Submission + - Government gaffe helps NSA Wiretapping Case
titotitozzz writes: "Ryan Singel at Wired reports:
It could be a scene from Kafka or Brazil.
Imagine a government agency, in a bureaucratic foul-up, accidentally gives you a copy of a document marked top secret.
And it contains a log of some of your private phone calls.
You read it and ponder it and wonder what it all means.
Then, two months later, the FBI shows up at your door, demands the document back and orders you to forget you ever saw it.
The case has been added to the EFF's wiretapping suit against AT&T. It may circumvent the government's present circular argument that the current plaintiffs have no documentation which proves that they are being surveilled and that the government doesn't have to provide said documentation because it would be considered a 'state secret' (and therefore inadmissible in court)."
The case has been added to the EFF's wiretapping suit against AT&T. It may circumvent the government's present circular argument that the current plaintiffs have no documentation which proves that they are being surveilled and that the government doesn't have to provide said documentation because it would be considered a 'state secret' (and therefore inadmissible in court)."
Submission + - Copyright law used to shut down anti-coal site
driptray writes: The Sydney Morning Herald reports that an Australian mining industry group has used copyright laws to close a website that parodied a coal industry ad campaign. A group known as Rising Tide created the website using the slogan "Rising sea levels: brought to you by mining" in response to the mining industry's slogan of "Life: brought to you by mining". The mining industry claimed that the "content and layout" of the parody site infringed copyright, but when Rising Tide removed the copyrighted photos and changed the layout, the mining industry still lodged a complaint. Is this a misuse of copyright law in order to stifle dissent?
Submission + - Vista activation circumvented with BIOS emulation
Steve Kerrison writes: "If a brute force Vista product key-gen won't work, then a tool to exploit the volume licensing used by OEMs might. HEXUS.net reports that a toolkit has been produced that emulates an OEM BIOS to make the system appear as a pre-activated machine. Combined with the correct certificate and OEM key, Vista won't perform any further activation."
Submission + - The Killing of Wi-Fi
justelite writes: "John C. Dvorak from PCMagazine write a good article about next strategy of American cell-phone-service companies . From article: "There is mounting evidence that the cellular service companies are going to do whatever they can to kill Wi-Fi. After all, it is a huge long-term threat to them. We've seen that the route to success in America today is via public gullibility and general ignorance. And these cell-phone-service companies are no dummies.""
Submission + - The Cancerous Role Viruses May Play
eldavojohn writes: "New Scientist is running a brief article on viruses playing a role in causing cancer. From the article, "During tumour development, the chromosomes of affected cells often become wildly rearranged, but no one knew why. Duelli and Lazebnik suspected that cell fusion — when two or more cells unite by merging membranes — might be to blame. Several common viruses can initiate this process.""
Submission + - Top 20 Comic Weapons
Ant writes: "Cardboard Monocle has its top 20 list of comic book weapons. It is based on some characteristics: "When compiling the top 20 comic book weapons of all time, one must consider the weapon and not the wielder. We chose weapons that define the characters they belong to. Without their weapons, the characters on this list would lose their identities... We have purposely left out any 'weapons of limitless power.'..."
Seen on Neatorama."
Submission + - New Radiation Treatment Drug Reduces Risk
eldavojohn writes: "A new drug developed is showing promising signs of reducing the risk of radiation death by almost 2/3. 5-androstenediol (AED), an adrenal gland hormone that stimulates marrow-cell growth will hopefully be something to use in emergency cases or in situations with a potential 'dirty bomb' to mitigate the amount of lives lost. From the article, "Amid growing fears of terrorist attacks with radioactive materials, the US government plans to award a contract for the treatment for acute radiation syndrome later this month under its revamped BioShield fund for civilian defences against chemical, biological and nuclear threats." An example of a capitalistic market at its finest or a result of over zealous terrorist fears?"
Submission + - Slashdot FireHose Beta Sneak Preview
Davak writes: "The old fogey slashdot has announced a new (dare I say, Web 2.0) youthful, digg-like voting system-Firehose. This new code is described as a "collaborative system designed to allow users to assist editors in the story selection process." This review of the Firehose describes the new features and implications of this new system. For example, much of Firehose's AJAX eye candy is built around yahoo's ajax toolkit."
Submission + - SPAM: New technology removes viruses from drinking water
FiReaNGeL writes: "University of Delaware researchers have developed an inexpensive, nonchlorine-based technology that can remove harmful microorganisms, including viruses, from drinking water. The new technology could dramatically improve the safety of drinking water around the globe, particularly in developing countries. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), over a billion people — one-sixth of the world's population — lack access to safe water supplies. Four billion cases of diarrheal disease occur worldwide every year, resulting in 1.8 million deaths, primarily infants and children in developing countries. Eighty-eight percent of this disease is attributed to unsafe water supplies, inadequate sanitation and hygiene."
Submission + - Final AACS key found
julie-h writes: The PowerDVD AACS private key for playing Blu-Ray and HD-DVD's have been found. This was the last key needed. What does this mean? We don't have to sniff/snoop Volume IDs anymore. We can create a program that can decrypt (or play if you will) a disc without any need for WinDVD or PowerDVD. So no sniffing/extracting of keys anymore. And more over: it can work on all platforms... In other words: we can make our own independent, user friendly player (or decrypter).
Journal SPAM: Pentagon tells Bush: climate change will destroy us 5
Climate change over the next 20 years could result in a global catastrophe costing millions of lives in wars and natural disasters..
A secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs and obtained by The Observer, warns that major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a 'Siberian' climate by 2020. Nuclear conflict, mega-droughts, famine and widespread rioting will erupt across the world.
