European cops fed up with “daredevils of the web”

Written on 2nd October 2008                                                                                                              1 COMMENT
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief

You’ve probably seen a movie or two of some maniac doing a crazy thing in traffic, from riding on top of train to driving 160 kilometers per hour while steering with you feet. Well, you might see less of those coming from Europe the coming months, as the European traffic police has decided to focus more on bringing these daredevils down.

The cops made this promise during a gathering of the TIPSOL organization – European Traffic Police Network – yesterday. Representatives of the traffic police will ask governments and ISP’s to “take action” against people who upload their life threatening stunts to YouTube and social networks.

I guess the taking action part refers to supplying IP addresses, which is quite worrisome. Not that it isn’t a bad thing that the police want to stop the darn daredevils, but it’s yet another incentive for ISP’s to give away IP addresses. It will be interesting to see how legislators react to the traffic police’s proposal.

Europe, Internet service provider, IP address, traffic police, youtube

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Is your wireless network a tool for terrorists?

Written on 4th August 2008                                                                                                              0 COMMENTS
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief

You might support an obscure terrorist clan without even knowing it. Ok, I know this sounds a bit like propaganda from the Bush administration. But it actually happened to 48-year-old American expat Kenneth Haywood. He was just chilling in his apartment last week, when an anti-terrorist squad raided his house. These cops probably scared the living daylights out of him before they asked an explanation for emails sent by the Indian Mujahideen from his IP address.

These Indian Mujahideen are a dangerous group from Mumbai who probably hacked Haywood’s wireless network. After communicating via this network, they killed 42 people with 22 separate bombs in Ahmedabad, India.

The business consultant Haywood told the Hindustan Times that the technician who set up the web connection had insisted he wouldn’t change his default password. How easy do you want to make it for these fundamentalists?

So if you’re sensitive to all this code orange/ red BS you might wanna have another look at your wireless network. If you’re not, check your network anyhow. Your neighbor might be using it for his torrent addiction…

Ahmedabad, Hindustan Times, India, IP address, Kenneth Haywood, Mumbai, wifi

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