Ken Garen, CPA, Co-Founder and President, UBCC

Merkel, Hollande to discuss European communication network avoiding U.S. Reuters – 1 hr 0 mins ago BERLIN (Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Saturday she would talk to French President Francois Hollande about building up a European communication network to avoid emails and other data passing through the United States. Merkel, who visits France on Wednesday, has been pushing for greater data protection in Europe following reports last year about mass surveillance in Germany and elsewhere by the U.S. National Security Agency. Even Merkel's cell phone was reportedly monitored by American spies. Merkel said in her weekly podcast that she disapproved of companies such as Google and Facebook basing their operations in countries with low levels of data protection while being active in countries such as Germany with high data protection. "We'll talk with France about how we can maintain a high level of data protection," Merkel said. ...

Internet governance too US-centric, says European commission Commission says NSA revelations call into question US role in internet governance, which should be more global Ian Traynor in Brussels The Guardian, Wednesday 12 February 2014 11.56 EST The mass surveillance carried out by the US National Security Agency means that governance of the internet has to be made more international and less dominated by America, the European Union's executive has declared. Setting out proposals on how the world wide web should function and be regulated, the European commission called for a shift away from the California-based Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann), which is subject to US law, is contracted by the US administration and is empowered to supervise how digital traffic operates. "Recent revelations of large-scale surveillance have called into question the stewardship of the US when it comes to internet governance," said the commiss...

FIRST LOOK: HP takes giant leap in server design Moonshot hyperscale server brings high density and low power consumption to the data center By Tom Henderson, Network World   February 10, 2014 05:59 AM ET Network World -   When it comes to data center servers, the goal is to pack the most power into the smallest, most efficient package. HP has leapfrogged past traditional blade servers with its new Moonshot line that delivers high density and low power in a space-saving "cartridge-based" chassis. We received the first publicly reviewable unit in the Moonshot series and at the end of testing we were exhausted, but also in awe. The enormous effort in initial configuration, we found, pays handsomely. Strategically, HP has launched Moonshot as a response to the white-box server makers who are grabbing an increasing share of the server market, especially among cloud service providers and large enterprises. Moonshot falls into the general category of hyperscale compu...

New surveillance technology can track everyone in an area for several hours at a time By Craig Timberg, Wednesday, February 5, 1:28 PM DAYTON, Ohio — Shooter and victim were just a pair of pixels, dark specks on a gray streetscape. Hair color, bullet wounds, even the weapon were not visible in the series of pictures taken from an airplane flying two miles above. But what the images revealed — to a degree impossible just a few years ago — was location, mapped over time. Second by second, they showed a gang assembling, blocking off access points, sending the shooter to meet his target and taking flight after the body hit the pavement. When the report reached police, it included a picture of the blue stucco building into which the killer ultimately retreated, at last beyond the view of the powerful camera overhead. “I’ve witnessed 34 of these,” said Ross McNutt, the genial president of Persistent Surveillance Systems, which collected the images of the killing in Ciudad Ju...

NEWS/ Just When You Thought Google Glass Couldn't Get Creepier: New App Allows Strangers to ID You Just by Looking at You by JOHN BOONE Tue., Feb. 4, 2014 4:27 PM PST Have you ever seen someone wearing Google Glass out at the bar? Like a real person at a real bar actually wearing Google Glass? If so, you know how absolutely ridiculous they look. Which may be the only factor we have that will stop this: A new app will allow total strangers to ID you and pull up all your information, just by looking at you and scanning your face with their Google Glass. The app is called NameTag and it sounds CREEPY. The "real-time facial recognition" software "can detect a face using the Google Glass camera, send it wirelessly to a server, compare it to millions of records, and in seconds return a match complete with a name, additional photos and social media profiles." The information listed could include your name, occupation, any social media profiles you ...

Vein Scan Payment System Launched Posted: Feb 06, 2014 10:34 AM PST Updated: Feb 06, 2014 11:54 AM PST Trenton, New Jersey (My9NJ) - We live in a world where the security of our finances is just as important of a concern as the security of our homes. Identity theft, fraudulent payments, and accidental misuse of funds are all realities in our fast paced economy. In recent years however, technology has played a huge role in securing financial assets. PINs and security codes have been the status quo for basic financial security, but two friends in New Jersey are taking that concept a step further by using vein scans to confirm a person's identity to secure financial transactions. It’s called Pulse Wallet and it is a point-of-sale register and biometric payment terminal. PulseWallet lets customers link their credit cards and other payment methods to their palms so they can leave their wallets at home. The co-founders are Matt Saricicek and Aimann Rasheed. ...

Sony selling PC business, says sayonara to Vaio By Richi Jennings February 06, 2014 6:18 AM EST Sony (NYSE:SNE) has announced a deal to sell its Vaio PC business to Japan Industrial Partners, a company that specializes in manufacturing sector investment and turnaround. Revelations that Sony is closing the kimono on its PC business leaves more than a few bloggers shocked. Earlier in the week, rumors of a Vaio buyout by Lenovo proved false, driving down Lenovo shares by 16% before Sony issued a statement denying such gossip. Saying sayonara to Vaio and desktop PCs, Sony intends to place more emphasis on mobile and high-end consumer devices, just like everyone else. In IT Blogwatch, bloggers say adios, ciao, and goodbye to Sony Vaio. Filling in for our humble blogwatcher Richi Jennings, is a humbler Stephen Glasskeys. http://blogs.computerworld.com/it-industry/23495/sony-selling-pc-business-saying-sayonara-vaio-itbwcw?source=CTWNLE_nlt_blogs_2014-02-06