Court records show Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), a part of ICE, and the FBI obtained Con Edison user data. The utility provider refuses to say whether law enforcement needs a warrant to access its data.#ICE #News
Con Edison Refuses to Say How ICE Gets Its Customers’ Data
Con Edison, the energy company that serves New York City, refuses to say whether ICE or other federal agencies require a search warrant or court order to access its customers’ sensitive data. Con Edison’s refusal to answer questions comes after 404 Media reviewed court records showing Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), a division of ICE, has previously obtained such data, and the FBI performing what the records call ‘searches’ of Con Edison data.The records and Con Edison’s stonewalling raise questions about how exactly law enforcement agencies are able to access the utility provider’s user data, whether that access is limited in any way, and whether ICE still has access during its ongoing mass deportation effort.
“We don’t comment to either confirm or deny compliance with law enforcement investigations,” Anne Marie, media relations manager for Con Edison, told 404 Media after being shown a section of the court records.
In September, 404 Media emailed Con Edison’s press department to ask if law enforcement officers have to submit a search warrant or court order to search Con Edison data. A few days later, Marie provided the comment neither confirming nor denying any details of the company’s data sharing practice.
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Do you know anything else about how ICE is accessing or using data? I would love to hear from you. Using a non-work device, you can message me securely on Signal at joseph.404 or send me an email at joseph@404media.co.404 Media then sent several follow-up inquiries, including whether ICE requires a warrant or other legal mechanism to obtain user data. Con Edison did not respond to any of those follow-ups.
Con Edison’s user data is especially sensitive, and likely valuable to authorities, because in many cases it will directly link a specific person to a particular address. If someone is paying for electricity for a home they own or rent, they most likely do it under their real name.
Federal agencies have repeatedly turned to Con Edison data as part of criminal investigations, according to court records. In one case, the FBI previously said it believed a specific person occupied an apartment after performing a “search” of Con Edison records and finding a Con Edison account in that person’s name. Another case shows the FBI obtaining a Con Edison user’s email address after finding it linked to a utilities account. A third case says “a search of records maintained by Con Edison, a public utilities provider to the greater New York City area” revealed that a specific person was receiving utilities at a target address. Several other cases contain similar language.
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Court records also show HSI has accessed Con Edison data as part of criminal investigations. One shows HSI getting data from Con Edison that reveals the name associated with a particular Con Edison account and address. Another says “there was no indication in the records from Con Edison that the SUBJECT PREMISES is divided into multiple units.” A third shows that HSI “confirmed with Con Edison” who was a customer at an address at a particular point in time.Ordinarily HSI is focused on criminal investigations into child abuse, money laundering, cybercrime, and other types of criminal networks. But in the second Trump administration’s mass deportation effort, the distinction between HSI and ICE is largely meaningless. HSI has reassigned at least 6,198 agents, or nearly 90 percent, and 12,353 personnel overall to assist the deportation arm of ICE, according to data published by the Cato Institute in September. HSI also performs worksite enforcement.
The court records don’t describe how the investigators obtained the Con Edison data exactly, whether they obtained a search warrant or court order, or elaborate on how some officials were able to “search” Con Edison records.
Usually companies and organizations readily acknowledge how and when law enforcement can access customer data. This is for the benefit of users, who can then better understand what legal mechanisms protect their data, but also for law enforcement officials themselves, so they know what information they need to provide during an investigation. Broadly, companies might require a law enforcement official to obtain a search warrant or send a subpoena before they provide the requested user data, based on its sensitivity.
La programmazione della Biblioteca nazionale centrale di Firenze per il 2026
Il 27 ottobre alle ore 15.00, presso la Sala Galileo della Biblioteca, la Direttrice, dott.ssa Elisabetta Sciarra, ha presentato le principali linee programmatiche dell’Istituto per il 2026, in relazione agli obiettivi e ai compiti dell’amministrazione.
