Central database could lead to 'massive identity fraud' Ken Young, vnunet.com 18 Oct 2005
Microsoft's national technology officer has attacked the UK government's plans for a centralised database supporting the proposed national ID card scheme.
Jerry Fishenden told vnunet.com that current plans for a centralised database with large amounts of information on each person are a mistake, and could lead to "massive identity fraud".
He went on to criticise the IT industry for not clearly voicing the real concerns.
"It is unnecessary to build a system with all the data in one place," he said. "The Home Office should be basing the design on the knowledge that any system of that size will be breached, most likely by criminal gangs with huge resources."
When asked why he was making such statements on the day the Commons voted on the ID Card Bill, Fishenden said only that the IT industry had so far not been getting its views across properly.
"When we attend meetings with the Home Office I have noticed that industry representatives do not voice their concerns very much. Only outside the meetings do you hear their concerns," he explained.
Fishenden pulls no punches concerning the industry's lack of input so far. " I do not think that the IT industry has been coherent and consistent enough about the way the ID card system is conceived," he said.
"Any ID system needs only to keep information that is appropriate to a particular search in one location. That way you reduce the impact of loss or theft by decentralising the data."
Part of the problem could be because the Home Office liaises with a number of IT industry groups, notably Eurim, Intellect and the British Computer Society (BCS).
Fishenden maintained that his views are supported by the BCS, which has made similar representations to the Home Office.
"The IT industry needs to find a language in relation to privacy and identity to talk to the wider community," said Fishenden.
Critics may see the attack as a means of pulling the programme more in the direction of Microsoft's view of IT systems.
Fishenden sees no conflict of interest in saying that "decentralised IT is part of Microsoft's philosophy. It's all part of our shared services agenda." Permalink to this story www.vnunet.com/2144113
The heavy-handed ejection of the pensioner, who was pulled from his seat by conference stewards - one of whom is reported to be a professional bodyguard and bouncer - will be discussed next month, along with the party's decision to confiscate boiled sweets from delegates on the grounds they could be used as missiles.
They also ejected an 82 year old man, Mr Wolfgang, for shouting "Nonsense" Mr Wolfgang fled Nazi Germany as a teenager for the freedom of Britain.
A witness, Mr Forrest, said: "I literally said 'hear, hear' twice. Later, this gentleman shouted 'nonsense'. It was just the voicing of an opinion and they grabbed hold of him. I said: 'You leave him alone, he is an old man' and five stewards pulled me out of the centre. They've taken my pass away and they won't let me back into the conference centre."
When the Prime Minister was asked by a journalist whether he would apologise to Mr Wolfgang, he did not comment.
Mr Blair also blocked a motion for the conference to pay tribute to Robin Cook, the cabinet minister who resigned over the war and died in August.
Robin Cook died shortly after revealing the following
Bin Laden was, though, a product of a monumental miscalculation by western security agencies. Throughout the 80s he was armed by the CIA and funded by the Saudis to wage jihad against the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. Al-Qaida, literally "the database", was originally the computer file of the thousands of mujahideen who were recruited and trained with help from the CIA to defeat the Russians. Inexplicably, and with disastrous consequences, it never appears to have occurred to Washington that once Russia was out of the way, Bin Laden's organisation would turn its attention to the west.
Whittemore ruled that Terri Schiavo's parents, Robert and Mary Schindler, had not established a "substantial likelihood of success" at trial on the merits of their arguments, contending Terri Schiavo's "life and liberty interests" had been protected by Florida courts.
Terri Schiavo's family was prevented from being at her bedside when she died this morning shortly after 9 am ET at a Pinellas Park, Florida hospice, a family spokesman said.
Michael Schiavo flatly rejected the Schindlers' request to be with their daughter in her final moments, Frank Pavone said, adding, "His heartless cruelty continued until the end."
My Grandmother's Brain -- OK -- But Would I Stop Feeding My Grandmother?
First of all, the University of Miami's appellation for this scan is inaccurate. "Cortical regions" are not and can not be filled with spinal fluid. The sulci (spaces between cortical ribbons) are enlarged secondary to cortical atrophy and these sulci are filled with cerbrospinal fluid.
The most alarming thing about this image, however, is that there certainly is cortex left. Granted, it is severely thinned, especially for Terri's age, but I would be nonplussed if you told me that this was a 75 year old female who was somewhat senile but fully functional, and I defy a radiologist anywhere to contest that.
