Your Car, House, Everything Will Know If You Are 666-Complaint In The Future… And People Are Finding That “Irresistible”

Last week, a man crash landed his drone on the White House lawn. Evidently, the individual, a member of a US intelligence agency, had been drinking and was showing off his drone to a friend when he lost control of the craft.





DJI Phantom drone with a GoPro camera.


Any other house and lawn and no problem. Obviously, not the case here. The president called for more drone regulations. Headlines fretted White House security. And DJI, the drone’s maker, grounded drones in the Washington DC area with a GPS software patch.

And perhaps that last item is the most intriguing. A maker of a physical product reached out through cyberspace and disabled it to comply with the law. (In fact, the update couldn’t be forced on owners as the drones aren’t internet connected, but if owners want to benefit from other updates, they have to accept that one.)

Now, it’s not to say DJI’s move doesn’t make sense. The fledgling drone industry is just getting its feet, and the FAA is still considering how to regulate it. Bad press about runaway drones in high-security areas? Not really all that ideal. Also, since 9/11, the airspace around Washington DC has been highly restricted. It’s not hard to see why the rule make sense in Washington. If a drone can carry a camera, it can carry more lethal packages and deliver them at a distance.

DJI had also already established a few thousand no-fly zones surrounding airports. Such no-fly zones are as much about safety as malevolent acts—mistakes happen, and we wouldn’t want a jet engine inhaling an errant toy aircraft.

But underneath all that is the fact that a simple software update can dramatically change what an already owned product can do. Most updates add functionality, but in this case an update took functionality away.

Where most regulated products rely on the threat of punishment and law enforcement to ensure people follow rules, with computer-based physical products, we may be witnessing the birth of a new, distinctly modern regulatory era.

Imagine a future in which the FAA rules on a particular item—say, no drones within 100 feet of federal buildings. Prior regulations have been put in place that require all drone makers to update their no-fly zones within five days. Almost instantly, no drone can fly within some new set of GPS coordinates. Why might this be appealing to regulators? In theory, the rule requires less enforcement because drones are physically prevented from flaunting it.


We’ve been talking drones, but they’re just one early example. There are others.




Tesla digital display.

Tesla, for example, is well-known for pushing automatic software updates to its cars. And these aren’t just updates to the dashboard readout. Elon Musk just announced a software tweak to improve the Tesla Model S P85D’s acceleration by 0.01 seconds—small but significant in the high-end market where accelerations are measured and compared in hundredths of seconds.

As we head toward an increasingly driverless future, cars will become more like computers on wheels than wheels with computers. What regulations could be written into software? Speed limits? No-drive zones? Car won’t start until you put on your seatbelt?

And, of course, it doesn’t end there either. Analysts expect billions of new physical devices to come online in the next decade. The Internet of Things may afford the government real-time regulatory enforcement—government mandated thermostat settings to save energy or restricted water usage in a drought, for example.

Could such a system be abused? No doubt about it.

Well-meaning regulations with unforeseen consequences are written regularly. Authoritarian regimes that already keep a tight grip on their countries' internet could, in the future, control much more. Further, regulatory software updates would likely only work for the law-abiding—those motivated to circumvent them will find a way.

But so it is with any technology. It’s trite but true—technology is a double-edged sword. The ability to wirelessly update a product may also extend its life and slow obsolescence. Your Tesla might get faster or smoother acceleration. Your drone may become a better flier in high winds or learn to do a flip off the palm of your hand.


Credit to singularity Hub

Gerald Celente Destroys Brian Williams

Calls grow to arm Ukraine, as European leaders scramble for peace plan

European leaders scrambled Thursday to try and forge a diplomatic deal to end fighting in eastern Ukraine, in an apparent bid to head off U.S. consideration of lethal military aid for the Ukrainian government in its war against Russian-backed separatists.

At the same time, a bipartisan call in Congress for the U.S. to arm Ukraine was only growing, with lawmakers saying the military aid "is past due."
"We can't just stand by and let them be slaughtered by superior weapons," Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said Thursday.

Top Obama officials are weighing pleas from both sides, without tipping their hand as to the next step as they hold a flurry of meetings with European counterparts.

Secretary of State John Kerry, who met with top Ukrainian officials in Kiev on Thursday, offered no definitive decision on the question of lethal aid. But he said President Obama is reviewing all options, including "the possibility of providing defensive systems to Ukraine."

