SAN DIEGO - North Park Institution Closes

NOTE:  This article was copied from the e-newspaper, therefore no link to article.

"Last stand for newsstand" by Peter Rowe, San Diego Union-Tribune 12/5/2019

Paras, a North Park institution for 70 years, will close Dec 29, a victim of Internet, its owner says

Todd Viter didn’t notice the large signs when he walked into Paras Newsstand to buy Wednesday’s Los Angeles Times.

Then someone told him what they said: “Store Closing/ Everything Must Be Sold!”

“I’m shocked,” said Viter, 51, learning that owners Ken and Ann Gabbara plan to close Paras by year’s end.  “I love the history stuff he has — the World War II magazines and stuff about after World War II.  I’m disappointed.”

For 70 years, this shop near the corner of University Avenue and 30th Street has sold cigars, gum, newspapers and magazines.  Magazines by the ton.  There are now about 2,500 unique titles on Paras’ racks, the county’s largest stockpile of current periodicals.  For readers like David Harrell, a fan of railroad monthlies, and Edgar Hall, a Soap Opera Digest devotee, there’s no place like Paras.

To wander the crowded aisles is to immerse yourself in hobbies, vocations, passions.  Turn a corner and there’s every conceivable publication for anglers: Ice Fishing, Sportfishing, Pacific Coast Sportfishing, Fly Fisherman, Bassin’.  A nearby shelf holds some of Harrell’s favorites: Trains, Railway, Locomotive, Great Train Stations, Passenger Train Journal, Railfan & Railroad, Tramways & Urban Transit: The International Light Rail Magazine.

“Some of the bestsellers are magazines about cars, planes, boats, guns and the literary stuff,” said Kent Snyder, a Paras employee.  “Then there are the weeklies — you know, the tabloids.”

After Snyder’s hiring in July 1986, some mornings he’d find impatient fans of The Globe and The National Enquirer lined up outside the door.

“The little old ladies would be standing out on the corner,” Snyder.  “The owner would say, ‘Just a minute, ladies.’”

At Paras, these mob scenes are history though the store still carries History, National Geographic History, All About History, Current History.  There are still regulars who come in for newspapers and magazines they can’t find elsewhere, but nearly as many consumers buy candy or coffee.  There’s also a steady flock of browsers who use their cell phones to snap photos of intriguing covers, then seek those publications online.

“We tried hard, we put up a good fight,” said Ken Gabbara, who bought this shop with his wife in 2007.  “But Mr. Internet is winning the war and there’s nothing I can do about that.”

‘Another family’

On this site in 1949, Frank Hill opened a cigar and notions shop.  Four years later, he sold the place to Chris Paras, who began stocking reading material.  By the 1970s, Paras boasted an impressive selection of out-of-town newspapers.  Visitors from Miami popped in to buy the Herald, New Yorkers to peruse the Post and the Times, Chicagoans the Tribune, Seattleites the Post-Intelligencer.

Most of those newspapers are no longer delivered to Paras, as publishers encourage far-flung readers to subscribe to digital editions.  The magazine inventory, though, continued to swell, prompting Paras to expand in 1995 and again in 1996.

“Even with the Internet, the business has been pretty steady,” Snyder said.  “It’s only in the last couple of years that it’s gone down.”

Besides North Park, there were Paras newsstands in Ocean Beach and La Mesa.  In 1987, the Paras family sold the North Park shop to two brothers, Michael and Rocky Attallah.  Twenty years later, they sold to the Gabbaras.

The couple added snacks, souvenirs, candles, jewelry and other items to the store.  But the backbone of Paras — pronounced like the French capital, Paris — remains the many, many magazines.

This is the place if you want the latest issue of Sea Classics, Classic Boat, Wooden Boat, Good Old Boat or just plain Boat.  Where enthusiasts scope out Guns & Ammo, Gun Digest, and Precision Rifle Shooter.  Where do-it-themselfers pick up Old House Journal, New Old House, Home & Design, House & Garden, Homes & Gardens, Southern Home and San Diego Home/Garden.

And it’s where Edgar Hall has been buying Soap Opera Digest for the last 15 years.

“I’m not going to be happy about this,” Hall said of the impending closure.  “I’ve gotten to know the staff here.  It’s almost like having another family.”

One final Sunday

Like video rental stores, newspapers, shopping malls and other institutions upended by online competition, Paras Newsstand’s inefficiencies are part of its charm.  A No.  6 bus stops right outside the shop’s open door, and the driver yells a good-natured gibe at Ken Gabbara.  Street people wander in, buying the occasional coffee, chocolate bar or sticks of incense.  David Harrell, 83, knows he could buy the Los Angeles Times at newsboxes close to his downtown residence, but he’d rather take the bus to Paras.

“I don’t like the street machines at all,” he said.  “Sometimes, you lose your money.”

“We’ve formed a lot of good relationships,” said Ken Gabbara, 66.  “We’re very lucky.”

Gabbara said he’s still making ends meet at Paras, but the store’s profits are shrinking while he and his wife’s health issues are expanding.  He’d like to find a buyer for this store, but now plans to stay open only through Dec 29, the Sunday after Christmas.

“I want everyone to be able to pick up their Sunday papers,” he said.

On the walls of Paras, above shelves holding the John Wayne Ultimate Puzzle Book, Hawaii Weddings and Dapper Dan, some of the many stories written about this institution are framed.  The headline on one: “We’ll Always Have Paras.”

Not sure.  Nor, it seems, will we always have a place to buy the latest Paris Review, Cuba Plus, New Eastern Europe, Sactown, Tahoe, Salt Lake, Los Angeles or San Diego Magazine.

OPINION - Shields and Brooks 5/24/2019

"Shields and Brooks on Trump-Pelosi feud, 2020 Democrats" PBS NewsHour 5/24/2019

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week’s political news, including NewsHour interviews with 2020 Presidential candidates Eric Swalwell and Kirsten Gillibrand, the escalating feud between President Trump and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and whether ongoing congressional investigations are leading to impeachment.

Judy Woodruff (NewsHour):  And now we turn to the analysis of Shields and Brooks.  That's syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.

Hello to both of you.

So, we are trying to work our way through a conversation with each one of these candidates.

Mark, there are now, as we said, 23 of them.  We talked to Eric Swalwell tonight, Kirsten Gillibrand last night.

I'm not going to say they are one-issue candidates, but they are — in his case, you heard him talk about gun control, Kirsten Gillibrand emphasizing women's issues.

What are you hearing from them?  Is it smart for them to seize on one issue or not?

Mark Shields, syndicated columnist:  Well, we will find out whether it is.

It just strikes me that abortion, as an issue, has been…

Judy Woodruff:  What she's talking about.

Mark Shields:  That's where Kirsten Gillibrand is probably most prominently identified — is an issue where those who seek serious and large change find themselves on the political defensive.

And I think it's fair to say that it's hard to imagine anybody running a winning national campaign on enlarging and making statutory abortion legal in all circumstances or, for that matter, a Democratic Party which is essentially unwelcoming to those people who are — have reservations or are pro-life, but agree on every other issue.

Essentially, we had Bob Casey in his fifth term from Pennsylvania, the United States senator, wouldn't be welcome and not receive party backing, basically.

Judy Woodruff:  What is coming through to you?

David Brooks, New York Times:  Yes.

When I look at these candidates, I'm first struck by how the self-esteem movement was obviously very effective.

