I haven’t gotten around to making a module on digital imaging, but when I do, I’ll definitely be covering the issue of fake photos and how to spot them. For now, here’s a link with some tips.

After my blog radio interview this last Thursday, the interviewer, who's also a writer for Blogcritic Magazine, posted a transcript on their webpage here. He left out the most important detail about credit freezes as an ID theft protection tool, but I've e-mailed him about it and hopefully he'll fix it soon. Tags: Blogcritic, Interview, Radio

Child gets foot stuck in escalator due to the Croc brand shoes she was wearing. Most disturbing is this:

CPSC is aware of 77 entrapment incidents since January 2006, with about half resulting in injury. All but two of the incidents involved popular soft-sided flexible clogs and slides.

What the hell is the Consumer Product and Safety Commission doing if they know about this problem and aren’t doing anything about it? Of course, if the current head of the CPSC is as bad as the one Bush nominated last time, this is hardly a shock. Tags: If You Only Knew, Kids

It looks like there’s a brand new game becoming popular on the well-known news site, Digg.com: comment burying! All you have to do is dig down every comment you see on an article and groupthink will lead others on digg to do the same. Viola! Now you have an article with all buried comments like these: Let the games begin! Tags: Digg

AT&T has an exclusive contract with the Department of Defense and is therefore the “cheapest” provider military families can use to contact loved ones in the Middle East. But using the phone cards is more than just a hassle. Though AT&T advertises a very low rate, the actual charges are far more than nearly any other option available since the calls rarely go through and minutes are charged whether they do or not. At least one military wife found that spending $3 per minute with her cell-phone was cheaper in the long run.

McCain is cut from the same cloth as our great friend, President George W. Bush. He too would support warrantless wiretaps and telco immunity. Best of all, he's of the same philosophy that the President can do whatever he damn well pleases during a "time of war" which is funny since we're conveniently in a "War on Terror" that's sure to end as quickly and decisively as the "War on Drugs".

The Article II citation is key, since it refers to President Bush's longstanding arguments that the president has nearly unlimited powers during a time of war. The administration's analysis went so far as to say the Fourth Amendment did not apply inside the United States in the fight against terrorism, in one legal opinion from 2001.

That would be just great. Yeah… Let's have a president that continues the vicious downward spiral of American stability, freedom, and public opinion… Let's do that. Tags: Bushiness, McCain, Utter Failure, Well Duh!

By putting tons of cameras at different angles on an airplane and carefully inspecting everyone's faces and movements, the EU hopes to identify terrorists before they strike. There's only a few problems to work out: 1) There's no way to know what a terrorist looks like 2) Removing privacy with no gain is a vast waste of money and resources 3) Mass surveillance hurts everyone and doesn't actually work. (H/T to schneier for the link) Tags: Big Brother

A great report has just been released by Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering - CASPIAN. It's 47 pages of frequently asked questions along with detailed, well researched responses to each. From their press release:

The report reveals how news outlets like Time Magazine, Business Week, and the RFID Journal were used as unwitting pawns in a VeriChip scheme to spread misinformation about the cancer studies. Since research linking the product to cancer first surfaced last year, each of these publications has repeated misstatements from VeriChip company executives, in many cases printing the inaccurate statements verbatim and unchallenged.

Good thing non-profit companies are watching or else this sort of skulduggery would go unnoticed. Tags: RFID, Verichip

This Thursday, I’ll be doing an interview on Techtips blog radio. You can listen or call in to talk with me about Identity Theft issues. Link here: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/stations/bc/TechTips/2008/06/05/How-to-avoid-becoming-an-ID-Theft-victim Tags: Identity Theft, Radio

It seems that wearing a t-shirt with a gun on it is grounds for a ban from flying. I know there's "always two sides", but this is just plain stupid. (H/T to schneier for the link) Tags: Utter Failure