Free Republic

The FR site is VERY slow and herky jerky today. Can I expect it will be shut down altogether tomorrow? Or, maybe tonight?

How do we explain the current sorry spectacle of a highly intelligent president who repeatedly makes bad choices and decisions? Make no mistake about it – President Obama has done just that. Ever pause and wonder how ostensibly perspicacious individuals can show remarkable errors in judgment? History is filled with people like this, proving repeatedly intelligence is no guarantee of good judgment and decision-making. Why? In the 1980s, American aerodynamicists faced a conundrum: How did the USSR, using comparatively rudimentary computers and without CAD/CAM, nonetheless closely match America's best fighter designs? The answer, not immediately obvious, was that Soviet programmers...

A court threw out child porn charges against a Muslim cleric targeted as a terrorist by Canadian authorities, ruling purported evidence was gathered illegally. In 2007, Brampton, Ontario, cleric Ayad Mejid, targeted by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service as a suspected supporter of terrorism, sent his laptop to the spy service to prove his innocence, The Globe and Mail reported. Intelligence officials searching the computer without a warrant then forwarded the laptop to Toronto Police detectives who arrested Mejid, alleging they found child pornography images, the newspaper said Wednesday. The night before Thursday's trial, Superior Judge Jane Kelly threw out...

Yesterday, some T-Mobile stores began selling its newest mobile device, the G2, an Android-based smart phone originally slated for an October 6 release while AT&T is slated to release it later in the year. This device truly is representative of the next generation of mobile devices. The hardware capabilities surpass the abilities of most available netbook computers, including the ability to play High Definition video seamlessly. Unfortunately, the G2 also comes with built-in hardware that restricts what software a device owner might wish to install.Specifically, one of the microchips embedded into the G2 prevents device owners from making permanent changes...

A baby-faced band of "money mules" helped an Eastern European hackerring transfer $3 million in cash it pilfered from American bank accounts, federal prosecutors in New York said yesterday. The group, including several women who are college co-eds here on student visas, was allegedly tasked with opening hundreds of bank accounts used to receive the stolen funds.

Authorities have charged more than 60 people worldwide in connection with a global cybercrime scheme that relied on Internet viruses to steal millions of dollars from U.S. bank accounts, the FBI said.

A new photonic chip that works on light rather than electricity has been built by an international research team, paving the way for the production of ultra-fast quantum computers with capabilities far beyond today’s devices. Future quantum computers will, for example, be able to pull important information out of the biggest databases almost instantaneously. As the amount of electronic data stored worldwide grows exponentially, the technology will make it easier for people to search with precision for what they want. EDITOR’S CHOICE Making sense of a ‘nonsensical world’ - Sep-16 Fears over computers’ impact on lives - Sep-14 Brain scan...

I am tired of fighting with MA Bell and I am activly looking for a new Internet Service Provider. Currently I have a bundled DSL and a land line (which I do not use). My cost each month is about $60 when I get a valid bill. My service is currently disconnected and is slated to be turned back on in 3 to 4 days. I have already waited one day. When my service is working, I have two 'hard wired' PCs and two WiFi devices. Does anyone have any good suggestions on who to turn to for better service?

I just started getting notices from my email service for failure to deliver mail I didn't send; to addresses I dont recognize and apparently (according to Yahoo mail) dont exist. Is this a scam? All the addresses that are reportedly non existant are to Yahoo email addresses. Any Ideas appreciated!

I have 2 computers and one laptop hooked up to Verizon DSL via my Westell 327 router. I am using XP Pro.

http://www.techeye.net/science/wired-chinese-and-japanese-kids-forget-how-to-write Wired Chinese and Japanese kids forget how to write Can you blame them? 27 Aug 2010 11:35 | by Nick Farrell | posted in Science Wired Chinese and Japanese kids forget how to write - Writing Chinese and Japanese is a particularly difficult skill and since computers came along it is fast becoming something that kids are forgetting. Sure they can read and write their language on a computer, but according to BreitBart when they pick up a pen they have forgotten how to do it. Dubbed "character amnesia", the problem is becoming widespread across China, and some are...

