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Aligning Words and Deed With Human Rights - Via CDT - PolicyBeta:
The Olympics are well into their second week. Although we’ve seem some inspiring performances from athletes like swimmer Michael Phelps and gymnast Nastia Liukin, it’s sad that these games have been mired in controversy from the beginning: the IOC’s lack of will or ability to hold China to its promise to improve its human rights record as a condition of winning the Olympic bid, China’s violent crackdown on Tibetan demonstrators, ugly protests during the global Olympic torch relay, the apparently underage Chinese gymnasts, and – “dear” to CDT’s heart – the surveillance of Beijing hotel guests’ communications and the Chinese government’s unwillingness to make the Internet totally free of censorship for foreign journalists. read more »
Hacker Reportedly Kidnaps and Tortures Informant, Posts Picture as a Warning to Others - Via Threat Level:
Editor: Interesting graphic removed. Go to original site for that [...]
A Turkish computer hacker who was helping that country's media and national police investigate computer crimes was kidnapped and tortured by a notorious ATM hacker, according to a report from the Turkish press. read more »
FBI Apologizes to Post, Times - Via The Washington Post :
FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III apologized to two newspaper editors yesterday for what he said was a recently uncovered breach of their reporters' phone records in the course of a national security investigation nearly four years ago.
Mueller called the top editors at The Washington Post and the New York Times to express regret that agents had not followed proper procedures when they sought telephone records under a process that allowed them to bypass grand jury review in emergency cases.
The Justice Department's inspector general, who is reviewing the bureau's procedures in such cases, uncovered lapses that allowed FBI agents in 2004 to obtain telephone records of Post staff writer Ellen Nakashima, who was based in Jakarta, Indonesia, at the time. The FBI also obtained telephone records of an Indonesian researcher in the paper's Jakarta bureau, Natasha Tampubolon.
Records of New York Times reporters Raymond Bonner and Jane Perlez, who worked in Jakarta in 2004, also were compromised, the Times confirmed yesterday. read more »
minilinks for 2008-08-14 - Via EFF.org Updates: read more »
- Oops! FBI Sorry For Spying on Journalists FBI Director Robert Mueller called the NY Times and the Washington Post to express regret for a breach of reporters' phone records.
- Google Comes Clean On Targeted AdvertisingThe Internet giant confessed to using DoubleClick cookies to deliver targeted advertising to users.
French Reporters at Black Hat Hacked Fellow Reporters - Via Threat Level:
LAS VEGAS -- Reporters covering the Black Hat Security Conference this week were apparently hacked by three French reporters.
A Black Hat spokeswoman, explained that three French reporters gathered log-in data for reporters in the Black Hat press room and tried to convince organizers of the Wall of Sheep to post the data publicly. The Wall of Sheep is a traditional feature at the DefCon hacker conference but was launched at Black Hat for the first time this year. read more »
French Reporters at Black Hat Booted from Conference for Hacking Fellow Reporters - Via Threat Level:
LAS VEGAS -- Reporters covering the Black Hat Security Conference this week were allegedly hacked by three French reporters. The three reporters are believed to have sniffed a private network that other reporters at the conference were using -- an apparent violation of the federal wiretap statute.
A Black Hat spokeswoman explained that the three reporters gathered log-in data for reporters in the Black Hat press room and tried to convince organizers of the Wall of Sheep to post the data publicly. The Wall of Sheep is a traditional feature at the DefCon hacker conference (which begins tomorrow in Las Vegas) but was launched at Black Hat for the first time this year. read more »
In Beijing, Reporters Encounter Internet Curbs as Olympics Near - Via NewsHour with Jim Lehrer Podcast | PBS:
Beijing is putting the final touches on preparations for the start of the Olympic Games next week -- but reporters are encountering Internet curbs despite expectations of open Web access for foreign journalists. A reporter and media expert weigh the issue.
(Read Original Article - Via NewsHour with Jim Lehrer Podcast | PBS.)
Olympics Journalists Urged To Use Crypto, to Thwart Chinese Spying - Via Threat Level:
Journalists covering the Olympics in Beijing ought to consider using virtual private networks and avoiding the use of instant messenger to interview subjects for stories, says Rebecca MacKinnon, CNN's former Beijing bureau chief and University of Hong Kong new media professor.
"If you are trying to work on sensitive stories that may be beyond topics that perhaps the Chinese government might be happy about you reporting, if you’re communicating with sources who might be under surveillance, you need to make sure that you’re using secure e-mail and that you’re using a secure internet connection," she says. read more »
Mother Sues After Bebo Story Hits Press - Via Slashdot: Your Rights Online:
slick_shoes notes a story out of England: a woman named Amanda Hudson is suing six national newspapers for defamation and breach of privacy after they ran stories based on her 15-year-old daughter's exaggerated claims about her party, published on her Bebo site. The party was held at the family's £4m villa in Spain, and the daughter's account claimed that jewelery had been stolen and furniture and a television set thrown into the swimming pool; in addition there were claims of sex and drug use. The mother says that this was all falsehood and exaggeration. A number of newspapers picked up claims and photos from Bebo and ran them nationally. --- From the article: "The case is expected to have far-reaching consequences for third parties who use or publish information from social networking sites. Lawyers say it could place a duty on all second-hand users to establish the truth of everything they want to republish from such sites.
