UK surveillance program could expose private lives

FILE In this Friday, Sept. 23, 2011 file photo a man talks on a mobile phone as the hi-rise buildings of the banks based in the Canary Wharf business district are seen in the distance from Parliament Hill on Hampstead Heath in London. British officials have given their word: 'We won't read your emails.' But experts say that its proposed new surveillance program, unveiled last week as part of the government's annual legislative program, will gather so much data that spooks won't have to read your messages to guess what you're up to. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham)

FILE In this Friday, Sept. 23, 2011 file photo a man talks on a mobile phone as the hi-rise buildings of the banks based in the Canary Wharf business district are seen in the distance from Parliament Hill on Hampstead Heath in London. British officials have given their word: 'We won't read your emails.' But experts say that its proposed new surveillance program, unveiled last week as part of the government's annual legislative program, will gather so much data that spooks won't have to read your messages to guess what you're up to. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham)

(AP) ? British officials have given their word: "We won't read your emails."

But experts say the government's proposed new surveillance program will gather so much data that spooks won't have to read your messages to guess what you're up to.

The U.K. Home Office stresses it won't be reading the content of every Britons' communications, saying the data it seeks "is NOT the content of any communication." It is, however, looking for information about who's sending the message and to whom, where it's sent from and other details, including a message's length and its format.

The proposal, unveiled last week as part of the government's annual legislative program, is just a draft bill, so it could be modified or scrapped. But if passed in its current form, it would put a huge amount of personal data at the government's disposal, which it could use to deduce a startling amount about Britons' private lives ? from sleep patterns to driving habits or even infidelity.

"We're really entering a whole new phase of analysis based on the data that we can collect," said Gerald Kane, an information systems expert at Boston College. "There is quite a lot you can learn."

The ocean of information is hard to fathom. Britons generate 4 billion hours of voice calls and 130 billion text messages annually, according to industry figures. In 2008, the BBC put the annual number of U.K.-linked emails at around 1 trillion.

Then there are instant messaging services run by companies such as BlackBerry, Internet telephone services such as Skype, chat rooms, and in-game services like those used by World of Warcraft.

Communications service providers, who would log all that back-and-forth, believe the government's program would force them to process petabytes (1 quadrillion bytes) of information every day. It's a mind-boggling amount of data, on the scale of every book, movie and piece of music ever released.

So even without opening emails, how much can British spooks learn about who's sending them?

THEY'LL SEE THE RED FLAGS

Did you know how fast you were going?

Your phone does.

If you sent a text from London before stepping behind the wheel, and a second one from a service station outside Manchester three hours later, authorities could infer that you broke the speed limit to cover the roughly 200 miles that separate the two.

Crunching location data and communications patterns gives a remarkably rich view of people's lives ? and their misadventures.

Ken Altshuler, of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, raves about the benefits smartphones and social media have brought to savvy divorce attorneys. Lawyers don't need sophisticated data mining software to spot evidence of infidelity or hints of hidden wealth when they review phone records or text traffic, he said.

"One name, one phone number that's not on our client's radar, and our curiosity is piqued," he said. The more the communication ? a late-night text sent to a work colleague, an unexplained international phone call ? is out of character, "the more of a red flag we see."

THEY'LL KNOW WHEN YOU'RE SLEEPING

The ebb and flow of electronic communication ?that call to your mother just before bed, that early-morning email to your boss saying you'll be late ? frames our waking lives.

"You can figure somebody's sleep patterns, their weekly pattern of work," said Tony Jebara, a Columbia University expert on artificial intelligence. In 2006, he helped found New York-based Sense Networks, which crunches phone data to do just that.

Jebara said that calls made from the same location from 9 to 5 are a good indication of where a person works; the frequency of email traffic to or from a person's work account is a good hint of his or her work ethic; dramatic changes to a person's electronic routine might suggest a promotion ? or a layoff.

"You can quickly figure out when somebody lost their job," Jebara said, adding: "Credit card companies have been interested in that for a while."

THEY'LL KNOW WHO'S THE BOSS

Drill down, and communication can reveal remarkably rich information. For example, does office worker A answer office worker B's missives within minutes of the message being sent? Does B often leave colleagues' emails unanswered for hours on end? If so, B probably stands for "boss."