(LAUGHTER)

David Brooks:  Because, when I look at the presidency — I have interviewed a lot of Presidents since Reagan, really.  And the one thing I come away with after every single interview was, I could never do that job.

Like, it's a really hard job.  And Eisenhower — if I were Eisenhower, I would think, yes, I could do that.  I have run a war.  Franklin Roosevelt was governor of New York.  Ronald Reagan was governor of California.  George H.W. Bush had served in every position almost imaginable.

But why these people think they could be President of the United States is a little mystifying to me.  But maybe they're right.

The second thing I look for is a unique selling proposition, like an actual route to the White House, why you're called to run, not — why it's not just about you getting a little more famous, but why there's been some call on you to run.

And for Elizabeth Warren, I can see it.  She's got a set of policies and plans that are sort of unique.  It's a unique selling proposition.  Biden's got broad experience.  Bernie Sanders has an outlook.

With a lot of the candidates, a lot of the 23, I don't quite see a unique selling proposition or politically even a route to victory.

Judy Woodruff:  Hmm.  Well…

Mark Shields:  Well, no, I don't argue with that.

I mean, I just say, the uneasy consensus on abortion in this country seems to me be in favor of the status quo, which is rape, incest and the life of the mother.  And that — to me, if you start to change that, which I think Republicans are finding right now, when you have got the Republican national chair disavowing it, and the Republican Senate majority leader disavowing the latest change, the most zealous changes that the Republicans are making, I think it tells you something about the politics of that issue.

David Brooks:  It's weird that 50 percent of the country is sort of in the middle on abortion.

Mark Shields:  Yes.

David Brooks:  And Gillibrand says no Democratic candidate should get support if they're in the 50 percent, which is like a guarantee of permanent minority.

Judy Woodruff:  All right, well, let's talk about something that's consumed us for the last couple of days.

And that is what was a fight, a battle between the President and Democrats in the Congress over subpoenas and documents and so forth that has turned into this very personal feud, Mark, between Speaker Pelosi and President Trump.

And here is just a little bit of what the two of them have been saying about each other over the last two days.

Mark Shields:  OK.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.):   We believe that the President of the United States is engaged in a cover-up.

Donald Trump:  I don't do cover-ups.  I'm the most transparent President probably in the history of this country.  So, get these phony investigations over with.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi:  I pray for the President of the United States.  I wish that his family or his administration or his staff would have an intervention for the good of the country.

The White House is just crying out for impeachment.  That's why he flipped yesterday.

Donald Trump:  I'm an extremely stable genius.  She's a mess.  Look, let's face it.  Crazy Nancy, I will tell you what, I have been watching her.  And I have been watching her for a long period of time.  She's not the same person.  She's lost it.

I think Nancy Pelosi is not helping this country. 

Judy Woodruff:  So, Mark, it's gotten very personal.

Mark Shields:  It has gotten very personal, particularly on the President's part.

And it just struck me, when Nancy Pelosi used the term intervention, that's a serious — that is a — that's an attempt, a collective attempt, a cooperative attempt, a collaborative attempt on the part of family and friends to intercede and to present to a person they think is suffering from an addiction or some sort of condition that condition is out of control, and with the idea of seeking remedy and seeking repair.

And I don't think she used the term lightly.  And I would add to that, when you get General James Mattis, who has been totally silent…

Judy Woodruff:  Former defense secretary.

Mark Shields:  Former defense secretary.

He left, and he now is cautioning this President on Iran.  He is cautioning him, the United States, on the use of military power and arguing that diplomacy is important.  When you get the former secretary of defense, whom the President upbraided and insulted, Rex Tillerson, going to the Congress, and really raising serious questions about the President's…

Judy Woodruff:  He testified this week.

Mark Shields:  Testified that the President was unprepared, ill-prepared for the summit in Hamburg with Secretary — with Mr. Putin, and left the United States at a disadvantage, I think that this a larger message here than just political back and forth.

I think there's a serious concern about this President and this presidency.  And, Judy, the first rule I learned covering American President politics is, beware of the Presidential candidate who does not have friends of his or her own age who can tell him when he's wrong and to go to hell.

And, right now, there are no grownups left in the White House.  Donald Trump has Mr. Kushner and Mr. Miller as his two confidants.

Judy Woodruff:  How serious do you see this?

David Brooks:  Yes, I mean, it irks me that they're both questioning each other's mental competence, basically.

You can question policies.  You can question a lot of things, but to say someone is basically in mental decline, it just — it just strikes me as a little too personal.

Donald Trump was — is in the Hall of Fame of the World Wrestling Federation.  And he's taking it to the World Wrestling Federation levels of confrontation.  And do I think he knows what he's doing?  Well, at some level, I do think he does.

The question is, in that stage play, when he confronted all the Democrats, was it him going crazy because he's so self-obsessed?  Yes.  But was — is there also some craftiness to it?  Yes.

I think it's politically the right move for him.  If you look around the world, what's rising is hostility to elites?  Modi gets elected.  Australia, Brexit, Netanyahu, it's just all over the world.

And you can win, you can be forgiven a lot of sins, if you oppose coastal elites in our country, urban elites.  And he's riding that train.  And Nancy Pelosi is a good foil for that.  And, politically, I do think there's some — it's not crazy what he's doing.

Judy Woodruff:  Well…

Mark Shields:  Can I just disagree with David, OK?  And that's this?

I don't think it is shrewd.  I mean, remember what they were discussing.

Judy Woodruff:  I'm sorry, you don't think it's…

Mark Shields:  I don't think it is shrewd.  I don't think it's clever.

What they were discussing is the infrastructure of the United States.  If there's one issue on which there is agreement that the country that was number one on all infrastructure, roads, highways, airports, ports, rail just 15 years ago, and is now number nine, and we're falling apart — we have got an $836 billion back-load.  We haven't raised the gasoline tax in 26 years.

And there's something with the economy just maybe needing a goose very well next year.  I mean, this begs to be done.  It's something that the country desperately needs.  And he walks away from it.  He walks away from it and just ignores it, when, in fact, he could have a political success and a public success.

David Brooks:  I would say, first of all, the fact that he walked away from it shows he cares about more himself than the country.

Mark Shields:  Yes.

David Brooks:  That, I agree with.

Mark Shields:  OK.

David Brooks:  But I don't think it's wrong to think that voters are driven more by animosity than by, what have you done for me?

If you can whip up animosities in this climate, or at least among some voters, then you have got a route to victory, rather than saying, oh, I did something really good for you, you should be grateful, you should reward me.

Those kind of soft and uplifting emotions are a little alien right now from politics.

Judy Woodruff:  Well, let me just say, speaking of whipping up animosities, I just want to show you just this, again, a short clip.

This is something that the President tweeted a version of this.  His personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, had spread this on Twitter and then pulled it back.

This is a doctored and then a real version of Nancy Pelosi speaking this week.  I just want to show you a bit of it.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi:  And then he had a press conference in the Rose Garden with all this sort of visuals that obviously were planned.

And then he had a press conference in the Rose Garden with all this sort of visuals that obviously were planned.

Judy Woodruff:  So — and, I mean, we have seen this happen in social media.  It's what's going on right now.  But to know that the President's lawyer — the President was pushing another version of Pelosi.

They pulled together some clips where Pelosi was speaking in a sort of halting way and had it on FOX Business Channel.

I mean, what are we seeing here?

Mark Shields:  We're seeing, Judy, the lack of any moral center or compass in a President and a presidency.

