Google: The CIA’s Spy-Buddy

From Eric Sommer at Pravda.ru via Market Oracle, January 14, 2010:

“The western media is currently full of articles on Google’s ‘threat to quit China’ over internet censorship issues, and the company’s ‘suspicion’ that the Chinese government was behind attempts to ‘break-in’ to several Google email accounts used by ‘Chinese dissidents’.

However, the media has almost completely failed to report that Google’s surface concern over ‘human rights’ in China is belied by its their deep involvement with some of the worst human rights abuses on the planet: Continue reading

Wikileaks’ Julian Assange “In Danger” From Pentagon?

More on the ubiquitous founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange. I maintain a neutral to positive rating on Assange, despite criticism of him. The whistleblower emails on anthropogenic global warming that were published on Wikileaks (climategate) hugely damaged the climate cabal, but there are some credible writers who maintain that he’s passing off disinfo as well. I honestly can’t tell one way or other. Lately it’s occurred to me that that the controversy might relate to infighting between factions of the intelligence community, but how is the question. Anyway, that’s pure speculation on my part. Continue reading

Wikileaks’ Role In Julius Baer Case Linked to Soros, Sachs, & Spooks?

From The Wayne Madsen Report (a subscription-based service) comes this analysis (April, 2010) of the attack on the financial privacy of Swiss money manager, Julius Baer Group, exposed by whistle-blower Rudolf Elmer:

“WMR’s financial intelligence sources report that the unauthorized disclosure of a compact disk to Wikileaks that contained financial details of the clients of the secretive and usually highly-secure Zurich-based independent money management Julius Baer Group was designed to destroy the firm’s standing with its customers and make it ripe for a hostile takeover by interests associated with multi-billionaire vulture capitalist George Soros, including Goldman Sachs. Julius Baer was founded in the 19th century. Continue reading

Army Intelligence Analyst Arrested in Wikileaks “Helicopter Attack” Video Probe

From Wired.com:

“Federal officials have arrested an Army intelligence analyst who boasted of giving classified U.S. combat video and hundreds of thousands of classified State Department records to whistleblower site Wikileaks, Wired.com has learned.

SPC Bradley Manning, 22, of Potomac, Maryland, was stationed at Forward Operating Base Hammer, 40 miles east of Baghdad, where he was arrested nearly two weeks ago by the Army’s Criminal Investigation Division. A family member says he’s being held in custody in Kuwait, and has not been formally charged. Continue reading

CEO Admits Google Street-View Cars Recorded “Millions” of Homeowners’ Wifi Data

The Telegraph (June 4, 2010) reports that Google, which had been caught earlier recording private wifi messages has just ‘fessed up to the seriousness of what it did:

“In an interview with the Financial Times, the search engine’s boss admitted the company could have gained access to the personal details of millions of unsuspecting internet users.

Google is currently at the centre of a global privacy storm after it admitted that its Street View cars had mistakenly collected information Continue reading

Government Subsidies Are the Problem, Not Undocumented Workers

“Conservatives Should Support Amnesty For Illegal Immigrants,”

The Humble Libertarian, May 5, 2010

Think of it this way: as classical liberals, we understand that a bureaucrat in Washington could not possibly have enough information to correctly regulate the price or quantity of a good or service. This applies to labor markets, and immigration is essentially a function thereof. There’s no way Washington or the state of Arizona can know how much immigration we really need. Continue reading

National Health Service Accounts For 30% of Security Breaches Among UK Organizations

NHS Data Revelations Bode Badly For NPflT

Dylan Sharpe, bigbrotherwatch.org, April 29, 1010

“When Big Brother Watch released our report into the security of confidential medical dataBroken Records – one of our arguments against the number of non-medical personnel having access to patient records was the huge incidence of data loss within the NHS.

Today that fear has been confirmed as – for at the least the second year running – the NHS has topped the list of UK organisations subject to the highest number of data breaches. As reported by the Health Service Journal:

More serious data breaches have taken place within the NHS than any other UK organisation, according to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO).

A total of 2897 breaches were reported, accounting for more than 30% of the total number, deputy commissioner David Smith told the Infosec security conference.

The NHS, which is currently introducing digital patient records, said that 113 incidents occurred due to stolen data or hardware, with a further 82 cases of lost data or hardware.

How can we be expected to have faith in the government’s new online programme, when the NHS is incapable of keeping our private data safe now?

The Summary Care Record will provide over half-a-million people with access to our medical records and therefore massively increase the chances of that data falling into the wrong hands.

This latest scandal provides further proof that if you are contacted by the NHS asking for permission to upload your medical records onto the database, take the opportunity and opt out.”