Man Hacks 911 System, Sends SWAT on Bogus Raid

Posted by Zonk on Wednesday October 17, @03:33PM
from the word-dumb-doesn't-cover-it dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The Orange County Register reports that a 19 year old from Washington state broke into the Orange County California 911 emergency system. He randomly selected the name and address of a Lake Forest, California couple and electronically transferred false information into the 911 system. The Orange County California Sheriff's Department's Special Weapons and Tactics Team was immediately sent to the home of a couple with two sleeping toddlers. The SWAT team handcuffed the husband and wife before deciding it was a prank. Says the article, 'Other law enforcement agencies have seen similar breaches into their 911 systems as part of a trend picked up by computer hackers in the nation called "SWATting"'"

[+] security, court, swat, donttasemebro, !funny (tagging beta)

Bill Introduced to Congress Would Allow ID Theft Restitution

Posted by Zonk on Wednesday October 17, @02:11PM
from the an-increasingly-common-problem dept.

verybadradio writes with an article at News.com about a bill introduced into Congress that would allow citizens who have been victimized by identity theft to seek repayment for the money and time spent repairing their credit history. The bill was introduced by Democrat Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Republican Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania. "Last year, 8.4 million Americans were victims of identity theft, and many were left with a bad credit report, which takes months or years to repair, the lawmakers said ... The bill would also eliminate a requirement that the loss resulting from damage to a victim's computer must exceed $5,000 for prosecution; make it a felony to use spyware or keyloggers to damage 10 or more computers; and expand the definition of cybercrime to include extortion schemes that threaten to damage or access confidential information on a computer."

[+] privacy, politics, usa, goodnews, squeezingbloodoutofaturnip (tagging beta)

'Bionic' Nerve To Repair Damaged Limbs and Organs

Journal written by stemceller (975823) and posted by samzenpus on Thursday October 18, @02:29AM
from the we-will-rebuild-him dept.

University of Manchester researchers have transformed fat tissue stem cells into nerve cells -- and now plan to develop an artificial nerve that will bring damaged limbs and organs back to life. In a study published in October's Experimental Neurology, Dr Paul Kingham and his team at the UK Centre for Tissue Regeneration (UKCTR) isolated the stem cells from the fat tissue of adult animals and differentiated them into nerve cells to be used for repair and regeneration of injured nerves. They are now about to start a trial extracting stem cells from fat tissue of volunteer adult patients, in order to compare in the laboratory human and animal stem cells.

[+] biotech (tagging beta)

Spam Hits 95% of All Email

Posted by CmdrTaco on Wednesday October 17, @08:45AM
from the thats-just-depressing dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Commtouch released its Email Threats Trend Report based on the automated analysis of billions of email messages weekly. The report examines the appearance of new kinds of attachment spam such as PDF spam and Excel spam together with the decline of image spam, as well as the growing threat of innocent appearing spam containing links to malicious web sites. Image spam declined to a level of less than 5% of all spam, down from 30% in the first quarter of 2007; also, image pump-and-dump spam has all but disappeared, with pornographic images taking its place."

[+] security, spam (tagging beta)

Geek and Gadgets Set Cross-US Speed Record

Posted by kdawson on Wednesday October 17, @02:13AM
from the breaker-breaker-need-a-bear-check dept.

Brikus writes "And you thought your car had gadgets. In this story from Wired magazine, we hear about Alex Roy and his quest to break the record time for a cross-USA road trip. One of the biggest roadblocks to breaking the record: highway patrol officers, about 31,000 along the way. So Roy decked out his E39 BMW M5 with a thermal camera, radar/laser detectors, GPS devices, police scanners, and other high-tech gadgets and toys."

[+] asshole, toy, breakinthelawbreakinthelaw, deathrace2000, cannonballrun (tagging beta)

Spore Release Date is official

I heard some time ago but forgot to post anything. Spore's release date is 3/3/08. I am going to pre-order it . If this does not matter to you at first glance, read the link what the game is about. It has the potential to change the future of gaming IMO!

Microwind Generator For Low Power Systems

Posted by CmdrTaco on Sunday October 14, @09:06AM
from the welcome-to-sunday dept.

An anonymous reader wrote in to say that "Shawn Frayne, has developed Windbelt, efficient, cheap lowpower wind generator built out of taut kite fabric." Everyone has seen the video where the suspension bridge is ripped apart by wind- his idea was to use the same thing to generate power. I doubt I'll be running my desktop off it any time soon, but it's a cool idea.

[+] power, taut, economical, tacomanarrows (tagging beta)

Promising Blood Test for Alzheimer's

Posted by kdawson on Sunday October 14, @05:59PM
from the results-look-good-i-forget-why dept.

The online edition of the British journal Nature Medicine has a study of a blood test for Alzheimer's disease, developed at Stanford. The test lights up if 18 specific molecules are present in a blood sample. Using samples of stored blood, the test proved 90% accurate in identifying people who had been diagnosed with the disease by other methods. It was also 87% accurate in distinguishing samples from people who do not have Alzheimer's but exhibit some other form of dementia. The numbers of samples involved were small — SFGate's writeup has some details. The Mercury News's article says the test's developers want to begin selling it to laboratories in 2008, for which FDA approval would not be required. They hope to get FDA approval for general use by 2009.

[+] biotech, science (tagging beta)

Space solar power potential highlighted in report

Posted Oct 14th 2007 10:40PM by Conrad Quilty-Harper
Filed under: Wireless

A report into the feasibility of space-based power rigs that would beam solar power down to earth in the form of microwaves has been published, with its findings being along the lines of "yes, it'll happen, but only when the money's there." The Pentagon is itching to get its hands on the technology, which would include mirrors several miles wide focusing sunlight onto solar cells, highlighting the potential for beaming energy to remote regions of the world (read: wherever they're fighting.) The problem is more of an economic one, with the technology behind the project apparently being feasible since the 70s: only now that oil prices have tripled, and the technology has become greatly more efficient, is an actual space installation seeming realistic. In fact, we could see early efforts for the giant mirrors as soon as 2012: any bets that they'll double as death rays?

Tags: Mirror, Pentagon, power, Space

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