What did they know and when did they know it. If they don't have a convincing story, they will be sued like they have known for a year and cover it up.

http://www.databreaches.net/?p=2988

TX: Gexa Energy data system hacked last spring

April 11, 2009 by admin Filed under: Business Sector, Hack, U.S.

Fanny S. Chirinos of Caller-Times reports on a breach that occurred almost a year ago, but is first being disclosed to affected customers:

Former and current customers of Gexa Energy may have had their personal information compromised last year.

The Houston-based company on April 2 issues a letter to customers who had applied for or initiated service in spring 2008. That letter stated that on April 30, 2008, a hacker breached customer data. [Not normal to keep activity logs that long, unless you are actively investigating a breach. Bob]

There doesn’t seem to be any statement on Gexa Energy’s web site about the incident and so far, no other mainstream media sources have covered the story. someone can find out why it took Gexa almost a year to realize that they had been hacked, assuming that they first discovered it now.

All this in less than a month! I know that because I looked at the site – something I would never have done without this story.

http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/04/11/2152251&from=rss

Goldman Sachs Tries To Shut Down Dissident Blogger

Posted by kdawson on Saturday April 11, @10:07PM from the maybe-they'd-like-a-different-number dept.

The Narrative Fallacy sends along a piece from the Telegraph on efforts by Goldman Sachs to silence a blogger who is posting commentary critical of the bank.

"Goldman Sachs has instructed Wall Street law firm Chadbourne & Parke to pursue blogger Mike Morgan, warning him in a recent cease-and-desist letter that he may face legal action if he does not close down his website goldmansachs666.com. According to the C&D letter, dated April 8, the bank is rattled because the site 'violates several of Goldman Sachs' intellectual property rights' and also 'implies a relationship' with the bank itself. Morgan claims he has followed all legal requirements to own and operate the website and that the header of the site clearly states that the content has not been approved by the bank. In a post entitled Goldman Sachs vs Mike Morgan, the blogger predicts that the fight will probably end up in court. He went through a similar battle with US home builder Lennar a few years ago after he set up a website to collect information on what he alleged was shoddy workmanship in its homes. 'Since I went through this with Lennar, I've had advice from some of the best intellectual property lawyers, and I know exactly what I can and can't do. We're not going to back down from this.'"

No doubt this will change (except for politicians?)

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/021077.html

April 11, 2009

Report: Strange But True: Free Loan From Social Security

Strange But True: Free Loan From Social Security, by Alicia H. Munnell, Alex Golub-Sass, and Nadia Karamcheva

• "When to claim Social Security is one of the most important decisions Americans make when approaching retirement. Currently, retirees can choose between claiming at the Full Retirement Age and receiving full benefits, claiming as early as age 62 but receiving reduced benefits, or delaying retirement to as late as age 70 and collecting higher monthly benefits. The reductions and the delayed retirement credits are approximately actuarially fair for the person with average life expectancy. Early retirement benefits are lowered by an amount that offsets the longer period for which they will be received. The delayed retirement option offers higher benefits but for a shorter remaining lifetime. Thus, on average, workers will receive the same lifetime benefits regardless of when they claim between the ages of 62 and 70. Recently, several unconventional claiming strategies have come to light that have the potential to pay higher lifetime benefits to some individuals and increase system costs. This brief focuses on one of these strategies, which we call the “Free Loan from Social Security” strategy. The first section outlines the procedure and incentives of employing this strategy. The second section, using data from the Health and Retirement Study, presents estimates of the cost to Social Security under three different scenarios and describes who would gain. The final section concludes that the estimated annual $6 billion to $11 billion cost of allowing free loans from Social Security is likely to increase substantially over time."

I met Grace Hopper at a seminar in 1983. She was urging everyone to drop COBOL even then.

http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/04/11/1430252&from=rss

COBOL Turning 50, Still Important

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday April 11, @11:20AM from the legacy-code's-legacy dept.

Death Metal writes with this excerpt from a story about COBOL's influence as it approaches 50 years in existence:

"According to David Stephenson, the UK manager for the software provider Micro Focus, 'some 70% to 80% of UK plc business transactions are still based on COBOL.' ... Mike Gilpin, from the market research company Forrester, says that the company's most recent related survey found that 32% of enterprises say they still use COBOL for development or maintenance. ... A lot of this maintenance and development takes place on IBM products. The company's software group director of product delivery and strategy, Charles Chu, says that he doesn't think 'legacy' is pejorative. 'Business constantly evolves,' he adds, 'but there are 250bn lines of COBOL code working well worldwide. Why would companies replace systems that are working well?'"