Sono stati illustrati i maggiori programmi di spesa in termini di esecuzione di lavori e acquisizione di servizi, nonché le attività e gli eventi previsti, con particolare riferimento alle risorse economiche, umane e strumentali impiegate.
Strategie per affrontare le sfide finanziarie e promuovere l’accesso alla cultura (ppt)
L'articolo La programmazione della Biblioteca nazionale centrale di Firenze per il 2026 proviene da Biblioteca nazionale centrale di Firenze.
Connector-Free Zone: PCB Edge as USB-C Interfaces
Sometimes when you’re making a PCB that you plan on programming over USB, but you only plan on plugging in a couple of times, it would be nice to make that connection without another BOM item. Over on GitHub [AnasMalas] has released a PCB edge USB-C connection symbol/footprint to do just that!
This isn’t the first PCB edge USB-C connector we’ve seen, but this one has some nice features. It’s available in both KiCad and EasyEDA formats, allowing you to easily add it into your preferred ECAD software. As well as supporting multiple software packages, there are two versions included: a 10-pin and 14-pin version. The 10-pin version has, on each side, 2 USB voltage pins, 2 ground pins, and a CC1 or CC2 pin on its respective side; this version is ideal if you’re looking to just supply power via the connector. The 14-pin version has all the pins of the 10-pin version with the addition of four data-positive and data-negative pins needed to relay information to the board, ideal if you’re planning on programming a microcontroller with this connection.
One important note is that, while most PCBs default to 1.6 mm thickness, if you use this connector you’ll need to drop that down to ~0.8 mm to properly interface with a common USB cable. [AnasMalas] also suggests using ENIG board finish to preserve the connectors on your USB cable.
For such a small and common connector, USB-C holds a ton of potential. Be sure to check out our series all about USB-C for more details.
Thanks to [Ben] for the tip.
Cybercrime-Konvention: Menschenrechtsverletzungen über Grenzen hinweg
netzpolitik.org/2025/cybercrim…
Vascello o presagio? Cosa ci dice la nuova “Victory” di Singapore sulla guerra navale del futuro
@Notizie dall'Italia e dal mondo
Una nave che sembra provenire da Battlestar Galactica. Così il ministro della Difesa di Singapore Chan Chun Sing ha definito la “Victory”, primo dei sei esemplari della nuova classe di Multi-Role Combat Vessels (Mrcv) in
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Spoofing dell’ID chiamante, un reato transnazionale. La posizione di Europol
Europol sostiene con urgenza un approccio europeo unificato per combattere il crescente problema dello spoofing dell’ID chiamante, una tecnica sempre più sfruttata dai criminali informatici per attività fraudolente e truffe di ingegneria sociale.
Questa pratica prevede che i criminali manipolino le informazioni visualizzate sul telefono del destinatario, facendo sembrare che la chiamata provenga da una fonte legittima, come una banca, un ente governativo o persino un membro della famiglia. La natura ingannevole di questi appelli ha portato a notevoli danni finanziari e sociali, con perdite globali stimate in circa 850 milioni di euro all’anno. Telefonate e SMS continuano a essere i principali vettori di queste truffe, rappresentando circa il 64% degli incidenti denunciati. Nascondendo la loro vera identità e posizione, i truffatori sono in grado di manipolare le vittime inducendole a rivelare informazioni personali, trasferire denaro o concedere l'accesso a dispositivi e account, il che rende estremamente difficile per le forze dell'ordine rintracciarli e perseguirli.
La natura senza confini dello spoofing dell’ID chiamante ha consentito alle reti criminali organizzate di operare in più giurisdizioni, complicando ulteriormente gli sforzi per combattere il problema. Queste reti spesso sfruttano le lacune giurisdizionali per evitare il rilevamento e il perseguimento giudiziario, utilizzando lo spoofing come strumento per impersonare entità fidate e ottenere la fiducia delle vittime. In alcuni casi, questa pratica è stata utilizzata nei cosiddetti incidenti di "schiacciamento", in cui vengono effettuate false chiamate di emergenza dall'indirizzo della vittima, portando a risposte di emergenza su larga scala. Le indagini hanno anche rivelato l'emergere di un modello di business "spoofing-as-a-service", che offre strumenti già pronti per impersonare forze dell'ordine o istituzioni finanziarie. Questi servizi sono spesso gestiti dall’estero, rendendo ancora più difficile per le autorità rintracciare e fermare gli autori dei reati.
