Sunday, May 31, 2009

"On Streets and on Facebook, Homeless Stay Wired"

~~Digital Technology has now even become part of the homeless lifestyle. The internet is such a useful tool that it can actually ease the burden of social isolation that is part of being homeless.

Remember : Technological Advances are meant to improve the quality of all people's lives ; housed or houseless.~~ posted from Blackberry by technopolitical~~



"On Streets and on Facebook, Homeless Stay Wired"

http://foxnews.proteus.com

May 31, 2009
9:43 AM


Like most San Franciscans, Charles Pitts is wired. Mr. Pitts, who is 37 years old, has accounts on Facebook, MySpace and Twitter. He runs an Internet forum on Yahoo, reads news online and keeps in touch with friends via email. The tough part is managing this digital lifestyle from his residence under a highway bridge. "You don't need a TV. You don't need a radio. You don't even need a newspaper," says Mr. Pitts, an aspiring poet in a purple cap and yellow fleece jacket, who says he has been homeless for two years. "But you need the Internet.

http://foxnews.proteus.com/content.html?contentId=37858¤tPage=0

~~
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Saturday, May 30, 2009

The Government's Urgent Push into CyberWarfare.

~~ The sport of CyberWarfare is now becoming part of our economic recovery and the reorganization of the American commerce system. ~~ technopolitical ~~



"CYBERWAR: Contractors Vie for Plum Work, Hacking for the United States."

By CHRISTOPHER DREW and JOHN MARKOFF


Published:
May 31, 2009

http://mobile.nytimes.com



MELBOURNE, Fla. - The government's urgent push into cyberwarfare has set off a rush among the biggest military companies for billions of dollars in new defense contracts.





The exotic nature of the work, coupled with the deep recession, is enabling the companies to attract top young talent that once would have gone to Silicon Valley. And the race to develop weapons that defend against, or initiate, computer attacks has given rise to thousands of "hacker soldiers" within the Pentagon who can blend the new capabilities into the nation's war planning.Nearly all of the largest military companies - including Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin and Raytheon - have major cyber contracts with the military and intelligence agencies.


http://mobile.nytimes.com/article;jsessionid=890810930FD395399FFDF08898666AEB.w5?a=3702
31&f=19



Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

"Obama Announces Strategy Against Cyberattacks"

"Obama Announces Strategy Against Cyberattacks"

By DAVID E. SANGER and JOHN MARKOFF

New York Times

Published: May 30, 2009

WASHINGTON - President Obama declared Friday that the country's disparate efforts to "deter, prevent, detect and defend" against cyberattacks would now be run out of the White House, but he also promised that he would bar the federal government from regular monitoring of "private-sector networks" and the Internet traffic that has become the backbone of American communications.


Mr. Obama's speech, which was accompanied by the release of a long-awaited new government strategy, was an effort to balance the United States' response to a rising security threat with concerns - echoing back to the debates on wiretapping without warrants in the Bush years - that the government would be regularly dipping into Internet traffic that knew no national boundaries.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/article?a=369728&f=25

"Obama's new cyber czar may create turf war"

~~ Truly Cyber Politics. Who will "run" the internet is no easy question. For the average Netizen it really does not directly affect our emailing and blogging.

But in the world of Cyber Warfare, Cyber Crime and etc, who actually is in "control" of the Internet is serious political drama- with real world consequences.~~

~posted from blackbery by technopolitcal ~~



NEWS ANALYSIS

By Lolita C. Baldor

Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The digital battlefield is proving to be difficult terrain for President Barack Obama.As he unveiled his plan Friday to make the nation's computer networks more secure, he fulfilled a campaign pledge to make cyber security a top priority.


But he fell short on another promise to create a cyber adviser "who will report directly to me."Ten months ago, candidate Obama told a Purdue University audience that he "will make cyber security the top priority that it should be in the 21st century."


He went on to pledge that he would coordinate efforts across government, implement a national policy, tighten standards to make information more secure, and bring together government, industry and academia "to determine the best ways to guard the infrastructure that supports our power.


On Friday, Obama took the first step toward making that far-reaching promise a reality.

But it remains unclear whether the structure he is creating will be capable and powerful enough to take on an enduring and monumental task.


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31003816/


Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Monday, May 25, 2009

Mobile.POLITICO:The A-list: The best email lists in politics

~Email has really taken off as a fund raising tool, I believe beyond anybody's realistic expectations. The stratospheric amounts that Obama 2008 raised using the internet will go down as a historic watershed.

