Today’s Headlines

This must be the most absurd move by Comcast ever, and you don’t have to look hard to find absurd moves by Comcast, but anway I digress. Comcast reportedly told Chris Albrecht of NewTeeVee that they’d like to install cameras in their cable boxes so they may see who is watching the TV in your […]

Nnamdi Chizuba Anisiobi, Anthony Friday Ehis and Kesandu Egwuonwu have pleaded guilty to federal charges of running an advance-fee scam reports The Register.
Using names such as Yellowman, Abdul Rahman, Michael Anderson, Edmund Walter, Nancy White, Jiggaman and Namo, the men sent spam emails to thousands of potential victims, in which they falsely claimed to […]

Are you prepared for emergencies? Everyone should have an emergency preparedness kit that includes at least the following:

One gallon of water per person per day for at least three days

A three-day supply of non-perishable food

Battery-powered or hand crank radio and a NOAA Weather Radio with tone alert and extra batteries for both

Flashlight and extra […]

Consumerist is warning everyone should check their credit card statements for a charge from, “STC SAWA RECHARGE RIYADH SA”.
The Saudi Arabian phone card company is fraudulently passing charges to consumer’s cards, usually for sums of $80. If you find one of these unwanted charges, contact your card company to dispute the charges. This may not […]

While privacy advocates applaud private domain name registration services, which hide personal information and even the name of the domain name’s owner, some are questioning if it aides criminals and even terrorists.
The Canadian The Globe and Mail implies that these private domain name registration services impede law enforcement and provide shelter to terrorists as it’s […]

Vnunet reports that SoftScan is predicting a 40% surge in spam mail this September. The increase will supposedly target students returning to school after this summer break.
“It is a pattern we have seen in previous years, but this September looks as if it will be the largest increase yet,” said Diego d’Ambra, chief technology officer […]

With Fourth of July just around the corner you might be anxious to buy and light some fireworks. It’s definitely fun but you have to be careful to not become one of the statistics.
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission staff estimates that there were 9,200 emergency room-treated injuries associated with all fireworks in 2006. Most […]

Live365, MTV, Pandora, Real/Rhaposdy, Yahoo and many others participated in the Day of Silence to protest the impending royalty rate increase.
Many webcasters shut off their streams entirely or introduced long periods of silence, static, or other sounds with public service announcements on about the campaign.
The big question remains, did any of this accomplish […]

A 28 year old man has been arrested by Spanish police and charged with creating and distributing malware that infected an estimated 150,000 mobile phones, according to reports.
Commwarrior spreads via Multimedia Messaging Service by sending a message to other devices within Bluetooth range. If the recipient accepts the incoming message — which poses as a […]

BroadbandReports is reporting that ISPs in the US and Canada are considering billing by metered use as the current unlimited pricing model isn’t profitable enough.
The “unlimited” model of pricing may be on its way out — replaced by a pricing scheme where you pay for only the bandwidth you use.
The question becomes: which ISP […]

Bristol Township, Pennsylvania has a snake problem. A BIG snake problem.
They’ve recently caught a nine and half foot albino Burmese python in an industrial park. There is another snake that eluded capture and is believed to have eaten a cat. It’s currently hiding under a home.
This is not the first time that Pennsylvania has […]

Did you get the email?
LOS ANGELES, CA — Paris Hilton who not more than four hours earlier was physically removed from a courtroom, has been stabbed multiple times.
Although no official statement has been released, unnamed sources from within the Lynwood medical ward tell CNN that Paris received two wounds to the chest, one to the […]

Has your bank account ever had ATM withdrawals that you didn’t make? If so you could have been a victim of skimming.
Clever thieves are making magnetic readers that fit over the card slot on ATMs to capture the card’s number and magnetic data as the card is inserted into the machine. They also install a […]

Thanks in part to the popularity of “Catch Me If You Can,” a new crop of young crooks and con artists learned the old check fraud tricks and are starting to use them again.
The crooks obtain a legit check and “wash it” using household chemicals to wash off the ink and then rewrite write […]

Today is the official deadline for DSL, cable, broadband over power-line, satellite, and all other internet providers to finish up installing FBI approved surveillance gear to comply with the FCC’s interpretation of the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA.)
CALEA was passed in 1994 by Congress to help the FBI listen to and record conversations […]

The entire June issue of Business 2.0 was accidently deleted and then they found out that the backup server failed to get backups of everything. Oops! It’s not enough to just be backing up, you need to actually check that the backups are working.
Luckily, Business 2.0’s lawyers had email copies of all the article’s text […]

Beware of non-government IRS knockoff sites. The real web site for the Internal Revenue Service is at IRS.gov. Not .com or .org or any other domain name extension.
CCIA president Ed Black called IRS.com and similar Web sites deceptive. IRS.com has a U.S. flag symbol at the top of its home page, he noted.
“The fundamental […]

Norwich Union claims that more car accidents occur on every Friday the 13th than any other day, oddly 13% more.
Norwich Union researched claims over a five-year period, during which time there were six Friday the 13ths, and discovered that the number of claims on these days was significantly higher (13%) when compared to other days […]

A Nebraska woman, while attempting to bring up previous tax returns through the Turbo Tax web site, found that she (and others) could access returns of other people with the same last name and first initial. The exposed data included the Social Security Numbers and back account routing numbers for three other people.
Turbo Tax has […]

The FBI is poking around the virtual worlds in Linden Lab’s Second Life and they’ve visited at least one virtual casino.
The law is unclear if Linden Labs, Second Life’s creator, could face criminal charges.
The surge in Second Life gambling coincides with a crackdown in the real world by the U.S. government, which has arrested executives […]