Inventor creates TSA-proof underwear to shield private parts from x-ray machines, prying eyes

January 26, 2011 Comments off

Philip Caulfield

While holiday travelers may not get through this week without a Transportation Security Administration agent touching their junk, a man in Colorado has a new invention he says will prevent anyone from looking at it.
Jeff Buske has created a special kind of underwear with strategically placed fig-leaf designs he says will shield TSA scanners from viewing fliers’ private parts and keep travelers safe from radiation emitted from the notorious “backscatter” x-ray machines.
Buske, an engineer, said his briefs, bras and inserts, which he’s marketing under the name Rocky Top Gear, use a special metal that protects people’s privacy when undergoing medical or security screenings.
“The object is…to protect the public, educate people and ultimately see these X-ray machines put in the Dumpster,” Buske told CBS4 Denver.
The undergarments come in designs featuring a pair of women’s hands modestly clasped together and inserts shaped like shields and stop signs.
The gear is currently for sale online at some ominously cryptic prices.
A pair of fig-leaf themed tighty-whiteys is available for a “special” offer of $19.84, while a women’s bra insert costs $9.11 and women’s briefs costs $17.76.
While the gear won’t protect fliers from a TSA frisking, Buske says his undies should achieve a happy medium between what travelers want to keep hidden and what security officials need to see.
“If someone is trying to hide something large under the thing, it’s going to show up as a bulge, visible to the eye,” Buske told CBS4.
The TSA had no comment about the underwear.

Rise of Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria – “Arms Race” Between Nature and Tech?

January 26, 2011 Comments off
NDM-1 was first detected in Klebsiella pneumoniae (pictured here) but has since been found in other strains including E. coli. 

A recent spike of infections in the United Kingdom involving bacteria armed with an enzyme that makes them resistant to virtually all antibiotics has many health experts concerned. The enzyme, called NDM-1, was first identified in 2009 in a patient in New Delhi, India infected with Klebsiella pneumoniae (NDM-1 stands for New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase). Since then, the gene that produces NDM-1 has been found in many different strains of bacteria, including E. coli, and infections involving these “superbugs” has become an ongoing health problem in many parts of India and Pakistan. Now, a recent publication in the journal Lancet Infectious Diseases describing the discovery of NDM-1 in 37 patients in the UK (many of which had travelled to India or Pakistan) has clearly demonstrated the potential for this to become a global crisis. Bacteria harboring NDM-1 have now been found in the United States, Japan, and Canada.
Despite the dire warnings of health experts, NDM-1 Read more…

Russia To Adopt Universal ID Card in 2012

January 26, 2011 1 comment
Russian Universal ID2012 will be the year of universal ID cards in Russia. 

For all those conspiracy theorists out there, 2012 just got a little more ominous. As required by legislation passed this last summer, Russia will adopt a universal ID card starting next year. The Universal Electronic Card (UEC) is intended to eventually replace all local, regional, and national forms of ID, providing a central database through which Russians can access everything from medical insurance to ATMs. According to the official website, the UEC will be adopted by around 1000 national and regional services along with about 10,000 commercial enterprises. The mayor of Moscow has already declared it will be able to handle public transportation there, and we can expect similar adoptions throughout the nation. Will all Russians be carrying a single form of ID that is their only passport to all public and private services? Looks like it. A similar project has started in India, and there are experiments for related concepts in Mexico. Universal ID is starting to catch on around the globe. Where will it spread to next?

Ostensibly, the UEC is designed to push the Russian ID Read more…

Obama may get power to shut down Internet without court

January 25, 2011 Comments off

A bill giving the president an Internet “kill switch” during times of emergency that failed to pass Congress last year will return this year, but with a revision that has many civil liberties advocates concerned: It will give the president the ability to shut down parts of the Internet without any court oversight.

The Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act was introduced last year by Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) and Susan Collins (R-ME) in an effort to combat cyber-crime and the threat of online warfare and terrorism.

Critics said the bill would allow the president to disconnect Internet networks and force private websites to comply with broad cybersecurity measures. Future US presidents would have those powers renewed indefinitely.

According to a report Monday at CNET News, the bill will be back on the Senate agenda in the new year. But a revision introduced into the bill in December would exempt the law from judicial oversight. According to critics, this change would open the law to politically-motivated abuse by any administration, no matter Read more…

Mexico to pioneer iris technology on ID cards

January 25, 2011 Comments off

Its only a matter of time until the U.S. moves to this widespread technology.

Mexico will on Monday become the first country to start using iris scans for identity cards, according to the government, which claims the scheme will be highly secure.

“The legal, technical and financial conditions are ready to start the process of issuing this identity document,Felipe Zamora, responsible for legal affairs at the Mexican Interior Ministry, told journalists Thursday.

The documents, which will include the eye’s image as well as fingerprints, a photo and signature, will be 99 percent reliable, Zamora said.

Critics, including the National Human Rights Commission, have slammed the system, expressing concern that compiling personal data could violate individual rights.

The move will be introduced gradually, with some 28 million minors taking part in a first two-year stage, due to cost 25 million dollars.

The cards are due to start for adults from 2013.

Iris recognition is increasingly used in airports, controlling access to restricted areas, and prisoner booking and release.