And as we see below even though Hillary Clinton lost, her email list still lives and prospers~~


~~posted from blackberry by TechnoPolitical~~.


http://mobile.politico.com/story.cfm?id=22915&cat=topnews

Clinton’s online mint isn’t even considered the best in its class. There are a handful of other lists, in both parties, that are thought to be either equal or even more potent.Using the criteria used by political pros to assess the value of these emails lists—size, freshness, comprehensiveness (does it include addresses, land lines, cell phone numbers or donation data?), open rates (what percentage of emails in a given send get opened), click-throughs (how many links are activated), actions and donations (how many emails result in a contribution or a letter to member of Congress) as well as intangibles like buzz and list managers’ skills—here is POLITICO’s ranking of the top five most potent email lists in politics
==

Monday, May 18, 2009

Major League Baseball awarded geolocation patent

~~ I am a big baseball fan ,
so i just could not resit posting this ,
even though it is more techno , than political --
but its BaseBall and that is all that really counts.
It is also really very interesting.~~`

==============

Major League Baseball awarded geolocation patent

  • By Ben Klayman - Fri May 15, 2009 5:41PM EDT
CHICAGO (Reuters) -

Major League Baseball has won a patent for technology that blocked certain fans from viewing local games online, and it may open the door for the U.S. sports league to profit by licensing it to media companies.

Baseball's advanced media business was awarded a U.S. patent last month for online geolocation technology, a system that uses two or more electronic methods (such as wireless and satellite) to pinpoint the geographic location of a subscriber, the sports league said in a statement late Thursday.

The sports league filed for the patent, its first, in 2004 as a way of excluding certain fans from watching its games streamed live online.

MLB wanted to block reception of games in a subscriber's local market as a way of protecting the hundreds of millions of dollars its 30 clubs receive in rights fees from such regional sports networks as the New York Yankees' YES or Boston Red Sox's NESN.

"This was a clear example where necessity really was the mother of invention," Bob Bowman, chief executive of baseball's advanced media arm, said Friday in a telephone interview.

Baseball now could approach any company using multiple geolocation technologies to determine a subscriber's location and ask for a licensing fee, analysts said. The other options would be for those companies to try to work around baseball's patent or challenge it in court.

