Page 35 of 88 FirstFirst ... 2533343536374585 ... LastLast
Results 341 to 350 of 872

Thread: Cutting Edge Technology in the news

  1. #341
    Lead Moderator calikid's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Location
    Sunny California
    Posts
    10,228
    Blog Entries
    19
    Guard your privacy, or lose it.

    4 Simple Changes to Stop Online Tracking
    In less than 10 minutes, you can drastically improve your privacy online and protect yourself against unwanted and invisible tracking.

    Note that these privacy safeguards will also be blocking some ads. EFF is working with online advertisers to try to convince them to provide real privacy protections for users, but until they agree to meaningful standards about online tracking, these steps will be necessary for users to safeguard their browsing privacy. Aside from removing ads, these changes won't affect your browsing experience on the vast majority of websites. It's possible, however, that a tiny fraction of websites may behave differently or break, in which case the easiest solution is to temporarily use a "private browsing" mode without the settings enabled, or a fresh browser profile/user with default settings.

    Step 1: Install Adblock Plus

    Get Adblock Plus. After it is installed, be sure to change your filter preferences to add EasyPrivacy:

    Step 2: Change Cookie Settings

    Now you are going to set your cookies to expire when you exit your browser, and ......

    Step 3: Turn Off Referers

    This famously misspelled header typically sent by default with every HTTP request gives a lot of potentially personal information to websites. But you can turn it off.....

    Step 4: Install HTTPS Everywhere

    Install EFF's browser add-on HTTPS Everywhere. This maximizes your use of HTTPS to ensure that your private.....


    For Details..... the Story Continues on the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)
    The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but
    progress. -- Joseph Joubert
    Attachment 1008

  2. #342
    Lead Moderator calikid's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Location
    Sunny California
    Posts
    10,228
    Blog Entries
    19
    Some helpful Cyber tips on making it through disasters.

    Digital tips for the next Sandy-like emergency

    By Andrea Bartz and Brenna Ehrlich

    It's been more than a week since Hurricane Sandy battered the East Coast, leaving a mess in its wake that we'll be cleaning for months to come.

    In addition to consuming our worries and our watercooler chatter, the disaster has taken social media by, uh, superstorm, keeping us connected as we weathered the build-up, the tempest and its aftermath.

    On October 29, all the top 10 most-mentioned phrases on Facebook in the United States were Sandy-related, including "stay safe," "power," "cold," and "my friends." On Twitter, storm-related terms were top trending topics, and on Instagram, users uploaded 10 pictures per second with the hashtag "Sandy."

    In the spirit of post-disaster giving, we offer these tips (in addition to donations to the Red Cross and blood banks, obviously) for using the Web wisely before, during and after a catastrophe. Keep them handy for next time, because you've heard the scientists and all their global warming hullabaloo-ing.

    (Or you can always take this tack. Shrug.)

    BEFORE THE EMERGENCY

    -- By all means, yuk it up.

    If there's an OK time to laugh in the face of danger, it's before the disaster has hit, when people scuttling around town like frenzied chipmunks in search of batteries and bread could really use a bit of comic relief.

    Artist Todd Hale's hilarious Olivia Newton John infographic, for example, brought lots of smiles in the days leading up to the storm.

    -- Use it to crowdsource, and to be helpful yourself

    If anything brings out chilly East Coasties' soft sides, it's a shared disaster. Tap into the goodness of locals' hearts by requesting help ("Anyone know of a grocery store in Fort Greene that still has TP/water/malt liquor beverages?!") and by offering newsflashes yourself (e.g., adding a tip to Foursquare noting that a bodega is positively bursting with flashlights and Tecates).

    Keep the good karma rolling apres storm, of course — retweeting information about local blood drives, say, or pointing out which restaurants have reopened their doors.

    DURING THE DISASTER

    -- Let everyone know you're safe.

    We live in New York City and experienced massive ego boosts when scores of "Are you safe? Dry? Alive?" texts rolled in during the storm. The thing is, had our power been out, we would have been pretty irritated by all the momentary drains on our smartphones' batteries.

    Storms are the perfect time to value efficiency, and social networks are all about a small effort for a big reward: They give us unprecedented opportunity to broadcast information about ourselves to interested parties with just one update.

    Whether you prefer to use Twitter, Facebook, a blog or something else, give the basics ("We're safe but without water or power, will keep you posted, and thanks for all the messages!") and then focus on the issues at hand. Like, oh, survival.

