Technology has advanced to where it now not only makes sense, it’s financially viable to install a network attached storage device (NAS) to any home network.   Take for example Western Digital’s My Book World Edition NAS device: it has 2 terabytes of storage, installs in less than five minutes and is accessible by almost anything on your network.

Because the My Book plugs directly into your home router via an Ethernet cable, it transfers and streams data at the full speed of your router.  The device shows up in Windows under My Network Places, in OSX under Shared devices and for those running Netbooks with Ubuntu Linux, you aren’t left out in the dark either.  Simply go to Places, Connect to Server and enter the IP address of the NAS.  If you need to expand, the My Book also has a front-facing USB drive on it.

There are several reasons to utilize an NAS: obviously to back up your data, but one new trend is sharing media.  For Netbook users, this is essential, since hard drive space is at a minimum.  Utilize an NAS device to store movies, music and photos and access them at full network speed.  In the event you drop or lose the Netbook, or it gets stolen, all the data you need is still at home.

Windows and Mac users who use iTunes to organize their music can easily set their shared stored music directories to the attached storage device, freeing up hard drive space on their own computer and giving access to other people on the network.

Since it’s now easier than ever to legally acquire movies and TV shows because of licensing deals and broadband internet, it makes sense to download them once, store them on a My Book and then access them from any whatever computer is most easily accessible.

OSX users can also use an NAS to serve as their Time Machine backup; Windows can use the included automatic backup software.  An LED gauge can tell you at a glance how much free space is available on it.

Michael Jackson’s funeral is predicted to be the biggest event in entertainment history with hundreds of thousands turning up in Los Angeles to pay their respects to the late King of Pop. While thousands of seats have been made available to the public, a public viewing of Michael’s body has been reported to be unlikely.

The majority of his fans won’t be able to make it in person to the memorial service in Los Angeles and will tune into a live broadcast of the event. Traditionally this would all be done on TV, but with online video now becoming increasingly popular many will tune in online.

This is expected to be one of the biggest events in online video history and it’s been suggested that the online viewing figures in the U.S. could exceed 200 million.

Currently Obama’s Inauguration and the 2008 Olympics have attracted the most online viewers so far, but it is very probably that Michael Jackson’s funeral will break new records.

There will be a variety of live streams broadcasting from the Staples Center covering Michael’s memorial service, as well as broadcasts from the many tribute’s that will be taking place across the globe.

You can watch Michael Jackson’s funeral live online here, where a comprehensive library of streams and videos of the event are being built ready for the historic day.

At first the story seems too good to be true; create a website oddly reminiscent of The Onion, then sell it to them. But for two clever brothers that’s exactly what happened.

Four months ago, Leo and John Resig created an entertainment photo blog called The Chive. From header to footer, it felt like you’d arrived at The Onion. At a glance it was brand theft but Leo and John had more far-reaching motives, “Imitation is the best form of flattery. Plus we knew The Onion could take a joke” said Leo, “Actually, we wanted to get their attention. It was our plan all along. We hoped the Onion would see the big potential in our little site and help us out.” Well, not exactly.

The Onion saw The Chive and it wasn’t love at first sight. Julie Smith, the GM for the Onion contacted brothers and kindly asked them to deconstruct their themes to look less like The Onion. The brothers once again turned to irony for aid, “We counter-offered. We offered to buy The Onion for $2.50 and a pack of Newport Menthols,” said John grinning, “Julie took it well. She politely declined.”

The Chive then shed its Onion skin and rebranded itself entirely. Today, nothing but the Chive’s vegetable name is akin to The Onion.

But then something happened. The Chive started to blossom. Every day, thousands of new visitors funneled into The Chive. It seems the brothers’ ability to aggregate all the current, funny photos on the net was bringing in a massive audience, nearly 50,000 unique visitors a day after only 4 months.

“When half our staff was surfing The Chive, we knew there was something there,” says President and CEO of The Onion, Steve Hannah” adding, “Of course we knew that The Chive would want more than a couple dollars and menthol cigarettes. Everybody knows menthols are only good during the winter and we’d ticked over to spring. We offered a bit more.”

A bit more to say the very least. The Onion purchased its bastard vegetable cousin for 3.9 million dollars on Monday. The brothers Resig will still operate the blog, they’ll just do it from different parts of the globe. Says John, “I always wanted to see Sri Lanka before the civil war, so I’m building a time machine.”

