I can't believe that came from your mouth!
Archive for February, 2006
Katrina Victims Trapped by Blizzard of ’06
Feb 13th
As millions began the week by shovelling snow off their sidewalks, some families, displaced by Hurricane Katrina, and now trapped by the snows of the blizzard of 2006, began their week with a call for Federal aid that never showed up.
“We called the Red Cross and FEMA, asking for a helicopter ride or a snowblower, and they flat-out refused our requests!” exclaimed Sharonda Brown, former resident of New Orleans.
“Families are stranded in their homes with no way to get out,” said an angry Kanye West during a break while he was shooting a new mucic video that depicted him as Jesus Christ. “This is clearly George Bush’s fault.”
Out of the three dozen families that had been relocated to suburban Washington DC hotels and shelters, only one family had a snow shovel that could be used to get them down their driveway and to freedom. “We come from the south. We have never seen no snow like this,” said LeBron Washington, a former resident of New Orleans’ Ninth Ward. “Now I’m stranded in this house, with no way to get to the store or even to the Bus Stop so I can go look for work.”
There were early reports of cannibalism, rape and at least one beheading in the homes of the trapped victims, but these reports have not been substantiated.
The Bush Administration, despite knowing about the pending snow storm for two days, failed to deploy a single Homeland Security Specialist to dig these Katrina victims from their snowy tombs.
The office of Homeland Security Director Michael Chertoff declined comment. It is not kown at this time whether or not Democrat Senators will call for hearings, although House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi commented, “This is just the latest proof that this administration is filled with scandal and cronyism.”
Pelosi then called for an immediate cash assistance grant to those victims stranded by the 2006 blizzard in the amount of Two Thousand dollars.
All is not lost for those families trapped and suffering due to the neglect of the Bush Administration and its mismanagement of the Blizzard Crisis of 2006. Sean Penn recently purchased one dozen Huskies from PetSmart, and is currently working on building a hand-made dog sled. “If I can manage to get these dogs and this sled on an airplane, I will fly to Washington and mush these dogs to the rescue of George Bush’s victims,” he quietly averred.
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Loading ...Company Creates “Crash Test Dummy” for the Web
Feb 13th
Don’t know why no one really thought of this before. A company has created a series of automated bots that surf the net, download any free software offerred, fill out web forms with unique email addresses, all in an attempt to find out which sites are safe, and which sites will infect users with spam, spyware and trojans.
They call the bot a “HoneyMonkey.” This is akin to a “honeypot” which is a fake system intended to get hacked so the observers can study the techniques of hackers, and a “honeynet” which is a network that is also designed to get hacked. A “HoneyMonkey” is a fake user, designed to get screwed over by bad websites in order to categorize the malware on the sites.
From SecurityFocus:
SAN FRANCISCO — File-sharing software that installs adware, Web sites that attempt to compromise a visitor’s computer, and free downloads that install a host of other unwanted software — the Web has become a confusing, and sometimes dangerous, place for the average home user.
Tom Pinckney, vice president of engineering and co-founder, SiteAdvisor A group of graduates from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) aim to change that by crawling the Web with hundreds, and soon thousands, of virtual computers that detect which Web sites attempt to download software to a visitor’s computer and whether giving out an e-mail address during registration can lead to an avalanche of spam.
“We put a robot ‘you’ in first, and then you can see if it comes out with a bunch of arrows stuck in it,” Pinckney said. “By using virtual yous, we end up measuring behaviors in a more holistic approach–creating a list of sites that are good and a list of sites that have dubious behavior.”
The service builds on research into data collected through legions of computers that automatically browse the Internet, downloading free programs and filling out forms. Microsoft has used such client-side honeypots, which the software giant’s researchers call honeymonkeys, to browse the riskier side of the Web for servers that use zero-day exploits against visitors. The University of Washington used similar techniques to survey the Web and find that one in twenty executables on the Internet contain spyware.
SiteAdvisor wanted to take the model further and so created virtual computers that acted as if they were the most permissive users–downloading any offered program and entering in uniquely identifiable e-mail addresses into any forms. The result is that the service can keep track of the consequences of visiting a site and giving that site information. So far, the company’s browsing automatons–virtual Windows machines running on Linux computers–have browsed more than 1.6 million Web sites.
The company intends to offer a free service to consumers and charge for a premium version of the service to make money.
“If your car had an EULA 20 pages long that allowed the manufacturer to wallpaper your house in Exxon ads, would you go for that?” he asked. “That is what these sites are trying to do to our computers.”
“Because there are some bad screensaver sites out there, no one is downloading free screensavers anymore,” he said. “This could help the good sites.”
