging Stories
March 2nd, 2010Via: Independent: It could spell the end of the kiss and tell: public figures might, within 18 months, have the power to stifle bad news stories before they are published, a senior lawyer has warned. The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) is currently fast-tracking a landmark case, brought by Max Mosley, to tighten UK […]
Half the Members of an “Independent Panel” Appointed to Study the Quadrennial Defense Review Have Financial Ties to Defense Contractors
March 1st, 2010Via: USA Today: More than half of the panel members appointed to review the Pentagon’s latest four-year strategy blueprint have financial ties to defense contractors with a stake in the planning process, a USA TODAY analysis shows. Congress created the 20-member panel in 2006 to analyze the Defense Department’s four-year plan, known as the Quadrennial […]
Obama Signs Patriot Act Extension
February 28th, 2010Via: AP: President Barack Obama has signed a one-year extension of several provisions in the nation’s main counterterrorism law, the Patriot Act. Provisions in the measure would have expired on Sunday without Obama’s signature Saturday. The act, which was adopted in the weeks after the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks, expands the government’s ability to […]
U.S. Secret Service Uses 1980s Mainframe
February 28th, 2010Via: ABC News: A classified review of the United States Secret Service’s computer technology found that the agency’s computers were fully operational only 60 percent of the time because of outdated systems and a reliance on a computer mainframe that dates to the 1980s, according to Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn. … Sources tell ABC News […]
Cybersecurity Bill to Give President New Emergency Powers
February 28th, 2010Via: The Hill: The president would have the power to safeguard essential federal and private Web resources under draft Senate cybersecurity legislation. According to an aide familiar with the proposal, the bill includes a mandate for federal agencies to prepare emergency response plans in the event of a massive, nationwide cyberattack. The president would then […]
IBM Researchers Develop Energy Efficient Method to Analyze the Quality of Data at Record Speeds
February 26th, 2010Via: IBM Press Release: Research today unveiled a breakthrough method based on a mathematical algorithm that reduces the computational complexity, costs, and energy usage for analyzing the quality of massive amounts of data by two orders of magnitude. This new method will greatly help enterprises extract and use the data more quickly and efficiently to […]
