Tag: social media

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Rutherford teen in ‘catfish’ scam sentenced to 6 months in prison

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Rutherford teen in ‘catfish’ scam sentenced to 6 months in prison

JUNE 25, 2014, 2:38 PM    LAST UPDATED: WEDNESDAY, JUNE 25, 2014, 6:59 PM
BY KAREN SUDOL
STAFF WRITER
THE RECORD

A federal judge sentenced a Rutherford teen to six months in prison for luring a classmate into an online relationship with a fictitious girl he created on Facebook and making a false kidnapping report about the girl to an overseas U.S. Embassy.But Andriy Mykhaylivskyy, 19, received credit for three months time served so he will serve three months in prison, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

U.S. District Judge Claire C. Cecchi also ordered Mykhaylivskyy to pay a $500 fine and serve three years of supervised release, federal prosecutors said.

The type of scam Mykhaylivskyy admitted to in court in March is called “catfishing,” which involves creating an elaborate fake persona to attract a handful of victims, often causing far greater financial and emotional damage. He pleaded guilty to making false statements in a matter within the jurisdiction of the executive branch of the U.S. government.

Specifically, Mykhaylivskyy created a fake online identity in the name of Kate Fulton and started an online relationship using her fake name with a then-18-year-old classmate. In July, while visiting Ukraine, he telephoned the U.S. Embassy in Moldova and reported that his girlfriend, Kate Fulton, had been kidnapped while vacationing in Bulgaria and that her mother had received a $50,000 ransom demand.

– See more at: https://www.northjersey.com/news/rutherford-teen-in-catfish-scam-sentenced-to-6-months-in-prison-1.1041137#sthash.arJrALEW.dpuf

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Ridgewood students tackle social media issues

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Ridgewood students tackle social media issues

JUNE 13, 2014    LAST UPDATED: FRIDAY, JUNE 13, 2014, 4:09 PM
BY LAURA HERZOG
STAFF WRITER

When it comes to improving student culture surrounding social media, who better to turn to than students themselves?

Students who participated in the first Ridgewood High School Student Leadership Summit worked on solutions to challenges, including ways to increase school spirit.

That was the thinking of Ridgewood High School (RHS) administrators, who recently consulted with students after a social media crisis this past May was caused by Yik Yak, a localized app that allows people to make anonymous comments. Using the app, a 17-year-old boy made an anonymous gun threat on May 13 that targeted RHS. After an around-the-clock police investigation, the boy was found and taken into custody.

But there were problems with the app even before that event, administrators said.

“Students that I talked to shared that there were just horrendous, horrible things written about other students, about us staff members,” said RHS Assistant Principal Basil Pizzuto. “There were some students really hurt by it, really, really hurt by it, and kind of still struggling with what they went through.”

In order to improve this situation, administrators – including Pizzuto – decided to talk directly to students. “Student leaders” identified by faculty were emailed an invitation to discuss the issue with adults on May 28.

Ultimately, 10 students gave up their monthly sleep-in day to discuss social media and school culture in the RHS Campus Center.

– See more at: https://www.northjersey.com/news/education/rhs-students-tackle-social-media-issues-1.1035198#sthash.NjbvYhNq.dpuf

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N.S.A. Collecting Millions of Faces From Web Images

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N.S.A. Collecting Millions of Faces From Web Images

By JAMES RISEN and LAURA POITRASMAY 31, 2014


The National Security Agency is harvesting huge numbers of images of people from communications that it intercepts through its global surveillance operations for use in sophisticated facial recognition programs, according to top-secret documents.

The spy agency’s reliance on facial recognition technology has grown significantly over the last four years as the agency has turned to new software to exploit the flood of images included in emails, text messages, social media, videoconferences and other communications, the N.S.A. documents reveal. Agency officials believe that technological advances could revolutionize the way that the N.S.A. finds intelligence targets around the world, the documents show. The agency’s ambitions for this highly sensitive ability and the scale of its effort have not previously been disclosed.

The agency intercepts “millions of images per day” — including about 55,000 “facial recognition quality images” — which translate into “tremendous untapped potential,” according to 2011 documents obtained from the former agency contractor Edward J. Snowden. While once focused on written and oral communications, the N.S.A. now considers facial images, fingerprints and other identifiers just as important to its mission of tracking suspected terrorists and other intelligence targets, the documents show.

https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/01/us/nsa-collecting-millions-of-faces-from-web-images.html?_r=0

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Yik Yak is just the latest we may be able to limit it use or get rid of it altogether but there will be another one just like it along 5 minutes later

Yik-Yak

Yik Yak is just the latest we may be able to limit it use or get rid of it altogether but there will be another one just like it along 5 minutes later

Unfortunately Yik Yak is just the latest mole to whack. We may be able to limit it use or get rid of it altogether but there will be another one just like it along 5 minutes later. Maybe as parents we should step up and teach our kids about respect, responsibility and self confidence instead of focusing our fear and rage at this and other social media outlets.