Europol ha sottolineato che l’attuale squilibrio, in cui lo spoofing è facile da commettere ma difficile da indagare, è insostenibile. Per risolvere questo problema, Europol sollecita l’attuazione di misure che aumentino i costi e la complessità tecnica per i criminali che devono nascondersi dietro identità contraffatte, consentendo allo stesso tempo agli investigatori di agire rapidamente oltre confine. Una recente indagine Europol condotta in 23 paesi ha evidenziato le sfide significative nell’attuazione di misure efficaci contro lo spoofing dell’ID chiamante, lasciando circa 400 milioni di persone in tutta l’UE vulnerabili a questi tipi di attacchi.
Le forze dell’ordine hanno identificato diversi ostacoli importanti, tra cui una cooperazione limitata con gli operatori di telecomunicazioni, normative frammentate e una mancanza di strumenti tecnici per identificare e bloccare le chiamate contraffatte. Per affrontare queste sfide, Europol e i suoi partner hanno delineato tre priorità chiave:
- lo sviluppo di standard tecnici armonizzati per tracciare le chiamate fraudolente, verificare gli ID chiamanti legittimi e bloccare il traffico ingannevole;
- il rafforzamento della collaborazione transfrontaliera per migliorare la condivisione di informazioni e prove tra le forze dell’ordine, i regolatori e le parti interessate del settore;
- l’allineamento delle normative nazionali per consentire la tracciabilità legale, chiarire gli usi legittimi del mascheramento dell’ID chiamante e promuovere strumenti antifrode comprovati.
Sebbene le richieste misure anti-spoofing siano fondamentali, le forze dell’ordine sono anche consapevoli che i criminali continueranno ad adattare ed evolvere le loro tattiche. Le minacce emergenti come le truffe basate su SIM, i servizi prepagati anonimi e gli schemi di smishing (tipologia di phishing che utilizza messaggi di testo e sistemi di messaggistica per appropriarsi di dati personali) richiederanno una vigilanza continua e una cooperazione intersettoriale. Le misure proposte da Europol sono in linea con la strategia ProtectEU, che mira a rafforzare la capacità collettiva dell’Europa di combattere la criminalità organizzata e proteggere i cittadini dalle minacce sia online che offline. Attraverso una continua collaborazione tra più soggetti interessati, l’Europa può lavorare per ripristinare l’integrità delle sue reti di comunicazione e ridurre il crescente danno causato dallo spoofing dell’ID chiamante.
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The Channel Crossing Bridge That Never Was
When the Channel Tunnel opened in 1994, the undersea rail link saw Britain grew closer to the European mainland than ever before. However, had things gone a little differently, history might have taken a very different turn. Among the competing proposals for a fixed Channel crossing was a massive bridge. It was a scheme so audacious that fate would never allow it to come to fruition.
Forget the double handling involved in putting cars on trains and doing everything by rail. Instead, the aptly-named Euro Route proposed that motorists simply drive across the Channel, perhaps stopping for duty-free shopping in the middle of the sea along the way.
Long-Held Dreams
The concept of a permanent tunnel or transit link between Britain and France dates back a long way. The earliest recorded example is from 1802, when French engineer Albert Mathieu-Favier proposed a tunnel design for horse-drawn stagecoaches to travel between the Isles and the mainland. Ultimately, though, the feasibility of engineering such a project was beyond the limits of the time. The idea would never quite go away, though, with the British and French governments eventually coming to explore it in earnest starting in the late 1950s. The Channel Tunnel Study Group was established as an Anglo-French task force to explore the possibilities of building a crossing between the two nations. This led to an early effort to construct a cross-Channel tunnel beginning in 1973, only for the project to be scrapped two years later by British Prime Minister Harold Wilson on the basis of cost and the strains of the worldwide oil crisis.
