The US intelligence community is using Web 2.0 technology, including wikis, blogs, social networks and video sharing software, to speed up communication between people and agencies.

Wired.com is reporting on how US spies are already using their own internal version of Wikipedia called Intellipedia to share and collaborate on intelligence topics. US intelligence professionals routinely post and respond to classified blogs.

And now spies are using their own classified versions of YouTube called iVideo to post and view videos on military and intelligence issues.

The CIA’s Web 2.0 guru Sean Dennehy says “If someone in Tokyo has video that needs to get back to headquarters, they can upload it to this site and then it would be not only accessible to headquarters, but accessible to the entire network and then people could, using the comments, be able to start a discussion about that video and what the implications of that video are.”

So far iVideo is mostly used to share training-related videos, but Dennehy would like to eventually move a large number of intelligence agency videos to the system.

Videos must be divided based on classifications:

• Top Secret - is used by people in the 16 federal intelligence agencies who have the appropriate clearance.

• Secret - is used by employees of the Defense and State departments.

• Sensitive but Unclassified - is open to government employees generally and approved guests.

Source: Wired.com

The ’six degrees of separation’ notion states that every person on the planet is only six contacts away from every other person on Earth.

A new study from Microsoft’s Research Redmond Lab studied the six degrees of separation using instant messaging information gathered from Microsoft Messenger users.

The information gathered from people who use Microsoft Messenger included 4.5 terabytes of compressed information from 1 billion conversations per day over a month period of time.

The data was collected in June 2006 and contains information on 30 billion conversations between 240 million people.

The researchers were surprised to learn that the average number of contacts to get from one random person to another was only 6.6.

This number is very close to the ’six degrees of separation’ idea.

The Microsoft study was led by Eric Horvitz and Jure Leskovec. Horvitz stated that he was surprised that their results so closely matched the 1967 study.

He wondered whether the number six is a basic constant for human social interactions: ‘Do we have a natural harmonic for social communication?’ he asks. ‘This is my conjecture — more work needs to be done on that.’”

Source: ZDNet.com

RFID Wizards is reporting on a new system that allows the FBI to track people and assets secretly using Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) technology.

The Intelligent Perimeter Defense system is known as NOX and it allows the FBI to track people without their knowledge.

The NOX system uses high-resolution video images and RFID identification, for tracking and tracing people and assets in real time on a facility map to show the movement of both tagged objects and people. The system allows security personnel to monitor theft as it happens, even if the stolen item is hidden inside another object or article of clothing.

NOX is different from other security systems because it uses RFID for secret surveillance - RFID readers are hidden inside walls, floors, and ceilings; RFID tags are discretely placed; and only the security people know that the system is operational – until the thief is caught. At that point, all the thief knows is that he or she has been caught in the act by video cameras.

A commander with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service commented on the NOX technology by saying –

“It takes a criminal twelve seconds to defeat a lock or fence. Yet, we spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to create fences that only provide an illusion of security. NOX creates a virtual perimeter that tells us who is penetrating the perimeter, when they are doing it and, where it’s happening. With this information, we can respond with the appropriate level of force and prevent further penetration.”

NOX will have a large number of uses for both private and government sectors. It is estimated that employees steal over a billion dollars a week from their employers for a total of one trillion dollars annually.

Source: Industry Wizards

Here is an interesting news clip, featuring an interview with RateMyCop.com founder Gino Sesto and police officer Kevin Martin from Fox News.

The Associated Press is reporting on an interesting public records story. The US Federal Emergency Management Agency has requested that The Advocate newspaper of Baton Rouge, Louisiana pay nearly $210,000 for a public records request that requires the agency to produce over 2 million pages of documents.

The Advocate is investigating FEMA’s response to hurricanes Katrina and Rita and has officially requested the documents relating to the agency’s inspection and maintenance of government issued trailers and mobile homes. FEMA states that the first 100 pages of any public records request are free and every page thereafter costs 10 cents to produce for a total cost of about $210,000.

FEMA spokesman James McIntyre states that the agency charges for large public records requests that requires pulling FEMA employees from other jobs to handle the processing of the request.

The executive editor of The Advocate, Carl Redman, stated that FEMA has used stalling tactics to avoid the complying with the public records request ever since it was submitted in September 2006.

The newspaper is requesting copies of contracts, invoices and other public records associated with the trailers and mobile homes that have housed tens of thousands of victims of the 2005 hurricanes.

Source: MediaInfo.com

When criticism of public officials and law enforcement officials is silenced, what you effectively have is a police state.

Wired.com’s Threat Level blog has posted a piece about web hosting provider GoDaddy.com’s removal of a police-watchdog website called RateMyCop.com.

RateMyCop.com allows people to rate and post opinions on the uniformed police officers in their community. The controversial site is trying to restore service after GoDaddy.com stopped providing service to the site in light of criticism from law enforcement officials.

GoDaddy.com has given conflicting excuses for its decision to remove RateMyCop.com, which does not do much for the credibility of a major web hosting provider.

Rate My Cop founder Gino Sesto says he was given no advance notice from GoDaddy about the suspension of service.

Police departments were bothered by RateMyCop’s plans to watch police officers in January, when the Culver City, California, startup began issuing public information requests for lists of uniformed officers.

The website has been online since February 28th. It stores names and, in some cases, badge numbers on 140,000 cops in approximately 500 police departments, and allows users to post opinions about the police they’ve dealt with.

The site does not list information on undercover officers and does not list personal information on police officers like home phone numbers or residential addresses.

Officers can also use the site to respond to posted criticisms.

A GoDaddy spokeswoman stated that the company wouldn’t comment on the issue due to its privacy policy. Sesto is currently arranging web hosting with another company.

The site is currently live @ RateMyCop.com.

Source: Wired.com

ComputerWorld.com has published an interesting test of two popular social networking sites Facebook.com and LinkedIn.com to find out how they rank against each other for business-related purposes.

They compared the two social networks on 6 different measurements.

Here is a summary of the areas tested and results:

1. The ability to look for a job without your boss knowing –

Winner: TIE

Computer World Opinion:

LinkedIn seems to offer better job search services, especially if you’re a professional, because of its more businesslike atmosphere, its emphasis on business networking and the resume-like profiles that each user provides. However, if you’re nervous about your boss finding out about your job search, Facebook offers much more anonymity, since you can create an alternative personality just for that purpose. LinkedIn’s format actively discourages anonymity; you can create a false ID, but then you’d lose all your connections.

2. Research information about a job you’re interviewing for –

Winner: LinkedIn.com

Computer World Opinion:

Both LinkedIn and Facebook are great for networking, and if your “friends” at Facebook are employed at a variety of companies, they can offer as good a chance of finding contacts at a company you’re interested in as LinkedIn.

However, LinkedIn does provide more chances of contacts via its InMail service, which lets you contact friends of friends — very handy when you’re looking for contacts in a specific organization. It does cost an extra $20 a month, but if you’re interested in a well-paying position, the ability to network at that company is more than worth the cost.

3. Locate a contract worker for a three-month Web project –

Winner: Facebook.com

Computer World Opinion:

While LinkedIn does offer a job board, it’s not inexpensive to use, and there’s no guarantee that you’ll get any better results than through some other job board. (You are able to get some feedback on applicants from contacts who have worked with them, but that’s chancy.) Facebook’s networking abilities — sans added fees — gives it the win here.

4. Solicit ideas and discussion from team members –

Winner: Facebook.com

Computer World Opinion:

No question here: Facebook is the winner. Its setup was created for communication within groups of people, while LinkedIn is more about the individual.

5. Get feedback on a IT problems from peers outside your company –

Winner: LinkedIn.com

Computer World Opinion:

Again, no contest. Facebook isn’t really a place where you can jump in to easily find professional IT staffers (or tech enthusiasts) unless you know where to look. Assuming you don’t care who knows that you can’t solve a particular problem, LinkedIn is the better place to find an answer.

6. Stay in contact with former coworkers and associates –

Winner: TIE

Computer World Opinion:

This one ends in a dead heat. Networking is what both these services do, whether it’s the informal “friending” of Facebook or the more formal search for colleagues at LinkedIn. Either way, you can find old associates by searching through school and organization networks, contacting your existing friends/colleagues, and using social networking the way it’s supposed to be used.

Source: ComputerWorld.com

The Times Online is reporting on a unique FaceBook group that is being used to contact blood donors to let them know what blood types are needed and the locations that are in need of the blood.

A New York charity called Takes All Types collects information about the blood types that are needed in which areas, and sends out alerts to registered Facebook users who may be suitable blood donors.

Ben Bergman is a New-York-based recruiter set up the blood donor group and said that it has immediately attracted the interest of hospitals and blood banks.

Facebook.com now has over 38 million registered people that can be potential contacts for blood drive efforts.

Source: Times Online

In this short YouTube video, CNN interviews Chinese hackers, who claim to have broken into high-level private and government websites, including a Pentagon website. The hackers claim that they have been paid by the Chinese Government to conduct these security breeches.

In our wired world of Big Brother, Little Brothers, socially networked smart mobs, tagged images and RFID implanted humans, George Orwell is more timely than ever before, even when he didn’t get everything quite right. Below are some of my favorite Orwell quotes for our networked age.

—————————————-

Orwell foresaw Big Brother, but not all the networked Little Brothers –

“Big Brother is watching you.”

Orwell on freedom in general and freedom of speech in particular –

“Freedom is the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.”

Orwell on the ironic mixture of technology and human nature ( No, social networks will not make people more civilized. ) –

“As I write, highly civilized human beings are flying overhead, trying to kill me.”

George on the dangerous power of thoughts and words –

“But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.”

On the limitations of journalists and the press –

“Early in life I had noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper. ”

In times of stress, turmoil and disfunction, Orwell observed that some things still work –

“The atom bombs are piling up in the factories, the police are prowling through the cities, the lies are streaming from the loudspeakers, but the earth is still going round the sun.”

Orwell on the control of the means of communication —

“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”

Source of quotes: BrainyQuote.com