An exception to the rule?

http://www.thelocal.se/29636/20101015/

Swedish professor rejoices over laptop thief's memory stick miracle

A professor at Umeå University in northern Sweden was stunned after a thief who stole his laptop copied and returned the contents of the computer to him - on a USB memory stick.

The easy part if determining who sits in the oval office. More difficult: Who is the VP and what does he do for a living...

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/025519.html

October 18, 2010

National Protect Your Identity Week - Learn How to Deter, Detect and Defend Against ID Theft

News release: "This is National Protect Your Identity Week, and the Federal Trade Commission, the nation’s consumer protection agency, has information to help consumers, businesses, and law enforcement officials safeguard personal information and take action if an identity thief strikes.

• www.ftc.gov/idtheft is a one-stop national resource to learn about the crime of identity theft. Consumers can learn how to avoid identity theft – and what to do if their identity is stolen. Businesses can learn to help their customers deal with identity theft and prevent problems in the first place. Law enforcement officials will find resources that help victims of identity theft.

• www.YouTube.com/FTCVideos has short educational videos that help consumers learn more about identity theft, phishing, reducing spam, and protecting their computers against unwanted intrusions.

• www.onguardonline.gov/games lets consumers test their cyber smarts with interactive games on everything from phishing and computer security to social networking and e-mail scams.

• www.ftc.gov/freereports offers details about a consumer’s right to get a free copy of his or her credit report from each of the three national credit reporting companies, upon request, once every 12 months. Reviewing one’s credit report regularly is an effective way to deter and detect identity theft."

Charting the evolution of Mr. Roger's Neighborhood

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/025529.html

October 18, 2010

State of the Internet 2010: A Report on the Ever-Changing Threat Landscape

State of the Internet 2010: A Report on the Ever-Changing Threat Landscape, CA Technologies Internet Security Business Unit

Internet Security Intelligence Report, October 2010

• "Today approximately 1.8 billion people use the Internet to do everything from conduct business, communicate with friends and family, keep up with current events or simply entertain themselves playing games or watching videos. Each individual and each Internet connected device presents a certain footprint that is exposed and often manipulated for criminal or political gain. Malware, or malicious software, is often the catalyst for this manipulation, while targets span the gamut from corporate and national secrets to personal information that can be used to directly steal money or perpetuate another crime. Technology and the Internet provide the = means and opportunity, while global socioeconomic trends provide the motive to perpetuate these crimes. Supporting this criminal activity and adding to the challenges of protection and law enforcement is the growth of a criminal ecosystem. This network of criminals and services introduces multiple layers of anonymity while providing modular functionality for perpetuating cybercrime. In this paper we have defined this ecosystem as “Crimeware-as-a-Service,” and we share examples of how this ecosystem is exploiting the latest technology trends of cloud computing and social media. The ability to perpetuate these crimes across the Internet without swift and severe repercussions further fuels this Crimeware, challenging security professionals and governments alike to find new ways to protect valuable information."

“'cause that's where the money is” Willie Sutton

http://www.databreaches.net/?p=14784

Data loss doubles in financial services sector

October 18, 2010 by admin

So as I was saying, breaches aren’t down in 2010.

Almost twice as many financial services companies suffered information theft, loss or attack in the past 12 months than in the previous year, according to a new conducted by the Economist Intelligence Unit and security company Kroll.

The report found that 42% of financial services companies surveyed have suffered data loss in the past year, compared to 24% in the previous survey. This was a greater a proportion than in any other sector.

Across all sectors the incidence of information theft, loss or attack rose from 18% in 2009 to 27.3% in 2010.

Source: Information Age.

Related: Global Fraud Report 2010/2011 – Kroll. From the introduction to their report:

Four important themes emerge:

• Theft of information and electronic data overtakes physical theft for the first time as the most frequently reported fraud.

• Fear of fraud is dissuading 48% of companies from operating in other countries. China and Africa are the geographies most affected, with corruption identified as the greatest concern.

• Companies appear unprepared for heightened Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) enforcement and the impact of the UK Bribery Act. For example, only one third of respondents with a presence in the United States or United Kingdom felt the laws applied to them.

• Fraud is largely an inside job across all geographies and industries. Some 44% of respondents attributed fraud to employees and a further 11% identified agents or intermediaries as the key perpetrators.

This year we analyze for the first time fraud losses as a percentage of income. There is cause for concern: fraudsters’ take from business increased 20% in the last 12 months. Almost 90% of respondents report being victims of fraud – similar to last year’s survey results.

Statistics

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/025527.html

October 18, 2010

Pew Survey: Survey: 96% of Young Adults Own Cell Phones

Americans and their gadgets, by Aaron Smith, Senior Research Specialist, October 14, 2010

• "In recent years the digital world has expanded far beyond the desktop1, and consumers can now choose from an array of devices capable of satisfying their need for “anytime, anywhere” access to news, information, friends and entertainment. This report examines the latest research from the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project regarding seven key appliances of the information age: Cell phones; Desktop and laptop computers; Mp3 players; Game consoles; Tablet computers and e-book readers."

This should eliminate any problems with “over booking.” Just deny as many passengers as required as “security risks”

http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=16055

Airlines to cancel reservations and deny passage to travelers who won’t provide “Secure Flight” info

October 18, 2010 by Dissent

From the Identity Project, concerning news:

Airlines are moving rapidly toward global industry standards, effective November 1, 2010, that could lead to cancellation of reservations — including already ticketed reservations — without notice to travelers and in violation of the contractual conditions in effect when tickets were sold, and denial of transportation to would-be passengers in violation of airlines’ operating licenses and international aviation treaties that require them to operate as “common carriers”.

We’ve previously noted the impossibility of knowing how the TSA will enforce its Secure Flight passenger surveillance and control scheme, since the enforcement of “Secure Flight” demands for information will, presumably, be carried by airlines acting on secret TSA Security Directives. And in one of their most recent non-responses, the TSA reiterates their claim that all such Security Directives are by definition exempt from disclosure, regardless of whether their disclosure would have any actual effect on safety or security.

Read more on Papers, Please!

