-NewsBit: Increase in gun violence

For the last couple of weeks, gun violence all across the united states has been an almost daily occurrence. The Empire State shooting is yet another example of this seemingly ceaseless spree killings. Following the attack (in which all bystanders hit were shot by police and not the gunman), witnesses and general public started to blame politicians. They then began to blame the gun policy within New York City, which is the most strictest in the nation.

To be blunt, gun law in New York City in and of itself has been a useless tool to keep guns out of the hands of unstable individuals. Our current laws did NOT make a difference in either the Colorado shootings (a.k.a The Dark Knight Rises shootings) or the empire state shootings. Both of these individuals had obtained the guns legally, and neither had any signs that would have disqualified them from obtaining them. Broader federal legislation is needed to remedy this problem of gun violence, but as it stands America can't come to a consensus on virtually anything. Or perhaps, they are of a consensus, but that view is not represented in the political discourse of the politicians. With the even more incredible amount of money needed to actually become a representative (at any level of government), how can any politician truly have the best of those the claim to represent at heart? But that is another topic for another time.

Honestly, with the amount of guns that Americans own and are actively purchasing, I don't even think that passing more stringent laws would be beneficial. As the numbers currently stand, America is insanely inundated with guns. The United States currently has the highest rate of gun ownership IN THE WORLD. This includes both so called first world and third world nations, and even higher than in Russia, Iran, China, etc. China is well over a billion strong, and even they do not have a higher gun rate. Africa is also a billion deep, and is also lacking when gun rate is compared to the united states.

Each year 8 million new guns are produced by manufacturers, and apparently Americans buy up at least HALF OF ALL NEWLY PRODUCED GUNS. It pains me to say it but no amount of legislation in the world will fix this problem of gun violence. There needs to be discourse in the public realm amongst the American citizenry as to why it is so incredibly gun crazy. Every single nation on earth does not hold a candle to the overall rate and the actual amount of guns owned by the United States.

Besides, just like in all the shootings prior, any mention of regulation only spikes the amount of gun purchases further. In the end, it seems Americans will probably wind up killing herself.

Sources:

http://www.fastcodesign.com/1662850/infographic-of-the-day-does-the-us-really-have-that-many-guns

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/09/gun-ownership-infographic_n_1762059.html

--Re (Tech): Best of Firefox add-ons (Part 2)

This will be the second installment of the add-ons that everyone should be using on the internet right now with their Firefox web browser. These add-ons protect your privacy, guard you from those annoying (and potentially dangerous) advertisements, and keep you all in all in good shape when surfing the internets. Plus, they add a little functionality to the way you approach web surfing and web browsing.

   

    6)     DownloadHelper

This add-on allows you to download videos from virtually any site you visit. It also gives you the capacity to convert the video to the format that best suits your needs before you download it. In addition, it also allows you to extract a myriad of other content from a website much more easily. I mostly use this nifty add-on to extract video from you tube.com, then use the media player “VLC” to play the movies on my desktop. 

   7) Xmarks

Simple bookmark synchronization, both on the same computer and on multiple other computers. Use this to backup all your hard researched bookmarks, and even be able to sync them to other computers. The next time your installation of Firefox needs to be removed, you won’t have to worry about losing your information.

    8) BetterPrivacy

Apparently, many corporations have recognized that users have become more vigilant about the way their data is stored. Most computer users are more privy to the existence of cookies, and are more likely to remove them at the end of a session. But did you know there is already a thing as a “Super-Cookie”? Super-cookies cannot be removed by simply pressing the CTRL+SHIFT+DELETE command and wiping all your history off. These cookies are stored in a different area of your computer, and are usually stored there INDEFINETLY. Fortunately, this add-on does all the work of removing these nuances for you, and can even be customized to remove super-cookies at set time intervals. This add-on is a MUST for all those who are privacy conscientious.

