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walktalker · 04-01-02, 06:43 PM

Judge OKs FBI Keyboard Sniffing
The Justice Department can legally use a controversial electronic surveillance technique in its prosecution of an alleged mobster. In the first case of its kind, a federal judge in Newark, New Jersey has ruled that evidence surreptitiously gathered by the FBI about Nicodemo S. Scarfo's reputed loan shark operation can be presented in a trial later this year.
http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,49455,00.html

Trolling the Web for Afghan Dead
For the past three months, Herold has spent 12 to 14 hours a day cruising the Net to compile figures on civilian casualties in Afghanistan, using sources as disparate as the radical Revolutionary Association of Women of Afghanistan (RAWA) and the BBC. He said he discovered that Washington's anti-terrorism campaign has killed an average of 65 Afghans a day, information he charges has been blithely dismissed by the American mainstream press. Pundits such as William M. Arkin, a former Army intelligence analyst and Washington Post columnist, have sought to minimize the importance of civilian casualties, he writes. Arkin did not respond to an interview request for this story.
http://www.wired.com/news/conflict/0,2100,49475,00.html

Nanotech Fine-Tuning
The versatility of carbon nanotubes, those sheets of graphite rolled into long tubes mere nanometers in diameter, has long been trumpeted. But until recently no one knew the nanotube was like a trombone. According to a team of physicists from the United States and South Korea, nanotubes can be tuned with the movement of molecules rolling around inside -- like a trombone changes its pitch with the up and down motion of its slide. These adjustable electric properties offer a new kind of tunable circuit component, one that will join regular, unfilled nanotubes as the great multi-purpose device of the nanometer-sized world.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,49447,00.html

Making Energy, Making Money
Energy legislation emphasizing renewable fuels could help boost the U.S. economy by $300 billion and create as many as 300,000 new jobs by 2016, according to an independent analysis. The study, paid for by the National Biodiesel Board, concluded that increased use of American made fuels such as biodiesel and ethanol would generate an additional $71 billion over the next 15 years.

Last Stand of Oz Domain Fight
It might be described as the last stand of an Internet volunteer against the advance of 21st century technocrats -- the swan song of a beard against the suits. In one corner sits reclusive, volunteer Australian-network programmer Robert Elz, who communicates only selectively with the outside world by e-mail and avoids being photographed. In the other sits a fledgling Australian national Internet managerial organization known as "auDA." In the middle sits the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the global organization overseeing certain technical aspects of the Internet. It had to play hardball in choosing between the two.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,48973,00.html

ACLU frowns on face-recognition tool
Face-recognition technology designed to help catch known criminals proved ineffective during a two-month period, according to a report released Thursday by the America Civil Liberties Union. Using state open-record laws, the civil liberties organization examined system logs at a Florida police department. It discovered that over a two-month period, the software failed to identify a single person photographed in the department's criminal database, according to the report. It added that the software produced many false identifications.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

Dolly the sheep has arthritis
Dolly the cloned sheep has developed arthritis at the relatively young age of five and a half, say the scientists who created her. But they say it is impossible to know whether the cloning process is to blame. "The fact that Dolly has arthritis at this comparatively young age suggests there may be problems," Ian Wilmut of the Roslin Institute in Scotland told the BBC. But, he added: "We cannot ever know whether this is the result of cloning or just an unhappy coincidence." The average lifespan of a sheep is 12 to 14 years.
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99991745

Unsolicited e-mail not protected, judges say
In a victory to thrill anyone annoyed by the "spam" that clogs e-mail accounts, an appellate court has upheld the constitutionality of California's tough 1998 law regulating unwanted commercial messages. The state Court of Appeal ruled Wednesday that California can require Internet "spammers" to identify their e-mails as advertisements. The court also said they must provide ways for recipients to get off their mailing lists.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...4/MN228257.DTL

Rise of Net 'Borders' Prompts Fears for Web's Future
It is the modern-day equivalent of a border sentry. When visitors try to enter UKBetting.com, a computer program checks their identification to determine where they're dialing in from. Most people are waved on through. Those from the United States, China, Italy and other countries where gambling laws are muddy, however, are flashed a sign in red letters that says "ACCESS DENIED" and are locked out of the Web site.
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173389.html

NASA explores electromagnetic space launches
Researchers at NASA are looking into whether electromagnets can be used to send rockets into space, a technological leap that could dramatically cut launch costs. Spacecraft burn hundreds of thousands of gallons of fuel to reach orbit. But rocket engineers at the Marshall Space Flight Center are investigating whether electromagnetic power can do the job.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/space/0...hes/index.html

Wireless Phone, Radio Clash Up in the Air
Satellite radio and wireless phone companies are locked into a sometimes nasty battle before the Federal Communications Commission that could limit the power of the satellite radio companies' land-based repeater towers – a restriction that is either needlessly expensive or essential to avoid interference with next-generation pagers and cell phones, depending on which side one believes. Wireless companies, including Verizon Wireless Inc. and BellSouth Corp., want the FCC to force D.C.-based XM Satellite Radio Inc. and its New York-based rival, Sirius Satellite Radio Inc., to replace their powerful repeater towers.
http://www.washtech.com/news/media/14448-1.html

