Somehow this seems to lack a strategic vision...

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_5188588,00.html

Police camera proposal raises privacy concerns

Denver may expand surveillance already in place on Colfax

By Felix Doligosa Jr., Rocky Mountain News December 4, 2006

Denver criminals soon could be showing up on surveillance cameras on some of the city's most crime-ridden corners.

Members of the Denver Police Department are hoping to place cameras in targeted residential and commercial neighborhoods throughout the city. In some cases, the public might not know the equipment is there - unless they happen to spot the electronic eye atop a light pole or in another discreet location.

... "A program that assigns police officers to monitor public spaces through video surveillance has the potential to erode privacy, inhibit freedom and chill public expression in public places, with little or no benefit in reduced criminal activity," said Mark Silverstein, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado.

Silverstein said the benefits to law enforcement are illusory.

"If the cameras deter crime, (the criminals) simply move it to another place, potentially prompting a call for even more cameras and more surveillance."

... The equipment records images 24 hours a day, but officers do not constantly track the monitors. [So they're not interested in prevention? Bob] Investigators, however, can replay the video for help in identifying suspects or conducting an investigation.

Denver police have not been tracking any statistics on how much crime has been reduced from the cameras, but they believe the equipment is helping.

... In Baltimore, about 300 cameras survey alleys and streets in and near downtown.

Crime in these areas has gone down an average of about 17 percent, said Lt. Matthew Bauler of the Baltimore Police Department.

... Martinez insists that the Denver Police Department will not violate individual privacy rights.

Still very common and very, very irritating.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2003461389_websecurity04.html

Monday, December 4, 2006 - Page updated at 12:07 PM

Washington state settles for $1 million in spyware case

The Associated Press

OLYMPIA - Washington state will receive a $1 million settlement from New York-based Secure Computer, resolving the state's first computer spy ware lawsuit, Attorney General Rob McKenna announced today.

More than 1,140 Washington residents who bought the company's Spy ware Cleaner software or in some cases, Popup Padlock, are eligible for refunds under the agreement filed in federal court last week.

Under the consent decree signed in Seattle by U.S. District Court Judge Ricardo Martinez, Secure Computer and company President Paul E. Burke agreed to pay $200,000 in civil penalties, $75,000 in restitution for consumers, and $725,000 in state attorneys' fees and costs. There was no admission or finding of wrongdoing under the agreement.

How not to research?

http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/12/05/swivel-to-launch-this-week-communitize-your-data/

Swivel Aims To Become The Internet Archive For Data

Michael Arrington

Swivel Co-founders Dmitry Dimov and Brian Mulloy start off by describing their company as “YouTube for Data.” That’s a good start for someone trying to understand it, because the site allows users to upload data - any data - and display it to other users visually. The number of page views your website generates. Or a stock price over time. Weather data. Commodity prices. The number of Bald Eagles in Washington state. Whatever. Uploaded data can be rated, commented and bookmared by other users, helping to sort the interesting (and accurate) wheat from the chaff. And graphs of data can be embedded into websites. So it is in fact a bit like a YouTube for Data.

But then the real fun begins. You and other users can then compare that data to other data sets to find possible correlation (or lack thereof). Compare gas prices to presidential approval ratings or UFO sightings to iPod sales. Track your page views against weather reports in Silicon Valley. See if something interesting occurs.

And better yet, Swivel will be automatically comparing your data to other data sets in the background, suggesting possible correlations to you that you may never have noticed.

Talk about setting yourself up for failure!

http://techdirt.com/articles/20061204/232014.shtml

Feds Vote To Keep Faulty E-Voting Machines Because It's Too Much Work To Fix Them

from the democracy-is-hard-work;-too-bad-not-everyone-agrees dept

Remember last week when we were surprised, but happy, to hear that the feds were finally set to recommend the US stop using paperless e-voting machines? Well, apparently we were celebrating a bit too early. It's just come out that, despite the report recommending rejecting such machines, the Technical Guidelines Development Committee rejected the proposal when they couldn't get the 8 out of 15 votes necessary (no word on whether they used e-voting machines to count the vote). While there was support for it from some, others disagreed. However, the reason given for rejecting the proposal are really ridiculous: "You are talking about basically a reinstallation of the entire voting system hardware." Why yes. Yes we are. That's because the entire voting system hardware is totally screwed up. So, to be more specific, we're talking about stopping an e-voting program that has serious problems and has raised plenty of legitimate questions about just how fair and accurate our elections are. That seems like a perfectly valid reason that shouldn't be tossed aside just because it'll be a lot of work. We also thought that democracy itself was supposed to be hard work, but apparently some of those on the Technical Guidelines Committee disagree. On the bright side, Sarasota County may still be able to resell those e-voting machines that lost tens of thousands of votes to some other state now.

