Set Up Cameras Around Your House, Let Company Monitor Them for Marketing Purposes
March 3rd, 2012Oh sure. Why not?
Via: Network World:
The little cameras in your home are multiplying. There are the ones you bought, perhaps your SLR or digital camera, but also those that just kind of show up in your current phone, your old phone, your laptop, your game console, and soon your TV and set-top box.
Varun Arora wants you to turn them all on.
The founder and CEO of GotoCamera in Singapore sees every such camera as an opportunity. The startup, which is attending this year’s DEMO Asia conference in Singapore, provides software and online storage for capturing or streaming video, and says it now has 100,000 users.
Arora hopes that eventually he can convince his users to switch on the various cameras in their homes and let his company’s algorithms analyze what they show, then sell the results as marketing data, in a sort of visual version of what Google and other firms do with search results and free email services.
“But video is another level of privacy for users,” he said.
And Now… Foreign Central Banks Will Buy U.S. Equities
March 3rd, 2012*chortle*
The Bernanke better flip the confetti cannons to full-auto mode.
Via: Zero Hedge:
In other words, while the Fed’s charter forbids it from buying US equities outright, it certainly can promise that it will bail out such bosom friends as the Bank of Israel, the Swiss National Bank, and soon everyone else, if and when their investment in Apple should sour.
Luckily, this means that the exponential phase in risk is approaching as everyone will now scramble to frontrun central bank purchases no longer in bonds, but in stocks outright, leading to epic surges in everything risk related, then collapse and force the Fed to print tens of trillions to bail everyone out all over again, rinse repeat, until this chart becomes asymptotic. We say luckily, because it means that the long overdue systemic reset is finally approaching.
U.S. and Israel Plan Attacks on Iran
March 2nd, 2012Via: Bloomberg:
Obama administration officials are escalating warnings that the U.S. could join Israel in attacking Iran if the Islamic republic doesn’t dispel concerns that its nuclear-research program is aimed at producing weapons.
Four days before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled to arrive in Washington, Air Force Chief of Staff General Norton Schwartz told reporters the Joint Chiefs of Staff have prepared military options to strike Iranian nuclear sites in the event of a conflict.
“What we can do, you wouldn’t want to be in the area,” Schwartz told reporters in Washington yesterday.
Pentagon officials said military options being prepared start with providing aerial refueling for Israeli planes and include attacking the pillars of the clerical regime, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and its elite Qods Force, regular Iranian military bases and the Ministry of Intelligence and Security. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because Pentagon plans are classified.
“There’s no group in America more determined to prevent Iran from achieving a nuclear weapon than the Joint Chiefs of Staff,” Joint Chiefs Chairman Army General Martin Dempsey told the House Budget Committee yesterday. “I can assure you of that.”
Separately, unnamed U.S. officials told the Washington Post that U.S. military planners are increasingly confident that sustained attacks with the Air Force’s 30,000-pound (13,608 kilograms) “bunker-buster” bombs could put Iran’s deeply buried uranium-enrichment plant at Fordo out of commission.
Syria: Clinton Admits U.S. On Same Side As Al Qaeda To Destabilize Assad Government
March 2nd, 2012Via: Global Research:
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has acknowledged that Al Qaeda and other organizations on the US “terror list” are supporting the Syrian opposition.
Clinton said: “We have a very dangerous set of actors in the region, al-Qaida [sic], Hamas, and those who are on our terrorist list, to be sure, supporting – claiming to support the opposition [in Syria].”
Human Medical Experimentation at Edgewood Arsenal
March 2nd, 2012Via: CNN:
The moment 18-year-old Army Pvt. Tim Josephs arrived at Edgewood Arsenal in 1968, he knew there was something different about the place.
“It just did not look like a military base, more like a hospital,” recalled Josephs, a Pittsburgh native. Josephs had volunteered for a two-month assignment at Edgewood, in Maryland, lured by three-day weekends closer to home.
“It was like a plum assignment,” Josephs said. “The idea was they would test new Army field jackets, clothing, weapons and things of that nature, but no mention of drugs or chemicals.”
But when he went to fill out paperwork the morning after his arrival, the base personnel were wearing white lab coats, and Josephs said he had second thoughts. An officer took him aside.
“He said, ‘You volunteered for this. You’re going to do it. If you don’t, you’re going to jail. You’re going to Vietnam either way — before or after,'” Josephs said recently.
From 1955 to 1975, military researchers at Edgewood were using not only animals but human subjects to test a witches’ brew of drugs and chemicals. They ranged from potentially lethal nerve gases like VX and sarin to incapacitating agents like BZ.
The military also tested tear gas, barbiturates, tranquilizers, narcotics and hallucinogens like LSD.
Hayden Says Stuxnet Was, ‘A Good Idea’; Mentions Potential for Blowback
March 2nd, 2012Via: CBS:
Could the Stuxnet virus that sabotaged the Iranian nuclear program be used against the U.S. infrastructure or other high profile targets? A retired American general who was the head of the Central Intelligence Agency when Stuxnet would have been created calls the cyber weapon a “good idea,” but warns it is out there now for others to exploit. Steve Kroft reports on Stuxnet and the potential consequences of its use in a “60 Minutes” story to be broadcast Sunday, March 4 at 7 p.m. ET/PT.
