Microsoft: we listen to broadcasters, not customers:




Danny sez, "A Microsoft spokesperson told CNet today that 'Microsoft included technologies in Windows based on rules set forth by the (Federal Communications Commission). As part of these regulations, Windows Media Center fully adheres to the flags used by broadcasters and content owners to determine how their content is distributed and consumed.' Do they really mean that they're obeying the broadcast flag that courts and Congress rejected as being executive overreach by the FCC? The ones they have no obligation to follow?"

This is about the defunct "Broadcast Flag," an illegal proposal to have the FCC regulate devices (PCs, set-top boxes, etc) so that they'll only include approved technologies that the entertainment industry likes. The Second Circuit ruled that the FCC couldn't make these rules. But Microsoft's devices are following the rules anyway, refusing to allow you to record your favorite TV shows with your Windows PC if the broadcaster has marked them as "no record."

Link

(Thanks, Danny!)

See also: Microsoft and NBC enforce the nonexistent Broadcast Flag, WTF?!

Posted by mikki at 06:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Most Spam Sites Tied to a Handful of Registrars - Security Fix:


New research suggests that more than three quarters of all Web sites advertised through spam are clustered at just 10 domain name registrars.

The data comes from millions of junk messages collected over the past year by Knujon ("no junk" spelled backwards and pronounced "new john"), an anti-spam outfit that works by convincing registrars to dismantle spam sites.

Knujon's co-founder Garth Bruen said the links in spam messages touting fake pharmacies, knock-off designer products, pirated software and phony lending institutions redirect users to a relatively minuscule subset of sites that are generally under the control of a small number of companies.

Bruen focuses most of his energy on calling attention to spam sites that list blatantly false information in their WHOIS records, the global online directory designed to list the contact data for individuals who register Web sites.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the Marina Del Rey, Calif.-based group charged with overseeing the domain name system, requires all Web domain registrars to collect and maintain accurate WHOIS data for all domain holders. Under the terms of their contracts with ICANN, registrars are supposed to cancel any Web site registrations with inaccurate WHOIS data if the domain holder does not update their records within 15 days of receiving notice from the registrar.

It should surprise no one that spammers rarely provide their real credentials when registering new sites. But the trouble is that relatively few registrars police their own WHOIS records, or bother to do any kind of rudimentary checks to verify that the information is accurate when the domain holder first registers the site. And, until very recently, Bruen said, ICANN hasn't done much about it.

"ICANN doesn't have any authority or mandate to deal with spam or Internet abuse, but it does have a mandate to make sure the WHOIS records are accurate," Bruen said. "A lot of our work has focused on what's clearly within ICANN's management and what's in the registrar's contractual agreement with ICANN. And ICANN doesn't like the fact that they're being forced to comply with their own standards by third parties."

Over the past several months, Knujon has submitted so many automated complaints about inaccurate WHOIS records at registrars that it crashed ICANN's database on several occasions.

Bruen said he tried to warn ICANN that this would happen.

"The absurd thing about this is I flew out there in June and said 'Here's the direction we're heading in with Knujon, and from what I can tell, your database can't handle what we have to submit'," Bruen recalls telling the ICANN folks.

Bruen said ICANN tacitly acknowledged in a recent newsletter that the complaint database crashes and that Knujon was responsible for filing 40 percent (19,873 out of 50,189) of all WHOIS inaccuracy reports submitted to ICANN in the latest reporting period.

In April 2007, ICANN launched a new program to address WHOIS compliance issues, including an annual WHOIS data accuracy audit. It also combed through all of the inaccurate WHOIS reports and sent certain registrars a "Notice of Concern," though it declined to publicly name those companies.

So who are the top 10 registrars most favored by spammers? You can see the list along with Knujon's methodology here. A few of the names on it are unsurprising simply by virtue of their market share. Number five -- Bellevue, Wash., based eNom -- is the second largest registrar, according to DomainTools's registrarstats.com. Number six -- Pompano Beach, Fla., based Moniker -- has the eighth largest market share among registrars.

But size doesn't explain most of the names on the list. The registrars that scored the worst overall - Xinnet Bei Gon Da Software, BEIJINGNN, and Todaynic -- are all located in China, and are 18th, 47th and 99th in terms of market share, respectively.

Perhaps the most interesting name on the list is number 7 - a registrar out of Broomfield, Colo., called Dynamic Dolphin. According to Knujon, more than 10 percent of the company's 45,000-plus domains have false WHOIS data, and more than 17 percent of the domains registered through the company have been observed being advertised through spam.

A bit of digging into Dynamic Dolphin revealed that it is owned by a company called CPA Empire, which in turn is owned by Media Breakaway LLC. Those of you who read this post a few weeks back will recognize this company: Its CEO is Scott Richter, a notorious, self-avowed spammer who claims to have quit the business. As I noted in that post, anti-spam groups claim that Media Breakaway recently hijacked more than 65,000 IP address for use in sending e-mail and hosting commercial Web sites.

Dynamic Dolphin is a reseller of registrar services offered by number 9 on the list, an Indian company named Direct Information PVT Ltd. (Directi) and doing business as PublicDomainRegistry.com.

To its credit, Directi has been fairly active of late in removing spammy and outright nasty customers from its domain portfolio. Last year, the company canceled more than 18,000 registrations tied to the Russian Business Network (RBN), an ISP that experts say served as a front for organized Russian cyber criminals and child pornographers.

RBN was scattered to the four winds in November 2007, after stories from The Washington Post and other media outlets exposed the company's business activities and supporting networks. Experts say RBN may be dispersed, but it is hardly gone. Anti-spam groups have spotted cyber-crime activity that fits RBN's modus operandi at a number of Chinese ISPs and registrars since its original online base of operations was boarded up

Posted by mikki at 02:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

UnionLeader.com - New Hampshire news - Firefighters save girl's dog and her prom - Sunday, May. 18, 2008:


Alexandra Shaw lost her Fitzwilliam house, including her prom dress, in a fire that nearly claimed her dog yesterday.

Firefighters took a vote at the fire scene and agreed to donate money so Shaw could buy a new dress and attend last night's senior prom at Monadnock Regional High School in Swanzey.

"Her boyfriend picked her up and they went to the prom," Assistant Fire Chief Ed Mattson said. "She looked very nice (in the black dress)."

Firefighters first were alerted for smoke then a brush fire before they discovered the house at 29 Westminster Drive fully involved around 12:30 p.m.

No one was home at the time, and firefighters couldn't save the split-level home.

Firefighters found the family's dog, a black Labrador retriever, inside the home and initially thought the dog had died.

"We put cold water on it," Mattson said. "We gave the dog some oxygen."

The dog moved its head and was doing fine last night.

Firefighters didn't want Shaw to miss her prom.

"We had a quick meeting outside the house," he said. " 'We need to send this lady to the prom.' "

Posted by mikki at 03:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On a Need to Know Basis: Controlled Unclassified Information:

The White House issued a memo to executive branch agencies detailing how information previously termed “sensitive but unclassified,” should be designated and disseminated. Critics charge that the new rules for what is henceforth called “controlled unclassified information” will likely shield more government information from public view.

Posted by mikki at 03:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Shocking new airline security system:

Boy, I feel safer already...

