At some point, you have to
acknowledge 'the enemies of the state' otherwise it appears you are
using the Army on your own peaceful citizens.
"After Anonymous hacked
hundreds of Chinese government, company, and other general websites,
China has acknowledged
the attacks. Meanwhile, Anonymous China has not stopped its
onslaught. 'The group has hacked and defaced hundreds of Chinese
government, company, and other general websites over the last week.
A few targets have had their administrator accounts, phone numbers,
and e-mail addresses posted publicly. Last but not least, on many of
the hacked sites, the group even posted tips for how to circumvent
the Great Firewall of China. Surprisingly, the Chinese government
has acknowledged the attacks. While Anonymous was not specifically
mentioned, it's obvious what China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs was
referring to during
a briefing on Thursday, given the events during the last week.'"
I feel so cheap...
April 06, 2012
SmartMoney
- 10 Things Online Data Collectors Won't Say
- "If you're reading this on the Internet, chances are you're being followed. More than 200 data collection companies and ad networks use approximately 600 different tracking technologies to gather and sell information on people's web habits, according to Abine, an online privacy firm that tracks the trackers. The online advertising industry is a $31 billion business fueled largely by behind-the-scenes exchanges of consumers' personal online shopping and browsing habits. Web-based commercial data collectors work by quietly dropping bits of code called cookies on user computers, which allow collectors to track what people read, click or buy. That information, collected by companies such as BlueKai and DoubleClick (a Google subsidiary), is sold in real-time exchanges to ad networks, which then target segments of users with ads fitting their interests. Someone who just searched Expedia for information on Puerto Rico, for example, would be almost instantly hit with ads featuring San Juan hotels and resorts. Billions of these exchanges occur daily. Search engines and social networking sites such as Google and Facebook also track user data to generate targeted advertising. The result? The new cell phone or spring sandals users willed themselves not to buy show up in ads alongside their morning news."
[From the article:
Though it's hard to put a dollar amount
on the value of one person's data to a data broker or ad firm,
estimates range from a fraction of a cent for a single piece of data
to $5,000 for a full digital profile.
(Related)
Love
Social Media? Chances Are You’re Also A Fan of Chipotle, Saab and
Victoria’s Secret
According to a new
report by Experian Hitwise, 91% of online adults
now regularly use social media in some form or another.
This makes social networking the top online activity in the U.S.
today, with 15% of all U.S. Internet visits going to a social
networking site. Experian’s report also found that Pinterest
is now the third most popular social network in the U.S.,
right behind Facebook and Twitter. What’s more interesting than
those rankings, though, is what the report tells us about social
media’s most fervent users.
Experian, for example, found that
people who use social media regularly are significantly more likely
to fly on Virgin Atlantic than the average online adult. These
social media users are also more likely to drive a Saab, own an
iPhone, eat at Au Bon Pain, Chevy’s and Chipotle, and shop at
Payless Shoe Source and Victoria’s Secret.
Interestingly, those adults who visit
professional networking sites like LinkedIn more than the average
Internet user actually prefer United Airlines (they are probably more
interested in collecting frequent flyer miles and getting upgrades),
Whole Foods and The Cheesecake Factory. Just like the average social
media user, though, those who regularly frequent professional social
networking sites are also more likely to own an iPhone than the
average U.S. adult.
Have we reached a
milestone that hackers have been waiting for? Apparently.
Flashback
the largest Mac malware threat yet, experts say
Unless you've been living under a rock
for the past week, you've probably heard about Flashback, a piece of
malware targeting users of Apple's Mac
OS X that's now estimated to be quietly running on more than 600,000
machines around the world.
That number, which came from Russian
antivirus company Dr. Web earlier
this week, was confirmed
today by security firm Kaspersky. More than 98 percent of the
affected computers were running Mac OS X, the firm said.
… "600,000 represents around
12 percent of the Mac OS computers sold in Q4 2011," Cosoi said,
"which means that if we count the number of Mac OS devices sold
in the past three years, we can estimate that less than 1 percent of
the Mac OS computers are possibly infected. On the other hand, if we
look at the actual numbers and not at the percentages, the numbers
look pretty scary."
A new market for Amazon –
Tax Consulting!