    -- Stop joking when sh*t gets real

    In New York City, things got scary quickly — we heard reports of looting downtown, of houses sucked away on Staten Island, of power failures in hospitals that necessitated mid-storm evacuation efforts. Litmus test: Are people dying? Yes? Then don't joke about it. You just look unclever and out of touch (cough cough Dane Cook cough).

    -- Stay skeptical

    Don't re-share every darn heart-stopping picture that makes it into your feed. Said picture is probably fake and will just scare the bejeebus out of your already twitchy followers.

    -- Conserve your battery.
    This ought to go without saying, but: If your updates run along the lines of, "OMG it's so dark! All of our candles are scented and now the place smells like the trash room of a perfume factory! I can't believe I can see Orion from Manhattan! It looks like a scene from 'The Walking Dead' outside my window! Hey which flashlight app do you guys like best?!" no one will pity you when your phone gives its last feeble beep.

    Unplug. Play some cards. Make like this unintentionally hilarious Brooklyn-dweller and "live by candlelight, get in touch with (your) 19th-century self."

    AFTER THE STORM

    -- Mention it politely.

    As things return to normal, Story Continues
    The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but
    progress. -- Joseph Joubert
    Attachment 1008

  3. #343
    Lead Moderator calikid's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Location
    Sunny California
    Posts
    10,228
    Blog Entries
    19
    I must say, after 10 years with Sprint I switched to Cricket about a year ago, and never regretted the decision.

    Prepaid or postpaid?: The fight for your cell phone dollars (Smartphones Unlocked)

    No-contract carriers can slice your smartphone bill over the course of two years. But you may still opt for a pricier contract instead.
    by Jessica Dolcourt
    By definition, the no-contract carrier model is designed to save you money over the two-year contract agreement that reigns supreme here in the U.S.

    The question is: How much do you really gain by going prepaid, and what do you lose from the subscriber experience? Without a doubt, no-contract carriers like MetroPCS, Virgin Mobile, Boost Mobile, and Cricket Wireless can dramatically cut your monthly cell phone bill, but there are trade-offs.

    I'm not going to dive into every carrier's pricing structure and phone offerings, so for the sake of comparison, I'm going to break down the cost of ownership over a two year span for two carriers: Verizon, which has the most U.S. subscribers, and MetroPCS, the country's largest prepaid network.

    Samsung's Galaxy S3 makes a good model device thanks to its ubiquity across seven carriers; the 16GB version has a $199.99 base price for most contract providers.

    That's a cost that Verizon and others subsidize so that you can get your phone for less than the $500 that MetroPCS will charge. The trade-off for a "cheaper" phone is committing to two years of data fees no matter what, and getting slapped with a hundreds-dollar termination fee if you try to leave early.

    In addition, Verizon and others add an activation fee for new lines of service. If you're a new cell phone customer, or switching from another carrier, chances are high that you'll be tacking a nominal fee onto the transaction, and that adds up to the phone's overall cost.





    Verizon Wireless -- 2-year contract
    Samsung Galaxy S3 cost $200
    Activation fee (one-time) $35
    Monthly access rate $40
    Monthly rate (4GB data) $70
    Access fee, 24 months $960
    Data fee, 24 months $1,680
    2-year total, excluding taxes $2,915


    MetroPCS -- No contract carrier
    Samsung Galaxy S3 cost $500
    Activation fee $0
    Monthly rate (Unlimited 4G LTE) $55
    Data fee, 24 months $1,320
    2-year total, excluding taxes $1,820


    Assuming you use Verizon's new pooled Share Everything data plan, you'll have to pay a monthly access fee for any device, on top of the monthly bundle for unlimited talk, text, and a .....
    Story Continues
    Last edited by calikid; 11-12-2012 at 03:45 PM. Reason: table formating
    The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but
    progress. -- Joseph Joubert
    Attachment 1008

  4. #344
    Lead Moderator calikid's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Location
    Sunny California
    Posts
    10,228
    Blog Entries
    19
    Hang on to your hats folks, looks like we're in for another rough ride.

    Senate readies for fight over cybersecurity surveillance

    Sen. Joe Lieberman says his cybersecurity bill is necessary to prevent terrorists from dumping "raw sewage into our lakes." But privacy groups call it a big step toward Big Brother.
    by Declan McCullagh

    Sen. Joseph Lieberman spent years fighting unsuccessfully for a so-called Internet kill switch granting the president vast power over private networks during a "national cyberemergency."

    Now Lieberman, who did not seek reelection, is hoping a more modest version of his proposal will be approved before he leaves office. Majority Leader Harry Reid has inserted the cybersecurity bill into the Senate's post-election calendar, and a vote could happen as early as this week after debate on a proposal to open more public land for hunting and fishing.

