When I first read this article “Black Boxes Will Likely Be Required in New Cars by 2015” on Mashable.com I thought that was one of those bills that makes it way through one house but has no chance of making through both houses, let alone to the desk of the president.
A federal judge in Missouri has ruled that the FBI was in its legal right to use GPS tracking on a man’s car without a warrant.
On one hand I am glad they caught the fraudster. On the other I think it should require a warrant to spy on people that police suspect are breaking the law. See video at the link for the details.
In a request made yesterday to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, Verisign outlined a new “anti-abuse” policy that would allow the company to terminate, lock, or transfer any domain under its registration jurisdiction under a number of circumstances. And one of those circumstances listed was “requests of law enforcement.”
The Fabius Township Planning Commission will conduct a public hearing on a proposed amendment to the Township Zoning Ordinance relative to ‘shooting ranges’ during its meeting on Tuesday, October 11th.
What we need is an international police force with the enforcement power to really target the organized crime that operates on the net. It would investigate the top of the crimeware food chain and track down the people who are running the online crime syndicates. Each member country would be required to co-operate with others, regardless of the apparent size of the crime.
Of course, establishing such a new force would mean a number of legal challenges. For example, malicious code is often created in countries where it is not even illegal or where the perpetrators are not prosecuted.
In my opinion, such an agency should focus only on fighting international malware crime gangs. If it would try to extend to other areas, such as fighting pirates or hactivists, things would get much more complicated. Nobody wants banking trojan gangs around, and we should focus on this problem. The last thing I’d want is some sort of a net police that would try to restrict the freedom of the net. This very freedom is the reason the Internet has become as useful as it is.
Majorities of Democrats (65%) and Republicans (92%) are dissatisfied with the nation’s governance. This perhaps reflects the shared political power arrangement in the nation’s capital, with Democrats controlling the White House and U.S. Senate, and Republicans controlling the House of Representatives. Partisans on both sides can thus find fault with government without necessarily blaming their own party.
Down the page there is another interesting poll: Nearly Half Now Say Government Poses Immediate Threat, wich says Americans’ sense that the federal government poses an immediate threat to individuals’ rights and freedoms is also at a new high, 49%, since Gallup began asking the question using this wording in 2003.
To whatever high school intern probably came up with the idea, the White House’s "Attack Watch" website and Twitter account must have seemed a spark of genius. After all, they yoked together two trendy ideas—rapid response and crowd-sourcing—in service to the president. Give people the opportunity to report false and malicious things others are saying about Obama, so the administration and its supporters can fight back.
What could possibly go wrong?
The intern—whoever it was—must have been too young to remember the left’s Bush-era motto: "Dissent is the highest form of patriotism."
Last month, the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit handed down a unanimous ruling in the Simon Glik case. That case held that Glik had a “clearly-established” First Amendment right to record the actions of the police on the Boston Common, and that police officers should have known this when they arrested him. Civil libertarians are hoping a second ruling in Illinois will help cement the principle that audio recording is an activity protected by the First Amendment.
Saturday, September 17, 2011 marks the 224th anniversary of the adoption of the Constitution of the United States of America by the Constitutional Convention. In conjunction with this historical milestone, Public Law 915 guarantees the issuing of a proclamation each year by the President designating the period from September 17 through 23 as “Constitution Week.”
