"Disney World is now requiring all visitors to have their index and middle fingers scanned to gain entrance to the park. This started for season pass holders, but is now required for everyone." From the article: "'I think it's a step in the wrong direction,' Civil Liberties Union spokesman George Crossley said. 'I think it is a step toward collection of personal information on people regardless of what Disney says.'"

source: http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/07/15/2319207&tid=158&tid=186

The fracas over whether Karl Rove, one of President Bush's most trusted advisers, publicly outed an undercover CIA operative highlights the ease with which personal information on virtually anyone can be obtained.

It also points to the need for privacy laws -- and, in this case, national-security laws -- recognizing the harm that can be done with only a few computer keystrokes.

That harm, as a slew of recent security breaches makes clear, can include identity theft, credit card fraud and other invasions of one's personal-data space.

It can also represent a graver danger if the work you do is of interest to terrorists and other enemies of this country.

I found out how significant this threat can be when I attempted to identify the CIA agent in question for myself, based solely on what Rove is known to have told a journalist.

The results were troubling, to say the least.

First, a little background:

The key issue this week has been whether Rove broke the law when he reportedly told a journalist, Matthew Cooper of Time magazine, that the wife of a prominent administration critic works for the CIA in the sensitive field of weapons of mass destruction.

Rove's role was confirmed by an e-mail sent by Cooper to his bureau chief. The e-mail, obtained by Newsweek, concerned former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who had written a 2003 opinion piece challenging one of the White House's main justifications for an invasion of Iraq.

Wilson had been dispatched to Africa by the CIA in late 2002 to investigate claims that Iraq had tried to buy uranium from Niger. He found no evidence to support this allegation. Nevertheless, the claim was included in Bush's 2003 State of the Union speech.

Cooper wrote in his e-mail that he'd been told by Rove that Wilson wasn't sent on the trip by either the CIA director or by Vice President Dick Cheney.

Cooper wrote: "It was, KR said, Wilson's wife, who apparently works at the agency on WMD issues who authorized the trip."

Novak jumps in

Cooper didn't write a story about this right away. But shortly after Cooper's exchange with Rove took place, syndicated columnist Robert Novak did publish a piece about Wilson.

"Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction," Novak wrote. He cited two "senior administration officials" as saying that Plame was responsible for sending her husband to Niger.

According to the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982, it's a federal crime if anyone "as a result of having authorized access to classified information, learns the identity of a covert agent and intentionally discloses any information identifying such covert agent to any individual not authorized to receive classified information."

It's not my place to say whether Rove crossed that line in his discussion with Cooper. But I can say what I was able to do with the information Rove reportedly supplied.

First of all, I knew from published reports that the full name of the author of the critical op-ed piece was Joseph C. Wilson IV. A Google search quickly told me that he was born in 1949.

So I went to ZabaSearch.com, which readers of this space know is a powerful online people-search tool that rapidly combs through public records - - for free.

My first nationwide search for a Joseph C. Wilson born in 1949 turned up too many matches, so I narrowed the search by guessing that he likely lives in Washington, D.C.

Bingo. Now I had his home address. But I didn't know his wife's name.

So I went to the Web site of LexisNexis, a prominent data broker, and did a public-records search for Joseph Wilson in Washington, D.C., subsequently narrowing the search with Wilson's street address. Bingo again.

"Spouse name: Wilson, Valerie E."

For non-subscribers, LexisNexis is available online on a pay-per-search basis. It's also accessible via acquaintances at universities, law schools and a wide variety of private companies.

I did another LexisNexis search for Valerie E. Wilson in Washington, D.C. This confirmed she lives at the same address as Joseph C. Wilson. It also took me the next step.

"Former name: Plame, Valerie E."

I now had the identity of a covert CIA agent (who was using her maiden name as part of her cover as an energy-industry analyst working for a firm called Brewster Jennings & Associates, now known to be a CIA front company).

It took me less than a half-hour to identify her.

I then went back to Google and got a map of Plame's neighborhood and directions to her home. Google also allowed me to study a high-resolution satellite photo of Plame's house.

I could see that the property appears to be in a quiet residential community and looks approachable from all sides. It also offers ready access by car to major thoroughfares.

And I now possess all this information simply because I know (from Karl Rove, via Matt Cooper) that Joseph Wilson's wife "apparently works at the agency on WMD issues."

Little effort required

Rove's questionable judgment aside, this episode underlines how little effort is required in this info-rich age to identify and locate virtually anyone. You don't even need that person's name.

This should alarm anyone who relies on a measure of secrecy for his or her well being, as well as all others who value their privacy.

