One of my personal heros...

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-herbert13jun13,0,7656221.story

Don Herbert, 89; TV's 'Mr. Wizard' taught science to young baby boomers

By Dennis McLellan, Times Staff Writer June 13, 2007

Will this make the news? I doubt it.

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=1340285

20,000 Utahns May Be Victims of Identity Theft

June 12th, 2007 @ 5:00pm Mary Richards & Sandra Yi Reporting

This week, the Utah Attorney General's Office will send out 100 letters to Utahns whose social security numbers may have been compromised. They are the first in the country, to do this. Utah authorities call it a moral obligation.

Some 20,000 Utahns have been identified as victims. Most of them don't even know their identity has been stolen; so many people will be surprised to get one of these letters in their mailbox.

Coming soon to a police force near you!

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/05/choicepoint_sub.html

ChoicePoint Subsidiary Rolls Out License Plate Tracking System in UK

By Luke O'Brien May 30, 2007 | 5:43:43 PMCategories: Surveillance

Giant American data peddler ChoicePoint last week unveiled a new system in the United Kingdom for analyzing the thousands of license plate numbers collected by automated cameras nestled surreptitiously throughout the English heather. Called the "analyst's workstation" and designed by i2, a ChoicePoint-owned company, the system interfaces with three major databases and uses license plate information to help cops bust bad guys.

Say a passerby spots a suspicious green lorry idling near the scene of a burglary and gets a partial read on the tags. The workstation can call up a list of matching vehicles in the area. If John Smith, the notorious bandit, was rolling through the neighborhood in his green 2001 Ford Windstar at the time, the police now have a good suspect.

The last time we mentioned ChoicePoint in connection with license plate reading (LPR) technology, we got a stern reprimand from corporate flack Chuck Jones, who took issue with our quoting an LPR expert opining that ChoicePoint, which already harvests extensive personal info from the government, might one day find a use for trading in LPR data.

"To be clear, ChoicePoint does not obtain or sell -- and is not interested in obtaining and selling -- license plate information collected from license plate reading (LPR) equipment, better known as traffic or red light cameras. ChoicePoint is not in the business of monitoring the daily location of consumers." --Chuck Jones

In a follow-up e-mail, Jones said ChoicePoint would never [What is a promise like this worth? Bob] be interested in such a market. Our LPR expert tends to disagree. To be clear ourselves, when reached by phone in Cambridge, i2 spokeswoman Sarah Cooper said i2 does not obtain or sell LPR data. No word yet on when or if the analyst's workstation will reach American shores.

Readers might also be interested in this aggressively reassuring memo (.pdf) from ChoicePoint that seeks to dispel all your worst fears about the company.

On the flip side... Isn't this the path to a “Secret Police” mentality? Or perhaps we have just been demoted to second class citizens, again.

http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/06/12/2050212&from=rss

Is Videotaping the Police a Felony?

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday June 12, @07:42PM from the turnabout-is-fair-play dept. The Courts

AtomicSnarl writes "When Carlisle, PA, police noticed their traffic stop was being videotaped, they arrested the fellow with the camera for felony wiretapping. From the story: 'Kelly is charged under a state law that bars the intentional interception or recording of anyone's oral conversation without their consent... An exception to the wiretapping law allows police to film people during traffic stops.. [An assistant DA] said case law is in flux as to whether police can expect not to be recorded while performing their duties.'"

Attention Students! We're offering a new Major! (...and potential new grants)

http://www.privacydigest.com/2007/06/12/congressman+wants+train+spies+college

Congressman Wants to Train Spies in College

By Luke O'Brien EmailMay 25, 2007 | 2:25:55 PMCategories: Politics, Spooks Gone Wild

Wiretapping is fundamental. An earmark tacked on to a new intelligence spending bill by Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Florida) would fund college programs to train future spies. Hastings wants $2 million to finance "centers of academic excellence" at Florida schools that would educate America's youth on snooping and spooking and other intelligence matters.

... The $100 million in earmarks attached to the intelligence bill has riled some folks (more from USA Today here). Rep. John Murtha (D-Pennsylvania) hopes to bring home the bacon -- $23 million -- for his home state's National Drug Intelligence Center (NDIC) And Reps. Ed Markey (D-Massachusetts) and Roscoe Bartlett (R-Maryland) put in the most politically controversial amendment: a provision to require future National Intelligence Estimates to look into the dangers of climate change.

This might be a better (more profitable) major

http://techdirt.com/articles/20070612/102641.shtml

Tech Lessons From Organized Crime And The Red Light District

from the just-what-the-world-needed dept

Chris Lindquist writes "Organized crime, porn peddlers, gambling sites--they all use technology to make a killing. CIO.com has posted a collection of stories that spell out how these shady-side businesses uses IT for profit. Sadly, they seem to be far better at it than most companies: They're more agile, approach their operations with clear goals, apply appropriate technology for specific purposes, and they don't throw good money after bad. From the online techniques of penny stock scammers to innovation lessons from a pair of "accidental pornographers," to what you can do to fend off cybercriminals, the stories examine what the seedy side does right when it's doing wrong."

Whoever thought this one up should write for the movies. Take a minute to read it

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/06/appeals_court_r.html

Appeals Court Rules Cops Can Steal Cars and Lie to Victims To Conduct a Warrantless Search

By Ryan Singel EmailJune 08, 2007 | 1:11:23 PM

Hard to imagine how testing would fail to show this...

http://blog.wired.com/underwire/2007/06/ads_behaving_ba.html

Ads Behaving Badly -- An Apology from Wired News

By Wired Admin EmailJune 12, 2007 | 2:35:55 PMCategories: Advertising

An advertisement went live on Wired.com last night that obscured much of the site and gave readers no way to remove it for close to 8 hours. The ad was a so-called interstitial, admittedly one of the more invasive styles of online advertising, even when executed properly. In this case it was not, and for that we apologize.

Wired News has an ad review process to prevent things like this from happening, but it failed us in this case. We are examining what went wrong to ensure it does not happen twice. In the meantime, we are suspending all interstitial ads from the site until further notice.