Many people love to eat out. It’s nice to not have to cook and to enjoy high-quality food. Still, the expense can be saved with a little bit of effort and some ideas (and help) on cooking it. Free Gourmet Recipes is a site that can help you and your family to eat well and still save money.

Perhaps the most common form of entertainment is “dinner and a movie.” Even though they already do a ton of advertising, it’s worth noting that Netflix is an excellent way to save money and still get our Hollywood fix.

Video games have become so popular over the years that the prices have also gone up tremendously. Board games and card games, once a mainstay in family entertainment, have fallen to the wayside. Out of sight, out of mind, and most are sitting in the closet with pieces missing. For those who want to have fun without shooting aliens or fighting orcs, About has an excellent resource with several sources for the digital versions of good ol’ family board game night.

All of these things are great for entertainment, but what about bigger expenses? They say the worst birthdays and anniversaries to have from a gift perspective is shortly after Christmas. Many have spent their budgets and now they are remembering that someone special has a birthday in January. For those situations, eDivvy has the solution—the site lets you split the cost of a gift amongst friends which makes giving those special gifts a lot easier on everyone’s budget.

Here are some other sites that can help you save money after the holidays:

• Television—Cable and satellite are expensive. Hulu brings the joy of television straight to your computer.
• Coupons—Not everyone uses them. Some only use them when they need (like after the holidays). Coupon Clipper can help.
• Travel—Just because the holidays are over doesn’t mean that all of the travelling is done. Instead of using the mainstream sites like Orbitz or Priceline, Kayak is the best place to find the deals on travel that you need.
• Bargain Hunting—For those looking for the best deals, CheapCheapCheap is the place to go. It has deals from everyone. If there’s a special or a coupon available for major retailers, the folks at CheapCheapCheap will find it.

* * *

Read more about Saving Money on Daily Artisan.

Then, there are those who are able to fly under the radar, whether it’s because they focus on a specific niche or they are simply satisfied with their current market share.  Here are five website providers who fall into that category: great websites but not a ton of press about them.  If they choose to, the press will be coming soon.

ForeScene Creative Solutions

It isn’t easy to take a diner website and make it look exceptionally professional while keeping it as functional as it needs to be.  ForeScene has achieved this with many of their websites, including Rockaways Diner.

TK Carsites

The automotive industry is ripe with complex websites that are difficult to navigate and even more difficult to find on the search engines.  TK Carsites and their Power of 5 SEO platform has turned one website into 5 with an innovative marketing technique.  Instead of dealers getting one domain, they actually get 5 - one for each of their profit centers.  From a navigation and search engine optimization perspective, it doesn’t get any better, as Burnsville Toyota in Minneapolis has found out.

In2Media

You would normally think that desks are boring.  Not Milk.  The desk itself is extraordinary and the website is done in a way that truly does it justice.  When you can build a website that can people busy for extended periods of time looking at a desk, you know you’ve done your job.

Pearse Street

There are several free platforms out there for people and organizations to build social networks.  There are also many social network website providers out there that charge a lot.  Pearse Street falls right in the middle - affordable but effective. Just take a look at what they did with Craten Fire - very effective.

Barbara Carneiro

Minimalism.  Nobody does it better.  For those who need a simple, super-fast, easy to use website, Barbara Carneiro is the pro.  There is nothing on the websites that will make anybody say “Wow” but there is nothing ont he websites that will make them say “Bleh” either.  Minimalism.  Enough said.  Take a peak at Bartley Capital.

Researchers in Madagascar report remarkable fearlessness in the Aye-aye; some accounts tell of individual animals strolling nonchalantly in village streets or even walking right up to naturalists in the rainforest and sniffing their shoes. Therefore, it is no wonder that displaced animals often raid coconut plantations or steal food in villages. It is not unlike the Common Raccoon in this regard.