For your Computer Security Manager...

http://it.slashdot.org/story/10/10/18/1432212/How-To-Tame-the-Social-Network-At-Work?from=rss

How To Tame the Social Network At Work

Posted by CmdrTaco on Monday October 18, @11:01AM

"InfoWorld's Dan Tynan provides an in-depth report on how IT can tame social networking at work without shutting the organization off to the kinds of business opportunities today's social networks present. 'They're a productivity sink and a bandwidth suck. They're a vector for malware and a gift for corporate spies. They're a data spill just waiting to happen. And like it or not, they're already inside your enterprise,' Tynan writes. 'Most companies are in denial about how much their employees are using social nets, as well as what they can do to stop it.' Worse, many are still balking at the fact that having a presence on social networks is rapidly becoming a requirement for doing business. Strict commonsense policies, next-generation firewalls, data leak prevention software — all can decrease your company's exposure to the risks inherent in social networking while still enabling your company to solve problems, burnish its public image, recruit top talent, and generate ideas through social networks."

Something to stimulate my students? (They won't let me use the cattle prod) While it loads (it's huge) watch the video on the “Internet of things”

http://tech.slashdot.org/story/10/10/19/0345246/Googles-Slideshow-of-Interesting-Things?from=rss

Google's Slideshow of Interesting Things

Posted by Soulskill on Tuesday October 19, @05:08AM

"Google's Creative Labs came out with a slideshow of interesting things on the web. In the slideshow you will find 'a lot of interesting HTML5 apps, iPhone apps, visualization tools, 3D projections, art projects, creative YouTube videos, crowdsourcing services and many other interesting things.' It's basically a collection of fascinating little projects people have made and then distributed to the internet at large. Guaranteed to ruin your productivity for today. You can view it with Google Docs."

The online Math system we use comes with ear buds so students can listen to the videos wothout disturbing everyone in the classroom. They ignore the videos but still find a use for the ear buds. I think they will like this article...

http://beatcrave.com/2010-10-18/the-best-free-music-sites-on-the-web/

The Best Free Music Sites on the Web

(Related) I suppose it could be worse...

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/top-10-youtube-dance-lessons-learn-cool-dance-moves/

Top 10 YouTube Dance Lessons To Learn Cool Dance Moves

Now that's an interesting thought!

http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/10/18/229220/What-If-We-Ran-Universities-Like-Wikipedia?from=rss

What If We Ran Universities Like Wikipedia?

Posted by Soulskill on Monday October 18, @06:56PM

"Do university bureaucracies still make sense in the era of networks? At the recent Educause conference, David J. Staley laid out the findings of a focus group he conducted asking educators what a college would look like if it operated like Wikipedia. The 'Wiki-ized University' wouldn't have formal admissions, says Staley; people could enter and exit as they wished and the university would consist of voluntary and self-organizing associations of teachers and students 'not unlike the original idea for the university, in the Middle Ages.' In addition, the curriculum of the 'Wiki-ized University' would be intellectually fluid, and instead of tenure, professors' longevity 'would be determined by the community.' [Yes, my students can “vote me off the island.” Bob] Staley predicts that a new form of academic organization is emerging that will be driven by volunteerism. 'We do see some idea today of how "volunteer teaching" might look: think of the faculty at a place like the University of Phoenix. Most teaching faculty have day jobs — and in fact are hired because they have day jobs — and teach at the university for a nominal stipend,' writes Staley. 'If something like the Phoenix model is what develops in a wiki-ized university setting, this would suggest that a new type of "professorate" will emerge, consisting of those who teach or publish or conduct research for their own personal or professional satisfaction or for some other nonmonetized benefit.'"

Today seems to be “Pound on Facebook” day. Not without justification... After all, when my students “invite” me – via email, they are creating a link.

http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=16003

Not on Facebook? Facebook still knows you

October 17, 2010 by Dissent

And yet another concern about Facebook and privacy. This was reported by Rory Cellan-Jones earlier this week but evaded my eagle eye until now:

If you hate the idea of social networking and have never been on Facebook, then Facebook knows nothing about you. Correct? So how come when you set up a profile on the social network for the first time, it can suggest friends for you?

That was what someone who contacted me over the weekend wanted to know.

He described himself as a 30 year veteran of the IT industry who had always been deeply sceptical about social networking. But as an experiment he had set up Facebook profiles, first for himself and then, with permission, for a friend who had also never been near the network.

In each case he was presented with a list of possible friends the moment the profile was created and before there had been any response to the validation e-mail Facebook sends to confirm your e-mail address.

This he described as “really scary stuff for the whole community that do not wish to participate in Facebook social networking, since if they have not registered others can create accounts using their e-mail addresses, and get their list of friends.”

Read more on BBC.

(Related)

http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=15988

Facebook in hot water with Germany again

October 17, 2010 by Dissent

German ministers criticised social networking site Facebook on Sunday for failing to respect privacy, following a report of a serious flaw that allowed non-subscribers access to private data.

German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine reported that a glitch potentially allowed anyone access to the contact lists of subscribers.

New subscribers to Facebook are required to enter their email address. However, by entering the email address of an existing user, it was possible to view their full list of contacts, until they had responded to a security request.

This would potentially allow access to hundreds of names, contact details and other personal information, the newspaper reported.

Read more from AFP.

(Related)

http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=15999

Facebook in Privacy Breach Involving Apps

October 17, 2010 by Dissent

Okay, by now any headline connecting Facebook to a privacy breach almost doesn’t seem newsworthy, but this one is big. Emily Steel and Geoffrey A. Fowler report:

Many of the most popular applications, or “apps,” on the social-networking site Facebook Inc. have been transmitting identifying information—in effect, providing access to people’s names and, in some cases, their friends’ names—to dozens of advertising and Internet tracking companies, a Wall Street Journal investigation has found.

The issue affects tens of millions of Facebook app users, including people who set their profiles to be completely private. The practice breaks Facebook’s rules, and renews questions about its ability to keep identifiable information about its users’ activities secure.

[...]

The apps, ranked by research company Inside Network Inc. (based on monthly users), include Zynga Game Network Inc.’s FarmVille, with 59 million users, and Texas HoldEm Poker and FrontierVille. Three of the top 10 apps, including FarmVille, also have been transmitting personal information about a user’s friends to outside companies.

Read more in the Wall Street Journal. It’s a solid piece of investigative journalism and if Facebook improves its privacy because of it, we all owe the WSJ a big thank you.

[From the article:

Defenders of online tracking argue that this kind of surveillance is benign because it is conducted anonymously. In this case, however, the Journal found that one data-gathering firm, RapLeaf Inc., had linked Facebook user ID information obtained from apps to its own database of Internet users, which it sells. RapLeaf also transmitted the Facebook IDs it obtained to a dozen other firms, the Journal found.

RapLeaf said that transmission was unintentional. "We didn't do it on purpose," said Joel Jewitt, vice president of business development for RapLeaf.

