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United States

Submission + - Study dismisses NH vote technology concerns (umich.edu)

Submitted by
indros13
indros13 writes: "The results of the NH primary sparked vote fraud rumors and well-meaning investigations based on differences in vote tallies between hand-counted and machine-counted wards. Three academics gave the issue a full statistical analysis and find that the differing tallies had nothing to do with systematic hacking or machine bias. Instead, the un-sexy conclusion is that underlying differences in demographics explain the results."
Mars

Submission + - Treasure Trove of Color Mars Pictures Released (arizona.edu)

Submitted by
Riding with Robots
Riding with Robots writes: "Today the high-res imaging team for the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter released hundreds of recent color images showing the surface of Mars in splendid detail. These particular pictures were available previously in black-and-white format only. The color versions are the products of camera filters sensitive to wavelengths beyond human vision, so while the hues are not what you would see with your own eyes, the wild diversity of color is real nonetheless."
Censorship

Submission + - Military blocks YouTube for the troops

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Yesterday you reported on how the military is putting up their own YouTube channel for reasons heavily speculated. Now CNN reports on how the military puts those websites like YouTube and even blogs (MySpace and 11 other sites) off limits for the troops.

Where the article talks about how its being made harder for the troops to use the computer equipment for socializing by sending video's home I also can't help wonder if something isn't stinking here. At one part they try to start a populair trend by opening up a YouTube channel, aledgidly to "open up" and on the other handd they're making it near to impossible for the troops to get the real word out. In my opinion this puts the earlier post in a whole different perspective.
Wii

Submission + - Hudson Filter: Excessive Blurring of TG16 Titles

Submitted by
Mugenmidget
Mugenmidget writes: "Many users of the Virtual Console have noticed that Turbo Grafx games undergo excessive bilinear filtering that makes these titles the blurriest and easily the most misrepresented on Nintendo's Virtual Console service. Hudson has made some slight comments about this occurrence on their official forums, but since January we have heard nothing more on the blurring that plagues the TG16 titles available on the Virtual Console. http://www.hudsonentertainment.com/viewtopic.php?t =343 There's a thread started that addresses fan concerns, and we'd appreciate it if you could spread the word to your reader base so they can voice their opinion on this emulation issue and be heard by the Hudson staff."
United States

Submission + - Web searches at US border

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: From IHT: "Andrew Feldmar, a Vancouver psychotherapist, was on his way to pick up a friend at the Seattle airport last summer when he ran into a little trouble at the border.

"A guard typed Feldmar's name into an Internet search engine, which revealed that he had written about using LSD in the 1960s in an interdisciplinary journal. Feldmar was turned back and is no longer welcome in the United States, where he has been active professionally and where both of his children live."

"Mike Milne, a spokesman for the Customs and Border Protection agency in Seattle, said he could not discuss individual cases for reasons of privacy. But the law is clear, Milne said. People who have used drugs are not welcome here.

""If you are or have been a drug user," he said, "that's one of the many things that can make you inadmissible to the United States."

"He added that the government was constantly on the hunt for new sources of information. "Any new technology that we have available to us, we use to do searches on," Milne said."
Censorship

Submission + - Gov't requests sex offender data from MySpace

Submitted by
athloi
athloi writes: "Attorney generals from seven states sent a letter to MySpace.com on Monday, asking the social networking site to provide the names of registered sex offenders who use the site.

While no one wants to defend sex offenders, this could lead to account signups that require real identification so the provider is not subjected to subpoenas for sex offenders on a regular basis."
Biotech

Submission + - Cancer therapy without side-effects?

Submitted by
Roland Piquepaille
Roland Piquepaille writes: "Most of you know at least one person who has been affected by cancer and treated by chemotherapy, suffering from side-effects such as hair loss or nausea. This is because chemotherapy attacks both healthy and unhealthy cells in the whole body. Now, Australian researchers are using nanotechnology to offer chemotherapy relief. They've created 'nano-cells' from 'inert' bacteria — meaning they can't reproduce — which can deliver potent drugs exactly where they're needed. As this new therapy allows to target very precisely the tumors, the amounts of drugs are much smaller and the harmful side-effects of chemotherapy will be avoided in the future. This method could be used for a wide variety of cancers and human clinical trials should start by the end of this year. Read more for many additional references about this future harmless cancer therapy."
Security

