The Newspaper Shop -- Thursday edition

[walktalker]

You can't keep me from publishing for long dammit
Amazon, Yahoo take Red Cross donations
Web sites including Amazon.com and Yahoo.com are allowing people to make donations to the American Red Cross through their Web sites. Both online companies have placed links on their home pages allowing visitors to make direct payments to the Red Cross after Tuesday's attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington. Amazon's Web site counter said 12,979 payments had been made so far, totaling $323,801.69. "All of us at Amazon.com are deeply saddened by the recent tragedies in New York City, Washington, D.C., and southwestern Pennsylvania, and we extend our sympathies and condolences to those affected," Amazon said in a notice on the site that has replaced its main home page.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

How terrorists attacked your privacy rights, too
Just before 9 a.m. ET on Tuesday, the debate over privacy took a dramatic turn. While it once pitted computer wonks and civil libertarians against law enforcement and the intelligence community, today it becomes, more than ever, a clear and present issue of personal and national security. Citizens will never know how many terrorist incidents have been prevented by intelligence work. But we are now all dramatically -- and, for some, personally -- aware of one that wasn't. In 1949, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson wrote that Constitutional logic must be tempered with practical wisdom in to avoid converting the Bill of Rights into a "suicide pact." At the same time, these freedoms are key in defining who we are as a nation and a people and to how citizens relate to their government. The question to be asked in coming days and weeks is a complex one: How do we balance personal privacy against the need for protection against our enemies? The answers won't come easily.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/co...812049,00.html

Gesture of help ripples out over the Web
It was a small, kind gesture on a big, horrific day. Bill Shunn, a freelance computer programmer and part-time science-fiction writer living in the Astoria section of Queens, N.Y., was sitting at home Tuesday morning with his wife when they heard the first reports on radio that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. He was watching television reports as another airplane commandeered by terrorists crashed into the second tower. Like most other New Yorkers, Shunn couldn't get a connection to phone friends and family. So he went to the Internet and relied on e-mail to communicate, asking about the well-being of different people. Other people had the same idea and began e-mailing him with questions about acquaintances. The widening circle of e-mails soon inundated Shunn, and he decided to create his own "New York City Bombing Check-in Registry."
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

FBI taps ISPs in hunt for attackers
The hunt for suspects in Tuesday's terrorist attacks has moved online. America Online has handed the FBI e-mail records for accounts belonging to the suspected hijackers, according to a report on CNN's Web site Thursday. AOL spokesman Andrew Weinstein declined to comment on any matters involving the investigation. AOL Time Warner's online division stores logs of when instant messaging users are on the network; it also can access e-mail correspondence under certain situations. "We are cooperating with (the FBI) in this ongoing investigation," Nicholas Graham, spokesman for Dulles, Va.-based AOL, said Wednesday. Although Graham wouldn't provide details, he denied reports that the company had agreed to install a Carnivore surveillance system. The FBI developed Carnivore, now renamed DCS1000, to allow it to wiretap communications that go through Internet service providers.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...096919,00.html

Bush: 'It's a new kind of war'
With hundreds of people confirmed dead and almost 5,000 missing, President Bush said on Thursday the United States and its allies were determined to "do generations a favor by coming together and whipping terrorism." The president, facing the biggest challenge of his eight-month presidency, spoke as the probe into the shadowy Middle Eastern figures behind Tuesday's strikes against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon gathered pace. U.S. stock markets remained closed and New York's financial district lay stricken as Bush and his lieutenants continued efforts to mobilize a global coalition to take military action against those responsible for Tuesday's four deadly hijacks.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

EBay bans World Trade Center items
Online auctioneer eBay has banned the auction of any items relating to the World Trade Center or the Pentagon on its site. The company, responding to outrage across its notice boards on Wednesday afternoon, removed several hundred listings from its site that associated themselves with the destroyed buildings. At 6 PM PDT, eBay.com posted a statement on the community section of its site asking all customers to refrain from mentioning the World Trade Center, the Pentagon or the events of Sept. 11 in their listings.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...812193,00.html