United States Patent 6,933,851

Hahne , et al. August 23, 2005

Air travel security method, system and device

Abstract

A method of providing air travel security for passengers traveling via an aircraft comprises situating a remotely activatable electric shock device on each of the passengers in position to deliver a disabling electrical shock when activated; and arming the electric shock devices for subsequent selective activation by a selectively operable remote control disposed within the aircraft. The remotely activatable electric shock devices each have activation circuitry responsive to the activating signal transmitted from the selectively operable remote control means. The activated electric shock device is operable to deliver the disabling electrical shock to that passenger.

via The Kaz

Posted by mikki at 10:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Man admits telling CIA officers: 'I have a bomb':


WASHINGTON - A man who used a snow plow attached to his pickup truck to ram a gate outside CIA headquarters pleaded guilty to making a bomb threat.
After CIA Security Protective Service officers surrounded Antoine Lowery, 30, of D.C., at the Virginia headquarters on Feb. 22, 2008, he told them at least three times that the trruck would explode.

According to a statement of facts filed with his plea agreement, he used phrases that included "the truck is going to blow up" and "I have a bomb." He also counted down from five to zero several times.

Lowery faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison, 3 years of supervised release and a $250,000 fine when he's sentenced Aug. 8.

Posted by mikki at 11:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Photographers stand up for your rights in LA, June 1:


Discarted sez,

One June 1, photographers throughout Los Angeles will gather at the Hollywood and Highland Metro Station to peacefully protest against the unnecessary treatment they have received from security guards (particularly the white shirts), LAPD, and LASD while photographing in public places, and on the Metro.

Make signs, T-shirts, and be sure to bring your cameras (still and video). Sign ideas as well as other ideas should be posted here. We need things that will make us stand out as a cohesive group.

Start Time: 11:00am, June 1
Location: Hollywood and Highland, 6801 Hollywood Los Angeles, CA 90028

At about 1:30pm we will board the Metro and travel to Union Station

Start Time: 2:00pm
Location: 800 N Alameda St Los Angeles, CA 90012
Contact: info@discarted.com

Link, Link to Flickr group

See also: Taking pictures on LA's Red Line violates the "9/11 Law"

(Image: Photographing the photographer, a Creative Commons Attribution Sharealike photo from Naixn's Flickr stream)

Posted by mikki at 12:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Angry flight attendant charged with setting fire on plane - CNN.com:


FARGO, North Dakota (AP) -- A 19-year-old flight attendant has been accused of setting a fire aboard a commercial airplane that was forced to make an emergency landing in Fargo, North Dakota.

Eder Rojas was charged Thursday in federal court in Minneapolis. The case will be prosecuted in Fargo.

Officials say the Compass Airlines flight from Minneapolis to Saskatchewan landed safely in Fargo on May 7, after smoke begin to fill the back of the plane.

Court documents say Rojas, of Woodbury, Minnesota, told authorities he was upset at the airline for making him work that route.

Posted by mikki at 09:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Italian tourist detained by Homeland Security for visiting his American girlfriend:


A NY Times article describes how Domenico Salerno, an Italian was jailed by the US government for 10 days after coming to the US to see his American girlfriend and her family.

[O]n April 29, when Mr. Salerno, 35, presented his passport at Washington Dulles International Airport, a Customs and Border Protection agent refused to let him into the United States. And after hours of questioning, agents would not let him travel back to Rome, either; over his protests in fractured English, he said, they insisted that he had expressed a fear of returning to Italy and had asked for asylum.

...

“The border patrol officer said to my face that Domenico said he would be killed if he went back to Italy,” [Salerno's girlfriend Caitlin Cooper] recalled, voicing incredulity that, in his halting English, he could express such a thought. “Also, who on earth would ever seek asylum from Italy?”

Twelve hours later, when Mr. Salerno was granted a five-minute phone call, he called Ms. Cooper and denied saying anything of the kind. Instead, he said, the asylum story seemed to be retaliation for his insisting on speaking to his embassy.

After being turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he was taken to the Pamunkey Regional Jail in Hanover, Va., where he ended up in a barracks with 75 other men, including asylum-seekers who told him they had been waiting a year.

Posted by mikki at 03:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

California Supreme Court Rules Lesbian and Gay Couples Have Right To Marry:

California’s Supreme Court ruled 4-3 today that the state may no longer exclude same-sex couples from civil marriage.  In In re Marriage Cases, a consolidation of the cases brought on behalf of 14 same-sex couples as well as the City of San Francisco under the California state constitution, the Court ruled that the marriage ban violates the state’s fundamental constitutional right to form a family relationship and the state constitution’s equal protection clause.

According to the controlling opinion:

Our state now recognizes that an individual’s capacity to establish a loving and long-term committed relationship with another person and responsibility to care for and raise children does not depend upon the individual’s sexual orientation, and, more generally, that an individual’s sexual orientation — like a person’s race or gender — does not constitute a legitimate basis upon which to deny or withhold legal rights.

We conclude that, under this state’s Constitution, the constitutionally based right to marry properly must be understood to encompass the core set of basic substantive legal rights and attributes traditionally associated with marriage that are so integral to an individual’s liberty and personal autonomy that they may not be eliminated or abrogated by the Legislature or by the electorate through the statutory initiative process. These core substantive rights include, most fundamentally, the opportunity of an individual to establish — with the person with whom the individual has chosen to share his or her life — an officially recognized and protected family possessing mutual rights and responsibilities and entitled to the same respect and dignity according a union traditionally designated as marriage.

“The court’s decision today upheld the highest ideals of fairness and opportunity that are embodied in the California Constitution,” said Shannon Price Minter, Legal Director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, who argued the case on behalf of 14 same-sex couples and two organizations, Equality California and Our Family Coalition.

Currently, lesbian and gay couples may legally marry in Massachusetts, Canada, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, and South Africa. In 2007, an Iowa trial court held that Iowa’s marriage ban violates the Iowa Constitution. That case is now before the Iowa Supreme Court. A lawsuit challenging the exclusion of same-sex couples from marriage in Connecticut is also pending before the Connecticut Supreme Court. 

Anticipating this ruling, opponents of same-sex gay marriage are attempting to amend the California Constitution to discriminate against lesbian and gay couples. A group funded by numerous out-of-state interests hopes to qualify an initiative on the November ballot that would ask voters to alter the constitution by denying gay and lesbian couples the freedom to marry, which the court upheld today. The California Secretary of State has not yet determined if the initiative has qualified for the November ballot.

Posted by mikki at 02:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Public Knowledge Says New Study Shows FCC Needs To Act on Comcast Blocking:

The Max Planck Institute has released a new survey of worldwide BitTorrent traffic finding that Comcast and Cox are the chief offenders for throttling traffic, and that they block at all hours of the day and night.