I mean, when — they're going to ask — the grandchildren are going to ask, what did you stand for, grandpa, what did you do?  I mean, when Roosevelt brought a country that was on its knees and its back, back to its feet, when Ronald Reagan won the Cold War, I mean, when Lyndon Johnson brought civil rights to the country, this is what he's going to say?

I doctored up, I made my opponents look bad, I put out phony tapes on them?

I mean, this is beyond — this is an indignity to the office, and it's a disgrace, really, to the country.

David Brooks:  Yes, I agree with that, but it's sort of the times.

We're sort of the old legacy media.  The "NewsHour," The New York Times, The Washington Post, we're legacy media.  But the one thing legacy media has is, we have basic standards below which it's unimaginable to sink, like making up stuff.

Judy Woodruff:  Absolutely.

David Brooks:  And if you do make an error, you correct it.

And so that's just the job we do.  It's the normal thing, part of our world.

The Internet comes in, and there are some things on the Internet that are great, that live up to the standards that we're used to as professionals, and some things that are not.

And you have got to make the distinction between those above the line and those below the line.  But that distinction between above the line and below the line seems to get washed away on the Internet.

And it doesn't help that the President doesn't seem — even seem to acknowledge the idea of the line.

Judy Woodruff:  It's the Internet.  It's social media.  It's also some work being done on cable — on cable news.

Mark Shields:  That's right.

ONLINE - Hate Speech

Hate speech is not protected free speech any more than falsely yelling 'fire' in a crowded venue is protected.

"U.S. laws aren’t keeping up with spread of hate online, says civil rights advocate" PBS NewsHour 4/9/2019

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Violent hate crimes are on the rise in the U.S. and across the globe.  As a result, the ways in which hate groups use social media to threaten, galvanize and radicalize are drawing new scrutiny, including from Congress on Tuesday.  Amna Nawaz reports on the Capitol Hill discussion and talks to Kristen Clarke of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, a national civil rights organization.

SOCIAL MEDIA - The Threat of Intelligent Machines

"How to keep AI from turning into the Terminator" by Mark Surman, CNN Opinion 1/15/2019

On GPS: The threat of intelligent machines (video link)

Editor's Note: Mark Surman is the executive director of the Mozilla Foundation, a global community devoted to keeping the internet open and free.  The views expressed in this commentary are his own.  View more opinion on CNN.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has long occupied an outsized role in our collective imagination, in everything from pulp science fiction novels to James Cameron blockbusters.  When AI is the antagonist, it is corporeal and impossible to overlook, like the Terminator.  Even in the real world, discussions about rogue technology tend to focus on the overt and dramatic, such as Elon Musk's exhortations on Twitter that the dangers of AI rival the dangers of nuclear weapons.

Perhaps humankind is moving toward an oppressive artificial superintelligence.  In the meantime, artificial intelligence is already woven into our everyday lives.  It provides us with things we love and need, from productivity advice to movie recommendations.  Yet, when we don't carefully consider its impact on our democracies, our justice systems and our well-being, we open ourselves up to real risks.

The AI of today is invisible to most of us, yet ubiquitous.  One example we interact with frequently is recommendation engines on the internet -- the code recommending that next video on YouTube or a post on Facebook.  These algorithms pull together vast amounts of our personal data to learn about us and curate our experience online.  In this case, AI is simply your personal data mixed with the data of people with similar interests -- and then pointed back at you.

The result can be serendipitous and delightful.  It can also be dangerous.  Last year, Silicon Valley moguls opened up to New York Magazine about how today's social media is designed to addict users.  Using our data to manipulate us to stay on a site may or may not be pernicious in its own right.

But even if you don't worry about it for yourself, there is growing evidence that these systems tend to radicalize and polarize.  Last year, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill researcher Zeynep Tufekci dubbed YouTube "the Great Radicalizer": view one anti-vaccination video, and YouTube will suggest a second; watch one factually incorrect political video, and YouTube will recommend a sequel.

Further, these algorithms can be gamed by humans to sow even more discord.  Data for Democracy researcher and Mozilla fellow Renee DiResta uncovered how anti-vaccine activists exploit Google's algorithm to spread dangerous disinformation.  How?  By publishing reams of misleading articles peppered with popular keywords and search terms.  She also recently testified before Congress about how Russian operatives manipulated Facebook's AI to influence American voters by posing as American news outlets and American voters.  (Note: Mozilla, a nonprofit, is the creator of the open-source Firefox browser, a competitor of Google's Chrome browser.)

Of course, the problem isn't technology, per se -- AI isn't inherently malicious.  But it does replicate and amplify human bias.  Computer programs are made by humans who bake in certain design goals and draw on certain data sets.  Inside all of this are the normal contradictions of humanity: generosity and greed; inclusion and bias; good and evil.

Think about it: If the goals and incentives of a set of programmers are to increase advertising revenue, it's not surprising that the content recommendation algorithms they create keep people watching videos for as long as possible.  And, since these algorithms learn and adapt to get better at their goals, it's not surprising that apps like Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram are becoming what Professor Ronald J. Deibert, who has hosted past Mozilla fellows, dubbed "addiction machines" in a recent paper titled, "Three Painful Truths About Social Media."

Further, this technology is developed by a small handful of companies -- names like Facebook that you know and others, like Palantir, that you probably don't -- with little transparency.  Public officials, investigative journalists, and civic-minded citizens can't peer at the code to uncover problems.  Put simply: "The public doesn't have the tools to hold algorithms accountable."

The question we really need to be asking is: how do we make AI responsibly and ethically?  Fortunately, there is a growing cadre of people and companies asking this question.

Researchers like Tufekci and DiResta are vital voices.  Groups like the Center for Humane Technology are examining how the "addiction economy" works.  Organizations like New York University's AI Now Institute are examining the ways AI impacts essential liberties.  Even established players like Microsoft and startups like Element AI are calling for regulation.

Others are stressing the need for more engineers and product designers who consider responsibility and ethics when building AI.  Imagine a social app designer who asks: How do I both grow profits and keep users safe?  People who create drugs and automobiles ask these questions; why not developers?  With this in mind, Mozilla (my company), Omidyar Network, Schmidt Futures, and Craig Newmark Philanthropies are leading the Responsible Computer Science Challenge, a $3.5 million initiative to integrate ethics into undergraduate computer science curricula.

Finally, it is worth noting that a handful of governments are starting to step up, too.  In 2018, the New York City mayor's office announced an AI watchdog panel.  More recently, the governments of Canada and France announced a joint initiative to examine the intersection of AI and ethics.  And, in Finland, the government is training 1% of the population in AI basics, such as when it is deployed and the definitions of terms like "machine learning" and "neural networks."

As artificial intelligence becomes more pervasive, it's critical to foster a better public understanding of its impact on society.  Hulking robots make for good cinema but aren't accurate representations of how AI can and does do harm today.  We need to focus on real solutions, like planning for ethical and responsible technology at the drawing board, not after the fact.

Bottom line: We need to anticipate and eliminate bias in AI before it reaches millions of people.

THE WAR WITH RUSSIA - American Election Security

"‘42 states haven’t upgraded their election equipment in over a decade and Russia knows it’" PBS NewsHour 1/10/2018

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Primary voting in the 2018 elections is set to being in just two months.  Is the U.S. voting system secure in case Russia tries to interfere?  Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla) and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn) join Judy Woodruff to discuss their bipartisan effort to protect future elections, as well as President Trump’s call for Republicans to take over the Russia probe and the immigration negotiations.