It would be over a decade before the concept returned to the fore. The French and British governments reconvened in 1984 to establish baseline parameters for the project, before opening up the project to proposals in 1985. That process saw the Channel Tunnel Group win the day with a plan for a 51.5-kilometer dual-track rail-only tunnel, with trains carrying passengers and hauling cars between the two countries. The Treaty of Canterbury was signed in 1986, and construction began soon after, eventually leading to the infrastructure that exists today.
The Channel Tunnel might have been the winning project, but it wasn’t the only proposal on the table. The Euro Route project was an altogether bolder scheme. Their plan called for a three-stage crossing combining both road and rail. Cars would travel via a spectacular road link featuring bridges springing from each coast, leading into an immersed tunnel running through the deepest section of the Channel. Meanwhile, there would also be a twin-track rail tunnel not dissimilar from the Channel Tunnel itself.
The Euro Route project was marketed based on its key offering—users would be able to drive all the way with a minimum of fuss. “From your home you will drive straight to France,” read the marketing materials. There would be no fussy loading and unloading of automobiles on to train cars. Meanwhile, those that wished to travel by rail could equally do so via the separate rail tunnel, with freight trains using the passage as well.
The project would not be cheap. Estimates were that it would cost some £6 billion to build (1985 prices). At the time, this figure came in at two to three times what the Channel Tunnel proposal was expected to cost—no surprise given it also involved an entire road crossing in addition to a rail tunnel. However, the project was backed by a consortium of heavyweight British institutions—including British Steel, Barclays Bank, and GEC—which had together secured over seven billion pounds in funding for the project. The intention was that it would be paid for in time by charging tolls to access the crossing.
The road crossing was designed for drama and practicality in equal measure. Motorists would leave the M20 near Dover, before passing through toll booths to pay for the journey. From there, they would make their way onto a bridge standing some fifty meters above the waves. This cable-stayed bridge would stretch for 8.5 km to an artificial island, where the motorway would spiral down beneath sea level to the undersea tunnel below. This tunnel consisted of a 21 km immersed tube tunnel carrying parallel dual carriageways safely beneath the shipping lanes, emerging at a second artificial island before another bridge carried traffic the final 7.5 km to France. A third artificial island would also sit in between the other two, serving as a ventilation shaft for the road tunnel and acting as a marker to enforce lane discipline for shipping in the Channel.
All in all, traveling the Euro Route was expected to take just 30 minutes over the road. Customs formalities were to be “speeded up by computer” to ease the journey, pushing the total time to approximately 45 minutes. This was to be a key advantage over concepts like the all-rail Channel Tunnel. “NOTE: A shuttle service would require additional time for waiting, and loading and unloading; Euro Route does not,” noted the marketing materials. . Those behind the EuroRoute believed people wanted to drive across the Channel themselves, rather than sitting in their cars on a train for a longer period of time.
The combined bridge-tunnel-bridge concept was, at first blush, more complicated than simply building a single long road tunnel from coast to coast. However, such a tunnel would have likely measured well over 30 km in length. This was considered somewhat undesirable both for the length of time spent underground and the build-up of traffic emissions. The open-air bridges were used to help break up the journey so less time would be spent in a tube beneath the waves. This design also created opportunity, for the artificial islands weren’t seen as just entry and exit points to the tunnel below. EuroRoute envisioned them as destinations in their own right, with refuelling, refreshment, and parking facilities, as well as other niceties like hotels and duty-free shopping complexes.
The rail component proposed by EuroRoute was remarkably similar to what was eventually built as part of the Channel Tunnel project. It concerned a tunnel running between Cheriton and Sangatte, though EuroRoute planned to use immersed tube construction for the majority of its length, rather than boring through the entire length as with the Channel Tunnel. Overall, though, it similarly featured two tubes for bidirectional travel, with a central shaft for maintenance access.