… Facebook prohibits app makers from transferring data about users to outside advertising and data companies, even if a user agrees. The Journal's findings shed light on the challenge of policing those rules for the 550,000 apps on its site.

… On Oct. 6, Facebook created a control panel that lets users see which apps are accessing which categories of information about them. It indicates, for example, when an application accesses a user's "basic information" (including a user ID and name). However, it doesn't detail what information friends' applications have accessed about a user.

… It's not clear if developers of many of the apps transmitting Facebook ID numbers even knew that their apps were doing so. The apps were using a common Web standard, known as a "referer," which passes on the address of the last page viewed when a user clicks on a link. On Facebook and other social-networking sites, referers can expose a user's identity.

For our 'medical' students. (Requires IE and an XPS viewer)

http://www.phiprivacy.net/?p=4543

Social Networking Guidelines for Physicians, Office Staff and Patients

By Dissent, October 18, 2010

The Healthcare IT Guy blogs:

Ohio State Medical Association (OSMA) Legal Services Group has released their Social Media Toolkit for Physicians, Office Staff and Patients to “help physicians navigate through the world of online communication”. I’ve taken a quick look and it’s a terrific document with a good discussion of whether or not physicians should “friend” their patients. It covers many other aspects of medical practice social networking risks and benefits and is worth checking out.

Could this be why we see no legal action?

http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/10/17/170227/DoD-Study-Contradicts-Charges-Against-WikiLeaks?from=rss

DoD Study Contradicts Charges Against WikiLeaks

Posted by samzenpus on Sunday October 17, @03:35PM

"Last Summer, after WikiLeaks released 90,000 leaked internal US military documents in their Afghan War Log, Pentagon officials went on a media offensive against WikiLeaks, accusing it of having the 'blood on Its hands' of American soldiers and Afghan collaborators who are named in the documents. The charge has echoed through the mainstream media (and Internet comment threads) ever since. Now, CNN is reporting that after a thorough Pentagon review, 'WikiLeaks did not disclose any sensitive intelligence sources or methods, the Department of Defense concluded.' And, according to an unnamed NATO official, 'there has been no indication' that any Afghans who have collaborated with the NATO occupation have been harmed as a result of the leaks. Will the Pentagon's contradiction of the charges against WikiLeaks get as much play in the media as those original accusations did?"

Sometimes it's hard to undo that voodoo we do.

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/025515.html

October 17, 2010

Ruling Imperils Production of Genetically Modified Sugar Beets

WSJ: "U.S. sugar production will be cut by about 20% if farmers are banned from planting genetically modified beets next year, according to data prepared for the U.S. Department of Agriculture as part of a court case over whether to continue allowing the practice. Genetically modified beets have come to account for 95% of the U.S. sugar-beet crop in the five years since they were approved by the Agriculture Department. But in August, a judge threw out the USDA's initial approval for the use of genetically modified seeds, saying it hadn't done enough research into the environmental impact. The department says the studies the judge required will take about two years. That triggered concerns there wouldn't be enough traditional sugar-beet seeds for next spring's planting season, as many seed producers had switched to genetically modified varieties. It takes about two years to produce seeds. Sugar beets, from which sugar is processed, will account for about 60% of domestic U.S. production."

• Federal Court Finds USDA Broke The Law In Allowing Planting Of Genetically Engineered Sugar Beets: This case is Center for Food Safety v. Vilsack, No. C10-04038 JSW (N.D. Cal. 2010). The court order is available here

Golly gosh. You can make money blogging?

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2010/10/the-10-most-valuable-blogs-in-america/64119/

The 10 Most Valuable Blogs in America

1st :: Gawker Properties

Valuation: $240 million

The Gawker network of sites, controlled by founder Nick Denton, includes Gawker, Deadspin, Jezebel, Jalopnik, Gizomodo, Lifehacker, and several others. Gawker claims that its combined sites have just over 20 million unique visitors per month. Audience-research firms do not give any reason to suspect that these figures are inflated; they may in fact be low. The sites have about 235 million page views per month, and CPMs average $19 per page. This puts the company’s annual revenue at $53.6 million. Gawker pays many writers based on their production and keeps relatively inexpensive office operations. The company’s flagship site only has a dozen or so writers and editors. Operating costs are about 55% of revenue. The content of the sites and their aggressive editorial approach make it an unlikely M&A target.

There are some interesting start-ups out there, and a few that could change the way I teach (or at lest, the way I test)

http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/18/tws2010/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Techcrunch+%28TechCrunch%29

TWS2010 Showcases 10 Promising Israeli Startups

… Kryon Systems develops software called ‘Leo’ which provides actionable help. For example, say you’re working on an Excel sheet and want to merge cells. Instead of just looking it up in the help section, you would type it into Leo’s floating help bar which would offer to do it for you. You would then see the mouse move and perform the necessary actions.

… Sparkeo is a learning platform that lets experts create and sell interactive video courses over the web in minutes. Sparkeo targets ‘experts’ in any field with the promise of making additional income while transferring their knowledge.

… Webydo is a Design Management System (DMS) that transforms Photoshop PSD files to functional websites with no knowledge of HTML or CSS. Using drag-and-drop only, the platform outputs W3C compliant, cross-browser validated code with pixel by pixel accuracy.

It couldn't hurt to evaluate this and pass it around...

http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2010/10/own-your-space-online-safety-ebook-for.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+freetech4teachers%2FcGEY+%28Free+Technology+for+Teachers%29

Monday, October 18, 2010

Own Your Space - Online Safety Ebook for Teens

Own Your Space is a free, sixteen chapter ebook designed to educate tweens and teens about protecting themselves and their stuff online. This ebook isn't a fluffy, general overview book. Each chapter goes into great detail explaining the technical threats that students' computers face online as well as the personal threats to data that students can face online. For example, in the first chapter students learn about different types of malware and the importance of installing security patches to prevent malware infections. The fourteenth chapter explains the differences between secured and unsecured wireless networks, the potential dangers of an unsecured network, and how to lock-down a network. Download the whole book or individual chapters here.

How come there is no similar concern in the US?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2010/oct/16/little-merion-webcamgate

Webcamgate case resolved. Badly

The case was resolved – more or less – last week, when the school district agreed to pay out a $610,000 settlement: $175,000 for Robbins, $10,000 for another student, the rest to their lawyer. So what happened to the school administrators, to McGinley, Matsko and the others who spied on teens at home, then lied about the extent of it?

