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Submission + - N.S.A. Collecting Millions of Faces From Web Images (nytimes.com)

Advocatus Diaboli writes: The National Security Agency is harvesting huge numbers of images of people from communications that it intercepts through its global surveillance operations for use in sophisticated facial recognition programs, according to top-secret documents. The spy agency’s reliance on facial recognition technology has grown significantly over the last four years as the agency has turned to new software to exploit the flood of images included in emails, text messages, social media, videoconferences and other communications, the N.S.A. documents reveal. Agency officials believe that technological advances could revolutionize the way that the N.S.A. finds intelligence targets around the world, the documents show. The agency’s ambitions for this highly sensitive ability and the scale of its effort have not previously been disclosed.

Comment Why only Vaccines.Alcohol users database is better (Score 1) 493

Why only limit to vaccination database? Alcohol kills much much more individuals and is clearly a public hazard. Tracking those who buy alcohol and who consume has will reduce the number of casualties by 10 to 15 thousand people in United States alone. The annual cost for alcohol-related traffic accidents totals more than $50 billion per year. The #1 and #2 killers in US are cardiovascular diseases and cancer. We should monitor all those who do not exercise enough because they are a clear public hazard as well.

Comment Live 100 miles from US border? No rights for you. (Score 1) 205

Next thing you will hear that all the Americans who live within 100 miles from the US Border, including west and east seashores, do not have constitutional 4th and 5th amendment. At least that what DHS is trying to project by setting border checkpoints. Probably 80% of US population live within 100 miles from US borders. Guess that the next revelation will be that American's calls are getting intercepted, recorded and archived, but never kept for more than 5 years, unless NSA is involved in lawsuit. We know that all calls recorded in UK, Bahamas, Bermuda, Cayman islands, Iraq so far.

Comment Obamacable (Score 0) 286

Tens of millions of those without cable will get access to affordable quality cable through the marketplace. Over half of thous without cable Americans can get free or low cost cable service using their State's Cable Providers Marketplace. You can't be denied from coverage when you get sick or make an honest mistake on when you talk to operator. You also can't be denied coverage or television for being lazy or charged more for being lazy. You can't be charged more for being a woman either. Small businesses can get tax credits for up to 50% of their employees cable television installation costs, assuming employers allow to watch obamacable at work at least one hour a day. Young Adults can stay in parents house and watch cable free until they turn 26. 82% of adults without cable will qualify for free or low cost cable. ObamaCare helps to curb the growth in cable spending. Your Obamacable bill will be cheaper than cable bill

Comment Instructions to Vote is a fine idea (Score 1) 60

Instructions to politicians dictating what to vote for is a fine idea and a great tool to accountability. It will be even better when crowds of taxpayers will be directing how to spend taxes and what taxes to collect. That is when the democracy will start. Just think about it: The government knows income and expenses of every household with scientific precision. Voters, however, use the ballot system inherited from Helenic era.

Comment Re:Important Legally (Score 1) 138

In the closed session, reduction of certain phrases will be presented as a "win" against the terrorsm because only real terrirsts would be searching for banned concepts, rights? Since there are less searches, there is less work for a three letter agencies. So .... it will be presented that the current status quo... works. Just like TSA theater .... works too.

That is not the problem. Problems will start when people with one half of the brain will know that they are being monitored, but, at the same time, with other part of the brain will genuinely think that they are free.

Comment Re:A firearm that depends on a battery? (Score 1) 1374

Not trying to be a flamebaiter, but one constitution, which is the basis for the laws applies in all of the 50 US states. Missouri basically said, 2nd amendment applies, any laws that try to limit anything are basically void. Again, when Roe Vs Wade law or Gay marriage law became federal laws applicable to any state, even the state that does not consent. So how fucking come one federal law is applied and pushed through the throats, while some other laws are just optional. By the way, encouraging debate opponents who do not agree with one's position to move to different state, country or planet is essentially claiming moral superiority and saying that unless you think the same way I think, your opponent does not deserve to live in your neighborhood.

Comment Re:Why only Americans are of concern ? (Score 0) 310

So there is a difference between citizens versus other people? Except that the Constitution has never separated "We the People" into citizens and non-citizens. In fact slaves were considered as the ones who did not have a voting rights back then. I would say that to be completely fair, US should be much more careful about the rights of those who do not have US citizenship because those people, non-US citizens are much more vulnerable, and much less represented and protected than US citizens.

