Is this common? First report I've read where the police are actively looking for the victims. (No doubt, so they can add burglary to the charges...) Would (should?) this cost be passed on to a TJX?
http://www.pogowasright.org/article.php?story=20071222072718335
TX: Police Tracking Down ID Theft Victims
Saturday, December 22 2007 @ 07:27 AM EST Contributed by: PrivacyNews News Section: Breaches
With six arrests so far in the case, police have begun trying to track down what appear to be hundreds of victims in an identity theft ring that targeted South Texans.
Authorities raided a home on Eagle Drive back on Dec. 6.
U.S. Marshals, assisted by police, found drugs stacks of cash and stolen property, including checkbooks and credit cards.
.... To track down victims, investigators have to go through the evidence including lock boxes containing stolen credit cards and checkbooks.
"It's hard to say," Lt. Lauren White of the Corpus Christi Police Department said, leafing through evidence, "but there's probably 20 different IDs in here from different people."
Source - KRISTV.com
Your tax dollars at work: Training the next generation of crooks?
http://www.pogowasright.org/article.php?story=2007122207190954
Personal Information Included In Prison Probe
Saturday, December 22 2007 @ 07:19 AM EST Contributed by: PrivacyNews News Section: Breaches
Social workers' notes on troubled families and the names, addresses and license numbers of drivers who were in accidents are among the information processed by inmates in a prison program now under investigation for a possible security breach.
The DataCon center at York Correctional Institution in Niantic remains closed a week after Department of Correction officials shut it down. The center enters and scans data for at least 11 state agencies that, collectively, deal with information about many Connecticut residents.
[...]According to the DOC, DataCon has operated securely at York — both as a money-saving service to the state and as an occupational training program for inmates — for 10 years. DataCon employs approximately 50 female inmates for pennies per hour.
Source - The Day
Re-taking control
http://politics.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/12/22/026216&from=rss
Norway Mandates Government Use of ODF and PDF
Posted by Zonk on Friday December 21, @10:30PM from the playing-nice-with-everyone dept. Government Politics Linux Technology
siDDis writes "Earlier this year Slashdot mentioned that Norway was moving towards mandatory use of ODF and PDF. Now it's official: the Norwegian government has mandated the use of open document formats from January 1st, 2009. There are three formats that have been mandated for all documentation between authorities, users and partners. HTML for all public information on the Web, PDF for all documents where layout needs to be preserved and ODF for all documents that the recipient is supposed to be able to edit. Documents may also be published in other formats, but they must always be available in either ODF or PDF."
Tools & Techniques: The Stalkers Toolkit This should give us the address of most politicians, including Osama?
http://www.pogowasright.org/article.php?story=20071221090959986
Details of Unlisted Number Address "Exploit" Revealed
Friday, December 21 2007 @ 09:09 AM EST Contributed by: PrivacyNews News Section: Internet & Computers
Greetings. After due consideration, some expert advice, and since the firm involved obviously feels that they're not doing anything wrong (will everyone else agree?), I've decided to release the details of the unlisted number to address lookup "exploit" I outlined in Psst! Wanna Know the Street Address for an Unlisted Number? -- please see that entry for the background on this situation. This "exploit" is still up and running as of a few minutes ago.
As noted previously, this technique is extremely successful at revealing the street addresses for U.S. landline (non-mobile) telephone numbers, including those aforementioned unlisted numbers. The returned information isn't 100% accurate for all queries and some numbers are missing -- I suspect stale data in certain situations -- but it's very "good" overall.
[...]The company under discussion is Acceller, Inc., and you can visit their services access page at:
In the upper right-hand corner of the page, you'll find a "Search For Offers" form where a phone number may be entered -- then click "Compare Offers Now" -- it's that simple. (Note: You may need to have cookies enabled for this to work, and Internet Explorer may perform better than other browsers in some cases for these queries.)
Enter a phone number, watch the bouncing ball for 10 seconds or so, and then you stand an excellent chance of seeing a street address revealed for U.S. non-mobile numbers (along with the various service offerings available at that address, of course).
Source - Lauren Weinstein's Blog
(Props, Infowarrior mail list)
Could be interesting. I'm teaching a web site class in January, this could be an interesting rubric...
http://techdirt.com/articles/20071221/154105.shtml
Get College Credit For Being Famous Online
from the and-what-did-you-major-in? dept
It's certainly no secret that in an age of changing business models for content creators, that understanding the nature of online marketing is important. Huge industries have grown up around online marketing, viral marketing and word of mouth marketing. But, when it gets right down to the core, it's about figuring out ways to get attention -- and it appears that one college professor is imparting that message quite clearly to his students in a class where the entire goal is for students to become famous online. It apparently doesn't matter how they become famous, but their grades depend on it. The class, at Parsons The New School for Design, has 15 students, all vying to be more famous than one another. What's amusing is that, as the semester wound down and more subtle means of becoming internet famous were proving ineffective, many in the class resorted to the old short-term standby: posting videos of scantily-clad women on blogs and using suggestive titles. You can check out the class blog to judge for yourself how famous the students have become.
Speaking of which...
http://www.killerstartups.com/Web-App-Tools/AppJetcom---Instant-Web-Programming/
AppJet.com - Instant Web Programming
Want to make or host a web application and think it’s not so easy? Using AppJet you can write and run applications on your browser. Applications are programmed on a web based text editor in the very simple Javascript programming language. Javascript is used on both the server and client side. The only thing you have to do to get your own application is to type up your code and save it. Then the application is published to a website where it runs when anyone goes to the site. They don't require you to know lots of different programming languages, and the process drastically is simplified by getting your work hosted online. AppJet.com provides a place for beginner programmers and experienced developers alike to build simple web apps with minimal fuss.
For those of us fascinated by language...
http://digg.com/educational/Top_7_Ways_to_Overhaul_Your_English_Online
Top 7 Ways to Overhaul Your English Online
blog.shankarganesh.com — Thesauri and dictionaries are only a good beginning if you are looking to seriously straighten out your language skills online.
http://blog.shankarganesh.com/2007/12/21/how-to-improve-your-english-online/
Interesting report on the ed-u-bidness
http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/016886.html
December 21, 2007
New GAO Reports: Budget Issues, Military Health Care, Veterans' Benefits, Higher Education
Budget Issues: Accrual Budgeting Useful in Certain Areas but Does Not Provide Sufficient Information for Reporting on Our Nation's Longer-Term Fiscal Challenge, GAO-08-206, December 20, 2007
Military Health Care: Cost Data Indicate That TRICARE Reserve Select Premiums Exceeded the Costs of Providing Program Benefits
GAO-08-104, December 21, 2007
Veterans' Benefits: Improved Operational Controls and Management Data Would Enhance VBA's Disability Reevaluation Process, GAO-08-75, December 6, 2007
Higher Education: Tuition Continues to Rise, but Patterns Vary by Institution Type, Enrollment, and Educational Expenditures, GAO-08-245, November 28, 2007
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