Once again, we missed a day, leaving us with a lot of catching up on the latest development in the world of the dark arts, corporate snooping, and military posturing.
Most notable [and after the jump], rapid escalation of the Asian security crisis and the latest in corporate cyber-stalking.
We begin with a headline from Reuters:
Man arrested for suspected plot to blow up Kansas airport
Authorities have arrested a man suspected of plotting to blow up the Mid-Continent Airport in Wichita, Kansas, in a suicide attack with a carload of explosives, officials said Friday.
Terry Loewen, a 58-year-old aviation technician from Wichita, intended to die a martyr in the bombing, U.S. District Attorney for Kansas Barry Grissom said at a news conference.
Authorities said Loewen was believed to have been motivated, at least partly, by religious beliefs. Officials said Loewen had made statements prior to the attempted attack that he was resolved to commit an act of violent “jihad” on behalf of al Qaeda against the United States.
Now, on to the latest twist in the one story that has been capturing global headlines for months. From News Corp Australia:
US spy ‘open to cutting deal with Snowden’
A NATIONAL Security Agency official has said in an interview he would be open to cutting an amnesty deal with US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden if the fugitive agreed to stop divulging secret documents.
Rick Ledgett, who heads the NSA’s task force investigating the damage from the Snowden leaks, told CBS television’s 60 Minutes program that some but not all of his colleagues share his view.
And from The Guardian, vanishing hopes for reform:
NSA review to leave spying programs largely unchanged, reports say
Panel to propose bulk surveillance continue – with some curbs
Adviser calls apparent decision to leave core intact ‘shameful’
More from Wired:
White House Task Force Urges Curb on NSA’s Bulk Data Collection
A presidential task force charged with determining what reforms are needed for the NSA and its surveillance activities has recommended the agency be led by a civilian commander, instead of a military one, and that bulk phone records the NSA wants to collect be retained by phone companies or held by a third party, rather than being stored by the NSA.
The task force also recommended restrictions on when and how the NSA can search the data, according to the Wall Street Journal. And it recommended separating the code-making division of the NSA, which develops and promotes codes, from the NSA division that breaks electronic security codes. Documents recently leaked by Edward Snowden described a decade-long effort by the NSA to crack different types of encryption and other security mechanisms in order to provide access to protected data for surveillance, a task at odds with the NSA’s traditional role in helping to develop public algorithms.
Still more from Ars Technica:
Obama panel says NSA phone spying records should be held by third party
Intelligence officials likely to oppose restrictions on surveillance.
Reuters has the response from The Most Transparent Administration in History™:
White House says plans no split of NSA, Cyber Command
The Obama administration on Friday said it will keep one person in charge of both the National Security Agency spy agency and the military’s Cyber Command, despite growing calls for splitting the roles in the wake of revelations about the vast U.S. electronic surveillance operations.
The White House had considered splitting up the two agencies, possibly giving the NSA a civilian leader for the first time in its 61-year history to dampen controversy over its programs revealed by former contractor Edward Snowden.
Dogs and ponies, via The Verge:
NSA officials go on tour to heal agency image amid surveillance scandal
The National Security Agency has endured six months of criticism from media outlets since Edward Snowden released documents disclosing the agency’s massive global surveillance apparatus. With its back against the wall, NSA head Keith Alexander and Snowden task force head Richard Ledgett are speaking directly to the press as a means of getting ahead of the story, with the hope of painting themselves — and Snowden himself — in a new light.
Another Snowden link, via Ars Technica:
Archaic but widely used crypto cipher allows NSA to decode most cell calls
Snowden docs make it official: The NSA can crack 30-year-old A5/1 crypto.
The National Security Agency can easily defeat the world’s most widely used cellphone encryption, a capability that means the agency can decode most of the billions of calls and texts that travel over public airwaves each day, according to published report citing documents leaked by Edward Snowden.