BRIEF BUT SPECTACULAR - Martha Lane Fox, About the Internet

"The alarming challenge of building a safer, fairer internet" PBS NewsHour 12/14/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  When Martha Lane Fox was starting her career in tech, the internet felt like the "most incredible, redistributive, democratic, empowering force for good."  So what went wrong?  Fox, a current board member of Twitter and founder of Doteveryone, offers her Brief but Spectacular take on how to make sure the internet lives up to its potential.

INTERNET - The 'Terrorist' Attack on Net Neutrality

"Killing net neutrality means no one is looking out for consumers’ interest, says FCC Commissioner" PBS NewsHour 12/12/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  The FCC is expected to roll back net neutrality rules on Thursday, a move that could have significant implications for Americans' access to the internet.  FCC chairman Ajit Pai is pushing to kill the Obama-era rules, which ensure that internet providers treat all content on the web equally.  Mignon Clyburn, a Democrat on the commission, joins Judy Woodruff to explain why she opposes the change.

REF: "How will rolling back net neutrality affect consumers? You’ll have to read the fine print." PBS NewsHour 11/21/2017

DATA SECURITY - The Equifax Hack

"Hackers accessed personal data from 143 million Equifax customers.  Here's what we know." by Erica R. Hendry, PBS NewsHour 9/7/2017

Equifax, a major credit reporting agency, announced Thursday that hackers had gained access to personal data from approximately 143 million of its customers.

Here's what we know.

What happened?

Sometime between mid-May and July, hackers breached an Equifax web application, gaining access to the names, birth dates, addresses, Social Security numbers and, in some cases, driver's license numbers of some 143 million customers, the company said in a blog post Thursday.

Equifax discovered the breach July 29.  The company says it has “no evidence of unauthorized activity on Equifax's core consumer or commercial credit reporting databases.”

Who's affected?

Equifax is one of the three major credit tracking companies in the country.

The number of customers affected in this breach amounts to nearly half of the entire U.S. population, which was 324 million in a U.S. census count in January, CNBC points out.

Along with the sensitive personal data, hackers also gained access to credit card numbers of 209,000 U.S. customers and documents related to credit report disputes from another 182,000 American consumers.

TechCrunch says citizens of Canada and the UK were also affected by the breach.

How bad is this?

As TechCrunch put it:  “pretty bad.”

Reporter Ron Miller writes:

This is not the worst breach of all time by a long shot in terms of pure numbers.  That distinction goes to Yahoo, now part of Oath (which was acquired by our parent company, Verizon).  They had a leak involving more than a billion users.

But this leak is particularly worrisome because Equifax is a credit reporting service and tracks a history of your consumer life, credit cards, credit scores and more — and it gives the black market a potential gold mine of information about people's financial lives.

“In addition to the number [of victims] being really large, the type of information that has been exposed is really sensitive,” said Beth Givens, executive director of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, told the Washington Post.  “All in all, this has the potential to be a very harmful breach to those who are affected by it.”

What's next?

Equifax's stock fell 9 percent after the news broke, USA Today noted.

The company has set up a website — www.equifaxsecurity2017.com — for consumers to see whether, and how much of, their data was breached.  It's offering free credit monitoring to all those affected by the hack.

Meanwhile, law enforcement and an independent cybersecurity firm are investigating the scope of the hack and how it occurred.  They're expecting to release their findings in the coming weeks.

"Did the Equifax hack put your personal data at risk?  Here's what to do now." PBS NewsHour 9/8/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Half of all Americans could have had their sensitive data compromised by a security breach at the credit reporting agency Equifax.  William Brangham joins John Yang to discuss what happened and what consumers should do to safeguard their credit.

INTERNET - Hate Sites Not Blocked

"Despite Disavowals, Leading Tech Companies Help Extremist Sites Monetize Hate" by Julia Angwin, Jeff Larson, Madeleine Varner, and Lauren Kirchner - ProPublica 8/19/2017

Update, Aug. 19, 2017:
This story has been updated to include a comment from PayPal.

Update, Aug. 22, 2017:
The name of Taboola's spokesman was removed at the company's request.


Because of its “extreme hostility toward Muslims,” the website Jihadwatch.org is considered an active hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League.  The views of the site's director, Robert Spencer, on Islam led the British Home Office to ban him from entering the country in 2013.

But its designation as a hate site hasn't stopped tech companies — including PayPal, Amazon, and Newsmax — from maintaining partnerships with Jihad Watch that help to sustain it financially.  PayPal facilitates donations to the site.  Newsmax — the online news network run by President Donald Trump's close friend Chris Ruddy — pays Jihad Watch in return for users clicking on its headlines.  Until recently, Amazon allowed Jihad Watch to participate in a program that promised a cut of any book sales that the site generated.  All three companies have policies that say they don't do business with hate groups.

Jihad Watch is one of many sites that monetize their extremist views through relationships with technology companies.  ProPublica surveyed the most visited websites of groups designated as extremist by either the SPLC or the Anti-Defamation League.  We found that more than half of them — 39 out of 69 — made money from ads, donations or other revenue streams facilitated by technology companies.  At least 10 tech companies played a role directly or indirectly in supporting these sites.

Traditionally, tech companies have justified such relationships by contending that it's not their role to censor the Internet or to discourage legitimate political expression.  Also, their management wasn't necessarily aware that they were doing business with hate sites because tech services tend to be automated and based on algorithms tied to demographics.

In the wake of last week's violent protest by alt-right groups in Charlottesville, more tech companies have disavowed relationships with extremist groups.  During just the last week, six of the sites on our list were shut down.  Even the web services company Cloudflare, which had long defended its laissez-faire approach to political expression, finally ended its relationship with the neo-Nazi site The Daily Stormer last week.

“I can't recall a time where the tech industry was so in step in their response to hate on their platforms,” said Oren Segal, director of the ADL's Center on Extremism.  “Stopping financial support to hate sites seems like a win-win for everyone.”

But ProPublica's findings indicate that some tech companies with anti-hate policies may have failed to establish the monitoring processes needed to weed out hate sites.  PayPal, the payment processor, has a policy against working with sites that use its service for “the promotion of hate, violence, [or] racial intolerance.”  Yet it was by far the top tech provider to the hate sites with donation links on 23 sites, or about one-third of those surveyed by ProPublica.  In response to ProPublica's inquiries, PayPal spokesman Justin Higgs said in a statement that the company “strives to conscientiously assess activity and review accounts reported to us.”

After Charlottesville, PayPal stopped accepting payments or donations for several high-profile white nationalist groups that participated in the march.  It posted a statement that it would remain “vigilant on hate, violence & intolerance.”  It addresses each case individually, and “strives to navigate the balance between freedom of expression” and the “limiting and closing” of hate sites, it said.

After being contacted by ProPublica, Newsmax said it was unaware that the three sites that it had relationships with were considered hateful.  “We will review the content of these sites and make any necessary changes after that review,” said Andy Brown, chief operating officer of Newsmax.

Amazon spokeswoman Angie Newman said the company had previously removed Jihad Watch and three other sites identified by ProPublica from its program sharing revenue for book sales, which is called Amazon Associates.  When ProPublica pointed out that the sites still carried working links to the program, she said that it was their responsibility to remove the code.  “They are no longer paid as an Associate regardless of what links are on their site once we remove them from the Associates Program,” she said.