Submission + - TSA can't figure out security certificates
markgo2k writes: "The Washington Post reports that TSA has taken a new website live that people who are wrongly on the famous "no-fly" list can protest their status. Unbelievably, the website uses a self-signed certificate (and some have reported that you can submit forms insecurely as well). Perhaps contractor (Desyne Web Services, Inc. www.desyne.com) nor whoever was managing them ever actually tested the site or figured that flashing red certificate error warnings were something that might not be okay on a site that asks for name, address, height, weight, date of birth, hair color, eye color, passport number, birth certificate, drivers license number, military id number..."
Submission + - Why is the RIAA against music download services?
GuyverDH writes: I've been sitting here scratching my head, trying to come up with a reason beyond greed as to why the RIAA is against download services, whether they be pay services or non pay services.
As I tried to sift through information, it suddenly came to me. I think I know the reason they do not like download services. It (the non DRM'd download services) is not defective by design. Let me re-state this. The original download services did not have DRM. They didn't care about piracy, they cared about defective by design. DRM free downloads can be copied off to backup media, and re-used on just about any platform. Essentially the user would NEVER have to buy another copy of that music again. This, in my opinion, is the real reason the RIAA is against this.
Let's look at the history of the music industry.
One of the first commercially available music formats was the vynil album. It had the built in defect that the media was easily damaged. Small scratches were enough to make the media unusable.
Next we had tape — reel to reel, 8-track, cassette, DAT. All of these had the inherit defect that they were easily damaged. The tape was easily mangled or erased, either by dirty heads (as the tape dumped magnetic residue onto the heads), or because of different speed reels or other components that the tape was routed through.
Next we had optical media — Compact Disc, Music DVDs. These were probably the most defective media ever created or adopted by the RIAA. Why? Because something as simple as a fingerprint is enough to cause the media to fail (at least until it's cleaned). The act of cleaning the disc, if not done properly, is enough to permanently damage it.
Finally, the digital file format, DRM free. P2P file sharing services were the anti-defective by design. Not only were the files DRM free, but they were in formats that just about anyone could read. There is also the fact that simple replication to additional media (backup tapes, discs, other hard drives, flash media, etc...) gave the end-user the ability to re-create any failed media without re-purchasing the music.
Every one of these media formats were designed with a built in defect. They were designed to fail during normal use. They were designed to fail in a way that we'd blame the media not the industry that used the media. They were designed to fail to increase their revenue streams through re-purchasing music due to media failure.
Guess what? We fell for it.
This, I believe, is the reason the RIAA is against DRM free digital music distribution.
It's not about pirating. It's about lost revenue due to the fact that people aren't having to re-purchase music over and over and over and over again due to (surprise) failed defective by design media.
Give it some thought. Maybe I've gone over the deep end, but I truly think this may be the root cause.
As I tried to sift through information, it suddenly came to me. I think I know the reason they do not like download services. It (the non DRM'd download services) is not defective by design. Let me re-state this. The original download services did not have DRM. They didn't care about piracy, they cared about defective by design. DRM free downloads can be copied off to backup media, and re-used on just about any platform. Essentially the user would NEVER have to buy another copy of that music again. This, in my opinion, is the real reason the RIAA is against this.
Let's look at the history of the music industry.
One of the first commercially available music formats was the vynil album. It had the built in defect that the media was easily damaged. Small scratches were enough to make the media unusable.
Next we had tape — reel to reel, 8-track, cassette, DAT. All of these had the inherit defect that they were easily damaged. The tape was easily mangled or erased, either by dirty heads (as the tape dumped magnetic residue onto the heads), or because of different speed reels or other components that the tape was routed through.
Next we had optical media — Compact Disc, Music DVDs. These were probably the most defective media ever created or adopted by the RIAA. Why? Because something as simple as a fingerprint is enough to cause the media to fail (at least until it's cleaned). The act of cleaning the disc, if not done properly, is enough to permanently damage it.
Finally, the digital file format, DRM free. P2P file sharing services were the anti-defective by design. Not only were the files DRM free, but they were in formats that just about anyone could read. There is also the fact that simple replication to additional media (backup tapes, discs, other hard drives, flash media, etc...) gave the end-user the ability to re-create any failed media without re-purchasing the music.
Every one of these media formats were designed with a built in defect. They were designed to fail during normal use. They were designed to fail in a way that we'd blame the media not the industry that used the media. They were designed to fail to increase their revenue streams through re-purchasing music due to media failure.
Guess what? We fell for it.
This, I believe, is the reason the RIAA is against DRM free digital music distribution.
It's not about pirating. It's about lost revenue due to the fact that people aren't having to re-purchase music over and over and over and over again due to (surprise) failed defective by design media.
Give it some thought. Maybe I've gone over the deep end, but I truly think this may be the root cause.
Submission + - Study suggests US/UK are failing children
Brian Ribbon writes: "The BBC has a report regarding a study into child welfare by international charity Unicef, which reveals that the US and UK have the lowest levels of child welfare out of 21 countries studied. The study measured child welfare using six categories; family and peer relationships, material well-being, health and safety, behaviour and risks, and children's own sense of well-being (educational and subjective).
Is it a coincidence that the countries which have the most draconian legislation disguised as measures to protect children also have the lowest level of child welfare, or is the level of paranoia and hysteria in these countries actually harming children?"
Is it a coincidence that the countries which have the most draconian legislation disguised as measures to protect children also have the lowest level of child welfare, or is the level of paranoia and hysteria in these countries actually harming children?"
