Archive for 2012/07/28

Internet service providers are monitoring their customers, who will be held responsible for all activities on their connection

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Blocking, Copyright, Education / Awareness, Enforcement, Filtering, Illegal File Sharing, New Business Models, Stats / reports

Actually, every online movement always has been either tracked or logged, whether it’s by a provider or advertiser somewhere, but this time providers will be monitoring for illegal downloading or sharing of copyrighted materials. And even if you are not doing the downloading, it could have consequences.

A collaboration called The Center for Copyright Information has organized a plan called the Copyright Alert System to educate the public and cut down online piracy with implementation coming later this year. The group consists of the Motion Picture Association of America, the Recording Industry Association of America and five of the United States’ biggest Internet service providers: AT&T, Cablevision, Comcast, Time Warner Cable and Verizon.

If any illegal downloading activity is found on a user’s Internet protocol address, the user will receive an email saying their account has been used illegally with directions to legal avenues for viewing movies or listening to music. After two warnings, if the activity persists, a third and fourth message will be a pop-up window or landing page requesting a confirmation of receipt. For a fifth infraction an ISP can reduce the user’s Internet speed, force the user to watch an educational video or make the customer call their provider to explain what’s happening. These actions are taken by the ISPs themselves, so each could enforce it differently. Finally, a sixth incident could open the user to be sued. Past lawsuits involving Sony have asked for $10,000 per illegal song or movie.

This new policy puts the IP address holder in blame, rather than the person who actively downloaded the protected content. Anyone attached to the same home or business network uses the same IP address when going out on the Internet. If a household or business has more than one computer, laptop, smartphone or device, they all share the same public IP address.

It will be up to the home or business to determine which machine and which user accessed illegal content.

More:
http://mywebtimes.com/archives/ottawa/display.php?id=459865

Facebook is caught between Wall Street, which wants aggressive ads, and users, who want privacy

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, New Business Models, Privacy / Data Protection, Stats / reports

http://www.wired.com/business/2012/07/facebook-users-vs-wall-street/

Music Labels Won’t Share Pirate Bay Loot With Artists

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Copyright, Education / Awareness, Enforcement, Stats / reports

Have allocated it to IFPI to fund new anti-piracy campaigns

More:
http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-loot-with-artists-120728/

TeamPoison hacker sentenced to six months in prison in connection with cyber crime

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Cybercrime, Education / Awareness, Enforcement, Jurisprudence, Network Security, Privacy / Data Protection, Public Policy, Stats / reports

Junaid Hussain, 17 (5.08.94) of Birmingham, has today, Friday 27 July, been sentenced to six months in prison at Southwark Crown Court.

He had pleaded guilty on Thursday 28 June to:

Conspiracy to cause a public nuisance contrary to Sect 1(1) of the Criminal Law Act 1977 – between 1.1.10 and 14.4.12 within jurisdiction of the Central Criminal Court, he conspired with others to cause a public nuisance. As leader of TeamPoison he was involved in the making of nuisance phone calls to the Anti-Terrorist Hotline which had the effect of preventing legitimate callers getting through;

An offence contrary to Section 1 of the Computer Misuse Act 1990 (unauthorised access to a computer) ((previously reported counts 3 and 4 were compressed into a single count)). This offence relates to the illegal acquisition and publication of Tony Blair’s address book in June 2011 by TeamPoison.

A further offence was left to lie on file.

More:

http://content.met.police.uk/News/Teenager-sentenced-in-connection-with-cyber-crime/1400010374619/1257246745756

More than a third of all Google Android apps host malware

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Cybercrime, Education / Awareness, Enforcement, Network Security, Privacy / Data Protection, Stats / reports

More than a third of all Google Android applications contain some form of malware, according to tests conducted by BT. A security expert for the U.K. telecom service provider said it expects to test apps for other mobile operating systems and find similar results.

“We analyzed more than 1,000 Android applications and found a third compromised with some form of active or dormant malware,” said Jill Knesek, head of the global security practice at BT. “Almost every device is compromised with some kind of malware, although often it’s not clear if that code is active or what it is doing,” she said in a panel discussion at the NetEvents Americas conference here.