The Euro Route proposal noted that public sentiment was on its side. Contemporary research suggested that fifty-two percent of people preferred driving across, with many actively disliking the car shuttle concept. Yet when decision time came, the governments chose the Channel Tunnel—ultimately the simpler, cheaper rail-only proposal. The fact that the Channel Tunnel project would end up with massive budget overruns and significant delays perhaps casts that decision in a different light. At the same time, we might never know how well—or how badly—construction of the Euro Route might have gone.
EuroRoute’s bridges and islands seem destined to remain forever on the drawing board, another grand infrastructure dream that fell victim to caution and economics. But those architectural drawings still capture something important—the ambition of an era when it seemed anything could be built, even a bridge linking two former bitter enemies over the busiest shipping lanes in the world.
Siccome uso Friendica da un po' volevo dare un contributo alla sua esistenza e non avendo più le competenze del programmatore volevo aiutare come traduttore.
Sono andato sul sito Transifex, dove secondo le istruzioni dovrei trovare i file da tradurre, e mi trovo davanti al solito avviso sul fatto che usano i cookie ma l'unica opzione che vedo è "Accept all", non c'è verso di usare il sito senza prendersi tutti i cookie.
Sto sbagliando io qualcosa o davvero hanno scelto un sito così "unfriendly"?
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These anti-facial recognition glasses technically work, but won’t save you from our surveillance dystopia.#News #idguard #Surveillance
Zenni’s Anti-Facial Recognition Glasses are Eyewear for Our Paranoid Age
Zenni, an online glasses store, is offering a new coating for its lenses that the company says will protect people from facial recognition technology. Zenni calls it ID Guard and it works by adding a pink sheen to the surface of the glasses that reflects the infrared light used by some facial recognition cameras.Do they work? Yes, technically, according to testing conducted by 404 Media. Zenni’s ID Guard glasses block infrared light. It’s impossible to open an iPhone with FaceID while wearing them and they black out the eyes of the wearer in photos taken with infrared cameras.
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However, ID Guard glasses will not at all stop some of the most common forms of facial recognition that are easy to access and abuse. If someone takes a picture of your naked face with a normal camera in broad daylight while you’re wearing them, there’s a good chance they’ll still be able to put your face through a database and get a match.For example, I took pictures of myself wearing the glasses in normal light and ran it through PimEyes, a site that lets anyone run facial recognition searches. It identified me in seconds, even with the glasses. One of the biggest dangers of facial recognition is not a corporation running an advanced camera with fancy sensors, it’s an angry Taylor Swift fan who doxes you using a regular picture of your face. Zenni is offering some protection against the former, but can’t help with the latter.
But the glasses do block infrared light and many of the cameras taking pictures of us as we go about our lives rely on that to scan our faces. When those cameras see me now, there will be black holes where my eyes should be and that’s given me a strange kind of peace of mind.
The modern world is covered in cameras that track your every movement. In New Orleans, a private network of cameras uses facial recognition tech to track people in real time and alert cops to the presence of undesirables. Last year tech billionaire and media mogul Larry Ellison pitched a vision of the future where cameras capture every moment of everyone’s life to make sure they’re “on their best behavior.”
Zenni’s director of digital innovation, Steven Lee, told 404 Media that the company wanted to offer customers something that helped them navigate this environment. “There’s devices out there that are scanning us, even without our permission and just tracking us,” he said. “So we asked ourselves: ‘could there possibly be a set of lenses that could do more than just protect our vision, maybe it could protect our identity as well.’”
As a side benefit of beating facial recognition, I noticed the ID Guard lenses were more comfortable for me to wear in sunlight than my normal glasses. I’m sensitive to sunlight and need to wear prescription sunglasses outdoors to prevent headaches and discomfort. The Zenni glasses cut down on a lot of that without me needing to wear shades.Lee explained that this was because the ID Guard blocks infrared light from the sun as well as cameras. This was one of the original purposes of the coating. “When we delved into that, we realized, not only could it protect your eyes from infrared…but it also had the additional benefit of protecting against a lot of devices out there…a lot of camera systems out there utilize infrared to detect different facial features and detect who you are,” he said.
