Wednesday, November 18, 2009

I thought this (like almost all breaches) would continue to grow as more data was released (or leaked) Unfortunately, I was right.

http://www.databreaches.net/?p=8314

Card payment processor breach in Spain affecting Europeans

November 18, 2009 by admin Filed under Breach Incidents, Financial Sector, Non-U.S., Of Note

Back in October, this site reported that “tens of thousands” of Swedish banking customers and “tens of thousands” of Finnish banking customers had been affected by a breach in Spain that might involve a card payment processor. Today, the BBC reports that:

Anyone who used a Visa or Mastercard credit card when in Spain may have had their card data compromised.

In Germany, as many as 100,000 cards are reportedly being recalled.

In a statement, Visa Europe confirmed that “it is aware of a possible card data security issue in Spain. No details are yet confirmed, but we do not believe that the issue is specific to Visa.”

Visa and Mastercard reportedly starting alerting banks about four weeks ago. The Local (Germany) reports:

According to Wednesday’s edition of the Financial Times Deutschland, the Volksbank and Raiffeisenbank have decided to take more than 60,000 Visa and Mastercards out of circulation.

That brings the total number of credit cards recalled in Germany in recent weeks to more than 100,000. In October, retailer KarstadtQuelle replaced more than 15,000 customer credit cards while the German subsidiary of Barclay’s also recalled thousands. Commerzbank and Deutsche Bank also froze hundreds of credit cards as a precautionary matter.

At the weekend, German airliner Lufthansa announced it was replacing thousands of its “Miles & More” cards issued by the Deutsche Kreditbank after it was found many of the cards were used in Spain. However, so far there have been no cases of fraud discovered with the cards that can be used to collect frequent flyer miles with the airline.



I don't understand the logic here.

http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=5461

D.C. Circuit Examines Warrantless GPS Surveillance

November 17, 2009 by Dissent Filed under Court, Surveillance, U.S.

Mike Scarcella writes:

When federal authorities got a warrant to install an electronic tracking device to track a drug suspect, agents acted in an “abundance of caution,” a federal prosecutor said today in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, where the government is defending its ability to secretly follow suspects without judicial supervision.

Peter Smith, an assistant U.S. attorney in the District of Columbia, argued that the authorities did not need a warrant to attach the global positioning system onto the vehicle of the suspect, Antoine Jones, the target of a cocaine trafficking ring in Washington. Jones was convicted last year and sentenced to life in prison. He is challenging the conviction.

Read more on The Blog of Legal Times. Hat-tip, FourthAmendment.com

[From the Blog article:

Smith said GPS does not generate any information that the authorities cannot otherwise obtain using traditional physical surveillance—following a vehicle secretly for hours on end. Traditional surveillance, he said, provides more detail than GPS—including the number of passengers and information about who is behind the wheel.



Canada, or at least the Privacy Commissioner, seems to understand the issues. “Doing something” is always a problem.

http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=5454

Ca: Watchdog raises alarm over security measures

November 17, 2009 by Dissent Filed under Non-U.S.

OTTAWA – Were you the person who recently cashed a government-issued cheque for under $300 at your local trust company?

You probably never expected to be flagged as suspicious, but you were, says Canada’s privacy commissioner in a new audit of Canada’s financial watchdog agency.

Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart’s annual report, tabled in Parliament Tuesday, warns that Ottawa, in the drive to combat terrorism and money-laundering with the aid of modern technology, has developed a “seemingly insatiable appetite for personal information about individuals.”

Read more in the Toronto Star.

[From the Privacy Commissioner's website:

To view the reports:



Either UK laws are even stranger than Rumpole made them out to be, or the whole country is smoking wacky-weed.

http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=5450

Ex-MI5 agent in memoirs battle sues newspaper for naming him

November 17, 2009 by Dissent Filed under Breaches, Court, Non-U.S.

David Leigh and Richard Norton-Taylor report:

A former MI5 secret agent is suing the London Evening Standard for revealing his name, his lawyers say, in an attempt to extend Britain’s privacy laws to cover the identity of intelligence officers.

The agent is also threatening the Guardian with a high court injunction if the paper re-publishes his identity. The Guardian is therefore withholding details, for the time being, that might give clues to his identity.

The man’s name continues to be available online, where legal complaints have failed to silence foreign bloggers and websites which specialise in intelligence leaks. His lawyers say: “We do not agree that the information is in the public domain.”

The altercation highlights once again the difficulty of suppressing information in the online age. What makes the case doubly unusual is that the agent is simultaneously fighting his former employers in the name of free speech. He wants to be allowed to publish his memoirs under a pseudonym.

Read more in the Guardian.



Not quite a “get out of jail” card, but better than nothing?

http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=5446

Federal Regulators Issue Final Model Privacy Notice Form

November 17, 2009 by Dissent Filed under Featured Headlines, Govt, Legislation, U.S.

Eight federal regulatory agencies today released a final model privacy notice form that will make it easier for consumers to understand how financial institutions collect and share information about consumers. Under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLB Act), institutions must notify consumers of their information-sharing practices and inform consumers of their right to opt out of certain sharing practices. The model form issued today can be used by financial institutions to comply with these requirements.

The final rule provides that a financial institution that chooses to use the model form obtains a “safe harbor” and will satisfy the disclosure requirements for notices.

