Osama Bin Laden Dead

Osama Bin Laden has been killed the release with some early info follows belo

WASHINGTON - Osama bin Laden, the glowering mastermind behind the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks that killed thousands of Americans, was killed in an operation led by the United States, President Barack Obama said Sunday.

A small team of Americans killed bin Laden in a firefight at a compound in Pakistan, the president said in a dramatic late-night statement at the White House.

A jubilant crowd gathered outside the White House as word spread of bin Laden's death after a global manhunt that lasted nearly a decade.

"Justice has been done," the president said.

Former President George W. Bush, who was in office on the day of the attacks, issued a written statement hailing bin Laden's death as a momentous achievement.

"The fight against terror goes on, but tonight America has sent an unmistakable message: No matter how long it takes, justice will be done," he said.

Few details were immediately available of the operation that resulted in bin Laden's death, although the president said none of the Americans involved was harmed.

The development comes just months before the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center towers in New York and the Pentagon in Washington, orchestrated by bin Laden's al-Qaida organization, that killed more than 3,000 people.

The attacks set off a chain of events that led the United States into wars in Afghanistan, and then Iraq, and America's entire intelligence apparatus was overhauled to counter the threat of more terror attacks at home.

Al-Qaida was also blamed for the 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa that killed 231 people and the 2000 attack on the USS Cole that killed 17 American sailors in Yemen, as well as countless other plots, some successful and some foiled.

Do You Know Where Your Bananas Come From ?

Do You Know Where Your Bananas Come From ? Well if the allegation's are true, they may have come from groups that the Untied States have on their terrorism list. I guess we will just have to wait for the trial, if there is one, to get all the facts. In The meantime what are your thoughts? My opinion is if the allegation's are true, this could be very damaging to the company, after all do you want to buy bananas from a company that deals with terrorists? I know I don't.

By MATT APUZZO, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Banana company Chiquita Brands International was charged Wednesday with doing business with a terrorist organization.

Federal prosecutors said the company and several unnamed high-ranking corporate officers did business with the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia. The group is described in court documents as a violent right-wing organization that the U.S. has designated as a terrorist organization.

The company also did business with the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, according to prosecutors.
The payments were approved by senior executives at the Cincinnati-based company, prosecutors wrote in court documents. Corporate books were kept to conceal the deals, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors said Chiquita began paying the right-wing AUC after a meeting in 1997.
"No later than in or about September 2000, defendant Chiquita's senior executives knew that the corporation was paying AUC and that the AUC was a violent paramilitary organization," prosecutors wrote in Wednesday's court filing.
The document filed by federal prosecutors is known as an information. Unlike an indictment, it is normally worked out through discussions with prosecutors and is followed by a guilty plea. A plea hearing is scheduled for Monday.
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On the Net:
Chiquita: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/ap/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/storytext/terrorism_bananas/22266840/SIG=10q1588e6/*http://www.chiquita.com/

Big Brother Double Double Plus Good

For awhile in Canada some ISP's have been keeping records on their own. I'm not really sure how I feel about this issue, as I can see the reasons for wanting to combat crime, yet I'm very worried that in the effort to do this we become what we are trying to combat and civil rights that people courageously fought for sometimes losing their life for could be compromised in this well meaning attempt.

In the end this is the question I'm struggling with I the act of fighting terrorism and cyber-crime/crime are we becoming what we are fighting against? Basically in the act of trying to prevent actions from happening do we create the circumstances in which they can thrive?

I look forward to any comments people have on this issue.

FBI director wants ISPs to track users

By Declan McCullagh

FBI Director Robert Mueller on Tuesday called on Internet service providers to record their customers' online activities, a move that anticipates a fierce debate over privacy and law enforcement in Washington next year. "Terrorists coordinate their plans cloaked in the anonymity of the Internet, as do violent sexual predators prowling chat rooms," Mueller said in a speech at the International Association of Chiefs of Police conference in Boston. ISP snooping time line

In events that were first reported by CNET News.com, Bush administration officials have said

Internet providers must keep track of what Americans are doing online.

June 2005: Justice Department officials quietly propose data retention rules.

December 2005: European Parliament votes for data retention of up to two years.

April 14, 2006: Data retention proposals surface in Colorado and the U.S. Congress.

April 20, 2006: Attorney General Alberto Gonzales says data retention "must be addressed."

April 28, 2006: Rep. Diana DeGette proposes data retention amendment.

May 16, 2006: Rep. James Sensenbrenner drafts data retention legislation--but backs away from it two days later.

May 26, 2006: Gonzales and FBI Director Robert Mueller meet with Internet and telecommunications companies.

June 27, 2006: Rep. Joe Barton, chair of a House committee, calls new child protection legislation "highest priority."
"All too often, we find that before we can catch these offenders, Internet service providers have unwittingly deleted the very records that would help us identify these offenders and protect future victims," Mueller said. "We must find a balance between the legitimate need for privacy and law enforcement's clear need for access." The speech to the law enforcement group, which approved a resolution on the topic earlier in the day, echoes other calls from Bush administration officials to force private firms to record information about customers.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, for instance, told Congress last month that "this is a national problem that requires federal legislation." Justice Department officials admit privately that data retention legislation is controversial enough that there wasn't time to ease it through the U.S. Congress before politicians left to campaign for re-election. Instead, the idea is expected to surface in early 2007, and one Democratic politician has already promised legislation.

Law enforcement groups claim that by the time they contact Internet service providers, customers' records may have been deleted in the routine course of business. Industry representatives, however, say that if police respond to tips promptly instead of dawdling, it would be difficult to imagine any investigation that would be imperiled. It's not clear exactly what a data retention law would require. One proposal would go beyond Internet providers and require registrars, the companies that sell domain names, to maintain records too. And during private meetings with industry officials, FBI and Justice Department representatives have cited the desirability of also forcing search engines to keep logs--a proposal that could gain additional law enforcement support after AOL showed how useful such records could be in investigations.

A representative of the International Association of Chiefs of Police said he was not able to provide a copy of the resolution. Preservation vs. retention At the moment, Internet service providers typically discard any log file that's no longer required for business reasons such as network monitoring, fraud prevention or billing disputes. Companies do, however, alter that general rule when contacted by police performing an investigation--a practice called data preservation.

A 1996 federal law called the Electronic Communication Transactional Records Act regulates data preservation. It requires Internet providers to retain any "record" in their possession for 90 days "upon the request of a governmental entity." Because Internet addresses remain a relatively scarce commodity, ISPs tend to allocate them to customers from a pool based on whether a computer is in use at the time. (Two standard techniques used are the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol and Point-to-Point Protocol over Ethernet.)

In addition, Internet providers are required by another federal law to report child pornography sightings to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which is in turn charged with forwarding that report to the appropriate police agency. When adopting its data retention rules, the European Parliament approved U.K.-backed requirements saying that communications providers in its 25 member countries--several of which had enacted their own data retention laws already--must retain customer data for a minimum of six months and a maximum of two years.

The Europe-wide requirement applies to a wide variety of "traffic" and "location" data, including: the identities of the customers' correspondents; the date, time and duration of phone calls, VoIP (voice over Internet Protocol) calls or e-mail messages; and the location of the device used for the communications. But the "content" of the communications is not supposed to be retained. The rules are expected to take effect in 2008.

CNET News.com's Anne Broache contributed to this report.

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-6126877.html