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The U.S. Department of Justice has gone far beyond Google, MSN, and AOL in its quest to justify the anti-pornography Child Online Protection Act: The DOJ actually subpoenaed at least 34 Internet service providers, search companies, and security software firms. InformationWeek obtained copies of the subpoenas, replies, and other supporting documents through a Freedom of Information Act request. (You can download the subpoenas here at Information Week)

Unmanned aerial vehicles have soared the skies of Afghanistan and Iraq for years, spotting enemy encampments, protecting military bases, and even launching missile attacks against suspected terrorists. Now UAVs may be landing in the United States. A House of Representatives panel on Wednesday heard testimony from police agencies that envision using UAVs for everything from border security to domestic surveillance high above American cities. Private companies also hope to use UAVs for tasks such as aerial photography and pipeline monitoring. "We need additional technology to supplement manned aircraft surveillance and current ground assets to ensure more effective monitoring of United...

From Anchorage it takes 90 minutes on a propeller plane to reach this fishing village on the state's southwestern edge, a place where some people still make raincoats out of walrus intestine. This is the Alaskan bush at its most remote. Here, tundra meets sea, and sea turns to ice for half the year. Scattered, almost hidden, in the terrain are some of the most isolated communities on American soil. People choose to live in outposts like Dillingham (pop. 2,400) for that reason: to be left alone. So eyebrows were raised in January when the first surveillance cameras went up...

New Yorkers, get ready for your closeup. The NYPD is installing 505 surveillance cameras around the city - and pushing to safeguard lower Manhattan with a "ring of steel" that could track hundreds of thousands of people and cars a day, authorities revealed yesterday. .. The NYPD also has applied for $81.5 million in federal aid to install surveillance cameras, computerized license plate readers and vehicle barriers around lower Manhattan, Kelly said. .. But don't expect the NYPD to install its cameras without battling the New York Civil Liberties Union. The watchdog group's associate legal director, Chris Dunn, questioned the...

Mayor Daley on Monday embraced a radical plan to require every licensed Chicago business open more than 12 hours a day to install indoor and outdoor cameras. "Block clubs, community organizations want cameras. ... They can't walk down the street. ... Their kids have to go around a corner away from the gang-bangers. You can't walk to church. You can't get on the CTA. ... Cameras really prevent much crime. Cameras also solve a lot of crime. The terrorist attacks in London were solved by cameras. The whole incident was solved by cameras," Daley said.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Pentagon has built a massive security database to help protect U.S. military bases and troops that includes unwarranted information on Iraq war opponents and peace activists in the United States, a defense official said on Wednesday. The official said the database included police reports and law enforcement tips in a legitimate domestic security effort, but that it had mistakenly swept up and kept information on people who were not threats to launch terror attacks. *snipped* Defense Undersecretary for Intelligence Stephen Cambone planned to send a letter to Congress explaining the error and promising to clean up...

Wired.com does not allow material to be posted which is a shame, because this is a great article, so you'll have to visit the site to read it (the link I put here will just take you back to FR). Admins, if this is still not okay, please lock it.

MIAMI - Miami police announced Monday they will stage random shows of force at hotels, banks and other public places to keep terrorists guessing and remind people to be vigilant. Deputy Police Chief Frank Fernandez said officers might, for example, surround a bank building, check the IDs of everyone going in and out and hand out leaflets about terror threats. "This is an in-your-face type of strategy. It's letting the terrorists know we are out there," Fernandez said.The operations will keep terrorists off guard, Fernandez said. He said al-Qaida and other terrorist groups plot attacks by putting places under surveillance...

WEST PALM BEACH — Police are rolling out surveillance cameras downtown and in the city's most violent neighborhoods, the first step in an ambitious plan to make West Palm Beach the most closely monitored city in South Florida.In the next month, four cameras are expected to be placed along Clematis Street and in troubled neighborhoods on the city's north side. Able to rotate 360 degrees and read a license plate a half-mile away, they will roll 24 hours a day and can be programmed to zoom in at the sound of gunfire. West Palm Beach police will test the first...