If this type of rating system catches on, sites that host questionable logic or sypware will be forced to clean up their acts. And in the long run, this type of protection will be good for the whole internet community. Of course, SiteAdvisor will likely be gobbled up by one of the big AV companies before long and bundled in one of their comprehensive offerings. Better yet, such a service may be used by a portal company such as AOL or Earthlink.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...Update: Credit Card Investigation Involves Walmart
Feb 12th
In a post yesterday, I guessed that Walmart may be involved somehow in a current investigation into the theft of ATM cards. CNET provides an update today which indeed shows that Walmart is involved, as is OfficeMax.
From CNET here:
Sources now say that the case might involve two separate retail chains–one which has ackowledged a problem and another whose possible role is uncertain.
After receiving a call from CNET News.com about the investigation into the 200,000 canceled credit cards, a Wal-Mart media representative refused to answer questions but called attention to a statement released by the company on Dec. 2, 2005. In the statement, Wal-Mart acknowledged that credit cards used by some customers who bought gas at the company’s Sam’s Club stations between Sept. 21, 2005, and Oct. 2, 2005, were compromised. Many Sam’s Clubs also accept debit cards.
“The investigation began when the credit card issuers reported that some cardholders were reporting fraudulent charges on their statements,” Wal-Mart said in its press release. “It is still in its preliminary stages, with no determination on how the data was improperly obtained.”
But the trail doesn’t end with Wal-Mart, said sources close to the investigation. As investigators began to look into the recent rash of unauthorized charges, they found that a large number of people whose debit cards were compromised had one thing in common: they previously had shopped at office-supply chain OfficeMax, said a banking source familiar with the case. Two law enforcement sources also said OfficeMax is part of the investigation but did not provide details.
“We have not suffered any security breach to our knowledge,” OfficeMax spokesman William Bonner said Friday.
According to one banking official close to the case, OfficeMax has been queried by at least one financial institution about the matter.
“This is why we don’t reveal the names to the public,” said the banking official who requested anonymity. “We’re not sure which customers may have been ripped off in the Wal-Mart deal or whether OfficeMax was the problem.”
The other part of my post dealt with the speculation that terrorist groups could be involved. Nope, it looks like it is still hacker gangs that are using the stolen data.
The credit union told customers that the fraud resulted in “counterfeit cards being made and used internationally.” Golden 1 told the Bee that it closed accounts after discovering unauthorized withdrawals at ATMs in Great Britain, Russia and South Korea. Golden 1 also said that not all the debit cards cancelled had unauthorized withdrawals on them, but all were used at an unidentified Sacramento business in the fall of 2005.
Someone working for that merchant is suspected of pilfering account and personal identity numbers from the cards, the Bee reported.
So hacker gangs continue to use credit cards and personal information as currency on the internet. Hackers exchange this information for services, such as exploit code, denial of service attacks, passwords to botnets and more.
And if teenager hacker gangs can use stolen identities to finance their shenanigans, how easy would it be for terrorist groups to do the same?
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...Security Breach Leads to Cancelled Bank Cards
Feb 11th
The FBI is on a case dealing with a probable security breach that has led to the compromise of hundreds of bank accounts. Was the stolen cash used against the US by terrorist organizations? From CNET here:
A data security breach that has spurred at least two large banks to cancel thousands of customer debit cards appears to be connected to an older ongoing investigation in Sacramento, the FBI said Friday.
Scores of Bank of America and Washington Mutual customers have received notifications from the banks that their debit cards were cancelled because of a breach at a “third-party” establishment. In interviews with CNET News.com, neither bank would disclose the name of the unidentified company.
However, law enforcement and banking sources, who asked for anonymity, told CNET News.com that the unidentified business was one of the big-box retailers.
Another law enforcement official, FBI Special Agent John Cauthen, said the bureau is part of a joint investigation into the matter along with the Secret Service.
Cauthen said the FBI believes the case is tied to a security breach first reported in The Sacramento Bee last November. In that case, the Golden 1 Credit Union canceled about 1,500 debit cards after being alerted to possible fraud in the Sacramento area.
The credit union told customers that the fraud resulted in “counterfeit cards being made and used internationally.” Golden 1 also said that not all the debit cards cancelled had unauthorized withdrawals on them, but all were used at an unidentified Sacramento business in the fall of 2005.
Someone working for that merchant is suspected of pilfering account and PIN numbers from the cards, the Bee reported.
In a phone interview, Cauthen said the FBI and Secret Service are “working what appears to be the same debit-card case.”
News of a wider problem arose this week when The San Francisco Chronicle wrote that Bank of America had begun canceling numerous debit cards. On Friday, the paper reported that as many as 200,000 debit-card holders could be affected.
Replacing the cards likely will cost the bank millions, as replacing debit cards costs about $20 apiece, according to Dan Clements, CEO of CardCops.com, an identity theft watchdog group.
“I’ve not seen debit cards stolen like this,” Clements said. “Usually it’s a combination of credit and debit cards…this is a large hack, no question about it. Quite frankly, this is the first piece of the puzzle hackers need to commit full-blown identity theft on consumers.”