Where to set the boundaries between hate speech and legitimate advocacy for perspectives on the edge of the political spectrum, and who should set them, are complex and difficult questions.  Like other media outlets, we relied in part on the Southern Poverty Law Center's public list of “Active Hate Groups 2016.”  This list is controversial in some circles, with critics questioning whether the SPLC is too quick to brand organizations on the right as hate groups.

Still, the center does provide detailed explanations for many of its designations.  For instance, the SPLC documents its decision to include the Family Research Council by citing the evangelical lobbying group's promotion of discredited science and unsubstantiated attacks on gay and lesbian people.  We also consulted a list from ADL, which is not public and that was provided to us for research purposes.  See our methodology here.

The sites that we identified from the ADL and SPLC lists vehemently denied that they are hate sites.

“It is not hateful, racist or extremist to oppose jihad terror,” said Spencer, the director of Jihad Watch.  He added that the true extremism was displayed by groups that seek to censor the Internet and that by asking questions about the tech platforms on his site, we were “aiding and abetting a quintessentially fascist enterprise.”

Spencer made these comments in response to questions emailed by ProPublica reporter Lauren Kirchner.  Afterwards, Spencer posted an item on Jihad Watch alleging that “leftist 'journalist'” Kirchner had threatened the site.  He also posted Kirchner's photo and email, as well as his correspondence with her.  After being contacted by ProPublica, another anti-Islam activist, Pamela Geller, also posted an attack on Kirchner, calling her a “senior reporting troll.”  Like Spencer, Geller was banned by the British Home Office; her eponymous site is on the SPLC and ADL lists.

Donations — and the ability to accept them online through PayPal and similar companies — are a lifeline for sites like Jihad Watch.  In 2015, the nonprofit website disclosed that three quarters of its roughly $100,000 in revenues came from donations, according to publicly available tax records.

In recent weeks, PayPal has been working to shut down donations to extremist sites.  This week, it pulled the plug on VDARE.com, an anti-immigration website designated as “white nationalist” by the SPLC and as a hate site by the ADL.  VDARE, which denies being white nationalist, immediately switched to its backup system, Stripe.

Stripe, a private company recently described by Bloomberg Businessweek as a $9 billion startup, is unusual in not having a policy against working with hate sites.  It does, however, prohibit financial transactions that support drugs, pornography and “psychic services.” Stripe provided donation links for 10 sites, second only to PayPal on our list.  Stripe did not respond to a request for comment.

VDARE editor Peter Brimelow declared on his site that the PayPal shutdown was likely part of a purge by the “authoritarian Communist Left to punish anyone who disagrees with their anti-American violence against patriotic people.” He urged his readers to donate through other channels such as Bitcoins.  “We need your help desperately,” he wrote.  “We must have the resources to defend ourselves and our people.”

In 2015, VDARE received nearly all of its revenue — $267,038 out of total $293,663 — from donations, according to publicly available tax return forms that the Internal Revenue Service requires nonprofits to disclose.

Brimelow did not respond to our questions, instead characterizing ProPublica as the “Totalitarian Left.”

Some sites also supplement their donations with revenue from online advertising.  For instance, SonsofLibertyMedia.com, which is on the SPLC list, generated about 10 percent of its revenue — $37,828 — from advertising in 2015, according to its tax documents.

The site, which describes itself as promoting a “Judeo-Christian ethic,” and recently posted an article declaring that a black activist protesting Confederate statues needed “a serious beat down,” does not appear to attract advertisers directly.

Instead, Sons of Liberty benefits from a type of ad-piggybacking arrangement that is becoming more common in the tech industry.  The website runs sponsored news articles from a company called Taboola, which shares ad revenues with it.  Known for being at the forefront of “click-bait,” Taboola places links on websites to articles about celebrities and popular culture.

Taboola's policy prohibits working with sites that have “politically religious agendas” or use hate speech.  “We strive to ensure the safety of our network but from time to time, unfortunately, mistakes can happen,” said a Taboola spokeswoman.  “We will ask our Content Policy group to review this site again and take action if needed.”

Sons of Liberty founder Bradlee Dean said that he forwarded our questions to his attorney.  The lawyer did not respond.

Hate sites can initiate relationships with tech companies with little scrutiny.

Any website can fill out an online form asking to join, for instance, Amazon's network, and often can get approved instantly.  Once a website has joined a tech network, it can quickly start earning money through advertising, donations, or content farms such as Taboola that share ad revenues with websites that distribute their articles.

Some companies, such as Newsmax, say that joining their ad network requires explicit prior approval.

But, according to a former Newsmax employee, the only criterion for this approval was whether traffic to the site reached a minimum threshold.  There was no content review.  Salespeople were told to be aggressive in signing up publishing partners.

“We'd put our news feed on anybody's page, anyone who was willing to listen,” he said, “it's about email addresses, it's about marketing, they don't care about ultra conservative or left wing.”

Dylan Roof frequented a website described by the SPLC as “white nationalist.”  He said in a manifesto posted online that finding the website was a turning point in his life.  He went on to murder nine African-American churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015.  That year, USA Today found Newsmax ads on the site.

They no longer appear there.

INTERNET - Preserving History

"Internet history is fragile.  This archive is making sure it doesn't disappear" PBS NewsHour 1/2/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  What's online doesn't necessarily last forever.  Content on the Internet is revised and deleted all the time.  Hyperlinks “rot,” and with them goes history, lost in space.  With that in mind, Brewster Kahle set out to develop the Internet Archive, a digital library with the mission of preserving all the information on the World Wide Web, for all who wish to explore.  Jeffrey Brown reports.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM (NewsHour):  We're increasingly cataloging our lives online, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, seemingly endless YouTube videos.  It's a digital-first and often digital-only world.

The advantages of this unlimited digital storage seem obvious, but how permanent are some of those records?  How do we preserve digital history?

Jeffrey Brown has the story, part of our ongoing series Culture at Risk.

JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour):  So, this is like an ancient temple come to life in a modern age.

BREWSTER KAHLE, Founder, Internet Archive:  In a modern day.  It's a Greek-style building, which we loved, because the whole idea is the Library of Alexandria reborn now.

JEFFREY BROWN:  It's an ancient idea, to gather and preserve the world's knowledge.  But now that library will look like this.

These stacks of servers, Brewster Kahle told me recently, represent a 20-year and running effort to build a kind of digital library, and to essentially back up the ever-expanding World Wide Web.

BREWSTER KAHLE:  In one of these would be 100 years of a channel of television.  Or this much is all of the words in the Library of Congress.

We need to be able to preserve our digital history.

JEFFREY BROWN:  Kahle was an early Internet entrepreneur who in 1996 founded the Internet Archive, a nonprofit that operates out of an old Christian Science church in San Francisco.

It was designed to address a fundamental flaw in the original creation of the World Wide Web by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989.

BREWSTER KAHLE:  The wonder of it is, it's very, very simple.  Anybody could go and set up a web server on their computer and make it available to the world.

Unfortunately, it's too simple.  It's fragile, that if something happens to that piece of equipment, that Web site just, blink, is gone.

JEFFREY BROWN:  If it's online, it lives forever, right?  Well, no.

Kahle says the average lifespan of a Web page is just 92 days.  Information is altered and deleted all the time for all kinds of reasons.

A 2013 Harvard study, for example, found that half the hyperlinks in Supreme Court cases, today's equivalent of footnotes, are broken, a phenomena known as link rot.  Government agencies remove documents, and companies fail, and with them the sites they host.  Think of GeoCities, Yahoo! Video, and, more recently, the news site Gawker.

