Category: Government

Government Military Politics

There may be nothing America can do to save Iraq

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As reported on The Verge. By Verge Staff  Growing ISIS insurgency threatens to pull Obama back into Iraq, but his options are limited Less than four years after the withdrawal of American troops, Iraq is once again descending into chaos and violence. Islamist insurgents from an al-Qaeda breakaway group have seized large swaths of northern Iraq, and are marchingtoward Baghdad. The unrest has inflamed deep-seated sectarian divides between Sunni and Shiite Muslims in Iraq, resulting in…

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Government Hardware Dev Legal

Backscatter X-ray gun will help police hunt contraband

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As reported on Engadget. BY STEVE DENT  Though “strip-search” backscatter X-ray machines were pulled from US airports for privacy reasons, the tech has found a new home in the MINI Z portable scanner. Made by American Science and Engineering (AS&E), it displays see-through images on a Windows tablet PC from low-intensity backscatter X-rays that don’t penetrate deeply into organic tissue. The company said it took seven years of research to shrink the X-ray tubes enough to create a handheld device that uses…

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Government Microsoft Politics

Microsoft resists US government demand to seize offshore emails

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As reported on Engadget. BY STEVE DENT Microsoft has filed a court challenge to a US government demand that it hand over emails from its data center in Ireland. That appears to be the first time a US corporation has opposed such an order, and Microsoft has been backed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and an amicus brief from Verizon. The US prosecutor heading the drug case in question said that if the objection succeeds, tech companies like Microsoft…

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Government Legal

Here’s The FCC’s Language Asking For Comment On Banning “Pay-For-Priority Service”

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As reported on TechCrunch. by Alex Wilhelm After much sturm und drang, the Federal Communications Commission this morning voted to proceed on a set of controversial net neutrality rules. The proposed regulations now enter a four month comment period. Expect there to be shouting. This morning the FCC voted to move forward with a set of proposed rules to collect public response. Most controversial in the proposals is the potential for the legal codification of paid prioritization agreements…

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Government Internet

It’s time for the FCC to stand up for Americans instead of ruining the internet

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As reported on The Verge. By T.C. Sottek Cowardice and capitulation could mess up a vital utility The internet is fucked, and the US government is making it worse. Political cowardice caused the FCC to lose its first battle for net neutrality regulation: the rules that keep the internet as you know it free and open. The idea of net neutrality is that all traffic is created equal — whether you’re a movie streaming from Netflix, or a…

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Government Security

There’ll be no escape from the FBI’s new facial recognition system

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As reported on Engadget. BY DANIEL COOPER If you thought that the NSA wanted too much personal information, just wait a few months. The EFF is reporting that the FBI’s new facial recognition database, containing data for almost a third of the US population, will be ready to launch this summer. Codenamed NGI, the system combines the bureau’s 100 million-strong fingerprint database with palm prints, iris scans and mugshots. Naturally, this has alarmed privacy advocates, since it’s not just felons whose…

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Government

US Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius To Resign

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As reported on TechCrunch. by Alex Wilhelm Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius is resigning. President Obama, according to the New York Times, has selected Sylvia Mathews Burwell of the Office of Management and Budget as her replacement. Secretary Sebelius became a household name following the catastrophic launch of Healthcare.gov, the government’s portal to provide a marketplace for private health insurance during the rollout of the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare. Despite that flop of national proportions, the…

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Government

US Burns Through All High-Skill Visas For 2015 In Less Than A Week

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As reported on TechCrunch. by Alex Wilhelm And then there were none: As expected, more people applied for high-skill and high-degree U.S. work visas in the first five days of the application period than there were slots. This is precisely what happened last year. This indicates that the number of high-skill and high-degree folks out there who want to come to the U.S. is far higher than the number this country is willing to accept. Each year, 65,000…

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Government Politics

Then and now: life in a divided Ukraine

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As reported by The Verge. By Amar Toor As attention shifts toward Crimea’s referendum, Ukrainian activists look back on the months that changed their lives   In April 1977, Ukrainian activist Myroslav Marynovych was arrested by Soviet police. He was 28 at the time, and had become an outspoken advocate for human rights, working to raise awareness about ongoing violations in what is now Ukraine. In the eyes of the Soviets, though, his work threatened to…

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Government Internet Security

If You Used This Secure Webmail Site, the FBI Has Your Inbox

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As reported on Wired. BY KEVIN POULSEN Photo: Peter Earl McCollough/WIRED   While investigating a hosting company known for sheltering child porn last year the FBI incidentally seized the entire e-mail database of a popular anonymous webmail service called TorMail. Now the FBI is tapping that vast trove of e-mail in unrelated investigations. The bureau’s data windfall, seized from a company called Freedom Hosting, surfaced in court papers last week when prosecutors indicted a Florida man…

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