"We are not interested in a proxy war. Our objective is to change Russia's behavior," Kerry said.
A "proxy war," fueled by an influx of U.S. weapons, presumably is the fear of the leaders of France and Germany, who headed to Kiev and Moscow to seek a possible deal. Asked about those concerns at Thursday's White House press briefing, Obama's top spokesman Josh Earnest said the president takes the views of U.S. allies very seriously and will consult with them, though he will make whatever decision he believes is in the best interest of the U.S.

On Capitol Hill, however, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle had a clear message Thursday for the president: arm Ukraine.
"It is time to give Ukraine the ability to defend itself," Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., said. "It is past due."

France and Germany, though, were hoping this time they can come up with a peace deal that both Ukraine and Russia can agree upon. French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel traveled to Kiev and met with Ukraine President Petro Poroshenko on Thursday evening. They plan to visit Moscow on Friday with a peace proposal "based on the territorial integrity of Ukraine."

"It will not be said that France and Germany together have not tried everything, undertaken everything, to preserve the peace," Hollande said earlier. A senior French government official said the two leaders decided Wednesday night on the trip and did not consult American officials about it.

In Moscow, Putin adviser Yuri Ushakov said Russia was "ready for a constructive conversation" aimed at stabilizing the situation, establishing a dialogue between the Ukrainian government and the rebels and rebuilding economic ties between eastern Ukraine and Kiev.

Western diplomats said Putin gave the French and Germans a nine-page peace plan, and that Hollande and Merkel were taking a repackaged version of that with them. The diplomats said the European version drops the most objectionable elements of the Russian plan to fit what Ukraine and the Europeans want, such as some autonomy for eastern Ukraine with special protections for language, culture and local taxes.

Kerry, meanwhile, brought $16.4 million in new humanitarian aid to Ukraine.

Credit to Fox News

Latest Scientific Findings...Wireless Radiation Causes Cancer

National advocacy group calls on major children’s health organizations to promote safe technology in schools with the “Turn It Off 4 Kids” Initiative.

The National Association for Children and Safe Technology (NACST) is taking action after two recently published studies indicate there is sufficient evidence demonstrating exposure to wireless radiation, also known as RF-EMF, causes cancer. Wireless routers and devices such as tablets, laptops, baby monitors and cell phones all emit this type of radiation.

The State of the Science: The Debate is Over
Professor of Oncology Lennart Hardell, MD, PhD, and Statistician Michael Carlberg of Orebro University Hospital, Sweden found a 3-fold risk with 25 or more years of cell and cordless phone use in a study published October 2014 in Pathophysiology. Very significant was the finding that people who first used mobile or cordless phones before the age of 20 had the highest risk.

Increased wireless phone use also correlated with lower survival rates for people diagnosed with the most malignant gliomas in a second study published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health by the same researchers. Hardell and Carlberg stated, “Due to the relationship with survival, the classification is strengthened.”

In both studies, the authors state that RF-EMF should be regarded as a human carcinogen, “requiring urgent revision of current exposure guidelines.” These two studies followed the July 2014Occupational and Environmental Medicine Journal publication of the CERENAT case controlled study where French researchers found almost a 3-fold increase in brain cancer with 896 or more hours of lifetime cell phone use.

Based on the accumulation of research demonstrating the health effects from wireless radiation, Professor Olle Johansson of the Karolinska Department of Neuroscience has stated, “the debate is over” on wireless.

“Given the established and emerging science, it only follows that students be provided a safe learning environment, free from wireless radiation,” stated an NACST spokesperson.

Scientists Call for the World Health Organization to Reclassify RF-EMF
 

In 2011, the WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified RF radiation as a Class 2B, “possible human carcinogen.” Since 2011, several of the World Health Organization invited scientists have called for a reclassification to an increased risk level. The abstracts of these 2014 studies state that RF should now be regarded as a “Group 1 Human Carcinogen,” placing it in the same category as tobacco, asbestos and benzene.

NACST’s Turn It Off 4 Kids Initiative
In light of these recent scientific publications and expert warnings, NACST is reaching out to health organizations asking them to prioritize the issue of children’s health and wireless exposures in educational settings for 2015 in the following ways:

1. Call for all new school technology to be hardwired.
2. Call to replace existing wireless technology systems with hardwired systems.
3. Call for the implementation of primary prevention efforts such as educating the public about simple steps to reduce exposure, especially in regard to children and pregnant women.
4. Educate their organization’s members and audience on this issue by emails, informational web pages, updated materials, and all other means possible.

