Scared Mexicans Turn to Bogus Tracking Chip Implants
August 29th, 2011Via: Washington Post:
Of all the strange circumstances surrounding the violent abduction last year of Diego Fernandez de Cevallos, the Mexican power broker and former presidential candidate known here as “Boss Diego,” perhaps nothing was weirder than the mysterious tracking chip that the kidnappers allegedly cut from his body.
Lurid Mexican media accounts reported that an armed gang invaded Fernandez’s home, sliced open his arm with a pair of scissors and extracted a satellite-enabled tracking device, leaving the chip and a streak of blood behind.
Fernandez was freed seven months later with little explanation, but the gruesome details of his crude surgery have not dissuaded thousands of worried Mexicans from seeking out similar satellite and radio-frequency tracking products — including scientifically dubious chip implants — as abductions in the country soar.
…
In recent years, all manner of Mexican media reports have featured the chips, with some estimating that as many as 10,000 people are walking around with the implants. Even former Attorney General Rafael Macedo told reporters in 2004 that he had a chip embedded “so that I can be located at any moment wherever I am.”
That’s pure science fiction – a sham – say RFID researchers and engineers in the United States. Any device that could communicate with satellites or even the local cellular network would need a battery and sizable antenna, like a cellphone, they say.
“It’s nonsense,” said Mark Corner, an RFID researcher at the University of Massachusetts.
Xega executives declined to respond to questions about the specifications of their products, citing security protocols. When pressed, Kuri acknowledged that a Xega implant would be essentially useless unless the client carried the GPS-enabled transmitter – meaning the chip might bring psychological security but little practical benefit for a rescue operation.
Pentagon Has Paid $720 Million in Late Fees for Storage Containers Since 2001
August 29th, 2011Via: USA Today:
The Pentagon has spent more than $720million since 2001 on fees for shipping containers that it fails to return on time, according to data and contracts obtained by USA TODAY.
The containers — large metal boxes stowed on ships and moved from port on trucks — are familiar sights on bases in Iraq and Afghanistan where troops use them for storage, shelter and building material. Yet each 20-foot container returned late can rack up more than $2,200 in late fees. Shipping companies charge the government daily “container detention fees” after the grace period ends for the box to be returned.
Artist’s Depiction of a Bank on Fire Drew Attention L.A. Police
August 29th, 2011Via: Los Angeles Times:
Alex Schaefer’s depiction of a Chase branch going up in flames drew the attention of L.A. police, who asked if he was a terrorist. He said the work was a metaphor for the havoc banking practices have caused the economy.
Standing before an easel on a Van Nuys sidewalk, Alex Schaefer dabbed paint onto a canvas.
“There you have it,” he said. “Inflammatory art.”
The 22-by-28-inch en plein air oil painting is certainly hot enough to inflame Los Angeles police.
Twice they’ve come to investigate why the 41-year-old Eagle Rock artist is painting an image of a bank building going up in flames.
Schaefer had barely added the orange-and-yellow depiction of fire shooting from the roof of a Chase Bank branch when police rolled up to the corner of Van Nuys Boulevard and Sylvan Street on July 30.
“They told me that somebody had called and said they felt threatened by my painting,” Schaefer said.
“They said they had to find out my intention. They asked if I was a terrorist and was I going to follow through and do what I was painting.”
No, Schaefer said. He explained that the artwork was intended to be a visual metaphor for the havoc that banking practices have caused to the economy.
A terrorist certainly would not spend hours on a public sidewalk creating an oil painting of his intended target, he told the officers.
The police took down his name, address and telephone number on a form — Schaefer declined to provide his Social Security number — and departed.
“They were friendly. They weren’t intimidating,” he said. “I figured that when they left, they probably decided the episode was stupid and they’d just wad up the form and throw it away.”
Wrong. On Tuesday, two more officers showed up at Schaefer’s home. This time they were plainclothes detectives.
“One of them asked me, ‘Do you hate banks? Do you plan to do that to the bank?’ ” Schaefer again explained what his painting symbolizes.
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Schaefer said he has been surprised by the hubbub his burning bank has caused.
“I’ve only had two experiences with the police in my life, and these were both of them,” he said. “I have this feeling I’ll get different treatment at airports from now on.”
Research Credit: minerva
4 Million People Without Power in Northeastern U.S.
August 28th, 2011Via: CNN:
Trees toppled and streets flooded Sunday morning as Irene lashed some of the biggest cities in the Northeast with wind gusts and torrential rains.
Even as Irene weakened to a tropical storm, authorities in the region warned that its impact was not waning.
“We’re not out of the woods yet. Irene remains a large and potentially dangerous storm,” U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano told reporters.
Officials said the storm had knocked out power to more than 4 million people and was responsible for at least 15 deaths in six states.
The Slow Disappearance of the American Working Man
August 27th, 2011What’s the solution? Hmm.
War: Now Even Better for Wiping Out Excess Men (and Women and Children and Elderly). Buy Now!