Bloomberg Businessweek has the latest form of blowback:
IBM Shareholder Sues the Company Over NSA Cooperation
Spying is not good for business. That’s been the message from many U.S. tech companies and industry groups in recent months following revelations last summer that several companies were cooperating with the National Security Agency over its Prism surveillance program. The industry says it stands to lose tens of billions of dollars as customers in other countries turn to homegrown technology instead.
Now one such company, IBM (IBM), is facing a lawsuit over its cooperation with the NSA. IBM was sued yesterday by a shareholder claiming it violated federal securities laws in seeking to hide losses that stemmed from disclosures of its relationship with the NSA.
While Business Insider has yet another disappointment from the land of Hope™ and Change™:
AP Photojournalist Blasts Obama’s Press Restrictions As ‘Orwellian Image Control’
A photojournalist for the Associated Press is pulling no punches in a scathing opinion piece published today in The New York Times, referring to the restrictions on press photographers covering the president as “draconian” and calling official photo releases “propaganda.”
The article written by Santiago Lyon, vice president and director of photography for the Associated Press, is titled “Obama’s Orwellian Image Control.”
Lyon takes issue with the release of pictures from official White House photographers as an “idealized portrayal of events” that could not be considered journalism. He also doesn’t mince words in his conclusion, calling these photos “propaganda.”
And the latest embarrassment for the folks at Langley from The Guardian:
CIA veterans say Robert Levinson affair may damage intra-agency co-operation
AP: former FBI agent missing in Iran was working with CIA
Relations between analysts and operatives likely to be strained
An unauthorized CIA spy operation initiated by agency analysts didn’t just lead to an American being seized in Iran. It may have damaged ties between intelligence analysts and operations specialists, according to CIA veterans.
More media embarrassment from Gawker:
ABC, NYT Repeatedly Lied About CIA Operative Robert Levinson
ABC News and The New York Times have known since 2007 that Robert Levinson, the ex-FBI agent who was kidnapped in Iran, was not, as the U.S. government and his family claimed, an independent businessman: He was working for the CIA. The Times’ report today discloses this timeline; ABC News’ report does not—but a source at the network confirmed to Gawker that ABC reporters discovered the CIA connection in 2007 as well. At the request of the government and Levinson’s family, however, both outlets repeatedly stated, without any caveats, that Levinson was on a “business trip” when he was captured. A review of their coverage indicates that ABC News did so at least 7 times, and the Times at least 3 times.
The Christian Science Monitor has more lies:
Levinson, Iran, the CIA, and lies
The US government has been lying for years about Robert Levinson, a man kidnapped in Iran after being sent there as part of a rogue CIA operation. Some media have been playing along.
While the AP reports that Levinson’s handlers were CIA employees, they all appear to have been analysts, rather than employees expert in gathering intelligence themselves and running assets in the field. The AP says the employees running Levinson as their own private collection agent weren’t authorized to do so, and that three analysts were quietly sacked in 2007 for their involvement and a further seven admonished.
BBC News offers the latest White House spin control:
White House: Robert Levinson not a government employee
The AP agency says the White House is choosing its words carefully – that Bob Levinson was not an “employee” but a “contractor”
The White House has said the ex-FBI agent believed to have been held in Iran for the last seven years was not working for the US government at the time of his disappearance.
White House spokesman Jay Carney spoke the day after the Associated Press news agency reported Mr Levinson was on an unauthorised mission for the CIA.
And more embarrassment via the London Daily Mail:
CIA star and ‘quirky’ office analyst who introduced her friend to the agency before he was sent on ‘rogue’ mission that led to disappearance
Anne Jablonski was forced to quit the CIA following the investigation into Levinson’s kidnapping
She is now working in the private sector and teaches yoga
She also blogs about finding inner peace and making her own cat food for her pets
BBC News has another imbroglio-in-the-making, this time for spooks across the pond:
Iran claims to have captured MI6 spy
Iran says it has captured a spy working for British intelligence agency MI6 in the south-eastern city of Kerman.
The head of Kerman’s revolutionary court said the alleged spy had admitted being in contact with four British intelligence officers 11 times, both inside and outside the country.
