With concerns about COVID-19 in mind, the U.S. Forest Service is thinking about swapping public transportation for limited vehicle entry.

He gave a rare interview for “Becoming.”

He gave a rare interview for “Becoming.”

This episode originally aired on April 24, 2020. Ohio’s unemployment rate has reached 11.6% due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 10th worst in the nation. Laid-off workers should be on the lookout for scams and schemes trying to swindle away unemployment benefits and federal stimulus checks.

This episode originally aired on April 24, 2020. Ohio’s unemployment rate has reached 11.6% due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 10th worst in the nation. Laid-off workers should be on the lookout for scams and schemes trying to swindle away unemployment benefits and federal stimulus checks.

The U.S. Federal Highway Administration has an opening for a position that closes June 1, 2020.

Airports and the communities they serve view robust air service as an important element for economic well-being and overall quality of life. Incentive programs are often used to encourage airlines to maintain or augment service to a community. Recent airline industry trends, including airline consolidation, use of larger aircraft, the rise of ultra-low-cost airlines, and challenges with pilot supply as well as regulatory and policy developments, have affected the significance of these programs. The TRB A...

The government loves its secrets. It loves them so much it does stupid things to, say, "secure the nation..." or "protect the integrity of deliberative processes" or whatever the fuck. We should not trust the government's reasoning when it chooses to redact information from documents it releases to FOIA requesters. These assertions should always be challenged because the government's track record on redactions is objectively awful.

Here's the latest case-in-point: Emma Best -- someone the government feels is a "vexatious" FOIA filer -- just received a completely stupid set of redactions from the Secret Service. Best requested documents mentioning darknet market Hansa, which was shut down (along with Alpha Bay) following an investigation by US and Dutch law enforcement agencies.

The documents returned to Best contained redactions. This is unsurprising given the nature of the investigation. What's surprising is what the Secret Service decided to redact. As Best pointed out on Twitter, the Secret Service decided public press releases by the DOJ were too sensitive to be released to the general public.

Here's one of the redactions [PDF] the Secret Service applied to a press release that can be found unaltered and unedited at the Justice Department's publicly-accessible website:

And here's what the Secret Service excised, under the bullshit theory that a publicly-released press statement is somehow an "inter-agency or intra-agency memorandums or letter which would not be available by law to a party other than an agency in litigation with the agency."

“This is likely one of the most important criminal investigations of the year – taking down the largest dark net marketplace in history,” said Attorney General Jeff Sessions. “Make no mistake, the forces of law and justice face a new challenge from the criminals and transnational criminal organizations who think they can commit their crimes with impunity using the dark net. The dark net is not a place to hide. The Department will continue to find, arrest, prosecute, convict, and incarcerate criminals, drug traffickers and their enablers wherever they are. We will use every tool we have to stop criminals from exploiting vulnerable people and sending so many Americans to an early grave. I believe that because of this operation, the American people are safer – safer from the threat of identity fraud and malware, and safer from deadly drugs.”

Um. Is Jeff Sessions being Yezhoved by the Secret Service? Does the agency consider him to be enough of a persona non grata after his firing by Trump to be excised from the Secret Services' official recollection of this dark web takedown? This insane conspiracy theory I just made up makes as much sense as anything the Secret Service could offer in explanation for this redaction. The redaction removed nothing but the sort of swaggering statement Attorney Generals always make after a huge bust.

Needless to say, Emma Best is challenging the Secret Service's redactions. Pithily.

I am appealing the integrity of the redactions, as you withheld public press releases under b5, which is grossly inappropriate.

Yeah. That's an understatement. The Secret Service has no business redacting publicly-available info. Even if this was a clerical error, it's so bad it's insulting. And that's why you can't trust the government on things like this: when it's not being malicious, it's being stupid.

Last week AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson stepped down after his $150 billion bid to dominate the video advertising space fell flat on its face. Stephenson's tenure was plagued by no shortage of scandals, though it was his failures on the TV front that likely cost him his comfy seat as one of the highest paid executives in America.

After spending $150 billion on several dubious megamergers (most notably the 2015 purchase of a satellite TV provider DirecTV), Stephenson saddled the company with an ocean of debt. So much debt it was forced to raise rates on customers in the middle of one of the biggest transformational shifts in the TV sectors in decades (cord cutting and the rise of streaming video). And while Stephenson deserves credit for at least trying to get out ahead of the trend, his tenure was pockmarked by a long line of dubious decisions that directly contributed to the company losing more than 3.2 million pay TV subscribers last year alone.