It also should serve as a wake-up call for legislators that existing privacy and national-security laws haven't kept pace with dazzling improvements in information technology.

The intent of current laws might be to keep certain info under wraps. The reality is that nearly all data are exposed and accessible, there for the taking by anyone with a computer and a small measure of resourcefulness.

With little effort, I pinpointed a working CIA agent. I did so only to make a point.

Can we be sure that the intentions of the next person to commence such a search will be as benign?

source:http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/07/15/BUG0UDO7R31.DTL

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on Wednesday laid out a reorganization plan for the department that includes a new assistant secretary for cybersecurity and telecommunications. This assistant secretary will report to the undersecretary of the Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate, which under the reorganization is now known as the Preparedness Directorate.

The assistant secretary will be responsible for identifying and assessing the vulnerability of critical telecommunications infrastructure and assets. That person also will be called upon to gather critical-infrastructure threat information and lead the national response to cyber and telecommunications attacks, according to information available on Homeland Security's Web site.

Homeland Security's planned reorganization follows Chertoff's multistep review of the department's programs, policies, operations, and structure. Speaking Wednesday at the Ronald Reagan Building in Washington, D.C., Chertoff pointed to IT management as one of his department's six imperatives. Chertoff took over the top position at Homeland Security on Feb. 15.

Homeland Security's decision to create an assistant secretary for cybersecurity and telecommunications is expected to be well received by Congress and IT advocates calling for better use of technology in securing the country's physical and virtual borders. In May, the House of Representatives passed a $34 billion budget for Homeland Security that called for elevating the nation's head cybersecurity official to assistant secretary status.

IT industry representatives were pleased with Wednesday's news. "The plan unveiled by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security serves as a profound step in the right direction, specifically through the establishment of new senior positions with responsibility over cybersecurity and critical infrastructure protection," Robert Holleyman, president and CEO of the Business Software Alliance, said in a statement. BSA is a trade group consisting of hardware and software vendors who seek to influence government policy on a number of technology issues.

The Cyber Security Industry Alliance sees the new position as an important step toward securing the country's critical-information infrastructure. "By adding a position that holds both the resources and authority to effectively lead public-private efforts to harden our nation's IT and communications infrastructure against cyberattacks, DHS has created the foundation needed to move forward with the execution of a comprehensive approach to cybersecurity that will successfully build on public- and private-sector efforts to date," executive director Paul Kurtz said in a statement. Launched in February 2004 by a group of technology providers including Computer Associates, Network Associates, and Symantec, the alliance's mission is to improve cybersecurity through public policy, education, and technology-focused initiatives.

source:http://informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=165702130

Six-month pilot project rolled out to about 9,000 Time Warner customers; 'savvy PC users' here reason S.D. was chosen

In what is billed as a nationwide first for a cable company, Time Warner Cable is letting its customers in Mira Mesa and Tierrasanta watch television over their home computer's high-speed Internet connection.

The pilot project ushers in what some experts believe is the future of TV – television over the Internet.

Ultimately, they predict, Internet protocol television, or IPTV, could deliver more channels, offer custom features, such as local weather or sports scores, and allow viewer interaction.

For now, Broadband TV, as Time Warner calls its service, offers the same 75 channels that are available with its standard Advantage service.

"It's basically like having another outlet for watching TV," said Judy Walsh, president of Time Warner's San Diego division. "It's TV on your PC. It's that simple."

The six-month pilot project was rolled out Friday to 9,000 of Time Warner's customers in the test area who subscribe to both cable television and its Road Runner high-speed Internet service.

To watch television on a computer connected to Time Warner's Road Runner Internet service, customers download and install a media player made for Time Warner by RealPlayer onto their computers. Then, they log on to a special Web site (www.twcbbtv.com) using their cable TV account numbers.

It takes up to seven seconds to connect to a channel. The show that is playing on that channel then streams on the computer screen. Viewers change channels with the click of a mouse.

One challenge for Time Warner was to make sure that the shows air smoothly over the Internet, just as they do on television, as opposed to the jumpy picture that is typical of streaming video.

Bob Jones, vice president of engineering for Time Warner's San Diego division, said the key to high-quality video is keeping the data on the company's private network. While the video travels along the same pipeline as e-mail and Web sites, it never leaves Time Warner's lines.

Walsh said consumers have been asking for such a service.

"People have indicated they want to be able to watch TV on all of the devices in their homes," she said. "This is in response to what people want."

San Diego was chosen as the test market for Broadband TV because "it has a terrific population of savvy PC users," said Peter Stern, executive vice president of product management for Time Warner. "This is the type of service that tests well with more experienced, heavier users of the Internet."