The study is here:

http://broadband.mpi-sws.mpg.de/transparency/results/

The following statement is attributed to Gigi B. Sohn, president and co-founder of Public Knowledge:

“This study is further proof that the largest cable companies are hiding behind ‘network management’ excuses when caught throttling the legitimate traffic of their customers. This study clearly shows there is no blocking at peak usage times, or on certain busy days. The study found the ‘percentage of blocked connections remains high at all times of the day. Our data suggests that the BitTorrent blocking is independent of the time of the day.’

read more

Posted by mikki at 01:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Stupid Security | It Is Secure 'cos It Looks Secure:


Anonymous Coward writes "I work at a large UK international airport which shall not be named. There was one particular section which was open access , but the Decision Makers decided to increase security by adding a swipe card and keylock with individual codes for each person so they could record every individual entry. For weeks after it was installed I studiously swiped my card, keyed in my personal access code and waited for the green light and beep before pushing the door open. That then one day I forgot and just pushed the door - which opened. The rumour is that the powers that be be received so many complaints from manager types that they decided to disconnect the security system, but left the access control systems in place so that it looks like it is a high security door."

Posted by mikki at 12:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's about time too....

FAA Says Emergency Medical Helicopters Need Safety Improvements:


Three men died last weekend when an emergency medical-services helicopter crashed near Madison, Wis., and this week the FAA responded with an update on its work to address safety concerns about such flights. The NTSB reported on the helicopter emergency medical services fleet in 2006, and asked the FAA to impose stricter requirements on all such operators. "While the FAA has not ruled out proposing new or changing existing rules, the agency has prompted significant short-term safety gains that do not require rulemaking," the FAA said in a statement on Tuesday. The agency said it is focusing on better training for flight crews; encouraging the use of technology such as night-vision goggles, radar altimeters, and terrain awareness and warning systems (though such systems don't work optimally in helicopters, the FAA says); and more detailed, airline-type FAA oversight for operators. "Safety improvements are needed," the FAA said.

Posted by mikki at 12:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The slogan you deserve:


“The Change You Deserve,” the new GOP slogan, was also a slogan for Effexor, an antidepressant drug, though it seems to have been abandoned (the thechangeyoudeserve.com website is inactive, and the FDA sent a warning letter about some of the marketing surrounding the slogan). Here’s the Huffington Post on the slogan:

Its common side effects are very much in keeping with the world the House Republicans have striven to build: nausea, apathy, constipation, fatigue, vertigo, sexual dysfunction, sweating, memory loss, and - and I swear I am not making this up – “electric shock-like sensations also called ‘brain zaps.’”

Its less common side effects are equally awesome in their appropriateness.

And when the Food And Drug Administration reviewed the ad copy that included the tagline, “The change you deserve,” it took issue with Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, which manufactures Effexor, saying that the company made “unsubstantiated superiority claims.” Sounds like the GOP have picked an ironically accurate tagline for their efforts!

Democratic lawmakers were no less gleeful. The Washington Post reports:

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) called reporters into his office. “Democrats, not drugs, is what the American people need,” he said. He flashed the Effexor side effects on a large flat-screen television. “Nausea, up to 58 percent,” Hoyer said. “Actually it’s higher than that for Republicans.”

For House Republicans, the diagnosis is obvious: They are suffering from Election Anxiety Disorder.

…. And Hoyer didn’t even mention the warning label, which states that patients should be watched to see if they are “becoming agitated, irritable, hostile, aggressive, impulsive, or restless.”

This is an example of a second-comer’s use doing harm to the second-comer. Rather than free riding, which doesn’t seem to have been the GOP’s intent at all, the slogan can easily be tarred with inappropriate connotations. Reciprocally, though this use is clearly not actionable dilution, it’s easy to see how it could harm the brand—Effexor’s been dragged into a political battle that really has nothing to do with it, and the side effects that provide political ammunition might not seem so funny (or so bad) if one were actually treating depression.

Posted by mikki at 12:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

May 15, 1930: The Skies Get a Little Bit Friendlier:

1930: Ellen Church becomes the world's first airline stewardess, working a Boeing Air Transport flight from Oakland, California, to Chicago. The flight takes 20 hours and involves 13 stops along the way.

Church, a registered nurse from Iowa, was so enamored of flying that she became a certified pilot. She approached BAT (the forerunner of United Airlines) looking for a pilot's job, a futile hope for women in those days. But the BAT exec did like Church's other suggestion: that commercial airliners carry nurses on board.

Smelling a publicity coup, and figuring that on-board nurses would help quell the public's fear -- very real at the time -- of flying, he sold her proposal to the boys at the top. BAT hired eight nurses, including Church, for what it thought would be a three-month experiment.

These weren't just any nurses, though.

Even then, there were strict physical requirements for what BAT referred to as "sky girls." In addition to being a registered nurse, the successful candidate had to be single, under 25, no taller than 5-feet-4, and she could weigh no more than 115 pounds. And although it wasn't written down anywhere, the prospective stewardess had to be attractive, at least to the guy doing the hiring.

So they were trim and petite, which did not necessarily suit the rigors of the job. That's because the first stewardesses did a lot more than merely serve passengers, pass out airsick bags or take a pulse now and then. They were expected to haul luggage, screw down loose seats, help with fueling the plane and finally, at day's end, help the pilots push the plane into the hangar.

Glamorous? You bet.

Like a lot of other service jobs, working conditions for stewardesses -- flight attendants in today's parlance -- only improved with their determination to organize and use the power of the union to obtain better pay and benefits.

As for Church, she worked as a stew for 18 months before being grounded as a result of injuries sustained in an automobile accident. She returned to nursing, but her flying days weren't over yet: During World War II, she served as a captain in the Army Nurses Corps, receiving the Air Medal for distinguished service in the European Theater.

After the war, Church continued her nursing career in Terre Haute, Indiana. She was killed in a horseback riding accident in 1965.

The airfield in her hometown of Cresco, Iowa, is named in her honor.

Source: Various

Posted by mikki at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Universal Music: when we get hit with copyright damages, that's "unconstitutionally excessive":


Universal Music Group loves the idea of suing music fans for the full freight when it comes to copyright infringement, celebrating their ability to extract $150,000 per act of infringement with punitive damages on top -- but now that Universal's been slapped with one of these copyright suits (for sampling Hendrix without permission, something I think they should be able to do, FWIW), they've decided that these damages are "unconstitutionally excessive."

The case in question involves now-deceased rapper The Notorious B.I.G., whose album Ready to Die incorporated an unlicensed sample of "Singing in the Morning" from the Ohio Players after a Hendrix sample was denied clearance. The sample made its way onto the final album and even onto reissued albums. Bridgeport Music and Westbound Records, which control the rights to the song, sued. A district court ruled in their favor; Bridgeport took the $150,000 maximum in statutory damages, while Westbound sought compensatory and punitive damages. Westbound scored big, earning $366,939 from the jury along with punitive damages of a whopping $3.5 million.

In appealing the ruling, Universal argued that the punitive damages award was "grossly excessive and should be vacated or at least reduced." The reason? It's excessive. The brief quotes a Supreme Court ruling that said, "In practice, few awards exceeding a single-digit ratio between punitive and compensatory damages, to a significant degree, will satisfy due process." Universal pointed out that the award in question was "approximately 10 to 1, far above the line of unconstitutional impropriety."

Link

Posted by mikki at 11:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Does the RIAA Have Legal Legs?:

I don't blog much about the minutae of the cascade of digital music-related lawsuits in part because there are people who obsessively blog these things and I've lost patience with it over the years. One place that hasn't lost patience and generally does a very good job with the details is Recording Industry vs The People.

