Wiring the future

The Boston Globe for May 19 had an interesting article in the Ideas section, "The Too-Smart City" by Courtney Humphries, in print at pp . K1, 4-5. The article looks at the amazing new ideas that city planners and technologists are coming up with, sometimes without much public debate, for making cities work smoother and smarter.  Some are better known than others, such as the multiple cameras that are being installed in many cities to monitor for criminal activity or watch for those who run red lights, or fail to pay tolls. Others are less well known.

The entire article gave me such mixed feelings, because some of the ideas, such as the lead-off technology, a system to help maximize and ease parking, sound like a WOW! and very seductive sort of thing.  A Boston University professor is testing a technology that helps drivers locate the best parking spot for their purposes in a parking garage at the university.  The system uses a smart phone app to sense when a spot is opening at the optimal location for that driver and alert the person.  Oooh!  Hard to complain about that, it seems. Lots of the technology in the article is designed to make life in cities more efficient, easier, and more convenient. Much of it is designed to make things safer, and easier to manage for the city administrators.

But the rest of the article gives the reader an increasing sense of Big Brother unease, as one reads about cameras, data gathering and storage that one never knew about, and that really wasn't debated. There are issues about First, Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights, though the article does not discuss this in legal terms. There are also problems in terms of sharing data with third parties and protecting the data from hackers.

There are multiple levels of other problems, too, as the author brings up the issue of cities that purchase proprietary software from corporations, for systems on which the city relies:
1)  Without open access to the code, the city becomes completely reliant on the corporation that wrote the code. If the company suddenly increases the subscription fees, the city is trapped. 
2) Or if the company goes bankrupt, there is nobody to update and manage the code. (Does these sound familiar, librarians?)
3) The author also raises the issue, when a city relies on coders to create an algorithm to analyze criminal hotspots, for instance, there is real policy-making being done by that coder.  People need to realize that and ask for the algorithm involved to understand the assumptions being coded into the program.

This is a very interesting article, and I recommend you read it.  One thing that struck me. The author is assuming that crowd-sourcing or at least open discussion, is better for policy-making.  One thing that I have learned about the development of the Internet, is that the technologists who built it actually did a GREAT job of securing the system against the sorts of control that government figures are just now wanting to impose. The very infrastructure of the Internet makes centralized government control and monitoring very difficult.  If it had been set up with the input of the crowd, or planning by governments, the Internet would be a much different place. It makes me have mixed feelings about this author's assumptions that opening these policies up for group discussion is going to be a positive improvement.  I am not sure I like the decision-making as it is; I am just becoming more skeptical about democracy and the wisdom of crowds, I guess.

The decoration is a still from the movie 1984, and of course, Big Brother is watching you!  I am afraid I found the image at http://floridapundit.com/2010/09/your-stimulus-dollars-at-work-big-brother-is-watching-your-garbage/

New Student Loan Bills in Committee - Watch Out!

On July 1, 2013, the interest rates on student loans is scheduled to double, from from the current 3.4% to 6.8%.  

The House Education and Workforce Committee, controlled by Republicans, passed HR 1911,out of committee to the floor,  the Smarter Solutions for Students Act (another link to the text here, and to a summary of the bill here; the Committee provides a factsheet here, and its press release here.) This bill ties the student debt interest rate to the federal reserve interest rate.

The Congressional Progressive Caucus, Representative Sinema appears to have introduced an alternative to this student loan bill, the Stability to Ensure the American Dream for Youth Act (STEADY), HR 1876.IH.  This bill simply extends the current interest rate until 2017.

The White House has made a proposal on the issue, in the annual budget. Obama's proposal would tie student loan interest rates to the 10-year Treasury note rate, but with a lower added percentage: 0.93 percent for federal student loans, 2.93 for unsubsidized loans and 3.93 for PLUS loans. (You can't see that level of detail in the Whitehouse press release here,  Here is a link to the entire budget; here is the Washington Post analysis).

There is a bill from Senator Elizabeth Warren chugging along in the Senate, S897.IS.  Her interest rate would be the same as that offered to banks by the Federal Reserve.  She just introduced it May 8.  According to the little news item, Warren's bill is gathering support. The bill is titled the Bank on Students Loan Fairness Act, and is, like the House bill, designed to avoid the looming jump in student loan interest rates.  Note that Warren's bill does not address private loans.

And there is a stop-gap measure in the Senate, jointly sponsored by Senators Jack Reed, Tom Harkin and Harry Reid, S. 953. Titled The Reed-Harkin Student Loan Affordability Act, the bill freezes the interest rate at 3.4%, and pays for the expense by closing several tax loopholes.  See the press release for a nice summary.  Sadly, though, the bill cannot possibly make its way through the legislative process before July 1.  

