CQ Politics | Innovations - Technology: August 2008 Archives

Warner Wins Over Twittering Crowd

August 27, 2008 6:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

People have been all a-Twitter at the Democratic National Convention, sending out their instant reactions to events in the message sharing service's 140-character chunks. Wired tells us that Virginia Gov. Mark Warner lit up Twitter during his keynote speech when he said, "In four months, we will have an administration that actually believes in science," garnering the approval of geeks everywhere. So far, there's been little talk of science policy at the convention.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

The Role of Tech in Running for President

August 27, 2008 4:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Fundraising and hitting the campaign trail are not the only key tasks in running for President. Business Week's Technology Insider traces how "technology and an appreciation of how to use it have always been important to political campaigns," from FDR's pioneering use of radio to today's use of microtargeting of voters and online social networks.

Web pick posted by CQ Staff

Nielsen Measures Obama's Text Audience

August 27, 2008 2:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If the phone rings at 3 a.m., it's probably Barack Obama texting you the late news of his vice presidential choice. Nielsen, which normally measures television audiences, said about 2.9 million people received the cell phone message, which had already been scooped by the more old-fashioned media. The Wall Street Journal points out that Obama still wins, having collected all those cell phone numbers so he can contact supporters in the future.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Technique Lets the Deaf Sign Through Cell Phones

August 26, 2008 1:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Voice communications don't work for deaf people, and the quality of video carried by American cellular networks is generally too low to carry images of people signing. Now researchers at the University of Washington have overcome this problem by coming up with video-encoding algorithms that enhances only the important parts of a video feed, Ars Technica reports. Since speakers of American Sign Language rely mostly on hand gestures and facial expressions, the algorithm raises the image quality of hands and faces and lowers it in the rest of the video so the video doesn't overrun the cellular network's bandwidth limitations.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

'Lots of Technology' Deployed To Keep the Peace at the Convention

August 25, 2008 1:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

By Drew Armstrong, CQ Staff

A three-dimensional tabletop map stands before an eight-foot by eight-foot video screen displaying a map of downtown Denver at the United States Secret Service's Denver Multi Agency Communications (Command) Center. The command center will allow 62 federal and local agencies to monitor and record everything related to the Democratic National Convention. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

DENVER -- Officials are keeping a lid on the technologies they will use to keep convention-goers safe, but the city has been spending heavily on security equipment and technology ahead of the event.

"You're going to have lots of additional capabilities brought to it, lots of technology deployed throughout Denver," said P.J. Crowley, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress and a terrorism and security expert.

Continue reading 'Lots of Technology' Deployed To Keep the Peace at the Convention.

Your Driver's License May Be Watching You

August 22, 2008 6:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Driver's licenses in states bordering Canada or Mexico may soon come equipped with RFID tags that can be read as far away as 30 feet. Though they're designed to decrease identity fraud, they and other RFID devices could also allow the government to track you without your knowledge. " Scientific American says lawmakers so far have done little to address potential privacy invasions for citizens.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

States Ditch Computer Voting

August 22, 2008 3:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Kathi Payne and Kari Verjil, elections officials for San Bernardino County, California pose with mothballed touch-screen voting machines on Tuesday. Disenchanted officials saw elections delayed by vanishing votes and breakdowns. There was evidence that the ATM-like devices were vulnerable to hackers. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)

Break out the butterfly ballots. After a number of states spent $2 billion to replace old-fashioned voting systems with touchscreens, several of those states are reversing course and getting rid of the electronic voting machines ahead of the November presidential election. Ars Technica reports that states including Alaska, California, Florida, Iowa, Maryland, Tennessee, and New Mexico will get rid of their voting machines in favor of old-fashioned paper ballots.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Microspacecraft Could Help NASA Launch More Missions

August 21, 2008 10:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

One way NASA could launch more missions more less money is by increased use of microspacecraft that weigh less than an average man. The hurdle has been that the smaller craft can't use the shields and systems that larger ones employ to avoid damaging temperature swings and meteorite damage. But Wired Magazine reports that researchers have developed a plastic skin that helps the small craft regulate temperatures and makes possible their use above low-earth orbit.

Saving Energy With New Lighting Technology

August 21, 2008 4:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

By Ellen Perlman, Governing.com

Ann Arbor, Michigan is investigating LED street lighting in hopes of cutting its $1.4 million street lighting bill in half. (City of Ann Arbor photos)

Sam Palmer is not a choreographer, but he plays one at the public library in Fayetteville, Arkansas. From his basement office, Palmer has created a dance for the building's interior lights on his computer system, giving each a role for different times of day. Some dim on bright days. Others turn on as staff members arrive. In the late afternoon, half of the lights turn off.

Ann Arbor, Michigan, also relies on sophisticated computer programming to light its city buildings and conduct some intriguing experiments with outdoor lighting. The city started out by replacing more than a thousand 100-watt globe streetlights in the downtown area with 56-watt LED lights. Now, energy officials are taking control of 28 of them and using radios to dim them, make them flash, or turn off one or more of the four lighting panels in each streetlight.

Continue reading Saving Energy With New Lighting Technology.

Biometrics May Lower Identity Theft

August 20, 2008 1:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

More powerful and inexpensive microprocessors are leading to increased use of biometrics---the use of individual physical characteristics as identifiers. Scientific American says that fingerprinting, face recognition, and iris scans are becoming more popular methods to fight identity theft, because it's not as easy to fake an eye scan as it is to steal a PIN. One issue, though, is that the error rates in some systems are still too high.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Palm Scans Come to the U.S.

