Sunday, June 24, 2007

Burn before repair? Certainly another reason to secure your data! (This bozo deserves to be caught.)

http://www.pogowasright.org/article.php?story=20070623082005781

By taking one's computer in for repairs, one assumes the risk of a private search

Saturday, June 23 2007 @ 08:20 AM CDT Contributed by: PrivacyNews

Best Buy in Shreveport was installing a new hard drive in the defendant's computer, and they did a simple diagnostic check not requested by the defendant [Fire him! Bob] to verify that the comptuer was operating correctly, because it had operations issues. The repairman used his own flashdrive [Fire him! Bob] to check the computer's function, and then the computer opened [A miracle! The computer did something it was not asked to do? Bob] the default "My Pctures" (sic) folder, and he found child porn. The police were called. The search was a purely private search. The advances in computer technology and privacy concerns do not yet require the courts to revisit the expectation of privacy issues. State v. Horton, 2007 La. App. LEXIS 1315 (2d Cir. June 20, 2007)

Source - FourthAmendment.com (blog)

[From the blog entry: “In a sense, the discovery of the images the by technician in this case is more analogous to a "plain view" discovery of evidence of a crime.” ]



Some nifty quotes! My very negative interpretation of this: The same growth rates can be expected in your organization. Are you ready?

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/015238.html

June 22, 2007

The Expanding Digital Universe: A Forecast of Worldwide Information Growth Through 2010

The Expanding Digital Universe: A Forecast of Worldwide Information Growth Through 2010 - "In this detailed white paper, IDC researches and analyzes the impact of ever-increasing amounts of digital information generated worldwide. It defines the digital universe and forecasts its growth to an incredible 988 exabytes (or 988 billion gigabytes) in the year 2010. Get a clear picture of what this expanding universe means to you and your organization. Find out what’s driving growth—from files and e-mail to voice data and images. And learn about strategies for managing the rapidly expanding digital universe."

  • Related review, Backbone Magazine: Data explosion—each of us sent six exabytes of e-mail last year, June 7, 2007 - "In 2006, the amount of digital information created, captured and replicated worldwide was equal to 161 billion gigabytes, or 161 exabytes [...the 161 exabytes generated in 2006 total approximately three million times more information than is contained in all the books ever written.] If you took that information and bound it in books the size of the latest Harry Potter novel, you’d get 12 stacks of books that each stretched from the Earth to the Sun."



I'm not sure this helps me understand...

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/015237.html

June 22, 2007

Enterprise 2.0 Whitepaper

Donald Tapscott's White Paper: Winning With The Enterprise 2.0, "addresses the advantages and challenges of implementing E2 technologies." (62 pages, PDF)



Perhaps we could inject ads into tax forms, court fillings, etc. This could cause problems with the homework I assign my Web Site class. Are there Copyright issues here?

http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/06/23/real-evil-isp-inserted-advertising/

Real Evil: ISP Inserted Advertising

Duncan Riley June 23 2007

Texas based ISP Redmoon has implemented software that hijacks pages being visited by their customers by placing Redmoon’s own ads on these pages.



A useless threat?

http://www.pogowasright.org/article.php?story=2007062317130822

Google threatens to close gmail germany over privacy concerns

Saturday, June 23 2007 @ 05:13 PM CDT Contributed by: PrivacyNews News Section: Non-U.S. News

According to spiegel.de (german), Google is threatening to close down the german version of it’s popular gmail service if the german Bundestag passes it’s new internet surveillance law. According to googles german privacy representative, Peter Fleischer, the new law would be a severe blow against privacy and would go against Googles practice of also offering anonymous e-mail accounts.

Source - Google Blogoscoped

[Actual Post: http://blog.outer-court.com/archive/2007-06-23-n52.html ]



Interesting question: If he provides a service by offering forms online that you otherwise have to drive to the motor vehicle office to obtain, is there a problem? One source for forms, indexed so people can find them, might actually be a useful service.

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--websitesuit0622jun22,0,7278255.story?coll=ny-region-apnewyork

Mass. sues operator of vehicle registry Web site

June 22, 2007, 7:53 PM EDT

BOSTON (AP) _ The state is suing a New York man who allegedly operated a Web site that mimicked the state's Registry of Motor Vehicle site and misled consumers into paying a fee to download forms they could obtain for free.

The attorney general's office filed the complaint Thursday against Chris Wiesner, 55, of Alpine, N.Y., and his business, www.Download-Forms-DMV.com, according to a statement released Friday.

... The attorney general's office said that since November 2005, [not a very fast response... Bob] about 28,000 consumers paid over $280,000 to Wiesner online to download forms from his Web site.

The state alleges that Wiesner crafted his Web site so that consumers using Internet search engines would locate the site in a sponsored link or have it listed as one of the primary Web sites on the response page. [Let's hope that's not illegal Bob]

Those accessing his site would be required to become a subscriber by entering their credit or debit card information and pay a $10 fee in order to get forms they could have obtained free if they went directly to the Massachusetts RMV or vehicle registry Web sites of 18 other states, the attorney general's office said.


Related? Will the US object if Google does a better job?

http://usinfo.state.gov/xarchives/display.html?p=washfile-english&y=2007&m=June&x=20070612175746xlrennef0.9354822&t=livefeeds/wf-latest.html

12 June 2007

New U.S. Web Site Helps Legal Immigrants Assimilate

WelcometoUSA.gov provides wide variety of information

Washington -- The United States is welcoming legal immigrants with a new Web site that helps them find such things as the requirements for naturalization, the location of nearby English-language classes or a copy of the U.S. Constitution.

No comments: