Roll Top Computer
School used Webcams to Spy on Students at Home
A suburban Philadelphia school district accused of secretly switching on laptop computer webcams inside students’ homes says it never used webcam images to monitor or discipline students and believes one of its administrators has been “unfairly portrayed and unjustly attacked.” The Lower Merion School District, in response to a suit filed by a student, has acknowledged that webcams were remotely activated 42 times in the past 14 months, but only to find missing, lost or stolen laptops — which the district noted would include “a loaner computer that, against regulations, might be taken off campus.” “Despite some reports to the contrary, be assured that the security-tracking software has been completely disabled,” Superintendent Christopher W. McGinley said in a statement on the district’s Web site late Friday. Officials vowed a comprehensive review that McGinley said should result in stronger privacy policies.
The Problem with Twitter and Facebook
House thieves have been given a leg-up by a new Web site that allows people to see whether or not you are at home — thanks to information you’re probably already posting online. House thieves have been given a leg-up by a new Web site that allows people to see whether or not you are at home — thanks to information you’re probably already posting online. The site, Please Rob Me, works by taking data from sites such as Twitter and Facebook, relying on users checking into various locations. It then presents “opportunities” to visitors to “Please Rob Me” when it appears someone is not home.
FBI wants records kept of Web sites visited
The FBI is pressing Internet service providers to record which Web sites customers visit and retain those logs for two years, a requirement that law enforcement believes could help it in investigations of child pornography and other serious crimes. FBI Director Robert Mueller supports storing Internet users’ “origin and destination information,” a bureau attorney said at a federal task force meeting on Thursday. As far back as a 2006 speech, Mueller had called for data retention on the part of Internet providers, and emphasized the point two years later when explicitly asking Congress to enact a law making it mandatory. But it had not been clear before that the FBI was asking companies to begin to keep logs of what Web sites are visited, which few if any currently do. The FBI is not alone in renewing its push for data retention. As CNET reported earlier this week, a survey of state computer crime investigators found them to be nearly unanimous in supporting the idea. Matt Dunn, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in the Department of Homeland Security, also expressed support for the idea during the task force meeting.
Feds push for tracking cell phones
Two years ago, when the FBI was stymied by a band of armed robbers known as the “Scarecrow Bandits” that had robbed more than 20 Texas banks, it came up with a novel method of locating the thieves. FBI agents obtained logs from mobile phone companies corresponding to what their cellular towers had recorded at the time of a dozen different bank robberies in the Dallas area. The voluminous records showed that two phones had made calls around the time of all 12 heists, and that those phones belonged to men named Tony Hewitt and Corey Duffey. A jury eventually convicted the duo of multiple bank robbery and weapons charges. Even though police are tapping into the locations of mobile phones thousands of times a year, the legal ground rules remain unclear, and federal privacy laws written a generation ago are ambiguous at best. On Friday, the first federal appeals court to consider the topic will hear oral arguments (PDF) in a case that could establish new standards for locating wireless devices.
iPad feeds Macmillan-Kindle price war
“Amazon.com removed titles from its Kindle store from publishing giant Macmillan Friday night in a dispute sparked by Apple Inc.’s new iPad. But the move is only temporary as Amazon said it would capitulate to Macmillan’s demands that it be allowed to charge more than the $9.99 e-book maximum allowed by Amazon. Apple announced Wednesday that Macmillan was among a group of publishers that would sell their titles on the iBook site set up for the iPad. Apple is allowing publishers to charge more than the $9.99 that Amazon has set for titles sold for the Kindle, long a point of dispute with publishers.”
Captain America works for the USO?
It’s one thing to take Batman off the comic-book page and make his costume still look good in a live-action feature, but Captain America presents a far bigger challenge — the hero is essentially a walking flag, which might leave many average moviegoers giggling instead of saluting. But director Joe Johnston and the team at Marvel Studios have a plan for “The First Avenger: Captain America,” which is due in Summer 2011: They’ve added a new wrinkle to the classic mythology to explain why a scientifically enhanced super-soldier would venture out in the WWII battlefields in a costume that leans a bit heavy on the old Betsy Ross imagery. “The costume is a flag, but the way we’re getting around that is we have Steve Rogers forced into the USO circuit. After he’s made into this super-soldier, they decide they can’t send him into combat and risk him getting killed. He’s the only one and they can’t make more. So they say, ‘You’re going to be in this USO show’ and they give him a flag suit. He can’t wait to get out of it.”
WikiLeaks suspends all operations
WikiLeaks has temporarily shut down, citing funding problems as the reason the site is no longer in operation. The site, a hotbed for anonymous tip-offs and submissions regarding sensitive information, has been around since 2006 and has been staying afloat thanks to numerous donations from undisclosed sources. It seems that these donations have dried up, forcing the site to take a temporary hiatus.
Is Amazon Preparing for Apple?
Amazon’s New Plan for eBooks: 70% Cut For Publishers, $10 Max Price – “Amazon’s finally got some competition—and may be about to get even more—so they’re doing everything they can to stay competitive, and to keep publishers happy. This means higher revenue cuts, but also new rules. Interesting rules. The new system works like this: If they elect to publish under this new program, publishers are entitled to 70% of a books sale price, minus delivery costs, at $0.15/MB. (Amazon says the average book size now is about 368k, which would cost six cents to deliver). This is practically an inversion of their current scheme which saw publishers getting less than half of the book’s sale price, so on the surface this is a very good thing.”
Apple ‘Kindle’?
“Apple is holding an event on January 27th to show off something the company is calling their “latest creation.” Everyone thinks that this is going to be their Mac Tablet that has been all over the gadget blogs for the last few months. I think it makes more sense for them to release a Kindle competitor and tie it into the iTunes store like the iPod. They could easily give Amazon a run for the money if they were to get into the eBook business and unfortunately for smaller retailers like Barnes and Noble it would make the Nook and other competitors effectively null and void.
The Decade’s 10 Most Dastardly Cybercrimes
Even though the decade isn’t over for another year this article is still pretty good… “It was the decade of the mega-heist, when stolen credit card magstripe tracks became the pork bellies of a new underground marketplace, Eastern European hackers turned malware writing into an art, and a nasty new crop of purpose-driven computer worms struck dread in the heart of America. Now that the zero days are behind us, it’s time to reflect on the most ingenious, destructive or groundbreaking cybercrimes of the first 10 years of the new millennium.”
