Left to chance

On Social Networks, You Are Who You Know

phil — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 07:28:00 PST

santosh maharshi writes “On social networks like Facebook, even if you have kept your profile very private, people can just look at your friends list and infer lots of vital information about you. Most of the social networks like Facebook and LinkedIn allow people to see your picture and your friends list as part of the open access for visitors (the article says that only 5% of Facebook users have bothered to hide their friends list). In a study titled You Are Who You Know: Inferring User Profiles in Online Social Networks (PDF), conducted by Alan Mislove of Northeastern University and his colleagues at the Max Planck Institute for Software Systems, an algorithm was tested that can accurately infer the personal attributes of Facebook users simply by looking at their friend lists. ‘At Rice [University], the algorithm accurately predicted the correct dormitory, graduation year, and area of study for the many of the students. In fact, among these undergraduates, researchers found that “with as little as 20 percent of the users providing attributes we can often infer the attributes for the remaining users with over 80 percent accuracy.”‘”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

FCC Asks You To Test Your Broadband Speeds

phil — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 05:51:00 PST

AnotherUsername writes “The Federal Communications Commission is asking the nation’s broadband and smartphone users to use its broadband testing tools to help the feds and consumers know what speeds are actually available, not just promised by the nation’s telecoms. At http://www.broadband.gov/, users enter their address and test their broadband download speed, upload speed, latency, and jitter using one of two tests (users can choose to test with the other after one test is complete). The FCC is requiring the street address, as it ‘may use this data to analyze broadband quality and availability on a geographic basis’ (they promise not to release location data except in the aggregate). The agency is also asking those who live in a broadband ‘dead zone’ to fill out a report online, call, fax, email, or even send a letter. The announcement comes just six days before the FCC presents the first ever national broadband plan to Congress. Java is necessary to run the test.” Lauren Weinstein points out some of the limitations in the FCC’s testing methodology.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

UK Gov’t Wants Facebook To Feature Child Safety Button

phil — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 03:40:00 PST

judgecorp writes “Harriet Harman, the deputy leader of the Labour Party, has said that UK government ministers are ‘taking action’ to get Facebook to add a British child protection button (called CEOP) to its site. The move comes after the UK’s Daily Mail withdrew allegations that teenagers on Facebook are continually pestered — though Facebook is still considering suing the paper. The campaign apparently ignores Facebook’s assertion that it already has better child protection in place and the CEOP button would be limited to the UK.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A Sad Day For the New Zealand Internet

phil — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 00:36:00 PST

An anonymous reader writes “Another one bites the dust, as New Zealand’s Internet filter stealthily goes live with two smaller ISPs, and three of the largest already rumoured to have signed up to do the same. However, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is apparently ‘committed to helping people to circumvent government internet filtering,’ so perhaps the USA will launch an invasion to free the poor downtrodden Kiwis from their own evil government?” Clever of one of the acquiescing ISPs to have named itself “Watchdog.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

TJX Hacking Conspirator Gets 4 Years

phil — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 19:40:03 PST

Humza Zaman, a co-conspirator in the hack of TJX and other companies, was sentenced Thursday in Boston to 46 months in prison and fined $75,000 for his role in the conspiracy. The sentence matches what prosecutors were seeking.

Zaman, a 33-year-old former network security manager at Barclays Bank, was charged with laundering between $600,000 and $800,000 for hacker Albert Gonzalez, who is currently awaiting sentencing on charges that he and others hacked into TJX, Office Max, Heartland Payment Systems and numerous other companies to steal data on more than 100 million credit and debit card accounts.

Zaman pleaded guilty in April to one count of conspiracy. His sentence includes three years of supervised release with the condition that Zaman must disclose his conviction to any future employer. Upon release, Zaman will not be barred from using computers.

Zaman is the second conspirator in the TJX case to be charged. Former Morgan Stanley coder, Stephen Watt, was sentenced in December to two years in prison for his role in the TJX case, which involved supplying Gonzalez with a sniffer program used to siphon card data from the TJX network.

Once the card data was stolen, mules were used to siphon the money from ATMs and send the money electronically — either by a wire transfer or using digital currencies such as E-gold and Web Money — to a bank account in Latvia. Gonzalez’s portion of the booty was then transferred to other bank accounts, some of them opened under fictitious names. Zaman’s job in the United States was to withdraw funds from these accounts at ATMs in various locations across the country, and then send the cash to Gonzalez in Florida.

Zaman also traveled to San Francisco three times in late 2005 and early 2006 and met with “an unknown man of apparent Eastern European descent” who slipped him between $50,000 and $370,000 in cash each time. Zaman then shipped the money via Federal Express to Gonzalez. Zaman also picked up money in New York for Gonzalez. Each time, he earned 10 percent of the amount shipped.

In March 2008, two months before Gonzalez was arrested in Florida, Zaman sent him ATM system logs from Barclays, a bank where Zaman was working as manager of network perimeter security. Prosecutors said Gonzalez uploaded the logs to a Latvian server he controlled and shared with others, but there is no evidence that the logs were used for nefarious purposes before Gonzalez’s arrest or after.

In addition to the Barclays ATM logs, investigators found 16.3 million payment card numbers on the Latvian server and an additional 27.5 million card numbers on a server in the Ukraine.

Gonzalez is currently facing a minimum 17-year sentence in prison.