If you drive in metropolitan Baltimore and use a cellular phone, somebody might be "watching" as you come and go. A Canadian company is monitoring the flow of vehicle traffic in the area by using an emerging technology that tracks the constant stream of data generated by drivers' cell phones as they communicate with towers in the network. Advertisement Maryland highway officials are excited. They plan to use the technology to help traffic move more smoothly. But privacy advocates worry that the system could lead to bigger headaches than a Beltway backup. ...But Kevin Bankston, staff attorney for the Electronic...

NASA administrator says space shuttle was a mistake - actual link to article - Source URL points to Slashdot where I first came across it.

LONDON (AP) - Foreigners who preach hatred, sponsor violence or belong to extremist groups could be deported from Britain under strict new measures that Prime Minister Tony Blair announced Friday, nearly a month after suicide bombers killed 52 people on London's transit system. Membership in extremist Islamic groups such as Hizb-ut-Tahrir would become a crime under the new measures. The group, which advocates the creation of an Islamic state in Central Asia, already is outlawed in several countries. Blair said the government also would compile a list of Web sites, bookshops and centers that incite hatred and violence. British nationals...

British Transport Police have been targeting specific ethnic groups for "intelligence-led" stop-and-searches as part of their heightened security measures. BTP Chief Constable Ian Johnston said that his officers would not "waste time searching old white ladies".

I have a friend who works with a Texas state agency that deals with missing people. To say they are frustrated by the amount of coverage Natalee Holloway, the runaway fiancee, Laci Peterson, etc., generate, while the families they work with are ignored by the MSM, would be an understatement. To quote her (she does read and post on FR, however she has deliberately refrained from participating in these missing persons discussions since it's close to her job): I can survey 20 people on the street, about a missing teen from Alabama, and many will immediately name Natalee Holloway. If...

For more than a half-century, the Gore family and its Western Seafood Co. have been a landmark on Freeport's waterfront, a key stop for hundreds of shrimp boats along Texas' Gulf Coast. But that could soon change if city officials get their wish to let a Dallas entepreneur build an $8 million marina in its place. Family members say the case has eerie similarities to a Connecticut case at the heart of a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision. The court ruled that cities have the right to seize private property through eminient domain for private development. On Tuesday, Wright Gore...

As some of you know, Penn & Tell have a show, on Showtime, called, well we'll just call it BS!. Tonight's episode is about gun control. 10PM eastern on Showtime (repeats at various times over the next week). From the video preview, Penn: a .44 slug in the brain stops rape in an instant. That sets the tone for the show. Make sure the kids aren't around, the language is R-Rated.

Starting three years from now, if you live or work in the United States, you'll need a federally approved ID card to travel on an airplane, open a bank account, collect Social Security payments, or take advantage of nearly any government service. Practically speaking, your driver's license likely will have to be reissued to meet federal standards. The Real ID Act hands the Department of Homeland Security the power to set these standards and determine whether state drivers' licenses and other ID cards pass muster. Only ID cards approved by Homeland Security can be accepted "for any official purpose" by...

A fight by homeowners to save their New London, Connecticut, neighborhood from city officials and private developers -- an important property rights case with an unusual twist -- will reach the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday. At issue is whether governments can forcibly seize homes and businesses, for private economic development.... ......Legal analysts said they see the case as having major implications nationwide in property rights and redevelopment issues.

Tagline of the movie: When a country descended into madness And the world closed its eyes He opened his arms And created a place Where hope could survive

For every American soldier killed in Iraq, nine others have been wounded and survived -- the highest rate of any war in U.S. history. It isn't that their injuries were less serious, a new report says. In fact, many young soldiers have had faces, arms and legs blown off and are now returning home badly maimed. But they have survived thanks to armor-like vests and fast treatment from doctors on the move with surgical kits in backpacks. Today in Iraq, real-life Hawkeyes and B.J. Hunnicuts have stripped trauma surgery to its most basic level, carrying "mini-hospitals" in six Humvees and...