Comment If Apple infotainment is great why dont we see it (Score 2, Insightful) 194

If Apple infotainment is great why don't we see it in the airplanes. We don't see it because it is damn too expensive. I do respect Apple's commercial acumen, quality, design and innovations, but I don't own any of the apple's products nor am I planning to, and I have tried..... No offense to Mac owners and I have heard a lot about their quality and durability. When someone is buying and Iphone, it is easy to bury equipment depreciation to service provider fee. When someone will buy a car in the nearest future, apple infotainment will be one of the many junk services that people will just cross out. I quietly hope that Apple infotaintment will take the same place among junk fees and services such as extended gold service plan, super coated seat protection, anti-theft glass engravings, floor plan fee and other.

Comment If this is not a bribery then I don't know what is (Score 5, Insightful) 133

If fact of donations will be confirmed, then Comcast lost in the court of public opinion. The merger should not be approved on the ground of anti-trust laws, unfair competition and reduced choice by consumers. At the minimum this should send a message to the future senators who will be tempted to take donations of the big business.

Comment This is a big deal (Score 5, Interesting) 111

If EU switches to open document format, significant part of the market will consider European advice. They get many things wrong but this one they got right. The proprietary documet standard could be comparable to the proprietary railway track gauge. Can you imagine paying an extra royalty because you are using "specially measured" difference between the wheels. The problem for Microsoft is that at some point, very soon they will figure out that it does not matter which operating system is on user's PC. I fully expect that in 5-10 years most of the users will not know what operating system they are using.

Comment Climate change conferences in 2014 (Score 0, Flamebait) 987

I have found one non-scientific observation about climate change conferences, which I am quoting in full: "I just Googled 'climate change conferences 2014': New York - Sep. Beijing - May. Peru - Dec Brazil - May. Iceland - Jun. Bonn - Mar. Las Vegas - Jul. Queensland - Sep/Oct. Venezuela - Nov. By then I got bored. It would appear that the best way to see the world on expenses and rack up plenty of air-miles is to become a 'Climate Change Expert'.

Comment Why stop on cell phone kill switch (Score 2) 218

While the cellphone kill switch is a fascinating and debatable idea, with trepidation I am waiting for the first study for human kill switch devices. We saw those prototypes in the movie The Running Man. They no longer need to be intrusive and look like dog collars. They can be discreet and miniature like cardiac pacemakers. The kill switch needs not be messy and explosive: all you do is switch off the current. Human Kill switches have enormous potential. If widely adopted, billions of dollars could be saved. For all kind of fugitives from justice. For example, Mr Snowden would not be an issue, nor any stolen information in his laptop or his head. You no longer go the hard way through extradition, all you do is let the authorization not to explode unlast. Application opportunities are just... boundless: kill switches can be customized to have automatic Taser installed, for example. Or, another thought: there would be no need to have vehicle kill switches, because it would be possible to control the driver who is controlling vehicles. Police would have no need to carry handguns anymore, because you could carry remote controllers. We are talking not billions but trillions of dollars in savings here.

Submission + - So what and how exactly "big brother" is monitoring at work

Trachman writes: Many of us working in corporations of medium and larger size are accustomed to periodic reminders that there is zero privacy on what employees do on their computers. There is a usual clause that incidental (infrequent) use is OK.

So what exactly is being monitored: I know that emails stay for ever, that we all know. Same with company provided chats and phone calls. I know that files on the servers monitor various "meta-data", such as when accessed, modified and deleted and keeps versions of data (every company can have different holding period).

To further narrow and scope the question, let's excluding those clear cut cases where someone is working after official warning, or complained (for whatever reason) to HR, or was specifically reported after complain.

Let's also scope out the work specific applications where the user activity is logged for audit and accountability purposes.

That leaves browser, P2P software (such as Skype), music listened over the work computer.

So the question is what are the common practices of reviewing the internet browsing and internet activities?

P.S. Once I worked within the audit team in top notch institution in, let's put it that way, not a very friendly environment and 100% of the calls were listened. My girlfriend called to tell me to share some very intimate news. I still blush when remember and realize that there were additional ears listening my telephone conversation.

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