Younger generations have been exposed longer to risk factors for obesity.
A new report reveals that the number of deaths caused by obesity in the United States has been vastly underestimated by researchers. Obesity accounts for 18 percent of deaths among black and white Americans between the ages of 40 and 85, according to the study published online Aug. 15 in the American Journal of Public Health. Previous estimates had placed obesity-related deaths at only 5 percent of all U.S. deaths.
Once everything in your house contains a computer, everything in your house can be hacked.
Security researchers have found that one of the problems with having a “smart” home is that some day, it might be smart enough to attack you. Everything we own, from our refrigerators and egg cartons to our cars and thermostats, will some day be outfitted with internet-connected sensors and control systems, allowing all our possessions, and ultimately all of our civic infrastructure, to communicate with each other and be controlled remotely.
Continue reading… “The cybercrime of things coming soon”
NSA headquarters.
The latest scoop from The Guardian’s concerns the ability of National Security Agency analysts to search vast databases of emails, online chats, and web browsing histories, among other online activity.
Continue reading… “Future NSA abuses are highly likely”
The XKeyscore software collects the contents and metadata from emails, online chats and Web browsing history for virtually anyone.
A Guardian report has revealed that NSA training materials openly said that the XKeyscore system, which it says formed a significant part of its PRISM surveillance activities disclosed by Edward Snowden last month, collected massive amounts of data, including the contents and the metadata of emails and chats.
Continue reading… “XKeyscore – new NSA tool sees “nearly everything” you do online”
Air pollution in India
The World Bank has released a report that says pollution and other environmental degradation costs India $80 billion a year, nearly six percent of gross domestic product.
Continue reading… “The cost of pollution in India: $80 billion a year”
Mobile raises the showrooming threat to a new level.
The practice of “showrooming,” or viewing an item in a retail store and then buying it online, has brought the e-commerce threat directly to bricks-and-mortar retailers.
Continue reading… “Major retailers that are most threatened by mobile”
National Security Agency headquarters at Fort Meade, Maryland.
New York Times: The revelations that telecom carriers have been secretly giving the National Security Agency information about Americans’ phone calls, and that the N.S.A. has been capturing e-mail and other private communications from Internet companies as part of a secret program called Prism, have not enraged most Americans. Lulled, perhaps, by the Obama administration’s claims that these “modest encroachments on privacy” were approved by Congress and by federal judges, public opinion quickly migrated from shock to “meh.”
Continue reading… “NSA surveillance is criminal”
Tim Berners-Lee
Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, says the internet is facing a “major” threat from “people who want to control it on the sly” through “worrying laws” such as SOPA, the US anti-piracy act, and through the actions of internet giants.
So far in 2013, Chicago homicides outnumbered slayings in the larger cities of New York and Los Angeles last year.
Chicago has drawn a lot of attention for the soaring gun violence and gang bloodshed, creating a political test for Mayor Rahm Emanuel in President Obama’s hometown. But a year later, Chicago has Chicago has witnessed a drop in shootings and crime. Killings this year have dipped to a level not seen since the early 1960s.
Continue reading… “Tactics by the city of Chicago have put a major dent in the killing trend”
Recent lawsuits and Justice Department investigations have uncovered grotesque abuses of mentally ill inmates at state and local prisons.
It has been an extraordinary three weeks , and maybe the darkest period in the history of the American penal system. In four states the systemic abuse and neglect of inmates, and especially mentally ill inmates, has been investigated, chronicled and disclosed in grim detail to the world by lawyers, government investigators and one federal judge. The conclusions are inescapable: In our zeal to dehumanize criminals we have allowed our prisons to become medieval places of unspeakable cruelty so far beyond constitutional norms that they are barely recognizable.
Continue reading… “The American prison system’s darkest period in history”
An elderly Chinese woman participates in a survey on dementia.
China had more people living with Alzheimer’s disease than any other country in the world in 2010. They had twice as many cases of Alzheimer’s and other kinds of dementia as the World Health Organization thought.
Continue reading… “More than 9 million people in China have dementia”
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When a bridge falls in America, like this one near Seattle last week, infrastructure spending has a way of transforming into a national obsession. Fortunately, falling bridges in America are still a rarity. But, infrastructure spending is being squeezed at the very moment that infrastructure spending is a historic bargain for the federal government.
Continue reading… “Falling bridges and the decline of U.S. infrastructure spending”
By delving into the futuring techniques of Futurist Thomas Frey, you’ll embark on an enlightening journey.
Learn More about this exciting program.