   9)      Collusion

An incredible tool which visualizes which sites are tracking you at any given moment in REAL TIME. Allows you to see cross-site cookie tracking at any given moment. Check it out, and be creped out.

  10)   Web Developer (1.1.9)

I only use this add-on solely to counter the tracking by websites. There is an option provided by this add-on (named “disable referees”) which allows you to stop the tracking of you across websites. By enabling this add-on’s feature, you might trigger leech protection on some sites, however. In other words, you might not render one or two sites correctly because the protection for this webserver is on. The only site that I saw had not worked properly was 4chan.org when I tried to post some content, but that is about it.

--Re (Tech): Best of Firefox add-ons (Part 1)

    FireFox has steadily been taking over the internet browser wars simply by word of mouth alone. The real quality that allows Firefox to outshine all other browsers is all the customization that it offers. In this post, I will list some of the add-ons/extensions that we simply cannot live without. 

       1)   AdBlock Plus

     With over 13 million users, and its ease of use, AdBlock Plus is easily a must for every firefox user out there. Simply download the add-on, click a couple subscriptions (don’t worry, they are all free), and you have got a vastly faster internet experience. Blocking of ads happens in conjunction with an updating filter list (which blocks adverts from a myriad of countries), so you can rest assured that you will not be bombarded with ads no matter which website you visit! In addition, you can manually hide any elements on the page you do not like with this addon. The “Element Hiding Helper for AdBlock Plus” add-on makes it much more user friendly to shape the way you see the web to your own liking. 

            2)     HTTPS-Everywhere

Ever wish that the website you visited would automatically take you to the more secure version of itself, especially when pertaining to your sensitive information? There is an add-on for that concern aptly named HTTPS-Everywhere. This add-on forces a numerous amount of popular (and some not so popular) websites out there to force encryption if that website has such an option available. Sites such as google and facebook are included in the rule set, and if a site you frequent is not supported, you can write your own.

https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere 

     3)     Flagfox

An extension which seamlessly determines which country the server location of the site you are visiting, and displays it by putting a little clickable flag in the address bar. Clicking the flag gives you the IP address of the country, and will even map out a best estimate to its location. It also includes things such as the LAT and LONG of the server location. This add-on could be key if you ever wanted to determine if a site you are visiting is actually fake. Being routed to another website which looks almost exactly the same as the legitimate version you are trying to access can happen significantly less if you pay attention to this little guy. Here is a great example of how I managed to figure out (before the news confirmed it) that the article written by a faux Keller (of the NYTimes) was illegitimate. The server hosting the fake New York Times was (and is not) even being hosted in America!

  

           4)    Search By Image for google

Taking usability one step further is this add-on. It allows the user to right click on any image, and instantly search that image against google images to find similar ones. So, instead of having to save the image and then upload it to google to be searched, this removes that time wasting step and allows for seamless image checking of whatever it is you are searching for…

         5) Webmail Ad Blocker

The web is fraught with annoying and potentially dangerous advertisements, and your inbox is no exception. Take the protection of ad blocking and spam one step further with this seamless add-on. This extension blocks those annoying ads placed on the right side of your inbox in Hotmail, Gmail, and Ymail.

--Re (Tech): Anonymous Browsing (Pt. 2)

Having your traffic constantly encrypted/obfuscated is the only other way to securely browse anonymously in this day and age. The great part about this method is that your data can be securely accessed (without prying eyes) from virtually anywhere you want. From a public wifi hotspot to an ISP provided Internet connection, data transmitted to and from the computer is completely secure. The are a host of VPN services out there, and all of them cost an incredibly small amount. But before we get into that, let's describe exactly how a VPN works to do all this great stuff. Don't worry, I will describe how a VPN works in the most simplest way I can.

VPN's (Virtual Private Networks) are essentially what they say they are; they are secure networks in which only approved users can access. There are two versions of a VPN: site-to-site VPNs, and remote access (for the purposes of this blog, we'll only focus on the remote access portion). VPN works by establishing a secure tunnel from your comptuer to that network. All data sent through that tunnel is encrypted, so there is already a layer of protection. The data you access will also be unknown because you are connected to the VPN.

