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With all that's been happening with the Super storm, Hurricane Sandy, social networking may seem far from our mind, but it turns out social network sites, like twitter has become a common source for breaking news about what's going on in different places. At times like these, people often join together and find courage and compassion in one another, while others simply seek to make the problem worse. That's what happened when someone had tweeted false news about the hurricane, like tweeting about the New York Stock Exchange building being flooded and under three feet of water. The rumor had spiralled and even been repeated on CNN and the Weather Channel before being found fake. Normally, false tweets are simply overlooked or scoffed at, but at times like this those kinds of tweets can create mass panic and worry. They are definitely immoral, but what has come into question is whether it should be considered illegal. Some think that this type of tweeting was done to increase fear and endanger, but should his behaviour be considered criminal? After all, he does have freedom of speech and the freedom to lie is included in that, except in "rare occasions". Personally, I think that, normally, silly, fake tweets can be overlooked and just scrolled past, but in times of emergency, tweets like this that can add more fear and panic to an already troubled situation should be considered a criminal action. In times of crisis, everybody should be uniting and helping each other, not creating more danger and trouble. Freedom to lie in the face of disaster like this, about that kind of information is not something that should be tolerated. No matter how big or small the aftermath and reaction to those tweets, they should not be overlooked and in no way should the law consider it okay.

This article discusses a youtube video, UFO prank. In the video a man or women supposedly captures a UFO on a shaky camera. Youtube viewers immediately know it is a fake video. The environment plays a part in this article because it is giving a negative feedback as some people start to believe in UFOs, and adapt to their existence in a negative way. For example, they can cause a scare and panic to many people who watch the video, and little do they know all it is, is a well edited video. 

This article describes how scientists are working to create new top off the line security. As we've seen in many sci-fi movies ; there is such a thing as eye scanners. they have existed for sometime now, but they have been primitive and worked just by using the iris of your eye. This could be faked easily by someone just taking a picture of your eye and simply holding it to the screen. This new technology however is a lot more sophisticated. It uses your eyes "fixations" and "saccades" to determine if it is really you. Fixations is how your eye behaves when it is still and saccades is how your eye behaves when it is moving from point to point. This new technology is a breakthrough in security, as it is virtually impossible to fake. no more stolen passwords, or hacked systems. Now unless its really you, the system wont let the person in. THis is extremely important as it prevents theft, hacking, and many other problems. To conclude, this technology is extremely important to our security and will greatly contribute to our future

With Christmas slowly approaching, many of us will be shopping for presents online. For scammers, this means there will be more unsuspecting victims to scam. McAfee knows the risk of being scammed is present and has set up a list of 12 scams seen during the holiday season. These include fake charities, malicious mobile apps, too-good-to-be-true offers, and fake gift cards. As online shopping gets more popular, the threat from scammers increases as well so we have to know how to protect ourselves and keep our information secure. While shopping online is more convenient and cheaper in some cases, it isn't as secure as shopping in person at a store. Despite the lesser security in shopping online, people still would prefer it because of its convenience. I think it is good that McAfee released this list of scams to look out for because it will make sure more consumers during the Christmas season and everyday will have knowledge of what to look out for when shopping online. Though I doubt many people will see the list, McAfee has possibly saved many people from having to deal with being scammed, besides even if you can't help everyone you should help anyway.

This article states that you have to be careful when you are looking for a job that lets you work from home because scammers make fake websites to get valuable information from you. For example the company CNBC website has been copied to http://cnbc.com-index.in. The URL is .in and not .com that is one way to know that the website is a fraught it should be .com. People who have gone to this copied websites to apply for a job have been asked very personal questions such as are you married, bank information, and to pay a fee for a company laptop. You should be suspicious if your contact for the job has an email of @gmail.com or @hotmail.com usually companies have their specific email. To avoid this scam always Google the company and your contacts email. Always have an opened eye to URL's and what the job application is asking for. I choose privacy and security as my tag because these scammers can get a lot of information from and start maxing out your credit cards and take money out of your bank account. In my opinion the government should step in and start watching out for theses fake websites and take them down of the internet or block them.  

This article talks about how hackers have been scamming netflix users into believing that there is a problem with there netflix account. when the user calls the 'tech support line" (which is also fake) they are transferred to a scammer who will prompt you to download a program that allows them to search your computer for any valuable information. These scammers have also charged these innocent people with a fake bill of $400. So do not fall for these tricks or else you'll be dealing with your information stolen and $400 down the drain. This article reminds us how careful we have to be while enjoying our computers.

A scam that takes advantage of Google Docs is making is spreading throughout the web. It uses the same google.com URL and even makes us of Google's SSL encryption. It is very difficult to tell that it is a hack. The scam starts with an email that leads to a GoogleDocs link. It then takes you to a fake login screen. Once you login, you'll be taken to an actual google doc but your credentials will be sent to a PHP script on a compromised server. To avoid this, you must be careful when clicking on links sent in emails, and if the login does not recognize you as a google user, the you should notice that it is the fake log in page. This is actually scary, and everyone should always be aware of their emails and scams.

 This article is about impersonating people online. Outside of the internet people can be arrested and fined for pretending to be a police officer, soldier, and even a normal person. This law still does not apply to life on the internet. This politician in Arizona is trying to make this a law. Doing this could stop people from scamming others online (ex. pretending to have cancer or someone else to get one) but could also stop popular parody accounts used for entertainment(ex. popular twitter accounts such as Fill Werell). Overall this law could probably bring more good than bad helping people protect their identity.