Yesterday they published an entry that caught my eye because it goes to the heart of something I've been wanting to see for a while: someone is trying to kick the legs out from under the set of suppositions that the RIAA are using to sue the pants off everyone and anyone.

Here's a short list of things the RIAA would like us to believe and have (by and large) gotten judges to agree with:

• You are not allowed to make MP3 copies of tracks on CDs you legally own


• Placing MP3s into a file directory that might be accessed from outside your computer is equivalent to giving away copies


• An IP address is equivalent to a personal identifier

There are more, of course, but let's focus on these for a moment as we've further developments to discuss in Atlantic v. Howell, a case I pointed to in December of last year. At that point, there was contention over whether the Cartel were backtracking on the question of whether CD owners have the right to rip their own CDs.

Well now we a judge rejecting the RIAA's motion for summary judgement in the case. If the judge had bought into the RIAA's premises above the case would've been another slam-dunk win for the Cartel. Instead Judge Wake appears to be ready to change his earlier stance and agree with the defendants (and their EFF counsel) that simply placing copies in a directory is not a "distribution". This is key because if there's no distribution then there's no copyright infringement.

Furthermore, there's a good question to be argued as to whether the defendants are even the ones who put that MP3 file there. Such an issue would be settled by a trial, but the RIAA doesn't want trials. Its jihad is based on filing and rapidly settling thousands of these lawsuits. Having them go to trial would prove time-consuming, risky, and expensive even if the Cartel won.

For a large variety of reasons, the Cartel can't afford to wage this war in the court trial dockets. It needs to be conducted in the mass, scalable fashion whereby the threat of the judiciary is used to extort payment from consumers... err, victims... err, named defendants.

Despite the amount of time this case has already dragged out, it's still in the very early stages. As Eric Bangeman pointed out in his ars technica story on the denial, Judge Wake's reasoning is at odds with other judges' decisions on similar issues. For the great majority of cases, the RIAA is being successful in its jihad. My guess is that they'll argue this case a little further to see if Judge Wake can be swayed back. If he continues to rule against them, they'll drop the case before it goes to trial - they have no incentive to get an actual verdict on the books against them and an appeal would be even more expensive. So long as the tide continues to run in their favor, the Cartel can keep going even if it has to drop a case now and then. To truly kick the legs out from under them would require an act of Congress or a decision by a much higher-level court. Neither will happen soon.

Posted by mikki at 06:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Note: If he took these out of the water to photograph them, I find that disgusting. If not, I find that brilliant. We shall see.

Enchanting nudibrach glam-shots:

Marilyn sez, "David Doubilet is the Annie Leibowitz of the marine gastropod world. He took all but two photos in this amazingly beautiful gallery of nudibranchs to accompany a feature story on the same subject in the June Nat Geo magazine, online now."

Link to article, Link to gallery)

(Thanks, Marilyn!)

Posted by mikki at 02:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Forgotten tot left behind at Vancouver airport:


VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) - An immigrant family left a 23-month-old boy in the Vancouver airport and learned he was missing only when contacted during the next leg of the trip.

Jun Parreno, the boy's father, told The Vancouver Sun the mix-up occurred Monday as he, his wife and two grandparents of the child, J.M., were scrambling between their arrival in Canada and a connecting flight to Winnipeg on Air Canada.

Running late after having to unpack and repack all their luggage, "we had 10 minutes before boarding," said Parreno, who was emigrating with his family from the Philippines. "We were running for the gate."

He said he thought his son was with the three other adults, who were running to the gate ahead of him, and they thought the little boy was with him.

Instead, in a scenario similar to the movie "Home Alone," the toddler was wandering alone between a security checkpoint and the flight gates, said Angela Mah, an Air Canada representative.

"We were called by (security) who told us one of the security people had a toddler in tow," Mah said. "He doesn't speak English, so we found a Tagalog-speaking agent who has been looking after him."

There was no boarding pass for the youngster because he did not have a separately assigned seat, so there was no indication in the airline's computer system that someone had missed a flight, nor had there been any panicked calls from anyone on a flight missing a child, Mah said.

That's because the family was scattered in different parts of the plane to Winnipeg and still didn't know the child had been left.

Air Canada staff began checking flights that had left, and "we eventually determined who his parents might be ... and the flight crew talked to them," Mah said. "They didn't realize until then that the baby had been left behind.

"We're not aware of this ever happening on an Air Canada flight before."

The parents were put into telephone contact with the little boy, and Parreno was put on another Air Canada plane to return to Vancouver to get him after the family's flight arrived in Winnipeg with the airline covering the cost of the two additional flights, she said.

Parreno had tears in his eyes when he returned to Winnipeg holding his son.

"I am relieved everything is OK ... but I was shocked," he said. "The staff at Air Canada took good care of him."

Posted by mikki at 12:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Outrageous! 1-year-old summoned to court:


HARRISONBURG, Va. (AP) - A Harrisonburg court has dismissed a case against a baby boy summoned to appear in court for an unpaid bill.

Richard White says he was shocked when he got a subpoena in the mail requiring his 1-year-old son, Jacy, to appear in Rockingham County General District Court next Tuesday over a $391 chiropractor bill.

Neither of Jacy's parents was named in the lawsuit, which has been dismissed at the request of the plaintiff.

Shortly after his son's birth in April 2007, White says he took Jacy to the chiropractor. He suspects that when the family moved, the office updated records for everyone but Jacy.

White says his insurance didn't cover the $391 and only recently billed him _ about the same time the residents of his former home forwarded the subpoena.

Posted by mikki at 12:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Serious Gmail Flaw: Security Group Demonstrates Sending Unlimited Spam Using Google’s Own Servers:


Researchers at Information Security Research Team (INSERT) have dissevered a serious flaw in Google’s Gmail service. The group demonstrates how anyone with no special Internet access privileges other than being able to connect to SMTP (TCP port 25) and HTTP (TCP port 80) servers is able to exploit a single Gmail account in order to be granted nearly unrestricted access to Google’s massive whitelisted SMTP relay infrastructure.

From the Report:

As part of our recent work on the trust hierarchy that exists among email providers throughout the Internet, we have uncovered a serious security flaw in Google’s free email service, Gmail. This vulnerability exposes Google’s email servers in a way that allows an attacker to use them as open spam and phishing relays. This issue is related to the risk of a malicious user abusing Gmail’s email forwarding functionality. This is possible because Gmail’s email forwarding functionality does not impose proper security restrictions during its setup process and can be easily subverted. By exploiting this problem an attacker can send unlimited spam and phishing (i.e. forged) email messages that are delivered by Google’s very own SMTP servers. Since the messages are delivered by Google’s own servers, an attack based on this flaw is able to bypass all spam filters that are based on the blacklist / whitelist concept. We were able to confirm that this vulnerability is indeed exploitable by crafting a proof of concept attack that allowed us to send forged email messages unrestrictedly through Google’s server infrastructure. We have also verified that this flaw allows attackers to bypass spam filters by using our method to send messages that are usually flagged as spam. While sending these messages directly from our network in the traditional way had the messages classified as spam, by sending the very same messages using our exploit, the messages were delivered directly to the victim’s inbox, thus bypassing filters. All email providers that offer Google’s SMTP servers any special level of trust (e.g. whitelist status) are vulnerable. We have contacted Google about this issue and are waiting for their position before releasing further details.

