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‘Too creepy even for Google’: Search engine boss warns governments against facial recognition technology

May 20, 2011 Comments off

dailymail

Concerns: Google boss Eric Schmidt warned against facial recognition

Concerns: Google boss Eric Schmidt warned against facial recognition

The executive chairman of Google has warned governments against facial recognition technology – saying it is ‘too creepy’ even for the search engine.

Eric Schmidt said that the technology has advanced rapidly in recent years and that it could be rolled out across the internet.

But the controversial technique has angered privacy campaigners who claim that it would be a further erosion of privacy and civil liberties.

Now Schmidt has dispelled any suggestions that internet giant Google would be the first company to employ the system.

But he warned that there were likely to be other organisations who might ‘cross the line’ and use facial recognition.

Speaking today at Google’s Big Tent conference on internet privacy, technology and society, in Hertfordshire, Schmidt said that the accuracy of such technology was ‘very concerning’.

Facial recognition would work by scanning in a photograph of somebody’s face in order to Read more…

Categories: Biometrics, GOOGLE, Technology Tags: , , , , , , ,

6 Biggest Tech Security Fails in the Last Year

May 17, 2011 Comments off

ismashphone

Fail

This is the age of being perpetually connected. If you have a Twitter, Facebook or any other sort of account, your information is out there. The best thing to do is just keep the information you don’t want people to know offline. It’s just safer that way.

Now, let’s take a look at the times that the major companies have failed, big time. There are several of them, here they are.

1) Texas Workforce Commission – Identities Released: Social Security Numbers, Addresses, etc.

My home state (note: everyone on iSmashPhone is from a different part of the world). It was recently found that Social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers and other personal info, according to website ComputerWorld. Two security chiefs were fired over it, and while the Attorney General’s office says that there is no evidence that the exposed data has been misused, they did say that we should be careful about being targets of a new phone scam. Here is that press release. And everyone is worried about Apple? This was personal info for people who truly had no choice in the Read more…

Categories: Technology Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Global Press Freedom at Lowest Level in More Than Decade

May 3, 2011 Comments off

voanews

Photo: Reuters
Journalists and activists participate in a rally calling for press freedom in central Ankara, Turkey, March 19, 2011 (file photo)

Freedom House, a U.S.-based group that monitors human rights around the world says the number of people with access to free and independent media has declined to its lowest level in more than a decade.  In its newly released annual survey, the group says several key countries saw significant declines last year and that only one-in-six people live in countries with a press designated as free.

In this year’s annual index of global media freedom of 196 countries and territories, Freedom House says it rated 68 as “free” and the remaining two thirds as “partly free” or “not free.”

Freedom House Senior Editor Karin Karlekar says this is roughly an even breakdown, but a closer look reveals a different picture. “If you look at the population statistics, they are much bleaker, only Read more…

Categories: Rights, world Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

TIME: Everything’s Tracked- Get Over It

March 14, 2011 Comments off

infowars.com

In an astounding cover story for the March 21 issue of TIME called ‘Your Data for Sale,’ author Joel Stein tells readers to simply “get over” constant surveillance. The tagline, “Everything about you is being tracked– get over it” puts the issue in your face. Yeah, get over it, and the TSA porno-scanners and grope-downs, too.

Newsweek, like TIME, another Skull and Bones-dominated media organ, similarly published a shocker in 2009 with its cover story, ‘The Case for Killing Granny,’ preparing the masses to simply accept massive shifts in society’s norms as if it were a trifling occurrence. Unauthorized NSA wiretapping and other related surveillance (started long ago) was at least controversial during the Bush Administration, though it has unabashedly continued under Obama. Read more…

Categories: America, Big Brother, United States Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Russia warns the West against interference: Medvedev suggests that revolts in the Arab world were instigated by outside forces

March 13, 2011 Comments off

globalresearch

Moscow is concerned that the turmoil in the Arab world aggravated by western interference may destabilise Russia’s restive North Caucasus and former Soviet Central Asia

-Although Russian leaders have not named any country, experts and politicians have pointed a finger at the United States.

“The Arab revolt may have begun as spontaneous protests, but the West has now moved to take the endgame under its control,” says Konstantin Kosachyov, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the State Duma. Analysts say the U.S. is using the same techniques in the Arab East it earlier used in staging “coloured revolutions” in the former Soviet Union — in Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan. They noted the role of CIA-linked foundations such as the Freedom House and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), in supporting and training civil activists and Twitter and Facebook organisers of the protests in Egypt and Tunisia.