Online crooks exploit WTC disaster
Grieving Americans are flooding the Internet for solace and solidarity after Tuesday's terrorist attacks, but consumer advocates warn they may also find scams and spam online. The Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email (CAUCE) and the SpamCon Foundation warned Wednesday that con artists are concocting online fraud to profit from the gruesome attacks on the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon, which may have killed thousands of people. The groups say that most online scams come in the form of unsolicited e-mail, or spam, and postings in community forums soliciting donations for victims and survivors of the attacks.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

Judge extends Microsoft-DOJ deadline
A federal judge on Thursday extended the deadline for a joint status report that Microsoft and the government have been drafting for the next phase of the landmark antitrust trial. The software giant, Justice Department and 18 states had been expected to deliver the document on Friday, but U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly extended the deadline to 12 p.m. EDT Tuesday. The government and Microsoft requested the extension in a filing late Wednesday. Kollar-Kotelly extended the deadline "for good cause shown," according to her order. Microsoft spokesman Jim Desler did not disclose the reason the company and government requested the delay, but this week's terrorist attacks here and in New York may have been a factor.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

High-tech recovery put to the task
Businesses affected by the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center have been turning to disaster-recovery companies in an effort to get their operations back online. "The first call came in at 9:05 (a.m.) Eastern time," just a few minutes after the first plane struck the north tower of the 110-story World Trade Center on Tuesday, Comdisco spokesman Rich Maganini said Wednesday. "The calls came in almost one after the other right after that." "By midday, we had 25 disaster declarations. We are currently supporting 35 customers, many of which either had operations in the World Trade Center or in nearby buildings," Maganini said.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

'Mafiaboy' receives eight-month sentence
A Canadian teenage hacker nicknamed "Mafiaboy" has been sentenced to eight months in a youth detention centre, a move welcomed by prosecutors as a strong message against the world's hacking community. Judge Gilles Ouellet ruled on Wednesday that the 17-year-old Montreal teenager committed a criminal act when he crippled internet sites like Buy.com, eBay and Yahoo! last year, causing an estimated $1.7 billion in damages. The case underscored the Internet's vulnerability to cyber-attacks and fraud. "This was an attack that weakened a whole electronic communication system. This is a grave matter," Ouellet told the Quebec Youth Court.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

More than 5,000 people dead or missing
The number of dead and those reported missing in Tuesday's suicide attacks grew to more than 5,000 Thursday as authorities scrambled to unearth the dead and track down the living. Though untold bodies were still buried in the rubble of the World Trade Center, some rough counts had begun to emerge. Speaking on ABC's "Good Morning America," New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani said Thursday morning that the confirmed death toll in the World Trade Center had grown to 94. He told reporters later that 4,763 people had been reported missing.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=mn_hd

Anti-terrorist technology seeks funding
We already have technology that may have helped identify the terrorists who hijacked four planes Tuesday. But so far, airport and government authorities haven't expressed much interest in its use -- this week's events may change their minds. Two public companies and a slew of private companies have developed technology that can match pictures of people taken by security-checkpoint cameras with a database of known criminals. But we're a country vigilant in protecting civil liberties -- which means such cameras aren't used in the relatively light searches at airport security checkpoints. "There are 30 companies offering this technology,'' says Roger McCarthy, an engineer and chairman of Exponent, a failure-analysis company in Menlo Park. "And they all need money.''
http://www.siliconvalley.com/docs/op...t/mm091301.htm

More news later on...

[walktalker]

IBM empties Malaysia office in bomb scare
At least 600 employees of IBM Malaysia were asked to vacate their offices here early Wednesday morning after a bomb threat. Several bomb squads started combing the area shortly after employees were notified about the threat around 11:45 a.m. local time, according to an IBM Malaysia representative. Other tenants of IBM's 23-story building include IT companies such as VADS, Silver Lake and Global Impact. "The building is still off-limits now," the representative said, adding that the total number of workers affected could not yet be determined.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200...html?tag=ch_mh

