MisTek - Technological Misbehaviour

It seems that the big search engines might now be taken to task over their terrible behaviour in China.

You will remember our article on MSN’s recent selling out of Chinese blogger Zhao Jing, which was just the latest in a series of misdemeanours involving the search engines bowing to the anti-free speech whims of the Chinese government in a misguided attempt to secure future market share in China.

Luckily for the cause of free speech, the Republican representative for New Jersey, Christopher H Smith seems to have been taking notice of the internet furore caused by that (and other) news.

The chairman of a House sub-committe will begin hearings next month to investigate claims that US companies, including Microsoft and Yahoo, are aiding China’s net censorship.

The move comes a week after the reporter’s rights organisation - Reporters Without Borders issued a statement calling on US internet companies to establish a voluntary code of conduct. (You can sign the petition too.)

According to the Boston Globe, Chistopher Smith has made quite a name for himself as an ardent supporter of human rights and believes that a law may be the only thing that could stop companies cooperating with anti-free speech initiatives by the Chinese government.

If that happens to be the ultimate result of the hearing then it would be nice to see other Western nations follow the US lead with similar moves to deter corporate actions against free speech in repressive countries.

October, 2005 saw fifty five US soldiers in Iraq killed by increasingly sophisticated Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs).

At this stage there are 90 ways in which to detonate an IED including remote detonation by radio waves or even infrared signals.

The improved tactics of the insurgency are causing
major concern for US forces who are struggling to react.

While radio signal jammers have been used with some success in jamming detonation signals of IEDs, the devices also jam radio communications which presents its own safety concerns for soldiers. It has also led to a battle for control of the airwaves between US and insurgent forces.

“We have incident after incident of collisions, near misses and a commander having to turn off his jammer … so he can talk on the radio,” Army Brig. Gen. Susan Lawrence said. “This is a huge challenge that we’ve got to work on very quickly.”

The growing adeptness of the insurgency at using IEDs has also led to speculation that they are sending members to tertiary institutions to learn ways in which to better utilise technology against the US presense, though US forces representatives have declined to comment on whether any of those insurgent members are being educated in the US.

As US forces began to have some success with jamming technology against IED detonation, the insurgents have moved on to other techniques such as infrared signals. Such technology can be employed using commonly available components such as garrage door openers and burglar alarms.

At this stage there is no way to block an infrared signal.

It seems that there is a slight problem with the US government’s plans to create a national standard for driver’s liceneces by 2008.

As part of the federal government’s overall anti-terror legislation, they proposed sweeping amendmants to the ways in which driver’s licence systems are run in each state - the catcher being that the states themselves had to foot the bill for it.

But moving straight past the fact that this will do little good for actual security, and beyond the fact that none of the terrorists of 9/11 would have been in the least bit impeded by such a system and even moving past the issue of state’s rights, it seems the scheme has come up against a very real world obstacle - money.

The vast cost of the scheme looks like it’s going to blow out several state’s budgets.

While the Congressional Budget Office allowed $100 million in costs for reimbursing states, according to an AP story, Pensylvania alone is looking at a cost of $85 million.

Perhaps it’s time to call in the accountants.

New Apple iTunes software has drawn some flack this week.

The new software has the nifty little feature of sending computer user’s play lists back to Apple.

Of course this is then used to suggest new music the user might like via recommended links - the catcher being that the recommended music is stuff that the user hasn’t yet purchased.

Along with the predictable data of artist, song, genre type information, the software also sends a unique user ID of the music fan.

Then of course, that user ID could possibly be linked to the email and credit card details of the person as most people use this information to purchase songs in the first place.

What could possibly go wrong with this scenario?

Getting access to government computers in the UK has been made a whole lot easier this week.

Actually, we’re sure that they are scrambling to close this little gaping flaw in the security of the UK Parliament.

It seems that new MPs have been disallowed by the secuity boffins at the Houses of Parliament from having access to a wireless network. In fact new MPs since the last election have been issued computers without wireless, but many of them don’t even have offices yet so they are unable to connect them to the internet.

Enterprising young MPs, who need access to the internet to well.. do their jobs, have taken matters into their own hands by bringing in their own laptops.

But here is where it gets interesting. They have been connecting to an open wireless network from a cafe accross the street that offers free wireless in an attempt to draw in more customers.

By connecting to this network, MPs have effectively breached their own security by possibly allowing access to their computers to whoever might be looking for it. Rather than having a safe network offered from within Parliament they have accessed a network with unkown security measures.

Predictably, the security boffins in government are not impressed, but at least an inquiry has recommended that they install a secure wireless network.