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Republicans

Law requires ISPs to record all surfing activity

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes "A bill introduced last week by Representative Lamar Smith (R-TX) is beginning to raise eyebrows. (...) Under the guise of reducing child pornography, the SAFETY (Stopping Adults Facilitating the Exploitation of Today's Youth) Act is currently the gravest threat to digital privacy rights on the Internet. Given the increasing tendency of people, especially young people, to use the Internet as a primary means of communication, this measure would affect nearly all Americans in ways we are only beginning to understand. Also, given the fact that the Act requires all Internet Service Providers to record the web surfing activity of all Internet users, this amounts to the warrantless wiretapping of the entire Internet."
Privacy

Study: I.D. Thieves Prefer N.Y.C. and L.A.

Submitted by
Ant
Ant writes "If BetaNews article says: "If you live in New York, California, or Nevada, you have the biggest chance of being an identity/ID theft victim. However if you're a Wyoming, Vermont, or Montana resident, the opposite is the case. A study released Wednesday by security firm, ID Analytics, put those that live close to New York City/N.Y.C. or Los Angeles/L.A. at the highest risk. Living in the West also seemed to increase one's chances: Arizona, Oregon, and Washington all ranked in the top ten. The reason for the heightened occurrences of fraud in bigger cities is quite simple: the sheer amount of people living there makes it much harder to identify and track. Living in a highly populated state did not necessarily mean one would be at a higher risk. Two states with large populations, Pennsylvania and Ohio, ranked far down on the list at 36th and 46th respectively...""
Security

Chip-and-PIN one year on from enforced UK launch

Submitted by
Chris Green
Chris Green writes "Happy birthday Chip-and-Pin, one year old today Chip-and-Pin, the credit and debit card technology touted as a means of better security for transactions, is one year old in the UK today. Officially launched on Valentine's Day 2006 after a soft introduction, experts now say that fraudsters have moved to other means to defraud card account holders. http://www.itpro.co.uk/news/104629/happy-birthday- chipandpin-one-year-old-today.html"
Announcements

D-Wave Demonstrates First Quantum Computer

Submitted by
peace2300
peace2300 writes "http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2094849 ,00.asp On Tuesday, members of D-Wave Systems, a Vancouver-based hardware firm, gathered at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View to demonstrate what they claimed is the world's first commercially viable quantum computer: the "16-qubit" Orion. Touted as a systems-level "proof-of-concept" machine, the Orion uses a new type of analog processor that taps into quantum mechanics, rather than using the conventional physics associated with today's digital processing, to drive the computation. D-Wave maintained that its approach allows for the building of scalable processor architectures using many of the conventional processes and technologies employed in the semiconductor industry today. Furthermore, because Orion's processors are computationally equivalent to more standard devices, D-Wave says that any application can be developed for one type of quantum computer and then recast as an application for another. Full story here"
Privacy

Rights groups slam "lamer" data retention

Submitted by
amigoro
amigoro writes "Rights groups today slammed Data Retention Bill introduced by Representative Lamar "lamer" Smith (R-TX). ACLU said: "Legislation like this is like swatting a fly with a bazooka." CDT released a comprehensive memo about eight months ago describing the dangers of this bill, but apparently no-one listened. With a name like Lamar, what more can you expect?"

Promptness is its own reward, if one lives by the clock instead of the sword.