The past year has seen some large credit card heists. In June, an estimated 40 million credit cards were exposed when hackers penetrated the online defenses of CardSystems Solutions, a payment-processing company.
I’m going to guess that BestBuy or Walmart hired some thief for the Christmas Rush, and the thief used a card reader to sap the numbers of Debit Cards. Why debit cards and not credit cards? Probably for the ready accessibility for cash. The article notes that the cards were being used overseas.
Identity theft is a huge concern, and anyone who has been a victim could tell of the nightmare of trying to clean up their credit history once it has been tampered with. The biggest game on the internet for theft now is phishing and identity theft, which has been run by the Russian mafia and smaller organized crime bands.
A major concern at DHS is the belief that, if identity theft is easy for small-time crooks and organized crime, it is only a matter of time before terrorist organizations get in on the act as well. Since the US has frozen many of the assets of terrorist organizations, they have to come up with cash somewhere. In Islam’s quest for jihad, how sweet it must be to use stolen american cash against us infedels!
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...DHS Conducts “Cyber Storm”
Feb 10th
The National Cyber Security Division (NCSD) just completed its simulations today, running attack scenarios against common internet services and specifically, how it deals with the National Critical Infrastructure, like banking, power, chemical and other industries.
Such exercises are designed to determine the survivability of the critical infrastructure, but to me, the most important aspect of this type of simulation is the practice in communicating with the various players in the Cyber Field, such as Information Sharing and Analysis centers (ISACS) and key commercial players such as Managed Security Services Providers. We will need to wait for the full report to see how well everyone fared with their communication. From the AP here:
WASHINGTON – The government concluded its “Cyber Storm” wargame Friday, its biggest-ever exercise to test how it would respond to devastating attacks over the Internet from anti-globalization activists, underground hackers and bloggers.
Bloggers?
Participants confirmed parts of the worldwide simulation challenged government officials and industry executives to respond to deliberate misinformation campaigns and activist calls by Internet bloggers, online diarists whose “Web logs” include political rantings and musings about current events.
The Internet survived, even against fictional abuses against the world’s computers on a scale typical for Fox’s popular “24″ television series. Experts depicted hackers who shut down electricity in 10 states, failures in vital systems for online banking and retail sales, infected discs mistakenly distributed by commercial software companies and critical flaws discovered in core Internet technology.
Some mock attacks were aimed at causing a “significant cyber disruption” that could seriously damage energy, transportation and health care industries and undermine public confidence, said George Foresman, an undersecretary at the Homeland Security Department.
It may be interesting to note that Blogging played such a significant role in the exercise. In a time of warfare, sources of information (and disinformation) are fair game as targets of war. I remember how the American Version Website of Al-Jazeera disappeared off of the internet due to DDoS shortly after 9-11. The site was hosted at an American ISP, and there was evidence of attack packets on the internet that targeted the site and crushed its availability online. Now was this attack from pissed off American civilian hackers that did not like Arab-Owned disinformation websites? Or was this evidence of a cyber attack by the military? If it is the latter, it means that the military or an intelligence service will easily take down sites as part of a coordinated information warfare tactic.
It was also noted that the “Internet Survived.” This basically means that the GTLD root DNS servers managed to survive the attacks. There may be massive power outages and no one can use the internet from home, but the services will be there when the chaos of the national or regional incident is resolved and power is restored.
More from Homeland Security here.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...Maybe he Should Buy a Toyota?
Feb 9th
An idiot Theater manager in Miami Beach, FL bought a Ford Escape. Apparantly he didnt get the financing or the undercoating he wanted. What does he do? He drives his car throught the showroom, sets it ablaze, and does over a million dollars worth of damage to the property. From the Miami Herald:
Gerald Georgettis apparently thought he got a raw deal on a new car.
So he plowed the Ford Escape he didn’t want through the glass showroom, poured gasoline on it and set the North Dade Metro Ford dealership ablaze, Miami-Dade police said Sunday.
He caused nearly a million dollars in damage, scorching around a dozen cars, including a rare Ford GT Heritage, fire officials said.
Georgettis, 56, a supervisor with the city of North Miami Beach, walked away from the dealership Saturday afternoon as if nothing had happened, witnesses said.
Police caught up with him a few blocks away from the dealership at 9000 NW Seventh Ave. He was arrested without incident. Police charged him with first-degree arson, a felony, and with felony criminal mischief. He posted a $1,500 bond on Sunday.
Those who know Georgettis were shocked at his apparent act of buyer’s rage.
North Miami Beach Mayor Raymond F. Marin was stunned to hear Georgettis, whose duties include managing the city’s Jules Littman Performing Arts Theater, could do such a thing.