Nothing. No jobs lost and no financial consequences, either – they're not responsible for the $610,000 payout. The municipal insurer will cover it, then charge higher premiums to Lower Merion taxpayers. The same people whose rights were violated will foot the bill for those very violations.

Oh gee, what a surprise...

http://politics.slashdot.org/story/10/10/17/060246/Leaked-Letter-mdash-BSA-Pressures-Europe-To-Kill-Open-Standards?from=rss

Leaked Letter — BSA Pressures Europe To Kill Open Standards

Posted by Soulskill on Sunday October 17, @08:15AM

"The Business Software Alliance is trying to kill open standards. Free Software Foundation Europe has gotten hold of a letter in which the BSA tries to bully the European Commission into removing the last traces of support for open standards from its IT recommendations to the public sector. FSFE published the BSA's letter (PDF), and picked apart its arguments one by one."

Swiss Army folder tool. “I know I have that data somewhere...” Think of this as a “Cloud Search Engine”

http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/greplin-free-personal-search-engine/

Greplin: Free Personal Search Engine For All Your Web Services

Google has solutions both for searching the internet and your hard drive. However, these tools don’t help when it comes to your online life that is scattered across various social networks, email accounts and media platforms. Greplin is a free personal search engine that solves this problem by letting you search all your web data from a single place.

Once you sign up for Greplin, add as many services as you want including Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, Dropbox, LinkedIn, Google Docs and Google Calendar. Greplin will then provide a Google-like search box that will let you simultaneously search all these services for data.

www.greplin.com

For my Website students

http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/dataconverter-convert-excel-data-into-xml/

DataConverter: Convert Excel Data Into XML & More

Excel is the most popular tool used for storing data. However, it is not always easy to convert or integrate Excel data with a web server or code. DataConverter helps with that by converting Excel data into web-friendly formats including XML, JSON, ActionScript and Ruby.

Simply paste the Excel data in a CSV (Comma Separated Values) or Tab delimited into the tool and select the desired output format such as XML or ActionScript. Click convert and DataConverter will give you your data in the desired format that can be easily copied.

http://shancarter.com/data_converter/

Another Infographic: For my Computer Security class Perhaps we should require Senior Managers to look at this?

http://wikibon.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/8-Levels-of-IT-Security.html

8 Levels of IT Security

Now you can be a parent and Big Brother at the same time! Unfortunately, there's an App for that.

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/3-effective-cell-phone-surveillance-apps/

3 Most Effective Cell Phone Surveillance Apps to Monitor Your Kids [Android]

Use M-Spy to Listen In

Have you ever heard those urban legends that the CIA or NSA can connect to any cellphone in the world and hear what’s going on in the room? Well, with M-Spy from the Android Market, you can do that too. After you download and install M-Spy to your phone, all you have to do is set up a PIN number, and the phone is immediately enabled to act as your own personal audio bug no matter where it is.

Use the Android as an IP Webcam

While audio is useful, it would be even more useful if you could position your Android phone to monitor your home while your kids are being cared for or home alone. Using the IP Webcam app on the Android Market, you can transform your Android into an IP webcam.

Remotely Sense Motion, Movement or Sound

One of the most advanced remote surveillance apps is RL Watcher. This application lets you enable your phone to remotely sense movement, sound or even just the slightest motion of your phone.

Each remote sensor can be individually enabled so that you can receive a notification any time each sensor is tripped. Notifications of any activity can be via SMS, e-mail or by phone. For example, you can set the phone up so that if it moves, it’ll call you at any phone number and you can listen in to whatever is going on where the phone is situated.

Did you ban your teen from using their car? Put your Android phone in the car while you’re at work, and it’ll call you if the car starts moving. Put it in an empty room, and it’ll email you when there’s movement in the room. The possibilities are endless.

A re-hash of the Wall Street journal articles. PeakYou worked no better than some others I've tried.

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/10/15/1340244/Data-Miners-Scraping-Away-Our-Privacy?from=rss

Data Miners Scraping Away Our Privacy

Posted by Soulskill on Friday October 15, @10:08AM

"Twig, writing for Corrente, reports on data scrapers. They are not looking for passwords and such; scrapers are looking at blogs and forums searching for material relevant to their corporate clients. We are assured that the information is 'anonymized' to protect the identities of forum participants. However, a tool called PeekYou permits users to connect online names with real world identities. No worries, though — if you have a week to spare, you can opt-out of some of the larger data banks."

“If you advertise it, they will come.” Field of Madison Avenue Dreams.

http://www.phiprivacy.net/?p=4509

Who would send Angie’s List their sensitive medical info??!

By Dissent, October 15, 2010

Danger, Will Robinson!

Angie’s List has reportedly started offering a new service to resolve complaints consumers/patients may have about their doctors. But to do so, it reportedly requires users to sign a release that is Very Bad News.

According to the Medical Justice Blog, which has called attention to this dangerous release, it says, in part:

[My doctor] is hereby authorized to discuss and disclose all protected health information about me in its possession (whether in oral, written, or electronic form) to Angie’s List….

I understand that this includes routine medical treatment information (such as admission records, doctors order sheets, progress and notes, surgical records, laboratory records, and office notes)…

[My doctor is authorized to send] records relating to communicable diseases – which may include hepatitis, sexually-transmitted diseases, H.I.V. and AIDS. …-)…

[My signature also authorizes my doctor] sending records relating to drug or alcohol abuse, or drug or alcohol related diseases (whether or not covered by 42 C.F.R. Part 2), and psychiatric, psychological or counseling records…

[...]

I understand that information that I provide to Angie’s List or information that is used or disclosed in accordance with this Authorization may be used by Angie’s List to provide content for Angie’s List publications such as magazines, websites, or other works…

Wow. Angie’s List is not a HIPAA-covered entity. While patients can waive their own privacy and confidentiality and send anyone their records, no HIPAA-covered entity should participate in this at all. And frankly, neither should any patient, in my opinion.

Patients: if you have a complaint that you can’t resolve with your physician or health care provider, there are professional boards to hear your complaint. And if you can’t convince them, see a lawyer about your legal options. Sharing your sensitive information with a business is just plain privacy-dangerous.

Smart, but a few years late?

http://it.slashdot.org/story/10/10/15/2315205/How-Cornell-Plans-To-Purge-Campus-Computers-of-Personal-Data?from=rss

How Cornell Plans To Purge Campus Computers of Personal Data

Posted by timothy on Friday October 15, @07:27PM

"Cornell lost a laptop last year with SSNs. Now, they've mandated scanning every computer at the University for the following items: social security numbers; credit card numbers; driver's license numbers; bank account numbers; and protected health information, as defined by HIPAA. The main tools are Identityfinder (commercial software for Windows and Mac), spider (Cornell software for Windows from 2008) and Find_SSN (python script from Virginia Tech). The effort raises both technical questions (false positives, anyone?) and practical issues (should I trust closed source software to do this?). Have other Universities succeeded at removing confidential data? Success, here, should probably be gauged in terms of diminished legal liability after the attempted clean up has been completed."

Note: this program affects the computers of university employees and offices, rather than students' personal machines.

[Software mentioned:

Find_SSN http://security.vt.edu/Find_SSNs/index.html

Identityfinder http://www.identityfinder.com/us/ [There is a free home version Bob]

Cornell's “spider” http://www2.cit.cornell.edu/security/tools/

Interesting. They seem to be saying (again) that they are overselling their systems. “We want everyone to buy our unlimited data plans but we don't want them to use them. A few high volume users/applications can overwhelm our network, so we need to block them and charge more.”

http://mobile.slashdot.org/story/10/10/15/2124217/Can-Apps-Really-Damage-a-Cellular-Network?from=rss

Can Apps Really Damage a Cellular Network?

Posted by Soulskill on Friday October 15, @05:59PM

"In FCC filings earlier this year, T-Mobile described how the behavior of one Android IM app nearly brought their cellular data network to a breakdown in one city. Even more interesting, the US carrier describes how just the 300,000 unlocked iPhones on their network caused massive spikes in data usage. T-Mobile is using these anecdotes as evidence that mobile carriers should be able to retain control over the applications and devices on their network to ensure quality of service for all users. Do they have a point?"

(Related)

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-20019709-93.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20

Cell phone is 'gadget of choice' for Americans

U.S. consumers crave their gadgets, but the cell phone rules them all, according to a new Pew Internet study.

Among the 3,000 adults surveyed, 85 percent own cell phones. Mobile phones are especially in demand among younger adults, with 96 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds owning one. But even among those 65 and older, 58 percent have a cell phone.

Bad, but what can you expect when research is so carefully hidden (to protect patent rights?)

http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/10/15/1934228/Meta-Research-Debunks-Medical-Study-Findings?from=rss

Meta-Research Debunks Medical Study Findings

Posted by Soulskill on Friday October 15, @03:48PM

"From The Atlantic comes the story of John Ioannidis and his team of meta-researchers, who have studied the overall state of medical research and found it dangerously and widely lacking in trustworthiness. Even after filtering out the journalistic frippery and hyperbole, the story is pretty disturbing. Some points made in the article: even the most respected, widely accepted, peer-reviewed medical studies are all-too-often deeply flawed or outright wrong; when an error is brought to light and the conclusions publicly refuted, the erroneous conclusions often persist and are cited as valid for years, or even decades; scientists and researchers themselves regard peer review as providing 'only a minimal assurance of quality'; and these shortcomings apply to medical research across the board, not just to blatantly self-serving pharmaceutical industry studies. The article concludes by saying, 'Science is a noble endeavor, but it's also a low-yield endeavor … I'm not sure that more than a very small percentage of medical research is ever likely to lead to major improvements in clinical outcomes and quality of life.' I've always been somewhat suspicious of research findings, but before this article I had no idea just how prevalent untrustworthy results were."

(Related) Let's hope that somewhere there is an aspiring garage-based inventor of the cure for the common cold.

http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/10/15/1452226/The-Spread-of-Do-It-Yourself-Biotech?from=rss

The Spread of Do-It-Yourself Biotech

Posted by Soulskill on Friday October 15, @11:30AM

"Are you an electronics hobbyist or a garden shed tinkerer? If so, then move aside, because there's a new kid on the block: the DIY biotechnologist. The decreasing price of biotech instrumentation has made it possible for everyday folks (read: biotech geeks) with a few thousand dollars to spare to equip their garages and parents' basements with the necessary 'tools of the trade.' Some, like PCR machines, are available on eBay; other utensils are hacked together from everyday appliances and some creativity. For example: microscopes out of webcams and armpit E. coli incubators. Nature News has an article on the phenomenon, describing the weird and wonderful fruits of biotech geek ingenuity, like glow-in-the-dark yogurt. One could draw parallels with the early days of computer building/programming. It may be that we're looking at a biotech revolution, not just from the likes of Craig Venter, but from Joe-next-door hacking away at his E. coli strain. What are the Steve Wozniaks of biotech working on right now?"

I like Gertner a lot and this article is worth a read, but I had a chilling thought.. Do you suppose I could translate this curve to reflect how my students see the classes I teach?

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13556_3-20019730-61.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20

Gartner's hype cycle: Tablets, gestures, and cloud

Gartner's "Hype Cycle" ... The underlying concept is pretty simple. New technologies enter the market, become the subject of breathless hype, fail to immediately live up to the most breathless hyperbole, start to therefore be perceived as failures, and finally become useful for the mainstream market in a realistic, measured way.

Gartner's 2010 Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies Free, registration required.

For your Swiss Army folder...

http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/fileminx-free-instant-file-converter/

Fileminx: Free Instant File Converter Online

Ever received an email with an attachment that you couldn’t open because you didn’t have the required program on your system? Asking the sender to resend the file is not always an option since that’d require a lot of time and even then the sender might not have the same software stack as you have. Thankfully, Fileminx is here to save us from all the back and forth emails.

www.fileminx.com

• Similar tools: Online-Converter, DocsPal, OnlineFontConverter and Text2MindMap.

• Also read related articles:

5 Easy-to-use Freeware Video Converters
10 Great Apps to Convert Audio & Video Files in Linux
Top Free Media Converters for Windows

For my Geeks...

http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/mozilla-firefox-addon-builder-building-firefox-addons/

Firefox Addon Builder: A Web Tool To Simplify Building Firefox Addons

Mozilla Firefox Add-on Builder is a free online developer tool. Its aim is quite straightforward: to simplify the process of building firefox addons.

You start by creating an account on the add-ons website here. Next you will need the Add-on Builder Helper Firefox add-on; this add-on will help you try out add-ons and it can be found here. With these things set, you can start coding your add-on in the edit area.

You can start from scratch or, to add functionality, you could use one of the various APIs available in the code library.

builder.mozillalabs.com

Also read related articles: Web Developer Toolbar for Firefox and How to Make Your Own Firefox Addon.