    That move has reignited a long-simmering dispute over privacy, regulation, and cybersecurity, with Republicans saying Lieberman's bill is overly regulatory, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce calling it deeply "flawed." Civil liberties groups including the Electronic Frontier Foundation oppose Lieberman's bill on privacy grounds, warning it gives "companies new rights to monitor our private communications and pass that data to the government."

    "What we hope changes this time is that Sen. Reid will not block amendments like he did last time," a spokesman for Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republican minority leader, told CNET yesterday. "A lot of people have good ideas for improving/changing the bill, but they were all blocked from offering their amendments for a vote last time--despite Sen. Reid's public pledge that the bill would be 'subject to as fair, thorough, and open a process as is conceivable.'"

    During a vote in August that fell largely along party lines, Republicans blocked Lieberman's Cybersecurity Act of 2012 from moving forward. It received a vote of 52 to 46, but under Senate procedures, a 60-vote supermajority was required.

    Neither Reid nor Lieberman responded to requests for comment from CNET yesterday. An aide to Sen. Tom Carper -- a Delaware Democrat who is co-sponsoring Lieberman's bill and is expected to take the lead on cybersecurity topics next year -- said Carper is ready to work with critics to address their concerns, but the Senate shouldn't put off addressing cybersecurity threats any longer.

    One significant development since the failed vote over the summer: President Obama's threat to bypass the Congress by implementing part of Lieberman's bill through an executive order.

    Many Democrats like that idea. In a letter to the White House in September, Delaware's Christopher Coons and Connecticut's Richard Blumenthal say it's time for an executive order "directing the promulgation of voluntary standards" by the Department of Homeland Security. A few weeks later, Lieberman recommended much the same thing.

    This could ratchet up the pressure on Republicans to agree to Lieberman's approach. On the other hand, an executive order wouldn't get Democrats everything they want, so they have an incentive to try again in the Senate.
    Story Continues

    Cybersecurity Act of 2012 Excerpts

    "There is established a National Cybersecurity Council... The Council shall establish procedures under which each owner of critical cyber infrastructure shall report significant cyber incidents affecting critical cyber infrastructure... The term `critical cyber infrastructure' means critical infrastructure identified by the Council...

    "Notwithstanding any other provision of law...[Homeland Security] may acquire, intercept, retain, use, and disclose communications and other system traffic that are transiting to or from or stored on agency information systems and deploy countermeasures with regard to the communications and system traffic...

    "The Secretary may enter into contracts or other agreements, or otherwise request and obtain the assistance of, private entities that provide electronic communication or information security services to acquire, intercept, retain, use, and disclose communications and other system traffic or to deploy countermeasures..."
    The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but
    progress. -- Joseph Joubert
    Attachment 1008

  5. #345
    Lead Moderator calikid's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Location
    Sunny California
    Posts
    10,228
    Blog Entries
    19
    Can you hear me now? PROTECT MY PASSWORD Skype!

    Skype disables password resets due to e-mail security flaw

    The site has removed its password reset page to deal with a security hole that lets someone take control of another person's account.
    by Lance Whitney

    Skype is investigating a security problem that allows someone to take over a user's account by resetting the account password.

    The site confirmed today that it has taken down its password reset page as it probes the issue.

    We have had reports of a new security vulnerability issue. As a precautionary step we have temporarily disabled password reset as we continue to investigate the issue further. We apologize for the inconvenience but user experience and safety is our first priority.
    The problem was first documented on a Russian forum two months ago, according to blog site TG Daily. The people who uncovered the flaw reportedly told Skype about it, but the company apparently failed to address the matter until now.

    The flaw itself isn't that difficult to exploit.

    A person merely has to create a new Skype account using the same e-mail address as the intended victim. That person can then reset the password for all accounts associated with that e-mail address, thereby locking out the original account owner from Skype.

    The Next Web tested the process on some of its own staff members (with their knowledge) and was successfully able to change their Skype passwords and lock them out of their accounts.
    Story Continues
    Last edited by calikid; 11-14-2012 at 03:03 PM. Reason: correct a format issue
    The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but
    progress. -- Joseph Joubert
    Attachment 1008

  6. #346
    Anyone with Google's chrome browser should check this out...

    http://workshop.chromeexperiments.com/stars/

    Works best using Google Chrome.

    Here is a video of it.


