for life and liberty

The NSA Is Hiring! And Following A Pittsburgh Car Dealership On Its Twitter Account?

"The NSA's hiring arm has a Twitter account, NSACareers. This account tweets new job listings and pro-NSA news into the void, gathering more derision than potential hires in its pursuit of people skilled in the art of data wrangling but completely devoid of a conscience or soul. Could this be you? Are you the sort of 'informaticist' who can swiftly extract needles from haystacks to help prevent the next terrorist attack? Failing that, can you swiftly extract victory from the jaws of defeat and say, 'Tough luck on the recent bombing, but we'll get the next one, I promise?' If so, your country needs your informaticizing skills NOW." Continue reading →

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California Court Overturns ‘Overly Lenient’ LAPD Vehicle Impound Policy

"Superior Court Judge Terry Green sided with groups that challenged the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) for inventing a confiscation procedure that differed from procedures laid down by California state lawmakers. Proponents of car confiscation contend that the LAPD guidelines are an end-run around a law clearly ordering thirty-day impoundment of vehicles from drivers with expired or non-existent licenses. Confiscation is big business for the city. Towing and storage can run $1100 per vehicle, and with hundreds of thousands seized every year, the revenue generated reaches into the tens of millions." Continue reading →

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The Enemy of the NSA is My Friend

"My company was invited to present a new technology to 800 people at the July New York Tech Meetup. We showed off a self service kiosk that can save digital copies of house and apartment keys and then reproduce the physical keys when someone loses them or gets locked out. After our demonstration, one audience member asked if it would be used by the NSA to spy on people. My coworker told him not to worry because our CTO is an anarchist, which resulted in a round of applause. At the time, it was surprising how much credibility being an anarchist brought in that context. Yet, in retrospect it should have been obvious." Continue reading →

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9 things you should know about Bitcoins

"There are a number of places where you can spend Bitcoins. If you're a user of Wordpress or popular websites like Reddit, 4Chan, The Pirate Bay, EZTV and The Internet Archive, you can use Bitcoins to make donations. If you're into online storage, you can upgrade the 50GB free storage that Kim Dotcom's Mega.co.nz offers with Bitcoins. If you like trying your luck, you can try Bitcoin gambling at places like www.satoshibet.com and www.bc-casino. com. And just a little bit of digging will even throw up shopping websites like www.somethinggeeky.com that accept Bitcoin payments." Continue reading →

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15 reasons why Bitcoins are better than gold

"Technology is literally at the point where it is disrupting almost everything and this week has been a prime example of this trend. On the one hand Google co-founder Sergey Brin was revealed as the investor behind growing synthetic meat in a lab in order to disrupt the cattle business and Elon Musk proved he can disrupt the auto market with his successful launch of Tesla Motors and the recent public acceptance of his company’s vehicles which surpassed analyst estimates. Can you disrupt a commodity though? After some consideration I would assert you can and this post will explore the top reasons why Bitcoins are better than gold." Continue reading →

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Reserve Bank of India won’t regulate virtual currency Bitcoin, yet

"India's central bank is 'watching' Bitcoin, the virtual currency that is gaining popularity among Net users, but has no intention of regulating it right now. The Reserve Bank of India, which has its hands full trying to arrest the slump in the value of the rupee, will first seek to understand Bitcoins before seeking to bring it under its purview. 'As of now we are watching and learning about the developments in Bitcoins but are not regulating it,' an RBI spokeswoman wrote in an e-mailed response. In a note published in June, the central bank acknowledged that virtual currencies 'pose challenges in the form of regulatory, legal and operational risks.'" Continue reading →

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Bitcoin Comes Under Full Scale Attack by Regulators

"Cryptocurrencies are threatening because no central entity can fully control them and they also represent a nearly free and anonymous payment application. It's an algorithm that has the potential to make central banks, commercial banks, private banks, and the tax collectors obsolete. In other words, cryptocoins may be epoch changing for society. In the same way the Internet killed publishing or how VoIP killed long distance telephone carriers, cryptocoins may in fact kill debt-based money and brick-and-mortar banking. The banking cartel along with the government are scrambling to protect their territory and regulate Bitcoin." Continue reading →

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NPR: Lawmakers, Banking Regulators Take On Bitcoin

"CORNISH: How significant is New York's move to launch an investigation, to issue these subpoenas? BRITO: So it's interesting, people hear the word subpoena and they think something bad, right? But all the word subpoena means is that it is a request for information, right? And you're compelled to, you know, produce, you know, you're asked questions and you have to answer them. And I think that's very good. [..] So when I see New York issuing these subpoenas, being very transparent about the fact that they're going to be looking at this and asking for input, you know, I think that's very good." Continue reading →

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U.S. Sentencing Commission expected to recommend lower sentences for drug dealing

"Prison terms for all federal drug dealing offences could be cut under a sweeping sentencing review expected to be announced on Thursday that may go much further than the tentative steps toward ending America’s 'war on drugs', begun this week by attorney general Eric Holder. The US Sentencing Commission, the independent government agency responsible for setting guidelines for judges, will meet in Washington to consider amending the 'drug quantity table' – the grid that determines prison lengths for dozens of different categories of offence. The impetus for the new push to cut sentences appears to have been driven primarily by a need to cut soaring government costs." Continue reading →

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