The incident played out on a busy Saturday afternoon at the dealership. According to Miami-Dade Police, Georgettis was fuming over the price he paid, a new one goes for about $20,000 and it’s unknown what price he paid for a new beige Ford Escape SUV. On Saturday he went back to the dealership. It’s unclear what he was told, but he was angered with the final agreement.
He calmly got into the car and drove it through the windows, sending glass shattering everywhere. He then doused gasoline or a flammable fluid on the Escape and other cars and struck a match.
Georgettis, wearing a bright orange shirt and khaki shorts, was calm and strolled away.
The fire spread throughout the dealership and destroyed cars, computers and paperwork. Among the cars damaged was a rare baby blue 2006 Ford GT ”Heritage,” a limited edition model of only
250249 made that sells for $150,000.
So what does Georgettis do when he makes bail? Apparantly, he began to worry about how he was going to pay for his damages. So he goes to Dulles Airport in VA, hops a flight to Los Angeles, and somehow, manages to commit suicide in the cramped lavatory. From the Reuters online:
DENVER (Reuters) – A Florida man hanged himself in mid-flight aboard a United Airlines plane after being accused of arson at a Miami car dealership, police said on Thursday.
Denver police spokesman Sonny Jackson said Flight 209 from Washington to Los Angeles was diverted to Denver on Wednesday after the body of Gerald Georgettis was discovered hanging in the jet’s lavatory.
“All signs indicate that this was a suicide,” Jackson said.
I can barely manage to turn around in one of those lavatories. How was it that this man was able to hang himself? He must have been a little man. Its pretty sad that Georgettis managed to inconvenience so many other people before he went by diverting the flight and frightening the other passengers on the flight. As if his temper tantrum at a Car Dealership wasn’t designed to garner enough attention, he had to off himself in a manner to garner lots of attention too.
Condolences to his family, who will likely have to help pay for the damages for the dealership out of the man’s life insurance.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...Stupid Waitress Mails Condom Bombs
Feb 8th
What is up with all of the violence in the Boston Region? First a psycho goes on a rampage in a gay bar and now an idiot stripper-wannabe mailed rubbers filled with an explosive mixture to various places because she hates men!
From the AP here:
BOSTON – A former strip club waitress mailed condoms filled with a potentially explosive mixture to a television station, strip clubs and other places, saying she was tired of being mistreated by men, according to court documents.
In FBI documents unsealed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Boston, Kimberly Lynn Dasilva, 40, said she “couldn’t take it anymore.”
None of the condoms exploded. They each contained a mixture of drain-cleaning detergent and gasoline, which could explode when combined, authorities said. Dasilva told investigators she did not think they would explode.
On Sept. 21, a suspicious package arrived at the Bridgewater State College admissions office, according to two FBI affidavits. When it was discovered that fluid had leaked from the package, the building was evacuated and the State Police Bomb Squad was called in. A note inside the package said “Boom.”
Five more packages containing condoms filled with Drano and gasoline were found the next day at the Brockton postal annex, according to the FBI affidavits. They were addressed to Boston television station WFXT, Boston radio station WXKS-FM, the Outlaws motorcycle club in Taunton, and two strip clubs Alex’s in Stoughton and The Foxy Lady in Brockton.
Dasilva, a single mother of two teenagers who used to work at Alex’s and The Foxy Lady, was arrested Friday night after FBI agents and state police troopers raided her home and found letters hidden in the ceiling tiles of her bedroom that allegedly linked her to the mailings.
On Monday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Robert B. Collings released her on a $10,000 unsecured bond and scheduled a hearing in the case for Feb. 23.
So a single mom, who has to serve horny guys drinks while they stare at strippers got tired of being mistreated by men? That’s like working at a 7-11 and getting tired of selling Big Gulps! This Kimberly DaSilva is pathetic and should be locked away for a long time. Sending mail bombs may have gone out of style with the Unibomber, but in this day and age of post-9-11, such actions cannot and should not be taken lightly. Even if she is a mom, works a dead end job and thinks the world has been so unfair and mean to her.
Not only does she suck at hiding evidence, she can’t mix her explosives right either.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...Chickens in The News!
Feb 7th
I can’t believe this is a news story. But I have been to Arkadelphia, Arkansas, and it has a Sonics, a Waffle House and a Cracker Barrel. Oh yeah, a whole bunch of hick white folk too! From the AP here:
ARKADELPHIA, Ark. – Sometimes a chicken does have lips, just sometimes not her own. Marian Morris saved her brother’s exotic chicken, Boo Boo, by administering “mouth-to-beak” resuscitation on the fowl after it was found floating face down in the family’s pond.
Morris, a retired nurse, said she hadn’t had any practice with CPR in years, but that she was interested to see if she “still had it.”
“I breathed into its beak, and its dad-gum eyes popped open,” Morris said. “I breathed into its beak again, and its eyes popped open again. “I said, ‘I think this chicken’s alive now. Keep it warm.’”