That's an example of what Jebara's Columbia colleagues call "automated social hierarchy detection," a technique that can infer who gives the orders, who's respected and who's ignored based purely on whose emails get answered and how quickly. In 2007, they analyzed traffic from the Enron Corporation's email archive to correctly guess the seniority of several top-level managers.

Intelligence agencies may not need such tools to untangle corporate flowcharts, but identifying ringleaders becomes more important when tracking a suspected terrorist cell.

"If you piece together the chain of influence, then you can find the central authority," he said. "You can figure that out without looking at the content."

THEY'LL KNOW WHO YOU'RE TALKING TO

Seeing how networks of people communicate isn't just about finding your boss. It's about figuring out who your friends are.

Programs already exist to determine the density of communications ? something that can identify close groups of friends or family without even knowing who's who. If one user is identified as suspicious, then users closest to him or her might get a second look as well.

"Let's say we find out somebody in the U.K. is a terrorist," said Kane. "You know exactly who he talks to on almost every channel, so BOOM you know his 10 closest contacts. Knowing that information not only allows you to go to his house, but allows you to go to their houses as well."

A SNOOPER'S CHARTER?

Detective work at the stroke of a key is clearly attractive to spy agencies. British officialdom has been pushing for a mass surveillance program for years. But civil libertarians are perturbed, branding the proposal a "snooper's charter."

Kane says the surveillance regime has to be seen in the context of social networks such as Facebook and LinkedIn, where hundreds of millions of people are constantly volunteering information about themselves, their friends, their family and their colleagues.

"There's no sense in getting all Big Brother-ish," he said. "The bottom line is that we're all leaving digital trails, everywhere, all the time. The whole concept of privacy is shifting daily."

Associated Press

my sisters keeper kirby sarah palin muhammad ali cbi the shins atomic clock

US WCup qualifier at Guatemala on pay-per-view

By RONALD BLUM

AP Sports Writer

Associated Press Sports

updated 5:24 p.m. ET May 18, 2012

NEW YORK (AP) - The United States' World Cup qualifier at Guatemala on June 12 will be shown on pay-per-view over the objection of the U.S. Soccer Federation.

Traffic Sports USA purchased the rights from the Federacion Nacional de Futbol de Guatemala and announced an agreement Friday with Integrated Sports Media to distribute the match in the U.S.

It will have a suggested retail price of $29.95 and will be available on DIRECTV, DISH Network and Avail-TVN and iN Demand - which is available on systems of Time Warner Cable, Cablevision, Comcast, Charter, Frontier and COX.

FIFA gives home teams rights to World Cup qualifiers. The Americans' home qualifiers against Antigua and Barbuda on June 8 and Jamaica on Sept. 11 will be televised by ESPN2.

"The pay-per-view route is definitely not our preference," USSF spokesman Neil Buethe said.

In qualifying for the 2010 World Cup, eight matches on ESPN2 averaged 787,000 viewers and two matches on ESPN averaged 734,000.

Doug Jacobs, president of Integrated, estimated the number of buys for this game would be "many thousands" - a tiny fraction of the 1.5 million homes that bought the Floyd Mayweather-Miguel Cotto fight on May 5.

When the Americans clinched their sixth straight World Cup berth with a 3-2 win at Honduras in October 2009, the game was available in the U.S. only on closed circuit. Jacobs said ensuring wide distribution was not his company's responsibility.

"What's good for the sport, that's U.S Soccer's agenda," he said. "We're a private business. I'm a soccer fan, and the alternative was a lot worse. It could have been as it was in 2009, closed circuit. It's the lesser of two evils."

Traffic also owns the rights to the U.S. qualifiers at Jamaica on Sept. 7 and at Antigua on Oct. 12.

Last year, the 53 members of the Union of European Football Associations decided to pool their television rights for national team games starting after the 2014 World Cup.

"If we wanted to pool all the rights of the countries we could. This is done elsewhere," CONCACAF Acting Secretary General Ted Howard said. "Each country owns its own rights to their home broadcasts."

? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


advertisement

news 10 hillary rosen j.k. rowling j.k. rowling axl rose google earnings pat burrell

Outsourcing?Maintaining | Extraordinary Business | Aepiphanni ...

Outsourcing?Maintaining | Extraordinary Business

How to maintain highly profitable relationships with your outsourcing partners

Buyer's RemorseAnyone who has purchased anything in the past probably has experienced buyer?s remorse ? the sense of regret after making a purchase.? When working with your outsourcing partner, that is the last thing you want.? Therefore, you must set and manage expectations, and like you would with your employees, review their work, praise them for their accomplishments or take the appropriate action for not meeting your expectations.

