Have we gone crazy? Should a minor
terrorist act (3 dead vs 3000 on 9/11) spark this kind of reaction?
It looks like we're searching for a division of Taliban.
Boston
on Lockdown as Residents Are Ordered to 'Shelter In Place' While Cops
Sweep Watertown
In an unprecedented move, the city of
Boston, in its entirety, is being asked to shelter-in-place,
with schools and mass transit closed. Nearby Watertown, where police
and federal authorities are searching for the Boston Marathon bomber
who is still at large, is in lockdown as Friday's
manhunt continues.
At this moment, heavily armed members
of the military, assisted by local law enforcement, are going
door-to-door in Watertown, searching every house, garage, and shed
for bombing suspect Dzhokhar
Tsarnaev. CNN indicates that 9,000
members of law enforcement are involved in the effort.
In light of that, town authorities have
apparently asked businesses to remain closed. According to
the Boston Globe, all vehicle traffic is banned in
that city.
… For many, there's nowhere to go,
anyway. Taxi
service has been suspended. The regional mass transit has
been closed; in part, apparently, because authorities don't want
crowds of people gathering together.
(Related) Rush to sensationalize. (No
need for judgement) We'd rather have “news” than facts.
Anything to “scoop” the other guys...
Boston
Marathon spectator Salah Barhoum, who was interviewed by authorities
following the bombings, swears he 'didn't do it'
… Teenager Salah Barhoum’s face
was plastered on the front page of the New York Post Thursday,
labeling him and a friend “Bag Men” being sought by authorities
investigating the Boston Marathon bombings.
But the FBI later
released surveillance of the actual suspects — neither of whom
resembled the bag-toting Barhoum and his friend on the tabloid’s
cover.
…
At 1:30 a.m. Thursday he turned himself in to cops, who spoke to
him for about 20 minutes and let him go.
Their
only advice: “They said I should delete my Facebook,” Barhoum
said.
Nevertheless, The Post reported
splashed their faces on its pages and suggested they were suspects.
Even after the FBI cleared the pair,
Post Editor-in-Chief Col Allan said, “We stand by our story.”
So
who is responsible for Security?
Brian
Krebs reports on a lawsuit where Park Sterling Bank (PSB) in
Charlotte, North Carolina is suing a former client, Wallace
& Pittman PLLC ,
after the latter was the victim of a fraudulent wire transfer. The
breach occurred after a key logger was installed on its system via a
phishing attempt and criminals obtained the firm’s login and
authorization credentials.
The bank claims it did not reverse the
loss, but only temporarily credited the account. The law firm did
not repay the bank for the credited amount, and had at one point sued
them for not having commercially reasonable security in place. That
complaint was later dismissed, and the bank turned around and sued
the law firm.
Read his coverage on
KrebsonSecurity.com.
What are they thinking? “People
hated this last year, but maybe they forgot?” Actions that put
government before individuals is a very liberal (Democrat) thing to
do, how did this get through a Republican controlled House?
Dave Maass and Mark M. Jaycox of EFF
write:
Today, Internet
freedom advocates everywhere turned their eyes to the U.S. House of
Representatives as that legislative body considered the Cyber
Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act.
For the second
year in a row, the House voted to approve CISPA, a bill that would
allow companies to bypass all existing privacy law to spy on
communications and pass sensitive user data to the government.
EFF condemns the vote in the House and vows to continue the fight in
the Senate.
“CISPA is a
poorly drafted bill that would provide a gaping exception to bedrock
privacy law,” EFF Senior Staff Attorney Kurt Opsahl said. “While
we all agree that our nation needs to address pressing Internet
security issues, this bill sacrifices online privacy while failing to
take common-sense steps to improve security.”
The legislation
passed 288-127, despite a veto threat from Pres. Barack Obama, who
expressed serious concerns about the danger CISPA poses to civil
liberties.
Read more on EFF.
Not mentioned in their post is the fact
that the bill passed by an even wider margin than last year, when it
passed 248-168.
Things are going in a very wrong
direction.
Very wrong.
“We'll get all the data, then we'll
find some use for it.”
Carter Dougherty of Bloomberg reports:
The new US
consumer finance watchdog is gearing up to monitor how millions of
Americans use credit cards, take out mortgages, and overdraw their
checking accounts. Their bankers aren’t happy about it.
The Consumer
Financial Protection Bureau is demanding records from the banks and
is buying anonymous information about at least 10 million consumers
from companies including Experian.
While the goal is
to sharpen enforcement and rule-making, banking
executives question why the bureau is collecting so much without
being more specific about the benefits. [Simple: we can, therefore
we must! Bob]
Read more on Boston
Globe.
What can the government do?
April 18, 2013
CRS
- Cybersecurity: Selected Legal Issues
Cybersecurity:
Selected Legal Issues, April 17, 2013.
- "The federal government’s role in protecting U.S. citizens and critical infrastructure from cyber attacks has been the subject of recent congressional interest. Critical infrastructure commonly refers to those entities that are so vital that their incapacitation or destruction would have a debilitating impact on national security, economic security, or the public health and safety. This report discusses selected legal issues that frequently arise in the context of recent legislation to address vulnerabilities of critical infrastructure to cyber threats, efforts to protect government networks from cyber threats, and proposals to facilitate and encourage sharing of cyber threat information among private sector and government entities. This report also discusses the degree to which federal law may preempt state law. It has been argued that, in order to ensure the continuity of critical infrastructure and the larger economy, a regulatory framework for selected critical infrastructure should be created to require a minimum level of security from cyber threats. On the other hand, others have argued that such regulatory schemes would not improve cybersecurity while increasing the costs to businesses, expose businesses to additional liability if they fail to meet the imposed cybersecurity standards, and increase the risk that proprietary or confidential business information may be inappropriately disclosed."
As I read it, the answer is a definate
“Maybe”
April 18, 2013
Submission
of Mental Health Records to NICS and the HIPAA Privacy Rule
CRS - Submission
of Mental Health Records to NICS and the HIPAA Privacy Rule,
April 15, 2013
- "Questions about the scope and efficacy of the background checks required during certain firearm purchases have gained prominence following recent mass shootings. These background checks are intended to identify whether potential purchasers are prohibited from purchasing or possessing firearms due to one or more “prohibiting factors,” such as a prior felony conviction or a prior involuntary commitment for mental health reasons. Operationally, such background checks primarily use information contained within the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) and a particular focus of the debate in Congress has been whether federal privacy standards promulgated under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (i.e., the HIPAA privacy rule) or state privacy laws are an obstacle to the submission of mental health records to NICS."
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