“The events [in the Arab world] bear all the traits of a total ‘network war’ (netwar) as formulated by John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt of the RAND Corporation back in 1996,” says Alexander Knyazev of the Moscow-based Institute of Oriental Read more…

Categories: Protests, Russia, Uncategorized, United States Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Twitter must give user info in WikiLeaks probe

March 12, 2011 Comments off

hosted.ap.org

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — A federal magistrate ruled Friday that prosecutors can demand Twitter account information of certain users in their criminal probe into the disclosure of classified documents on WikiLeaks.

The prosecutors’ reasons for seeking the records remain secret and it’s unknown how important they are to the investigation of the largest leak ever of classified American documents.

The Twitter users argued that the government was on a fishing expedition that amounted to an unconstitutional violation of their freedoms of speech and association.

But in a ruling issued Friday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Theresa Carroll Buchanan said the government’s request was reasonable and did nothing to hamper the Twitter users’ free speech Read more…

Categories: twitter, wikileaks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Saudi Arabian security forces quell ‘day of rage’ protests

March 12, 2011 Comments off

guardian.co.uk

Saudi Saudi policemen form a check point near the site where a demonstration was expected to take place in Riyadh on Friday. Photograph: Hassan Ammar/AP

Saudi security forces came out in strength in Riyadh on a “day of rage” organised by pro-democracy campaigners who managed only small demonstrations in the eastern provinces.

Expectations that the unrest sweeping the Arab world in the last few weeks would spread to its most conservative kingdom appeared to have been dashed by pre-emptive security measures and stern official warnings against any protests.

Far larger demonstrations rocked Yemen, where tens of thousands of pro and anti-government protesters took to the streets as President Ali Abdullah Saleh struggled to maintain his grip.

Clashes broke out in Read more…

Categories: days of rage, Saudi Arabia Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Banks spying on your bills, rent payments, paychecks: report

February 25, 2011 Comments off

This article was published a few months ago, however, it is worth re-posting!

www.rawstory.com

The age of the plain old credit score is gone, says a report at the Wall Street Journal, and it’s been replaced by ever more intrusive efforts by banks and credit agencies to gauge exactly what you’re worth, and what you can pay.

To that end, financial firms are now tracking their customers’ bank deposits, rent payments or home values, and even utility bills to figure out who may soon become a financial risk, reports WSJ‘s Karen Blumenthal.

So, for example, if your employer pays you through direct deposits and those deposits stop, financial institutions can now have warning that your money situation is likely to tighten, and may deny you credit on that basis.

But the efforts don’t end there. A new area of research, income estimation, “took off earlier this year,” WSJ reports, and involves financial firms collecting information about mortgages, personal loans and credit history to determine how much an individual makes and how much credit they should be given.

In this new era of deep data-mining, even your utility bills and rent Read more…

Categories: Banks, Big Brother Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Gas Prices Set to Rise Nearly 40 Cents in Coming Days

February 24, 2011 Comments off

Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
February 24, 2011

Earlier this week, market analysts warned that the price of gas may reach $5 by the end of summer. Now they are saying we could see that price by Memorial Day as the situation in Libya deteriorates.

On the S&P 500 today, the price of Brent Crude breached $119 a barrel during a period of frantic trading. Brent Crude is used to price two thirds of the world’s internationally traded crude oil supplies. The price was below $100 yesterday afternoon.

The world’s oil benchmark jumped almost $17 this week and it appears there is no end in sight as the situation in the Middle East heats up.

Saudi Arabia is under pressure to boost output as the prospect of a Libya production cutoff looms.

Oil traders said Saudi talks with Europe signal that the oil kingdom understands that the political crisis in Libya is now an oil supply crisis.

On Thursday, the Italian oil company Eni, the most active company in Libya, said oil production from the North African country has dropped to just a quarter of normal levels.

“You can only expect the price to go up. It is fear of the unknown. The risks are all to the Read more…

Categories: Libya, Middle East, Oil Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Saudi King Orders $37 Billion in Benefits to People To Quell Any Unrest

February 24, 2011 Comments off

news.yahoo.com

RIYADH (Reuters) – Saudi King Abdullah returned home on Wednesday after a three-month medical absence and unveiled benefits for Saudis worth some $37 billion in an apparent bid to insulate the world’s top oil exporter from an Arab protest wave.

The king, who had been convalescing in Morocco after back surgery in New York in November, stood as he descended from the plane in a special lift. He then took to a wheelchair.

Hundreds of men in white robes performed a traditional Bedouin sword dance on carpets laid out at Riyadh airport for the return of the monarch, thought to be 87.

Abdullah left his ailing octogenarian half-brother, Crown Prince Sultan, in charge during his absence.

Before Abdullah arrived, state media announced an action plan to help lower- and middle-income people among the 18 million Saudi nationals. It includes pay rises to offset inflation, unemployment benefits and affordable family housing.

Saudi Arabia has so far escaped popular protests against Read more…

Categories: Saudi Arabia Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,