Morris said she was pleased to find that the bird she saved was an “exotic,” and not just an ordinary chicken.
The chicken is called Boo Boo, because she is easily frightened. The family thought Boo Boo was startled and flopped into the pond.
You know, Arkadelphia is in a dry county. That means no Alkie-hol. When you don’t drink, I suppose resuscitating chickens is the next best thing.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...Microsoft Unveils Paid Security Service
Feb 7th
Back in 2003, Microsoft purchased a Romanian Anti-virus company called GeCAD. When that happened, AV companies like Symantec, McAffee and Computer Associates started quaking in their boots. It showed too. The traditional AV companies went on buying sprees, acquiring other security companies in an attempt to shore up traditional AV sales with other offerings, such as backup software, anti-spyware, mail filtering, and others.
Microsoft first used Giant Software for its anti-spyware platform. And it is a fabulous product too. Its free, and its more functional than any other spyware detection and elimination program. Now it looks like Microsoft will be releasing an AV platform too. It won’t be free, but the traditional AV companies just let out a collective “Oh No!” From the AP here:
SEATTLE – A new security service from Microsoft Corp. will charge users $49.95 per year to better protect its Windows operating system from spyware, viruses and other Internet attacks.
Microsoft plans to release the product in early June.
Called Windows OneCare Live, the subscription service will compete with security products made by traditional Microsoft partners, including Symantec Corp. and McAfee Inc. ? although the software giant insists that its aim is not to run those companies out of business.
Ryan Hamlin, general manager of Microsoft’s Technology Care and Safety Group, said Microsoft is less concerned with converting people already using other products. Instead, Hamlin says Microsoft’s goal is to provide protection for users who don’t have any added or up-to-date security ? a group that Microsoft estimates comprises 70 percent of consumer users.
“There’s plenty of room here, kind of, for all of us,” Hamlin said.
OneCare, which is already available for free in test form, aims to protect people running the most recent version of Windows against Internet attacks and intrusive spyware. It also promises to provide regular tuneups to help keep computers running smoothly, and offers users a way to back up and restore data.
The system will automatically update with the latest protections and occasionally add new features, Hamlin said.
Anyone who signs up for the test by April 30 can buy the paid service for just $19.95 per year.
The subscription fee is for up to three personal computers.
I have long been a supporter of Microsoft products, and I think this is a good move for the company. Many detractors will bemoan the fact that MS is about to run many of the AV companies out of business. But I say its about time that Microsoft will take such an active role in keeping its product up-to-date and secure. My only complaint is that this is not FREE.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...Mayor Nagin to Sell New Orleans Back to French
Feb 6th
Well, almost. Despite all of the money pouring into New Orleans to fix the city that is below sea level, Mayor Ray “Chocolate City” Nagin is telling foreign governments that they should help out by fixing up whole neighborhoods. From Reuters here:
NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) – Shortcomings in aid from the U.S. government are making New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin look to other nations for help in rebuilding his hurricane-damaged city.
Nagin, who has hosted a steady stream of foreign dignitaries since Hurricane Katrina hit in late August, says he may seek international assistance because U.S. aid has not been sufficient to get the city back on its feet.
“I know we had a little disappointment earlier with some signals we’re getting from Washington but the international community may be able to fill the gap,” Nagin said when a delegation of French government and business officials passed through on Friday to explore potential business partnerships.
Jordan’s King Abdullah also visited New Orleans on Friday and Nagin said he would encourage foreign interests to help redevelop some of the areas hardest hit by the storm.
“France can take Treme. The king of Jordan can take the Lower Ninth Ward,” he said, referring to two of the city’s neighborhoods.
The Bush administration has pledged billions of dollars to Katrina victims but five months after the storm, New Orleans remains largely in ruins.
Nagin said his message to President George W. Bush would be that the federal government needs to refocus on the devastated area.
“We need your undivided attention over the next six months,” he said. “We need backup. We need for you to make the words that you spoke in Jackson Square a reality.”
Nagin was referring to the president’s September 15 address to the nation from New Orleans, in which he pledged “we will do what it takes, we will stay as long as it takes” to rebuild.
French Transport Minister Dominique Perben, leading the French delegation to a city that was founded by France in 1718, said, “This catastrophe has deeply upset the French people and the French government.”
France, Perben said through a translator, “wants to be a long-term partner for Louisiana and New Orleans.”
So after buying New Orleans and the Louisiana Territory from France, Nagin is set to give a portion of it back to France in exchange for aid and the chance to make President Bush look like he doesnt care about blacks, the NO Saints, or whoever else still lives down there. But what makes Nagin think that King Abdullah would want the crappy 9th Ward?