But Stephenson's replacement, AT&T executive John Stankey, doesn't seem much better. In a profile piece last week, Bloomberg described fairly idiotic and cocky recent comments by Stankey as "blunt." Among them was the claim that "nobody knows as much about TV as me," and the insistence that those who don't subscribe to AT&T's confusing assortment of discount TV streaming services must certainly be stupid:

"When pitching AT&T’s new HBO Max streaming platform, he told the audience that anyone unwilling to pay $15 a month for the service had a low IQ. At a town hall with HBO employees last year, Stankey said the network had to dramatically increase its programming output, comparing the work ahead to childbirth. Once, when a Time Warner veteran criticized an idea during a meeting, Stankey replied, “I know more about television than anybody."

Yeah, sounds like just the guy to right the ship, and earn employee and customer respect. Especially for a company plagued with no shortage of hubris that believed it could just bully, bullshit, and bribe its way to industry domination.

One of the major reasons Stephenson was ejected was courtesy of recently hyperactive hedge fund Elliott Management, which holds a massive stake in AT&T. Elliott complained that Stephenson had become megamerger happy and, despite eliminating 37,000 jobs to recoup merger debt (despite billions in regulatory FCC favors and a $42 billion Trump tax cut) wasn't doing enough firing. Reports now suggest that Elliott didn't much like Stankey either, but settled on him after external options proved even more underwhelming:

"Elliott, the hedge fund run by Paul Singer, remains skeptical of incoming CEO John Stankey’s decision-making but has decided his understanding of AT&T’s sprawling assets makes him a better candidate to take over for Stephenson than any external candidate, according to the people...Elliott was skeptical of Stankey’s decision-making as an architect of AT&T’s acquisitions of DirecTV and Time Warner. It advocated that AT&T focus on divesting assets and lowering debt, pushing the largest U.S. wireless company to sell DirecTV, one of the assets Stankey has steadfastly defended."

In short nobody in this drama seems to know what they're actually doing. Few were happy with AT&T's previous leadership. And few seem happy with AT&T's new leadership, who apparently thinks he's a TV sector super genius, and you're a moron if you don't subscribe to AT&T's generally underwhelming TV offerings. Surely this will all go swimmingly.

The coronavirus pandemic and its associated lockdown in most countries has forced major changes in the way people live, work and study. Online learning is now routine for many, and is largely unproblematic, not least because it has been used for many years. However, online testing is more tricky, since there is a concern by many teachers that students might use their isolated situation to cheat during exams. One person's problem is another person's opportunity, and there are a number of proctoring services that claim to stop or at least minimize cheating during online tests. One thing they have in common is that they tend to be intrusive, and show little respect for the privacy of the people they monitor.

As an article in The Verge explains, some employ humans to watch over students using Zoom video calls. That's reasonably close to a traditional setup, where a teacher or proctor watches students in an exam hall. But there are also webcam-based automated approaches, as explored by Vox:

For instance, Examity also uses AI to verify students' identities, analyze their keystrokes, and, of course, ensure they're not cheating. Proctorio uses artificial intelligence to conduct gaze detection, which tracks whether a student is looking away from their screens.

It's not just in the US that these extreme surveillance methods are being adopted. In France, the University of Rennes 1 is using a system called Managexam, which adds a few extra features: the ability to detect "inappropriate" Internet searches by the student, the use of a second screen, or the presence of another person in the room (original in French). The Vox articles notes that even when these systems are deployed, students still try to cheat using new tricks, and the anti-cheating services try to stop them doing so:

it's easy to find online tips and tricks for duping remote proctoring services. Some suggest hiding notes underneath the view of the camera or setting up a secret laptop. It's also easy for these remote proctoring services to find out about these cheating methods, so they're constantly coming up with countermeasures. On its website, Proctorio even has a job listing for a "professional cheater" to test its system. The contract position pays between $10,000 and $20,000 a year.

As the arms race between students and proctoring services escalates, it's surely time to ask whether the problem isn't people cheating, but the use of old-style, analog testing formats in a world that has been forced by the coronavirus pandemic to move to a completely digital approach. Rather than spending so much time, effort and money on trying to stop students from cheating, maybe we need to come up with new ways of measuring what they have learnt and understood -- ones that are not immune to cheating, but where cheating has no meaning. Obvious options include "open book" exams, where students can use whatever resources they like, or even abolishing formal exams completely, and opting for continuous assessment. Since the lockdown has forced educational establishments to re-invent teaching, isn't it time they re-invented exams too?

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter, Diaspora, or Mastodon.