August 18, 2008 6:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Infrared scans that verify identity by making a map of the veins in a person's palm will be required for all people taking the Graduate Management Admissions Test next year. Discovery News says this is the first use of this technology in the United States, although ATMs in Japan have been using it for about five years. A palm scan is considered more secure than a fingerprint, because it can't be lifted from an object as easily as a fingerprint and it requires a live hand with active blood flow.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Open Source Companies Having a Tough Time

August 18, 2008 1:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Open source software has led to better, cheaper applications. But the major providers of open source, such as Red Hat and Novell, have not profited much from such innovations, reports BusinessWeek. Instead, it's the tech giants such as IBM, HP, and Oracle that are making all the money.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Does the Internet Change How We Think?

August 16, 2008 1:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

With information easily available on the Internet and stored on devices like cell phones, could that be causing humans to devote less effort to remembering things? That's what an essayist at Salon wonders. He jumps off an essay from a University of Chicago sociologist writing about whether the Internet changes how people think, which itself follows on an Atlantic Monthly piece entitled, "Is Google Making Us Stupid?"

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, xconomy.com

Waiver Allows Olympic Film Crews to Use Military-Grade Camera

August 15, 2008 1:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

By Rob Margetta, CQ Staff

U.S. caution over China's access to technology has extended to the Olympics, says the surveillance camera manufacturer Axsys Technologies, which went through a lengthy waiver process so its military-grade high-definition cameras could be used at the games.

Axsys found out the White House approved its waiver only a week before the Olympics began, concluding six months of feeding the State Department information about the V14 High Definition camera systems slated to be mounted on helicopters and boats to film outdoor events including cycling, rowing, the marathon and the opening and closing ceremonies.

Continue reading Waiver Allows Olympic Film Crews to Use Military-Grade Camera .

McCain to Unveil Technology Agenda Today

August 14, 2008 10:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Lots of fun has been poked at presumed Republican nominee John McCain for being computer-averse, but today he will unveil a technology plan on his web site aimed at creating what his campaign calls "good, high-paying, innovation-oriented 21st-century jobs," according to the Wall Street Journal. Elements of the plan include creation of a national "chief technology officer," tax breaks for companies that offer high-speed Internet access in low-income and rural areas, and expansion of the H!-B visa program to help meet the demand for qualified candidates for high-level technology jobs.

Passport Chips Not Secure, Hackers Warn

August 11, 2008 6:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A number of governments are implanting radio frequency identification (RFID) tags into passports as a way of making them more secure. But a pair of researchers at last week's Black Hat conference in Las Vegas showed the Wall Street Journal's Business Technology Blog that they could hack into the chips and change the data. One said it took about four hours to break the encryption key and get the data contained in a passport chip.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Biometrics, Other DHS Travel Programs Making Progress

August 8, 2008 6:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

By Rob Margetta, CQ Staff

Kathy Kraninger, head of the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Screening Coordination, gave a rundown today on progress made in the highest profile screening programs, including:

The Electronic System for Travel Authorization

Kraninger called the program "the biggest thing we're working through and certainly the thing that's gotten the most attention." ESTA deals with how DHS processes foreign air passengers who can travel to America visa-free, because their countries are members of the Visa Waiver Program. It requires such travelers to fill out an online form with biographical and security information three days prior to departure.

Continue reading Biometrics, Other DHS Travel Programs Making Progress.

Technique Would Make E-Cars ... Noisier

August 7, 2008 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you had any thoughts of sneaking up on your enemies and running them over with a nearly silent hybrid car, forget about it. Lotus Engineering, which makes active noise management systems to keep it quiet inside the car, has developed a system to produce artificial engine noises and make the cars safer for pedestrians. Edmund.com says the company has made a demo model of its "Safe and Sound Hybrid" using a standard Toyota Prius.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Companies Tackle Power-Hungry PCs

August 6, 2008 3:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Personal computers are responsible for 40 percent of the carbon emissions attributable to information technology, according to the research firm Gartner. So Microsoft is joining with the non-profit Climate Savers Computing Initiative and a Seattle-based startup, Verdiem, to look for ways to save energy in PCs. The New York Times reports that the group is providing free software to help PC users find ways to use less energy.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

New Handheld Radio Promises "Interoperability" for Early Responders

August 4, 2008 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

By Rob Marghetta, CQ Staff

The technology and communication provider Harris Corp. has announced its contender in a market the Department of Homeland Security is pushing private industry to invest in: handheld interoperable emergency communications,

Just two months ago, DHS's Science and Technology Directorate said it wants companies to find ways to allow local, state and federal law enforcement and emergency officers to talk to one another, and that's exactly what Unity, its new family of multiband software-defined radios does, Harris said Friday.

Continue reading New Handheld Radio Promises "Interoperability" for Early Responders.

Air Force Developing Anti-Laser Protections

August 1, 2008 11:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Anticipating a day when enemy combatants will be armed with lasers capable of melting holes in its equipment and weapons, the U.S. Air Force is looking for technology that will protect its weapons. Among the possibilities listed in a request for proposals is a spray-on coating to deflect laser energy or a broadband reflector that can be embedded in a weapon's skin, Wired tells us. Such technologies, the Air Force suggests, could also protect commercial airliners from terrorists with lasers.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Controversial Employee Verification System Reauthorized

August 1, 2008 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

By Karoun Demirjian, CQ Staff

A controversial government-sponsored employee verification system got a firm vote of support Thursday in the House, despite deep disagreements over whether

the program is the appropriate mechanism through which to screen job applicants' work eligibility.

A five-year reautorization of the program ) passed 407-2. The bill is the product of weeks of negotiation between backers of E-Verify, the government's voluntary, Internet-based system, and supporters of the New Employee Verification Act, or NEVA , which envisioned using existing state-based networks currently used to identify deadbeat dads. The E-Verify plan is due to expire by the end of November.

Continue reading Controversial Employee Verification System Reauthorized.