Wednesday, February 14, 2018

Since this is in essence a ‘free shot’ at our elections, why would anyone stop?
Russian Threat To Elections To Persist Through 2018, Spy Bosses Warn Congress


(Related)
Can The U.S. Combat Election Interference If Some Don't Believe It's Happening?
America's adversaries are circling like coyotes just beyond the light from the campfire, top intelligence officials warn — but that's not the scariest thing to some members of the Senate intelligence committee.
What bothers them is the need to convince people the coyotes are there.
"My problem is, I talk to people in Maine who say, 'the whole thing is a witch hunt and it's a hoax,' because that's what the president told me," said Sen. Angus King, I-Maine.


(Related)
Intelligence Chiefs: Trump Has Not Directed Us to Stop Russian Meddling




Clever!
IRS Issues Urgent Warning On New Tax Refund Scam - And It's Not What You'd Expect
Just when you thought you'd read about all of the tax scams: The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is warning taxpayers about a new – and growing – scam involving erroneous tax refunds being deposited into real taxpayer bank accounts. Then, the crooks use various tactics to con taxpayers into turning over the funds. It's a new twist on an old scam.
Here's how it works. Thieves are using phishing and other schemes to steal client data from tax professionals. Then, using that data, they file fraudulent tax returns and use the taxpayers' real bank accounts to deposit erroneous tax refunds. Finally, the thieves, posing as IRS or other law enforcement, call attention to the error and ask taxpayers to return the money to them.




It’s good that they are concerned about Security, but why take this approach?
Sara A. Arrow and Craig A. Newman
Recently-issued guidance from the U.S. Department of Education (ED) threatens to “yank” Title IV funding for post-secondary institutions lacking appropriate data security safeguards. The guidance comes as the risk of educational data breaches has intensified, as we have previously reported. The stakes are even higher now that ED has put Title IV recipients on notice that, beginning in fiscal year 2018, they may be subject to compliance audits regarding their data security programs.




Is this the future of Online Retail, for example? A measure of your readiness for citizenship?
China's Dystopian Tech Could Be Contagious
… Home to half a billion human beings, beset by pressures both shared with other urban places and uniquely Chinese, it’s remarkable that churning conurbations like Shanghai, Chengdu, or Beijing are not constantly breaking out into open, ungovernable chaos. Just like cities anywhere, though, they do not—a stability that appears to arise almost entirely from self-organization.
Perhaps spurred on by their distaste for everything implied by such liberality, the Chinese government has become convinced that a far greater degree of social control is both necessary and possible. It now has access to a set of tools for managing the complexity of contemporary life that it believes will deliver better, surer, and more reliable results than anything produced by the model of order from below.
Known by the anodyne name “social credit,” this system is designed to reach into every corner of existence both online and off. It monitors each individual’s consumer behavior, conduct on social networks, and real-world infractions like speeding tickets or quarrels with neighbors. Then it integrates them into a single, algorithmically-determined “sincerity” score. Every Chinese citizen receives a literal, numeric index of their trustworthiness and virtue, and this index unlocks, well, everything. In principle, anyway, this one number will determine the opportunities citizens are offered, the freedoms they enjoy, and the privileges they are granted.




I actually know a few people who might find this useful!
KDP is Amazon’s self-publishing tool, and it’s a simple way to take your book, turn it into a Kindle file, and start selling it on Amazon. They’ll help you sell it and pay royalties on each sale. It’s a great way to publish and sell a book, especially if you don’t want to pay a fortune for printing a hard copy.


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