From the McClatchy Washington Bureau, California’s plutocratic senator pronounces:
Feinstein: vote soon on releasing parts of secret CIA detention report
The Senate Intelligence Committee will soon vote on releasing parts of a report that alleges that the CIA misled lawmakers and U.S. officials about the value of the information produced by the agency’s post-9/11 secret detention and harsh interrogation program, the panel chairwoman said.
But that doesn’t mean the public will get to see the excerpts any time soon.
The 300-page executive summary, findings and conclusions will still have to go through a process to determine which parts can be made public and which will be blacked out. The review – which will involve the White House and CIA – could take weeks or months, said a congressional aide, who requested anonymity.
McClatchy Washington Bureau again, this time with word of another report on another, much older Langley cockup:
Lawsuit seeks to unlock CIA’s secret history of Bay of Pigs invasion
The Obama administration on Thursday fought to keep secret a CIA account of the 1961 Bay of Pigs debacle.
Half a century after the failed invasion of Cuba, and three decades after a CIA historian completed his draft study, an administration lawyer told a top appellate court that the time still isn’t right to make the document public.
And the Washington Times lends a covert hand:
Leon Panetta named as source of ‘Zero Dark Thirty’ scriptwriter’s information
A Freedom of Information request filed by government watchdog Judicial Watch revealed that former CIA Director Leon E. Panetta was the source who gave up secret information to the scriptwriter of “Zero Dark Thirty,” the Hollywood movie about the raid on Osama bin Laden.
Judicial Watch said in an email that Mr. Panetta revealed the classified information during an awards ceremony on June 24, 2011, to mark the administration’s assault on Osama bin Laden. Mr. Panetta was giving a speech at the ceremony, during which he concluded: “You have made me proud of the CIA family. And you have made me proud as an Italian to know that bin Laden sleeps with the fishes.”
Next, a trip noth of the border with some unsurprising story about Canada’s NSA counterpart, the Communications Security Establishment Canada, via CBC News:
CSEC watchdog muzzled, defanged
The wish and ‘a prayer’ of keeping tabs on CSEC
The revelation that a little-known Canadian intelligence operation has been electronically spying on trading partners and other nations around the world, at the request of the U.S. National Security Agency, has critics wondering who’s keeping an eye on our spies.
The answer is a watchdog, mostly muzzled and defanged, whose reports to Parliament are first censored by the intelligence agency he is watching, then cleared by the minister politically responsible for any problems in the first place.
And from Reuters, some dronish blowback:
In Yemen, al Qaeda gains sympathy amid U.S. drone strikes
Despite the toll taken on militants, residents in various parts of Yemen told Reuters they worry that the drone program is counter-productive. In the capital Sanaa, Abdulrazzaq al-Jamal, a journalist who has interviewed several members of AQAP, acknowledged the group has taken some hits from the drones, but said the strikes have also brought it followers.
“The drones have limited their movements but it makes their ideology more attractive to people. When a Yemeni is killed, it doesn’t matter whether or not he’s al Qaeda,” said Jamal, who was wearing the dagger common among Yemeni men.
Off to Sweden for a helping hand via TheLocal.se:
US spies asked Sweden for translation help
Leaked documents from the US have shown that the NSA asked Sweden for translation help on their “high-priority” material that involved the Swedish language.
The request came in the form of an internal message at the US National Security Agency (NSA), which asked Sweden’s National Defence Radio Establishment (Svenska Försvarets Radioanstalt – FRA) for translation help in the fight against terrorism.
From The Guardian, gag us with a spoon:
Calling for abolition of monarchy is still illegal, UK justice ministry admits
Department wrongly announced that section of law threatening people with life imprisonment had been repealed
The Treason Felony Act 1848 has been the subject of repeated legal confusion this century. It was the subject of a high court challenge by the Guardian in 2003. This week, in a footnote to a list of new offences, the MoJ said the powers in section 3 of the Act had finally been swept away in a belated, legislative pruning of unwanted laws.