Posted by mikki at 01:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Former Qantas Executive Pleads Guilty to DOJ Price-Fixing Charges:


Bruce McCaffrey, the former highest-ranking U.S. executive of Qantas Airways Limited, agreed to a plea deal with federal prosecutors Thursday to serve eight months in prison and pay a $20,000 fine. McCaffrey was charged with violating the Sherman Act by engaging in a conspiracy to fix air cargo rates between 2000 and 2006. If approved, the deal will require McCaffrey to cooperate with an ongoing investigation by the Justice Department's antitrust division into price-fixing within the airline industry.

Posted by mikki at 12:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Endangered parrots born in captivity reproduce in wild - CNN.com:


LA GARITA DE ALAJUELA, Costa Rica (AP) -- Endangered scarlet macaws born in captivity are reproducing in the wild for the first time on Costa Rica's southern Pacific coast.

The ZooAve Center for the Rescue of Endangered Species has released 100 of the birds into the wild in the past decade. But biologists didn't spot offspring until last year, biologist Laura Fournier said.

Since then, they have recorded 22 chicks born in the wild, and four more scarlet macaw couples have laid eggs, Fournier said.

The parrots once occupied all of Costa Rica. But hunting and poaching dramatically cut their population, and they are now found only in two national parks along the coast.

The biologists' goal is for 200 birds to populate an isolated coastal area.

Chicks are hatched at the ZooAve center in La Garita, northwest of Costa Rica's capital, San Jose. At 6 months, they take a 200-mile trip to the southern city of Golfito and then travel by boat to a beach and finally the isolated San Josecito conservation center, far from human settlements. There, they spend up to three months in captivity before being released.

The parrots, which live up to 80 years, can start reproducing at age 7. Of ZooAve's 86 scarlet macaws, 54 are in the reproduction program.

Many parrots in the breeding program were confiscated by environmental authorities or turned in by their former owners. Some can't leave the sanctuary because they don't know how to survive in the wild.

"Many don't even know how to feed themselves," Fournier said.

Posted by mikki at 12:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

NSL: Internet Archive Exposes Lack of Security in National Security Letters:




The Internet Archive has for a decade been a cornerstone of the Internet,
and the FBI was foolish to try to break it:

The FBI has withdrawn an illegal National Security Letter seeking
information from an online library and has lifted a gag order that until
Wednesday prevented any discussion of the information request.

Lawyers from the American Civil Liberties Union and Electronic Frontier
Foundation helped the Internet Archive push back against what they say
was an overly broad and unlawful request for information on one of its
users. The FBI issued its National Security Letter in November, but ACLU,
EFF and Archive officials were precluded from discussing it with anyone
because of a gag order they say was unconstitutional.

After nearly five months of haggling, the FBI eventually withdrew its
NSL, which requested personal information about at least one user of
the Internet Archive. Founded in 1996, the archive is recognized as a
library by the state of California, and its collections include billions
of Web records, documents, music and movies.

—
Watchdogs prompt FBI to withdraw 'unconstitutional' National Security Letter,
Nick Juliano,
therawstory,
Published: Wednesday May 7, 2008

How do these NSL represent "Security"?

In any case, National Security Letters were authorized by the mis-named
Patriot Act. Brewster Kahle has shown us how a real patriot acts:

"The goal was to help other recipients of NSLs and other libraries to
understand that you can push back on these," he said.

The FBI's letter demanded the "name, address, length of service, and
electronic communication transactional records ... and all electronic
mail (e-mail) header information," from the Archive about at least one
user of the Web site.

Kahle said the Archive didn't keep any private information on its users
aside from an unverified e-mail address, so he couldn't have handed any
of that information over even if he wanted to. However, he called the
FBI's attempts to gag him "horrendous" and unnecessary. He also worried
about the overreaching implications of such demands, which prompted him
to challenge the FBI's letter.

"As a library we know that we've long protected patrons from government
intrusions," he said.

-jsq

Posted by mikki at 03:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

RIAA says DRM is coming back -- in the future, you won't own music:


You know how all the record labels have been dropping their requirements for DRM on their music, opening up more and more venues for DRM-free music? Well, according to David Hughes, head of RIAA technology, that's just a temporary condition. From now on, we're going to increasingly rent our music with subscription services that will use DRM to take it away from us if we stop subscribing. Hughes says that that's the only possible way to run a subscription service -- but of course, Magnatunes has a DRM-free subscription service, and I still have all those issues of Asimov's they sent me when I had a subscription, even though I let the subscription lapse.

The RIAA believes in "intellectual property," which is a fancy way of saying: they believe that they get to own property, and you have to rent it. The bits on your hard-drive belong to them, and that means you have to install DRM that lets them control your PC so that you don't do bad things with their bits. In the information age, "property" is the exclusive preserve of giant companies that can afford to register copyrights and sue to defend them, while the rest of us get to sharecrop all our embodiments of their property, from furniture to t-shirts to music to games to cars to PCs.

Hughes believes that per-track purchases are going the way of the dodo in favor of these other models, and that's why DRM will have a resurgence. "I think there is going to be a shift," he said. "I think there will be a movement towards subscription services and they will eventually mean the return of DRM." Hughes did acknowledge that users would rather live in a world where DRM stayed out of their way by saying that as long as they get to use files how they want, users don't care about DRM.

The problem with DRM is that users can't use the files how they want, which is why they do care. And we're miles away from the kind of magical solution solution envisioned by the Hughes that would create the perfect, unnoticeable DRM scheme. Others on the panel realize this. Digimarc Corp. director of business development Rajan Samtani pointed out that there are too many ways for the "kids" to get around DRM and that it's time to "throw in the towel."

Posted by mikki at 12:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Garden Gnomes Pop Up In Front Of Frederick Businesses - News Story - WRC | Washington:


FREDERICK, Md. -- Those tacky gnome statues often seen in residential gardens have been showing up in front of businesses in downtown Frederick.
Eric Krasner, owner of CineGraphic Studios, said he found one in front of his business, moments after seeing two women posing for pictures with two gnomes on a bridge over Carroll Creek as he was driving to work. The women left the gnomes behind.
Police said they have not received any reports of stolen gnomes, and the Frederick Arts Council is unaware of any art projects involving gnomes.

The Frederick News-Post reports stealing gnomes from gardens and photographing them in other locations has been a popular prank for years.

Posted by mikki at 11:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

C64 emulator for iPhone:

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Software, Odds and ends, Apple, iPhone

Posted by mikki at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

New GA Fuel Promises Better Range, Lower Cost:


"Not only can our fuel seamlessly replace the aviation industry's standard petroleum fuel [100LL], it can outperform it," says John Rusek, a professor at Purdue University and co-founder of Swift Enterprises. The company recently unveiled a new general aviation fuel that it says will be less expensive, more fuel-efficient and environmentally friendlier than any on the market. Unlike other alternative fuels, Rusek said, SwiftFuel is made of synthetic hydrocarbons that are derived from biomass, and it can provide an effective range greater than 100LL, while costing about half as much to produce. "Our fuel should not be confused with first-generation biofuels like E-85 [85 percent ethanol], which don't compete well right now with petroleum," Rusek said. Patented technology can produce the 1.8 million gallons per day of fuel used by GA in the U.S. by using just 5 percent of the existing biofuel plant infrastructure, the company said.