http://tech.yahoo.com/news/nm/20090515/tc_nm/us_baseball_patent

Most Attacks Come from Legit but Hijacked Sites

~~~ The Internet is a very interesting place. Just be careful.~~~~



Most Attacks Come from Legit but Hijacked Sites

Web attacks are routinely hosted by actual sites infected and acting as zombies, security firm warns.

John E. Dunn, Techworld.com

Sunday, May 17, 2009 01:10 PM PDT
http://www.pcworld.com/article/165014/attacks_come_from_legit_hijacked_sites.html?tk=rss_news

hackers
Artwork: Diego Aguirre
The number of legitimate Websites being hacked to host malware has hit startling highs in recent days, new figures from MessageLabs have revealed.

Data taken from the days between May 4 and 8 showed that 84.6 percent of Websites blocked by the company for hosting malicious content were 'well-established' domains that have been around for a year or more.

During the same period, 10.2 percent of blocked domains were less than a year old and only 3.1 percent were less than a week old.

At first glance this, this runs counter to the assumption that malicious Websites more commonly exist for only days or hours in some cases, the better to avoid detection and filtering. This is termed "fast-fluxing," cycling websites through a maze of bogus sub-domains.

However, according to MessageLabs, the likely explanation is that a move to genuine domains means that the fast-fluxing has now migrated to use a different part of the domain tree.

"The bad guys will compromise the DNS and add sub-domains," said MessageLabs' Paul Wood. The recent figure represented a high mark, admitted Wood, but still represented a gathering storm.

"People need to be extra vigilant and understand that even sites they know and trust can be compromised through attacks such as SQL injection attacks, while businesses need to ensure they take the necessary precautions to block all the latest malicious sites," said Wood.

"With the ever advancing world of cybercrime, nothing can be taken at face value."

http://www.pcworld.com/article/165014/attacks_come_from_legit_hijacked_sites.html?tk=rss_news

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

CYBERWAR: Cadets Trade the Trenches for Firewalls

~~ Warfare in the TechnoPolitical Age ~~ 



CYBERWAR: Cadets Trade the Trenches for Firewalls

WEST POINT, N.Y. — The Army forces were under attack. Communications were down, and the chain of command was broken.

Pacing a makeshift bunker whose entrance was camouflaged with netting, the young man in battle fatigues barked at his comrades: “They are flooding the e-mail server. Block it. I’ll take the heat for it.”

These are the war games at West Point, at least last month, when a team of cadets spent four days struggling around the clock to establish a computer network and keep it operating while hackers from the National Security Agency in Maryland tried to infiltrate it with methods that an enemy might use. The N.S.A. made the cadets’ task more difficult by planting viruses on some of the equipment, just as real-world hackers have done on millions of computers around the world.

--------------------------------

May 12, 2009

Tracking Cyberspies Through the Web Wilderness

For old-fashioned detectives, the problem was always acquiring information. For the cybersleuth, hunting evidence in the data tangle of the Internet, the problem is different.

“The holy grail is how can you distinguish between information which is garbage and information which is valuable?” said Rafal Rohozinski, aUniversity of Cambridge-trained social scientist involved in computer security issues.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/12/science/12cyber.html?ref=science

First attempt to describe the 'electronic police state'

~~ Electronic -Governance of our lifes is now here .  Moreso outside the USA.  Non-Democracies know that a FREE and OPEN cyber-space  theatens them.  But i have faith that in the end Cyber-space will make the world a freer place. Maybe. ~~

The Electronic Police State

Posted by kdawson on Monday May 11, @11:54PM
from the watching-you dept.
PrivacyGovernment
gerddie writes"Cryptohippie has published what may be called a first attempt to describe the 'electronic police state' (PDF). Based on information available from different organizations such as Electronic Privacy Information Center, Reporters Without Borders, and Freedom House, countries were rated on 17 criteria with regard to how close they are already to an electronic police state. The rankings are for 2008. Not too surprisingly, one finds China, North Korea, Belarus, and Russia at the top of the list. But the next slots are occupied by the UK (England and Wales), the US, Singapore, Israel, France, and Germany."This is a good start, but it would be good to see details of their methodology. They do provide theraw data (in XLS format), but no indication of the weightings they apply to the elements of "electronic police state" behavior they are scoring.

Friday, May 8, 2009

UC Berkeley computers hacked, 160,000 at risk

~~ The Cyber Cat and Mouse wars  are with us daily. Really makes you wonder if cyber record keeping is secure at any level~~


UC Berkeley computers hacked, 160,000 at risk

May 8, 2009 1:53 PM PDT

This post was updated at 2:16 p.m. PDT with comment from an outside database security software vendor.

Hackers broke into the University of California at Berkeley's health services center computer and potentially stole the personal information of more than 160,000 students, alumni, and others, the university announced Friday.

At particular risk of identity theft are some 97,000 individuals whose Social Security numbers were accessed in the breach, but it's still unclear whether hackers were able to match up those SSNs with individual names, Shelton Waggener, UCB's chief technology officer, said in a press conference Friday afternoon.

Thursday, May 7, 2009

The rise of government 2.0

~~ The White House on "Facebook, MySpace and Twitter". 
 Pretty cool actually , and maybe politically important.
 President Obama likes to
 circumvent the old guard media and go strait to the people. 