ABBY SMITH RUMSEY, Author, “When We Are No More”:  People mistake the fact that the Internet is ubiquitous with the fact that it's permanent.

JEFFREY BROWN:  Abby Smith Rumsey is the author of “When We Are No More:  How Digital Memory Is Shaping Our Future.”

She began her scholarly career studying how information was purposely deleted in the totalitarian Soviet system.  These days, she thinks, we have a new kind of storage and retrieval problem.

ABBY SMITH RUMSEY:  It isn't permanent at all.  And, in fact, the thing about digital technology is, you can inscribe something onto a computer, but you can't put it on a shelf and expect to pick it out at random at 50, let alone 500, years, and be able to read it.

In fact, you won't have the hardware or the software to do that.  So, it's very fragile, indeed.

NEWSHOUR BOOKSHELF - "A Field Guide to Lies"

"Why we believe what we read on the internet" PBS NewsHour 9/21/2016

My advice.  Never believe ANYTHING that you cannot independently verify, or is from a source that provides no links back to itself, or to documents that are quoted in the post.

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  In the digital age, we have access to all the information that we could ever want.  But that means there’s also a lot of misinformation out there.  How do we know what’s true and what isn’t?  That’s what Daniel Levitin attempts to teach readers of his new book, “A Field Guide to Lies.”  Jeffrey Brown sits down with Levitin to learn how we can sift through the digital field of information.

JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour):  “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble.  It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” Mark Twain said that.

And imagine what he would make of the Internet, when everything is available and we’re sure we know so much.  But do we?

The Twain quote appears at the beginning of a new book titled “A Field Guide to Lies:  Critical Thinking in the Information Age.”

Our guide is Daniel Levitin, a neuroscientist and bestselling author of books, including “This Is Your Brain on Music” and “The Organized Mind.”

And, Dan, welcome to you.

Your starting point, we’re bombarded with information, but it’s harder than ever to know what’s true.

DANIEL LEVITIN, Author, “A Field Guide to Lies: Critical Thinking in the Information Age”:  We’re making more and more decisions every day.  I think a lot of us feel overloaded by the process.

And, as you say, it’s getting harder and harder to know, when you find things on the Internet, what you can believe and what you can’t.  And there isn’t really anybody doing it for us.

JEFFREY BROWN:  And you see this everywhere.  You go through both data, numbers, and — and, well, everything, right?

DANIEL LEVITIN:  Yes.

I mean, it’s in Facebook and in statistics and in things that politicians say.  And it’s in headlines.  It’s in representations that a salesman might make to you.  It’s everywhere.

JEFFREY BROWN:  It’s clearly annoying you, right, as a scientist.  You don’t — you just don’t like this world.

(LAUGHTER)

DANIEL LEVITIN:  Well, I like a world where each of us has the tools to be able to make able to make our own decisions.

I don’t think I’m always right, but I would like to empower people to come to sound conclusions using a systematic way of looking at things.

DOCUMENTARY - "Zero Days"

"‘Zero Days,’ a detective story about the cyber warfare arms race" PBS NewsHour 7/7/2016

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  “Zero Days,” a new documentary by Alex Gibney, lays out a sobering view of the rise of cyber warfare and its acceleration since intelligence agencies sabotaged Iran’s nuclear program.  Gibney sits down with Jeffrey Brown.

HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour):  A new documentary lays out a sobering view about the use of cyber-warfare, a future that’s accelerated since intelligence agencies sabotaged Iran’s nuclear program.

The film, called “Zero Days,” opens in more than a dozen cities tomorrow and will be available online.

Its director stopped by as part of the recent AFI Docs festival.

Jeffrey Brown has our conversation.

JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour):  The 2010 cyber-attack on an Iranian nuclear facility dubbed Stuxnet, the first question was, what exactly was this sophisticated weapon, the second, who created and carried it out, and in the years since, many new questions have arisen about cyber-warfare and the new world we live in.

The documentary “Zero Days” pulls together what happened with Stuxnet and since.

Alex Gibney, Academy Award-winning documentary maker of numerous films, joins me now.

Welcome to you.

ALEX GIBNEY, Director, “Zero Days”:  Thank you.

JEFFREY BROWN:  Why was this a subject you wanted to tackle?

ALEX GIBNEY:  It seemed like it was a story that was about the Internet and the militarization of the Internet, but wasn’t properly understood.  And I certainly didn’t understand it, so it made me want to dig in.

Trailer Quotes:

• "Get Ready to Get Very, Very Paranoid"
• "Welcome to the Next Global War"

GREED FILE - Patents and Trolling for Ca$h aka Extortion

COMMENT:  Way in my past, there was an article that the U.S. Patent Office was NOT computerized as were other government regulatory agencies.  It implied that this was intentional since a paper system was very slow and other persons could file their patents BEFORE the first patent on something was approved.  Thereby giving the sneak-thieves an legal out.

Of course the patent system is  now computerized.

But there are opinions like: "The 'broken patent system': how we got here and how to fix it" by Nilay Patel, The Verge 7/10/2012

"U.S. innovators dogged by money-grubbing ‘patent trolls'" PBS NewsHour 5/26/2016

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  The U.S. economy is driven by innovation, but unwelcome “patent trolls” are gunking up the system.  Patent reform bills sit idle in Congress as the “trolls” set up companies for the sole purpose, critics say, of shaking down inventors while never creating anything.  “We just have to write 'em a check so they'll go away,” says one disgusted app maker.  Economics correspondent Paul Solman reports.

TODD MOORE, CEO, TMSOFT:  So here's Amazon jungle.

PAUL SOLMAN (NewsHour):  That's Todd Moore's 'White Noise' mobile phone app, which generates the call of the wild, and pretty much any other sound you can think of, to lull the sleep-challenged to la-la land.

And this is frogs?

TODD MOORE:  Yes.  Don't you just want to fall asleep?

PAUL SOLMAN:  I'm getting slightly drowsy.

It was such a basic idea, Moore didn't even bother to apply for a patent.  And yet he himself was sued for patent infringement.

TODD MOORE:  They were claiming a hyperlink inside the white noise app, that you would tap it and go to the Internet, that was infringing on one or more of their patents.

PAUL SOLMAN:  But doesn't almost every app have a hyperlink of some sort?

TODD MOORE:  Yes.  If you're using the Internet it does, so how can they say that's infringing on a patent?

PAUL SOLMAN:  And all they were asking to go away, $3,500.  Welcome to the world of so-called patent trolls.

NARRATOR:  A patent troll is someone that makes their money by filing frivolous lawsuits against companies, with the hope that these companies will pay a fee to settle, rather than go to court.

FBI NEWS - Ransomware

"Incidents of Ransomware on the Rise" FBI News 4/29/2016

Hospitals, school districts, state and local governments, law enforcement agencies, small businesses, large businesses—these are just some of the entities impacted recently by ransomware, an insidious type of malware that encrypts, or locks, valuable digital files and demands a ransom to release them.

The inability to access the important data these kinds of organizations keep can be catastrophic in terms of the loss of sensitive or proprietary information, the disruption to regular operations, financial losses incurred to restore systems and files, and the potential harm to an organization’s reputation.

And, of course, home computers are just as susceptible to ransomware, and the loss of access to personal and often irreplaceable items—including family photos, videos, and other data—can be devastating for individuals as well.