However, public contempt goes beyond this. The Aye-aye is often viewed as a harbinger of evil and killed on sight. Others believe that should one point its long middle finger at you, you were condemned to death. Some say the appearance of an Aye-aye in a village predicts the death of a villager, and the only way to prevent this is to kill the Aye-aye. The Sakalava people go so far as to claim Aye-ayes sneak into houses through the thatched roofs and murder the sleeping occupants by using their middle finger to puncture the victim’s aorta.[6]

Incidents of Aye-aye killings increase every year as its forest habitats are destroyed and it is forced to raid plantations and villages. Because of the superstition surrounding it, this often ends in death. Fortunately, the superstition can prevent people from hunting them for food.

This rare specie may not look like it at first glance but they are related to chimpanzees, apes, and humans.

Aye-ayes are black or dark brown in color and are known by their bushy tail that is larger than their body. They also feature big eyes, slender fingers, and large, sensitive ears. Aye-ayes have pointed claws on all their fingers and toes except for their opposable big toes, which enable them to dangle from branches.

Aye-ayes spend their lives in rain forest trees and avoid coming down to the ground. They are nocturnal, and spend the day curled up in a ball-like nest of leaves and branches. The nests appear as closed spheres with single entry holes, situated in the forks of large trees.

While perched aloft, the aye-aye taps on trees with its long middle finger and listens for wood-boring insect larvae moving under the bark. It employs the same middle finger to fish them out. The digit is also useful for scooping the flesh out of coconuts and other fruits that supplement the animal’s insect diet.

Many people native to Madagascar still consider the aye-aye an omen of ill luck. For this reason they often have been killed on sight. Such hunting, coupled with habitat destruction, have made the aye-aye critically endangered. Today they are protected by law.

The holidays are considered by many to be the best time of the year. For others, the traffic, hassle, and competitive nature of the season makes enjoying it nearly impossible. Thankfully, the Internet has resources for those of us who would choose to chop off a toe if it meant avoiding the holiday turmoil. Here are some ways to make it all easier:

Arrange Travel Online

Everyone knows where to get plane tickets online.  Expedia, Orbitz, PriceLine - with clever advertising and well-searched websites, they have the best prices available, right? Not necessarily.  Your first stop should always be:

Kayak

While they definitely aren’t the biggest name in the crowded online travel segment, they are considered by many to be the best.  Instead of working with one batch of prices, Kayak compiles from 140 different sources.  Reviews on sites such as ConsumerSearch, Kiplinger, PC World, and Washington Post seem to agree that Kayak is the way to travel.

Greeting Cards that Don’t Blend

Let’s consider the facts.  If you’re reading this article (and possibly taking notes) then you are probably one who doesn’t mind a little sarcasm with your holiday cards.  Most holiday cards are nice, sentimental, and rather boring.  They blend.  You - you’re a trend setter.  You want to be noticed, to stand out from the green and red, from the silver and gold.  For you, we offer…

SomeCards

Rather than describe it, you’ll get the idea from some of the text:

• You’re a hard person to half-assedly shop for
• Just wanted to help spread hope, peace, joy, and other marketing buzzwords
• There’s nothing like holiday cheer to offset devastating seasonal affective disorder

You get the picture.

Why Cook? Have it Delivered

It’s definitely less expensive to go to the store, pick out a turkey, ham, duck, or whatever suits your holiday fancy, then go home, prepare the food, cook it all up, make the side dishes, and present it in a beautiful.  Then again, you can just order it online and have it delivered.  DONE!

Impromptu Gourmet

With high marks from a few different sources, we gave the ordering process at Impromptu Gourmet a try.  We selected a dinner for 10 and took these choices:

• Gourmet Canape Assortment for starters
• Cajun Turkey as our Entree
• Red-Skinned Garlic Mashed Potatoes and Maple Glazed Carrots as our sides
• Multi-Grain Boule for bread
• Rocky Mountain Mudslide Cake for desert
• Holiday Celebration CD as our dinner music (yep, it comes with dinner music)

…all for $199.95.  Okay, before you run to the store, remember.  It’s once a year. Is the hassle really worth saving money?  If so, at least have the food delivered instead of going to the store:

Schwan’s

The selection is strong, the prices are reasonable, and the quality is as good if not better than what you can get at your average grocery store.  You’ll have to cook it, but at least you don’t have to get out and buy it.

Not in the US? Here is a resource for the UK as well as one for Australia.

Shop Online

One would think that this is the easy part with just about every retailer in the world (who wants to stay in business) offering some way to order and have products delivered.  While that may be the case, it doesn’t change the fact that some sites are made better than others and offer innovative ways to make it happen.