All the volcano webcams of the world

January 25, 2011 1 comment

Pacific

Hawai’i (United States)

Haleakala – info – webcam

Kilauea – info – webcams: Pu’u O’oThanksgiving Eve BreakoutHalema`uma`u Crater from HVOHalema`uma`u Crater overlook

Mauna Kea – info – webcam

Mauna Loa – info – webcam

Mariana Islands (United States)

Anatahan – info – webcam

Western/Southern Pacific

Japan

Asama – info – webcam

Aso – info – webcam

Fuji – info – webcam

Iwate – info – webcam

Sakurajima – info – two webcams: onetwo

Unzen – info – webcam

Read more…

Categories: Earth, volcano, world Tags: , ,

World needs $100 trillion more credit, says World Economic Forum

January 25, 2011 Comments off

The world’s expected economic growth will have to be supported by an extra $100 trillion (£63 trillion) in credit over the next decade, according to the World Economic Forum.


The global credit stock has already doubled in recent years, from $57 trillion to $109 trillion between 2000 and 2009

This doubling of existing credit levels could be achieved without increasing the risk of a major crisis, said the report from the WEF ahead of its high-profile annual meeting in Davos.

But researchers warned that leaders must be wary of new credit “hotspots”, where too much lending takes place, as the world emerges from a financial catastrophe blamed in large part “to the failure of the financial system to detect and constrain” these areas of unsustainable debt.

“Pockets of credit grew rapidly to excess – and brought the entire financial system to the brink of collapse,” said the report, written in conjunction with consulting firm McKinsey. “Yet, credit is the lifeblood of the economy, and much more of it will be needed to sustain the recovery and enable the developing world to achieve its growth potential.”

The global credit stock has already doubled in recent years, from $57 trillion to $109 trillion between 2000 and 2009, according to the report.

The WEF said the continued demand for credit could be met “responsibly, sustainably – and with fewer crises”. However, it cautioned that to achieve this goal, financial institutions, regulators, and policy makers need more robust indicators of unsustainable lending, risk, and credit shortages.

Categories: Economy, world Tags: , ,

China used downed U.S. fighter to develop first stealth jet

January 25, 2011 1 comment

China was able to build its first stealth bomber using technology gleaned from a downed U.S. fighter, it has been claimed.

Beijing unveiled its state-of-the-art jet – the Chengdu J-20 – earlier this month.

Military officials say it is likely the Chinese were able to develop the stealth technology from parts of an American F-117 Nighthawk that was shot down over Serbia in 1999.

Lift-off: China's J-20 stealth plane has made a successful test flight Lift-off: China’s J-20 stealth plane has made a successful test flight. Military officials say it is likely the Chinese were able to develop the stealth technology from parts of an American F-117 Nighthawk that was shot down over Serbia in 1999 

U.S. stealth plane It was during Nato’s aerial bombing of Serbia during the Kosovo war, that an anti-aircraft missile shot a Nighthawk (pictured). It was the first time one of the ‘invisible’ fighters had ever been hit 

During Nato’s aerial bombing of the country during the Kosovo war, a Serbian anti-aircraft missile shot the Nighthawk. It was the first time one of the ‘invisible’ fighters had ever been hit.

The Pentagon believed a combination of clever tactics and luck had allowed a Soviet- Read more…

Massive Filament Eruption Jan 24th

January 25, 2011 Comments off

Massive Filament Eruption on the solar corona as spotted on the SDO website yesterday and subsequent solar tsunami effects show a powerful event .

Middle Class Shrinking; Poverty Class Expanding

January 25, 2011 Comments off
No Jobs, No Hope, No Future: 27 Signs That America’s Poverty Class Is Rapidly Becoming Larger Than America’s Middle Class

In the America that most of us grew up in, most Americans considered themselves to be part of the “upper middle class”, the “middle class” or “the lower middle class”.  Yes, there have always been poor people and homeless people, but they were thought to be a very small sliver of the population.  Well, today all of that is dramatically changing.  America’s emerging “poverty class” is exploding in size at the same time that America’s middle class is rapidly disappearing.  You won’t hear it on the mainstream news, but the truth is that the United States has lost ten percent of its middle class jobs over the past decade.  Only the top 5 percent of income earners in the U.S. has had their incomes increase enough to keep up with the rising cost of living over the past 40 years.  The truth is that today there are a whole lot of people aggressively jostling for the small number of good jobs that are actually available and each year millions more Americans are being squeezed out of the middle class.  The number of Americans that are financially dependent on the U.S. government continues to set new records month after month.  The number of Americans that are participating in the labor force continues to go down.  The sad reality is that the “American Dream” that so many Americans used to take for granted is being ripped away from us.  If you still believe that the United States is guaranteed to always have a very large, very prosperous middle class then you really need to read the statistics listed below.

If you told most Americans ten years ago that in 2011 over 43 million Americans would be on food stamps hardly anyone would have believed you.

But yet here we are.

The U.S. economy simply is not producing enough good jobs anymore.  Most of those that are able to acquire one of these jobs have been able to cling to middle class status, but for millions upon millions of others economic desperation has become “the new normal”.

In fact, more Americans than ever seem to have Read more…