Web enabled Business Models.

http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/10/16/0427239/How-to-Heartlessly-Arbitrage-Used-Books-With-a-PDA?from=rss

How to Heartlessly Arbitrage Used Books With a PDA

Posted by timothy on Saturday October 16, @08:03AM

"Michael Savitz writes at Salon how he makes a living armed with a laser bar-code scanner fitted to a Dell PDA. [Automating the “look up” Bob] Savitz haunts thrift stores and library book sales to scan hundreds of used books a day and instantly identify those that will get a good price on Amazon Marketplace. 'My PDA shows the range of prices that other Amazon sellers are asking for the book in question,' writes Savitz. 'Those listings offer me guidance on what price to set when I post the book myself and how much I'm likely to earn when the sale goes through.' Savitz writes that on average, only one book in 30 will have a resale value that makes it a "BUY" but that he goes through enough books to average about 30 books sold per day. 'If I can tell from a book's Amazon sales rank that I'll be able to sell it in one day, I might accept a projected profit of as little as a dollar. The more difficult a book will be to sell, the more money the sale needs to promise.' [Economics 101 Bob] Savitz writes that people scanning books sometimes get kicked out of thrift stores and retail shops and that libraries are beginning to advertise that no electronic devices are allowed at their sales. 'If it's possible to make a decent living selling books online, then why does it feel so shameful to do this work?' concludes Savitz."

I'm a huge fan of WolframAlpha and my Math students quickly become fans too.

http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2010/10/wolfram-alpha-word-widgets.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+freetech4teachers%2FcGEY+%28Free+Technology+for+Teachers%29

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Wolfram Alpha Word Widgets

Wolfram Alpha is known as a computation and statistics search engine, but Wolfram Alpha offers more than that. Two of examples of this are found in Wolfram's new word widgets. Wolfram now offers a dictionary widget that provides users with definitions, synonyms, and pronunciations.

[Classic Word Calculator http://developer.wolframalpha.com/widgets/gallery/view.jsp?id=b3f44d9054402de39441e165a4bdfe0

The Fun Word Calculator provides users with anagrams, rhyming words, and the Scrabble value of words.

[Fun Word Calculator http://developer.wolframalpha.com/widgets/gallery/view.jsp?id=9f655cc8884fda7ad6d8a6fb15cc001e

[I also recommend:

Using Wolfram|Alpha in the Classroom http://www.wolframalpha.com/educators/

A couple of points: First, the potential harm of Identity Theft isn't just in the first or second year after the event. Second, a well planned fraud may go for years without detection – unlike the small time 'quick buck' copycats we see so frequently. Three, I'm beginning to suspect the police generally don't trust the organizations breached to help in an investigation.

http://www.databreaches.net/?p=14696

Orange Regional Medical Center asks investigators for info on breach

October 14, 2010 by admin

Following revelations yesterday by the FBI and U.S. Attorney’s Office of a massive Medicare fraud scam that utilized patient data stolen, in part, from Orange Regional Medical Center in New York, I asked the center whether they had known about the breach when it occurred in 2005 and whether and when patients were notified of the breach. In response, the center sent me this e-mail statement:

Orange Regional Medical Center was very concerned to learn from news reports that we were among several NY healthcare facilities from which patient identities had been allegedly obtained in 2005 by an organized crime ring, for the purposes of committing Medicare fraud. We were not aware of this Medicare fraud scheme until learning of it from news outlets; and we consider ourselves among the victims of this conspiracy. Orange Regional regards the protection of patient information to be among our highest priorities and we take any purported breach of patient information very seriously.

We have reached out to the FBI, Department of Justice and Office of the Inspector General and asked that they share with us any information relating to this incident and, specifically, whether this breach occurred within Orange Regional or outside at a site unrelated to Orange Regional. Presently, we are awaiting information.

In light of a statement in the indictment linking stolen patient data directly to a breach at ORMC in 2005, it sounds like the center had no idea that there had been a breach and still does not really know about it.

This is not the first time we’ve seen law enforcement withhold information about breaches from breached entities, but now that they’ve indicted people, it would be helpful if they informed the breached entities what they know about how the breaches occurred and which patients’ data were stolen so that the hospitals can contact their patients to make proper notification and offer apologies and support, as appropriate.

Technologically illiterate or simply too inept to steal patient data on you own? Let HHS help!

http://www.phiprivacy.net/?p=4500

HHS covets role as ‘data sugar daddy’ to app developers

By Dissent, October 15, 2010

Mary Mosquera reports:

The Health & Human Services Department plans in December [In time for Christmas? Bob] to release significantly more health-related data to spur commercial development of new software applications designed to help patients, providers and policymakers make better health care decisions.

National, state and county health performance data sets will be made available via the Internet to HHS’s “Health Indicators Warehouse,” according to Todd Park, HHS’s chief technology officer, who said HHS will also set up a permanent “one stop shop” Web site for public access to community health data and health-related data from other federal agencies.

“We want to keep flooding the market with more and more data from our vaults,” said Park, who views government as an enabler of business innovation and a source of support to developers and programmers looking to use public data in useful applications and services.

Read more on Government Health IT.

How about flooding us with data on privacy and security?

[From the article:

In an example of innovative uses of the data, Park highlighted how software firm Adobe Systems converted ASCII text files containing veteran and Medicare information into the HTML format for Web documentation, which made the information easier for beneficiaries to read and manipulate.

The application is part of the “Blue Button” initiative, a program under which the Veterans Affairs Department and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services offer beneficiaries access to copies of their personal health information via a button on the VA and CMS Web sties.

Look at everything technology makes available to us!

http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=15902

Coming soon to your pharmacy: Police accessing your prescription records

From The Associated Press:

Starting next year, dozens of states will begin knitting together databases to watch prescription drug abuse, from powerful painkillers to diet pills.

With federal money and prodding, states are being asked to sign onto an agreement allowing police, pharmacies and physicians to check suspicious prescription pill patterns from Nevada to North Carolina.

Civil liberties and privacy advocates have objected to the state databases, which would be linked with technology and standards developed by the Justice and Homeland Security departments.

Thirty-four states operate databases to fight a drug problem authorities say is growing more deadly than heroin.

Read more onn Lancaster Online.

(Related) “If you've got nothing to hide...” we'll make something up for you!

http://www.phiprivacy.net/?p=4480

The war on drugs makes flu sufferers felons

By Dissent, October 14, 2010

Jim Edwards asks, “Why Do Police Want a Centralized Database of Flu Sufferers?”