Keep in mind ? your outsourced partners are to bring their expertise to your business to enable your businesses to achieve some success or factors of success that you could not achieve otherwise.? Therefore, it is your responsibility to ensure that they live up to it.? Here are five ways to ensure you are managing your partners appropriately.

  1. Managing Expectations ? you set your expectations before hiring your outsourced partner.? When you begin to ?let things slide? or have to make their problems your problems, you are beginning to lose hold of your outsourced partners.? Good outsourced partners won?t make their problems yours, and will ensure that whatever needs to be done is done consistently.? The more vague your expectations are, the more leeway there will be with your outsourcing partner.
  2. Regular review ? your outsourcing partner should be very interested in getting feedback from you.? If you provide them with feedback, and do so using the expectations list you?ve created, there will be no surprises.? By scheduling them regularly, perhaps quarterly, you will ensure that the regular reviews are done, and that your outsourcing partner is well engrained into your company and company culture.
  3. ?Praise and Pinch!? ? Like you and your company, companies benefit from recognition of great service.? It typically encourages more of the same or higher level of work or service.? At the same time, you need to be very clear about the areas that aren?t meeting your expectations and what you intend to do about it.? If you feel that the relationship must be terminated, do so.? You will probably find that avoiding ending the relationship will cause you greater stress and your business greater harm.
  4. Financial Review ? Your outsourced partner is a firm whose goal should be to help your business achieve some success or factors of success.? Therefore, you have to look at the return on your investment.? Certainly, some efforts take longer to present themselves financially, such as marketing or sweeping the parking lot.? However, part of the review would be to work out what the alternative might look like.? How NOT having that partner would impact your business, or how having a different partner would impact your business.
  5. Strategic Review ? Consider how long or what indicators exist that tell you how long the partner should be involved in your company.? Is it for a short term?project?? IOs it managing through growth stages?? Is it until your company has enough volume to hire your own person or team to take over for that outsourcing partner?? Understand where your company is in that dynamic and don?t end up so ?needy? that you cannot make the right decision at the right time.

Maintaining a strong relationship with an outsourcing partner should be taken no less lightly than you would take that of an employee.? As the company leadership, it is your responsibility to set your expectations, manage them and take the appropriate response as necessary.? When you don?t, you could ultimately hurt the entire company and all of its stakeholders.

Aepiphanni Business Consulting: The Business Strategy People?is an Atlanta, Georgia based Operations Management and Business Strategy Consulting Firm dedicated to serving the needs of small to medium sized business leaders. We help business leaders DESIGN| CREATE | BUILD extraordinary businesses.? We support our clients with financial management, product and service production and delivery, outsourced services management, sales & marketing and business growth.? We provide them with a number of flexible solutions to help them reach their goals.

Join us for a 30-minute complimentary Coffee & a Consult, to learn more about Aepiphanni and how we might help you move your company from existing to extraordinary.

childish gambino sandusky interview with bob costas sandusky interview with bob costas live oak mark kelly mark kelly jeff goldblum

Syria's Assad 'doomed,' says Israel's Barak

[ [ [['A picture is worth a thousand words', 5]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/why-facebook-bought-instagram-4-theories-160400376.html', '[Related: Why Facebook bought Instagram: 4 theories]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['He was in shock and still strapped to his seat', 9]], 'http://contributor.yahoo.com/join/yahoonews_virginiabeach', '[Did you witness the jet crash? Share your story with Yahoo! News]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['A JetBlue flight from New York to Las Vegas', 3]], 'http://yhoo.it/GV9zpj', '[Related: View photos of the JetBlue plane in Amarillo]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['Dick Clark', 11]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/dick-clark-dies-at-82-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/a/p/us/news/editorial/c/21/c217c61aa2d5872244c08caa13c16ec5.jpeg', '500', ' ', 'Reuters', ], [ [['the 28-year-old neighborhood watchman who shot and killed', 15]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/white-house-stays-out-of-teen-s-killing-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/cv/ip/ap/default/120411/martinzimmermen.jpg', '630', ' ', 'AP', ], [ [['Titanic', 7]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/titanic-anniversary/', ' ', 'http://l.yimg.com/a/p/us/news/editorial/b/4e/b4e5ad9f00b5dfeeec2226d53e173569.jpeg', '550', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['He was in shock and still strapped to his seat', 6]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/navy-jet-crashes-in-virginia-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/cv/ip/ap/default/120406/jet_ap.jpg', '630', ' ', 'AP', ], [ [['xxxxxxxxxxxx', 11]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/russian-grannies-win-bid-to-sing-at-eurovision-1331223625-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/a/p/us/news/editorial/1/56/156d92f2760dcd3e75bcd649a8b85fcf.jpeg', '500', ' ', 'AP', ] ]