Signs of Life: On the Lookout for Extraterrestrial Sweet Spots
Looking for life elsewhere is a tough task for human or robot. The good news is that the scientific skill and tools to search for, detect and inspect extraterrestrial life are advancing rapidly. A revolution in the field of microbiology is afoot, along with extraordinary progress in understanding the "geobiological" history of Earth. And then there's growing amazement about life on this planet and how it can survive and thrive even in the most extreme and bizarre of environments. For example, within the last ten years alone, more than 1,500 new species of microorganisms have been discovered and genetically sequenced.
http://www.space.com/searchforlife/l...ts_020103.html

Badtrans Victim Database Goes Commercial
Rudy Rucker last month refused to turn over to the FBI his massive database of users infected by a recent Internet worm. But the listing has lately become a treasure-trove for organizations trying to root out Badtrans.B from their networks. According to Rucker, operator of Monkeybrains.net, a small San Francisco-based Internet service provider, companies including Prudential, Motorola, ETrade, British Petroleum and 3M have paid a small fee to receive a list of their customers and employees culled from the database of more than 300,000 accounts infected by Badtrans.B.
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173402.html

Legal Fight Costs Federal Agencies Web Access, E-Mail
A protracted legal battle over mismanagement and poor computer security has left the U.S. Department of Interior, the National Park Service and a slew of other agencies without e-mail and Internet access for nearly a month. Now, the hardship of living in the technological dark ages is beginning to take its toll.
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173393.html

US Army Web Site Goes Dark In Asia-Pacific Region
The main U.S. Army Web site is unreachable for many Web surfers in the Asia-Pacific region, according to user reports and network test results. Web surfers in Taiwan and New Zealand have reported they are unable to reach the site. Tests conducted today using network trace tools from Internet addresses in other Asian countries, including India, Singapore, Korea and Hong Kong produced similar results. Attempts to access the Army site from Internet addresses in the U.S. were successful.
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173391.html

Killer Paid Online Data Broker For Material
On the last day of her life, Amy Boyer could not have known a killer was waiting for her on her way home from work. But her stalker knew exactly where she would be. As the 20-year-old dental assistant slipped into her Honda Accord on a quiet road just off Main Street here one day in October 1999, the obsessed young man pulled up, shot her repeatedly and then turned the gun on himself.
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173387.html