Prosecutors had sought only 46 months and a $75,000 fine for Zaman because his activities were limited solely to money laundering. The government said it had “no evidence that Zaman participated in, or reasonably foresaw the extent of, the intrusions and data thefts perpetrated by the Gonzalez organization.”

Prosecutors said Zaman did not provide “substantial assistance” in the investigation or prosecution of anyone else. He provided information about his own activities, the authorities said.

According to the prosecution’s sentencing memo (.pdf), Zaman was a popular kid with lots of friends. He was a member of chess, debate and math clubs and was on a successful career path, earning $130,000 plus bonuses from Barclays, where he worked for two years.

“But he enjoyed partying and using expensive recreational drugs when he wasn’t working,” prosecutors said. “So he needed cash beyond his six-figure legitimate income.”

Zaman told Threat Level that the government’s portrayal of him as a money launderer and drug addict is exaggerated, even though he pleaded guilty to the conspiracy charge. He says he just picked up the packages of money as a favor to Gonzalez, whom he met in 2004 through Stephen Watt, and didn’t know that the money came from carding.

“I asked [Gonzalez], ‘Is this illegal?’ And I was told that this was just money that was owed to him,” Zaman said.

He said he only picked up a few packages of money for Gonzalez, primarily in 2005, before he stopped.

Update: This story has been updated with comments from Zaman.

Photo: Refracted Moments/Flickr

See also:

Original article at Threat Level

Pennsylvania CISO Fired Over Talk At RSA Conference

phil — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:07:00 PST

An anonymous reader writes “Pennsylvania’s chief information security officer Robert Maley has been fired for publicly talking about a security incident involving the Commonwealth’s online driving exam scheduling system. He apparently did not get the required approval for talking about the incident from appropriate authorities.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Hate Blogger Wins Second Mistrial

phil — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:02:15 PST

Deadlocked jurors in the Hal Turner hate blogger case were excused late Wednesday after deliberating two days. It’s the second mistrial in the government’s case to prosecute the New Jersey man for allegedly threatening to kill judges.

Assistant U.S. Attorney William Hogan said a new trial was “highly likely.” A third trial was tentatively scheduled April 12 in New York federal court.

Turner, of New Jersey, blogged at turnerradionetwork.blogspot.com that the three judges of the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit of Appeals should be “killed” for upholding a Chicago handgun ban in June.

“Let me be the first to say this plainly: These judges deserve to be killed. Their blood will replenish the tree of liberty. A small price to pay to assure freedom for millions,” the 47-year-old blogger wrote.

He also posted addresses, photos, maps and other identifying information about Chief Judge Frank Easterbrook and Judges Richard Posner and William Bauer.

The first mistrial in December was declared after jurors, deliberating two days, said they were hopelessly deadlocked. That happened again Wednesday with a new jury. That second jury, and not the first one, heard testimony from the three judges who said they felt threatened by Turner’s writings.

Turner, who remains free, claimed he was an Federal Bureau of Investigation informant paid to disseminate right-wing rhetoric. Facing up to a decade in prison if convicted, the 47-year-old maintained the First Amendment protected his speech.

See Also:

Original article at Threat Level

Pink Floyd Beats EMI In Creativity Flap

phil — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:49:59 PST

Pink Floyd prevailed Thursday in a legal brawl with its label when a British judge ordered EMI to stop selling individual downloads of the acid-inspired group’s songs without permission.

The artists behind The Dark Side of the Moon and The Wall, and other top sellers claimed its decade-old contract with EMI required the band’s music to be sold as an entire album, not as single tracks in which EMI has permitted iTunes to distribute.

High Court of Justice Judge Andrew Morritt of London agreed, ruling the 1999 agreement with EMI was crafted to “preserve the artistic integrity of the albums.”

Pink Floyd said its musical craft surrounding concept albums was being misrepresented when sold in singles. EMI claimed the contract allowed digital sales of Pink Floyd music, even one song at a time.

The Dark Side of the Moon turned 37 years old on Wednesday. Wired’s Underwire blog declared it “Earth’s reigning concept album.”

Photo: wonderferret/Flickr

See Also:

Original article at Threat Level

EMI Cannot Unbundle Pink Floyd Songs

phil — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:40:00 PST

smooth wombat writes “Before the advent of iTunes and MP3s, EMI and Pink Floyd entered into a contract which stated that EMI could not unbundle individual songs from their original album settings. This was insisted upon by the members of Pink Floyd, who wanted to retain artistic control of their works, which they considered ’seamless’ pieces of music. However, with the advent of digital downloads, EMI has been selling individual songs through its online store. Pink Floyd sued, claiming EMI was violating the contract, whereas EMI said the contract only applied to physical albums, not Internet sales. Judge Andrew Morritt backed the band, saying the contract protected ‘the artistic integrity of the albums.’ Judge Morritt also ruled EMI is ‘not entitled to exploit recordings by online distribution or by any other means other than the complete original album without Pink Floyd’s consent.’”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Bill To Ban All Salt In Restaurant Cooking

phil — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:22:00 PST

lord_rotorooter writes “Felix Ortiz, D-Brooklyn, introduced a bill that would ruin restaurant food and baked goods as we know them. The measure (if passed) would ban the use of all forms of salt in the preparation and cooking of food for all restaurants or bakeries. While the use of too much salt can contribute to health problems, the complete banning of salt would have negative impacts on food chemistry. Not only does salt enhance flavor, it controls bacteria, slows yeast activity and strengthens dough by tightening gluten. Salt also inhibits the growth of microbes that spoil cheese.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.