US Justice Dept. sued for info on cellular tracking practices - Via BetaNews >:
In purported efforts to help the public "understand the privacy risks of carrying a mobile phone," the ACLU and the EFF are suing the Justice Dept. for "documents, memos, and guides" about procedures used to track individuals through cell phones.
The American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation aren't looking for money -- except to cover their own costs -- in their most recent lawsuit against the US Department of Justice. Instead, the two civil liberty advocacy groups want information about whether and how the government might be using the location capabilities in cell phones to find out where people are.
"The overwhelming majority of Americans -- over 200 million people -- carry mobile phones. This large number is steadily increasing. The information the ACLU seeks therefore bears on the privacy of a vast segment of the United States population," according to the complaint, which was submitted this week under the Freedom of Information Act.
"Recent court decisions and media reports reveal that US Attorneys Offices (USAOs) are assisting law enforcement officers in obtaining information from mobile carriers that enables officers to track the location of individuals' mobile phones," the document says. read more »
AP Tackles Citibank ATM Heist - Via Threat Level:
The Associated Press chimes in today on the Citibank ATM hacking story you've been following here. The article doesn't shake loose any new information, but the mainstream press attention makes it all but inevitable that Citibank and Cardtronics will eventually have to come clean on the breach. So far, neither company has revealed how many PINs were compromised, or how much money has been stolen.
read more »Old Media Fails Readers With 'Fake Neutrality,' Says Arianna Huffington - Via Threat Level:
Traditional media outlets have failed their readerships miserably by hiding behind a fake curtain of neutrality, when the facts often stack up more heavily in favor of one naked "truth," charged liberal activist and online publisher Arianna Huffington Monday morning at a conference in New York City about politics and technology.
"The main problem with the old media is that they've given up the pursuit of the truth for the pursuit of fake neutrality, which means that they present every story and every issue as if it has two sides," said Huffington, the founder of the eponymous, left-leaning political online newspaper The Huffington Post during her presentation at the Personal Democracy Forum in New York City.
Chief among her examples was the issue of global warming. But the war in Iraq, and the debate over the teaching of evolution were also presented as objects of her biting, and often hilarious sarcasm. read more »
Journalists Win Appeal In FBI Brutality Case - Via American Civil Liberties Union:
SAN JUAN, PR - A federal appeals court ruled yesterday that an unprovoked attack on journalists by FBI agents would clearly violate the Fourth Amendment. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit reversed an earlier decision to dismiss a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of journalists who were kicked, punched and pepper sprayed by FBI agents as they attempted to report on the search of a San Juan apartment.
"This decision makes clear the FBI cannot exert excessive force and intimidation every time it wants to avoid public scrutiny," said Catherine Crump, staff attorney with the ACLU First Amendment Working Group. "By reinstating our lawsuit, the appeals court will let us continue fighting for the principle that reporters should be able to approach law enforcement officers without fear of harassment." read more »
Three Media Mistakes on Warrantless Wiretapping - Via EFF.org Updates:
Here's a game you can play when reading or watching news about the President's warrantless wiretapping program. There are a few mistakes that the media keeps repeating over and over and over — see if you can spot them.
Friday night's exchange on PBS News Hour between host Judy Woodruff and New York Times columnist David Brooks is typical:
Deadly Earthquake Doesn't Shake China's Internet Censors - Via Threat Level:
NEW HAVEN, Connecticut -- Even as China dealt with the aftermath of deadly 7.9-magnitude earthquake earlier this month that killed more than 55,000 people, the Chinese government's internet censors were on the job.
"Reporters rushed to the scene, and there was general feeling that the government had lifted the restrictions on reporters," said Robert Dietz, the Asia program coordinator for the U.S.-based Committee to Protect Journalists. "But the central propaganda department never stopped handing down directives, never stopped telling people how much to report." read more »
Live Webcast: Future of News, May 14-15 - Via Freedom to Tinker:
We’re going to do a live webcast of our workshop on “The Future of News“, which will be held tomorrow and Thursday (May 14-15) in Princeton. Attending the workshop (free registration) gives you access to the speakers and other attendees over lunch and between sessions, but if that isn’t practical, the webcast is available.
Here are the links you need: read more »
Senate Poised To Tighten Broadcast Ownership Rules - Via American Civil Liberties Union:
Washington, DC – Today, the Senate Commerce Committee is expected to approve a bipartisan resolution, sponsored by Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND), which would restore a media ownership rule recently rescinded by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The old rule generally restricted a company from owning both a newspaper and a television station in the same city, unless the FCC granted a waiver.
Caroline Fredrickson, Director of the ACLU’s Washington Legislative Office said, “Senator Dorgan’s resolution aims to protect the airing of a multiplicity of voices, which fuels our democracy. Democracy is not served well by a media oligarchy where five or six corporations decide what Americans see in the news. We urge the Commerce Committee to also take up S. 2332, Senator Dorgan’s bill to reverse the media ownership rules to ensure the FCC does not go down this road again.” read more »
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