More:
http://www.eetimes.com/electronics-news/4391305/More-than-a-third-of-Android-apps-host-malware

US National Security Agency boss asks hackers to make internet more secure

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Cybercrime, Education / Awareness, Enforcement, Network Security, New Business Models, Privacy / Data Protection, Public Policy, Stats / reports

The head of the American government’s secretive National Security Agency has taken the unprecedented step of asking a convention of computer hackers to join him in an effort to make the internet more secure.

In a speech to the 20th annual Def Con gathering in Las Vegas, the four-star general Keith Alexander stressed common ground between US officials and hackers, telling them privacy must be preserved and that they could help by developing new tools.

“You’re going to have to come in and help us,” Alexander told thousands of attendees.

More:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/jul/28/national-security-agency-hackers-internet

One third of people traveling this summer will head off during the Games, choosing to leave the crowds behind

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, Public Policy, Stats / reports

For many who decide to stay closer to home, the Games will be a television-only event. Millions of Britons were disappointed when they didn’t receive Olympic tickets in the country’s lottery. And those tickets that still remain are being sold privately, to corporate sponsors.

“This is an inevitable result of the way the Games are done, primarily for the interest of the rich. The Olympics are the epitome of some of the worst things in the world at the moment – the removal of resources from poor people and giving it to rich people,” said Albert Beale, spokesperson for the Counter-Olympics Network.

It’s a tale of two extremes. While large corporations benefit from the Games, smaller businesses are forbidden from doing so.

Local shops are only allowed to sell licensed Olympic merchandise. Any store found selling unofficial products containing the words “Olympic,” “gold,” or “summer” could face a fine of up to US$31,000.

Obtaining permission to carry licensed merchandise requires developing an account with official sponsors – which simply isn’t an option for local stallholders.

“It’s too much of a risk. We’re a really small business. We can’t open accounts with these huge companies. Adidas wants thousands to open an account. We’d love to, but we’ll make do,” a local stallholder told RT’s Laura Smith.

Other rules that have been met with opposition include forbidding London’s famous black taxis from using traffic lanes designated only for athletes and officials.

More:
http://www.rt.com/news/london-olympics-corporate-sport-2012-198/

Bombshell: Leaked UN Treaty Does Ban Guns

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, Public Policy, Stats / reports

http://www.infowars.com/bombshell-un-gun-treaty-does-ban-guns/

Major Harvard Study Published in Federal Govt Journal Confirms Fluoride Lowers IQ

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, Public Policy, Stats / reports

http://www.infowars.com/major-harvard-study-published-in-federal-govt-journal-confirms-fluoride-lowers-iq/

New Device Turns Eye Movement Into Handwriting

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, New Business Models, Stats / reports, Tech Evolution

http://gizmodo.com/5929598/new-device-turns-eye-movement-into-handwriting

How To Watch Every Second of the Olympics. Cable, No Cable, Pirated Streams, Android Tricks And Subscription Hijacking