And if this is indeed a Chocolate City, maybe the Swiss will help out the city by supplying some fine nougat to the French Quarter. What with all of the chocolate and nuts, some nougat injection would turn the place into a giant Snickers Bar.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...MySpace Gay Axeman Killed in Shootout
Feb 5th
Self-professed “Juggalo”, high school dropout, and purported NeoNazi, Jacob Robida attacked two men in a bar with a hatchet, then shot another man in Massachusettes. He then fled, abducted a cyber girlfriend in West Virginia, eventually shot her, a policeman, and died in an ensuing shootout.
What does MySpace have to do with it? MySpace fails to screen members’ pages for violent themed speech, and does not report such speech to authorities, or at the minimum, disallow pages that contain such language. Robida used the chat programs, blog pages and friends postings to talk about his hatred for others. While such speech is protected under the first amendment, it is not protected under MySpace.
MySpace regularly deletes accounts that contain sexual material and language, and they delete accounts that are distasteful, such as pages created posthumously that lampoon the recently departed. For instance, after the death of Peter Jennings, dozens of pages cropped up about him and his propensity to chain smoke. If posthumous criticism of celebrities is not protected under MySpace acceptible usage, then hate speech and postings about violence should not be protected either. Jacob Robida’s MySpace page is here.
It contains some racist speech and some telling information on the psychotic murderer. For instance, this little gem of a poem:
PASS THE AXE
“Pass me something Sharp and Wicked and I’ll pass it back don’t worry I’ll pass it back.”
Hey click on the axe and grab it. Get your hands bloody baby! Add it to your page or put it in a comment box. Doesn’t matter where you put it just PASS THE FUCKIN AXE!
He goes on to say that his favorite murder weapon is a hatchet. These references are more geared to the “Insane Clown Posse” music lyrics than to naziism, but it doesnt matter. This scum bag is dead.
The whole sordid story from ABCNews here:
GASSVILLE, Ark. Feb 5, 2006 (AP) Two days after a violent rampage at a gay bar in Massachusetts, authorities said the teen suspect fled 1,500 miles to Arkansas where he fatally shot a police officer and a 33-year-old woman.
Jacob D. Robida, a high school dropout who friends said glorified Naziism, was shot twice in the head in a gun battle with police Saturday, officials said. He was critically injured.
After Thursday’s hatchet-and-gun attack at Puzzles Lounge in New Bedford, Mass., which injured three people, police said the 18-year-old fled in a green Pontiac and picked up Jennifer Rena Bailey, at her Charleston, W. Va., home.
“Apparently she’s had a prior relationship with this guy and had been corresponding with him,” said West Virginia State Police Sgt. C.J. Ellyson.
They were driving through the northern Arkansas town of Gassville when Officer Jim Sell pulled them over for a traffic stop. The teen twice shot Sell, 56, said Massachusetts prosecutor Paul Walsh Jr.
Witness Maryann Hoyne said she saw the officer’s squad car bumper to bumper with Robida’s car, and heard three gunshots. Sell was on the ground and Robida got back into his car and drove off, she said.
Sell returned a moment later to retrieve his gun, which he had left at the side of the officer, said Hoyne, manager of the Brass Door Motel in Gassville.
About 25 miles away, Robida drove over spike strips set out by state troopers and drove with two punctured tires into downtown Norfork. Robida’s car then careened into several parked vehicles to avoid a police barricade.
“When he wrecked he started firing at our officer and a state police officer, and the officers returned fire,” said Baxter County Sheriff John Montgomery.
The teen shot the woman in the car with him before he was wounded in the shootout with police, Walsh said. State police wouldn’t confirm Walsh’s account and said ballistics tests would determine how the woman died.
The good news out of all of this is that this idiot’s friends on MySpace swear that the police had the wrong guy! They claim that the assaults were perpetrated by someone that hated Jake and wanted to set him up to take the fall. I guess this proves my theory that MySpace is just “Homepages for Dummies.”
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...New Must-See Movie!
Feb 3rd
From Steven Spielberg, Bob Zemeckis and Ang Lee comes this touching story about two time-travelling cowboys. One is an old man and a scientist. The other is a young teenager, caught up in the Old Doc’s experiments that went horribly awry, because he forgot to calculate…
for Love.
BROKE-
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...MySpace.Com Involved in Sex Probe
Feb 3rd
Shocker. MySpace, the site of the most grotesquely coded personal websites, and alternatively known as homepages for dummies, is being used to stalk and harrass women. Some genius cops in Connecticut somehow stumbled onto this fact. From the AP here:
Police are investigating whether as many as seven teenage girls have been sexually assaulted by men they met through the popular Web site MySpace.com.
The girls, ages 12 to 16, are from Middletown and say they were fondled or had consensual sex with men who turned out to be older than they claimed. None of the incidents appeared to be violent, said Middletown Police Sgt. Bill McKenna.
He said it was difficult to determine the exact number of victims because some girls have been reluctant to disclose that they met their assailants online.
The social networking Web site allows users to create profiles that can include photos, personal information and even cell phone numbers.