CheapCheapCheap

Did we mention “cheap”?  That’s the name of the site, and it definitely fits.  Rather than search for the best deals and specials on the various home sites of your favorite shopping places, CheapCheapCheap brings the specials to you.  They find the specials and post them, allowing consumers to search for and even rate the specials.  It’s a great concept, regardless of the mundane design of the site.

10 Best Online Wine Shops

Wine is a classy gift that is normally “put to use” shortly after it has been received and/or chilled.  Still, it’s a matter of taste and preference.  Rather than list dozens of sites, we’ll list one.  This article on FoodandWine.com breaks down the 10 best places to order.

eDivvy.com

Group gifting - great in theory, tough to make it happen.  At least it used to be.  Now, eDivvy.com gives people a way to select gifts from several online vendors and have the group gifting coordinated for you.  Instead of several little gifts, family, friends, or co-workers can pitch in the funds to get a great gift for someone.  eDivvy.com has an innovative interface that handles the email contacts, money collection, and sending of the gift to the recipient or the organizer.  It’s time to return the $15 CD’s and get your loved ones an iPod.

Hot Holiday Gifts, 2008

Bizrate has always been one of the best places to find items and compare the prices.  It’s huge database is comprehensive and the items are competitive.  This year’s guide to “Hot in ‘08″ is a nice way to get a wide assortment of gifts for different people all in one place.

Installation and Getting Started

1. Introduction to Linux - A Hands on Guide

2. Linux From Scratch

3. The Easiest Linux Guide You’ll Ever Read - An Introduction to Linux for Windows users

4. Linux Installation and Getting Started by Matt Welsh

5. Comprehensive Linux Textbook by Muayyad Saleh Al-Sadi

6. Pocket Linux Guide

7. Linux+ Study Guide

8. The Linux Cookbook: Tips and Techniques for Everyday Use by Michael Stutz

9. Beyond Linux from Scratch

10. Brian and Tom’s Linux Book

11. Everyday Linux

12. Linux Dictionary

13. Learning the Unix Operating System

14. Slackware Linux Essentials by Alan Hicks, Chris Lumens, David Cantrell, and Logan Johnson

Security

1. Linux Admins Security Guide

2. Linux Security Howto

3. Linux Firewall Configuration, Packet Filtering & netfilter/iptables

4. Securing and Optimizing Linux by Gerhard Mourani

System Administration

1. The Book of Webmin Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love UNIX

2. Linux Network Administrator’s Guide by Olaf Kirch and Terry Dawson

3. Self-Service Linux: Mastering the Art of Problem Determination by Dan Behman and Mark Wilding

4. SUSE Linux Administration Guide

5. Bash Guide for Beginners

6. In The Beginning Was The Command Line

7. Vi iMproved (VIM)

Programming

1. The Art of Unix Programming

2. Advanced Linux Programming by CodeSourcery LLC

3. Java Application Development on Linux by Carl Albing and Michael Schwarz(PDF)

4. Writing GNOME Applications

5. Advanced Linux Programming

6. Secure Programming for Linux and Unix

7. The Art of Unix Programming

8. The Linux Development Platform

9. Secure Programming for Linux and Unix HOWTO

10. C++ GUI Programming With Qt 3

11. Linux Kernel Module Programming Guide by Ori Pomerantz

12. KDE 2.0 Development

13. GTK+/Gnome Application Development

14. GNU Autoconf, Automake and Libtool

15. The Linux Kernel Module Programming Guide

16. PHP Essentials

17. Javascript Essentials

18. Visual Basic Essentials

Migration

1. Linux Client Migration Cookbook

2. Linux Client Migration Cookbook, Version 2: A Practical Planning and Implementation Guide for Migrating to Desktop Linux by Chris Almond