The service is technically and economically feasible because of advancements in technology.

Internet connections have gotten faster. Road Runner in San Diego, for instance, offers download speeds of up to five megabits per second, in which a customer can, on average, download a typical song file in about five seconds.

In addition, video can now be compressed into smaller files without losing quality, allowing more shows to be fed down the same pipeline.

After the service has been tested for six months, Time Warner said it will decide whether to expand it to other customers in San Diego County or even elsewhere in the nation.

The delivery of television shows over the Internet using IPTV technology is a sign of the long-talked-about convergence of the television set and the computer.

"IPTV will really not appear to be IPTV to the consumer because all they will subscribe to is a television service," said Herve Utheza, a digital media industry analyst with the Diffusion Group research firm. "They'll end up choosing between cable, satellite and telecom operators, and maybe, one day, online services to watch television and movies."

Telephone companies are especially eager to deliver television over the Internet to compete with cable TV providers, satellite TV operators and traditional broadcasters.

SBC Communications, the largest telephone company in San Diego County, has embarked on a $4 billion project to offer IPTV video service over its copper wire and fiber-optic lines beginning next year.

With SBC, the TV service will available over television sets equipped with special set-top boxes. No pricing has been set.

SBC plans to offer more than just television shows with its service. The service will allow customers to use their televisions to view photos stored on their computers, spokesman Larry Solomon said. It will provide weather information for their cities and scores of their favorite sports teams. And it will allow customers to record a program from their cell phones or their computers.

On-demand video will also be made available at an additional cost.

One of the keys to the IPTV technology is that instead of sending all the channels to a customer all the time, as is the case with traditional cable, only the channel selected by the customer is transmitted, saving on bandwidth.

SBC and others say that means an IPTV service can deliver far more channels to a customer.

"Because it's an IP (Internet protocol) network, the possibilities are limitless," Solomon said. "Television viewing has not progressed very much in the last 10 years. We're going to revolutionize the video experience in the home."

The competition between cable and telephone companies is fierce, especially now that cable companies are offering phone service. IPTV is the next battleground for the two industries.

"The telephone companies have been crowing about their plans with regard to IPTV," said Stern, the Time Warner executive vice president. "Our experience in delivering multichannel television has actually enabled us to deliver this service before any of the phone companies."

SBC's Solomon said his company intends to compete as aggressively in television service as the cable companies have in the phone business.

"We're going to turn the tables around and become a very aggressive competitor in the video business," Solomon said. "And the winner is going to be the consumer."

Worldwide, about 1 million households watch TV delivered via Internet technology, according to a report by the Diffusion Group.

By 2010, the report predicts that 14 million households will subscribe to a telephone company's IPTV service, 6.5 million will receive IPTV from a cable or Internet service, and 17 million households will subscribe to it via a satellite company.

Smaller telephone companies in the United States have already deployed IPTV.

Elsewhere, television over the Internet is taking hold in France, Italy, Great Britain, Spain, Hong Kong and Korea, analyst Utheza said.

In San Diego, Cox Communications, the county's largest cable provider, this year launched a subscription service for $14.95 a month that allows customers to watch live Major League Baseball games over its high-speed Internet connections.

Later this year, Cox plans to launch a new feature that will marry the Internet with TV by allowing customers in San Diego County to surf the Web and check their e-mail on the television. It will be free to digital cable subscribers.

source:http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20050713/news_1b13iptv.html

"After the speculation on earlier this week, the Working Group of Internet Governance (aka the United Nations attempt to govern the Internet) has just released their much anticipated report. News coverage and a helpful summary point to the four options on the table and the likely outcome in the months leading up to a final conference in Tunisia in November."

source:http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/07/15/0654206&tid=95&tid=162&tid=17

Fujitsu today announced their joint development of the world's first film substrate-based bendable color electronic paper with an image memory function. The new electronic paper features vivid color images that are unaffected even when the screen is bent, and features an image memory function that enables continuous display of the same image without the need for electricity. The thin and flexible electronic paper uses very low power to change screen images, thereby making it ideal for displaying information or advertisements in public areas as a type of new electronic media that can be handled as easily as paper. The jointly developed electronic paper will be showcased at Fujitsu Forum 2005, to be held July 14 and 15 at Tokyo International Forum.

Electronic paper offers all of the same characteristics of paper such as being thin, flexible, and lightweight. It also boasts low power consumption in that it does not require electricity except during screen image changes, making electronic paper especially suited for advertisements or information bulletins in public places for which paper is currently used. Electronic paper is especially convenient for use on curved surfaces, such as columns. In addition, electronic paper can be conveniently used in conjunction with mobile devices as an easy-to-read and portable display device.