While everybody seems to agree that the jump is a bad thing, there is a great gulf in how the two parties want to address the problem. The Republican solution, in the Smarter Solutions for Students Act, is to tie the interest rate to the Federal Reserve interest rate. That seems pretty benign right now, when rates are at historic lows. But that won't last for very long. And it appears these days that student loans may last longer than either marriages or mortgages!

Warren's solution cuts the student loan interest rates, and at the same time, tackles the problems of the entire student loan lending apparatus.  This comes at a time when the large banks that have been major lenders in the privatized student loan arrangements are beginning to complain about default rates. Interestingly, a coalition of big banks are seeking agreement from the regulators to extend the time for borrowers to repay some loans before the lender is required to write it off.  Currently, banks that extend time to borrowers may have the debt classified by regulators as a "troubled debt."  Such a designation then triggers requirements that the bank maintain more of their assets on hand, rather than investing them in income-earning projects.

However, from the debtor's point of view, forbearance is not a completely positive benefit.  While they may be allowed to defer payments at the time, when they don't have a job, or don't earn enough to make the payments, they will be required to pay the total owed amount in the future. And interest owed continues to mount. This means that the total cost of the loan continues to rise for the debtor who is offered forbearance!  

Here is an interesting map from CNN showing which states have the most student loans delinquent by 90 days or more.  It's an interesting map, and something to think about.  Keep in mind that student loans are the one kind of debt that are not usually allowed to be discharged in bankruptcy. Student loans that are delinquent are treated very differently than other debts. Here is a nice short article from Time about how student debt is treated, and how that has changed over time.

If Congress does not address this trap they have created for students and their families, it will be a shame on our country.  Lives are being ruined. Rather than creating upward mobility, college and higher education is trapping whole families into debt.

CERN celebrates 20 years of the World Wide Web

CERN is where the Web was actually invented by Tim Berners-Lee, and they are celebrating it's 20th birthday this year.  See their website here.

They also give a link to the document by which CERN put the Web into the public domain on April 30, 1993, which is what is making this the 20th anniversary.

Tip of the OOTJ hat to my good friend Roy Balleste for the alert!  The image is a picture of Tim Berners-Lee running WorldWideWeb software at CERN in 1994, from the CERN webpage.

Domain Name Rush Following Boston Bombing

Dear OOTJers,
       I was amazed, fascinated and a good bit appalled to read about the rush on Internet domain names in the wake of the bombing here in Boston.  There was a brief article in the Boston Globe, and I also found a longer article at a blog run by Time magazine. This one includes a screen shot of the various domain names, and details on how much they paid. Apparently, there are "speculators" who buy domain names with the idea of selling to another, at a higher price. The Globe article mentions that some folks are making a living at this -- though both articles stress that domain names linked to current events have a short shelf life in public interest.  Thus, speculators for these names are unlikely to make much or any money.

Both writers mentioned the distaste or poor taste factor that will certainly turn some people off. They note that there are a number of reasons, some charitable, for registering a domain name related to the Boston Bombing. In fact, the Globe article mentions several people who have  bought domain names with the idea of using them for a charity.  But it also mentions others who register domain names with plans to set up fraudulent charities. For now, I recommend sticking with the official One Fund.

Boston strong, and many thanks to all who are sending good wishes and aid for the bombing victims and shell-shocked Boston!
Betsy

Living Social Hack and AP Twitter Account Hacked

The website, LivingSocial, a daily deals site, was hacked late yesterday.  The original report came from AllThingsD.com, and includes the text of an e-mail the CEO sent to staff and now the public. No credit card data or merchant financial information was accessed, which must mean that they stored them on a separate server.  The cyberattack affected 50 million users (all users except those in Korea, Thailand, Indonesia and the Phillipines, which use different services with separate servers).  The attackers netted millions of user names, birthdates, e-mail and passwords.

The website now greets users with an announcement of the attack, and recommendation that users change their passwords.  The announcement notes that passwords are coded, and the CEO's e-mail says they have been "hashed and salted."  This mean they use an algorithm to code, or "hash" the passwords. Salting means that each user who uses the same password would have their password "hashed" into a different coded version.  However, those with passwords which are too easy may make it easy for the hackers to guess, since the hashing algorithm is known.  Hackers can use an online dictionary and a computer to try to guess multiple passwords in just a few seconds.  But because multiple passwords set to "password" would each have a different hashed version, the hackers will have to devote considerably more time to cracking passwords.

CNN Money Tech reports that a different cyberattack on the Twitter account of the Associated Press.  The hackers in that case planted a false report that President Obama had been injured in two explosions at the White House.   AP suspended their Twitter account, with an announcement that the report was false. However, the attack shows up security weaknesses with Twitter, which had been discussed for some time by security analysts with concern.  Apparently, unlike Facebook and Dropbox, among other sites which offer the option, Twitter does not yet require a "two-step authentication" process.