Posted by mikki at 02:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Chief RIAA Litigator Named Colorado Judge -- UPDATE | Threat Level from Wired.com:


Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter is appointing the Recording Industry Association of America's top litigator to the Colorado Court of Appeals.
Richard Gabriel, who prosecuted the Jammie Thomas case, is a partner in the Colorado office of Holme Roberts & Owens. Gabriel, who assumes the $124,000 annual post July 1, was a convincing litigator in the Thomas case, the nation's first RIAA lawsuit against an individual for file-sharing that went to trial.
The Minnesota jury took five minutes to conclude Thomas was liable and a few more hours to ding her $222,000.
Thomas' attorney, Brian Toder, said he recently got a call from Colorado officials who were vetting Gabriel for the appellate post, which is one court above the state trial courts and one below the Colorado Supreme Court. "I gave him a very favorable rating. I think he's a standup guy and a good lawyer. And I think he would be a good judge," Toder said.
The Pirate Party of the United States took a different position. "Being the lead counsel in a multi-year campaign of extortion, pretexting, and sham litigation should not be rewarded with a seat in any court, except perhaps as a defendant," said the party's chairman, Andrew Norton.
UPDATE
In a telephone interview, the 46-year-old Gabriel said "I saw an opportunity to serve and thought I would throw my hat in the ring and see what would happen."
Gabriel added that "I love the practice of law. There are parts of it that I will very much miss. I'm looking forward to the next challenges and next phase in my life. I very much enjoyed being in a courtroom representing my clients to the best of my ability."
There was no immediate word on who would replace Gabriel as the RIAA's top litigator. The RIAA has sued more than 20,000 individuals for allegedly file sharing copyrighted music.

Posted by mikki at 02:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Internet Archive Beats Back FBI's Demand for Subscriber Data:


The FBI has agreed to drop its demand that a San Francisco-based Internet library turn over subscriber information, according to court documents unsealed Monday. As part of a settlement, the FBI also agreed that its previously secret efforts could be publicized. Kurt Opsahl, who helped represent the Internet Archive -- whose Wayback Machine page allows viewers to see old versions of millions of Web pages -- said he believes the victory is only the fourth successful challenge to a national security letter.

Posted by mikki at 02:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

HOWTO keep your laptop from being searched at the border (it's hard):


The Electronic Frontier Foundation's Rebecca Jeschke sez, "EFF's Jennifer Granick outlines how you should protect yourself while traveling with private data. Bad news: it's not easy."

If you encrypt your hard drive with strong crypto, it will be prohibitively expensive for CBP to access your confidential information. This answer is imperfect for two reasons—one is practical, the other is technological.

Practically, the government has not disclosed CBP's laptop search practices, despite our Freedom of Information Act lawsuit for these documents. We don't know what a border patrol agent will do when confronted with an encrypted machine. One possibility is that the agent will simply give up and let the traveler pass with her belongings. Other possibilities are that the agent will turn the traveler and her machine away at the border, or that he will seize the laptop and allow the traveler to continue on. I suspect that on most occasions, CBP agents confronted with encrypted or password-protected data tell the owner to enter the password or get turned away, and the owner, eager to continue her voyage or to return home, simply complies.

If you don't want to comply, CBP cannot force you to decrypt your data or give over your password. Only a judge can force you to answer questions, and then only if the Fifth Amendment does not apply. While no Fifth Amendment right protects the data on your laptop or phone, one federal court has held that even a judge cannot force you to divulge your password when the act of revealing the password shows that you are the person with access to or control over potentially incriminating files. See In re Boucher, 2007 WL 4246473 (D. Vt. November 29, 2007).

Link

(Thanks, Rebecca!)

See also: EFF and security experts to Congress: We need hearings on Customs laptop seizures and snooping

Posted by mikki at 11:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

iPhone as Tricorder:

Filed under: Humor, iPhone

Posted by mikki at 11:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Extended Forecast: Bloodshed - New York Times:


Here’s a forecast for a particularly bizarre consequence of climate change: more executions of witches.

As we pump out greenhouse gases, most of the discussion focuses on direct consequences like rising seas or aggravated hurricanes. But the indirect social and political impact in poor countries may be even more far-reaching, including upheavals and civil wars — and even more witches hacked to death with machetes.

In rural Tanzania, murders of elderly women accused of witchcraft are a very common form of homicide. And when Tanzania suffers unusual rainfall — either drought or flooding — witch-killings double, according to research by Edward Miguel, an economist at the University of California, Berkeley.

“In bad years, the killings explode,” Professor Miguel said. He believes that if climate change causes more drought years in Tanzania, the result will be more elderly women executed there and in other poor countries that still commonly attack supposed witches.

There is evidence that European witch-burnings in past centuries may also have resulted from climate variations and the resulting crop failures, economic distress and search for scapegoats. Emily Oster, a University of Chicago economist, tracked witchcraft trials and weather in Western Europe between 1520 and 1770 and found a close correlation: colder weather led to more crackdowns on witches.

In particular, Europe’s “little ice age” led to a sharp cooling in the late 1500s, and that corresponds to a renewal in witchcraft trials after a long lull. And there’s also micro-evidence: in one area, a brutally cold May in 1626 led outraged peasants to call for punishment of witches thought responsible. Some scholars have also argued that the Salem witch trials occurred after a particularly cold winter and economically difficult period.

The point is that climate change will have consequences that will be difficult to foresee but will go far beyond weather or economics. There is abundant evidence that economic stress and crop failures — as climate scientists anticipate in poor countries — can lead to violence and upheavals.

In the United States, for example, some historians have found correlations between recessions or declines in farm values and increased lynchings of blacks.

Paul Collier, an Oxford University expert on global poverty, found that economic stagnation in poor countries leads to a rising risk of civil war. Professor Collier warns that climate change is likely to reduce rainfall in southern Africa enough that corn will no longer be a viable crop there. Since corn is a major form of sustenance in that region, the result may be catastrophic food shortages — and civil conflict.

The area that may be hardest hit of all — aside from islands that disappear beneath the waves — is the fragile Sahel region south of the Sahara Desert in West Africa. The Sahel is already impoverished and torn by religious and ethnic tensions, and reduced rainfall could push the region into warfare.

“The poorest people on Earth are in the Sahel, barely eking out an existence, and climate change pushes them over the edge,” Professor Miguel said. “It’s totally unfair.”

His research suggests that a drought one year increases by 50 percent the risk that an African country will slip into civil war the next year.

Ethnic conflict in Darfur was exacerbated by drought and competition for water, and some experts see it as the first war caused by climate change. That’s too simplistic, for the crucial factor was simply the ruthlessness of the Sudanese government, but climate change may well have been a contributing factor.

In a forthcoming book, “Economic Gangsters,” Mr. Miguel calls for a new system of emergency aid for countries suffering unusual drought or similar economic shocks. Such temporary aid would aim to reduce the risk of warfare that, once it has begun, is enormously costly to stop and often damages neighboring countries as well.

The greenhouse gases that imperil Africa’s future are spewing from the United States, China and Europe. The people in Bangladesh and Africa emit almost no carbon, yet they are the ones who will bear the greatest risks of climate change. Some experts believe that the damage that the West does to poor countries from carbon emissions exceeds the benefit from aid programs.