[ [ [[' the 28-year-old neighborhood watchman who shot and killed', 4]], '28924649', '0' ], [ [['because I know God protects me', 14], ['Brian Snow was at a nearby credit union', 5]], '28811216', '0' ], [ [['The state news agency RIA-Novosti quoted Rosaviatsiya', 6]], '28805461', '0' ], [ [['measure all but certain to fail in the face of bipartisan', 4]], '28771014', '0' ], [ [['matter what you do in this case', 5]], '28759848', '0' ], [ [['presume laws are constitutional', 7]], '28747556', '0' ], [ [['has destroyed 15 to 25 houses', 7]], '28744868', '0' ], [ [['short answer is yes', 7]], '28746030', '0' ], [ [['opportunity to tell the real story', 7]], '28731764', '0' ], [ [['entirely respectable way to put off the searing constitutional controversy', 7]], '28723797', '0' ], [ [['point of my campaign is that big ideas matter', 9]], '28712293', '0' ], [ [['As the standoff dragged into a second day', 7]], '28687424', '0' ], [ [['French police stepped up the search', 17]], '28667224', '0' ], [ [['Seeking to elevate his candidacy back to a general', 8]], '28660934', '0' ], [ [['The tragic story of Trayvon Martin', 4]], '28647343', '0' ], [ [['Karzai will get a chance soon to express', 8]], '28630306', '0' ], [ [['powerful storms stretching', 8]], '28493546', '0' ], [ [['basic norm that death is private', 6]], '28413590', '0' ], [ [['songwriter also saw a surge in sales for her debut album', 6]], '28413590', '1', 'Watch music videos from Whitney Houston ', 'on Yahoo! Music', 'http://music.yahoo.com' ], [ [['keyword', 99999999999999999999999]], 'videoID', '1', 'overwrite-pre-description', 'overwrite-link-string', 'overwrite-link-url' ] ]

the heart attack grill joe kennedy iii joseph kennedy iii ghost hunters lightsquared david lee honduras prison fire

International seminar on public debt management ? TalkVietnam

Experts from Thailand, India and international organizations gathered at a seminar on public debt management held in Hanoi on May 16 by the Ministry of Finance, the World Bank (WB), and International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Deputy Finance Minister Truong Chi Trung said the seminar provides participants with an overview of public debt management in the world, as well as its importance for national financial security.

Information at the seminar will include useful references to help the Government and localities improve the efficiency of public debt management.

Participants agreed that pubic debt management is a necessary tool to meet macroeconomic targets. Developing countries should share information about debt mobilization and refund, and consider the risks when making decisions on debt management.

Agencies for debt management and financial and monetary management should also share information about the Government?s demand for liquidity, both present and future.

Debt management agencies should timely report to the Government mounting debts, while monetary management agencies must inform financial management agencies about the impact of Government debts on monetary targets, participants proposed.

-->

madden 13 cover dalai lama tamera mowry slow jam the news madden cover obama slow jams the news metta world peace

Graphite enters different states of matter in ultrafast experiment

[ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 16-May-2012
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Anne Stark
stark8@llnl.gov
925-422-9799
DOE/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

For the first time, scientists have seen an X-ray-irradiated mineral go to two different states of matter in about 40 femtoseconds (a femtosecond is one quadrillionth of a second).

Using the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) X-ray Free-Electron Laser (XFEL) at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford, Stefan Hau-Riege of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and colleagues heated graphite to induce a transition from solid to liquid and to warm-dense plasma.

Ultrafast phase transitions from solid to liquid and plasma states are important in the development of new material-synthesis techniques, in ultrafast imaging, and high-energy density science.

By using different pulse lengths and calculating different spectra, the team was able to extract the time dependence of plasma parameters, such as electron and ion temperatures and ionization states.

"We found that the heating and disintegration of the ion lattice occurs much faster than anticipated," Hau-Riege said.