Kernel

1. The Linux kernel

2. Linux Kernel 2.4 Internals

Ubuntu

1. Unofficial Ubuntu Guide

2. Ubuntu Linux Essentials

Red Hat

1. Red Hat Enterprise Linux Installation Guide

2. Red Hat Enterprise Linux Reference Guide

3. Red Hat Enterprise Linux Step By Step Guide

4. Maximum RPM, Taking the Red Hat Package Manager to the Limit

Fedora Core

1. Red Hat Fedora Core 7 Installation Guide

2. Fedora Core 7 Desktop Guide

3. Fedora Linux Essentials

Knoppix

1. Knowing Knoppix

Debian

1. Debian GNU/Linux Desktop Survival Guide

2. Debian GNU/Linux System Administrator’s Manual

3. Linux Compute Clusters by Chander Kant

4. Linux Device Drivers, Third Edition

5. GNU Bash Reference Manual

6. GNU Emacs manual

FBI Agent Robert Eringer has served his country well not only pursuing and gaining the confidence of the CIA traitor, Edward Lee Howard, who defected to the Soviet Union in 1985 giving up important US secrets to the KGB, but also serving as the Prince of Monaco’s (Dis)Information Chief for three years. Here Robert gained first-hand knowledge of Putin’s abuse and wrote about it in his book, Ruse.

Mr. Eringer has enjoyed a wide-ranging career as a undercover FBI operative, journalist, novelist, and private intelligence consultant.

As an investigative reporter, Mr. Eringer’s specialty was infiltrating extremist groups, including violent anarchists, neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan.

Robert now writes for the Santa Barbara News-Press  where the article below was first featured on Putin’s corrupt dealings. The Santa Barbara News-Press provides access to subscribers only. We feel this article is newsworthy and should be seen by the masses. With that in mind, Mr. Eringer has given Daily Artisan his blessing to run his article.

By early 2005, Western intelligence services knew that Vladimir Putin was scheming to remain in absolute control of Russia beyond his second four-year term as president, which would expire in May 2008. Some thought he would attempt to amend the Russian Constitution by quashing term limits. But more likely, analysts predicted, Mr. Putin would contrive to become prime minister and transfer presidential powers to the prime minister’s portfolio. That, of course, is precisely what transpired.

And thus, the New Russia has provided its people — and the world — with their New Stalin: a megalomaniac autocrat determined to hold onto power at any cost, to include the beating and shooting to death of journalists who dare criticize his dictatorial rule — under which local elections have been obliterated and the media placed under strict control.

A self-admitted thug as a youth who desired to join the KGB from age 16, Mr. Putin was last month depicted in Vanity Fair as “the only small-time crook to become the president of Russia.”

A position he has abused to become a big-time crook.

Analysts at several Western intelligence services believe Mr. Putin has squirreled away a minimum of $15 billion — though some authoritative sources believe the real figure could be as high as $40 billion. Considerable cash is understood to be divided among German bank accounts (Mr. Putin served in East Germany as a KGB officer and speaks German), but much of this grafter’s booty has been laundered into real estate around Western Europe through a network of shady oil and gas distribution companies, including a Monaco-based S.A.M. called Sotrama, and several companies registered in Liechtenstein, including Oil Terminal, Horizon International Trading, and Petroruss, Inc.

Mr. Putin has also forged friendships with leaders of the European microstates — particularly Monaco and Luxembourg — for the purpose of creating new ciphered accounts through trusted cutouts to disguise ill-gotten gains in tax havens where bank secrecy is sacrosanct. Last year Mr. Putin vacationed with Monaco’s Prince Albert II, and in a peculiar display of machismo bared his naked chest for Kremlin cameramen. (Even more bizarre, to celebrate his 56th birthday four days ago, the Russian PM released “Let’s Learn Judo with Vladimir Putin,” a DVD that became an immediate big hit with Russia’s gay community.)

A senior officer with Russia’s FSB, successor to the KGB, told The Investigator that London-based oligarch Roman Abramovich was forced by President Putin to sell Sibneft — the fifth largest oil producing and refining company — to the Russian state, and then to disburse $13 billion in proceeds to a select group: Mr. Abramovich received only $4 billion, with the balance divided between Mr. Putin (at least $1 billion, probably as much as $5 billion), several of his Kremlin cronies, and former President Boris Yeltsin — part of a deal struck in 1999 when Mr. Yeltsin appointed Mr. Putin acting president.

The FSB officer expressed disillusionment with Mr. Putin because of how he has enabled his St. Petersburg pack to get fabulously rich — and now the Russian premier is trapped by the leverage these corrupt cronies have on him. Mr. Putin frets about finding himself out of power without immunity from prosecution for theft and corruption, hence his incentive, and determination, to remain in control. That’s another reason he ingratiates himself with European microstates — he may one day need safe haven.

