Virginia apparently is a state made up of moronic legislators. When Betty Ostergren, otherwise known as the "
Virginia Watchdog" and on of my
personal heroes, started posting social security numbers and other private data about state senators, she turned a few heads.
She got the information from the state's own public records websites where the senators were quick to pull some strings to get
their information off the sites, but Betty refused to pull it off hers until they fixed the system that left all the other less-connected people vulnerable.
Their response was to draft a law for her specifically (what an honor!) that would make it illegal to disseminate any public records that contained Social Security numbers. Facing tens of thousands of dollars in fines, she was fortunately rescued by the Virginia ACLU who
filed a lawsuit on her behalf.
And the good news is that the right decision was reached and
the state of Virginia was told to eat crow.
The saddest and sickest part of the whole situation is that they violently attacked the person who publicized what they were doing wrong while they made no effort to fix the wrong she exposed. Reminds me of certain other
disgusting people…
(H/T to
slashdot for the link)
Tags:
States
Though they originally blamed it on anti-virus software on the machines, Diebold has admitted that it was coding error that leads its machines to
drop votes. Hopefully that will help in the
lawsuit against Diebold and encourage others states to recoup their losses as well.
Tags:
Diebold
Funny that I was just talking about this with someone yesterday, but today there’s an article on Lifehacker about
saving money on textbooks. I have used their first suggestion, Bigwords.com many times myself though I’ve often found even better deals by simply looking for a previous edition book. For example, if your class is using the 5th edition, look for the 4th for big savings.
Anyway, if you or someone you know is looking for textbooks, perhaps you should give it a try.
Tags:
Schools
Did you know that you could get DSL service WITHOUT having to have a phone land line with the same company? Probably not since the phone company won’t tell you.
Check out
this article for tips on how to teach the “Customer Service Reps” what and how to do it.
Tags:
Money
I've
talked about this before, but there are some dirty tricks that people will pull to encourage you to vote their way or not vote at all.
It bears repeating so here is
a recent CNN article on the subject as a refresher.
(H/T to
privacyorg for the link)
Tags:
If You Only Knew
If you’ve been caught by surprise doing web searches with your kids and found something you
really didn’t want to explain, maybe Ask.com’s new
kid-safe search is worth checking out.
Tags:
Kids,
Search Engines
California, a historically consumer-friendly state, has recently won a settlement against Citibank for over
14 million dollars in theft from its customers. They apparently used a computer program to “sweep” up positive balances due to double paid bills or merchandise returns from customers’ accounts into the Citibank’s general fund.
So… What’s in
your wallet?
This is hardly surprising. The wireless toll systems use RFID and there isn't an RFID system yet that hasn't been hacked that I know of. Anyway, by cloning anyone's transponder, you can pass through the tolls while the other sucker pays the bill. Also useful for committing crimes in someone else's name.
(H/T to
slashdot for the link)
Tags:
RFID
Companies that are desperate to force you to look at their ads have been
disguising them as traffic tickets which you’ll surely not ignore. Even if the ad were fantastic, I think I’d throw it away as a matter of principle.
Note, this post begins a new category on my page dedicated to the low and dirty cheats among the market. It will serve as evidence for my continuing position that the market needs heavy and strict regulation to play fair.
Tags:
Tickets and Fines