So your Internet connection is connected to another network (VPN) through an encrypted tunnel. Plus, your VPN is making all the “request” to websites for you, and then sending you that data. Anyone watching your connection will see that you are only connected to a VPN, and that you are sending encrypted data. The website cannot know who you are, because you are not making the request, your VPN is! In addition, the data being sent to the site and the data sent to you are encrypted! And because the data is being routed through the higly secure VPN, anyone that actually operated the VPN (setup properly) cannot know either!

As a result, VPN's allow a user to bypass everything from censorship restrictions to geographic restrictions. You can connect to virtually any websites that are on the web, because you are not requesting the data, your VPN is. Utilizing a secure VPN, combined with the “Tails” operating system, and the TOR web browser makes the user as anonymous as the user can be.

Torrentfreak.com provides an excellent list on the different VPN providers who take VPN seriously (provided at the end of article). Lifehacker also did a top five best VPNs out there, which provide a handy list.

In the following tech post after this one, I will list some add-ons that can be downloaded by firefox users that can help encrypt traffic, keep track of your bookmarks, etc. These add-ons will genrally provide more functionality to firefox and in some cases keep the user slightly more protected on the web. Make no mistake however; the only way to stay completely anonymous is through the methods that were listed previously.

Links:

https://torrentfreak.com/which-vpn-providers-really-take-anonymity-seriously-111007/

http://lifehacker.com/5759186/five-best-vpn-service-providers

--Re (News): The government is watching you

--Re (News): The government is watching you.

If you live within the United States, you probably have not heard much about the spying campaign being waged by a multitude of organizations. Wired Magazine did a fantastic piece on the level of spying taking place (link included below), and it comes as no surprise to people who are involved in the tech industry. This has been confirmed on numerous reputable independent news coverage including “Democracy Now!”, “The Young Turks”, and so on. CSPAN has footage on testimony provided by these incredibly powerful individuals involved in the echelons of spying already taking place.

Numerous whistleblowers tried to sound the bell regarding the illegal dragnet spying, including William Binney a former NSA director of World Geopolitical and Military Analysis Reporting Group. He had worked for the NSA for nearly three decades and was heavily involved in developing the system that has been in use today to spy on American citizens. In the interview by “Democracy Now!”, Mr. Binney states that the NSA truly is lying and has been monitoring American citizens under the excuse of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. What this means is that every American citizen who utilizes or produces any type of data (this includes cell phone calls) as had this information recorded.

Mr. Binney, Former NSA Director.

I saw a disturbed individual on the train (who hasn't?) a couple years back, and he seemed to be on edge. He rather audibly let the rest of the passengers know that one of the reasons (I think he was seeing figures that were not there as well) he was so frightened was because the government was watching. Before I got the hell off that compartment of the train, I heard him remark that all of us were idiots. I actually did agree with him partially, but the extent to which I agreed was slightly less. Cameras and law enforcement are all over NYC, and we as individuals are constantly documenting one another. Combined with all the tracking applications on our cell phones, and easy camera access, we can easily be tracked 24/7. However, I guess I refused to believe the extent to which monitoring was taking place by the government entities and it's associates...

These new reports prove that the NSA and other agencies with similar capacities have been actively working to collect information on the citizenry. These are completely against the rights of American citizens, and work to undermine democracy in the “Leader of the Free world” itself. If these sorts of unreasonable searches and seizures are taking place with our data with impunity, who knows what other kinds of fraud waste and abuse are occurring. If this is the case, then truly what is the point of the government? The government is suppose to guard against such things, not participate in them. Then again, the whole 2008 economic crisis and the steps that were taken to protect the banks instead of the citizenry certainly lends credence to these claims Read my earlier post regarding ways to guard your privacy and to make yourself virtually anonymous. Also read up on information regarding Jacob Applebaum and the whole TOR project movement. Remember that this is the government, and that apparently they are getting paid to compromised your privacy and security.