From EUobserver, legal blowback in the works?:
France’s new surveillance law under fire
A new law in France, which expands surveillance monitoring powers, without judicial review, to government agencies like tax and finance authorities, may be challenged in the Constitutional Court, reports Reuters. Pro-right groups, tech companies Google and Microsoft, want the constitutional watchdog to review the law adopted earlier this week.
Moscow next, with suppressive thoughts about another perceived security threat. From The Guardian:
Vladimir Putin defends anti-gay laws as bastion of global conservatism
President says Russia stands on international stage in defence of traditional values against ‘fruitless so-called tolerance’
After the jump, the Asian security crises continue, with heads rolling, internet purging, ships nearly colliding, secrecy law protests, alliance plays, drones a-buildin’, and legal bribes; corporate cyberstalking, civil servant muzzling, and more. . .
Now it’s on to Japan, where the just-enacted central plank of the rapidly rising national security state continues to generate blowback. From the Mainichi:
Opposition to new secrecy law remains strong
Even after the state secrets protection law was promulgated on Dec. 13, protests against and concern about the new law remained strong and bitter.
A group of 23 criminal law scholars issued a statement of protest, saying the definition of secrecy is vague and the new law runs counter to the principle of no punishment without law, and violates the Japanese Constitution. The group called for abolishing the law with group leader Toshikuni Murai, professor emeritus at Hitotsubashi University, saying the public’s freedoms would be restricted one after another.
More blowback from the Asahi Shimbun:
INTERVIEW: Foreigners’ rights activist says new secrecy law may encourage xenophobia
When the new state secrets protection law takes effect within a year, it will impose severe punishments on public servants and other people who leak information concerning security.
The law, which passed the Diet on Dec. 6, was promulgated Dec. 13. Although the government said the lives of citizens will not be affected, Shin Sugok, a third-generation Korean resident in Japan and activist working for foreigners’ rights, fears that the law will increase antagonism against Koreans and other foreigners living in the country.
The Japan Times offers some critical perspective:
TPP offers early test of how far secrets law will cow Japan’s media
The central conflict over the recently passed state secrets bill was between the ruling coalition and its political opposition, but the real loser in the contest was the media, and not just because the new law would appear to limit its ability to gather news. The government always seemed to be one step ahead of the press in keeping its version of events prominent.
After the bill was passed, Tokyo Shimbun surveyed some experts for their take on the process. Several said the government purposely kept the details of the bill under wraps until it was submitted to the Cabinet for approval. As a result, the media was unprepared to cover it thoroughly when it quickly reached the debate phase.
The Christian Science Monitor sums up:
Japanese push back hard against state secrets law
Prime Minister Abe’s party instituted sharp limitations on leakers and journalists. Now, more than 80 percent of the public want the law changed and Abe’s popularity has plummeted.
Next, the first of many headlines on the ongoing oceanic boundary crises giving impetus to strengthening the Chinese security machine, heightened tensions in the always-anxious Koreas, and providing the impetus for the emerging Japanese national security state. From the Yomiuri Shimbun:
Japan, Philippines agree on airspace
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Philippine President Benigno Aquino on Friday agreed the two countries will cooperate on the issue of China’s newly declared air defense identification zone over the East China Sea.
If the zone expands into the South China Sea, the Philippines will be affected, Aquino told Abe in their meeting in Tokyo, indicating he hopes to work with Japan on the issue.
From the Japan Daily Press, a plea:
ASEAN, Japan, call for peaceful resolutions to sea disputes
The leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) may not be referring to the East Asian country by name, but the specter of China clearly hangs over their summit with Japan Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in Tokyo this week. Countries like the Philippines have said that they are committed to ensuring that territorial disputes will be resolve in a peaceful manner and calling for freedom of flight in international space.