I HAVE SEEN MANY WALKING, TALKING, FAIRLY COHERENT PEOPLE WITH WORSE CEREBRAL/CORTICAL ATROPHY. THEREFORE, THIS IS IN NO WAY PRIMA FACIE EVIDENCE THAT TERRI SCHIAVO'S MENTAL ABILITIES OR/OR CAPABILITIES ARE COMPLETELY ERADICATED. I CANNOT BELIEVE SUCH TESTIMONY HAS BEEN GIVEN ON THE BASIS OF THIS SCAN.
The worrisome, no alarming thing, for me, was that I heard a bioethicist and several important figures on the major media describe Terri's brain as MUCH WORSE. One "expert" said that she had a "bag of water" in her head. Several experts described her as a "brain stem preparation"
These statements are wholly inaccurate. This is an atrophied brain, yes, but there is cortex remaining, and where there's cortex (?life) there's hope.
If you starve this woman to death it would be, in my professional and experienced medical opinion, the equivalent of starving to death a 75-85 year old person. I would take that to the witness stand. Doctor CBB on CodeBlueBlog
A healthy woman, who can possibly swallow (untested for over 10 years) is refused water by Judge Greer, who it appears to me is teasing legal counsel in his latest ruling. He suggested the Schindlers should have submitted an affidavit, suggesting Terri tried to beg for her life, at a previous hearing. Does he imply he would have admitted the affidavit, or merely enjoyed refusing its submission, as he has refused so many alternative medical opinions?
A lady is dying unnecessarily, while the legal experts seem to be enjoying the legal strategies.
I do not see this as a right to life, or partisan political issue, as it has been promoted by the Mass Media. I believe Terri Schiavo has proven her will to live by surviving 2 previous feeding tube removals.
I do not believe that Food & water should be regarded as 'Artificial Life support'. They are not artificial to me! I need them.
I will try to follow this with the photos of the good samaritans arrested for trying to serve a glass of water
I've been so happy with Opera as a browser for many years. It has lots of useful facilities such as copy text to note, password manager, search or jump to a url directly from web page content.However, I have always found the mail client a bit shaky. It didn't appear to index reliably amongst other things.
I downloaded an update to McAfee & ... BANG. 3 years of mail gone. At least, unlike Outlook it's stored as text files, but it appears the whole thing needs a reindex that it can't do. I've temporarily installed another version. Happily for safety I leave my main mail accounts on the server, so downloaded them again.
I think I might revert to Lotus Notes mail client as its absolutely unburstable.
I'm spending some time checking some very interesting software utilities
With all the excitement of Desktop searches - Google - Microsoft et. al. I have come across BLINKX , which looks fantastic and is free for now. I will add my comments when my pc is fully indexed.
Speaking of FREE. For a zip compression & uncompression utility I now use FILZIP written by Phillipp Engel, available in English & German. Again its 100% free and has the following features
support for .ace, .arc. arj, .cab, .gz, .lha, .jar, .rar, .tar and of course .zip
I got a GPS for Xmas, I'm very pleased with it. I found this entertaining mail from a dissatisfied user:
The other day I went out and got a GPS 38 (you know, Global Positioning System device). Excited to use it, I went out into the middle of a field (I'm fully aware of the accuracy limitations with SA) and took a position point. I waited until I had a good lock on 6 bars first.
Then, I walked some distance away - at least a half of a mile. Making sure that I still had a good position fix, I then pressed the "GOTO" button and selected my point from the menu. Not really sure what was going to happen next, in order to protect myself, I crept down to the ground and by standing on my feet, sort of turned into a human ball. Then, with my right arm extended to the heavens holding the GPS, I clenched my eyes shut and pressed the "Enter" button.
There was no flash of light. No boom. Not even a puff of smoke. I cautiously opened my eyes. Can you believe it? I hadn't even moved an inch, let alone be anywhere closer to the point I had selected.
Is my unit defective? I traded my car for it and am now without transportation until I can get it working. Will fresh batteries make any improvement?
Richard
From: mitchell@intercom.net (Richard Mitchell) Newsgroups: sci.geo.satellite-nav Subject: I don't get it Date: Fri, 14 Jun 1996 21:23:50 EDT Sender: mitchell@intercom.net (Richard Mitchell) Message-ID: <4pt3b6$f43@shore4.intercom.net > NNTP-Posting-Host: ocean.intercom.net