Numerous R&D efforts are in progress in the field of electronic paper. However, thus far there had been no color electronic paper available that uses flexible film substrate capable of being bent without affecting the screen image and which features a memory function.

No electricity required for continuous display, minimal power consumption when changing screen image

• Features an image memory function that enables continuous display of the same image even when electricity is turned off therefore no electricity is required for continuous display.
  
• Screen image can be changed using minimal electricity consumption equivalent to the weak radiowaves used in contactless IC cards.
  
• Fujitsu's new technology significantly conserves energy by consuming only one one-hundredth to one ten-thousandth the energy of conventional display technologies.

High-level display performance

• The new electronic paper is constructed of three displaying layers - red, blue, and green. Since no color filters or polarizing layers are required, it features color that is significantly more vivid than conventional reflective-type LCDs.
  
• Proprietary Fujitsu technology ensures that screen color is unaffected even when the screen is bent or pressed with fingers.
  
• Because the screen image does not require repetitive updates to be maintained, the screen does not flicker.

Flexible film substrate

• The film substrate employed in Fujitsu's new electronic paper can be flexibly bent and thus significantly widens the range of potential applications.

Anticipated Applications
By leveraging the features of this technology, a wide variety of applications can be envisioned for Fujitsu's new electronic paper as a digital medium that can be handled like paper. Following are some examples:

Transit advertising on trains, information displays on curved surfaces, and other public display applications that could take advantage of its light weight and flexibility. Information displayed can be updated based on the time of day, enabling more effective advertising and informational signage.

Electronic shelf display tags, point-of-purchase displays, restaurant menus, and other in-store uses. Can also be used for pricing displays or product information displays that stand out in full color and can be readily updated.
Operating manuals, work orders, and other short-term information displays, facilitating the trend toward paperless offices or factories.

Text or images from mobile phones or other mobile devices can be transferred wirelessly to larger displays for easy viewing.

Use in the home can offer more convenient digital-media devices that can be carried from room to room.


Future Developments
Fujitsu will conduct test marketing and practical-use testing, targeting commercialization within fiscal 2006 (April 2006 to March 2007) to promote field innovation using its new electronic paper.


Figure 1. World's first film substrate-based bendable color electronic paper with image memory function (shown being bent)


Figure 2. World's first film substrate-based bendable color electronic paper with image memory function (color example)

source:http://www.overclockersclub.com/?read=2136713

"CNN is reporting that a planet has been discovered in a solar system with 3 suns. The observation brings into doubt the theory stating that planets form from the dust orbiting around a single sun. The discovery also resulted in a new method of searching for extrasolar planets-- until now most searching focused only on single-sun systems."

source:http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/07/15/0415230&tid=160&tid=14

RIP old fiend...

By BIG BLUE has hammered the final nails into OS/2's coffin. It said that all sales of OS/2 will end on the 23rd of December this year, and support for the pre-emptive multitasking operating system will end on the 31st December 2006.

Not bad, it lived 20 years - but no one could ever say it had a peaceful childhood. From the days of OS/2 Presentation Manager through its switch to Warp, the OS was always be-devilled by Microsoft, which seemed to have its own agenda.

It looks like it's gone then, unless OS/2 is a bit like a corpse in an Edgar Allen Poe novel, and it's being buried while it's still alive. And it will wake up screaming in its coffin shouting "Warp! Warp!".

It's doubly ironic that IBM has rather kindly posted a migration page for existing OS/2 users, so that they can easily move to Linux.

Not that IBM is likely to move to Linux from Windows any time soon now, especially given the "Windows vouchers" it got as a result of a court settlement with the Vole.

So, OS/2. May you rest in peace. And please stop scratching the coffin from the inside. It upsets the bereaved



source:http://theinquirer.net/?article=24625

In 1798 Henry Cavendish, known for his scientific brilliance and terrible fear of women, developed a system for calculating the gravitational constant (G) by measuring the gravitational attraction between two small spheres. In essence, he was able to "weigh the earth" by comparing the relationship between two known objects.

This got to thinking about weighing the internet -- calculating the number of users online. Since I am by no means a brilliant scientist and am horribly attracted to women everywhere, there were obviously roadblocks in my path that Henry did not have to deal with.

Want to know how many internet users there are? Curious about how many people read a site like Slashdot every day? Read on!

Tools
Alexa has done a nice job collecting the browsing statistics for a sizeable sample of internet users. It’s not a perfect sample, as it relies on a browser plugin that requires a voluntary install, but it’s about as good a sample as is available.