It's not Virtual Law, but that's where it's heading...

http://www.lessig.org/blog/archives/003622.shtml

Judge Posner, virtually

Judge Richard Posner of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals will visit Second Life on December 7th, from 6-8pm Second Life Time (PST). Read all about it here.

Why we need Virtual Law

http://techdirt.com/articles/20061204/223551.shtml

Did Google Let Clickfraud Case Drop, Rather Than Reveal Clickfraud Details?

from the sneaky,-sneaky dept

Nearly three years ago, a man was arrested for trying to blackmail Google over clickfraud. It was an amazingly brazen attempt. The guy had created a software program that he claimed could click ads without detection from Google, and then asked the company for $150,000 to keep him from releasing it. Google invited him to their offices for a meeting, where the guy even joked that "this feels like a blackmail session." Of course, law enforcement listening in one room over felt it actually was blackmail and charged the guy. However, Business Week notes that prosecutors quietly dropped the case two weeks ago, noting that while no one will talk publicly about it, the main reason may have been Google's reluctance to reveal much information for the case. Basically, the article contends that for Google to show that there were damages, they would have to explain how this program could successfully engage in clickfraud. Google may have then been concerned that revealing any of that info could either help other fraudsters, or give more ammo to various advertisers who are intent on suing Google over being charged for ads that are fraudulently clicked. However, on the flip side, the article notes that this admission that Google will let such obvious cases drop may encourage more people to engage in clickfraud, knowing that the risks aren't as high. It's still not clear why Google isn't somewhat more upfront with clickfraud. The company claims they don't want to help those engaged in the practice, but the more secretive they are, the more people question how successful they really are. It seems like there should be some middle ground where they can reveal some details without revealing how to beat their anti-clickfraud attempts.

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/013182.html

December 04, 2006

DNI Information Sharing Environment Privacy Guidelines Released

Press release: DNI Information Sharing Environment Privacy Guidelines

• Privacy Guidelines (9 pages, PDF)

Indeed worth reading...

http://michaelzimmer.org/2006/12/04/bendrath-on-the-politics-of-identity-governance/

Bendrath on the Politics of “Identity Governance”

Posted on Monday, December 4th, 2006 at 9:34 am

Ralf Bendrath has a thoughtful post on Oracle’s recently announced “Identity Governance Framework”, a set of draft standards for sharing and controlling personally identifiable information across different systems and applications. He was particularly struck by the use of the term “governance” in this context, and how it reflects a changing discourse on privacy & identity management:

... He writes more, and it is worth reading.

Expect to see similar tools from other vendors...

http://www.contentmanager.net/magazine/news_h21404_commvault_streamlines_legal_search_and.html

CommVault Streamlines Legal Search and Discovery of Enterprise E-mail

New E-mail Management Enhancements Save Significant Discovery Time for Legal Teams, Builds on End-User Mailbox Management

CommVault (NASDAQ: CVLT), a leading provider of Unified Data Management solutions, today announced data archiving software enhancements that improve legal search and discovery of enterprise Microsoft Exchange e-mail. Building upon its proven end-user mailbox search and retrieval features, CommVault has added a new specialized discovery search capability to the Microsoft Outlook client. Now, legal or compliance teams can directly search and retrieve messages from e-mail archives, based on the content in e-mail messages, attachments, instant messages, PST files or SMTP messages, without IT assistance.

Today, e-mail is the most frequently-requested type of business record sought by courts and regulators. Research by industry analysts at the Enterprise Strategy Group indicates that an estimated 77 percent of organizations involved in an electronic data discovery request say they have been asked to produce e-mail messages. As a result, IT organizations and legal groups must collaborate on discovery processes that require the search, retrieval and production of e-mail for litigation support.