A 16 year old teenage girl attracts the attention of her followers after her tweet claiming that there was someone in her house. The girl was supposedly kidnapped by the stranger in the house when she disappeared; however, after the investigation, the police confirmed that she left voluntarily. Within two days of searching for the lost teen, the police found her walking at the side of a highway. The police finalized that the teen faked her kidnapping.  After the teenage girl tweeted that there was someone in her house, more than 30,000 people retweeted and the local police department received over 6,000 calls about her frightening situation. This event shows how fast news travels through social networking sites and how messy the issue could become if what you post is untrue. The teen that was once known as the young lady who was kidnapped by an intruder, is now someone who has made poor choices and worried many people for reasons unknown.  

In the state of North Carolina, acts have been passed in order to protect students from cyber bullying. This state has also recently passed The School Violence Protection Law of 2012 to protect teachers from being bullied by their own students. Some teachers claim that they are wrongly accused by students who post rude insults and lie about them on the internet, but feels as if nothing can be done to stop the hate. This new law prohibits students from creating fake online accounts of any school employee, posting confidential information about them, and sending them junk or inappropriate websites to their electronic mails. As a result, any student who is caught will face serious consequences such as getting fined up to $1,000, being transferred to another school and sent to jail if he or she is found guilty. The consequences are quite serious since cyber bullying is a growing problem within and outside the school community and that it is considered to be a criminal offence. 

YES!!!! GET AT ME STUDENTS!! GET AT ME!!

Many of our teachers tell us clearly when we have a project or an assignment that involves research, we should try to avoid Wikipedia as a source. I think it's because of the fact that Wikipedia makes it easy to find information and that most of the information is starting to be more accurate instead of being fake information. In my opinion, most information that's on Wikipedia is almost no difference from the information found in textbooks. This article explains that Wikipedia should be used if the assignment is to find information and summarize it to something simple because Wikipedia simply shows you a summary that can be referenced in classes. This is related to being legal because mainly, copying information from something site like Wikipedia would be plagiarism. Although in my opinion using Wikipedia as a way to gather any information and constrict it into a small summary of that information, then it should be used.

The "Green Brain Project" aims to create an insectobot (a robotic insect) with the brain of a honey bee. It's not as crazy or difficult as it sounds though, the researchers working on this project are not directly copying a bees brain but trying to recreate it. More specifically they are recreating bees two most important senses- sight and smell. They will then upload this fake brain into a small insect like robot so it can act somewhat like a real honey bee. This is important, as it would be a huge step forward in robotics and also because scientists say they could use robotic bees to artificially pollinate. This could help  with the reduced number of honeybees. Bees are very important to the whole environment so this project could possibly be revolutionary. I chose the tag "environment" because scientist are trying to recreate a natural animal that not only comes from Earth but greatly impacts it. Plants need bees pollination to grow, and animals need plants to eat so with a lack of bees, the whole food web would take a major hit. This project aims to try to fix this. To me, it seems like it would be extremely expensive and difficult to create as many bees as the earth would need. Maybe in the distant future though, this may be realized.

Just a few days ago, another Twitter hoax is called into question. The tweet suggested that 18-year-old Justin Bieber is supposedly diagnosed with cancer. This prank all began with a screenshot of the tweet that seems to be from Entertainment Tonight's Twitter account which informs fans to go #BaldforBieber to support the ill celebrity. A website BaldforBieber.com was set up not long after the tweet and showed photoshopped tweets from Justin Bieber, thanking his fans for their support. On the website were also a number of fake news reports that proved that the rumors were "real". On Friday, the #BaldforBieber was revealed to be a hoax that the pranksters of 4Chan created.   I personally found this prank harsh and insensitive; however, it does teach a lesson, especially to those who actually shaved their heads with the intention of supporting the supposedly ill pop star. The results of this joke indicate how many people these days believe what they read and see on the internet. After such a well thought out yet extreme prank, Twitter users should think twice about information presented to them from the internet and make rational decisions. 

Look at any famous active youtuber who uploads regularly, and it's pretty hard not to notice this. The view counter stops at 301, and only updates after a certain amount of time (a day), and then makes this giant leap to 10,000 or whatever. I took the liberty of looking this up myself, and here's a pretty brief explanation of  what's going on: Youtube stops the counter to verify the authenticity of the clicks on the video, and future clicks. They try to detect, and eliminate counterfeit views. This is some cool info right here, maybe Google is only getting started on identifying fakes. Something similar Google has done to this is changing your novelty nickname to a real name to comment on youtube. Start to a more identifiable internet, perhaps!

Though Twitter, Google+, and Facebook are all relatively the same (in that they are social networking sites), they are radically different. Facebook and Google+ take into account your identity, but Twitter doesn't. Both Facebook and Google+ tell you specifically who all users are, but with Twitter you can remain anonymous, use a pseudonym, or create a fake account based on someone else, so long as its indicated. Essentially, all social networking sites are different, and the user can choose which one to join based on personal preferences.

This article was about the leading android app on the Google store to be a scam. It was suppose to protect your phone from malware and spyware, it costed $3.99. Virus sheild just changed the logo from an "X" to a check mark with no effort needed. Many complaints have been sent it saying that this app did not work. Making the price high and having good image previews, and a good description will make people want to buy it because they trusted the rating's and reviews. The app ended up not working, and with other 10,000 downloads, the people that made this scam, made a large amount of money. Google took this app down, and has their eye closely on malicious apps, to prevent this type of scam from happening again.