New submitter artciousc
writes with news that Amazon
is dodging taxes in the UK. From the article:
"Regulatory
filings by parent company Amazon.com with the U.S. securities and
exchange commission show
the tax inquiry into the UK operation, which sells nearly one in
four books sold in Britain, focuses on a period when ownership of the
British business was transferred to a Luxembourg company."
Clever trick there: "The UK
operation avoids tax as the ownership of the main Amazon.co.uk
business was transferred to a Luxembourg company in 2006. The UK
business is now owned by Amazon EU Sarl and the UK operation is
classed only as an 'order fulfilment' business." The HMRC
is investigating the legality.
An interesting way to divide free and
paid. Now you can design your own fusion reactor!
3DTin
is a free web-based program for creating three dimensional models.
3DTin provides templates that you can use to develop models or you
can build a model completely from scratch. The
service is completely free to use as long as you allow your models to
be labeled with a Creative Commons license and put in the 3DTin
gallery. The gallery is a great place is to find examples
of what can be created in 3DTin. Models that you create can be
exported for use in other modeling software.
Before you rush to try 3DTin
you should know that you do have to be using a modern web browser
that supports WebGL. For example, 3DTin will work with the latest
versions of Chrome and Firefox but will not work with older versions
of Firefox or Internet Explorer. 3DTin can be used as a Chrome
Web App too.
The video below offers a short
introduction to 3DTin, more tutorials are available on YouTube.
For the Criminal Justice students?
Here’s
What A Facebook Response To A User Data Subpoena Looks Like
Last year, Facebook got a little
more transparent explaining what kind of data it would provide to
law enforcement officials when they made formal subpoenas for user
profiles. Now, we can have a look at exactly what that Facebook
account report looks like, perhaps for the first time.
The document comes by way of the
newspaper the Boston Phoenix, which this week published a
long
feature on how digital sleuthing led to detectives tracking down
Philip Markoff, a man accused of robbing two women and murdering a
third, having initially made contact with them through Craigslist.
(Markoff committed suicide before his case went to trial.)
The feature is worth reading in itself,
but what’s equally interesting is that the Phoenix has
taken the opportunity to also make public an extensive amount of
evidence that was used in the case, covering things like CCTV
footage, audio of police interviews… and all of Markoff’s
Facebook data.
The Phoenix didn’t obtain that data
directly from Facebook itself, but got it as part of the Boston
Police Department’s public release of its investigation case file
(the BPD had originally gotten the data by subpoena).
(Ditto)
A limited study of 50 convicted
burglars in the U.K. reveals
what most of us knew already: if you tweet or post a Facebook
status about your vacation in Cancun, a criminal in your hometown may
target your house for a break-in. He or she may even use Google
Street View to case the joint.
But law enforcement is fighting back,
solving crimes using the same social media that makes it easy for
people to become victims. The
Boston Globe reports in today's editions that the Boston Police
Department has had "amazing" results with its use of social
media and its Text-A-Tip
For my Disaster Recovery
class. What word would make you move to shelter? Is this the new
“Threat Warning Orange?”
"The National Weather Service
has begun testing the way it labels natural disasters. It's hoping
that the new warnings, which include words like 'catastrophic,'
'complete devastation likely,' and 'unsurvivable,' will make people
more likely to take action to save their lives. But
what about their digital lives? Recommendations include: Keep
all electronics out of basements and off the floor; Unplug your
hardware; Buy a surge protector; Enclose anything valuable in
plastic. If the National Weather Service issued a 'complete
devastation' warning today, would your data be ready?"
Researchers take note... (pun not
intended, but inevitable)
Snapify
is a handy little Chrome extension that I've shown to live audiences
twice in the last two days. Both times I showed how it works I heard
some "oohs and ahs." Snapify allows you to
highlight any word or phrase on a webpage and quickly find
definitions, videos, Tweets, and webpages about that word or phrase.
See it in action in the video below.
Applications
for Education
Snapify
could be a great little tool for students to use when they're reading
articles online. Anytime students come to a word or phrase that they
don't understand they can simply highlight it and click "snap
it" to find definition or explanation.
For my friends who are
writing books and for those who bloody well should!
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