Using Alexa, you can find the percentage of internet users that visited a particular site on a particular day. If we know the actual number of visitors that come to a particular site, and compare this with the Alexa data, we can extrapolate the total number of users on the internet for that day.

Reference Data
Now, measuring the gravitational attraction between relatively small masses is very difficult, due to the fact that the actual gravitational force between tiny objects is infinitesimal. The larger the mass, the more measurable it's gravitational effect. In other words, Cavendish needed some really large balls to weigh the earth. 350 pound balls, to be precise.

There are some similarities, here, to weighing the internet. Alexa data is only really valid for the top 100,000 sites, so you need the stats for a relatively large site to even attempt to make a measurement. Not a lot of sites in the top 100,000 are too keen about divulging their stats. This kind of information is what you might call "shock value bragging material," so it’s typically saved for special introductions and dinner party conversations. So when Vince and Eliot were podcasting about the number of daily hackaday viewers, I realized we now have the missing piece of the puzzle.

Results
The two of them seemed to be in a bit of a disagreement as to the number of page hits hackaday receives daily, with Eliot figuring 65k and Vince figuring 80k. Assuming they both were making a reasonable estimate, I’m going to average that to a whopping 72,500 page hits a day on hackaday.

This was sometime around July 8th. According to Alexa, around that same time they had a reach of about 110 people per million users. On average, people who visited hackaday viewed roughly 1.4 pages.

So we can figure out the number of people who view hackaday by dividing 72,500 by 1.4, which gives us roughly 51,800 daily viewers. The 110 per million figure tells us that they get about .011 percent of the internet’s viewers. 51,800 divided by .00011 leaves us with a result of about 471 million internet users.

With this knowlege, you can easily estimate the traffic to other sites. If we go by the 471 million estimate, Slashdot gets a whopping 380,000 daily readers.

A Perplexing Conclusion
Unless my math is wrong, the result is way off from the 880+ million users Nielsen/NetRatings reports. Even if we go with Vince’s 80k/day estimate, that still leaves us with only 519 million users. It could be that the Alexa reach is exaggerated due to hackaday readers having the Alexa toolbar installed more than average, but I highly doubt that. I ran the numbers with BlogCadre (a statistically much smaller sample) from when we got boingboinged and it came out similarly, around 520 million users.

It would appear that either Nielsen is pretty inflated, or the Alexa toolbar is unavailable to a very large population of people -- a population that disproportionately doesn't read hackaday when compared to the population the toolbar is exposed to.

Cavendish’s measurement with the 350 pound lead spheres was so accurate that it stood for over a century. It had only a 1% error. It makes me jealous.

But who is off? Alexa? Nielsen? Both? Is hackaday still not a large enough site to produce statistically valid results? Are the available web use statistics really that inaccurate? I’m looking forward to your comments.

source:http://www.blogcadre.com/blog/jason_striegel/weighing_the_internet_2005_07_13_03_37_07

Optimus keyboard

Side view Every key of the Optimus keyboard is a stand-alone display showing exactly what it is controlling at this very moment. “Enter” key is big in size and nearly square in form Additional block of keys on the left is meant for switching between programs or modes Optimus is good for any layouts—Cyrillic, Ancient Greek, Georgian, Arabian—and so on to infinity: notes, numerals, special symbols, HTML codes, mathematical functions.

English lower-case	Russian upper-case
Photoshop	Quake

Patents pending.

There is little to choose between Microsoft and Linux in terms of operating system security, according to experts, but misleading figures and surveys are muddying the waters for IT managers evaluating the platforms.

Graham Titterington, principal analyst at Ovum, told vnunet.com that, while in security terms the gap between Linux and Microsoft had shortened, Linux had the edge.

However, he suggested that the mass of statistics put out by both sides was obfuscating the issue.

"A couple of years ago Linux was without doubt more secure than Windows, but things have changed a lot," said Titterington.

"My hunch would be that Linux still has the edge but it's difficult to tell with all this misleading information being pumped out.

"Just doing a head count of vulnerabilities is useless, for example, if you're not grading the seriousness of the vulnerabilities."

He added that Microsoft had made real progress on security in the past two years, but that the increasing number of Linux enthusiasts coming into the market would help the open source alternative in the long run.

John Engates, chief technology officer at managed hosting company Rackspace, which offers both Linux and Windows hosted servers, said: "If you think about where you get Linux talent it's in the younger generation.

"Linux has a slight advantage in that computer science students are learning it, but Microsoft has made life easier for non-techies, particularly with its improved patches."

Engates added that his company manages 13,000 servers, roughly half of which are open source and half Microsoft. He claims to see little difference between the security on either platform.

source:http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2139790/surveys-useless-security