Could E911 have helped in disaster?
Tuesday's terrorist attacks in the United States and a new federal report are generating fresh debate about a system used to pinpoint a cell phone user's location that wireless carriers are supposed to begin using Oct. 1. The system, called Enhanced 911, or E911, was proposed in 1996. In 1998, carriers were supposed to have the first phase in place, which would help police learn a cell phone caller's phone number and the nearest cell site. That was for an area anywhere within 1 to 5 miles. But the next phase would locate a cell phone caller within 100 yards. The tragedy at the World Trade Center in New York is supplying anecdotal evidence of the need for the system. Many survivors, some buried in the rubble, have used cell phones to call for help.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1004-200...html?tag=cd_pr

U.S. skies reopen
Airlines returned to the nation's skies with limited service Thursday as airports opened their doors to sparse, anxious crowds amid the tightest security since the Persian Gulf War in 1991. At Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix, Sam Hemphill was among a dozen people lined up at a TWA ticket counter. He said he was nervous about flying but was determined to get home to Jacksonville, Fla. "Whatever happens, happens," Hemphill said. "You have to keep going. If you stop living life, they've won." The U.S. aviation system was shut down Tuesday after hijacked planes were crashed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and another crashed in a Pennsylvania field.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=cd_mh

The day the Internet grew up
During Tuesday's terrorist attack on the United States, the Internet demonstrated that it is capable of fulfilling its function as a means of communication during a crisis. Every business should consider the Internet an integral component of its communications infrastructure. During an emergency, a business will employ every communications path available. Although parts of the Internet use telecommunication facilities, the manner in which messages are routed makes the Internet less dependent on a single enterprise, carrier or geographic location.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-201...html?tag=ch_mh

Sonicblue releases CD players for MP3s
Sonicblue on Wednesday released two RioVolt players for CDs that store digital-audio files. The $179 RioVolt SP250 comes with an FM tuner, rechargeable batteries and enough memory to store up to eight minutes of audio to protect against skipping. The $99 RioVolt SP90 has up to 120 seconds of audio protection and runs on two AA batteries. They both play CDs burned with up to 350 digital-audio files, or 20 hours' worth of material. The new devices come after more layoffs at the company. On Monday, Sonicblue laid off 90 of its 540 employees, or about 17 percent of its staff. The Santa Clara, Calif.-based company cut about 500 jobs earlier this year.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1006-200...html?tag=cd_mh

Videophones give reporters an edge
From amid the rubble in lower Manhattan on Wednesday, CNN reporter Gary Tuchman used a videophone to relay exclusive interviews of emergency staffers searching for survivors of the previous day's carnage. And only hours after the collapse of the World Trade Center on Tuesday, CNN also used a videophone to transmit an interview with the Taliban's leaders in Afghanistan as they sought to allay suspicions that Saudi exile Osama bin Laden was involved in the unprecedented terrorist attacks. These were just two marks of a crisis brought viscerally close to home, boosted by the media's use of satellite communications technology that continues to stretch and speed reporters' reach. For the past day, much of the world has watched as reporters have been able to send back video reports from places where satellite camera trucks and ordinary camera crews couldn't go.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1006-200...html?tag=cd_mh

Congress Mulls Stiff Crypto Laws
The encryption wars have begun. For nearly a decade, privacy mavens have been worrying that a terrorist attack could prompt Congress to ban communications-scrambling products that frustrate both police wiretaps and U.S. intelligence agencies. Tuesday's catastrophe, which shed more blood on American soil than any event since the Civil War, appears to have started that process. Some politicians and defense hawks are warning that extremists such as Osama bin Laden, who U.S. officials say is a crypto-aficionado and the top suspect in Tuesday's attacks, enjoy unfettered access to privacy-protecting software and hardware that render their communications unintelligible to eavesdroppers.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,46816,00.html

Making It Harder for Hijackers
As Americans began to question the safety of air travel in the aftermath of Tuesday's terrorist attacks, several aviation safety and security experts on Wednesday echoed a grim reality: No new technology or security measures can make flying infallible. There are many technologies on the market that can bolster flight security, including an increased use of biometric devices, advanced scanning equipment and profiling databases. But it's unclear, experts said, how much safer these systems would make the skies, and they would have done little in preventing the four hijackings that led to Tuesday's carnage.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,46782,00.html