Ransomware has been around for a few years, but during 2015, law enforcement saw an increase in these types of cyber attacks, particularly against organizations because the payoffs are higher.  And if the first three months of this year are any indication, the number of ransomware incidents—and the ensuing damage they cause—will grow even more in 2016 if individuals and organizations don’t prepare for these attacks in advance.

In a ransomware attack, victims—upon seeing an e-mail addressed to them—will open it and may click on an attachment that appears legitimate, like an invoice or an electronic fax, but which actually contains the malicious ransomware code.  Or the e-mail might contain a legitimate-looking URL, but when a victim clicks on it, they are directed to a website that infects their computer with malicious software.

One the infection is present, the malware begins encrypting files and folders on local drives, any attached drives, backup drives, and potentially other computers on the same network that the victim computer is attached to.  Users and organizations are generally not aware they have been infected until they can no longer access their data or until they begin to see computer messages advising them of the attack and demands for a ransom payment in exchange for a decryption key.  These messages include instructions on how to pay the ransom, usually with bitcoins because of the anonymity this virtual currency provides.

Ransomware attacks are not only proliferating, they’re becoming more sophisticated.  Several years ago, ransomware was normally delivered through spam e-mails, but because e-mail systems got better at filtering out spam, cyber criminals turned to spear phishing e-mails targeting specific individuals.

And in newly identified instances of ransomware, some cyber criminals aren’t using e-mails at all.  According to FBI Cyber Division Assistant Director James Trainor, “These criminals have evolved over time and now bypass the need for an individual to click on a link.  They do this by seeding legitimate websites with malicious code, taking advantage of unpatched software on end-user computers.”

The FBI doesn’t support paying a ransom in response to a ransomware attack.  Said Trainor, “Paying a ransom doesn’t guarantee an organization that it will get its data back—we’ve seen cases where organizations never got a decryption key after having paid the ransom.  Paying a ransom not only emboldens current cyber criminals to target more organizations, it also offers an incentive for other criminals to get involved in this type of illegal activity.  And finally, by paying a ransom, an organization might inadvertently be funding other illicit activity associated with criminals.”

So what does the FBI recommend?  As ransomware techniques and malware continue to evolve—and because it’s difficult to detect a ransomware compromise before it’s too late—organizations in particular should focus on two main areas:

• Prevention efforts—both in both in terms of awareness training for employees and robust technical prevention controls; and
• The creation of a solid business continuity plan in the event of a ransomware attack.  (See "Tips for Dealing with the Ransomware Threat" below)

“There’s no one method or tool that will completely protect you or your organization from a ransomware attack,” said Trainor.  “But contingency and remediation planning is crucial to business recovery and continuity—and these plans should be tested regularly.” In the meantime, according to Trainor, the FBI will continue working with its local, federal, international, and private sector partners to combat ransomware and other cyber threats.

If you think you or your organization have been the victim of ransomware, contact your local FBI field office and report the incident to the Bureau’s Internet Crime Complaint Center.


Tips for Dealing with the Ransomware Threat

While the below tips are primarily aimed at organizations and their employees, some are also applicable to individual users.

Prevention Efforts

- Make sure employees are aware of ransomware and of their critical roles in protecting the organization’s data.

- Patch operating system, software, and firmware on digital devices (which may be made easier through a centralized patch management system).

- Ensure antivirus and anti-malware solutions are set to automatically update and conduct regular scans.

- Manage the use of privileged accounts—no users should be assigned administrative access unless absolutely needed, and only use administrator accounts when necessary.

- Configure access controls, including file, directory, and network share permissions appropriately.  If users only need read specific information, they don’t need write-access to those files or directories.

- Disable macro scripts from office files transmitted over e-mail.

- Implement software restriction policies or other controls to prevent programs from executing from common ransomware locations (e.g., temporary folders supporting popular Internet browsers, compression/decompression programs).

Business Continuity Efforts

- Back up data regularly and verify the integrity of those backups regularly.

- Secure your backups.  Make sure they aren’t connected to the computers and networks they are backing up.

More info

ON THE PARANOIA FRONT - Microsoft on the Bandwagon

"Microsoft sues DOJ over demands for access to customer data" PBS NewsHour 4/15/2016

Here we go again.  The paranoia over privacy that helps criminals and terrorists hide from the law, even with a legal warrant.

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  In the wake of the FBI’s showdown with Apple last month, a new tech giant is taking up arms against government oversight.  Microsoft sued the Department of Justice Thursday, arguing that it is unconstitutional for the government to request access to a customer’s data while banning Microsoft from informing the individual in question.  Microsoft president Brad Smith joins Judy Woodruff for more.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  A high-profile showdown between a tech giant and the U.S. government over accessing private data.

This time, it’s Microsoft.  Yesterday, the company filed a suit against the Department of Justice in federal court.  Microsoft argues it’s unconstitutional for the government to ask for customers’ personal data or e-mails in most cases without the individuals’ knowledge.  The company says it’s received more than 5,600 requests for such data from the government in the last year-and-a-half, often from the cloud or remote servers.  And nearly half of those requests come with a ban from the government on alerting customers.

Brad Smith is the president of Microsoft.  He joins me from company headquarters in Redmond, Washington.

And welcome to the program, Brad Smith.

I do want to point out we invited the Department of Justice to join the interview, but they declined.

So, let me begin by asking you, what is it that the federal government is doing that Microsoft doesn’t like?

BRAD SMITH, President, Microsoft:  Well, what gives us concern is the fact we have received almost 2,600 — almost 2,600 of these so-called gag or secrecy orders over the last 18 months.

Over two-thirds of them have no end date at all.  So it means that we are permanently prohibited from telling customers that the government has accessed, read and obtained copies of their e-mails.  We feel that infringes on the constitutional rights of consumers and businesses to be secure from unreasonable government searches.

It infringes on our First Amendment right to speak, to share information with our customers.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  Well, we know the Justice Department has not responded to the lawsuit.  They have not said anything publicly, but we know that in the past they have said these are investigations that involve criminals, people who are breaking the law, that involve — that are perhaps involved in potential terrorist acts.

Why not work with the government when they’re trying to go after the bad guys?

BRAD SMITH:  Well, this is an issue that we have discussed with various officials in government for some time.

And we readily recognize that there are many cases where there should be some kind of secrecy, that there is a real danger if information is disclosed.  But we feel that these kinds of secrecy orders have been — become too routine.  They’re being issued in cases that involve businesses, as well as consumers.

.....

...hence, the paranoia.  Like businesses can't be criminals or help terrorists hide?  Also, lets warn the criminals BEFORE they are brought to trial, think secret Grand Juries.  Oh, wait, the Black-WEB sites used by drug lords and terrorists to hide.  Humm.... could it be the big profits such companies make laundering hiding money?

EDUCATION - WiFi on Wheels

"Wi-Fi on wheels leaves no child offline" PBS NewsHour 3/7/2016


Excerpt

SUMMARY:  The digital divide and lack of reliable Internet access at home can put low-income and rural students at a real disadvantage.  So when superintendent Darryl Adams took over one of the poorest school districts in the nation, he made it a top priority to help his students get online 24/7.  Special correspondent David Nazar of PBS SoCal reports with PBS NewsHour Student Reporting Labs.

HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour):  Tonight, an innovative solution to bridging the digital divide for students.

Too frequently, kids and their parents in rural low-income communities don't have access to the Internet and high-quality learning technologies.  But, in California, a unique project is providing free home access to the Web in one of the nation's poorest districts.

Much of the footage for this story was shot by teenagers who are part of our Student Reporting Labs network, in collaboration with PBS SoCal in Southern California.