In a statement Thursday, MySpace.com said it was committed to providing a safe environment for its users. The site, which includes safety tips, also prohibits use by anyone younger than 14, though a disclaimer says the people who run the site can’t always tell if users are lying about their ages.
If you are a parent, you probably should not allow your teenage daughter (or son) to have a myspace account. The content of the site is decidedly young adult, not teen. Secondly, if you do not monitor your child’s internet usage as a parent, you end up with teenagers making bad decisions like posting personal information about themselves online.
Taylor Behl and her killer, Ben Fawley regularly talked to each other on MySpace. And yes, to a pervert, the MySpace search feature looks like a dessert menu.
And surprise, people lie about their age online!
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...EFF: Endangering National Security
Feb 2nd
Well, our friends at EFF, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, are back again and still trying to endanger the lives of Americans. First, they tried to stop airports from asking for people’s identification. Now they are suing AT&T to attempt to force them to stop allowing the NSA to use their data to track down terrorists and persons with ties to Al-Queda within the United States. From Information Week here:
A group that
claims to protect electronic freedoms is suing a private telecommunications company in a class action lawsuit that claims the company gave the National Security Agency direct access to massive amounts of communications data.“The government did not act alone and is not acting alone,” lawyers for the Electronic Frontier Foundation wrote in a complaint filed against AT&T Tuesday. “The government requires the collaboration of major telecommunications companies to implement its unprecedented and illegal spying program.”
The suit claims that the NSA program is illegal, that AT&T serves many millions of customers contacting people in foreign countries through their long distance and Internet services and that it appears AT&T has been giving direct access to customers’ personal and protected data at least since 2001.
The complaint, filed in the Northern District of California on behalf of an unknown number of customers nationwide and in the Sunshine State, alleges that the company’s conduct violates several federal competition and privacy rules as well as First and Fourth Amendment rights.
The program is not illegal. And I am very happy that our government and the US corporations are working together to fight the minions of Mohommed and their evil intentions to destroy Americans. EFF is playing a dangerous game here with the lives of US citizens, and I predict a loss in the lawsuit. I also think that they are dangerously close to violating the rules of operating their non-profit organization by engaging in obvious political actions.
Its also cute that the EFF tries to associate the AT&T logo with the Death Star. I wonder if Lucasfilm gave them permission to use that image? Oh well, I stole the logo from EFF’s site without their permission. I’m sure that’s okay, because the EFF believes that information should be free.
See also this post.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...Drop Kick a Poodle
Feb 1st
I love a good local scandal. A jogger is accused of animal cruelty because he kicked a tiny yippy dog than was nipping at his heels. The dog’s owner and PETA claims it was dog assault. The man and jogging groups say it was self-defense, and besides, the dog owner was negligent because the dog was unleashed. From the Baltimore Sun here:
Janice Tippett turns her injured tiny toy poodle several times a day because the dog cannot yet move properly on her own. Following a veterinarian’s orders, Tippett stretches the dog’s limbs to keep them limber, administering canine physical therapy.
“I’m hoping to keep her spirit alive,” Tippett, 37, said. “I hope that in time she’ll be able to be walking and wagging her tail.”
The case of a poodle that was kicked and seriously injured by an Anne Arundel County jogger last week has stirred up a debate over when self-defense becomes animal cruelty, attracting the attention of animal rights, jogging and cycling groups.
The Anne Arundel County state’s attorney office is weighing whether to criminally charge a man who Tippett says kicked her 9-year-old poodle “like a football” after it began nipping at him Thursday in Edgewater.
The poodle had momentarily broken free from Tippett, who was loading the dog into her car at 8:30 a.m. Thursday.
Anne Arundel County police spokesman Shawn A. Urbas said the jogger could face a misdemeanor charge of animal cruelty or a felony charge of aggravated animal cruelty. However, Anne Arundel County laws require animals to be “leashed and under the control of a responsible person.”
Animal cruelty is a misdemeanor and carries a maximum penalty of 90 days in jail and or a $1,000 fine. Felony aggravated cruelty to animals carries a maximum penalty of three years in jail and a $5,000 fine.
According to Urbas, the white poodle was kicked two times by the jogger. The 4-pound dog spent 4 1/2 days in veterinary care.
Urbas said the dog ran out of her owner’s garage, chased the jogger and “nipped at his ankles.”
“The jogger tried to shoo it away, the dog persisted at the man’s feet and the jogger kicked it two times,” Urbas said.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals sent a letter yesterday to the state’s attorney’s office urging that they charge the jogger.
“We will ask for a vigorous prosecution like the world depended on it,” said Martin Mersereau, the manager for the domestic animal abuse department at PETA.
Tippett said the jogger’s kick sent the dog four feet into the air and 10 feet across the street. When the dog landed, she “was obviously in great trauma,” Tippett said.