I have an HP Laserjet4P printer that I connect to my Dell Vostro 1320 laptop via a parallel-to-USB cable. If I plug this cable into three of my four USB ports, I cannot print. I see, in my printer queue, the document, plus the remark "use printer offline." Only when I plug into the fourth USB port do I succeed in printing. When I do so, the "use printer offline" message disappears, the printer light blinks and prints and the queue entry disappears. What is going on? Thanks.

  154 lives were lost when Spanair Flight 5022 crashed moments after taking off from Madrid-Barajas International Airport in 2008. Now documents from an investigation into the incident are showing that a malware infection may have been to blame.According to the investigation, the computer system used to monitor technical problems on the plane was infected with a trojan. As a result, there were no alerts or warnings for three technical issues which "if detected, may have prevented the plane from taking off."The investigation is still not complete and authorities are trying to determine just how the malware got onto the...

Initially hailed as a solution to the biggest question in computer science, the latest attempt to prove P ≠ NP – otherwise known as the "P vs NP" problem – seems to be running into trouble. Two prominent computer scientists have pointed out potentially "fatal flaws" in the draft proof by Vinay Deolalikar of Hewlett-Packard Labs in Palo Alto, California. Since the 100-page proof exploded onto the internet a week ago, mathematicians and computer scientists have been racing to make sense of it. The problem concerns the speed at which a computer can accomplish a task such as factorising a...

SNIPPET: "Thousands of online banking customers have had their accounts drained by a sophisticated new computer virus, internet security experts say. Around £675,000 was taken from a "large UK financial institution" over the last month with 3,000 customers hit - and the attacks are ongoing. Online security firm M86 Security Labs said the customers were infected with a Trojan virus - which cannot be detected by traditional anti-virus software - while browsing the internet. The Trojan, known as a Zeus v3, copies the passwords and usernames of customers' online details and transfers their funds to a different account. It then...

NOTE The following text SNIPPET is a quote: International Hacker Arraigned After Extradition Elaborate Scheme Stole over $9.4 Million from Credit Card Processor ATLANTA, GA—SERGEI TŠURIKOV, 26, of Tallinn, Estonia, has been extradited to the United States. TŠURIKOV appeared today and was arraigned before United States Magistrate Judge E. Clayton Scofield III, on federal charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit computer fraud, computer fraud, and aggravated identity theft. TŠURIKOV was indicted by a federal grand jury on these charges on November 10, 2010, along with VIKTOR PLESHCHUK, 29, of St. Petersburg, Russia; OLEG COVELIN,...

Just a link. I think per the rules.

I was out running errands the other day and there was a weird picture laying on the printer when I got back. Can a virus do this or do I have a teenager who's possibly up to no good?

Investigators have found concrete evidence on computers used by Pfc. Bradley Manning that link him with the leak of classified Afghanistan war reports, a U.S. defense official said. The disclosure came as Defense Secretary Robert Gates pledged Thursday to "aggressively investigate the leak" and find ways to prevent further breaches, and told reporters that he had invited the Federal Bureau of Investigation to assist the probe. Defense officials said the FBI was investigating whether civilians aided Pfc. Manning in providing the information to WikiLeaks, a Web-based group that this week released 76,000 secret reports from Afghanistan. Pfc. Manning already was...

The Indian government has unveiled the prototype of an iPad-like touch-screen laptop, with a price tag of $35 (£23), which it hopes to roll out next year. Aimed at students, the tablet supports web browsing, video conferencing and word processing, say developers. Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal said a manufacturer was being sought for the gadget, which was developed by India's top IT colleges. An earlier cheap laptop plan by the same ministry came to nothing. The device unveiled on Thursday has no hard disk, using a memory card instead, like a mobile phone, and can run on solar...