A two-step authentication, done properly, requires a combination of two out of three types of information:
1.  Who you are (physical ID for instance, or fingerprint scan or facial recognition now on many laptops)
2. What you have (a gadget that generates a code, or a one-time password provided in a list by the website for users, for instance),
3.  What you know (passwords, mother's maiden name for a security question, for example)

For instance, a good two-step authentication procedure might require not only your password, but also an individually created key, which might be stored only on a user's phone. The user sends the secret key along with their password.  A lower tech alternative to the gadget code is the list of passwords provided separately to users. A user would input one of the codes and mark it off the list.  When a user runs low on the number of provided by the website, they request a new list.  As long as the two items are received within a short time (approximately 30 seconds), the system will accept the combination log-in.  The CNN article notes that Twitter had advertised for engineers to develop a two-step security process, but apparently this has not yet been implemented.

Another hack previously compromised Fox News' Twitter account. In that case, the hacked tweet was that President Obama had been assassinated. The recent fake tweet actually caused a brief downturn in the stockmarket. According to the CNN report,  Twitter's response to these and various other hacks on corporate Twitter accounts has been to urge more care.  What they need is to implement better security.

The decoration for this post is from Wikipedia, which notes it was designed in the late 1990's by Dagmar D'Surreal, as a logo for the PhreakNIC annual conference in Nashville, Tennessee. Many thanks to my son, Joe McKenzie, for technical explanations made easy.

National Library of Scotland to Hire a Wikipedian

The BBC reports that the National Library of Scotland is planning to hire a Wikipedian, to help move materials from their collection into Wikipedia, and to help their patrons learn how to use the online encyclopedia.  They mention in the report that the British Library hired its "first" Wikipedian in May, 2012.  I wonder if other major libraries have done this?

Tip of the OOTJ hat to my friend and colleague Roy Balleste, for pointing out the article to me.

The Power of Words: "Act of Terror"

When President Obama used the phrase "Act of Terror" to describe the Boston bombing, the business people shuddered.  Those whose windows were blown out, whose stores and restaurants were damaged, who lost a week's worth of food and customers to the area being closed as a crime scene are hoping that their insurance will help them bear the costs.  But since 9/11, insurance policies have contained a careful exclusion for Acts of Terror.  So, politicians and other speakers who use what seems like a simple phrase to describe the despicable acts have sent shivers through the Boylston - Copley Square business community.  The designation will be set, or not, by federal agencies. But for now, the insurance adjustors are trickling in to assess damage and begin the process of setting reimbursement rates.  As affected businesses reopen, they are keeping their fingers crossed that their coverage won't be scotched by what might otherwise seem like the most obvious statement in the world.

The image decorating this blog post was published at Newstimes.com, at http://www.newstimes.com/news/article/Boston-Marathon-finish-line-area-reopens-4459194.php and was there credited to  David L. Ryan of the Associated Press. The caption reads

The sculpture of the painter Copley gets washed down by Donald Ware an employee of Boston Parks and Recreation on Boylston Street on Tuesday, April 23, 2013 in Boston. The area near the Boston Marathon finish line where two bombs killed three people is slowly coming back to life. Authorities have yet to re-open all of Boylston Street, but Boston police on Tuesday morning allowed traffic and pedestrians to cross Boylston on Clarendon Street for the first time since the Patriots' Day bombings.

There were many images in the local press of workers in hazmat suits washing down the area, working to clean away blood and bomb debris before the area could re-open.

Recognition: Better Late than Never and Better Little than Nothing

Two New England states have interesting laws that are somewhat related in that they recognize groups that formerly (or currently) had no legal status.  New Hampshire has a bill (SB 187) moving through its legislature that very belatedly frees slaves who had petitioned the state government for emancipation.  A group of slaves who were fighting in the Revolutionary War wrote an eloquent plea to the state legislature requesting that they be freed:

... freedom is an inherent right of the human species not to be surrendered, but by consent, for the sake of social life. ... Here we can read with others, of this knowledge slavery cannot wholly deprive us.  Here we know that we ought to be free agents! Here we feel the dignity of human nature. . . . Here we feel a just equality.

Sad to say, the New Hampshire House voted to table the petition and to revisit it at another time,  saying that

The House is not ripe for a ­determination in this matter: Therefore ordered that the further consideration and determination be postponed till a more convenient opportunity.

The time is apparently ripe now.  The story in the  Boston Globe  mentions that five of the original group were emancipated by their owners, but the others died enslaved.  The Globe article reports that the bill began when local historian Valerie Cunningham discovered the story reported on the front page a 1779 New Hampshire Gazette, and included it in her book, Black Portsmouth.