A federal law intended to restrict the crystal meth trade is leading to a centralized police database of flu sufferers. In a rash of recent cases across the South and Midwest, people innocently buying the nasal decongestant pseudoephedrine – often sold as Pfizer (PFE)’s Sudafed, Dimetapp, and Advil Allergy Sinus, and Merck (MRK)’s Clarinex-D – have been arrested for “promotion of meth manufacturing” when in fact all they have is a stuffy nose. Possessing too much pseudoephedrine is often the sole requirement for a “promotion of meth manufacturing” charge.

[...]

In Wabash Valley, Ind., Sally Harpold bought a box of Zyrtec and a box of Mucinex and became the subject of an early morning police raid:

The morning she was arrested, Harpold and her husband were awakened by police officers banging on the front door of their home at Midway along U.S. 36. She was allowed to get dressed, and was then taken in handcuffs to the Clinton Police Department, where she was questioned about her cold medicine purchases. She was later booked into jail, and her husband had to pay $300 bail to get her released.

Harpold is actually employed in law enforcement: she works at the Rockville Correctional Facility for women. Her police mugshot ran on the front page of her local newspaper under the headline “17 Arrested in Drug Sweep.” The local cops couldn’t care less, according to TribStar.com….

Read more on bnet. Really. Read it. This is one of the problems with surveillance databases that do not have adequate checks on their use. People’s reputations can be wrecked.

Some in law enforcement acknowledge the problem, but their solution is to gaily discard HIPAA and invade privacy in the name of preventing false arrests:

The police’s major complaint about the law is that it doesn’t go far enough in allowing them to scrutinize the citizenry’s medical records. The system falls down, they say, because the pharmacy records aren’t centralized. They want to install a single, central online database into which all pharmacies would enter the indentifying information of anyone buying Sudafed.

The war on drugs should never be confused with a war on flu. Get it together, people. In the meantime, my family will stick to chicken soup, I guess.

(Related) ...and if you can't find a specific law they've broken, you can always brand them terrorists.

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/10/14/2220209/Wikileaks-Donations-Account-Shut-Down?from=rss

Wikileaks Donations Account Shut Down

Posted by timothy on Thursday October 14, @06:51PM

"The whistleblowing group WikiLeaks claims that it has had its funding blocked and that it is the victim of financial warfare by the US government. Moneybookers, a British-registered internet payment company that collects WikiLeaks donations, emailed the organisation to say it had closed down its account because it had been put on an official US watchlist and on an Australian government blacklist. The apparent blacklisting came a few days after the Pentagon publicly expressed its anger at WikiLeaks and its founder, Australian citizen Julian Assange, for obtaining thousands of classified military documents about the war in Afghanistan."

This should give the RIAA warm fuzzies... How did they ever convince the French to do this? Celine Dion autographs?

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/10/15/134255/French-Government-May-Subsidize-Music-Downloads?from=rss

French Government May Subsidize Music Downloads

Posted by Soulskill on Friday October 15, @09:26AM

"The European Commission has approved a French program to subsidize legal music downloads for young people. The Carte Musique scheme gives €25 (US$35) to French residents aged 12 to 25 to spend on music downloads or subscription services. Young people can purchase a €50 card for just €25, with the balance paid by the state."

I think I'd prefer the Regan approach – end it. But perhaps we have forgotten that history.

http://politics.slashdot.org/story/10/10/14/2130246/Chertoff-Advocates-Cyber-Cold-War?from=rss

Chertoff Advocates Cyber Cold War

Posted by timothy on Thursday October 14, @06:07PM

"The US and allied countries should formulate a doctrine to apply the principles of nuclear deterrence to cyber attacks and cyber espionage, according to former US Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff. No matter that it's very difficult to attribute the source of cyber attacks — just take punitive action against the platform being used to attack, says Chertoff."

Transparency?

http://idle.slashdot.org/story/10/10/14/133239/UK-Police-Force-Posts-All-Its-Calls-On-Twitter?from=rss

UK Police Force Posts All Its Calls On Twitter

Posted by samzenpus on Thursday October 14, @09:50AM

"One of the largest police forces in the UK is posting every incident reported to it today on Twitter. Greater Manchester Police began its 24-hour experiment this morning at 05:00 BST, tweeting all incident reports in the hope of highlighting the complexity of modern policing. 'Policing is often seen in very simple terms, with cops chasing robbers and locking them up,' Chief Constable Peter Fahy said in a statement. 'However the reality is that this accounts for only part of the work they have to deal with.'"

[From the article:

Due to restrictions imposed by Twitter, the force must alternate between three separate accounts - @gmp24_1, @gmp24_2, and @gmp24_3 - over the course of the day.

(Related) that didn't take long...

http://www.thinq.co.uk/2010/10/14/police-online-scuffle-over-fake-twitter-posts/

Cops in online scuffle over fake Twitter posts

This should make for an interesting lawsuit...

http://www.phiprivacy.net/?p=4464

CIO Fired After Others May Have Accessed Her EHR

By Dissent, October 14, 2010

Gerry Higgins writes:

A prominent CIO of a regional hospital system encountered the limitations of HIPAA and so-called “Protected Health Information (PHI)” when her boss fired her after a short medical leave of absence. After years working without taking vacation, a family catastrophe that affected her health prompted her to take a medical leave of absence. She had a physician’s letter to justify the leave, which was sent to the Occupational Health section of the hospital system, and they guaranteed the information would be kept confidential. Upon her return, she was called into her supervisor’s office and was promptly terminated, even after years of excellent performance reviews.

Two co-workers in the Department of Clinical Informatics, which she had managed, told her that they were ordered by other executives in the hospital system for a copy of her Electronic Health Record – a flagrant abuse of PHI. There they found she had a history of depression, but she had managed the problem with Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, extensive psychotherapy and medication. Another employee in Human Resources, who recently left the department, told her that is was routine policy to share Physician’s letters supporting medical leave with the employee’s supervisor.

Read more on HealthSystemCIO.com.

That an employee’s supervisor may have access to any PHI or a doctor’s report has always been a workplace privacy issue across all settings, as I’ve blogged about on PogoWasRight.org at times.

I wonder whether the Chief Privacy Officer for the hospital was aware of this “routine policy” and had any input into it and why Human Resources does not make clear to employees requesting a medical leave that any doctors’ reports will be shared with their employer.

While I agree with some of the “lessons to be learned” that Gerry describes, there’s another lesson here for employers: be transparent.