Submission + - Identity theft battle moves to the states

Submitted by
coondoggie
coondoggie writes: "If you are looking to fight identity theft problems help is on the way. According to a story in the Washington Post today 33 states and the District of Columbia let consumers place a "security freeze" on their credit files and many more states are considering similar legislation. The explosion of identity thefts is top of mind among U.S. consumers according to data released recently by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC). More than a quarter of a million ID theft complaints were lodged with the agency in 2006, accounting for 36% of the 674,000 complaints the FTC received. http://www.networkworld.com/community/?q=node/1498 5"
Security

Submission + - 22,000 names and SSNs stolen at the U. of Missouri

Submitted by
Ardeaem
Ardeaem writes: "The University of Missouri is reporting that a security breach has allowed over 22,000 names and social security numbers to be stolen. It appears that an insecure application is to blame; used by the help desk to track issues, the application allowed the retrieval of names and SSNs. The "hacker" simply used the application to get the SSNs one by one. Of course, if the person's name is known, getting more information about them is possible through the school's directory, enabling the "hackers" to possibly compile a disturbing amount of information about each person. Why do organizations still use SSNs for identification, and can they be held liable for it? When will they learn?"
Google

Submission + - Google begins Massive Roll out of Web History

Submitted by
untouchableForce
untouchableForce writes: "It has been well known for some time that Google could record your search history and associate it with your Google Account. It was used to create service such as Personalized Search. A couple of weeks ago Google released a new tool called Web History and apparently it recently has began enrolling all of its new and existing users into it. I noticed it on my account today despite having previous disabled personalized search in my account. To their credit it was "paused" but I was still quietly enrolled in something I knew nothing about. Here is an overview of Web History can be found at this blog entry. Here is Google's FAQ regarding why it has suddenly appeared along with directions on how to remove it from your account.

Given all of the ways things are being interpreted in this world today I want absolutely no one having access to a complete history of what I searched. I submit this only to bring it to the attention of others who may have missed this. To Google's credit they do give you the ability to delete items from your web history, which will keep them from using it to make recommendations but they likely still have other records of it. The only positive aspect of this that I can see is at least we getting an additional glimpse on just how much information the search giant has on us."
Movies

Submission + - Holllywood Trying to Starve Canadian Pirates

Submitted by
KenAndCorey
KenAndCorey writes: "From an article on the CTV News web site, Warner Brothers has decided it won't be giving Canadians previews of its summer blockbusters.

Citing a failure by the government of Canada to make illegal the recording of movies directly from the screen by camcorder, the studio will not issue advance screenings of such audience pleasers like "Harry Potter and the Order of The Phoenix" and "Ocean's 13."
This is total crap, as we already know that the Canadian Movie Piracy Claim is Mostly Fiction. But as is the norm in Canada, we try to make it sound like it's not as bad as it may first appear. Douglas Frith of the Canadian Motion Pictures Distributors Association says,

We're not looking at the individuals who go in for fun to camcord a film in a theatre. It's organized crime. People are going in, they get paid between $5,000 to $7,000 for a very good copy of a film."
Well, not yet, anyway."
Editorial

Submission + - MySpace photo sagas continue

Submitted by gwoodrow
gwoodrow writes: We've all heard the "fired because of myspace" issues, where a simple blog or picture gets someone canned. But even as it's getting worse, the targets are fighting back:

"Teacher in training Stacy Snyder was denied her education degree on the eve of graduation when Millersville University apparently found pictures on her MySpace page 'promoting underage drinking.' As a result, the 27-year-old mother of two had her teaching certificate withheld and was granted an English degree instead. In response, Snyder has filed a Federal lawsuit against the Pennsylvania university asking for her education diploma and certificate along with $75,000 in damages."

The offending picture? A picture from halloween 2005 of Stacy in a pirate outfit drinking from a cup.
Censorship

Submission + - State laws target used CD sales

Submitted by NetDanzr
NetDanzr writes: According to this article in PC World, at least four US states have passed or are considering legislation that would curb the resale of used CDs. In Florida, for example, a store that wishes to sell used CDs must post a $10,000 bond, fingerprint CD sellers, hold onto the CDs for 30 days and only offer store credit (no cash) for CDs. While these rules are in line with existing pawnshop laws, they haven't been applied to used records and book stores previously. Used video and video game resellers have gotten a break, though: they'll have to hold onto the merchandise for only 15 days.
United States

Submission + - GAO Study Contradicts Counterfeiting Claims

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A new study (pdf) from the U.S. General Accounting Office contains data confirming that claims about counterfeiting are massively overstated. Michael Geist notes that the report found that less than one percent of shipments entering the U.S. contained counterfeit goods, a far cry from the 5 to 7 percent of international trade that is often claimed.

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