Wednesday, September 24, 2003

U.S. Court Blocks Anti-Telemarketing List (Reuters) A federal court in Oklahoma has blocked the national "do not call" list that would allow consumers to stop most unwanted telephone sales calls, one week before it was due to take effect. [Yahoo! News - Technology] What's crazy about this is the block is based on the court believing the FTC isn't the agency that should do this, that its the FCC that should be managing the list. That's stupid, telemarketing is a business practice, not communications infrastructure; the list belongs with the FTC. I bet if you dug deep enough you'd find that somebody bribed a judge so they could get a delay in the start of the Do Not Call registry, so they could make their Q4 and 2003 numbers... 1:02:38 PM

Virus strikes State Department A computer virus hits the federal department, affecting the performance of the government's IT system that manages visa approvals, according to published reports. [CNET News.com] 12:44:34 PM

State Department Crippled by Windows Virus The Winnipeg Sun reports that a virus (probably a Windows worm) infected a visa application system run by the U.S. State Department: The U.S. State Department's electronic system for checking every visa applicant for terrorist or criminal history failed worldwide late yesterday because of a computer virus, leaving the U.S. government unable to issue visas.   The virus crippled the department's Consular Lookout and Support System, known as CLASS, which contains more than 12.8 million records from the FBI, State Department and U.S. immigration, drug-enforcement and intelligence agencies. Among the names are those of at least 78,000 suspected terrorists. [MacInTouch] 12:36:53 PM

An open invitation to election fraud Not only is the country's leading touch-screen voting system so badly designed that votes can be easily changed, but its manufacturer is run by a die-hard GOP donor who vowed to deliver his state for Bush next year. [Salon] 5:52:51 AM

Report: Microsoft dominance poses security risk A paper written by three security researchers argues that the giant's dominance in key software technologies threatens national infrastructure. [CNET News.com] 5:47:40 AM

© Copyright 2003 The Decline and Fall of the American Empire.