Via: Business Week:
A smaller share of men have jobs today than at any time since World War II
As President Barack Obama puts together a new jobs plan to be revealed shortly after Labor Day, he is up against a powerful force, long in the making, that has gone virtually unnoticed in the debate over how to put people back to work: Employers are increasingly giving up on the American man.
If that sounds bleak, it’s because it is. The portion of men who work and their median wages have been eroding since the early 1970s. For decades the impact of this fact was softened in many families by the increasing number of women who went to work and took up the slack. More recently, the housing bubble helped to mask it by boosting the male-dominated construction trades, which employed millions. When real estate ultimately crashed, so did the prospects for many men. The portion of men holding a job—any job, full- or part-time—fell to 63.5 percent in July—hovering stubbornly near the low point of 63.3 percent it reached in December 2009. These are the lowest numbers in statistics going back to 1948. Among the critical category of prime working-age men between 25 and 54, only 81.2 percent held jobs, a barely noticeable improvement from its low point last year—and still well below the depths of the 1982-83 recession, when employment among prime-age men never dropped below 85 percent. To put those numbers in perspective, consider that in 1969, 95 percent of men in their prime working years had a job.
Men who do have jobs are getting paid less. After accounting for inflation, median wages for men between 30 and 50 dropped 27 percent—to $33,000 a year— from 1969 to 2009, according to an analysis by Michael Greenstone, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology economics professor who was chief economist for Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers. “That takes men and puts them back at their earnings capacity of the 1950s,” Greenstone says. “That has staggering implications.”
Irene: Utilities Bracing for Widespread Power Outages
August 26th, 2011Via: AP:
Hurricane Irene’s strong winds and heavy rains threaten to deliver long-lasting power outages to millions of customers along the East Coast, utility officials and weather forecasters say.
An unusually large number of people may be affected by Irene because it is forecast to stay just offshore — and thus retain much of its power — as it inches up the coast from North Carolina to New England. When a hurricane hits land, it quickly loses steam.
High winds are the biggest threat to utility wires and poles. Recent heavy rains in the region have made trees even more vulnerable to toppling over. Flooding can cause problems for power plants, which are often located near rivers or other bodies of water.
The path and strength of the storm is still uncertain. However, utilities are preparing for the possibility that outages will be widespread and lengthy.
Credit Default Swaps Indicating Market Crash Might Be Weeks Away
August 26th, 2011Via: Telegraph:
A more severe crash than the one triggered by the collapse of Lehman Brothers could be on the way, according to alarm signals in the credit markets.
Insurance on the debt of several major European banks has now hit historic levels, higher even than those recorded during financial crisis caused by the US financial group’s implosion nearly three years ago.
Credit default swaps on the bonds of Royal Bank of Scotland, BNP Paribas, Deutsche Bank and Intesa Sanpaolo, among others, flashed warning signals on Wednesday. Credit default swaps (CDS) on RBS were trading at 343.54 basis points, meaning the annual cost to insure £10m of the state-backed lender’s bonds against default is now £343,540.
The cost of insuring RBS bonds is now higher than before the taxpayer was forced to step in and rescue the bank in October 2008, and shows the recent dramatic downturn in sentiment among credit investors towards banks.
People Who Doodle Learn Faster
August 25th, 2011I really enjoy Vi Hart’s videos and other work. My head was pretty much wrecked for math by sK0oL. Vi reminds me that it didn’t have to be that way. Check out her latest video, What Is Up with the Noises?:
And, oh yeah…
Via: io9:
New research published today shows that doodling helps you learn. In fact, say scientists, students should be encouraged to doodle while they take notes in class.
Mexican Terrorists Target Nanotech Researchers with Package Bombs
August 25th, 2011Via: Times Union:
A Mexican terrorist group is targeting nanotechnology researchers around the world.
The group, which is influenced by the Unabomber, has sent package bombs to universities and research facilities in South America and Europe. A number of victims, including professors, were injured after they opened mail that exploded.
Research Credit: lagavulin
Germany: Facebook Data Collection Under Fire Again
August 25th, 2011I use a custom filter in AdBlock+ to block all Facebook nonsense. I haven’t seen one of those ‘Like’ buttons in years. (Not on my computer, anyway.)
If you don’t know what this ‘Like’ button garbage is all about, it’s a little widget that site operators put all over the place that lets Facebook users indicate when they like something on the Internet. These bits of Facebook code are like a plague that have spread over most of the Internet.
Via: Computer World:
A German privacy protection authority is calling on organizations there to close their Facebook fan pages and remove the social networking site’s “Like” button from their websites, arguing that Facebook harvests data in violation of German and European Union law.
The Independent Centre for Privacy Protection (ULD), the privacy protection agency for the German state of Schleswig-Holstein, issued a news release on Friday saying Facebook builds a broad, individualized profile for people who view Facebook content on third-party websites.
Data is sent back to Facebook’s servers in the U.S., which the agency alleges violates the German Telemedia Act, the German Federal Data Protection Act and the Data Protection Act of Schleswig-Holstein. The agency alleges the data is held by Facebook for two years, and wants website owners in the state to remove links to Facebook by the end of next month or possibly face a fine.