It caused Mr. Putin a bad patch in late 2005, when he brooded over an affair with a pretty female Russian gymnast less than half his age named Alina Kabayeva. He met the agile Ms. Kabayeva in August 2004 when she took part in the Athens Olympics. Mr. Putin began to drink too much vodka, alone. In early 2006, feeling bullish as head of the G8 Summit, he got a grip and suspended his extramarital relationship. But earlier this year Mr. Putin left Ludmila, his wife of 25 years, to resume a liaison with the gymnast.

He tools around Moscow in a customized Audi with “007″ car tags. Yet when Mr. Putin worked in the KGB he was no James Bond. His spook skills were so lackluster he was stationed not in Berlin, to which he aspired, but Dresden. Yuri Shvets, a defector who attended KGB school with Mr. Putin, remembers him as a lowly, despised snitch.

Intelligence analysts told The Investigator Mr. Putin is extremely secretive and possesses a bullying nature. He has few friends and trusts no one; he respects those who stand up to him, and is contemptuous of those who easily concede to his wishes. He can be charming and supremely self-confident. In negotiations he is focused and tenacious; success brings out his arrogance. He strives to have something on everyone — and has directed his intelligence services to perform accordingly.

Mr. Putin’s corruption dates back to the early 1990s when he ditched a KGB career and got appointed deputy mayor of his native St. Petersburg — allowing that city’s powerful Tambov organized crime group to flourish. The Putin-Tambov relationship led to the creation, in 1995, of Petersburg Oil Terminal, which soon became the nucleus of satellite distribution companies benefiting Mr. Putin and Guennadi Timchenko, a leading figure in Mr. Putin’s illicit financial structures. The Geneva-based Mr. Timchenko is thought to be Mr. Putin’s childhood pal in addition to former KGB colleague.
Perhaps Mr. Putin’s most revealing characteristic is how he spends his spare time: watching brutal videos of military reprisals against Chechen nationalists. The more barbaric the imagery played out on his TV screen, including Chechen teenage boys being shot in the head, the greater is said to be Mr. Putin’s enjoyment.

His public relations adviser, Marina Litvinovich, said this about Mr. Putin after quitting in disgust: “It seemed he had no human feelings, no compassion.”

Needless to say, Ms. Litvinovich was later attacked on a Moscow street and severely beaten.

So how will Mr. Putin react to Russia’s new Independent Democratic Party, created 10 days ago by “Mr. Perestroika” himself, Mikhail Gorbachev? Will Gorby, now 77, suddenly contract food poisoning? Given that Mr. Putin’s popularity rating has fallen from 80 to 33 percent in recent months, perhaps he will move to a beachfront duplex in Monte Carlo, where he can play Tarzan with Prince Albert year-round.

Image Source 1, 2, 3

Robert Eringer worked as a spy for the FBI for 10 years beginning in 1993. Robert was responsible for bringing American CIA Traitor Edward Lee Howard to capture which he wrote about in his book, Ruse. Robert now writes for the Santa Barbara News-Press  where the article below was first featured on the Manchurian Microchip.

The Santa Barbara News-Press provides access to subscribers only. We feel this article is newsworthy and should be seen by the masses. With that in mind, Mr. Eringer has given Daily Artisan his blessing to run his article.

The geniuses at Homeland Security who brought you hare-brained procedures at airports (which inconvenience travelers without snagging terrorists) have decreed that October is National Cyber Security Awareness Month. This means The Investigator — at the risk of compromising national insecurities — would be remiss not to make you aware of the hottest topic in U.S. counterintelligence circles: rogue microchips. This threat emanates from China (PRC) — and it is hugely significant.

The myth: Chinese intelligence services have concealed a microchip in every computer everywhere, programmed to “call home” if and when activated.

The reality: It may actually be true.

All computers on the market today — be they Dell, Toshiba, Sony, Apple or especially IBM — are assembled with components manufactured inside the PRC. Each component produced by the Chinese, according to a reliable source within the intelligence community, is secretly equipped with a hidden microchip that can be activated any time by China’s military intelligence services, the PLA.