The correspondent is David Nazar.

DAVID NAZAR (NewsHour):  Thirty minutes west of the wealthy suburbs of Palm Springs is a desert oasis best known its annual Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival.

But behind the parties and concerts stretches a vast and isolated landscape, home to the second poorest school district in the country, where most families live below the poverty line and struggle just to pay the rent.

DARRYL ADAMS, Superintendent, Coachella Valley Unified School District:  We have some of the poorest of the poor in our country, very economically challenged, and 100 percent of our students are on free and reduced lunch.  Some of them living at trailer home parks that some have been condemned recently, or some in railroad, abandoned railroad cars.  It's just unbelievable, some of the challenges they face.

DAVID NAZAR:  Coachella Valley Unified School District Superintendent Darryl Adams believes the right use of technology is critical for the families in this area, like Norma Olivas and her daughter, Anisa Perez.

NORMA OLIVAS, Anisa's Mother:  I do see students sometimes struggling, and, right now, sometimes, some of the kids struggling to get school, to do certain things.  And I wouldn't want my daughter to go through any that.  I wouldn't want her to be a dropout.

DAVID NAZAR:  When Adams took the job in 2011, the graduation rate was 70 percent, according to the district.  One of his key initiatives was to get every student an iPad and WiFi service, but he knew it would be challenge.

DARRYL ADAMS:  We have 1,250 square miles to cover, larger than the state of Rhode Island.  So, when we out there were spots in every which way, students weren't connected, we said, well, how can we get them connected?

And so one of the ways, we said, look, we got 100 buses.  Let's put WiFi routers on those buses.  And let's park them where the need is.

INTERNET - Encryption Wars

"Why tech companies may be winning the encryption argument" PBS NewsHour 10/13/2015

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Ever since (traitor) Edward Snowden released information about the extent of secret U.S. surveillance, a battle has been growing between tech companies and the government over access to data.  New reports suggest the Obama administration may be backing down on its demands over encryption.  William Brangham speaks to David Sanger of The New York Times.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Ever since (traitor) Edward Snowden released a mountain of information about the extent of U.S. government secret surveillance, the battle has been growing between tech companies and the government over access to data.

One of the major fronts in that battle has been the decision by Apple, Google, Microsoft and others to lock down, or encrypt, data on smartphones and digital devices.

But new reports say the Obama administration may be backing down from its demands.

William Brangham has the story.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM (NewsHour):  For months now, the Obama administration has said it’s essential to be able to occasionally access messages, texts and photos that are sent on today’s smartphones.  But many of the latest devices give individual users the power to control their data and block others from seeing it.

Until recently, law enforcement has argued that this encryption is making it increasingly hard to track terrorists or criminals who are using these devices to communicate with each other.

For example, this is what Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates told a Senate hearing this summer:

SALLY YATES, Deputy Attorney General:  ISIL currently communicates on Twitter, sending communications to thousands of would-be followers right here in our country.  When someone responds and the conversations begin, they are then directed to encrypted platforms for further communication.

And even with a court order, we can’t see those communications.  This is a serious threat, and our inability to access these communications with valid court orders is a real national security problem.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM:  This past week the Obama administration has apparently backed off on some of its demands to gaining access to our digital devices.

David Sanger has been reporting on this for The New York Times.  And he joins me now.

David Sanger, welcome.

DAVID SANGER, The New York Times:  Thanks.  Good to be with you, William.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM:  The term of art here is encryption.  And for those who haven’t been following this debate very closely, could you just give us a quick primer?  What is encryption?

DAVID SANGER:  Well, encryption is a sophisticated version of what you did when you made codes when you were a kid.

It is taking the data that’s in your phone and wrapping it in a code so that if somebody got ahold of that phone, if they didn’t know the key, they couldn’t de-encrypt it.  And sometimes conversations are encrypted or data is encrypted when it’s moving across a telephone wire as well.

Note the last high-lighted sentence, that means terrorists can hide.

POLITICS - They're Tracking You on Smartphones

"Smartphone user?  The 2016 candidates are watching you" PBS NewsHour 9/18/2015

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  If you own a smartphone, you are already on the frontline of the 2016 presidential race.  On the left and the right, campaigns are amassing information about you and figuring out how to influence you with individualized marketing.  And that's not the only way that candidates have gone digital.  Political director Lisa Desjardins reports.

LISA DESJARDINS (NewsHour):  With all the gentility of a marching band, the presidential campaign is under way and booming.  But like much of America, you may think the 2016 presidential fight has yet to really enter your life.

Do you think any of the campaigns are paying any attention to you right now?

WOMAN:  Not really, no.

MAN:  Very little.

WOMAN:  Not a whole lot.

MAN:  Probably almost zero.

WOMAN:  Not really, no.

LISA DESJARDINS:  And last question, do you have a cell phone?

WOMAN:  Of course.

MAN:  Yes, I do.

WOMAN:  I do.

MAN:  Yes, I have a cell phone.

MAN:  Yes, I have a cell phone.  It’s a very big part of my life because I do a lot with my cell phone.

LISA DESJARDINS:  If you have a smartphone — and two-thirds of us in America do, according to the Pew Research Center — you are already on the radar for most 2016 campaigns.  That’s because campaigns left and right are now amassing more and more data about voters, and they’re trying to influence you this time around using this.

COMMENT:  Hum..... so we are suppose to worry about government tracking but NOT about political tracking?  Really?!

INTERNET - Viral Violence

QUESTION:  Is violence going viral on the internet different from violence gone 'viral' on TV news?

"When a shooter’s violent video goes viral" PBS NewsHour 8/27/2015

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  A shocking, televised murder in Virginia has provoked a wide array of questions about the shooter and how horrific images go viral online.  Gwen Ifill speaks with Deborah Potter of NewsLab; Lance Ulanoff, chief correspondent and editor-at-large at Mashable, and Barry Rosenfeld of Fordham University.

GWEN IFILL (NewsHour):  We look now at what made this latest shooting sadly familiar and shockingly different with Lance Ulanoff, chief correspondent & editor at large at Mashable, the digital media Web site; Barry Rosenfeld, a professor of psychology and director of clinical training at Fordham University; and Deborah Potter, the founder of NewsLab, a nonprofit journalism resource center.  She is also a former television news correspondent and anchor.

Lance Ulanoff, was it only a matter of time before someone live-tweeted something so horrific?

LANCE ULANOFF, Mashable:  Yes, unfortunately, I think that’s true.

We are never without our technology.  It surrounds us.  It permeates our lives.  We have powerful computers in our pockets, and we have been — you know, we are training our children from the youngest age to use social media, so it’s something that comes very naturally to us.

And what I noticed as part of this, this horrifying crime, is that the use of social media seemed to be kind of a natural act happening as he was doing these things.  It didn’t feel — that part of it didn’t feel particularly premeditated.

GWEN IFILL:  Well, not only his act, but also was it a natural act that people instinctively shared what he put up online?

LANCE ULANOFF:  Yes.  Yes, it is.

But, you know, it’s funny, because I look at this guy, Flanagan, and I think to myself, this is a person who committed a heinous crime who wasn’t in his right mind, and used social media in a way that terrifies me.  The people who reshared what they saw, I understand the impulse, because you see something, it’s newsworthy, that is what we do in this modern age.

But I am surprised that they didn’t stop for a moment and realize and think about what they were doing.  And that’s kind of where I think we probably have to take a closer look.