About two years ago, the all-important centrifuges at Iran’s nuclear fuel enrichment facility at Natanz began failing at a suspicious rate. Iran eventually admitted that computer code created problems for their centrifuges, but downplayed any lasting damage. Computer security experts now agree that code was a sophisticated computer worm dubbed Stuxnet, and that it destroyed more than 1,000 centrifuges. Many believe the U.S., in conjunction with Israel, sabotaged the system. Retired Gen. Mike Hayden, once head of the NSA and CIA, who was no longer in office when the attack occurred, denies knowing who was behind it, but said, “This was a good idea, alright? But I also admit this was a big idea, too. The rest of the world is looking at this and saying, ‘Clearly, someone has legitimated this kind of activity as acceptable.'”
Not only that, says Hayden, but the weapon, unlike a conventional bomb that is obliterated on contact, remains intact. “So there are those out there who can take a look at this…and maybe even attempt to turn it to their own purposes,” he tells Kroft.
In fact, says Sean McGurk, who once led the Department of Homeland Security’s efforts to secure U.S. systems from cyberattack , “You can download the actual source code of Stuxnet now and you can repackage it…point it back to wherever it came from.” McGurk worries terrorists or a rogue country could refashion it to attack U.S. infrastructure like the power grid or water treatment facilities, even nuclear power plants. He tells Kroft he would never have advised anyone to unleash such a weapon. “They opened the box. They demonstrated the capability…it’s not something that can put back.”
U.S. Court Approves Warrantless Searches of Cell Phones
March 2nd, 2012Via: Reuters:
U.S. police can search a cell phone for its number without having a warrant, according to a federal appeals court ruling.
Officers in Indiana found a number of cell phones at the scene of a drug bust, and searched each phone for its telephone number. Having the numbers allowed the government to subpoena the owners’ call histories, linking them to the drug-selling scheme.
One of the suspects, Abel Flores-Lopez, who was convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison, argued on appeal that the police had no right to search the phone’s contents without a warrant.
The U.S. Court of Appeal for the 7th Circuit rejected that argument on Wednesday, finding that the invasion of privacy was so slight that the police’s actions did not violate the Fourth Amendment’s ban on unreasonable searches.
The case gave the court an occasion to examine just how far police can go when it comes to searching electronic gadgets.
Andrew Breitbart Drops Dead in Los Angeles: ‘I’ve Got Videos…That Nobody Has Seen’ ; ‘Wait Til They See What Happens March First’
March 2nd, 2012Update: Jerome Corsi Says Andrew Breitbart’s Last Interview Was with Sheriff Joe Arpaio
Via: YouTube:
—End Update—
Flashback, February 2011:
ObamaCollegeGate on the way? Yesterday during his speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference, Andrew Breitbart gave the audience and C-SPAN viewers a preview of what’s to come during the 2012 general election against Barack Obama. He said the mainstream media refused to vet Obama in 2008 and that he will not go unvetted in 2012. Breitbart says he has videos of Obama in college that nobody has seen. Considering he’s the man who took down ACORN and Anthony Weiner, this could be good.
—
With the announcement of Andrew’s passing overnight we could not help recalling our conversation just 3 weeks ago in Washington, DC. Andrew said on Feb 9, 2012 in Washington, DC “wait til they see what happens March first.”
Via: Los Angeles Times:
Conservative writer and website publisher Andrew Breitbart died of natural causes at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center about midnight, sources told The Times.
The exact cause of death was unclear, said the sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the case was ongoing.
It’s also unclear if he was stricken at the hospital or another location. [Updated at 10:13 a.m.: Breitbart’s father-in-law, actor Orson Bean, told The Times he collapsed on the sidewalk near his home while taking a nighttime walk.]
“Andrew passed away unexpectedly from natural causes shortly after midnight this morning in Los Angeles,” Breitbart.com said. “We have lost a husband, a father, a son, a brother, a dear friend, a patriot and a happy warrior. “
Internet and Blackberry Services Down at Pentagon
March 2nd, 2012Via: Herald Sun:
THE US military’s Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) shut down access to the internet and Blackberry service while work was being done to fix an unspecified problem, yesterday.
The shutdown, which came around 10:00am local time, meant that no one in the Pentagon had internet access. Many military downrange, including combatant commands, do not have internet either.
DISA, according to its website, is a Defense Department agency that provides command and control support to national-level leaders and joint-war fighters “across the full spectrum of operations.”
The agency sent out a network-wide notification on Thursday morning via email explaining that “users are experiencing problems browsing the internet due to a DISA-wide outage.” As a result, the memo said, “ALL Blackberry, email web-browsing, and VPN services are affected.”
People at the Pentagon told FOX they were still able to use email on their computers, but were unable to access the internet.
Inflation Rate on Typical Purchases: 8%
March 1st, 2012Via: CBS:
Forget the modest 3.1 percent rise in the Consumer Price Index, the government’s widely used measure of inflation. Everyday prices are up some 8 percent over the past year, according to the American Institute for Economic Research.
The not-for-profit research group measures inflation without looking at the big, one-time purchases that can skew the numbers. That means they don’t look at the price of houses, furniture, appliances, cars, or computers. Instead, AIER focuses on Americans’ typical daily purchases, such as food, gasoline, child care, prescription drugs, phone and television service, and other household products.