The Jakarta Globe covers a payoff:
Japan Seeks Asean Backing on China With $20b Pledge
Japan pledged $20 billion in aid and loans to Southeast Asia on Saturday, the latest step in its bid to woo global public opinion in a territorial dispute with China.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe offered the cash over five years for members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) at a celebratory summit to mark 40 years of ties with the bloc.
The Jakarta Globe takes a broader perspective:
China-Japan Rift Triggers Charm Offensive for Southeast Asia
China’s growing assertiveness with Japan and the US is helping bring a level of attention to Southeast Asia unseen since the Vietnam War, ushering billions of dollars of investment, wider access to trade and stepped-up military assistance.
A summit starting today between Southeast Asian leaders and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, coupled with US Secretary of State John Kerry’s visit to Vietnam and the Philippines from tomorrow, underscore the strategic and increasingly economic attraction of an area poised to benefit as the world’s top three economies — the US, Japan and China — vie for economic and political influence.
Kyodo News proposes:
Japan, ASEAN to seek “freedom of overflight” in light of China’s ADIZ
Leaders of Japan and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations will likely call for ensuring “freedom of overflight” in a joint statement to be issued at their summit that began in Tokyo on Friday, a diplomatic source said, in an implicit reference to China’s controversial air defense zone.
Jiji Press disposes:
Abe Sees No Need for Airlines to Give China Flight Plans
Japan will continue calling on private airlines not to meet China’s demands for the submission of flight plans when they pass through an air defense identification zone declared by Beijing, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe suggested Saturday.
Abe told a press conference that he has no plans to change his government’s policy regarding the oversight of the airline industry.
While the Japan Daily Press provokes:
Japan, South Korea hold East China Sea naval drill in message to Beijing
Despite the ongoing tensions in the region due to China’s newly-established Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ), its nearest neighbours Japan and South Korea pushed through with their biennial naval drills in the East China Sea. The area where the military drills were conducted lies within the controversial defense zone, which others see as a clear statement that both countries are still not keen to follow China’s rules on this issue.
Authorities said the events were planned even before China’s November 23 announcement and so they did not see fit to inform China about their rescue drills. Neither submitted any flight plans to Chinese authorities.
And JapanToday covers another provocation:
U.S., Chinese warships nearly collide in South China Sea
A Chinese naval vessel came dangerously close to a U.S. warship during a tense incident in the South China Sea last week, U.S. military officials said Friday.
The USS Cowpens, a guided missile cruiser, was forced to maneuver to avoid a collision with the Chinese ship that had crossed directly in front of it and halted, according to naval officers and defense officials.
China’s amphibious dock ship came less than 500 meters from the American warship, a defense official said.
From Xinhua, another move:
China discloses more massacre evidences at anniversary
Nanjing released new evidence and testimony on Friday from survivors of the massacre that took place in the city 76 years ago.
At an international peace rally to commemorate the 76th anniversary of the tragedy, about 5,000 people remembered the 300,000 victims killed by Japanese troops during WWII.
Jiji Press announces the inevitable:
Japan to Introduce Drones for 1st Time
The Japanese government plans to procure three unmanned surveillance drones for the first time for the Air Self-Defense Force amid growing airspace tensions after China’s newly claimed air defense identification zone over the East China Sea, officials said Friday.
The plan was included in a medium-term defense buildup program over the five years from fiscal 2014, officials said.
As does NHK WORLD:
Ministry wants new equipment for island defense
Japan’s Defense Ministry plans to buy new equipment to better defend remote islands in response to China’s increasing maritime activities.
Ministry officials say they want to buy 52 vehicles that can be used both on land and water. They also want to purchase 17 Osprey tilt-rotor transport aircraft to enable quick deployment of troops.
The Defense Ministry also wants to acquire 3 unmanned aircraft to step up surveillance of remote islands and surrounding waters in southwestern Japan. The US military’s Global Hawk is a likely choice.
The Asahi Shimbun has the interim numbers:
Japan increasing midterm defense budget to 24.7 trillion yen
The government on Dec. 12 decided on a five-year defense budget worth 24.7 trillion yen ($239 billion), an increase of more than 1 trillion yen from the previous period.