Final Model Privacy Form under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (pdf, 1.36 MB). Appendix A contains the sample notices.



For your Security Manager?

http://www.thetechherald.com/article.php/200947/4803/Budget-problems-and-IT-collaboration-issues-present-challenge-to-security

Budget problems and IT collaboration issues present challenge to security

by Steve Ragan - Nov 17 2009, 17:10

According to a new study by the Ponemon Institute and Lumension, the adoption of mobile devices, cloud computing, and collaborative technologies is happening faster than companies are able to adapt security policies. Part of this is due to poor budget allocation and broken IT collaboration.

… The report is available here.



Do you suppose the Google book scanning project will allow this level of integration in all areas? Could be a “game changing event.” NOTE: Automatically generates citations in many formats!

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/022829.html

November 17, 2009

New on LLRX.com - Bridging the DiGital Divide: A New Vendor in Town? Google Scholar Now Includes Case Law

Bridging the DiGital Divide: A New Vendor in Town? Google Scholar Now Includes Case Law - The November 17, 2009 Google launch of free caselaw searching via Google Scholar is the focus of John J. DiGilio's timely content and resource review.

[From the article:

Searching for case law on Google is simple and versatile. You can search by case name, topic, or even phrase (“separate but equal” is the example they use). All you need to do is go to Google Scholar (http://scholar.google.com) and click the new radio button for “Legal opinions and journals” It is just that easy. But what of the results? How do they compare to what we in the legal community are accustomed? A simple test of the new search might just surprise you. Take a case like Bowers v. Hardwick, for example - seminal, controversial, and heavily cited. Run it’s name through the Google Scholar search. What you get is almost overwhelming. Yes your search results will return the text of the decision. But that is not all. Decisions, in this case Bowers, can come with official citations and pagination. Key factors for anyone writing and citing to the case. The cases cited in the body of the decision, if Google has them, actually show up as clickable links. That should give the major vendors pause! But this is STILL not all Google Scholar has to offer. If there are legal journals that cite the case you have searched and Google has them, you will see them in your search. By clicking the “How Cited” link next to the case name on the results page, you can see how the document has been cited, where it has been cited, and other related cases. Searching for Bowers brings up a list of cases that have been seminal in the area of privacy rights, for example. Even the footnotes are clickable links! Suffice it to say that Google is on to something really good here.



Interesting article suggesting that at least a few lawyers are making use of many social networks.

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/022827.html

November 17, 2009

New on LLRX.com: Free Tools and Applications For More Efficient Online Interaction

Free Tools and Applications For More Efficient Online Interaction: Many lawyers understand the importance of networking, but running a law practice takes time and no one ever seems to have enough of it. This factor is one of the main reasons lawyers offer as an excuse to avoid online networking, but Nicole Black proposes how choosing even a few efficient applications from the range of free tools available can streamline and accelerate this marketing process.


(Related) Generate your own...

http://www.clipgenerator.com/

CLIPGENERATOR


(Related)

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/creaza-%E2%80%93-an-online-toolbox-for-creative-educational-fun/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Makeuseof+%28MakeUseOf.com%29

Creaza – An Online Toolbox For Creative & Educational Fun

Nov. 17th, 2009 By Saikat Basu

… a mindmapper, a cartoon creator, a movie editor and an audio application



I'll try it out, but if it doesn't have Dilbert I won't stick for long.

http://eu.techcrunch.com/2009/11/18/mendeley-the-last-fm-of-research-could-be-world%E2%80%99s-largest-online-research-paper-database-by-early-2010/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Techcrunch+%28TechCrunch%29

Mendeley, the-Last.fm-of-research, could be world’s largest online research paper database by early 2010

by Steve O'Hear on November 18, 2009

[UK] London-based Mendeley, which calls itself “the Last.fm of research”, has announced that it’s reached something of a milestone today – claiming 100,000 users and 8 million research papers uploaded to the site in less than a year since its launch. Furthermore, the online database is doubling in size every 10 weeks, says the company.

… Mendeley offers a secure online database for scientists, academics and researchers to store their research papers in the ‘cloud’, making it easier to share those documents with their peers but there’s an important ’social’ element too (if that’s the right word). The system helps researchers find and connect to like-minded academics in similar fields to foster collaboration.



Another TED talk that will make geeks drool...

http://www.ted.com/talks/pranav_mistry_the_thrilling_potential_of_sixthsense_technology.html#top

The thrilling potential of SixthSense technology

At TEDIndia, Pranav Mistry demos several tools that help the physical world interact with the world of data -- including a deep look at his SixthSense device and a new, paradigm-shifting paper "laptop." an onstage Q&A, Mistry says he'll open-source the software behind SixthSense, to open its possibilities to all.



If I have students build a wiki documenting all they learn in my classes, would I need to pay them royalties if I sold it?

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2009/11/welcome-to-the-wiki-party.ars

Wikis in the workplace: a practical introduction

The wiki crops up in many companies' internal discussions about process improvements and efficient collaboration, but it is often shot down because so few people have exposure to good models of what a really successful business wiki can do. Ars is here to help with a practical introduction based on real-world examples.

By Alan J. Porter | Last updated November 16, 2009 11:30 PM CT

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