Tag: government

Kim Dotcom Wins Case Against NZ Police To Get Seized Material Back

New submitter Mistakill writes “It seems the case against Kim Dotcom for the NZ Police isn’t going well, with Kim Dotcom scoring another victory in his legal battles. Police have been told they must search everything they seized from Dotcom and hand back what is not relevant to the U.S. extradition claims. Justice Helen Winkelmann told police their complaints about the cost and time of the exercise were effectively their own fault for indiscriminately seizing material in the first place. She wrote, ‘The warrants could not authorize the permanent seizure of hard drives and digital materials against the possibility that they might contain relevant material, with no obligation to check them for relevance. They could not authorize the shipping offshore of those hard drives with no check to see if they contained relevant material. Nor could they authorize keeping the plaintiffs out of their own information, including information irrelevant to the offenses.'” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Kim Dotcom Wins Case Against NZ Police To Get Seized Material Back

Tesla Motors Repays $465M Government Loan 9 Years Early

Tesla Motors announced today it has completely repaid the $465 million loan from the U.S. Department of Energy the company received in 2010. The funds were generated by Tesla through a recent sale of their stock, worth close to a billion dollars. The stock price had risen sharply after the company reported its first profitable quarter (and the stock still sits roughly 50% higher than before their earnings release). Today’s payment of $451.8 million finished off both the loan’s principal and its interest, nine years before the final payment was due. Tesla CEO Elon Musk said, ‘I would like to thank the Department of Energy and the members of Congress and their staffs that worked hard to create the ATVM program, and particularly the American taxpayer from whom these funds originate. I hope we did you proud.’ Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Tesla Motors Repays $465M Government Loan 9 Years Early

Power utilities claim ‘daily’ and ‘constant’ cyberattacks, says report

U.S. Congressmen Ed Markey and Henry Waxman pen a report outlining the increased hacks on power grid computer systems, saying that one utility receives about 10,000 attempted cyberattacks per month. [Read more]        

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Power utilities claim ‘daily’ and ‘constant’ cyberattacks, says report

Medical Firm Sues IRS For 4th Amendment Violation In Records Seizure

cold fjord writes “A healthcare provider has sued the Internal Revenue Service and 15 of its agents, charging they wrongfully seized 60 million medical records from 10 million Americans … [The unnamed company alleges] the agency violated the Fourth Amendment in 2011, when agents executed a search warrant for financial data on one employee – and that led to the seizure of information on 10 million, including state judges. The search warrant did not specify that the IRS could take medical information, UPI said. And information technology officials warned the IRS about the potential to violate medical privacy laws before agents executed the warrant, the complaint said.” Also at Nextgov.com. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Medical Firm Sues IRS For 4th Amendment Violation In Records Seizure

US Government Monitoring Associated Press Phone Records

Picass0 writes with distressing news from the AP wire, about the AP: “The Justice Department secretly obtained two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated Press in what the news cooperative’s top executive called a ‘massive and unprecedented intrusion’ into how news organizations gather the news.” They obtained call records from a number of desk phones, and the personal phones of many news editors. The DOJ has not commented, but it may be related to the possibility that the CIA director leaked information on a foiled terror plot in Yemen last year. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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US Government Monitoring Associated Press Phone Records

Apple deluged by police demands to decrypt iPhones

ATF says no law enforcement agency could unlock a defendant’s iPhone, but Apple can “bypass the security software” if it chooses. Apple has created a police waiting list because of high demand. [Read more]        

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Apple deluged by police demands to decrypt iPhones

US DOJ Say They Don’t Need Warrants For E-Mail, Chats

gannebraemorr writes “The U.S. Department of Justice and the FBI believe they don’t need a search warrant to review Americans’ e-mails, Facebook chats, Twitter direct messages, and other private files, internal documents reveal. Government documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union and provided to CNET show a split over electronic privacy rights within the Obama administration, with Justice Department prosecutors and investigators privately insisting they’re not legally required to obtain search warrants for e-mail.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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US DOJ Say They Don’t Need Warrants For E-Mail, Chats

India Rolls Out Central Monitoring System To Snoop On All Communications

hypnosec tipped us to news that India is rolling out a new intrusive monitoring system, using the authority of a 2000 telecom law. Quoting The Times of India: “However, Pavan Duggal, a Supreme Court advocate specialising in cyberlaw, said the government has given itself unprecedented powers to monitor private Internet records of citizens. ‘This system is capable of abuse,’ he said. The Central Monitoring System, being set up by the Centre for Development of Telematics, plugs into telecom gear and gives central and state investigative agencies a single point of access to call records, text messages, and emails as well as the geographical location of individuals.” Privacy advocates are worried about abuse, partially because India has no effective privacy legislation, and the “…Indian government under PM Manmohan Singh has taken an increasingly uncompromising stance when it comes to online freedoms, with the stated aim usually to preserve social order and national security or fight ‘harmful’ defamation.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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India Rolls Out Central Monitoring System To Snoop On All Communications

BT Begins Customer Tests of Carrier Grade NAT

judgecorp writes “BT Retail has started testing Carrier Grade NAT (CGNAT) with its customer. CGNAT is a controversial practice, in which IP addresses are shared between customers, limiting what customers can do on the open Internet. Although CGNAT goes against the Internet’s original end-to-end principles, ISPs say they are forced to use it because IPv4 addresses are running out, and IPv6 is not widely implemented. BT’s subsidiary PlusNet has already carried out CGNAT trials, and now BT is trying it on “Option 1″ customers who pay for low Internet usage.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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BT Begins Customer Tests of Carrier Grade NAT

Chinese Hackers Infiltrate US Army Database, Compromise Safety of Dams

coolnumbr12 writes “Chinese hackers have infiltrated a sensitive U.S. Army database that contains information about the vulnerabilities of thousands of dams located throughout the United States. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ National Inventory of Dams (NID) has raised concerns that information gathered in the hack could help China carry out a cyber-attack on the national electrical power grid.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Chinese Hackers Infiltrate US Army Database, Compromise Safety of Dams