Expert Endorsements

NASCT’s Initiative has been endorsed by several prominent scientists, physicians and safety advocates including Drs. Lennart Hardell, Olle Johansson, Anthony Miller and Dariusz Leszczynski. Dr. Leszczynski was a participating scientist in the WHO IARC panel on RF-EMF and cancer, and Dr. Miller has served as Director of the Epidemiology Unit, National Cancer Institute of Canada, Toronto.

Details on NACST’s Turn It Off 4 Kids Initiative, including endorsements, are here:http://www.nacst.org/nacst-turn-it-off-4-kids.html

About NACST

The National Association for Children and Safe Technology is dedicated to raising awareness about the health impacts of wireless radiation on children as well as advancing policies that safeguard children’s health and well being.

Credit to Activist Post

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Russia Deploys Nuclear ICBM Launchers On Combat Patrol

Perhaps it is a coincidence that a day before John Kerry's arrival in Kiev (a visit which "coincided" with a 35% devaluation of the local currency) where among other things the US statesman discussed the possibility of official (as opposed to unofficial) deliveries of US "lethal support" to the civil war torn and now hyperinflation country, that Russia decided to put its nuclear ICBMs on combat patrol missions in various Russian regions. 

Specifically, according to Tass, "About 700 units of military equipment, including launchers are deployed in the positioning areas in the Tver, Ivanovo, Kirov, Irkutsk regions, as well as in Altai Territory and the Mari El republic." 

More:

The Topol, Topol-M and Yars mobile ballistic missile launchers have been put on combat patrol mission in six Russian regions, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman for Strategic Missile Forces (RVSN) Colonel Igor Yegorov said on Wednesday. 

"The Topol, Topol-M and Yars mobile launchers are drilling combat duty tasks in six regions of the country with extended combat patrolling time. About 700 units of military equipment, including launchers are deployed in the positioning areas in the Tver, Ivanovo, Kirov, Irkutsk regions, as well as in Altai Territory and the Mari El republic," Yegorov said. 

According to him, the time of winter combat patrolling has been extended to nearly a month this year. "This means that each missile regiment will spend about 60 days per year on combat patrolling routes," he said. 

Topol is a ground-based mobile strategic intercontinental ballistic missile system. The Topol-M ICBM system belongs to the fifth generation of strategic missiles. The three-stage solid-propelled single warhead missile has a silo and mobile version. Yars is a solid-propelled mobile and silo-based intercontinental ballistic missile with multiple warhead.

Now all that is needed is for Emmett Fitz-Hume and Austin Millbarge to show up and to confirm the old saying that "a weapon unused is a useless weapon", especially if said weapon belongs to Northrop Grumman, Lockheed or General Dynamics.

Credit to Zero Hedge

NATO increases military power in Eastern Europe: 30,000 troops, 6 rapid units....

The NATO Response Force in Europe might increase to 30,000 troops from the current 13,000, said the alliance’s secretary general ahead of a defense ministers meeting in Brussels. Most of the RDF troops are set to be stationed near to Russia’s borders.

“I expect that the ministers will agree on several important elements of a package that increases our collective defense,” said Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg on the eve of a meeting of the alliance’s 28 defense ministers at NATO headquarters in Brussels.

The UK has already announced plans to deploy 1,000 troops and four multirole Typhoon fighter jets to join the Response Force in Eastern Europe.

The spearhead of that force will be 5,000 servicemen, distributed among six compact command centers in Eastern Europe, with about only 50 officers in each.

"It is a response to what we have seen from Russia over a period of time and it is in full accordance with our international obligations," NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters.

READ MORE: NATO to deploy extra troops in 6 E. European member states

These six Rapid Deployment Force units to be stationed in Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania are expected to be capable of rapidly reinforcing the region” in response to any threat from Russia,” Reuters reports.

“In Ukraine, violence is getting worse and the crisis is deepening. Russia continues to disregard international rules and to support the separatists,” Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters before the meeting.

When necessary, this force could be deployed in two days. The remaining 25,000 will be operational within a week.

Credit to RT