Oh, and regarding those not in the United States, but who have made contact with American citizens in the United States, those interactions have always been recorded.

Sources:

http://www.democracynow.org/2012/4/20/exclusive_national_security_agency_whistleblower_william

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/03/ff_nsadatacenter/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCqQ_wbp74o

--Re (Tech): Top Ten 360 Games for Single Player (on a budget).

--Re (Tech): Top Ten Xbox 360 Games Single Player (for under $30).

            These are the top ten games for the Xbox 360 that certainly give you the most bang for your buck. All games listed will be rated well above a 8.0 (gamespot rankings), and all are guaranteed to blow away as much time as you can possibly fathom with your miser like eye. Note: These are not in an order of highest rank to low; they are simply a list of games for the frugal shopper. The games listed will be soley focused on their single player aspect, and not their multiplayer content. This is all about the cheapest and most fun way to game on a tight budget (It really does not get any better than this). Replayability and length are also key within these judgments. Finally, these prices are taking from Amazon.com USED section. I mean, come on, we are talking frugality after all...

*Game of The Year edition means that the game comes with ALL available DLC (downloadable content) packaged.

*The prices do not factor in shipping and handling.

1. Red Dead Redemption Game Of The Year Edition ($22.98)
   
   
   
2. Deus Ex: Human Revolution ($9.47)
      
3.  Split Second ($5.94)
4. 
   NBA 2K12 (or really any within the series after 2K9) ($18.50)
5. Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition ($23.93)
6. Borderlands Game Of The Year Edition ($16.99)
7. Fallout 3 Game of The Year Edition ($11.95)
8. Elder Scrolls IV: Game of The Year Edition ($10.47)
9. Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood ($13.59)
10. Ace Combat 6 ($7.21)

            All of these are incredible games and waste an equally incredible amount of time, and are sure to keep you entertained for years. Games which have high replayability and longevity tend to be RPG games. Elder Scrolls and Borderlands are definitely two of these types of games. Sports and simulation games also have obvious replayability value to them. If you have any other suggestions, don't hesitate to drop a suggestion.

--Re (News): USPS Faces Man-Made default

--Re (News): USPS Faces man-made default.

     It is no secret that the United States Postal Service has been facing a fiscal crisis of sorts for some time. Although this seems to be rather underreported, the USPS seems to be steadily marching towards the end of its very own existence. Contrary to popular belief, the crisis that is being faced by the Post office is not because of an increase in Internet usage. Nor is it as a result of an incredulous amount of fraud waste and abuse by the service. It is single handedly due to the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 (PAEA) which forces the service to pay for 75 years of future health care benefit payments withing a single decade time span. This act, which was and Is clearly an impossible task to achieve, has forced a man made budgeting crisis onto the Post office.

     In addition, no other government organization is subject to such an incredible mandate. Combined with the partisanship and the incredible amount of money involved with all sectors of the government, this act seems to be a concerted attack on the service. This service has been available since 1775, and is thought to be a mandatory service to be provided by the government to the people. And until we can materialize products from sites such as Amazon.com through our computer, we still need these services for our shipping needs. The most sickening part of all of this is that the post office would have been in the black (meaning would have brought in a profit) but for the rather insane act that they are required to abide by.

     To solve this “deficit problem”, there have been numerous entities, representatives, and senators who have suggested that we move to privatize these services. Combined with this act, this would mean that all Americans would be beholden to private corporations for every form of their postage needs. If the USPS is allowed to fall this means that people (obviously) will be forced to pay more, whilst these corporations would be allowed to maximize their profits. Corporations ultimate mandate is to make as much profit as possible, by any and all means necessary. I do wonder what Benjamin Franklin, the first postmaster general and one of THE "founding fathers", would say to all of this.

Source: http://www.democracynow.org/2012/8/1/as_us_postal_service_faces_default