She drove the dog to the nearby Reichardt Animal Hospital, while her roommate, Margo Owen, administered CPR. The animal was treated at two other clinics and then released Monday.
Tippett said she has spent thousands of dollars on veterinary care.
After the dog was kicked, Tippett said she printed fliers and put them around the neighborhood to locate the jogger. On Saturday afternoon, a man called her cell phone and acknowledged kicking the dog.
“I just screamed, ‘Why did you do it?’ and I threw the phone to my friend,” Tippett said. “I don’t have a desire to talk to him.”
Tippett, meanwhile, is nursing her dog back to health: “My focus is getting my little girl better.”
There are so many things wrong with this story. First of all, the dog is 63 years old in Dog Years. If the animal was suffering so much, why didn’t the owner put it down? Because she is an irresponsible woman who refuses to take responsibility for her own actions. Rather than blame herself, she would rather point the blame elsewhere.
The story says that the poodle “broke free” as if it were some extremely powerful animal. The poodle didnt break free. Tippett neglected to watch her dog.
And PETA, stung by years of ineffectual lawsuits and staffed by girlie men, has to prosecute “like the world depends on it.” Uh. No, the world does not depend on it. PETA should go throw blood on shoppers somewhere like the world depends on it and leave this issue alone.
Finally, NOT THAT THERE IS ANYTHING WRONG WITH IT but this obvious lesbian couple should stop thinking that this dog is their “daughter.” Its not. Its a little yippee dog that is too stupid to live. And the owner is just prolonging its agony.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...The Boston Globe Leaks…
Feb 1st
The Credit card information of its users! Hackers and identity thieves lust after lists of credit cards like this. Instead of having to hack a website to get the information, they only need to wait for the Globe to give away their information. From Yahoo here:
BOSTON–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Jan. 31, 2006–The Boston Globe and Worcester Telegram & Gazette are notifying their home-delivery subscribers who pay by credit or bank card that some customers’ confidential credit card numbers were inadvertently printed on the backs of routing slips attached to newspaper bundles that were sent to retailers and newspaper carriers in the Worcester area this past weekend.
Information on up to 240,000 customers may have been distributed.
The Telegram & Gazette is also notifying its subscribers that routing information for the personal checks of 1,100 subscribers may have been inadvertently released with some of the bundles.
“We deeply value the trust our subscribers place in us and we are working diligently to remedy this unfortunate situation,” said Richard H. Gilman, publisher of the Boston Globe. “Immediate steps have been taken internally at the Globe and Telegram & Gazette to increase security around credit card reporting. We regret the disruption and inconvenience that this incident may cause.”
Payment information was mistakenly included on the reverse side of individual routing slips that were attached to up to 9000 bundles of Sunday Telegram & Gazette newspapers. No single customer name was distributed on any more than two bundles. The routing slips are typically discarded shortly after the bundles are delivered.
The incident took place when discarded internal reports were inadvertently recycled as the paper for printing the routing slips. The Telegram & Gazette has immediately discontinued the practice of reusing paper in this manner. Enhanced security measures have been put into place to assure the confidentiality of customer information at both newspapers.
The Globe has contacted the four major credit card companies — American Express, Discover, MasterCard and Visa — to advise them of the situation. Likewise, the Globe is contacting the banks of affected subscribers.
The Boston Globe and The Worcester Telegram & Gazette urge subscribers to contact their credit card companies if they are concerned about unauthorized transactions.
The New England Media Group is part of The New York Times Company
And from the WaPo here:
A scary slip-up indeed. The Boston Globe today sent a message to its subscribers about what it calls “an unfortunate event” that happened over the weekend.
The event: Confidential credit and bank account information of Globe and Telegram & Gazette (of Worcester, Mass.) was inadvertently disclosed on the back of slips used to label bundles of the Sunday Telegram. The records of about 240,000 customers may have been released.
The Globe said it was notifying the four major credit card companies, contacting the banks of its subscribers and mailing notices to affected customers. Meanwhile, it warned its readers to monitor their credit card bills and bank statements carefully. That’s good advice to follow all the time–even if you’re not a Globe subscriber.
I find it very hard to believe that this was a simple mistake. Why would anyone create a hard copy of this data? And why wasn’t this data shredded after it was no longer needed? How was it that the data was available to be used by the paper bundling crew?
Customer information and its credit card data should be kept on electronic media, encrypted and password protected, and accessible by only highly trusted staff. But someone printed this information from unprotected media. Why? To provide a report to the VP of finance? To provide data for an audit? Not likely.
I suspect that someone on the staff may have printed this information for monetary gain, and had intended to sell it to identity thieves. The printout is too bulky to walk with out the front door, so to get that information out, it would be easy to throw the paper in the trash and retrieve it after hours by dumpster diving. But someone decided to recycle this paper instead and use it for wrapping the news bundles.
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