[TELEGRAPH.CO.UK] British owner reunited with lost bird only to find he doesn't speak English any more
Posted by: Fred ||
10/15/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
You have to understand. He (the parrot) had bought a condo on the Costa Del Sol, and with the real estate collapse and all, it took some time to get his finances straight. (Sold out to a Moldavian executive.)
Posted by: ed in texas ||
10/15/2014 7:37 Comments ||
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#2
This could only happen in Southern California.
Posted by: frozen al ||
10/15/2014 10:57 Comments ||
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#3
You might worry if the parrot goes for another sojourn, returns 4 years later speaking Arabic, Farsi, or Urdu. Better debrief him first.
A Dallas nurse who has tested positive for Ebola violated infection control guidelines by flying on a commercial jetliner from Cleveland to Dallas the night before she arrived at the hospital with a fever, officials said today. The CDC is reaching out to the 132 passengers who flew with the woman on Frontier Airlines Flight 1143 on Monday evening, landing in Dallas at 8:16 p.m. The health care worker had no symptoms during the flight, the CDC said, but officials are identifying and notifying passengers because she arrived at the hospital with a fever the following morning. Frontier Airlines flight - and the same jet when it was reused hours later. Lots of potential exposure to flight crews, passengers, and service crews. And all the people they come into contact with. This is starting to look like a bad movie
The nurse, who has been identified as Amber Vinson, 29, was part of the team at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital who took care of Thomas Eric Duncan, a Liberian man who died of Ebola on Oct. 8. Vinson was one of the nurses who was very involved with the care for Ebola patient Duncan, who died of Ebola at the Dallas hospital. She drew his blood, inserted catheters, and dealt with his bodily fluids, according to Duncan's medical records obtained by the Associated Press.
Both nurses who became infected had contact with Duncan in his first days in the Dallas hospital -- on Sept. 28, 29 and 30 -- when he was having "substantial amounts" of vomiting and had diarrhea. notably on these dates the hospital admin did not have full protective equipment on their people - see other post about this
He said officials will be assessing other health workers who had extensive contact with Duncan on these days.
She is the second member of the hospital staff to contract the virus and a Dallas official warned today that additional cases among the hospital's health care workers are a "very real possibility."
She will be transferred to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta after she became the second person to contract the disease while working in the Dallas facility.
One question that has been raised is why Duncan was not transported from Dallas to one of the two other hospitals with specialized isolation units -- one in Omaha, Nebraska, and the other at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia -- which have successfully treated Ebola patients.
#2
The CDC is decontaminating the second nurse's home. She is in the hospital. I thought the virus only lasted 72 hours outside a host? The home is empty, let it sit and the virus will die. Or is the 72 hour life cycle not true?
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
10/15/2014 17:23 Comments ||
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#3
Don't worry! We have top men on the job. Top men! If any of these people come down with Ebola, we will track down their contacts and see if any of them get sick. Then we will track down *their* contacts and see if any of them get sick. Wash, rinse, repeat.
#4
The health workers who treated Dallas’ first Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan should not have been allowed to move around, Dallas county health director Zachary Thompson said Wednesday.
Thompson said that decision isn’t up to him — the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are handling the monitoring of those workers. He said he hasn’t heard any discussion about quarantine. But if it was up to the county health department, the patients “wouldn’t have been able to move around,” Thompson said.
If the state &/or county authorities are not able to order quarantines, then their laws need to be changed a couple of years ago.
#5
Sooooooooo the new protocol is that potential high-risk ebola cases here in the US are no longer allowed freedom of movement, yet all of West Africa gets a pass. Noted.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
10/15/2014 18:01 Comments ||
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#6
CBS News is reporting she contacted CDC, told them she had a 99.5 degree temp and they OK'd her flight back...but did not order the plane decontaminated or seats around her cleared or...anything. CDC head Tom Freiden needs to GO
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/15/2014 20:02 Comments ||
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#7
"M-O-O-N, that spells Ebola"
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/15/2014 20:19 Comments ||
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#8
When you first reaction to a potential existential national crisis is to go mugging in front of cameras on national TV, maybe you should try some other line of work.
Co-workers of a Dallas nurse who contracted Ebola from a sick patient say they worked for days without proper protective gear and that the hospital's Ebola protocols and procedures were unclear and inadequate, leaving workers and hospital systems prone to contamination.
Duncan was left in a nonquarantined zone for several hours, and a nurse supervisor faced resistance from hospital authorities after demanding that Duncan be moved to an isolation unit. Additionally, Duncan's lab specimens were sent through the hospital's tube system, potentially contaminating the entire system, the nurses said.
Nurses who interacted with Duncan were given the option of wearing special N95 masks, but some supervisors said the masks were not necessary, the nurses said, according to the statement.
"For their necks, nurses had to use medical tape, that is not impermeable and has permeable seams, to wrap around their necks in order to protect themselves, and had to put on the tape and take it off on their own," the statement reads. "Nurses had to interact with Mr. Duncan with whatever protective equipment was available, at a time when he had copious amounts of [explosive] diarrhea and [projectile] vomiting which produces a lot of contagious fluids." Apparently they were using regular "earloop" type masks, not full coverage respirators, which had attached disposable faceshields, and worse: paper type gowns, not the solid waterproof ones. This isnt bad medical personnel, this is classic bad administration. Trying to contain costs when they should be trying to contain disease and instead putting their people (and the public) at risk.
BRUSSELS — When a French nurse working as a volunteer in West Africa tested positive for Ebola last month, it took 50 hours to get her to Paris for treatment on a private American plane that had to fly all the way from Georgia to pick her up.
The nurse survived, but according to the aid group that sent her to Liberia and arranged to get her out, Europe’s failure to establish a swift evacuation service for infected medical workers has become a serious hurdle impeding the battle against Ebola in West Africa.
“For us, this is a big problem,” said Brice de le Vingne, director of operations for the group, Doctors Without Borders. “We will not be able to convince volunteers to go to these countries to help tackle the epidemic if we don’t have a good evacuation system.”
Dr. Hervé Raffin, the general director of Medic’Air, said the biggest obstacle was a shortage not of aircraft but of pilots willing to fly Ebola patients. He said his company’s usual pilots had all refused because “they think the risk is too high,” adding that he knew of only two pilots in all of Europe who would fly Ebola evacuation missions.
A 25-bed treatment center that the American military is building in Liberia to treat health workers could help relieve some of the strain. While visiting an Ebola treatment unit run by International Medical Corps in Liberia, Gen. Darryl A. Williams, commander of United States Army soldiers operating in Africa, said his forces had no general mandate to evacuate American medical workers who become infected. But he added, “If conditions warrant, we’re not going to turn our back."
A spokesman for Ms. Georgieva said the European Commission was also hoping to reach an arrangement soon with Phoenix Air, a private American company that works under contract for the United States government and is the only air ambulance operator equipped to handle patients who have developed full-blown Ebola.
The company, based near Atlanta, has two Gulfstream jets equipped to carry patients with highly infectious diseases like Ebola and is outfitting a third. The planes have flown more than a dozen people infected with Ebola out of West Africa, including the French nurse.
Oct 15 (Reuters) - A second Texas healthcare worker who treated the first patient in the United States to be diagnosed with Ebola has tested positive for the disease, the Texas Department of State Health Services said in a statement on Wednesday.
The worker at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital, who cared for Thomas Eric Duncan, was immediately isolated after reporting a fever on Tuesday, the department said.
"Health officials have interviewed the latest patient to quickly identify any contacts or potential exposures, and those people will be monitored," the department said.
The news comes just days after another nurse, 26-year-old Nina Pham, became the first person infected by Ebola in the United States while caring for Duncan during much of his 11 days in the hospital. He died on Oct. 8.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a statement that it was performing confirmation testing of Texas' preliminary tests on the new patient.
"An additional health care worker testing positive for Ebola is a serious concern, and the CDC has already taken active steps to minimize the risk to health care workers and the patient," the CDC said. (Reporting by Curtis Skinner in San Francisco; Editing by Alison Williams)
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says this morning that Amber Joy Vinson, the second Texas Health Resources Presbyterian Dallas to contract Ebola, traveled by air on Monday — “the day before she reported her symptoms,” as the CDC puts it.
The CDC says she flew Frontier Airlines Flight 1143 from Cleveland to Dallas/Fort Worth International on October 13, landing at 8:16 Dallas time. The CDC is asking all 132 passengers who flew on that trip to call 1-800-232-4636.
“After 1 p.m. ET, public health professionals will begin interviewing passengers about the flight, answering their questions, and arranging follow up,” says a statement from the CDC. “Individuals who are determined to be at any potential risk will be actively monitored.”
The CDC cautions: “The healthcare worker exhibited no signs or symptoms of illness while on flight 1143, according to the crew. Frontier is working closely with CDC to identify and notify passengers who may have traveled on flight 1143 on Oct. 13."
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have notified state health officials that the second health care worker in Dallas diagnosed with Ebola visited family in Akron from October 8-13. State health officials say they have been working with the CDC and the Summit County health officials to identify those who may have been in contact with the health care worker. Officials are also working with the airline to identify individuals on her flight from Cleveland to Dallas - Fort Worth on October 13. It's Frontier Airlines flight 1143.
There are no confirmed cases of Ebola in Ohio.
Visit WAKR.net for the latest information as it becomes available.
Now I'm wondering who I shook hands with at church on Sunday.
#8
Whistle-blower nurses issue anonymous statement about confused response at Presbyterian Dallas ER to Ebola case
DALLAS — Nurses at the Dallas hospital where a Liberian man died of Ebola described a confused and chaotic response to his arrival in the emergency room, alleging in a statement Tuesday that he languished for hours in a room with other patients and that hospital authorities resisted isolating him.
In addition, they said, the nurses tending him had flimsy protective gear and no proper training from hospital administrators.
The allegations, made under unusual circumstances, provided the first detailed portrait of Thomas Eric Duncan’s second trip to the emergency room...A statement outlining a litany of damning assertions was read by Deborah Burger, co-president of National Nurses United. The Oakland group does not represent the Dallas nurses, who are nonunionized, but has been vocal about what it says are hospitals’ failures to prepare for Ebola.
The Dallas nurses asked National Nurses United to read their statement so they could air complaints anonymously and without fear of losing their jobs, National Nurses United executive director RoseAnn DeMoro said from Oakland, Calif. DeMoro refused to say how many nurses signed off on the letter or how many were on the media call, but she said all of them worked at Presbyterian and had been involved in Duncan’s care or had direct knowledge of what had occurred after he arrived by ambulance.
The statement alleged that when Duncan was brought to Presbyterian by ambulance Sept. 28 with Ebola-like symptoms, he was “left for several hours, not in isolation, in an area” where up to seven other patients were. “Subsequently, a nurse supervisor arrived and demanded that he be moved to an isolation unit, yet faced stiff resistance from other hospital authorities,” they alleged.
Duncan’s lab samples were sent through the usual hospital tube system “without being specifically sealed and hand delivered. The result is that the entire tube system … was potentially contaminated,” they said. Last week I quoted an article which said one of Patient Zero's relatives knew about the lack of isolation on the 2nd ER visit, and personally called the CDC &/or the TX state health department to tell them about the patient's origination in the Hot Zone and that he thought his sick relative should have been in isolation.
#9
How many paid computer experts do they have to check no fly lists and none of the people from Dallas E bola Hospital were supposed to fly think they need more computers server farms and sat tracking or do people need to pull their FUCKING HEADS OUT OF THEIR ASSES?!? WHAT A FUCKING JOKE A TERA PLOP !!!!!!! NOT LIKE THE LIST WAS LONG OR IT WAS THE CHINS IN THE CHINA PHONE BOOK FUCKING PATHETIC!
#10
How many paid computer experts do they have to check no fly lists and none of the people from Dallas E bola Hospital were supposed to fly think they need more computers server farms and sat tracking or do people need to pull their FUCKING HEADS OUT OF THEIR ASSES?!? WHAT A FUCKING JOKE A TERA PLOP !!!!!!! NOT LIKE THE LIST WAS LONG OR IT WAS THE CHINS IN THE CHINA PHONE BOOK FUCKING PATHETIC!
#11
Whul, you need to understand the no-fly lists are for critical purposes, like monitoring tea-party, no government types. That and making sure that the TSA doesn't bother our betters, like the Saudis.
Posted by: ed in texas ||
10/15/2014 13:59 Comments ||
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#12
Last week I quoted an article which said one of Patient Zero's relatives knew about the lack of isolation on the 2nd ER visit, and personally called the CDC &/or the TX state health department to tell them about the patient's origination in the Hot Zone and that he thought his sick relative should have been in isolation. Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418
All you have to do to understand the hospital's almost militant reluctance to isolate Patient Zero is flip to the Ferguson, Missouri headlines.
[HOSTED.AP.ORG] West Africa could face up to 10,000 new Ebola cases a week within two months, the World Health Organization warned Tuesday, adding that the death rate in the current outbreak has risen to 70 percent.
WHO assistant director-general Dr. Bruce Aylward gave the grim figures during a news conference in Geneva. Previously, the agency had estimated the Ebola mortality rate at around 50 percent overall. In contrast, in events such as flu pandemics, the death rate is typically under 2 percent.
Acknowledging that Ebola was "a high mortality disease," Aylward said the U.N. health agency was still focused on trying to get sick people isolated and provide treatment as early as possible.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/15/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
The only strategy that can work at this stage (and probably the last couple of months) is forced containment, ie shooting people who try and leave containment areas.
It means condeming thousands to tens of thousands to save millions.
I am certain no one will make that call until it is too late.
#2
By my calculations, extrapolated from the WHO figures until they stopped printing them, we should be up for 7500 new cases this month.
November: 17,000 new cases.
Then it starts getting bigger exponentially
December: 38,000
January; 86,000
#5
I blame it on the man climate change and the republican led sequestration. As you will note, the mortalities are disproportionately democrat or potential democrats.
#6
At least we can stop worrying about peek oilz. And by gawd this Ebola stuff makes it to town Ima gonna say the hell with and by a couple cartons of Camels.
#9
anon 1 - I believe that is the desired outcome. I'm becoming more of the opinion that there are entrenched minds that want ebola here in the US. Of course, being elites, they can safely manage the situation...as they see fit.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
10/15/2014 13:57 Comments ||
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#10
Even if half the die-hard Democratic voters are dead by Election Day 2016, they will still vote the straight Dem ticket, you betcha.
#11
Champ is said to now be getting involved, cancelling fund raisers and trips. The Dems are pulling their campaign machine out of Kentucky. Nothing from Boehner or the pubs regarding Ebola or much of anything else. I have to wonder if their already planning on a postponement of the November election.
#12
"As you will note, the mortalities are disproportionately democrat or potential democrats."
Where's the problem, B?
/(do I really need it?)
Posted by: Barbara ||
10/15/2014 14:55 Comments ||
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#13
"I have to wonder if their already planning on a postponement of the November election."
I have no doubt they'll try, B. >:-(
Posted by: Barbara ||
10/15/2014 14:56 Comments ||
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#14
If it can be validated that ebola has the potential to become aerosolized, that will be a massive game changer. Anyone recognize this cone shaped object ?
[Iran Press TV] Contact with an Ebola patient in the United States has put the lives of 76 health care workers in danger, health authorities say.
The Ebola virus spreads through direct contact with infected blood, feces or sweat. It can also be spread through sexual contact or the unprotected handling of contaminated corpses.
The 76 include all those who entered Thomas Eric Duncan's room or handed his blood specimens at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas, said Thomas Frieden, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) at a news conference in Washington on Tuesday.
"I wish we had put a team on the ground the day the first patient was diagnosed," Frieden said, referring to the 42-year-old Liberian patient, who died at the hospital on Wednesday.
"There were 76 people who had some level of contact and therefore are being actively monitored," said the CDC director, adding they will be checked for fever on a daily basis.
Nina Pham, a nurse infected with the virus, has had contact with another person who is also being monitored.
Frieden said the 48 people, initially announced to be at risk due to contact with Duncan before he was hospitalized, have "now passed through the highest risk period."
A two-week mark signifies a decrease in the risk of Ebola development yet the virus has a 21-day incubation period, meaning the person should still be monitored.
Duncan, who is the first patient diagnosed with Ebola inside the US, died after a 10-day stay at hospital.
In the US, concern is rising about the disease, which has already killed 4,447 people, with the large majority of victims in West Africa, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
There is currently no known cure for Ebola, which is a form of hemorrhagic fever with diarrhea, vomiting and bleeding as its symptoms.
The Ebola virus spreads through direct contact with infected blood, feces or sweat. It can also be spread through sexual contact or the unprotected handling of contaminated corpses.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/15/2014 00:00 ||
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#2
Extensive coverage for the last 2 hours on the Cleveland TV channels.
The 2nd nurse's mother works at Kent State University along with 2 other family members - all 3 of whom she spent time with during her visit last weekend. KSU has asked all 3 family members to stay off campus for 21 days & monitor themselves.
#3
I just posted a Breitbart story that says Ebola can be spread through the air we breath. If I never hear from that CDC fok Dr. Thomas Frieden again, it would be too soon.
#4
According to his Wikipedia entry, Frieden started out in infectious disease control but went to work for the New York City health department and focused on tobacco, AIDS, diabetes and food policies.
Back in the Jurassic Era when I was studying microbiology, the CDC was known as the Center for Disease Control and was highly respected. Today, it has become the Center for Disease Control and Prevention - a classic case of bureaucratic mission creep. You had one job...
Too lazy to look for the link, but someone did some experiments that showed NHPs (Non-Human Primates, aka monkeys and certain Democrats) could catch Ebola via the air from pigs - Ebola makes pigs sneeze along with it's better known symptoms. Monkeys could *not* catch it from infected monkeys via the air. This suggests *anything* that creates an aerosol creates a hazard. Yes, pressure-washing Ebola vomit off the sidewalk is one such activity. As is explosive diarrhea and projectile vomiting.
#5
Rantburg U. Jobs Board: Finally some good news from Chenega, Corp (Alaskan Native American owned, see feathers and tomahawk logo). That is if you are looking for a CDC armed guard position, can steer clear of POTUS, elevators, and leave your camera at home.
Armed Security Guard, CDC CTAP (1400002336)
Chenega Corporation
Posted on: 10/15/14
Minimum Security Clearance
Public Trust Clearance Location
Atlanta, Georgia 30301 (map)
Workplace: No Preference
Travel: No Traveling
Abbreviated Summary:
* The Armed Security Guard (ASG) is primarily responsible to perform protective service work such as guarding government owned or leased buildings and property, protecting government equipment and material, and controlling access to government installations by employees, visitors, and residents. The ASG will respond to emergencies, enforce government regulations, and conduct crowd, parking, and traffic control, inspections, and perimeter and internal access control. The ASG does not act in the capacity of a law enforcement officer, and has no arrest or apprehension powers. The ASG is armed with a side arm, shotgun, or other weapons as required.
* Required to follow all company personnel and safety policies, and perform all assigned duties in a safe work manner.
* Will arrive at work in proper uniform and carrying needed, issued equipment.
* Will be required to exercise force up to and including deadly force.
* Must have valid state Armed Guard license requirements.
Job Guard Services
Primary Location
United States-Georgia-Atlanta
Organization
Chenega Total Assets Protection (CTAP)
Recruiter
James Zargan
[Iran Press TV] A United Nations ...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks... employee who contracted the deadly Ebola virus in West Africa has died after arriving in Germany for medical treatment, a report says.
A Sudanese doctor, who had arrived in Germany from Liberia last week, died Monday night in the city of Leipzig in Saxony state, St Georg Hospital said in a brief statement on Tuesday.
"Despite intensive medical care and the best efforts by medical staff, the 56-year-old UN employee succumbed to the serious infection," it noted.
Germany has previous treated two other Ebola patients infected in Sierra Leone, despite growing fears at the time of a potential outbreak of the deadly disease in Europe.
The patients included a Senegal ... a nation of about 14 million on the west coast of Africa bordering Mauretania to the north, Mali to the east, and a pair of Guineas to the south, one of them Bissau. It is 90 percent Mohammedan and has more than 80 political parties. Its primary purpose seems to be absorbing refugees... ese who was treated in Hamburg and released on October 4, and a Ugandan doctor currently undergoing treatment in Frankfurt.
The World Health Organization (WHO) warned last week that the spread of the Ebola virus across Europe is almost inevitable.
The WHO made the comments just hours after Europe's first case of Ebola infection was confirmed in Spain.
The infection rate is likely to exceed 10,000 new cases per week in the next two months, the WHO said.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/15/2014 00:00 ||
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[Breitbart] Last three paragraphs:
Savage observed that The Champ is declaring war on “white heterosexuals who are somewhat traditional, not necessarily faith oriented, that he is targeting that class of people… everything the man does is sort of a racial war... it’s a war of race and gender orientation. And he’s saying they have the majority. I mean, it’s pretty astonishing. The man who is suppose to be the President of the American people, dividing people like this. It’s shocking.”
Given Savage's expertise on nutrition, on a final note Marlow asked Savage what he thought of FLOTUS' dietary dictates for school children. Savage replied that they want to be “monitoring our every word, controlling what we eat and drink, think and speak.
"In 1991, I wrote a book called The Skeptical Nutritionist. The first line was about 'food fascism.' It reads: 'If you can control a person’s diet, you can control everything they do.' This is not about health per say, even though some of her suggestions make sense; this is about social control through food control.”
[AnNahar] Hackers based in Russia used a flaw in Microsoft Windows to spy on NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A single organization with differing goals, equipment, language, doctrine, and organization.... , European governments and other organizations as far back as 2009, security researchers said Tuesday.
A report by the cyber-security firm iSight Partners said the flaw dubbed "Sandworm" allowed the cyber spies to gain access to computers using all versions of Windows for PCs and servers during the past five years.
The researchers said Microsoft was notified of the vulnerability and was making a patch available on Tuesday.
The report said the team exploiting this flaw began operating in 2009, and stepped up its efforts in late 2013, as the crisis in Ukraine broke out.
The researchers said the targets included NATO, Ukrainian government organizations, Western European governments, energy and telecom companies in Europe and US academic institutions, but added that "visibility is limited and that there is a potential for broader targeting from this group."
They noted that many of the attacks "have been specific to the Ukrainian conflict with Russia and to broader geopolitical issues related to Russia."
According to a blog post by iSight, it's not clear what data may have been stolen but that the broad range of attacks "virtually guarantees that all of those entities targeted fell victim to some degree."
"We immediately notified targeted entities, our clients across multiple government and private sector domains and began working with Microsoft to track this campaign and develop a patch to the zero-day vulnerability," iSight added.
It noted that NATO was targeted as early as December 2013, and that other attacks hit a Polish energy firm and French telecommunications company.
The cyber-spying effort was referred to as Quedach by the security firm F-Secure, which described some elements of the campaign last month "but only captured a small component of the activities" and failed to identify use of the security flaw, according to iSight.
Windows 10's 'built-in keylogger'? Ha ha, says Microsoft – no, it just monitors your typing
Don't want Microsoft tracking you online and collecting data on your computing habits? Then you probably shouldn't install the Windows 10 Technical Preview, Redmond says.
The interwebs were abuzz on Monday over concerns about the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy of Microsoft's newly released, not-even-beta-yet OS, with some sites going as far as to claim that Windows 10 comes with a "built-in keylogger" to watch users' every move.
Turns out these Chicken Littles were right – sort of – but according to Microsoft they should have known about the data collection from the get-go, because they agreed to it.
"With Windows 10, we're kicking off the largest ever open collaborative development effort that will change the way we build and deliver Windows," a Redmond spokesperson told El Reg in an emailed statement. "Users who join the Windows Insider Program and opt-in to the Windows 10 Technical Preview are choosing to provide data and feedback that will help shape the best Windows experience for our customers."
And sure enough, although Microsoft isn't providing detailed information about what it's monitoring and how, the red flags for privacy freaks are all there in the legalese everyone breezed through before downloading the preview.
According to the Windows Insider Program's Terms of Use, "The purpose of the Program is to ... provide Microsoft with feedback and detailed usage data about all activities occurring on those devices so that Microsoft and its partners can improve their products and services."
That explicitly includes "personal information," the terms go on to say, and Microsoft might even contact program members with additional information that is personalized just for them.
The program's Privacy Statement gives a few hints about what kind of stuff Microsoft is looking for. Redmond reserves the right to collect such info as, "your name, email address, preferences and interests; browsing, search and file history; phone call and SMS data; device configuration and sensor data; and application usage."
The Technical Preview also phones home with data about the files you open and "performance or usage information," including what program features you use most often and how long the system takes to respond to clicks.
And then there's this gem, which is the one that got everyone moaning about keyloggers:
[When you] enter text, we may collect typed characters and use them for purposes such as improving autocomplete and spellcheck features.
Microsoft hasn't said just how many of those typed characters it might collect or how often, but this is in fact something that the Windows 10 Technical Preview might do.
Does this mean Microsoft is planning to use Windows 10 to swipe everyone's online banking passwords? The chances are slim to none – although if you do your online banking on a prerelease test version of Windows with an experimental build of Internet Explorer, you deserve what you get.
Microsoft does, however, seem to be getting more aggressive about the kind of user experience data collection it has been building into prerelease versions of its flagship products for several years now. (Remember all the user data that Redmond said went into crafting the Office Ribbon UI? Where do you suppose it came from?)
How much of this data-collection the shipping version of Windows 10 will do remains to be seen.
"As we get closer to a final product, we will continue to share information through our terms of service and privacy statement about how customer data is collected and used, as well as what choices and controls are available," Microsoft told The Reg.
For now, though, bear in mind that when you fire up the Windows 10 Technical Preview, you are definitely being watched. But you knew that
#5
I'd bet dollars to donuts that our own intelligence services were both aware and made use of this. Be funny if they found out about it from spying on the Russians, though.
Redmond reserves the right to collect such info as, "your name, email address, preferences and interests; browsing, search and file history; phone call and SMS data; device configuration and sensor data; and application usage."
In an on-line data analysis class, we used cell phone sensor data to determine what activity a user was engaged in - walking, sitting, lying down, going up or down stairs.
[Iran Press TV] Russian foreign minister says his country will not give in to the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... 's demands over the crisis in Ukraine, noting that the 28-member bloc will be loser of the sanctions it has slapped against Moscow.
"It goes without saying that we are not going to discuss some sort of criteria for the removal of sanctions," Sergei Lavrov told members of the Association of European Businesses in Moscow on Tuesday.
He added, "Whoever introduced them should cancel them. We are not going to implement someone's far-fetched demands. We don't know who is losing out more in terms of economy: Russia or the European Union."
The top Russian diplomat further noted that the total damage from anti-Moscow sanctions could cost EU taxpayers 40 billion euros ($50.6 billion) this year, and 50 billion euros ($63.3 billion) next year.
Lavrov stated that Russia is open to mending fences with European countries, saying, "I think that no clear-headed person in Europe would dispute an idea that there is no sensible alternative to improving ties between Russia and the EU."
Lavrov's comments came ahead of his planned meeting with US Secretary of State John F. I was in Vietnam, you know Kerry Former Senator-for-Life from Massachussetts, self-defined war hero, speaker of French, owner of a lucky hat, conqueror of Cambodia, and current Secretary of State... in Gay Paree later on Tuesday. The crisis in Ukraine is at the heart of the talks.
Ukraine's mainly Russian-speaking regions in the east have been the scene of deadly festivities between pro-Moscow forces and the Ukrainian army since Kiev launched military operations to stifle the pro-Russian protests in mid-April.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/15/2014 00:00 ||
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[DAWN] As Pakistain appears to head towards the highest number of polio ...Poliomyelitis is a disease caused by infection with the poliovirus. Between 1840 and the 1950s, polio was a worldwide epidemic. Since the development of polio vaccines the disease has been largely wiped out in the civilized world. However, since the vaccine is known to make Moslem pee-pees shrink and renders females sterile, bookish, and unsubmissive it is not widely used by the turban and automatic weapons set... cases in a single year, official data shows that an overwhelming 96 per cent of polio cases so far reported are among the Pashto-speaking population of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... and Fata.
Official epidemiological data recorded until October 1, 2014 reveals that the Wazir and Dawar tribes of North Wazoo have the highest ratio of the polio virus. The rustics on the other hand hold the government and Taliban equally responsible for the spread of polio virus in the region.
They are of the view that the bully boyz had banned the vaccination in parts of the tribal areas affected by the virus while the government and the administration never come up to their expectations and had left them at the mercy of the krazed killers.
According to data exclusively available with Dawn, out of these 96pc of cases, residents of North Waziristan Agency's Wazir tribe account for 34pc.
The Dawar tribe trails behind with 27pc, while the Afridi tribe accounts for 26pc of the cases so far this year.
The data further shows that out of those Pakhtuns who contracted the paralysing disease, 8pc were Banosi (Bannu residents), 4pc from Mohmand tribe and 1pc belonged to SLearned Elders of Islamnkhel tribe (one case each in Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... and South Waziristan tribal region).
Officials however also admit that, besides the given numbers, there exist a large number of cases which still need to be analysed.
They also endorse the statistics saying the tribes living in North Waziristan, parts of South Waziristan as well as Khyber agency are among the most affected population of Fata and KP.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/15/2014 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
The Pentagon on Monday released a report asserting decisively that climate change poses an immediate threat to national security, with increased risks from terrorism, infectious disease, global poverty and food shortages. It also predicted rising demand for military disaster responses as extreme weather creates more global humanitarian crises.
The report lays out a road map to show how the military will adapt to rising sea levels, more violent storms and widespread droughts. The Defense Department will begin by integrating plans for climate change risks across all of its operations, from war games and strategic military planning situations to a rethinking of the movement of supplies.
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, speaking Monday at a meeting of defense ministers in Peru, highlighted the report’s findings and the global security threats of climate change. The Pentagon’s increased emphasis on the national security threats of climate change is aimed in part at building support for a United Nations agreement, to be signed next year in Paris, that would require the world’s largest producers of planet-warming carbon pollution to slash their emissions.
The new report does not make any specific budget recommendations for how the military will pay for its climate change agenda, but if the Pentagon does request funding from Congress for its initiatives, it will clash with congressional Republicans, many of whom question the established scientific evidence that human activities are causing climate change.
#3
Well we won't have to worry about Pearl Harbor or San Francisco either, for that matter, what with the Sea levels going up. Most of Cuba will be gone and Copenhagen and Singapore will be radically swampy, to say the least.
There is always an upside. Louisiana will be toast, of course but that's all Bush's fault anyway. The Whales are safe, thank Timothy Leary ( up there is Heaven somewhere ).
Fort Sill will be about all that will be left. And no more Pendleton or Cherry Point. Always a nice thought.
Posted by: Big Thromoth3646 ||
10/15/2014 7:23 Comments ||
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#4
This is what is referred to as 'getting with the program'. Career decisions are being made around this.
Posted by: ed in texas ||
10/15/2014 7:32 Comments ||
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#5
This from the government that gets NASA on a diversity track.
"You wanna keep your new hardware program? You'd better get on the Global Warming train."
Posted by: Bobby ||
10/15/2014 7:32 Comments ||
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#12
"thank Timothy Leary ( up there is Heaven somewhere)"
I don't think that's where he landed, BT.
Posted by: Barbara ||
10/15/2014 16:32 Comments ||
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#13
IN my lifetime I have come to see government, basic federal government functions, all become tools of their political masters and lie, distort and obfuscate to the public to help the leftist agenda of the democrat party. Across a wide spectrum of government agencies once immune to political need, they now tell untruths or distort, or cook the books, or delay, or frankly in the case of DOJ and DHS, simply break the law knowingly through under enforcement, or selective enforcement..... no government long survives when it doesn't serve the people but thinks they serve it.....
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A Dallas nurse who has tested positive for Ebola violated infection control guidelines by flying on a commercial jetliner from Cleveland to Dallas the night before she arrived at the hospital with a fever, officials said today. The CDC is reaching out to the 132 passengers who flew with the woman on Frontier Airlines Flight 1143 on Monday evening, landing in Dallas at 8:16 p.m. The health care worker had no symptoms during the flight, the CDC said, but officials are identifying and notifying passengers because she arrived at the hospital with a fever the following morning. 
Co-workers of a Dallas nurse who contracted Ebola from a sick patient say they worked for days without proper protective gear and that the hospital's Ebola protocols and procedures were unclear and inadequate, leaving workers and hospital systems prone to contamination.
[HOSTED.AP.ORG] West Africa could face up to 10,000 new Ebola cases a week within two months, the World Health Organization warned Tuesday, adding that the death rate in the current outbreak has risen to 70 percent.
Rantburg U. Jobs Board: Finally some good news from Chenega, Corp (Alaskan Native American owned, see feathers and tomahawk logo). That is if you are looking for a CDC armed guard position, can steer clear of POTUS, elevators, and leave your camera at home. 
[Iran Press TV] A 
[AnNahar] Hackers based in Russia used a flaw in Microsoft Windows to spy on 
[Iran Press TV] Russian foreign minister says his country will not give in to the 
[DAWN] As Pakistain appears to head towards the highest number of 
Wazoo
