http://www.pogowasright.org/article.php?story=20081223145730771
RBS WorldPay Announces Compromise of Data Security and Outlines Steps to Mitigate Risk
Tuesday, December 23 2008 @ 02:57 PM EST Contributed by: PrivacyNews
RBS WorldPay (formerly RBS Lynk), the U.S. payment processing arm of The Royal Bank of Scotland Group, today announced that its computer system had been improperly accessed by an unauthorized party.
.... The issue, which affected pre-paid cardholders and other individuals, was identified on November 10 and law enforcement agencies and federal regulators were notified by RBS WorldPay shortly thereafter. RBS WorldPay's internal security professionals and outside experts are working with federal and state law enforcement authorities in an investigation of this event.
The affected pre-paid cards include payroll cards and open-loop gift cards. Personal information associated with certain payroll cards may have been improperly accessed. PINs for all PIN-enabled cards have been or are being reset. Affected individuals are being notified and information has been posted on the RBS WorldPay Web site, www.rbsworldpay.us.
The fraud that has been identified to-date is associated with RBS WorldPay's computer system supporting its U.S. pre-paid and open-loop gift card issuing business. Actual fraud has been committed on approximately 100 cards. Cardholders will not be responsible for unauthorized activity associated with this event. Certain personal information of approximately 1.5 million cardholders and other individuals may have been affected and, of this group, Social Security numbers of 1.1 million people may have been accessed. RBS WorldPay is offering impacted individuals whose Social Security numbers may have been affected a complimentary one-year membership in a national subscription credit monitoring service that provides access to individuals' consumer credit reports and daily monitoring of their credit files from all three national consumer reporting agencies. [...]
Source - PR Newswire Release on SunHerald.com
[From the article:
Those gift cards that had not been purchased have been deactivated and are being removed for destruction from stores as an additional precaution.
Logic isn't always applied.
http://www.pogowasright.org/article.php?story=20081223193027669
Expectations of privacy in cell phones
Tuesday, December 23 2008 @ 07:30 PM EST Contributed by: PrivacyNews
Today's Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot award goes to the Southern District Court of Kansas for an opinion issued last spring and unearthed today by GW law prof and blogger Orin Kerr. In United States v. Fierros-Alvarez, the Court somehow reached the mindboggling conclusion that citizens lack a "reasonable expectation of privacy" on address book and call records information stored in their cellular phones, and did so, apparently, by bizarrely applying the (execrable and outdated, but that's another rant) Supreme Court's 1979 ruling in Smith v. Maryland, which was fundamentally about information conveyed to third parties like the phone company:
Source - Law & Disorder blog
[From the article:
The defendant, however, has not shown that the phone book directory in his cellular telephone discloses more than the “addressing information”-the telephone number and the subscriber's name-on the same numbers appearing in the recent calls directory.
The FTC did something useful? (Is the a law school class on clear, humorous writing?)
http://www.pogowasright.org/article.php?story=20081223100237224
Privacy Policies: The Good, the Bad and the Witty
Tuesday, December 23 2008 @ 10:02 AM EST Contributed by: PrivacyNews
Privacy statements are all over the Web, it seems, and they're pretty much universally ignored. That's because the legal tracts that most companies display are the epitome of user-unfriendliness. few mavericks are trying a different approach, though, with statements that are clear, concise -- and sometimes even entertaining.
Source - E-Commerce News
[From the article:
Privacy statements that invoke the FTC's ire include "notices that don't provide sufficient information about collection and disclosure practices, or security practices, or notices that are in legalese," she said.
Well, I find them interesting...
Fresh Perspectives on e-Discovery from Young Minds in the “Academy”
... My son, Adam Colby Losey (shown left), recently published, Clicking Away Confidentiality: Workplace Waiver of Attorney-Client Privilege, as one of three student articles published in the current issue of Florida Law Review, Volume 60, Number 5, December 2008. Other articles in this same volume include: Student Speech Rights in the Digital Age by Mary-Rose Papandrea, a young Assistant Professor at Boston College Law School; and, Possession of Child Pornography: Should You Be Convicted When the Computer Cache Does the Saving for You? By Giannina Marin, a law review student at the University of Florida School of Law.
One to watch?
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10128600-93.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5
New York Times sued over Boston.com's linking practice
Posted by Elinor Mills December 23, 2008 11:42 AM PST
... In its lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts on Monday, Fairport, N.Y.-based GateHouse Media, which publishes more than 100 papers in Massachusetts, accuses the Times of violating copyright by allowing its Boston Globe online unit to copy verbatim the headlines and first sentences from articles published on sites owned by GateHouse, including the Newton Tab.
The links, as seen on Boston.com's Newton site for instance, lead to the original articles on the GateHouse-owned sites, which display advertising. However the lawsuit claims GateHouse is losing advertising revenue as a result of the linking because readers don't see the ads on the GateHouse site's home page.
The linking also confuses readers, leading them to believe that GateHouse endorses the linking practice, according to the lawsuit.