The budget for the next Mid-Term Defense Program, which will start in fiscal 2014, is expected to be approved at a Cabinet meeting next week along with new National Defense Program Guidelines.
Jiji Press has the bigger picture:
Japan’s FY 2014 Defense Budget to Rise 2.8 Pct
The Japanese government plans to raise its defense budget for fiscal 2014 starting next April by 2.8 pct from the previous year to 4,887 billion yen, informed sources said Friday.
The increase is mainly designed to boost the country’s capability to defend remote islands in the East China Sea in the face of China’s growing maritime assertiveness, the sources said.
While the Asahi Shimbun exposes:
Sumitomo Heavy doctored machine gun data
Sumitomo Heavy Industries Ltd. falsified performance data on machine guns it supplies the Defense Ministry, possibly affecting Japanese troops’ defense capability, in yet another scandal involving the manufacturer’s weapons.
The Tokyo-based company doctored data on its machine guns during performance tests for at least 10 years, making it appear as if the products cleared the ministry’s strict requirements, sources said.
On to North Korea and a comeback discerned via The Guardian:
The execution of Kim Jong-un’s uncle signals the hardliners are back
A massive purge may now be under way, with anyone connected to Jang Song-thaek in peril. Hopes of an end to the North Korea crisis have been dealt a serious blow
Jang Song-thaek and his wife Kim Kyong-hui (a sister of the dictator’s late father, Kim Jong-il) had, as a couple, been at the heart of the North Korean regime for decades, so their removal had to be done publicly and with the utmost ruthlessness; Jang was first stripped of his posts, then arrested and now executed as a “traitor for all ages” and “worse than a dog” as the regime announced.
BBC News worries:
North Korean purge of leader’s uncle sparks stability fears
The execution of the once-powerful uncle of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has rekindled fears of instability in the secretive nuclear-armed state.
South Korean defence chief Kim Kawn-jin promised “heightened readiness” after the purge of Chang Song-thaek.
The Asahi Shimbun consolidates:
ANALYSIS: Jang’s execution solidifies Kim’s dictatorship
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un sent an unmistakable message to anyone daring to challenge his authority with the purging and speedy execution of his uncle, considered his primary guardian and the nation’s second most powerful man.
While the Los Angeles Times finds a parallel:
North Korea’s youth revolution stirs unease
The execution of Jang Song Taek, 67, is seen as part of a purge of older officials by 30-year-old leader Kim Jong Un, in some ways reminiscent of China’s bloody Cultural Revolution under Mao.
From the Associated Press, accompanied by a picture of Leon Trotsky:
North Korea purge mirrors those in 20th century
And just as Stalin had former comrades erased from images and books, so too today. From Computerworld:
North Korea embarks on Internet purge of executed official
State-run websites have removed references to Jang Song Thaek, who was executed Thursday
The Mainichi confers:
US consults with nations on situation in NKorea
The U.S. says it is consulting with regional partners about the internal situation in North Korea after the execution of leader Kim Jong Un’s uncle
The White House says there’s a concern about the possibility of external provocations by Pyongyang.
BBC News orders:
North Korea ‘summons business people from China’
North Korean business people are being recalled from China following the execution of top official, Chang Song-thaek, says a South Korean report.
Leader Kim Jong-un may be purging associates of Mr Chang, who was in charge of economic ties with China.
And SINA English yearns:
China hopes for ‘stability’ after Jang’s execution
China said Friday it wants “stability” on the Korean Peninsula after the North announced the execution of leader Kim Jong-un’s once-powerful uncle, Jang Song-thaek, while describing the stunning downfall of Jang as Pyongyang’s “internal affair.”
From The Guardian, trying times:
Chinese activist Xu Zhiyong indicted over series of anti-corruption protests
Lawyer says he has yet to see formal charges against New Citizen’s Movement founder arrested four months ago
Xu founded the New Citizen’s Movement, a loose-knit grassroots organisation that aimed to promote government transparency, rule of law and education equality. Police arrested about 20 members of the group in a protracted crackdown this spring, after they unfurled banners in Beijing calling for officials to declare their assets.