Web Vents Open on U.S. Muslims
As the volume of anti-Arab hate speech on the Internet cranked to full blast Wednesday, U.S. Muslims reported rampant harassment on- and offline. Although the U.S. government has yet to finger a perpetrator in Tuesday's attack, several lines of investigation point to the involvement of an Arab country. Now America's estimated 7 million Muslims are bracing for the backlash. "We've got reports from all over the country," said Joshua Salaam, the Civil Rights coordinator for the Council on American Islamic Relations, a nonprofit group dedicated to promoting a positive image of Muslims in America. "People are reporting stuff to us from chat rooms that is absolutely hateful. Our own website has been bombarded with death threats."
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,46778,00.html

Civil Liberty the Next Casualty?
In the wake of the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks, scholars fear that Americans will sacrifice civil liberties that could be difficult to win back. Many civil liberties watchdogs say freedom in the United States have been slowly eroding for the past several decades. But they say Tuesday's attacks will redouble efforts by the government to infringe on civil freedoms, and now people won't resist. Internet service providers have reported that they are working with the FBI to monitor traffic, something they were reluctant to do before.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,46784,00.html

Eerie Image Pulled From CD
The cover for the upcoming CD from a popular hip-hop group portrays an eerily familiar sight. Against a backdrop of morning skies, the towers of the World Trade Center stand engulfed in flame from the impact of twin explosions. Clouds of smoke spew from the upper stories, all but obscuring the tip of what was once the epicenter of the New York City skyline. If it weren't for the super-imposed images of the Oakland, California, hip-hop duo known as The Coup, the scene could pass for a remarkably precise replica of the horrific tragedy that befell New York City on Tuesday morning.
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,46771,00.html

New Idea for Targeted TV Ads
If General Motors could zap ads directly to TV sets, it would undoubtedly promote different cars to different people: a minivan to parents with two kids, a convertible for the recent college graduate, an economy model for a low-income family. New set-top boxes being developed by Canal Plus and Scientific Atlanta will allow advertisers to do that -- while giving consumers a measure of privacy they don't normally get from interactive television services. The key is set-top software developed by Fremont, California's Metabyte Networks that filters ads, e-coupons and video-on-demand based on a household's demographics and viewing preferences. The information can then be stored on a TiVo or other personal video recording device for viewing at the user's pleasure.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,46765,00.html

They can't see why they are hated
Nearly two days after the horrific suicide attacks on civilian workers in New York and Washington, it has become painfully clear that most Americans simply don't get it. From the president to passersby on the streets, the message seems to be the same: this is an inexplicable assault on freedom and democracy, which must be answered with overwhelming force - just as soon as someone can construct a credible account of who was actually responsible. Shock, rage and grief there has been aplenty. But any glimmer of recognition of why people might have been driven to carry out such atrocities, sacrificing their own lives in the process - or why the United States is hated with such bitterness, not only in Arab and Muslim countries, but across the developing world - seems almost entirely absent.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/st...551036,00.html

Paper Documents Destroyed but Electronic Records Survive
The destroyed World Trade Center was the repository of countless reams of financial information on companies and individuals. But disaster-recovery experts said Tuesday that most of the largest financial services firms routinely back up data and store it in remote locations, ensuring that the bulk survived the attack. Some companies have contracts for information to be duplicated instantaneously, as soon as it is entered on a broker's or banker's personal computer.
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la...s%2Dtechnology

How hard is it to fly an airliner?
"You haven't got to be superhuman. You don't need a brilliant academic mind," says John O'Hara, Chief Flying Instructor at the BBC staff club's flying section. Learning basic flying skills in a light aircraft is something many people pick up very quickly, he says. "What you need is someone that is sensible, alert, has good eye-hand coordination and motivation." "If you can drive a car, then with sufficient training, you can do it," he told BBC News Online.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci...00/1542204.stm

More news later on

[fblaguy]

I like the story about the day the net grew up, it proves what the military wanted when it was created held true.....even if the news sites were having trouble for a while, there were still ways to get info about what was going on, on the net

[TankGirl]

I love to see our vigilant news service up and running in all circumstances! Great work WT , a well-chosen and highly interesting news package once again!

- tg