  7. #347
    Lead Moderator calikid's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Location
    Sunny California
    Posts
    10,228
    Blog Entries
    19
    A job board on Facebook? If they are not careful, Facebook management might actually find something useful for that honored time burner site!

    Recruiters post 1.7 million jobs on new Facebook jobs board


    The new app makes job recruiting on the social network more high profile, something that should worry LinkedIn.
    by Donna Tam

    Facebook today launched a job-board application, featuring 1.7 million listings from five different recruiting organizations.

    The new application, a product of the Social Jobs Partnership that Facebook started last year with several public agencies, aggregates jobs that are already available through the separate organizations to give job seekers a central location to look for work.

    This initial slew of jobs -- sorted by industry, location, and skills -- comes from BranchOut, DirectEmployers Association, Work4Labs, Jobvite, and Monster.com.

    "Today's launch of the Social Jobs Application highlights what we've known all along -- that both recruiters and job seekers benefit when jobs are posted where candidates spend their time, and research overwhelmingly tells us that this is on Facebook," Stephane Le Viet, CEO of Work4Labs, said in a press release. "Undoubtedly, there will be an acceleration of the shift to social media as the primary channel to find a job with the extraordinary push of this consortium. We are fully committed to making the Social Jobs Application on Facebook the best possible resource for connecting candidates and companies."

    Facebook is not making any money directly off this application, so this doesn't mean the company is getting into the jobs listing business just yet. Still, LinkedIn must be worried. Story Continues
    The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but
    progress. -- Joseph Joubert
    Attachment 1008

  8. #348
    Lead Moderator calikid's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Location
    Sunny California
    Posts
    10,228
    Blog Entries
    19
    Wouldn't want to lose any paying customers, now would they?

    Cable companies say they won't disconnect accused pirates

    Verizon and Time Warner Cable say they won't pull the plug on customers as a result of piracy complaints from Hollywood movie studios and record labels as part of the "six strikes" program.
    by Declan McCullagh
    NEW YORK CITY -- Verizon and Time Warner Cable said today they won't pull the plug on customers accused of piracy through a forthcoming "six strikes" program.

    Link Hoewing, Verizon's vice president, and Fernando Laguarda, Time Warner Cable's vice president, said at a forum organized by the Internet Society that after they repeatedly inform customers that that their activities appear to violate copyright law, the companies' obligation is fulfilled -- and no account termination will take place.

    That could reduce some of the privacy and due process concerns about the Center for Copyright Information, a joint venture between Hollywood copyright holders and Internet service providers, which is about to begin operations. AT&T, Cablevision, and Comcast are also members.

    But it doesn't mean that offenders will be off the hook. Copyright holders acknowledged that they retain their rights to, if they choose, sue the more serious offenders. That's what the record labels did in the case of Jammie Thomas-Rasset, the Minnesota woman slapped with a $220,000 penalty for copyright infringement.

    Ben Sheffner, the Motion Picture Association of America's vice president of legal affairs, told CNET after the event that he doesn't see his organization following the same path. "We have no plans to sue anybody," he said. "We don't. Suing somebody is not part of the system and we have no plans to sue."

    Leaked documents from AT&T made public last month say the network provider will begin to send out warning notices on November 28
    Story Continues
    The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but
    progress. -- Joseph Joubert
    Attachment 1008

  9. #349
    Quote Originally Posted by calikid View Post
    Wouldn't want to lose any paying customers, now would they?

    Cable companies say they won't disconnect accused pirates

    by Declan McCullagh
    NEW YORK CITY -- Verizon and Time Warner Cable said today they won't pull the plug on customers accused of piracy through a forthcoming "six strikes" program.

    Leaked documents from AT&T made public last month say the network provider will begin to send out warning notices on November 28
    Story Continues
    I am not as concerned with illegal downloads.

    It is the monitoring of personal daily lives that is dangerous, it is like having a stalker.

  10. #350
    Lead Moderator calikid's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Location
    Sunny California
    Posts
    10,228
    Blog Entries
    19
    Privacy on the Internet... what's that? The CIA director can't even have a mistress without the FBI getting all up in his email. Some hard lessons on email.

    Surveillance and Security Lessons From the Petraeus Scandal
    By Chris Soghoian

    When the CIA director cannot hide his activities online, what hope is there for the rest of us? In the unfolding sex scandal that has led to the resignation of David Petraeus, the FBI’s electronic surveillance and tracking of Petraeus and his mistress Paula Broadwell is more than a side show—it's a key component of the story. More importantly, there are enough interesting tidbits (some of which change by the hour, as new details are leaked), to make this story an excellent lesson on the government’s surveillance powers—as well as a reminder of the need to reform those powers.