Related?
http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/020153.html
December 23, 2008
Internet Overtakes Newspapers As News Source
Pew Research Center for the People & the Press: "The internet, which emerged this year as a leading source for campaign news, has now surpassed all other media except television as a main source for national and international news. Currently, 40% say they get most of their news about national and international issues from the internet, up from just 24% in September 2007. For the first time in a Pew survey, more people say they rely mostly on the internet for news than cite newspapers (35%). Television continues to be cited most frequently as a main source for national and international news, at 70%."
Is this likely to become an Obama Policy? I doubt it.
http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08%2F12%2F23%2F2217250&from=rss
How To Create More Jobs
Posted by kdawson on Tuesday December 23, @06:24PM from the getting-out-of-the-way dept.
TechDirt is spotlighting a call by Michael S. Malone, a columnist for ABCNews.com, for letting Silicon Valley create jobs once more. Malone argues that Sarbanes-Oxley and other attempts at accounting reform have done little to prevent fraud, but in fact have managed to kill off an entrepreneurship-venture capital-IPO cycle, centered in Silicon Valley, that has taken 30 years to nourish. Here's TechDirt:
"...it's time to roll back SarbOx and other accounting rules that have acted more for theatrical purposes rather than any legitimate reason. Basically, all they've done is create new reporting requirements that do little to nothing to either prevent fraud or clarify a company's actual financial position (its intended purpose). I'm all for radical transparency in financial info, but that's not what has been done. Instead, we've made it burdensome to actually grow a company — and that doesn't help create jobs. It helps kill them."
Two major factors: You can buy a modest laptop for the price you paid for your last desktop and they are more capable – battery life, storage and processor speeds are “adequate” for most users. Minor factor: They're cooler! Long term: we're heading toward hand-held computing – cellphones with all the capabilities of laptops.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-10128549-64.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5
Laptop shipments top desktops for first time; Netbooks a factor
Posted by Brooke Crothers December 23, 2008 10:25 AM PST
For my website students and those who use the feeds...
http://www.killerstartups.com/Web-App-Tools/blastcasta-com-doing-more-with-feeds
BlastCasta.com - Doing More With Feeds
BlastCasta is a new service that aims to let anybody maximize the uses that news feeds can be put to. For instance, you can turn any feed into a feed landing page or create a widget to add the content of that specific feed to your website. Moreover, feeds can be processed in a plethora of ways, as they can be combined and filtered, and even translated into different languages.
The implementation of this system is as easy as it gets, too – all you have to do is provide a feed URL, and choose the intended action from a “What do you want me to do with this feed?” drop down menu. Some options that were not mentioned above and which merit at least a mention include a “Get feed in JSON form” and “Create a news ticker”.
The site also includes a blog that is a compelling read for those who find the premise of the site appealing, as it deals with pivotal SEO considerations as well as the importance of a feed’s structure itself.
We saw this coming, now you can get road rage instead of cellphone distraction. (Make a fun hack to drive Mom & Dad crazy too)
http://www.killerstartups.com/Mobile/textecution-com-no-more-texting-while-driving
Textecution.com - No More Texting While Driving
In the words of the team behind this project, “Textecution kills texting functions while driving so your child, loved one, or employee lives.” This is quite an apt definition of the provided solution, and it must be said that it is an interesting development that can play out a very important role towards road safety.
The implementation of such a solution is quite unobtrusive, as it sits quietly on the background upon installing it and only pops up when you want to use your mobile device, letting you know if you are driving to fast to send or receive text messages. Only when the phone is at rest or your travelling speed is lower than 10mph will the texting ability be regained.
This application can be procured at the site for a price that is described online. For the time being, Textexecution is only available on the HTC G1 by T-mobile. It is stated that more phones will become supported as the Android platform expands its market. In the meantime, you can get started if you own the aforementioned device.
Related Another fun hack/stocking stuffer? Proof there's a niche for everything? (Proof most hackers enjoy juvenile humor.)
http://venturebeat.com/2008/12/23/iphone-fart-app-pulls-in-nearly-10000-a-day/
iPhone fart app pulls in nearly $10,000 a day
MG Siegler | December 23rd, 2008
Apple’s App Store is currently experiencing a plague of fart applications. Last week, I detailed one day in which at least 14 new fart apps were accepted into the store. And now, just in a quick search, it looks like there are about 50 apps all dedicated to making fart noises on your iPhone or iPod touch. Classy, I know, but why are there so many?
Because apparently there’s big money in fart apps — nearly $10,000 a day for the most popular ones.
Here's a “drive your co-workers crazy” application. Merry Christmas
http://www.therightfoot.net/mystuff/whatever/swf/bubblewrap.swf
For true music or movie aficionados.. (And so I can get on the wait-list at the library earlier than number 685!)
http://www.killerstartups.com/Web20/whatsout-net-release-dates-at-your-fingertips
WhatsOut.net - Release Dates At Your Fingertips
A very specific service, What’s Out will enable anybody to quickly inform himself about the latest music, movies and games releases that hit the high street. The word that truly defines this service is “concise”: the main page is subdivided into three main categories, and in every case a series of accompanying links is provided.
... The same applies to the released movies, only that in this case you are provided links to Amazon. In addition to that, a link to the Internet Movie Database is provided for additional reference purposes.
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