JapanToday obliges:
Apple removes censorship bypass app on Chinese orders
U.S. technology giant Apple has removed an anti-censorship application from its Chinese app store on orders from Beijing, the software’s developers said Friday.
The FreeWeibo app is intended to allows users to read sensitive postings on Sina Weibo, a Chinese equivalent of Twitter, that have been censored and deleted, one of its designers said.
Threatpost covers a similar retreat, this time for corporate ends:
Google Removes Privacy Regulation Feature from Android
Google has removed a pivotal privacy feature from its Android operating system that gave users the ability to deny permissions in and regulate information collection attempts by installed applications.
The feature, which users could control with a tool called AppOps Launcher, first appeared in Android 4.3. Just two days ago the Electronic Frontier Foundation published an article heralding the short-lived privacy control as “a huge step in the right direction.”
From CBS New York, cyber-stalking for fun and profit:
Retailers Go High-Tech To Track Shoppers
Some Concerned Marketing Data Systems Threaten Privacy
Big Brother could be at your favorite store.
As CBS 2′s Don Champion reported, a growing number of stores are using discrete and sophisticated technology — including mannequins with facial-recognition cameras hidden in their eyes — to track shopper demographics in an effort to boost sales. Retailers say the marketing data technology allows them to cater their business to customers better, but it’s also raising privacy concerns.
Alfonso Perez built a system called Shopperception that Walmart has utilized. It uses motion-sensored cameras to track a shopper’s product choice on a shelf and the time it takes to make a decision. Perez’s business has doubled in the past year.
SecurityWeek covers another form of digital insecurity:
Cyber Attacks Are The Root Cause in 30 Percent of Data Center Outages: Study
Study Shows Cost Of Data Center Outage at $7,900 Per Minute
And back to the public security sector, first with a major security fail from Ars Technica:
Boston Police indefinitely suspends license plate reader program
BPD’s scanners saw a stolen motorcycle 59 times over 5 months and police did nothing.
This suspension likely makes Boston one of the largest cities in America to stop using this sort of technology, which for years has been in wide use by thousands of law enforcement agencies nationwide. At present, BPD uses 14 individual LPRs, which enables them to scan “as many as 4 million vehicles a year,” the Globe noted.
MintPress News covers the medicolegal panopticon:
Sweeping DNA Collection Law Unsettles Federal Appeals Court
The law takes DNA from people never charged with a crime or who are discharged for lack of probable cause and keeps it on file in perpetuity.
A sample of Lily Haskell’s DNA is still stored in a California crime lab and available to be tested by law enforcement, even though she was never charged with a crime arising out of her arrest at a peace rally in San Francisco more than four years ago.
Now she is hoping a federal appeals court finally gives her — and other Californians — relief from a 2004 law that allows police to collect DNA samples from arrestees and then compare them to crime-scene samples in a state database without any formal charges being filed against those individuals or any judicial finding of probable cause that they had committed a crime.
The Guardian covers bureaucratic insecurity:
Canada: staff in MPs’ offices forced to sign gag orders to get pay rises
New contracts require all staff in MP’s offices to sign lifelong confidentiality agreements to prevent leaks of politically sensitive material.
They can only breach the confidentiality agreement if required to do so by law, such as during a court testimony. If current staff break this agreement they can be fired immediately with no severance pay.
A union representing staff in MP’s offices is looking into the legal grounds to challenge the agreement. It says some staff have foregone pay rises rather than sign it.
And for our final headline, from the Oakland Tribune, a costly sign of failure:
4 Bay Area counties may share $500M to build jails
Fifteen counties are in line to split $500 million in state-issued bonds to upgrade jails and build classrooms for inmate rehabilitation programs.
The Board of State and Community Corrections announced Thursday that it will vote on allocating the money next month. A committee recommended the 15 counties from among 36 proposals.