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, Stats / reports

http://gizmodo.com/5928992/how-to-watch-every-second-of-the-olympics

Minding your manners when sharing in social media

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, New Business Models, Privacy / Data Protection, Stats / reports, Tech Evolution
  • Don’t share pictures of people unless you’ve asked them if it’s OK or absolutely know they’re fine with it. It’s only polite, especially when you’re not in a public setting.
  • Never share pictures of children, unless their parents have said it’s OK and if the kids themselves are old enough to say they’re fine with it (I’m especially thinking about teenagers here; they might like to be asked). Related: don’t post the names of children unless you’ve asked.
  • Don’t check in to your children’s school, unless you really want the world to know where your kids go to school. Do you? If you’re sharing a picture from a school event, you don’t have to have a location attached to it.
  • Don’t check in to your house, unless you want your home address potentially known to the world.
  • Don’t check in to other people’s homes without asking them.
  • Don’t check other people in to events or places without asking them.
  • Don’t tag people in photos, unless they’ve given permission or you’re certain they won’t have a problem with it. Yes, Google and Facebook would love you to do this and may even prompt you to do so. You don’t work for them.
  • Don’t post pictures of your credit or debit cards. Seriously, people do this!
  • Don’t post your phone number, unless you want it potentially exposed to the world.
  • Don’t share or post things that may get you in trouble with your employer. Know what your workplace social-media policies are. Don’t assume that what you say and do on your personal account won’t somehow get held against you at your current or future job. It all goes on your permanent (social media) record.
  • Don’t share that private post from someone else with the public, without first asking for permission.
  • Don’t assume that anything you share privately will stay private, regardless of your own privacy settings. Once you post, assume it will be public. See also: the point above. Some of your friends won’t think to ask.
  • Be respectful when commenting. Here’s a rule of thumb: Comment as if you were talking to the person face-to-face. It’s astounding how rude and unnecessarily mean people will be online. We’d never tolerate such behavior in person. We shouldn’t tolerate it simply because it happens online.
  • Don’t use social media when you’re out being social in real life. This is a rule I violate all the time! But when I was unplugged recently, I found that it was kind of a relief not to think I needed to share that picture of something cool. I could just, you know, look at it myself and enjoy it more in the moment. There’s always time to share in the future.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-33620_3-57480331-278/minding-your-manners-when-sharing-in-social-media/

NBC Does Not Live Stream Opening Of Olympics. Salesforce’s Marc Benioff tweets a link to a pirate site

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, Stats / reports

It’s something of a tradition for NBC to ensure that the U.S. is even further cut off from reality.

In previous iterations of its Olympics coverage, the network’s insistence on refusing to show events live — favoring instead tape-delayed, saccharine soap opera — put many people off watching at all.

But not enough people, obviously. NBC seemed to believe that, without competition during the summer viewing season, it could create this false programming and people would watch by default, which quite a few did.

This year promised to be different. Every event was to be live-streamed. Oh, except two. The opening and closing ceremonies.

For some strange reason these would not be shown anywhere in the U.S. But that didn’t stop NBC from live-tweeting last night’s opening extravaganza. Yes, it used its tweets to get you all excited about not being able to see it on NBC.

Some might feel that it would have to take a humongous level of half-wittedness to conceive of such a plan.

But NBC’s explanation was full of intelligence.

More:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-57481830-71/nbcolympics-great-opening-show-too-bad-you-cant-see-it/

Google still has Street View WiFi data from United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Switzerland, Austria, and Australia

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, Google, Privacy / Data Protection, Public Policy, Stats / reports

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/07/google-still-has-street-view-wifi-data-from-uk-several-other-countries/

MPAA describes MegaUpload’s Kim Dotcom as a “career criminal” who had grown wealthy stealing the work of others

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Copyright, Education / Awareness, Enforcement, Illegal File Sharing, Litigation, Public Policy, Stats / reports

U.S. Government says it can freeze Mega assets even if case is dismissed. That’s because in the government’s view, the assets are the proceeds of criminal activity and the prosecution against founder Kim Dotcom will still be pending. The fact that the assets are in the name of Megaupload rather than its founder is of no consequence, the government claimed.

Hollywood, at least, seems nervous that Judge O’Grady might buy Megaupload’s argument. In a conference call held Wednesday in advance of today’s hearing, a senior vice president at the Motion Picture Association of America argued that the dismissal of the case against Megaupload would have little practical impact, since the company’s principals would still be facing indictment. And he rejected Kim Dotcom’s efforts to frame the case as a test of Internet freedom, describing Dotcom as a “career criminal” who had grown wealthy stealing the work of others.

More:
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/07/government-we-can-freeze-mega-assets-even-if-case-is-dismissed/

Google filed for summary judgment in the Google Books case against the Authors’ Guild, renewing its argument that the entire project constitutes fair use

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, Google, Litigation, New Business Models, Stats / reports

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/07/google-books-hasnt-cost-authors-a-dime-company-says/

Law firms investigating Zynga for insider stock sell-off

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, Stats / reports

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2012/07/law-firms-investigating-zynga-for-insider-stock-sell-off/

Australian cops tout arrest of man for Bitcoin drug deal

Posted: 2012/07/28 in Education / Awareness, Enforcement, Public Policy, Stats / reports

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/07/australian-cops-tout-arrest-of-man-for-bitcoin-drug-deal/