More news later on

04-01-02, 06:43 PM	#2
walktalker The local newspaper man Join Date: Aug 2000 Location: Montreal Posts: 2,036	Judge OKs FBI Keyboard Sniffing The Justice Department can legally use a controversial electronic surveillance technique in its prosecution of an alleged mobster. In the first case of its kind, a federal judge in Newark, New Jersey has ruled that evidence surreptitiously gathered by the FBI about Nicodemo S. Scarfo's reputed loan shark operation can be presented in a trial later this year. http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,49455,00.html Trolling the Web for Afghan Dead For the past three months, Herold has spent 12 to 14 hours a day cruising the Net to compile figures on civilian casualties in Afghanistan, using sources as disparate as the radical Revolutionary Association of Women of Afghanistan (RAWA) and the BBC. He said he discovered that Washington's anti-terrorism campaign has killed an average of 65 Afghans a day, information he charges has been blithely dismissed by the American mainstream press. Pundits such as William M. Arkin, a former Army intelligence analyst and Washington Post columnist, have sought to minimize the importance of civilian casualties, he writes. Arkin did not respond to an interview request for this story. http://www.wired.com/news/conflict/0,2100,49475,00.html Nanotech Fine-Tuning The versatility of carbon nanotubes, those sheets of graphite rolled into long tubes mere nanometers in diameter, has long been trumpeted. But until recently no one knew the nanotube was like a trombone. According to a team of physicists from the United States and South Korea, nanotubes can be tuned with the movement of molecules rolling around inside -- like a trombone changes its pitch with the up and down motion of its slide. These adjustable electric properties offer a new kind of tunable circuit component, one that will join regular, unfilled nanotubes as the great multi-purpose device of the nanometer-sized world. http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,49447,00.html Making Energy, Making Money Energy legislation emphasizing renewable fuels could help boost the U.S. economy by $300 billion and create as many as 300,000 new jobs by 2016, according to an independent analysis. The study, paid for by the National Biodiesel Board, concluded that increased use of American made fuels such as biodiesel and ethanol would generate an additional $71 billion over the next 15 years. Last Stand of Oz Domain Fight It might be described as the last stand of an Internet volunteer against the advance of 21st century technocrats -- the swan song of a beard against the suits. In one corner sits reclusive, volunteer Australian-network programmer Robert Elz, who communicates only selectively with the outside world by e-mail and avoids being photographed. In the other sits a fledgling Australian national Internet managerial organization known as "auDA." In the middle sits the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the global organization overseeing certain technical aspects of the Internet. It had to play hardball in choosing between the two. http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,48973,00.html ACLU frowns on face-recognition tool Face-recognition technology designed to help catch known criminals proved ineffective during a two-month period, according to a report released Thursday by the America Civil Liberties Union. Using state open-record laws, the civil liberties organization examined system logs at a Florida police department. It discovered that over a two-month period, the software failed to identify a single person photographed in the department's criminal database, according to the report. It added that the software produced many false identifications. http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02 Dolly the sheep has arthritis Dolly the cloned sheep has developed arthritis at the relatively young age of five and a half, say the scientists who created her. But they say it is impossible to know whether the cloning process is to blame. "The fact that Dolly has arthritis at this comparatively young age suggests there may be problems," Ian Wilmut of the Roslin Institute in Scotland told the BBC. But, he added: "We cannot ever know whether this is the result of cloning or just an unhappy coincidence." The average lifespan of a sheep is 12 to 14 years. http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99991745 Unsolicited e-mail not protected, judges say In a victory to thrill anyone annoyed by the "spam" that clogs e-mail accounts, an appellate court has upheld the constitutionality of California's tough 1998 law regulating unwanted commercial messages. The state Court of Appeal ruled Wednesday that California can require Internet "spammers" to identify their e-mails as advertisements. The court also said they must provide ways for recipients to get off their mailing lists. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...4/MN228257.DTL Rise of Net 'Borders' Prompts Fears for Web's Future It is the modern-day equivalent of a border sentry. When visitors try to enter UKBetting.com, a computer program checks their identification to determine where they're dialing in from. Most people are waved on through. Those from the United States, China, Italy and other countries where gambling laws are muddy, however, are flashed a sign in red letters that says "ACCESS DENIED" and are locked out of the Web site. http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173389.html NASA explores electromagnetic space launches Researchers at NASA are looking into whether electromagnets can be used to send rockets into space, a technological leap that could dramatically cut launch costs. Spacecraft burn hundreds of thousands of gallons of fuel to reach orbit. But rocket engineers at the Marshall Space Flight Center are investigating whether electromagnetic power can do the job. http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/space/0...hes/index.html Wireless Phone, Radio Clash Up in the Air Satellite radio and wireless phone companies are locked into a sometimes nasty battle before the Federal Communications Commission that could limit the power of the satellite radio companies' land-based repeater towers – a restriction that is either needlessly expensive or essential to avoid interference with next-generation pagers and cell phones, depending on which side one believes. Wireless companies, including Verizon Wireless Inc. and BellSouth Corp., want the FCC to force D.C.-based XM Satellite Radio Inc. and its New York-based rival, Sirius Satellite Radio Inc., to replace their powerful repeater towers. http://www.washtech.com/news/media/14448-1.html Signs of Life: On the Lookout for Extraterrestrial Sweet Spots Looking for life elsewhere is a tough task for human or robot. The good news is that the scientific skill and tools to search for, detect and inspect extraterrestrial life are advancing rapidly. A revolution in the field of microbiology is afoot, along with extraordinary progress in understanding the "geobiological" history of Earth. And then there's growing amazement about life on this planet and how it can survive and thrive even in the most extreme and bizarre of environments. For example, within the last ten years alone, more than 1,500 new species of microorganisms have been discovered and genetically sequenced. http://www.space.com/searchforlife/l...ts_020103.html Badtrans Victim Database Goes Commercial Rudy Rucker last month refused to turn over to the FBI his massive database of users infected by a recent Internet worm. But the listing has lately become a treasure-trove for organizations trying to root out Badtrans.B from their networks. According to Rucker, operator of Monkeybrains.net, a small San Francisco-based Internet service provider, companies including Prudential, Motorola, ETrade, British Petroleum and 3M have paid a small fee to receive a list of their customers and employees culled from the database of more than 300,000 accounts infected by Badtrans.B. http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173402.html Legal Fight Costs Federal Agencies Web Access, E-Mail A protracted legal battle over mismanagement and poor computer security has left the U.S. Department of Interior, the National Park Service and a slew of other agencies without e-mail and Internet access for nearly a month. Now, the hardship of living in the technological dark ages is beginning to take its toll. http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173393.html US Army Web Site Goes Dark In Asia-Pacific Region The main U.S. Army Web site is unreachable for many Web surfers in the Asia-Pacific region, according to user reports and network test results. Web surfers in Taiwan and New Zealand have reported they are unable to reach the site. Tests conducted today using network trace tools from Internet addresses in other Asian countries, including India, Singapore, Korea and Hong Kong produced similar results. Attempts to access the Army site from Internet addresses in the U.S. were successful. http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173391.html Killer Paid Online Data Broker For Material On the last day of her life, Amy Boyer could not have known a killer was waiting for her on her way home from work. But her stalker knew exactly where she would be. As the 20-year-old dental assistant slipped into her Honda Accord on a quiet road just off Main Street here one day in October 1999, the obsessed young man pulled up, shot her repeatedly and then turned the gun on himself. http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/173387.html More news later on __________________ This post was sponsored by Netcoco, who wants cookies, cookies, cookies and, you guessed it, more cookies