The other bill that caught my attention was a Connecticut bill, HB 6690, that provides animal advocates in abuse cases. Interesting testimony in an April 5, 2013 hearing on the bill here. The Boston Globe carried a brief article on the matter here. The article discusses, but the hearing has far more detail on the way the bill is tied to studies showing that mass murderers so often begin with cruelty to animals.  It is sometimes difficult reading, but shows how similar bills might progress. The sponsoring representative, Diana Urban, notes what a problem it is to prosecute such cases, and how often the charges are essentially dropped.

The animal rights poster decorating this blog post come from a helpful blog post at The Truth Syndicate. a series of posts listing animal rights laws across the U.S.  The first image is a well-known poster from the abolitionist movement.  According to Wikipedia, it actually comes from a medallion that was designed for the abolition movement in Britain, by Josiah Wedgewood. 

Life in Boston After the Marathon Bombing

Just an impressionistic little essay here, about how it has been to be living in Boston over the past week or so.  I am hugely grateful and amazed at the number of e-mails I have received from colleagues who wanted to know that I and my family were safe.  Thank you for thinking of us!

My family lives outside Boston itself, in the adjoining town of Milton.  We were quite to the periphery of the action.  However, you might like to know that the NELLCO board meeting that was scheduled for Friday was cancelled because of the lockdown.  I had assumed it was running, and had been puzzling over how to get there with public transit shut down and no taxis.  But that morning, Tracy Thompson e-mailed the folks on the board that the meeting was cancelled, and offering assistance in getting out of Boston.  The handful of out-of-towners who had driven their cars into Boston for a pre-meeting on Thursday went above and beyond, helping the other out-of-towners who were stranded by the shut-down of all public transit.  These kind colleagues often drove our friends all the way home, or at least to a public transit station that was open and operating outside of Boston's ambit.

Universities all across Boston, including my own Suffolk, were closed as part of the governor's lock-down order.  Students were urged to shelter-in-place and stay safe. Businesses throughout Boston were closed, with a few exceptions, such as hospitals, a few gas stations, and very few restaurants.  There are many photos in the newspaper today of empty streets yesterday, that normally would have been bustling.  Thousands of police officers from across Massachusetts and out of state descended onto Cambridge and Watertown for a massive man-hunt, going door-to-door.  I was interested to hear that officials requested Dunkin Donuts to stay open to supply the officers with coffee and hot food (nobody was willing to say, doughnuts!)  A number of restaurants sent donated food to the police as well.

As everybody knows who followed this case on the Internet or TV, the first suspect was killed in a blazing gun battle.  The second suspect, his brother, ran over the first with their car-jacked vehicle in escaping that battle.  In the early hours of April 20, the second suspect was located, hiding in a boat, that had been covered with a tarp for the winter.  This was in a backyard just outside of the zone where the police conducted house-to-house searches.

In the Boston Globe this morning, there is a full page ad from a kitchen cabinet company:

Don't #@$% with Boston!

The ad goes on to state that the company will donate 100% of their profits from any sales today to the Governor's One Fund, set up to provide support to the victims of the Bombing.   I bet they sell a lot of cabinets today! 



Betsy

Crowdsourcing the Boston Bombing Investigation

An article in today's Boston Globe explains how the FBI and other criminal investigators are calling on those who were at the Marathon, near the finish line, to share their photos and videos.  Not only that, but because they are getting thousands of images to sift through, they are also asking the public's help in looking at the images. 

Photos and video clips are being uploaded to 4chan's Imgur.com where visitors can scan them looking for suspicious images.  There is then a Reddit newsgroup, Find Boston Bombers forum, is also active in sorting images. The hosts of the Reddit group were aware of concerns that innocent people captured in these photos could be wrongly targeted, or that there could be vigilante justice.  They said that any clues marked by interested members are being forwarded as tips to federal investigators.

On the day of the bombing, early news reports mentioned both the FBI and ATF as turning up for the investigation.  There are, of course, lots of local police and state troopers involved. The Boston Firefighters and Police Unions have together offered a $50,000 award for information leading to an arrest.

The response of the public, in support of Boston and the Marathon has been truly heartwarming. The New York Yankees, Boston's baseball archrival, displayed a banner in unity with Boston and played the Boston theme song Sweet Caroline at the game yesterday.  The organizers of the London Marathon announced that they would not cancel their race, but hold it in tribute to the victims of the Boston Bombing. And the Colbert Report opened and the Daily Show last night with a tribute to the city of Boston. And today, there is an interfaith service at the Boston Cathedral of the Holy Cross. President Obama is scheduled to attend.  The service will be broadcast here at 11 AM Thursday, April 18.

The image decorating this post is courtesy of CBC Canada.