All this makes the United States’ reluctance to confront climate change in a serious way — like a carbon tax to replace the payroll tax, coupled with global leadership on the issue — as unjust as it is unfortunate.

So let’s remember that the stakes with climate change are broader than hotter summers or damaged beach houses. The most dire consequences of our denial and delay may include civil war — and even witch-killings — among the poorest peoples on earth.

I invite you to comment on this column on my blog, www.nytimes.com/ontheground, and join me on Facebook at www.facebook.com/kristof.

Posted by mikki at 11:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

US Military Coordinated Day of Prayer Events With Christian Right Group:


At least half-a-dozen active-duty military officials have been working closely with a task force headed by the far-right fundamentalist Christians planning religious events at military installations around the country to commemorate Thursday’s National Day of Prayer.

In working directly with the National Day of Prayer (NDP) Task Force and agreeing to work as event coordinators, these military officials not only violated constitutional provisions governing the separation of church and state but they also signed an oath that states they “believe that the Holy Bible is the inerrant Word of The Living God” and that “Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the only One by which I can obtain salvation and have an ongoing relationship with God,” according to materials posted on NDP Task Force’s website.

Furthermore, the declaration signed by the military officials says that they promise to “ensure a strong, consistent Christian message throughout the nation” and that National Day of Prayer events scheduled to take place at their military installations “will be conducted solely by Christians.”

Lisa Crump, manager of the NDP Task Force’s local coordinators, said that volunteers who are interested in becoming event coordinators, including members of the military, must complete click here "a simple application with contact data and statement of faith, confirming your commitment to Christ is all that's needed to get you on the way to becoming a [National Day of Prayer] Task Force volunteer coordinator."

Mikey Weinstein, the president and founder of the government watchdog group the Military Religious Freedom Foundation http://www.militaryreligiousfreedom.org blasted the military’s participation with the task force saying it endorses a discriminatory policy.

“It is not likely possible to conceive of a more blatant, heinous and noxious constitutional violation by our United States military than it's filthy, disgusting participation with the so-called National Day of Prayer "Task Force" and it's incontrovertible fundamentalist Christian supremacy agenda of unconstitutional religious exclusion,” Weinstein said. “Further, please immediately note that the Military Religious Freedom Foundation fully intends to include this despicable collusion in our current Federal litigation against the Department of Defense as yet another stunning example of a pernicious and pervasive pattern and practice of unconstitutional rape of the precious religious liberties of our honorable and noble United States soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen."

The NDP Task Force, which portrays itself as the official organizer of the National Day of Prayer, is headed by Shirley Dobson, wife of Focus on the Family’s James Dobson, who has close ties to President Bush.

Although the task force is not directly tied to any federal agency, it has coordinated many of its activities this year with active-duty military chaplains and other military personnel at bases around the country. That would appear to violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment prohibiting individuals from using the machinery of the state to promote any form of religion. The Constitution protects the rights of the public to worship, or not, as they see fit.

But the military has not been adhering to these strict regulations.

Indeed, two weeks ago, at Fort Carson Army Base in Colorado, the community events office sent out an email to everyone on the base along with a flyer announcing an event scheduled at Fort Carson in observance of National Day of Prayer. The email included a message from Specialist Brian Havens, who closed his note with “In Christ.” Havens is identified on the Task force website as an event coordinator, indicating that he signed the Task Force’s "Statement of Faith" application and agreed to uphold the NDP Task Force’s Christian policies.

According to Chris Rodda, the senior research director for The Military Religious Freedom Foundation, Weinstein tried to persuade one military chaplain to disassociate himself from a Task Force event in Missouri.

Rodda said she and Weinstein were “surprised” to come across the name of Chaplain Kevin L. McGhee of the Missouri National Guard. According to the NDP Task Force website, Maj. McGhee is scheduled to participate in the NDP Task Force prayer rally at Missouri State Capitol.

This is the same Chaplain McGhee who, last year, came to the defense of Chaplain Bob Larsen, when Larsen converted from Christianity to Wicca and applied to be the first Wiccan chaplain in the U.S. Armed Forces. When Larsen's application was denied, and he was removed from the chaplain corps, McGhee, who was Larsen's supervisor at Camp Anaconda in Iraq, said that a "grave injustice" had been done, and that "What happened to Chaplain Larsen -- to be honest, I think it's political. A lot of people think Wiccans are un-American, because they are ignorant about what Wiccans do."

MRFF informed Chaplain McGhee during a conference call last week of the discriminatory nature of the Missouri State Capitol event and the pledge on the part of its organizers to exclude non-Christians and asked him to reconsider his participation. McGhee has not responded to an email sent yesterday from MRFF asking if he still planned to participate.

This is not the first time the military has come under fire for work it has conducted on behalf of Focus on the Family and other Christian fundamentalist organizations.
ast August, the Pentagon's inspector general responded to a complaint filed in 2006 by Weinstein’s organization alleging that Defense Department officials violated military regulations by appearing in a video promoting Christian Embassy, a subsidiary of Campus Crusade for Christ.

The inspector general agreed and issued a scathing, 47-page report that was highly critical of senior Army and Air Force personnel for participating in the video while in uniform and on active duty.

The report recommended that Air Force Maj. Gen. Jack Catton, Army Brig. Gen Bob Caslen, Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks, Maj. Gen. Peter Sutton, and a colonel and lieutenant colonel whose names were redacted in the inspector general's report, "improperly endorsed and participated with a non-Federal entity while in uniform" and the men should be disciplined for misconduct. Caslen was formerly the deputy director for political-military affairs for the war on terrorism, directorate for strategic plans and policy, joint staff.. He now oversees the 4,200 cadets at the US Military Academy at West Point Caslen told DOD investigators he agreed to appear in the video upon learning other senior Pentagon officials had been interviewed for the promotional video.

The Army generals who appeared in the video appeared to be speaking on behalf of the military, but they did not obtain prior permission to appear in the video. They defended their actions, according to the inspector general's report, saying the "Christian Embassy had become a 'quasi-Federal entity,' since the DOD had endorsed the organization to General Officers for over 25 years."

Historically, the National Day of Prayer has been non-denominational. Former President Harry S Truman signed a bill proclaiming National Day of Prayer into law on April 17, 1952 so individuals of all faiths could pray together. In 1988, President Reagan designated the first day of May to be recognized as the National Day of Prayer.

But, for a number of years, the National Day of Prayer has been all about promoting fundamentalist Christianity. Dobson’s task force seems determined to turn the half-century old holiday into its own personal recruitment tool by proselytizing to members of the armed forces and the public in hopes of converting people to evangelical Christianity, according to task force documents posted on the group’s website.

The theme of Thursday’s 57th annual event is, “Prayer! America’s Strength and Shield,” which is based on Psalm 28:7: “The Lord is my strength and shield; my heart trusts in Him and I am helped.

Weinstein said the events scheduled for Thursday, specifically those planned by active-duty military officials, underscore the growing trend and the influence fundamentalists have inside the armed forces.