    Metadata is king

    Ms. Broadwell apparently attempted to shield her identity by using anonymous email accounts. However, it appears that her efforts were thwarted by sloppy operational security and the data retention practices of the companies to whom she entrusted her private data.

    The New York Times reported that “[b]ecause the sender’s account had been registered anonymously, investigators had to use forensic techniques—including a check of what other e-mail accounts had been accessed from the same computer address—to identify who was writing the e-mails.”

    Webmail providers like Google, Yahoo and Microsoft retain login records (typically for more than a year) that reveal the particular IP addresses a consumer has logged in from. Although these records reveal sensitive information, including geo-location data associated with the target, US law currently permits law enforcement agencies to obtain these records with a mere subpoena—no judge required.

    Although Ms. Broadwell took steps to disassociate herself from at least one particular email account, by logging into other email accounts from the same computer (and IP address), she created a data trail that agents were able to use to link the accounts.

    The Wall Street Journal similarly revealed that “agents spent weeks piecing together who may have sent [the emails]. They used metadata footprints left by the emails to determine what locations they were sent from. They matched the places, including hotels, where Ms. Broadwell was during the times the emails were sent.” NBC added further details, revealing that “it took agents a while to figure out the source. They did that by finding out where the messages were sent from—which cities, which Wi-Fi locations in hotels. That gave them names, which they then checked against guest lists from other cities and hotels, looking for common names.”

    Based on these reports, it seems that Ms. Broadwell did at least avoid the common mistake of sending sensitive emails from her residential Internet connection. However, she did not, it seems, take affirmative steps to shield her IP address (such as by using Tor or a privacy-preserving VPN service). Instead, she apparently logged in to her email accounts from public WiFi networks, such as those in hotels. Had she sent just one email, she might have been able to at least maintain plausible deniability. However, each new hotel (and associated IP login record) reduced the anonymity set of potential suspects. By the second or third hotel, it is likely that the list of intersecting names from the various guest lists contained just a single name: Ms. Broadwell’s.

    While the details of this investigation that have leaked thus far provide us all a fascinating glimpse into the usually sensitive methods used by FBI agents, this should also serve as a warning, by demonstrating the extent to which the government can pierce the veil of communications anonymity without ever having to obtain a search warrant or other court order from a neutral judge.

    The guest lists from hotels, IP login records, as well as the creative request to email providers for “information about other accounts that have logged in from this IP address” are all forms of data that the government can obtain with a subpoena. There is no independent review, no check against abuse, and further, the target of the subpoena will often never learn that the government obtained data (unless charges are filed, or, as in this particular case, government officials eagerly leak details of the investigation to the press). Unfortunately, our existing surveillance laws really only protect the “what” being communicated; the government’s powers to determine “who” communicated remain largely unchecked.

    Digital “dead drops” don’t protect you from government surveillance

    For more than a decade, a persistent myth in Washington DC, fueled by several counterterrorism experts, has been that it is possible to hide a communications trail by sharing an email inbox, and instead saving emails in a “draft” folder. This technique has been used by Khaled Sheikh Mohammed, Richard Reid (the shoe bomber), the 2004 Madrid train bombers, terrorists in Germany, as well as some domestic “eco-terrorists.” This technique has appeared in federal court documents as early as 2003, and was described in a law journal article written by a DOJ official in 2004. It is hardly a state secret.

    Apparently, this method was also used by General Petraeus. According to the Associated Press, “[r]ather than transmitting emails to the other's inbox, they composed at least some messages and instead of transmitting them, left them in a draft folder or in an electronic ‘dropbox,’ the official said. Then the other person could log onto the same account and read the draft emails there. This avoids creating an email trail that is easier to trace.”

    The problem is, like so many other digital security methods employed by terrorists, it doesn’t work. Emails saved in a draft folder are stored just like emails in any other folder in a cloud service, and further, the providers can be compelled, prospectively, to save copies of everything (so that deleting the messages after reading them won’t actually stop investigators from getting a copy).

    Ironically enough, by storing emails in a draft folder, rather than an inbox, individuals may be making it even easier for the government to intercept their communications. This is because the Department of Justice has argued that emails in the “draft” or “sent mail” folder are not in “electronic storage” (as defined by the Stored Communications Act), and thus not deserving of warrant protection. Instead, the government has argued it should be able to get such messages with a mere subpoena.
    Story Continues
    The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but
    progress. -- Joseph Joubert
    Attachment 1008

Tags for this Thread

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •