Police Protective Fund still suckering people

A friend posted a list compiled by Tampa Bay Times of America’s worst charities today so, knowing there’s a special place in Hell for scumbags who rip people off in the name of charity, I decided to check it out.

Lo and behold, spot number twenty was held by one of my favorite charities, the Police Protective Fund (PPF). You may recall I profiled the Police Protective Fund back in 2008 after I got a call from a solicitor seemingly trying his best to sound like a police officer.

According to tax records, PPF raised about $50 million from 2001 to 2010. Of that, roughly $15 million went to pay its solicitors. Oh, and as for the first responders PPF claims to assist, those brave men and women received $260,000 over that timeframe. That’s about $29,000 a year.

What most people don’t know is that the Police Protective Fund is a North Carolina corporation with its registered office at a corporation service on Hillsborough Street. I wonder if our fine attorney general would like to check these folks out. After all, they want to help cops, right? Why not help our state’s top cop investigate them for possible fraud?

70.3 million French phone records, 30 days: US envoy summoned after new NSA report draws ire

Here’s a story on the outrage expressed by our allies regarding NSA spying. What the article doesn’t mention is that these countries also engage in exactly the same kind of spying, against the US and other countries. In light of this, their protests ring a bit hollow.

The U.S. National Security Agency swept up 70.3 million French telephone records in a 30-day period, according to a newspaper report Monday that offered new details of the massive scope of a surveillance operation that has angered some of the country’s closest allies.

via 70.3 million French phone records, 30 days: US envoy summoned after new NSA report draws ire – The Washington Post.

Your D-Link router may have a backdoor

Another example that if you don’t own the source code to your software, you can’t be fully sure what it does.

A curious computer security professional published findings Saturday that deconstructed the firmware code for some D-Link router devices and discovered a backdoor built directly into the code. By changing the user-agent in a web browser to “xmlset_roodkcableoj28840ybtide,” a user could bypass the security on the device and get online or control the higher functions of the router.

via Your D-Link router may have a backdoor | The Raw Story.

Why Android SSL was downgraded from AES256-SHA to RC4-MD5 in late 2010

An Android developer has uncovered convincing evidence that Google inexplicably and deliberately dumbed-down Android’s SSL security.

“The change from the strong OpenSSL cipher list to a hardcoded one starting with weak ciphers is either a sign of horrible ignorance, security incompetence or a clever disguise for an NSA-influenced manipulation – you decide!”

Android is using the combination of horribly broken RC4 and MD5 as the first default cipher on all SSL connections. This impacts all apps that did not care enough to change the list of enabled ciphers (i.e. almost all existing apps). This post investigates why RC4-MD5 is the default cipher, and why it replaced better ciphers which were in use prior to the Android 2.3 release in December 2010.

via Why Android SSL was downgraded from AES256-SHA to RC4-MD5 in late 2010.

NSA’s $2B Spy Center is Going Up in Flames

Whoopsie.

The National Security Agency’s $2 billion mega spy center is going up in flames.Technical glitches have sparked fiery explosions within the NSA’s newest and largest data storage facility in Utah, destroying hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of equipment, and delaying the facility’s opening by one year.And no one seems to know how to fix it.

Within the last 13 months, at least 10 electric surges have each cost about $100,000 in damages, according to documents obtained by the Wall Street Journal. Experts agree that the system, which requires about 64 megawatts of electricity—that’s about a $1 million a month energy bill–isn’t able to run all of its computers and servers while keeping them cool, which is likely triggering the meltdowns.

via $2 Billion NSA Spy Center is Going Up in Flames | The Fiscal Times.

Flares over Raleigh attract no 911 calls

After learning from the Raleigh Fire Department that the flares I saw on the night of September 28th didn’t belong to them, I thought I’d reach out to the Raleigh-Wake 911 center to see if any calls had come in about the flares.

I got a response today from deputy director Walt Fuller who checked the records for downtown calls and turned up nothing:

I went back and looked into CAD and I saw several calls in the downtown area but they mostly security checks, traffic stops and other normal incidents. I saw no calls of the nature you mentioned.

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Residents seeing red after Raleigh ‘Color Run’ | abc11.com

Ed Crump with WTVD just ran a story on Raleigh’s Color Run fiasco (and nice headline, Ed. Sounds kinda familiar …)

RALEIGH (WTVD) — Some residents of historic Oakwood in downtown Raleigh say they are annoyed by the noise and mess left from last weekend’s “Color Run.”

Runners and volunteers played loud music and threw colored powder as part of the 5K event at Halifax Mall on Sept. 28.

However, some residents said they were really upset when their cars were towed off the street with less than 24-hours notice.

via Residents seeing red after Raleigh 'Color Run' | abc11.com.

The Snowden files: why the British public should be worried about GCHQ | World news | The Guardian

Good stuff from the Guardian.

There is a revealing moment in the most recent piece written for the Guardian by Sir David Omand, former head of GCHQ. He said that “the real debate we should be having … is about what privacy in a cyber-connected world can realistically mean given the volumes of data we hand over to the private sector in return for our everyday convenience, and the continued need for warranted access for security and law enforcement.”

That’s a total non-sequitur: Omand seems to think that just because we hand data over to Google and Facebook the government automatically has the right to access it. It’s as if, thanks to a global shortage of sticky gum, envelopes can no longer be sealed, so as a result the government awards itself a new right to mass-intercept and read everybody’s letters.

via The Snowden files: why the British public should be worried about GCHQ | World news | The Guardian.

Color Run post attracts attention

I’m overwhelmed. Really. My post about the Color Run has gone viral with over 6,400 page views already, simply from posting a single link on my Facebook timeline. My webserver’s been buzzing ever since. Apparently I’ve struck a chord.

I understand the Color Run company is aware of it, too. Should they reach out to me I’ll be happy to share their perspective, too.

Activate Good responds

Activate Good

The director of Activate Good, Amber Smith, reached out to me almost immediately after my Color Run post, having been alerted by a mutual friend. We chatted some this afternoon about the run and the aftermath.

It seems Activate Good was given the same deal that most other charities get from Color Run. That is, they got a donation based on the number of volunteers they provided. Activate Good contributed over 180 volunteers and performed a lot of the heavy lifting for the run, including the “color toss.” Amber says their volunteers were not involved in the clean up as that was done by others.
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