For my Ethical Hackers: Think of this as reverse engineering on the fly. And note that governments will protect “markets” even when they are not the issue...

http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/10/15/0139217/Norwegian-Day-Traders-Convicted-For-Manipulating-Computer-Trading-System?from=rss

Norwegian Day Traders Convicted For Manipulating Computer Trading System

Posted by timothy on Friday October 15, @01:53AM

An anonymous reader submits news of the conviction of two Norwegian day traders, Svend Egil Larsen and Peder Veiby, who were on Wednesday fined and given suspended sentences (Norwegian court, Norwegian document) for cleverly working out — and cashing in on — the way the computerized trading system of Interactive Brokers subsidiary Timber Hill would respond to certain trades. They used the system's predictable responses to manipulate the value of low-priced stocks. The pair have gotten some sympathetic reactions from around the world, and promise to appeal.

[From the article:

The news brings the role of automated trading systems, with complicated algorithms, back under scrutiny. High-volume algorithmic platforms are playing an increasingly important role in trading globally, with stock exchanges investing heavily to ensure their own networks meet the demand.

… In yesterday's conviction of the Norweigan traders, the prosecution said the pair had given "false and misleading signals about supply, demand and prices" when they manipulated several Norwegian stocks through Timber Hill’s online trading platform.

Anders Brosveet, the lawyer for Veiby, admitted that his client had learnt how the Timber Hill trading algorithm would behave in response to certain trades. However, he denied this amounted to "market manipulation".

Brosveet told the Financial Times, “They had an idea of how the computer would change the prices but that does not make them responsible for what the computer did.”

Interesting that they will spend more on e-discovery and therefore want the rules changed to limit it. Only 30% of US firms report Privacy “issues” v. 51% in the UK. (They also asked who uses Facebook and Twitter.)

http://www.bespacific.com/mt/archives/025483.html

October 14, 2010

Fulbright's 7th Annual Litigation Trends Survey Report

Fulbright's 7th Annual Litigation Trends Survey Report

• AmLawDaily: "Fulbright's 2010 report is based on survey responses from 275 U.S. and 128 U.K. in-house lawyers, the majority of whom were general counsel at companies with revenues north of $100 million in the last fiscal year. Ninety-three percent of U.S. respondents and 97 percent of U.K. respondents expected litigation involving their companies to increase or remain steady in the coming year. Eighty-seven percent of U.S. respondents faced new litigation in the past year, compared with 83 percent in Fulbright's previous survey."

A “challenge” for my Ethical Hackers

http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/10/14/1534255/Home-WiFi-Network-Security-Failings-Exposed?from=rss

Home WiFi Network Security Failings Exposed

Posted by CmdrTaco on Thursday October 14, @12:14PM

"The shocking state of home wireless (Wi-Fi) network security in the UK has been revealed by a life assistance company study. CPP used an 'ethical hacker,' Jason Hart, to test thousands of Wi-Fi networks across six UK cities, including London. He found that many didn't even have a password and roughly half of home UK Wi-Fi networks could be hacked in less than 5 seconds." [Suggests he was doing something manually. Let's fully automate and get the time down to under one second. Bob]

Another challenge for my Ethical Hackers: Let's look at thumbs to detect potential Texting and lips to detect potential cell phone use and could that runny nose indicate cocaine use?

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20019653-1.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20

Tiny Eyetracker watches for sleepy drivers

The compact digital camera system, being developed at the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology in Germany, tracks drivers' eye movements. If it spots the peepers shut beyond a user-defined interval, it sounds an alarm to keep the driver from dozing off.

For my Risk Management students. “Green” cars are both environmentally safe and delicious!

http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/10/14/1425219/Denver-Airport-Overrun-by-Car-Eating-Rabbits?from=rss

Denver Airport Overrun by Car-Eating Rabbits

Posted by samzenpus on Thursday October 14, @12:14PM

It turns out the soy-based wire covering on cars built after 2002 is irresistible to rodents. Nobody knows this better than those unlucky enough to park at DIA's Pikes Peak lot. The rabbits surrounding the area have been using the lot as an all-you-can-eat wiring buffet. Looks like it's time to break out The Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch.

For the amusement of my Math students...

http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/10/14/135219/Proving-0999-Is-Equal-To-1?from=rss

Proving 0.999... Is Equal To 1

Posted by CmdrTaco on Thursday October 14, @09:24AM

"Some of the juiciest parts of mathematics are the really simple statements that cause one to immediately pause and exclaim 'that can't be right!' But a recent 28 page paper in The Montana Mathematics Enthusiast (PDF) spends a great deal of time fielding questions by researchers who have explored this in depth and this seemingly impossibility is further explored in a brief history by Dev Gualtieri who presents the digit manipulation proof: Let a = 0.999... then we can multiply both sides by ten yielding 10a = 9.999... then subtracting a (which is 0.999...) from both sides we get 10a — a = 9.999... — 0.999... which reduces to 9a = 9 and thus a = 1. Mathematicians as far back as Euler have used various means to prove 0.999... = 1."

For all my tech and business students (Registration required)

http://web.docuticker.com/go/docubase/61222

The Age of Exabytes: Tools & Approaches For Managing Big Data

We are experiencing a big data explosion, a result not only of increasing Internet usage by people around the world, but also the connection of billions of devices to the Internet.

Eight years ago, for example, there were only around 5 exabytes of data online.

Just two years ago, that amount of data passed over the Internet over the course of a single month.

And recent estimates put monthly Internet data flow at around 21 exabytes of data.

This explosion of data - in both its size and form - causes a multitude of challenges for both people and machines. No longer is data something accessed by a small number of people. No longer is the data that's created simply transactional information; and no longer is the data predictable - either as it's written, or when, or by whom or what it's going to be read by. Furthermore, much of this data is unstructured, meaning that it does not clearly fall into a schema or database. How can this data move across networks? How can it be processed? The size of the data, along with its complexity, demand new tools for storage, processing, networking, analysis and visualization.

This new premium report explores how technologies are evolving to address the needs of managing big data, from innovations in storage at the chip and data center level, to the development of frameworks used for distributed computing, to the increasing demand for analytical tools that can glean insights from big data in near real-time.

I know you frequently ask yourself, “Are there any more sites as wonderful as Centennial-Man?” Well, these tools won't help you find them, but they work well on standard websites.

http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/similar-site-search-find-similar-websites/

Similar Site Search: Find Similar Websites On The Web With Ease

www.similarsitesearch.com

Similar tool: SimilarSites and SimilarWeb.