The research provides new insights into the behavior of matter irradiated by intense hard X-rays. Though the study ultimately serves as a breakthrough in plasma physics and ultrafast materials science, it also affects other fields such as single molecule biological imaging and X-ray optics.

For single-molecule bioimaging, the team found that in certain cases it may be substantially more difficult than anticipated because energy transfer is surprisingly fast. In X-ray optics, they found that the damage threshold is lower than anticipated.

This is the first XFEL high-energy density science experiment that used inelastic X-ray scattering as a plasma diagnostic.

The research appears in the May 15 edition Physical Review Letters.

###

Other Livermore researchers include Alexander Graf, Tilo Dppner, Rich London, Carsten Formann, Siegfried Glenzer, Matthias Frank and John Bradley.

Other institutions include SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory; Universitt Duisburg-Essen; Max Planck Advanced Study Group, Center for Free Electron Laser Science; Max Planck Institut fr medizinische Forschung; and Max Planck Institut fr Kernphysik, all of Germany.

Founded in 1952, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (www.llnl.gov) provides solutions to our nation's most important national security challenges through innovative science, engineering and technology. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is managed by Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

?


AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 16-May-2012
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Anne Stark
stark8@llnl.gov
925-422-9799
DOE/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

For the first time, scientists have seen an X-ray-irradiated mineral go to two different states of matter in about 40 femtoseconds (a femtosecond is one quadrillionth of a second).

Using the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) X-ray Free-Electron Laser (XFEL) at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford, Stefan Hau-Riege of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and colleagues heated graphite to induce a transition from solid to liquid and to warm-dense plasma.

Ultrafast phase transitions from solid to liquid and plasma states are important in the development of new material-synthesis techniques, in ultrafast imaging, and high-energy density science.

By using different pulse lengths and calculating different spectra, the team was able to extract the time dependence of plasma parameters, such as electron and ion temperatures and ionization states.

"We found that the heating and disintegration of the ion lattice occurs much faster than anticipated," Hau-Riege said.

The research provides new insights into the behavior of matter irradiated by intense hard X-rays. Though the study ultimately serves as a breakthrough in plasma physics and ultrafast materials science, it also affects other fields such as single molecule biological imaging and X-ray optics.

For single-molecule bioimaging, the team found that in certain cases it may be substantially more difficult than anticipated because energy transfer is surprisingly fast. In X-ray optics, they found that the damage threshold is lower than anticipated.

This is the first XFEL high-energy density science experiment that used inelastic X-ray scattering as a plasma diagnostic.

The research appears in the May 15 edition Physical Review Letters.

###

Other Livermore researchers include Alexander Graf, Tilo Dppner, Rich London, Carsten Formann, Siegfried Glenzer, Matthias Frank and John Bradley.

Other institutions include SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory; Universitt Duisburg-Essen; Max Planck Advanced Study Group, Center for Free Electron Laser Science; Max Planck Institut fr medizinische Forschung; and Max Planck Institut fr Kernphysik, all of Germany.

Founded in 1952, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (www.llnl.gov) provides solutions to our nation's most important national security challenges through innovative science, engineering and technology. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is managed by Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

?


AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


stan van gundy navy jet crash virginia beach crash kellie pickler stephen hawking marion barry virginia beach jet crash

London 2012: Natasha Jonas seals Olympics spot by beating Ingrid Egner

Natasha Jonas

Natasha Jonas has booked her place at London 2012. Photograph: Tom Jenkins

The British boxers Natasha Jonas and Nicola Adams have sealed their places at London 2012 with victories at the World Amateur Championships in China.

Jonas defeated Norway's Ingrid Egner 23-9 in her lightweight quarter-final bout, meeting the qualification criteria.

Adams, a Guardian Olympic diarist, secured a closely fought win over the multiple world champion Mary Kom of India.

Jonas said: "To know that I'm going to be going out in front of 10,000 people and they're all going to be cheering for me for a change is just unreal. I just can't wait to get onto that stage and show everybody what women's boxing is all about."

Ireland's Katie Taylor also booked her place in London, and did so without throwing a punch when her Romanian opponent Mihaela Lacatus withdrew with a neck injury.

"It's a dream come true, I just can't believe it really," she said. "It's just years and years of hard work really to get here, now I'm going to be an Olympian."

david letterman march of dimes james randi wargames blake griffin dunk florida primary full force