29,000 Sex Offenders on Myspace Get the Boot

For those who were wondering, there were almost 30,000 sex offenders on MySpace who were computer literate enough to use the service, but dumb enough to use their real names. How many are still there using fake names I wonder. Tags: , , , ,

Verichip – The Human Tracking RFID People – A Summary

Verichip is the first major company to try to make a market out of implanting people with a hard to remove tracking device. They tout it as a "security" device in that it can be used for proximity detection in sensitive areas and can be used to link to medical information in an emergency where the patient can't speak for themselves (for a yearly fee of course). Considering that the chips actaully weaken security, are hard to remove, and basically destroy all privacy you might have had, I find it hard to understand why people would consider this. Anyway, there's a good summary of the Verichip company here. Tags:

SAIC Security Goof Threatens 580,000 Military Personnel

A common story. With a common worthless response:
SAIC spokespeople said that several employees were placed on leave after the incident was disclosed, and that it contracted data security company Kroll Inc. to provide free identity theft protection for all affected individuals for one year.
Aww. How nice. Now it looks like they're doing something. Tags:

Hotmail Deletes Attachments to Save Bandwidth?

Very interesting:
It has long been suspected that there is a silent policy that makes Hotmail automatically delete the majority of attachments to save on bandwidth and internal disk space. Therefore it really doesn't matter if every client has access to 2GB of storage since they don't deliver the attachments to fill that space up anyway. If that truly is the case, then Microsoft may be liable for several hundred million cases of conspiracy and mail fraud
The real question is whether or not they'll actually get away with it if that's what they're doing. JTAG ERROR: No slashdot_ht index defined Tags:

UK Police Authorized to Tap Traffic Cameras at Will

In the UK, they're allowing the police to use the toll camera network to track vehicles. The cameras are used to enforce a toll and have software that analyzes license plates to match them with the car's owner.
But they will only be able to use the data for national security purposes and not to fight ordinary crime, the Home Office stressed.
Yeah right. Just like the FBI and national security letters. JTAG ERROR: No slashdot_ht index defined Tags: ,

FBI Uses Virus to Nap Bomb-Threat Teen

This is actually pretty clever. This kid was making bomb threats to his school and was doing a pretty good job at hiding his tracks until the FBI got involved. By sending a small program to his Myspace page, they somehow managed to infect his home PC with a monitoring program that collected evidence of his crime:
...if the Bureau could get the CIPAV installed on the user's machine, it would be able to collect the machine's IP address, MAC address, list of running programs, operating system, Internet browser used, language used, the registered computer name, the currently logged-in username, and more. All of this information would be relayed over the Internet back to an FBI computer in Virginia.
That sounds just like Windows Vista. Tags: ,

California E-Vote To Be Nullified

People don't seem to realize that e-voting needs to be an extremely air-tight system with a strong set of procedural controls to work. If you don't treat it like the crown jewels, you're going to have problems like this. JTAG ERROR: No slashdot_ht index defined

Bush Beats Down Science – Silenced Surgeon General

This is hardly surprising, but it's nice to see more of this kind of story surface. Bush has been pressuring the surgeon general to not do his job.
Carmona, whose four-year term as surgeon general expired in 2006, told the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform last week that he was constantly at odds with Bush administration political minders. They told him not to speak out on stem cell research, emergency contraception or sex education. They delayed release of a report on the dangers of secondhand smoke. They admonished him to mention the president frequently and favorably in public and not to address a group associated with the Special Olympics - a cause championed by the Kennedy family ... That's no way to treat a professional whose main job is to help the president, the Congress and the American people make intelligent health decisions. But it's not surprising that in a nation polarized on so many fronts, a president is going to expect any appointee to sing from the administration-approved hymnal.
I can't stand this kind of politics. Tags:

Another Day, Another Hidden Data Breach Exposed

Pfizer lost data, blah, blah, blah. All these reports do is strengthen the arguments for credit freezes and against data brokering. If we could freeze our credit reports, this wouldn't be a problem and if they didn't rape us for our data, this wouldn't have happened (oversimplified, yes, but it's the basic idea). Tags:

The State of the RIAA Today

One defendant of the RIAA inquisition has just been awarded attorney’s fees against the RIAA. The article does a good job of summarizing the history of this case and includes links to articles about more resistance from defendants and the courts againts their unethical practices. It’s worth a read.

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Security Software

Make sure you have a up-to-date Anti-Virus Program to protect you against bad websites or files.
Sometimes spyware gets in your computer and the anti-virus won't stop it. Use a spyware scanner to find and remove spyware and adware.
Use a software firewall to detect bad code on your computer when it tries to connect to the Internet.
Always keep your system up to date with security patches or none of the rest of your security software will matter.
Use an encryption tool to protect your important data when storing or transmitting it.
Switch to Firefox for your web browsing and you'll be better protected from Internet threats.

Safe Computing Practices

Don't get tricked by fake alerts or clever webpages into downloading viruses or spyware!

... or check out any of my other guides and tutorials by clicking here!

Anti-Virus

A virus can come from files, e-mails, web pages, or even devices you plug in (like thumbdrives or printers) and destroy your files or your computer once they get in. An anti-virus is software designed to detect and prevent that from happening.

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Spyware Scanners

Learn how to detect and remove spyware and adware using a free scanning tool.

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Software Firewall

Learn what a firewall is and why you want one on your computer.

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Operating System Updates

Make sure to keep your operating system up-to-date with security patches or else none of the rest of your security software will be able to protect you.

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File Encryption

Learn how to protect your important files on your computer or when transmitting them with free tools for file encryption.

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Mozilla Firefox - Internet Browser

There are many browser choices out there. Read why I think Firefox is one of the best.

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Fake Alerts

Maybe you've done everything right and you're computer is sufficiently fortress-like, but then you or someone in your family falls for a simple scam that tricks them into directly installing the bad guy's virus! Learn how to spot and ignore fakes!

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