Tag: INVESTIGATION

A public school teacher in Chicago is under investigation for allegedly ridiculing one of her students on Facebook. Last week, 7-year-old Ukailya Lofton attached Jolly Rancher candies to the ends of her braids in celebration of her school's picture day. The hairstyle reportedly amused Lofton's computer teacher, who allegedly took a picture of the child with her cell phone and shared it on ...

Ars Technica's Nate Anderson has put together a long and fascinating report on the tumultuous recent history of Aaron Barr -- the security expert who successfully infiltrated Anonymous, and then got burned, after running to the FBI with his findings. Based on e-mails he sent before beginning his mission, it's clear that Barr's motives, from the very beginning, were profit-driven. A social media ...

A consumer-advocacy group is urging Congress to investigate what it calls a suspiciously "cozy" relationship between Google and the Obama administration. In a letter (PDF) sent to Representative Darrell Issa, Consumer Watchdog asked the Republican to hold a congressional investigation into contracts that governmental agencies have signed with Google, as well as the NSA's "secretive" ...

Share A prison guard in Rhode Island has been arrested after he admitted to posing as his boss on Facebook. The guard, 27-year-old Matthew Lacroix, reportedly created the fake profile using a computer at his neighbor's house. Authorities first discovered the page in August, and eventually tracked the IP address to the home. Eventually, Lacroix pleaded guilty to "use of fraudulent information," ...

Federal investigators are currently pursuing a 23-year-old Russian man accused of orchestrating the so-called 'Mega-D' botnet that, at one point, had the capacity to send 10 billion spam e-mails per day. The network of 500,000 infected computers was taken down late last year, but one researcher quoted by the FBI said that Mega-D, at the height of its powers, "was likely the largest botnet in the ...

A few weeks ago, Google publicly admitted that its Street View cars had inadvertently collected personal data from unprotected Wi-Fi networks, and promised to implement tighter security measures to prevent future breaches. The company's mea culpa was enough to satisfy the Federal Trade Commission, which closed its investigation into the incident shortly after the announcement. The FCC, on the ...

Italy's L'Espresso is reporting today that Facebook has signed a secret agreement with Italian police, giving them unfettered and potentially illegal access to user profiles. According to what the paper calls "reliable" sources, the agreement allowed 400 police officers to gather information on Italian Facebook members suspected of identity theft, phishing scams and possession of child ...

Just two days after a group of hackers successfully swiped personal information from over 114,000 of AT&T's iPad users, the New York Times is reporting that the FBI has stepped in to investigate. Jason Pack, a supervisory special agent from the Bureau's new media office, says, "The F.B.I. is aware of these possible computer intrusions and has opened an investigation to address the potential ...

We're sure that you've all experienced the annoying post-purchase push to get you to subscribe to, sign up for, or buy something after hitting the check-out button at your (not so) friendly online retailer. Well, those often shady offers for rebates and big discounts are now the subject of a Senate Commerce Committee investigation. These post-purchase scams often subscribe you to discount or ...

Rising text messaging costs are annoying, but it turns out they might also be criminal. Senator Herb Kohl (Democrat, Wisconsin), a prominent member of the Senate Judiciary Committee who heads up the subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights, has targeted the cell phone companies for suspiciously anticompetitive practices. A couple of years back in 2005, just about every ...