The surprising part to me is that the DA claims to have never seen the warrants! Does the defense not have the right to see them and if they can, why did no one ask to see them?

http://thehill.com/policy/cybersecurity/225074-judge-unseals-secret-cell-spying-details

Judge unseals info on secret cellphone spying

… The judge in Charlotte, N.C., acted after a petition from the Charlotte Observer to make the documents public.

Included are 529 requests from local Charlotte-Mecklenburg police asking judges to approve the use of a technology known as StingRay, which allows cellphone surveillance.

… The records date back to 2010, meaning police made requests roughly twice a week. There were no records before 2010. The police requests are “rarely, if ever” denied, the Observer reported, and judges at times appeared to not know exactly what they were authorizing.

As a result, the Mecklenburg County District Attorney’s Office, which had not previously seen the documents, will review each case in which the technology was used.

How should you deal with “used to be” customers? OR What procedure should be followed to ensure you don't “over delete?”

Judge Koh OKs Privacy Suit Over Lost Apple Texts

Ross Todd reports:

A federal judge in San Jose just delivered Apple Inc. a double whammy in proposed class actions over a glitch that prevented the delivery of text messages to users who switched to non-Apple devices.

[…]

On Wednesday she declined to dismiss claims in a separate lawsuit alleging privacy intrusions under the Wiretap Act—claims that carry statutory damages of up to $10,000 per violation.

“Plaintiffs have sufficiently alleged a viable cause of action under the Wiretap Act for [Apple]’s intentional interception of text messages from current to former Apple device users,” she wrote in Backhaut v. Apple, 14-2285.

Read more on The Recorder.

The evolution of the rules for autonomous vehicles.

http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/technology/224954-connected-cars-are-accelerating-consumer-benefits-and-driving

Connected cars are accelerating consumer benefits and driving privacy issues

… By the end of the decade, one in five vehicles on the road will be connected to the Internet.

But for consumers to welcome these advances, they need to be sure their personal data will be handled in a trustworthy manner, as early research shows that considerable numbers of new car buyers are concerned about data privacy when it comes to car connectivity.

To address those concerns, the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers and the Association of Global Automakers have come together to put forward a set of privacy principles for vehicle technologies and services.

… A new and timely study, "The Connected Car and Privacy: Navigating New Data Issues," seeks to provide policymakers and all stakeholders with an overview of the various technologies currently available in cars and identifies the types of data collected and the purposes for which it is collected.

For my students, the most common cause of “I can't do math” syndrome seems to be the ability (or inability) of their early Math teachers to understand (or at least be comfortable with) math. If they had teachers who read “the one and only way” from the math textbook but could not handle the inevitable “Why?” they were doom to believe that “math is too hard for normal people.”

http://www.bespacific.com/women-academic-science-changing-landscape/

Women in Academic Science: A Changing Landscape

Psychological Science in the Public Interest 2014, Vol. 15(3) 75–141. Stephen J. Ceci1, Donna K. Ginther, Shulamit Kahn, and Wendy M. Williams

“Much has been written in the past two decades about women in academic science careers, but this literature is contradictory. Many analyses have revealed a level playing field, with men and women faring equally, whereas other analyses have suggested numerous areas in which the playing field is not level. The only widely-agreed-upon conclusion is that women are underrepresented in college majors, graduate school programs, and the professoriate in those fields that are the most mathematically intensive, such as geoscience, engineering, economics, mathematics/computer science, and the physical sciences.

… The results of our myriad analyses reveal that early sex differences in spatial and mathematical reasoning need not stem from biological bases, that the gap between average female and male math ability is narrowing (suggesting strong environmental influences), and that sex differences in math ability at the right tail show variation over time and across nationalities, ethnicities, and other factors, indicating that the ratio of males to females at the right tail can and does change.

… Importantly, of those who obtain doctorates in math-intensive fields, men and women entering the professoriate have equivalent access to tenure-track academic jobs in science, and they persist and are remunerated at comparable rates—with some caveats that we discuss. The transition from graduate programs to assistant professorships shows more pipeline leakage in the fields in which women are already very prevalent (psychology, life science, social science) than in the math-intensive fields in which they are underrepresented but in which the number of females holding assistant professorships is at least commensurate with (if not greater than) that of males. That is, invitations to interview for tenure-track positions in math-intensive fields—as well as actual employment offers—reveal that female PhD applicants fare at least as well as their male counterparts in math-intensive fields.”

Perhaps we could create an infographic like this to let everyone know about our research & development!

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/whats-happening-google-labs/

What’s Happening In The Google Labs?

Surely you’ve heard of the Google Labs, it’s a place of imagination where some of the coolest possible products of the future are in the works. But what is Google actually working on there? Are there any products that will be of interest to you? Will these projects ever actually see the light of day? So many questions, and thanks to the infographic below, so many answers!

Via Gryffin

For all my students, because Harvard is never wrong.

https://hbr.org/2014/11/how-to-improve-your-business-writing/

How to Improve Your Business Writing

Education is amusing..

Hack Education Weekly News

… The White House also hosted superintendents this week to sign a “Future Ready” pledge, promising to buy more digital stuff from textbook publishers and tech companies and telecoms. Because future.

… LAUSD has argued that a middle schooler can consent to sex with a teacher. The case involves a 14 year old student and her 28 year old student. The district, which is being sued by the girl’s family for negligence, says that the girl bears some responsibility.

… Back from the dead! LAUSD has not canceled all its contract with Apple and Pearson apparently, and the district will spend $22 million to buy 20,000 iPads just in time for spring standardized testing season. But this time around, instead of spending $504 per device, the district will pay $552 per iPad.

… Last week Coursera announced free verified certificates for veterans; this week, it’s free verified certificates for teachers.

… Not to miss out on the PR opportunity, edX is also offering free certificates for teacher training.

… The Gates Foundation has adopted an open access policy “that enables the unrestricted access and reuse of all peer-reviewed published research funded, in whole or in part, by the foundation, including any underlying data sets.”

… Not to let LAUSD’s student information system get all the laughs, New York City says it’s dumping the system it spent $95 million on.

… According to a study by Augenblick, Palaich and Associates, a Denver education research firm, “Colorado state government and school districts spend up to $78 million a year on testing, and some kind of standardized testing takes place during every week of the school year.”