Iditarod Race goes high tech with GPS devices

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6 March 2011
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When the 39th Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race starts in Anchorage on Saturday, 62 mushers and their dogs will embark on an annual trek that has evolved far from its shoestring roots.

The leading contenders are professionals, working year-round to prepare for the race and financed by corporate sponsors. There is a significant monetary reward at the end — $50,400 (31,023.02 pounds) and a new truck for the winner, and smaller cash prizes for all the finishers.

Mushers are equipped with the most high-tech outdoors equipment available, including custom-made sleds with adjustable runners for varying snow conditions and, starting this year, global-positioning-satellite (GPS) devices to check on their progress — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Lord West urges e-mail snooping crackdown

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4 March 2011
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Ministers must do more to stop internet service providers (ISPs) snooping on private e-mails without consent, an ex-cyber security minister has said. Some ISPs have trialled software that intercepts and scans e-mails to target ads.

They are meant to ask permission first – but former Labour minister Lord West says it is too easy to flout the rules — via dungbeetlemania.newsvine.com

Justices Rule for Protesters at Military Funerals

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3 March 2011
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The First Amendment protects hateful protests at military funerals, the Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday in an 8-1 decision.

Speech is powerful, Chief Justice John G Roberts Jr wrote for the majority. It can stir people to action, move them to tears of both joy and sorrow, and — as it did here — inflict great pain.

But under the First Amendment, he went on, we cannot react to that pain by punishing the speaker. Instead, the national commitment to free speech, he said, requires protection of even hurtful speech on public issues to ensure that we do not stifle public debate — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Suncorp Bank error reveals student’s eBay fraud

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2 March 2011
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A Brisbane schoolboy’s elaborate frauds were only discovered when $2 million accidentally lobbed into one of his fake bank accounts, a court has been told.

Philip Heggie, 19, pleaded guilty to more than 100 charges in the Brisbane District Court on Tuesday.

From December 2008 to December 2009, the then Year 12 student at St Laurence’s College used 119 Suncorp bank accounts in different names to defraud users of the auction website eBay — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Over 40,000 Does Dismissed In Copyright Troll Cases

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27 February 2011
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These have been some eventful weeks in the world of copyright trolling. Thousands of unnamed John Does in P2P file sharing lawsuits filed in California, Washington DC, Texas, and West Virginia have been severed, effectively dismissing over 40,000 defendants. The plaintiffs in these cases must now re-file against almost all of the Does individually rather than suing them en mass — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Report e-mail scams, National Fraud Authority urges

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27 February 2011
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Millions of Britons who receive scam letters and e-mails are now being urged to forward them on just the once – to the National Fraud Authority.

The agency has launched a new operation to track down the fraudsters behind the multi-million pound industry in scam mail, but needs public input.

It wants people to forward e-mails to email@actionfraud.org.uk for analysis — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Mobile carriers warn spectrum curbs will hurt next-gen services

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22 February 2011
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In Technology, World
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Australian consumers may not get the best deal out of next-generation mobile broadband services because of problems with spectrum allocations.

Carriers are quietly campaigning for larger blocks of 1800MHz spectrum in order to make the most of new generation mobile broadband technology known as long term evolution — via redwolf.newsvine.com

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