AT&T Online Store Warning

AT&T reports that hackers broke into records of customers who used the AT&T online store and have obtained credit card numbers and personal data. People who bought DSL equipment for high speed internet access may be affected.

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Hackers broke into one of AT&T Inc.'s computer networks and stole credit card data and other personal information from several thousand customers who shopped at the telecommunication giant's online store.

AT&T said it was notifying "fewer than 19,000" customers whose data was accessed during the weekend break-in, which it said was detected within hours.

The company said it immediately shut down the online store, notified credit card companies, and was working with law enforcement agencies to track down the hackers.

"We recognize that there is an active market for illegally obtained personal information," Priscilla Hill-Ardoin, AT&T's chief privacy officer, said in a statement.

AT&T will provide credit monitoring services for those affected. If you bought equipment from them, you might want to get in touch about this right away.

Ernesto Limps Ashore, Media Mourns

You can almost feel the tangible sense of mourning coming from the press today that Ernesto wasn't a massive hurricane when it hit South Florida. In the end it wasn't much of a storm at all and the press is having to scramble like heck to keep the narrative going by hoping - almost praying - that it just might possibly strengthen again once it hits open water.

Ernesto lost much of its punch crossing mountainous eastern Cuba. It made landfall late Tuesday on Plantation Key with 45-mph winds, far from the 74-mph threshold for a hurricane that Ernesto briefly met Sunday.

"Fortunately it didn't get too big," said David Rudduck of the American Red Cross. "It was the little train that couldn't."

Forecasters said Ernesto could weaken to a tropical depression later Wednesday, but rainbands could dump as much as 10 inches of rain in some spots along Florida's east coast.

At a bar in Key Largo, transplanted New Yorker Brian Lima nursed a beer while he watched the rain fall. "I've seen much worse rainstorms in New York," Lima said. (Emphasis added)

Ernesto was forecast to move up the middle of Florida and exit on the northeast coast by early Thursday before hitting the mainland again in Georgia or the Carolinas.

"How much strengthening occurs after Ernesto emerges into the Atlantic depends on how much of a cyclone is left," said senior hurricane specialist James Franklin.

Better luck next storm guys. I suspect there's a bit of tropical depression in newsrooms everywhere.

The Mantle Of Excuses

Turns out I was right about the driver who ran amok through downtown San Francisco yesterday. He was, indeed, from Afghanistan and had just returned from there after being married. Relatives of the man have already come forward and said he was disturbed, just a nice guy, etc., etc., etc. Exactly the same thing you hear all the time, no matter what the crime or criminal. Nothing odd there.

And officials are completely cutting off any consideration of this as a hate crime or even uttering the word "terror" in any context. By immediately, publicly and forcefully ruling out "hate" crime (a term I frankly detest for a number of reasons) and by reflexively rejecting any discussion of terrorism, authorities are effectively blocking off at least one avenue of investigation. That, sadly, is also not at all odd these days if the suspect has a Muslim name.

The Bookworm did a long round of updates that captured a lot of the news as it was breaking. You can see the pattern develop. The perpetrator  was experiencing jitters over his recent marriage. He was mentally ill. He was on medication. He had dreams of the devil, it's road rage, blah, blah, blah. But the last update has this:

UPDATE IX: I just watched local coverage. Apparently several witnesses reported that Popal referred to himself as a “terrorist.” The police quickly denied this. Either the police are trying to hide something (why?) or the witnesses are succumbing to mass hysteria.

There are also the automatic 'we're worried about what this means for Afghans' words sprouting in the linked news story. The perpetrator's ethnic/religious group as victim, or potential victim, is also sadly not at all unusual. You know what? I hope this does turn out to be a lunatic with delusions. At the same time, I would like our government officials, law enforcement and media to stop instantly throwing a mantle of protection over any consideration that it might be something else.

Would that same mantle be thrown over someone who purposely drove into a crowd at say a gay pride parade? How about a Presbyterian, white male who drove through a crowd of Asians? Pick any ethnic or racial or social group and start substituting one for the perpetrator and another for the victim. Imagine which groups get an automatic protection and which do not. Then ask yourself why.

Could we please stop the knee jerk protection if a Muslim is involved in anything. Let people know the facts, don't close off any avenue of investigation preemptively and let people know what is going on truthfully. If it turns out to be related to terrorism in any way, an immediate and forceful renunciation by the community that the perpetrator is part of would do more to defuse any possible backlash than reflexively trying to hide behind victim status. 

Iran Enriching New Batch Of Uranium

The Washington Post reports that Iran has begun enrichment activities on a new batch of uranium. The work is coming just a couple of days before the UN mandated deadline for halting those activities and should tell even the Clue Proof™ that Iran will not comply.

Iranian nuclear specialists have begun enriching a new batch of uranium in an apparent act of defiance just days ahead of a U.N. Security Council deadline for Tehran to stop such work or face the prospect of economic sanctions, officials in Washington and European capitals who have been monitoring Iran's efforts said yesterday.

Inspectors with the International Atomic Energy Agency plan to formally disclose the new enrichment work, as well as additional Iranian nuclear advances, in a report due out tomorrow, according to the officials, some of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The officials stressed that the Iranians are working at a slow pace with small quantities of uranium, and that they are enriching the material to an extremely low level that could not be used for nuclear weapons. Still, it is unlikely that the Iranians will stop the work in time to meet the Security Council's deadline.

For three years, Iran and the United States have publicly sparred over a nuclear program that Tehran says it built to produce energy but which the Bush administration believes is a cover for nuclear weapons work. IAEA inspectors have been trying, without success, to determine the true nature of the program, which Iran kept secret for 18 years.

Notice the way that the unnamed IAEA officials downplay the work and assure everyone that it is only small amounts and low enrichment. Which they know how? Iran carried this program on in secret for years right under the noses of the UN. Nobody in the IAEA actually knows what the Iranians are doing, only what they have allowed the UN to see.

For the uninformed, uranium bombs are relatively easy to fabricate. Plutonium bombs require a rather sophisticated manufacturing capability and a fairly high level of infrastructure. Neither is beyond the capability of Iran.