I installed Yik Yak a couple weeks ago to see what it was about and 99% of the posts are pure sophomoric drivel. Hopefully this should dilute some of the sting associated with the other 1% assuming it’s at all dangerous or hurtful. Comments like “Jimmy is a poopy head” should raise as much concern for our kids collective intelligence level as anything else.

A notice went out that some kid posted something about shooting up a school and the police didn’t seem to give it any credence whatsoever. After reading a couple of days worth of posts myself I have to say that I’m not very concerned either.

I don’t disagree with the doctor here in that the Ap, like any social media outlet, has the potential to be used as a vehicle for hate and bullying. I also agree that social media in general has begun to replace real human interaction and conversation with horrible consequences.

As parents it’s our job to teach our kids about responsible, moderate use of social media since it’s probably here to stay. As for Yik Yak, my message to my kids is why would you want to associate with the morons that post on it in the first place?

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North Jersey moms inspired by parenting create products and businesses

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North Jersey moms inspired by parenting create products and businesses

MAY 11, 2014    LAST UPDATED: SUNDAY, MAY 11, 2014, 1:21 AM
BY KARA YORIO
STAFF WRITER
THE RECORD

Every mother has been in a situation where she thinks, “There has got to be a better way.”

From easing separation anxiety to keeping your allergic child safe to easily finding a safe over-the-counter product when pregnant to solving the problems of the impractical beach bag — the issues are always there, and there are often ideas that follow. But who has the time to do anything with that creative thought?

Four North Jersey women are among the mothers who had those moments and acted on their inspiration. They created a product or product lines to help not only their families but other parents or future parents.

Audrey Storch, Iris Shamus, Rachel Katz-Galatt and Kimberlee Vaccarella share a strong belief in their ideas, a get-it-done attitude and a good support system required to be a parent, create a product and launch a business.

“The only difference between a dream and doing it is setting a goal — set a date for your dream and that’s how it becomes a reality,” said Storch, who created Huggs To Go in 1999. “Just go for it.”

Storch started her business — which made dolls that acted like a huggable picture frame — in a time before Google, never mind crowdfunding and social media. Tamara Monosoff was in a similar “Yellow Pages” situation more than a decade ago when the Bay Area mom wanted to create a product to keep kids from being able to unroll the toilet paper. She remembers making call after call to machinists with her daughter making noise in the background. She finally found an understanding soul.

“He said, ‘I’m a grandpa. Just bring her with you. Come on down,’ ” Monosoff remembered. “That changed everything for me.”

After she created the gadget and got some publicity, mothers with ideas continually sought her advice on how to go from idea to retail product. Those encounters led her to write “The Mom Inventors Handbook,” which recently released an updated edition, to help women find the resources they need.

– See more at: https://www.northjersey.com/news/north-jersey-moms-inspired-by-parenting-create-products-and-businesses-1.1013832#sthash.57oipo3j.dpuf

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Who’s Watching You Online?

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Who’s Watching You Online?
Amy Payne
March 10, 2014 at 5:30 am

In recent years, the world has watched as Twitter and Facebook made political uprisings possible. In countries where dissidents previously had trouble making their voices heard and connecting with one another, these tools changed history.

On the flipside, however, everyone from terrorists to foreign intelligence agencies rushed into the open space online.

“Exploiting social networks for military and intelligence purposes is a global game,” explains Heritage’s E.W. Richardson Fellow, James Jay Carafano. “China, for example, has stepped up its efforts to recruit Americans studying abroad as future ‘sleeper’ agents. The top tools they use to evaluate potential recruits? Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and reunion.com.”

Yesterday, Carafano spoke at the South by Southwest Interactive (SXSWi) Festival in Austin, Texas. Carafano, author of Wiki at War: Conflict in a Socially Networked World, joined the technology and ideas conference to speak on the impact of social networking on today’s warfare.

It may come as a surprise to many of us that, for example, not all email spam is harmless. Carafano warns:

Foreign intelligence services also use social media to try to get inside our computers. That malware your officemate downloaded by clicking on the email offering “50 percent off pizza”? It might just as easily have come from a hacker working for the Chinese military as from a Russian cyber-criminal or some punk cyber-dude in California.

And what is the U.S. government doing to protect us?

https://blog.heritage.org/2014/03/10/whos-watching-you-online-cyber-security/?utm_source=heritagefoundation&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=morningbell