“When United States military personnel knowingly engage in deliberately public activities absolutely demanding the prerequisite of a written, official acknowledgement of acceptance and supremacy of one particular religious worldview to the total exclusion of all others, it is not merely an 'issue' or a 'problem,' Weinstein said in an interview. “Let's call it what it is; a national security threat internally to this country every bit as formidable in magnitude as those external national security threats posed by the Taliban, al Quaida, the insurrectionists and the jihadists. It's as simple and wretched as that."

In addition to the NDP Task Force events being held on military bases, there will be widespread military participation in non-military NDP events. In Washington state, military flyovers are scheduled to take place at the Calvary Chapel South ball field in Kent, according to the task force website, and the Christian radio station, Praise 106.5 FM, said the Whidbey Island Naval Station will be providing a flyover at the Skagit County event in Mount Vernon.

In order for a military flyover to take place, a form must be filled out and filed with the Pentagon describing the event and, after a review; the proposal is either approved or denied by Pentagon public affairs. The flyovers scheduled for The National Day of Prayer do not appear on the military's list of eligible flyover events, raising questions about whether the usual application process was completed and approved by the Pentagon.

Additionally, Marine color guards are scheduled to appear at the National Day of Prayer celebration in Bakersfield, Calif., and the Concert of Prayer in Wheeling, West Virginia. The Niagara Falls Air Reserve Base Honor Guard is slated to appear at the "Call To The Wall" in Wheatfield, New York. The National Day of Prayer Noon Rally at the Phoenix, City Hall features the Luke Air Force Base Honor Guard, and the Fort Huachuca Select Honor Guard will appear at a service in Patagonia, Arizona.

Becky Armstrong, a spokeswoman for the National Day of Prayer task force, dismissed charges that the task force was discriminating against non-Christians.

"All Americans are free to exercise their First Amendment rights to organize events that observe the National Day of Prayer in a manner that reflects their religious perspective,” Armstrong said.

Posted by mikki at 12:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In another example of "let's be completely ridiculous, airline employees mindlessly follow the rules regardless of their stupidity

Air Marshals Denied Boarding Due To "No-fly List":


We've all heard the stories of ordinary airline passengers denied the right to fly because their name happens to match a name on the "no-fly list" kept by the Transportation Security Administration. But it appears that some federal air marshals, who are supposed to be on board as a protective measure, have also been denied boarding for the same reason. "In some cases, planes have departed without any coverage because the airline employees were adamant they would not [allow the marshal to] fly," an unidentified air marshal told The Washington Times. On Monday, the Department of Homeland Security said it will start this week to implement a new program that allows airlines to store travelers' birthdate information, which should eliminate most of the watch-list misidentification problems. "This is good for travelers and for security, because as we make the checkpoint environment calmer, it becomes easier to spot individuals with hostile intent," said Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff.

"Hassles due to misidentification and the resulting necessity to stand in line to check in at the ticket counter [are] consistently among the deepest -- and most valid -- complaints of the traveling public," he said.

Posted by mikki at 11:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Written by Harold Feld

RIAA and MS Teach Law Abiding Users to Hate DRM | Public Knowledge:


One of the biggest problems in public advocacy is translating abstract policy issues into the sort of concrete realities that bite the public on the rear end and get them to care. Happily, the RIAA and its ridiculous insistence on the most secure DRM imaginable — no matter how impractical, expensive, or user unfriendly — provides an endless series of such “teachable moments.” The recent announcement by MSN that it will shut down its music service and will therefore no longer refresh DRM keys is just such a moment.
MS found itself in a hard place. To offer the service it wanted, it needed to make commitments to the music industry about DRM. I do not think at the time MS understood this to mean that it would have a perpetual expense to maintain the service no matter what. Generally, if you decide the headaches aren’t worth it, you shut down.
But MS also made a clear commitment to its customers about the availability of the music and the ability to move it from one authorized device to another. No doubt MS had some fine print in its terms of service that give it the right to unilaterally terminate its service. But customers are still burned and they are not getting what they thought they understood MS to be selling.
As usual, the music industry that insists upon DRM protections at all costs and damn the customer have scant sympathy or even appreciation for the problem. As far as they are concerned, MS needs to meet its demands if it wants to license the songs, and customers need to live by their rules if they want to play the songs. Don’t like it, don’t buy it. Caveat emptor and all that.
Which is why the music industry strategy is so self-defeating. Does anyone imagine that this incident makes the public sympathetic to the music industry’s DRM demands? In a stroke, the music industry has taught another few million users that DRM means “Do Rip Me Off,” because these customers are not getting what they paid for AND, in no small part because of the music industry’s insane demands, are losing another legal source of music. This is a base of people who have demonstrated that they prefer to buy legally licensed music and abide by DRM than illegally download music for free. And their reward? They get ripped off and treated like garbage. When they complain, they are advised to circumvent the DRM by burning the music to CDS and then ripping the CDS. This hardly teaches respect for the law.
I do not expect the music industry to make the connection. An industry that routinely treats their customers with contempt in so many contexts and already believes everyone with a laptop and a broadband connection is a “pirate” is unlikely to understand how it is shooting itself in the foot. But it just pissed off a whole bunch of people who until now were willing to play by the RIAA’s rules.
I found the work-around to
Submitted by Wyatt Ditzler on April 30, 2008 - 1:38pm.
I found the work-around to keep a person’s music quite funny. Especially coming from the company that was responsible for the DRM.
However, would the work-around not constitute a violation of the DMCA to circumvent the DRM? And what is to keep MS or the RIAA from coming back and prosecuting those that follow the work-around instructions?
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Is MS doing this to avoid
Submitted by barry payne-eco... on May 1, 2008 - 6:40am.
Is MS doing this to avoid cannabilizing sales from Zune, which it says it’s making room for by cancelling MSN music? Why doesn’t MS offer selections from Zune to offset the losses to users from closing MSN music, or is MS engaging in forced migration to other sources or to upgrades the way it does with software?
Does the RIAA application of the DRM key favor some music over others in anti-competitive fashion, or does it distribute headaches equally and suppress all sales while encouraging illegal options or imperfect substitutes, including non-RIAA options?
If indeed RIAA is only shooting itself in the foot, then Harold seems to be raising the issue of copyright protection overkill to the detriment of all players involved, where both distribution outlet sales for content providers from the supply side are suppressed, as well as competition among those outlets for the benefit of users. But the RIAA has an incentive to suppress the latter and not the former, except when it gets incompetent and suppresses both.

Posted by mikki at 11:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Significant Chunk of IP Address Space Hijacked by Notorious Mass Emailing Company:


nternet address space long ago issued to San Francisco Bay Packet Radio, an organization that was involved way back in the 1970s in testing ARPANET, a predecessor to the global commercial Internet that we all use today. That organization was given the rights to do whatever it wanted with 134.17.0.0/16 address block.

That entire swath of Internet space is now registered to an entity in Westminster, Colo., called SF Bay Packet Radio LLC, but except for a similar name, this company has no relation to San Francisco Bay Packet Radio… ? A review of records posted by both Spamhaus.org and e-mail provider Outblaze.com shows that a large number of Internet addresses on the company’s Internet space have been blacklisted for sending junk e-mail… Spamhaus spokesperson said that JKS Media/Media Breakaway had indeed hijacked the IP space from its previous owner, and that the IP space should be revoked under the rules set out by ARIN.

Posted by mikki at 11:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)