 It may help for a President-People axis of power , that will get Congess to move on issues like health care.  
Let us hope so !! 
----------

The rise of government 2.0
By Micah L. Sifry & Andrew Rasiej 

 5/7/09 @ 4:32 AM EST

Last Friday, the White House made a splash online by announcing the launch of its official presence on Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, the popular social networking hubs. In doing so, President Barack Obama’s new media team demonstrated its understanding of one of the most basic facts of online culture and communications: You have to go where people are, instead of expecting them to come to you — no matter how big your brand. 

“Technology has profoundly impacted how — and where — we all consume information and communicate with one another,” the White House blog noted in a post titled “WhiteHouse 2.0.” It added, “WhiteHouse.gov is an important part of the administration’s effort to use the Internet to reach the public quickly and effectively — but it isn’t the only place.” 

Pentagon girds for cyber warfare

~~ These Cyber - Defense  issues are  daily news  in the "papers" now.    
Serious stuff .  ~~ 


Pentagon girds for cyber warfare

Attacks from well-funded nations, terror groups are biggest threats

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30630807/


By Lolita C. Baldor
updated 8:38 p.m. ET, Thurs., May 7, 2009

WASHINGTON - Cyber espionage and attacks from well-funded nations or terror groups are the biggest threats to the military's computer networks, a top officer said Thursday.

Air Force Gen. Kevin Chilton, who heads U.S. Strategic Command, said he worries that foes will learn to disable or distort battlefield communications. Chilton told reporters that even as the Pentagon improves its network defenses against hackers, he needs more people, training and resources to hone offensive cyber war capacity.

IP Enforcement Treaty Still Being Kept Secret

~~ Did anybody in the general public know this was being kept secret?

Even though it is now not
a secret that it is a secret,
as it is
posted all
over the Internet.


Just try making small talk in the elevator 
on this--- actually quite important , but boring --- topic.

---- z n o o z e ~~ y a w n ~~

==========================
Posted by timothy on Wednesday May 06, @06:00PM
from the in-the-spirit-of-openness- dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "More than a thousand pages of material about Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), are still being withheld, despite the Obama administration's promises to run a more open government.

The EFF and Public Knowledge filed suit in September of 2008, demanding that background documents on ACTA be disclosed under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). "We are very disappointed with the USTR's decision to continue to withhold these documents The president promised an open and transparent administration," said EFF Senior Counsel David Sobel.

Publicly available information about the treaty shows it could establish far-reaching customs regulations over Internet traffic in the guise of anti-counterfeiting measures. Additionally, multi-national IP industry companies have publicly requested that ISPs be required to engage in filtering of their customers' Internet communications for potentially copyright-infringing material, force mandatory disclosure of personal information about alleged copyright infringers, and adopt 'Three Strikes' policies requiring ISPs to automatically terminate customers' Internet access upon a repeat allegation of copyright infringement.

'What we've seen tends to confirm that the substance of ACTA remains a grave concern,' said Public Knowledge Staff Attorney Sherwin Siy. '

The agreement increasingly looks like an attempt by Hollywood and the content industries to perform an end-run around national legislatures and public international forums to advance an aggressive, radical change in the way that copyright and trademark laws are enforced.'"

http://politics.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/06/2148217&from=rss

"All trademarks and copyrights on this 
page/post [from Slash-Dot] are owned by their respective owners. 
Comments are owned by the Poster. "
--------------------------------------
 However :The INTERNET IS OWNED 
BY TECHNOPOLITCAL !!!!
=====================================
The Rest © 1997-2009 SourceForge, Inc."   
===============================================

Schwarzenegger Urges a Study on Legalizing Marijuana Use

~~ Why is this TechnoPolitical ?
Because Hemp -- whether Industrial 
or Medicinal or Recreational--
is a modern natural solution to
many economic woes ,
and as well,  
to  many costly health problems .

To have a natural un-adulterated
plant ILLEGAL is insane.

Part of technological maturity 
is unterstanding how to
best use what nature 
gives us for free.

Hemp is woven 
into human history. 
{ Pun intented }
Hemp is the strongest natural
 fiber there is.


The USA legalized 
& utilized HEMP
in "World War Two" with
"Hemp for victory"
as it was the 
cheapest and best fiber
for many military uses during WWII.

Also , ever wonder where the name
"Hempstead" came from ?
We
 now have
 a POTUS who has smoked pot , and inhaled-- and liked it.
It is time to legalize, tax , 
and educate everyone 
-- young and old-- 
honestly all about  
the Great Weed.

The TERMINATOR is correct here.
This issue needs public debate !

~~

Schwarzenegger Urges a Study on Legalizing Marijuana Use

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/07/us/07arnold.html?_r=1&hpw

Published: May 6, 2009

LOS ANGELESGov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Tuesday that the discussion over whether to legalize and tax marijuana for recreational use in California would benefit from a large-scale study, including international case comparisons, to show the possible impact of such a change.

----------------------------

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Zombie computers 'on the rise'

~~ Don't let you computer become a ZOMBIE !!!!
Use care online, update your anti-virus and spam-ware regularly.
