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“The U.S. District Court in New Jersey yesterday joined the growing ranks of federal courts that require lawyers to file all civil case pleadings in electronic format, making it easier for the public and press to obtain copies of them…According to the Administrative Office of U.S. Courts, the District of New Jersey becomes the 36th …
The Open Thumbshots Project is a free resource used by a number of sites, now including the Open Directory Project (DMOZ), that uses the application to provide screen shot previews of over 3 million sites prior to visiting them. Example: Open Directory News – scroll down the screen to see the thumbnail screen shots.
GSA audit confirms misuse of funds: “Employees at General Services Administration offices in three regions of the country misused 8(a) sole-source contracting authority, authorized work outside the scope of contracts and spent more than $133 million in funding earmarked for information technology inappropriately, according to a report released [January 8] from GSA’s inspector general.” Audit …
Lieberman Unveils Plan To Protect Privacy, Break Down Bush’s Wall Of Secrecy: “Joe Lieberman became the first candidate to release a comprehensive plan for protecting people’s personal privacy and breaking down George Bush’s wall of secrecy around his Administration. Among other steps, Lieberman would double the penalties for identity theft, get tough on credit reporting …
IRS will track Free File taxpayers: Even as the IRS encourages taxpayers to take advantage of the ease and efficiency of e-filing, news that information gathered from these services will be monitored by the agency has resulted in negative responses from industry representatives and privacy advocates.
VeriSign to implement change to .com and .net: “Some networking experts fear the change could cause Internet traffic problems. VeriSign Inc. is planning a change to a Domain Name System component responsible for coordinating updates to the .com and .net domains throughout the DNS, according to a company spokesman.” VeriSign’s dead certificates ‘knocked out Norton’ …
Senators Lieberman and Corzine called for the Library of Congress to expand content and provide enhanced search features on Thomas, the free, searchable database of federal legislation. [Link]
From Secrecy News, a copy of a Congressional Research Service internal memo from December 2003 that addresses the escalating controversy on restrictions to public dissemination of CRS reports.
Treasury breaks word on e-mail anonymity: “The Treasury Department’s Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) plans to publish nearly 10,000 e-mail addresses on the Web, violating its privacy promise to Americans who used e-mail to comment on a government proceeding.”
Copyright Office Announces Voluntary Negotiation Period for Rates and Terms for Digital Performance Right in Sound Records and Ephemeral Recordings. [Link]: “The Copyright Office announces the initiation of the voluntary negotiation period for determining reasonable rates and terms for two compulsory licenses for the period beginning January 1, 2005, and ending on December 31, 2006. …
Net Aids Identity Theft of Deceased: A woman at the center of an identity theft scam used the Web to retrieve Social Security numbers and credit information on 80 deceased people in at least five U.S. states, authorities say.”
A U.S. Newswire release dated January 6 states that National Press Club President Tammy Lytle, (who is also the bureau chief for the Orlando Sentinel) sent a letter to Sec. of Defense Rumsfeld expressing opposition to a new policy concerning website content issued by Defense Department Inspector General Joseph Schmitz. In a December 5 memo, …