Secret Service Using Totally Cool Sarcasm Detector While Watching Social Media

The United States Secret Service has escalated their social-media surveillance methods as of late, and it makes things soooo much better for the common person. If you don't have a specially-crafted program to filter that sentence, it contained sarcasm, which has become a problem for Big Brother by creating false positives for threats during their nitpicking of our online brain droppings.

The new technology is considered superior than tasking agents with creating fake profiles to gather and assess the public's social media commentary.  According to www.nextgov.com, the technology also includes the abilities for “sentiment analysis,” "influencer identification," "access to historical Twitter data," “ability to detect sarcasm," and "heat maps" or graphics showing user trends by color intensity, agency officials said.

The program will operate in real time and totally respects your opinion.

Oxymoronic GOP Science Committee Claims Global Warming "Debunked"

Despite many reputable, repeatable reports on the topic presented to the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee, the GOP Science Committee chairman Rep. Lamar Smith informed the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Process that their facts were wrong.

Claiming that the figures (accepted by 97% of scientists) that global warming is primarily man-made have been "debunked", Rep. Smith went on to blame Obama for the misrepresentation.

Human contributions to global warming are vast, including the excavation and burning of fossil fuels, as well as the acceleration of deforestation, both of which are tied to financial interests of the Republican party.

Despite placing blame elsewhere and burying their heads in the non-scientific sand, the GOP Science Committee's claims are refuted by many studies, including one by NASA, that base their findings from technological readings, well-observed weather issues, and changing environments worldwide.

NASA Plans To Test Heavy-Payload Martian Parachute In Hawaii

Don't worry, Earthlings, this is not a flying saucer, though it may someday help colonize a distant world.  NASA is test-dropping a new and improved parachute system, simulating space in the thin high-atmospheric air over the Hawaiian island of Kauai. The supersonic parachute, twice the size of the current parachute used to land the Martian rovers on the red planet, will be tested today in hopes that larger payloads (hopefully someday to include humans) can be delivered safely to Mars.

Robert Braun, a former NASA technology chief and current space technology professor at Georgia Institute of Technology, says the new tests are "advancing capabilities and creating the engineering knowledge needed for the next generation of Mars landers."

With the space agency's funds and efforts frequently embattled by political issues, it is inspiring to see them looking towards a major project for the future.

June 5th: Reset the Net

Proponents of an open and secure internet are pushing back against indiscriminate surveillance this week. Tech Crunch has the details:

A number of websites for Internet services, businesses and even several nonprofits, including Amnesty International, Greenpeace, MoveOn.org, and others, will participate in a series of online anti-NSA protests this week. The websites, which also include Reddit, Imgur, BoingBoing, DuckDuckGo, and several others are taking part in an online campaign called “Reset the Net,” which is specifically aimed at encouraging website owners and mobile app creators to integrate increased security protections into their services, like SSL and HSTS, for example. The overall goal is to make it more difficult for government agencies to engage in their spying activities.

Explains the campaign on its website, ResetTheNet.org: “The NSA is exploiting weak links in Internet security to spy on the entire world, twisting the Internet we love into something it was never meant to be: a panopticon.” While it’s not possible to stop the attacks, the site adds, those who offer users online services could help cut down on the mass surveillance by building proven security into the “everyday internet.”

Congressman Repays Official ISP Bribes with Sweetheart Bill

Don't say you're surprised.  Ars Technica has the gory details:

US Rep. Bob Latta (R-OH) on Wednesday filed legislation that would prevent the Federal Communications Commission from attempting to regulate broadband Internet service as a public utility.

It probably won't surprise you that Internet service providers have enthusiastically given money to this congressman. As we reported in our May 16 story "Bankrolled by broadband donors, lawmakers lobby FCC on net neutrality," Latta received $51,000 from cable company interests in the two-year period ending December 2013.

Watchdog decries politicians' claims that they "are acting in the public interest." Latta was one of "28 House members who lobbied the Federal Communications Commission to drop net neutrality," with those lawmakers having "received more than twice the amount in campaign contributions from the broadband sector than the average for all House members," our story noted.

The National Security Police State and Surveillance Society Makes Everyone Less Secure

This is a truism.  The attempt to make law enforcement's job easier makes everyone less secure. For example, requiring government sponsored back doors in your favorite operating system or router or cell phone, in order, say, to facilitate court ordered wiretapping, makes all such device vulnerable to anyone and everyone who has any interest or desire in compromising those devices for their own purposes.  A report from the Guardian exposes how "cyber-crime" laws are now actually criminalizing the work of security researchers!  Excerpt:

Some of the world’s best-known security researchers claim to have been threatened with indictment over their efforts to find vulnerabilities in internet infrastructure, amid fears American computer hacking laws are perversely making the web less safe to surf.

Many in the security industry have expressed grave concerns around the application of the US Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), complaining law enforcement and lawyers have wielded it aggressively at anyone looking for vulnerabilities in the internet, criminalising work that’s largely benign.
They have also argued the law carries overly severe punishments, is too vague and does not consider context, only the action.

HD Moore, creator of the ethical hacking tool Metasploit and chief research officer of security consultancy Rapid7, told the Guardian he had been warned by US law enforcement last year over a scanning project called Critical.IO, which he started in 2012. The initiative sought to find widespread vulnerabilities using automated computer programs to uncover the weaknesses across the entire internet.

Facebook: A Company That Really Listens to Its Users

Many would probably like to believe it's good that more and more companies are listening to their users. But this is probably not what they had in mind. From the International Business Times:

On the same day that Facebook touted sweeping new efforts to protect users’ privacy, the company confirmed that it plans to save data captured by smartphone microphones, potentially enabling the social media giant to listen in on private conversations.  

In a press release issued Wednesday, Facebook announced a forthcoming app update in which a new feature uses the phone's microphone to capture sounds in the user's environment, then identifies the song, movie or television show the user is watching based on what it hears. Once the sound is ID'd, users have the option to share it as a visual component of their posts.

Though Facebook assured that "no sound is stored,” the company acknowledged to International Business Times that it does intend to archive the data gleaned.