Do not visit stupid websites that load these viruses. ~~~~




Zombie computers 'on the rise'
By Maggie Shiels
Technology Reporter, BBC News, Silicon Valley
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8032886.stm
Page last updated at 09:03 GMT, Wednesday, 6 May 2009 10:03 UK

Twelve million computers have been hijacked by cyber-criminals and detected by security vendor McAfree since January, the firm has said.

It reports there has been a 50% increase in the number of detected so-called "zombie" computers since 2008.

The true number of newly-hijacked PCs is likely to be higher than those detected by McAfee alone.

The figures come as a report from Deloitte said a global approach to cyber-security is needed.

"Doing nothing is not an option," said Deloitte's Greg Pellegrino.

How does the data get stolen from my computer?

~~ TWO Nice articles over at CNET today.
One for those of you
who want to understand how online rip-offs happen.
( Beside the crazy over-charges from our ISPs
for hi-speed bandwidth we never really get.)

And another for those of you who still use P2P file share programs.
Which I really do not any more. Simply too many virus bugs in cyberspace, and too much data on my computer that I value.


http://m.news.com/2166-12_3-10233216-83.html

FAQ: Demystifying ID fraud

http://m.news.com/2166-12_3-10233216-83.html
How does the data get stolen from my computer?
There are many ways sensitive data can be pried out of computer users. In a typical social-engineering phishing attack, a consumer opens an e-mail that looks like it was sent by the consumer's bank, Amazon, PayPal, or some other trusted source. With a bogus excuse, such as suggesting there was a security incident and the user needs to verify his or her account details, the e-mail will prompt the recipient to provide username and password via a link to a Web site that looks legitimate but isn't. The consumer enters the information and continues on, not knowing that the data is now being sent to criminals.
---------------------------------------------------------------------

http://m.news.com/2166-12_3-10233419-38.html

P2P bill could regulate Web browsers, FTP clients

http://m.news.com/2166-12_3-10233419-38.html

May 5, 2009 4:30 AM PDT

news analysis The U.S. House of Representatives has scheduled a hearing Tuesday to examine a bill that would force peer-to-peer applications to provide specific notice to consumers that their files might be shared.


Math buffs awed by Odd Day

SAN FRANCISCO – Prepare to be awed by Odd Day.

For the mathematically challenged, Thursday's date, 5/7/09, is one of only six this century that will feature three consecutive odd numbers.

Numbers lovers say the rare occurrence is an excuse to celebrate.

"The previous stretch of six dates like this started with 1/3/1905 — 13 months after the Wright Brothers' flight," said Ron Gordon, the Redwood City teacher who enthusiastically promotes these numerical holidays, like Square Root Day on 3/3/09.

Gordon is offering a prize of $579 to those who celebrate the date with the most zeal or who get the most people involved in an Odd Celebration.

___

On the Net:

Odd Day: http://www.oddday.net/

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

EU calls on Obama to give up Internet oversight

~~ With the issues of Cyber Security at the forefront now
, do not count on the USA giving in so easily here ~~


EU calls on Obama to give up Internet oversight

Major decisions on Internet made solely by a California-based nonprofit

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30559082/

updated 10:43 a.m. ET, Mon., May 4, 2009

BRUSSELS - A senior European Union official called on President Barack Obama to give up United States' oversight of the Internet.

Major decisions on how the Internet is run are made solely by the California-based nonprofit Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers — which is overseen by the U.S. Commerce Department under an agreement that expires September 30.

US needs 'digital warfare force'

~~ The Issues of Cyber Warfare has really moved
to the forefront the last couple of weeks.

It is a whole new Technopolitcal World. ~~


US needs 'digital warfare force'

960th Network Security Squadron
The US has set up specialised detachments dealing with IT problems

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8033440.stm

The head of America's National Security Agency says that America needs to build a digital warfare force for the future, according to reports.

Lt Gen Keith Alexander, who also heads the Pentagon's new Cyber Command, outlined his views in a report for the House Armed Services subcommittee.

Monday, May 4, 2009

White House takes Web 2.0 leap

~~The Obama White House is redefining how the President

communicates with the American body politic.

Bravo !!!!

May it bring good things !

-----------


White House takes Web 2.0 leap

http://digital.asiaone.com/print/Digital/News/Story/A1Story20090502-138813.html

It launched pages on MySpace and Facebook and

sent its first "tweets" on Twitter. -AFP

Sat, May 02, 2009
AFP

by Chris Lefkow

WASHINGTON, US - The White House took a major leap into the Web 2.0 world, launching pages on social networks MySpace and Facebook and sending its first "tweets" on hot micro-blogging service Twitter.

Content from President Barack Obama's website WhiteHouse.gov is being fed in real time to White House profile pages on MySpace and Facebook and members of the communities can sign up as Facebook "fans" or MySpace "friends."

The White House had more than 60,000 fans on Facebook and more than 8,000 friends on MySpace within a few hours of the pages going online while more than 14,500 people had signed up as "followers" of the White House Twitter stream.

"Technology has profoundly impacted how -- and where -- we all consume information and communicate with one another," the White House said in a blog post titled "WhiteHouse 2.0."

"WhiteHouse.gov is an important part of the administration's effort to use the Internet to reach the public quickly and effectively -- but it isn't the only place," it said, pointing to the new online destinations.