Favorite Harris Corp.’s Stingray surveillance device has been one of the most closely guarded secrets in law enforcement for more than 15 years. The company and its police clients across the United States have fought to keep information about the mobile phone-monitoring boxes from the public against which they are used. The Intercept has obtained several Harris instruction manuals spanning roughly 200 pages and…
All posts tagged Mashable
A Famed Hacker Is Grading Thousands of Programs — and May Revolutionize Software in the Process
Favorite At the Black Hat cybersecurity conference in 2014, industry luminary Dan Geer, fed up with the prevalence of vulnerabilities in digital code, made a modest proposal: Software companies should either make their products open source so buyers can see what they’re getting and tweak what they don’t like, or suffer the consequences if their software failed. He likened it to…
GPS Tracking Devices Catch Major U.S. Recyclers Exporting Toxic E-Waste
Favorite A two-year investigation of electronics recycling using GPS tracking devices has revealed that policies aimed at curtailing the trade in toxic e-waste have been unsuccessful, with nearly one third of the devices being exported to developing countries, where equipment is often dismantled in low-tech workshops — often by children — endangering workers, their families, and…
For Putin’s Censors, Only Suicide Is Worse Than Homosexuality
Favorite IT IS THE OPINION of Russian censors that there is something worse than homosexuality, and that is suicide. The law “On Protecting Children From Information Harmful to Their Health and Development” bans the propaganda of suicide to anyone under 18. A September 2013 order from Roskomnadzor, the communications authority, explains what that means: “any…
The Horror Story of Publishing Children’s Books in Russia
Favorite I WALK IN ON a minor crisis at Samokat, a children’s publishing house in Moscow. The commercial director, Gleb Kochnev, is telling the editor-in-chief, Irina Balakhonova, that there is a problem in a book they have just published. The book is called Say Hi to Me, it is a primer on refugees for elementary school children,…
Bernie Sanders Gets Group Endorsements When Members Decide; Hillary Clinton When Leaders Decide
Favorite In the war for endorsements in the Democratic presidential primary, there is a clear trend. Every major union or progressive organization that let its members have a vote endorsed Bernie Sanders. Meanwhile, all of Hillary Clinton’s major group endorsements come from organizations where the leaders decide. And several of those endorsements were accompanied by…
Howard Dean Says He’s Not a Lobbyist But He Sure Acts Like One
Favorite Last week, we reported that Howard Dean, former presidential candidate and current supporter of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, had attacked Bernie Sanders for supporting a single-payer health plan, claiming that having the government pay for everyone’s health care would “undo people’s health care” and result in “chaos.” In our story, we noted that Dean,…
Navy SEAL Turns Over Picture of Bin Laden’s Body, Faces Investigation of Business Ties
Favorite A FORMER NAVY SEAL who shot Osama bin Laden and wrote a bestselling book about the raid is now the subject of a widening federal criminal investigation into whether he used his position as an elite commando for personal profit while on active duty, according to two people familiar with the case. Matthew Bissonnette,…
“13 Hours” Splashes Blood Across the Screen and Misses Real Story of Benghazi
Favorite WOULD YOU GIVE the story of Benghazi to the producer of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? Someone did. The result is the new film directed by Michael Bay, 13 Hours, which makes Rambo look like War and Peace. In 13 Hours, Bay displays a fetish for fake blood and heads that explode like watermelons when waves…
Howard Dean, Now Employed by Health Care Lobby Firm, Opposes Bernie Sanders on Single-Payer
Favorite Howard Dean is the latest in a string of Hillary Clinton supporters to charge that Bernie Sanders is wrong to support a single-payer health care plan. The former chairman of the Democratic National Committee claimed on MSNBC last night that Sanders’ reform might result in “chaos” because “trying to implement it would in fact undo people’s…