“It is there, deep inside your computer, if they decide to call it up,” the security chief of a multinational corporation told The Investigator. “It is capable of providing Chinese intelligence with everything stored on your system — on everyone’s system — from e- mail to documents. I call it Call Home Technology. It doesn’t mean to say they’re sucking data from everyone’s computer today, it means the Chinese think ahead — and they now have the potential to do it when it suits their purposes.”

Discussed theoretically in high-tech security circles as “Trojan Horse on a Chip” or “The Manchurian Chip,” Call Home Technology came to light after the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) launched a security program in December 2007 called Trust in Integrated Circuits. DARPA awarded almost $25 million in contracts to six companies and university research labs to test foreign-made microchips for hardware Trojans, back doors and kill switches — techie-speak for bugs and gremlins — with a view toward microchip verification.

Raytheon, a defense contractor, was granted almost half of these funds for hardware and software testing.

Its findings, which are classified, have apparently sent shockwaves through the counterintelligence community.

“It is the hottest topic concerning the FBI and the Pentagon,” a retired intelligence official told The Investigator. “They don’t know quite what to do about it. The Chinese have even been able to hack into the computer system that handles our Intercontinental Ballistic Missile system.”

Another senior intelligence source told The Investigator, “Our military is aware of this and has had to take some protective measures. The problem includes defective chips that don’t reach military specs — as well as probable Trojans.”

A little context: In 2005 the Lenovo Group in China paid $1.75 billion for IBM’s PC unit, even though that unit had lost $965 million the previous four years. Three congressmen, including the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, tried to block this sale because of national security concerns, to no avail. (The PRC embassy in Washington, D.C., maintains a large lobbying presence to influence congressmen and their staffs through direct contact.)

In June 2007, a Pentagon computer network utilized by the U.S. defense secretary’s office was hacked into — and traced directly back to the Chinese PLA.

A report presented to Congress late last year characterized PRC espionage as “the single greatest risk to the security of American technologies.” Almost simultaneously, Jonathan Evans, director- general of MI5, Britain’s domestic security and counterintelligence service, sent a confidential letter to CEOs and security chiefs at 300 UK companies to warn that they were under attack by “Chinese state organizations” whose purpose, said Mr. Evans, was to defeat their computer security systems and steal confidential commercial information.

The Chinese had specifically targeted Rolls-Royce and Shell Oil.

The key to unlocking computer secrets through rogue microchips is uncovering (or stealing) source codes, without which such microchips would be useless. This is why Chinese espionage is so heavily focused upon the U.S. computer industry.

Four main computer operating systems exist. Two of them, Unix and Linux, utilize open-source codes. Apple’s operating system is Unix- based.

Which leaves only Microsoft as the source code worth cracking. But in early 2004, Microsoft announced that its security had been breached and that its source code was “lost or stolen.”

“As technology evolves, each new program has a new source code,” a computer forensics expert told The Investigator. “So the Chinese would need ongoing access to new Microsoft source codes for maintaining their ability to activate any microchips they may have installed, along with the expertise to utilize new hardware technology.”

No surprise then that the FBI expends much of its counterintelligence resources these days on Chinese high-tech espionage within the United States. Timothy Bereznay, while still serving as assistant director of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division, told USA Today, “Foreign collectors don’t wait until something is classified — they’re targeting it at the research and development stage.” Mr. Bereznay now heads Raytheon’s Intelligence and Information Systems division.

The PRC’s intelligence services use tourists, exchange students and trade show attendees to gather strategic data, mostly from open sources. They have also created over 3,500 front companies in the United States — including several based in Palo Alto to focus on computer technology.

Back in 2005, when the Chinese espionage problem was thought to be focused on military technology, then-FBI counterintelligence operations chief Dave Szady said, “I think the problem is huge, and it’s something we’re just getting our arms around.” Little did he know just how huge, as it currently applies to computer network security.

The FBI is reported to have arrested more than 25 Chinese nationals and Chinese-Americans on suspicion of conspiracy to commit espionage between 2004 and 2006. The Investigator endeavored to update this figure, but was told by FBI spokesman William Carter, “We do not track cases by ethnicity.”

Excuse us for asking. We may be losing secrets, but at least the dignity of our political correctness remains intact.

Oh, and Homeland Security snagged comic icon Jerry Lewis, 82, trying to board a plane in Las Vegas with a gun — no joke.