So one of Obama's planes flew low around the New York city area inciting mass panic, but the real question is "why?"

The cost of this stunt was in the range of almost $400,000 and all for getting a shot of the plane flying with the Statue of Liberty in the background. You know, I'd have photoshopped that for half the price… They should have asked me.

And good.

E-voting isn't impossible, but it's definitely not ready for the mainstream. At the very least, they'll have to make a system that actually has auditing and accountability.

(H/T to Schneier's Blog for the link)

I noticed the reuse of characters in some of the movies like Robin Hood and the Jungle Book, but I never saw anything like this: some of the animation sequences are identical between movies!

It's something you've got to see to really understand.

A student tipped off the school administrators that a girl had some kind of drugs on her so they stripped her to her undies and told her to shake out her underwear. Some people defend this:

That leaves school administrators with the choice of embarrassing a child through a search or possibly having other children die while in their care, Justice David Souter said. "With those stakes in mind, why isn't that reasonable?" Souter said.

But there are several problems with this argument. First, the "reasonableness" depends entirely upon two conditions, that she possessed drugs and that those drugs would have caused harm to another student, both of which were not met.

The event in question is now about 3 years old, but the rulings and hearings are just getting started.

(H/T to Privacy.org for the link)

This error is everywhere!

It's weird but suddenly I've been seeing this annoying Google error randomly whenever I'm browsing around. In some cases, it's even come up when I wasn't using a link from Google! If I try reloading the page or, worst case, opening the page in Internet Explorer, it works fine most times.

I don't know what it is, but I wish it would stop. It's clearly some kind of weird Google flaw and I hope they fix it soon. If anyone knows what this is and how to get rid of it, please let us know in the comments.

One day, my father-in-law answered a phone call on his cell and was shocked to hear his own voice on the other end. After listening a few seconds, he realized that he was listening to a recorded conversation that he'd had with a customer many days prior.

My in-laws asked me how this happened and I theorized, but didn't have a good answer at the time.

Now it seems that what happened to him is the same sort of thing that happened to these two poor ladies where someone secretly installed software on their phone allowing them to track and monitor where they went, what they said, who called them and when, and, worst of all, turn on their cellphone remotely to listen to them even when they weren't using the phone.

At the end of the video, they mention a website for more information which has a few more details about the experiment such as the fact that the FBI used similar technology to spy on organized crime families.

The main problem here is that by putting all those extra features and gimmicks into cellphones means that they're nothing short of hand-held computers (and with that comes all the computer vulnerabilities). However, they mention ways to protect yourself such as:

• Keep a close watch on your cellphone
• Use a password on your phone to prevent casual tampering
• Avoid high-end phones with internet and multiple networking capabilities
• Remove the battery from the phone when it's not being used

And by this point you're probably thinking the same thing I am, if you are the kind who wants a cool phone, how realistic is any of this? Not very.

Instead, their last recommendation, which is the same I was going to make is to get a pre-paid cellphone for better security. Why? It's just a phone. No gimmicks, no computers (and no contract!).

It would be nice if cell phone companies would be willing to cell simple phones with only a few basic features that we actually want (like voice-dialing), but until and unless that ever happens, your best security is with a pre-paid phone.

Here's a great article for spotting ATM machine skimmers.

And here's a list of articles of people who've actually found them and alerted Consumerist.com.

(in heavy Indian accent): "Thank you for calling Microsoft! My name is Bob, how may I help you!?"

Yeah sure…

Well, if you're as sick of working with someone who's command of the English language is worse than a drunk's, you'll be happy to know that it looks like the foreign call center could be coming to an end.

(H/T to The Consumerist for the link)

This is different. Apparently, you can play a game where people have to be fast or they get shocked (presumably as practice for those quiz shows where you have to be first to buzz in).

A lot of work goes into making food ads look nice and pretty, but the reality isn't always as good at the props.

(H/T to Lifehacker.com for the link)