It's a long, long buildup to CEO's soliloquy, it's a long way to go

Knowledge 2020 With the long flights, late nights and early starts, IT conferences might seem endless. But with the shift to the online format becoming standard, for now at least, participants might be spared the trial of endurance.…

There's revenue to be had with being a participant in the payments web, and the Apple experience to measure up against

Samsung has announced it will launch a debit card.…

Mold is a fungus with the Ability to flourish in just about any circumstance. While found almost everywhere in nature, mold can cause serious problems when found in residential areas and must be quarantined and removed as soon as possible.… Continue Reading →

Finding top quality MP3 moving download can be real assignment thinking about that moving songs is somewhat of a particular specialty showcase. Certain everybody appreciates clouding prone to the clubs and furthermore move, yet have you ever before in reality… Continue Reading →

Apple has launched a new web page that brings together links and information about its online services for customers shopping from home during the global health crisis.


Titled "Everything you love about our stores is online," the new catch-all page links from the Apple.com home page and includes details about no-contact delivery options, Apple Specialist help, financing and credit options, Apple Trade In, Apple Card, order status checking, service and support.

The page also links out to "Today at Apple - At home," a series of fun how-to videos to help users get creative during the ongoing stay-at-home measures, and there's a series of category links for customers to explore products on Apple's online store.

Apple has been gradually re-opening its retail stores in countries where lockdowns have eased, although some are operating on limited hours.

Apple CEO Tim Cook last week said that Apple was going to reopen stores in Austria and Australia this week, and Apple's sole Apple Store in Vienna will be reopening on Tuesday, May 5.

We're still waiting to hear exactly when stores in North America will reopen, but Cook also said that Apple is planning to reopen a few stores in the U.S. starting in May. Store openings will be staggered, with Apple evaluating data that includes local guidelines and recommendations before reopening.
This article, "New Apple Web Page Directs Customers to Its Online Shopping Services" first appeared on MacRumors.com

Discuss this article in our forums

Have you ever noticed that the Internal Revenue Service's regulations often are illogical? Does anyone at the IRS think through its regulations? Continue reading →

IBM's Smarter Cities Challenge program (@CitiesChallenge) will be sending teams of company experts to five municipalities through 2018 to provide pro bono consultative advice on issues such as affordable housing, economic development, immigration, and public safety.

PSA Peugeot Citroën and IBM today announced a partnership to help various industries within the Internet of Things economy to analyze data to deliver new services from connected vehicles.

Microsoft recently experienced a significant interruption of their Azure cloud service. Since a decent amount of data was available for this incident, I decided to do a partial root cause analysis. All of my source data came from Microsoft's official Azure blog post on 2014-Nov-24. I did this primarily to create a sample analysis that […]

IBM Security today announced the launch of two new security testing practice areas focused on automotive security and the Internet of Things (IoT). The new services will be delivered via an elite team of IBM X-Force Red researchers focused on testing backend processes, apps and physical hardware used to control access and management of smart systems.

IBM announced today that the U.S. Army’s Logistics Support Activity awarded IBM a contract to continue providing cloud services, software development and cognitive computing, constituting the technical infrastructure for one of the U.S. federal government’s biggest logistics systems.

IBM today announced that Vissensa, a UK-based managed service provider (MSP), has taken delivery of the IBM Enterprise Cloud System, which will help the company offer new and improved cloud services to its customers.

Today, Allianz and IBM concluded an agreement in Munich regarding support for the operation of Allianz's data centers. IBM will be acting as the global provider of IT operation services for Allianz in effect from April 1, 2014, supporting the transformation of the company's global IT infrastructure.

IBM today announced continuing momentum for its social business offerings with clients around the world ushering in the next era of collaboration with IBM Verse and Connections. IBM also announced expanded capabilities in its collaboration portfolio with new innovations that make it easier for clients to gain and share business insights across teams.

IBM today announced it is teaming up with Toronto-based FinTech company Dream Payments to bring new revenue generating mobile payment offerings to financial institutions and merchants in the United States via the IBM Cloud.

IBM today announced a new agreement with Walgreens, one of the country’s largest drugstore chains, to deploy IBM retail analytics at more than 8,100 locations nationwide to help improve the efficiency of field service support for these locations.

IBM today announced a research collaboratory in Singapore, where researchers from IBM intend to collaborate with scientists and engineers from public agencies in Singapore to improve the quality of its urban services. The focus of this research effort will be to use sensor networks to more effectively model, predict and manage the use of natural and physical infrastructure resources – water, transport and energy.  

IBM today announced that as part of its Celebration of Service, designed to allow employees, retirees, clients and business partners to donate their time and expertise during the company's Centennial year, 300,000 IBMers around the world -- close to three quarters of its global workforce -- are volunteering in more than 5,000 projects in 120 countries, meeting civic and societal challenges and serving millions in need.

IBM has replaced Auckland University of Technology (AUT)’s core IT network as part of a new five year services contract. The new network, which went live in March, gives AUT great flexibility for deploying equipment to meet the changing needs of the university and enables it to capitalise on future enhancements in technology, such as video and data centres.