There’s many different kinds of facial recognition technology. Some simply take a picture of a user's face and match it against a database, but those systems have a lot of problems. Sunglasses block the eyes and render one of the biggest datapoints for the system useless and low light pictures don’t work at all so many cameras taking pictures for facial recognition use infrared light to take a picture of a person’s face.
“What's happening when you're using these infrared cameras is it's creating a map that's basically transforming your face into a number of digital landmarks, numerically transforming that into a map that makes us each unique. And so they then use an algorithm to figure out who we are, basically,” Lee said.
But the pink sheen of ID Guard beats the infrared rays. “When infrared light is trying to shine into your eyes, it’s basically being reflected away so it can’t actually penetrate and we’re able to block up to 80 percent of the infrared rays,” Lee said. “When that is happening, those cameras become less effective. They’re not able to collect as much data on your face.”
On the left, the Zenni ID Guard glasses under an infrared camera. On the right, normal sunglasses under an infrared camera. Matthew Gault photos.
To test ID Guard’s effectiveness I put them on my wife and sent her to battle the most complex facial recognition system available to consumers: an iPhone. Apple’s Face ID system is the most comprehensive kind of facial ID system normal people encounter everyday. An iPhone uses three different cameras to project a grid of infrared lights onto a person's face, flood the space in between with infrared light, and take a picture. These infrared lights make a 3D map of a user’s face and use it to unlock the phone.My wife uses an iPhone for work with a FaceID system and when she was wearing Zenni’s ID Guard glasses, the phone would not open. Her iPhone rejected her in low light, darkness, and broad daylight if she was wearing the Zenni glasses. If she wore her own sunglasses, however, the phone opened immediately because the infrared lights of Apple Face ID made them clear and saw straight into her eyes.
The 2D infrared pictures taken in most public spaces running facial recognition systems are much less sophisticated than an iPhone. And there’s a way we can test those too: trail cameras. The cameras hunters and park rangers use to monitor the wilderness are often equipped with infrared lights that help them take pictures at night and in low light conditions. Using one to take a picture of my face while wearing the Zenni glasses should show us what I look like in public to facial recognition cameras used by retail businesses and the police.
Sure enough, the Zenni glasses with ID Guard stopped the camera from seeing my eyes when the infrared light was on. I sat for several photos in dark conditions while the camera captured photos of my face. The infrared went right through my normal sunglasses while the ID Guard glasses from Zenni stopped the light all together. The camera couldn’t get a clear shot of my eyes.
Zenni is not the first company to offer some form of anit-infrared coating that disrupts facial recognition tech, but it is the first to make it affordable while offering a variety of style choices. The company Reflectacles has been offering a variety of Wayfarer-style glasses with an anti-IR coating for a few years now. But Reflectacles style options are limited and have a powerful green-yellow tint. Zenni is also a major glasses retailer competing with other major retailers, it’s offering a variety of styles that match different aesthetics, and the pink sheen is way less noticeable than the green coating.
Zenni offers the ID Guard on most of its frames and the glasses have a subtle pink tint that’s obvious if you look directly at them, but I didn’t notice when I wore them. I used them to watch TV and went to the movies with them on and never noticed altered colors. “So with the pinkish hue, that was not by accident,” Lee said. “It was purposeful. We wanted to do something where we could actively show individuals that the lenses were actively working to protect their identity.”
Whether Zenni’s ID guard will actually protect people from facial recognition is less interesting than the fact that they exist at all. The state of our surveillance dystopia is such that a major glasses retailer is advertising anti-facial recognition features as a selling point as if it was normal.
Larry Ellison's AI-Powered Surveillance Dystopia Is Already Here
"Citizens will be on their best behavior, because we’re constantly recording and reporting everything that’s going on."Jason Koebler (404 Media)
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