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Although there has been considerable focus on the Patriot Act as it impacts libraries, this Atlanta-Journal Constitution article details the wider impact of law enforcement’s significantly increased demand for customer data from businesses that range from scuba shops to telecommunications companies. Examples from the article include the following: “Last year, before the Memorial Day weekend, …
Scalable Exploitation of, and Responses to Information Leakage Through Hidden Data in Published Documents, by Simon Byers, AT&T’s Research Labs. Mr. Beyer’s research focused on the tools and techniques used to “search for hidden data in Word documents.” The use of hidden text is routine in the process of creating documents using Word, so this …
Aggregators Attack Info Overload : “Maniacally wired netizens who read a hundred blogs a day and just as many news sources are turning to a new breed of software, called newsreaders or aggregators, to help them manage information overload.” See also several of my previous postings on RSS and aggregators here and here and Dan …
Who Me? Blog? Ideas and Inspiration for Blogging Librarians, by Tasha Saecker, Green Lake Public Library [Library Stuff].
China blocks foreign software use in gov’t: “A new policy by China’s governing body the State Council will rule that all ministries have to buy only locally-produced software at the next upgrade cycle. The move, aimed at breaking the dominance of U.S.-based Microsoft on desktop computers, will eliminate Microsoft’s Windows operating system and Office productivity …
A GAO report released August 12 determined that the Executive Office for the U.S. Attorneys has serious security issues associated with the administration of IT systems, with specific concerns detailing the operation of a virtual private network (VPN) linking the 93 U.S. Attorney offices located throughout the US. Information Technology: Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys …
Senator Norm Coleman (R-MN), Chairman, Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, announced hearings on the RIAA’s aggressive anti-file sharing efforts targeting students and ISPs.
ISPs Among First to Detect, React to Outage: “Throughout the United States, ISPs and network operators were among the first to detect an infrastructure problem thanks to sophisticated monitoring systems. In addition to a New York drop, carriers saw traffic elsewhere surge as users logged onto news sites.
A User’s Guide to the Stored Communications Act – And a Legislator’s Guide to Amending It, by Orin S. Kerr, George Washington University Law School: Abstract: Americans care deeply about their Internet privacy. But if they want to know how federal law protects the privacy of their stored Internet communications, they’ll quickly learn that it’s …
From the CIA press release, the announcement about the availability of The World Factbook 2003: “This reference work provides a snapshot, as of 1 January 2003, of wide-ranging, hard-to-locate information about the background, geography, people, government, economy, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues for countries from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. The nine primary information categories and …
Internet Survives Power Failure: The Internet was for the most part performing normally, despite the power failure, according to Internet performance tracker Keynote Systems. Crash of System Predicted – North American Electric Reliability Council issued a warning to Congress two years ago. See the press release, NERC General Counsel Testifies on Electric Grid Reliabity. The …
According to the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, the non-profit Law Library Microform Consortium is creating a digital library, called LLMC-Digital, that will eventually comprise 91,000 volumes (100 million pages) of legal materials, half of which are currently available on microfiche. The beta site is currently available for free, but will become a fee-based service next month. “The …
