The Swedish police had raided the premises of the host PRQ of Sweden in Solna in Sweden. This “host activist, who advocates a radical conception of freedom of expression, including the servers hosting the download site The Pirate Bay or sites advocating pedophilia. It is also the host of Wikileaks, the site specializes in the publication of confidential documents made public this summer tens of thousands of reports of U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

According to preliminary information from Swedish media, the search was linked to a download illegal files, as part of an investigation by Belgian police launched two years ago. Investigators searching the Internet for the first time putting videos online of movies recorded in theaters, or “camcorders”, or even before their theatrical release, on streaming sites.

Other raids have taken place in other Swedish cities and other countries, including the Netherlands and Hungary. No arrest has been performed in PEQ, contrary to a previous search in 2006, as part of an investigation into The Pirate Bay, when several machines were confiscated by police. In total, four people were arrested in the country, but nobody at PRQ.

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Vowing to find new ways to stimulate the sputtering economy, President Barack Obama will call for long-term investments in the nation’s roads, railways and runways that would cost at least $50 billion.

The infrastructure investments are one part of a package of targeted proposals the White House is expected to announce in hopes of jump-starting the economy ahead of the November election. Obama will outline the infrastructure proposal Monday at a Labor Day event in Milwaukee.

While the proposal calls for investments over six years, the White House said spending would be front-loaded with an initial $50 billion to help create jobs in the near future.

The goals of the infrastructure plan include: rebuilding 150,000 miles of roads; constructing and maintaining 4,000 miles of railways, enough to go coast-to-coast; and rehabilitating or reconstructing 150 miles of airport runways, while also installing a new air navigation system designed to reduce travel times and delays.

Obama will also call for the creation of a permanent infrastructure bank that would focus on funding national and regional infrastructure projects.

Administration officials wouldn’t say what the total cost of the infrastructure investments would be, but did say the initial $50 billion represents a significant percentage. Officials said the White House would consider closing a number of special tax breaks for oil and gas companies to pay for the proposal.

Obama made infrastructure investments a central part of the $814 billion stimulus Congress passed last year, but with that spending winding down, the economy’s growth has slowed. Officials said this infrastructure package differs from the stimulus because it’s aimed at long-term growth, while still focusing on creating jobs in the short-term.

In a Labor Day interview on CBS’”Early Show,” Labor Secretary Hilda Solis said the plan Obama was to unveil Monday would “put construction workers, welders, electricians back to work … folks that have been unemployed for a long time.”

With the unemployment rate ticking up to 9.6 percent, and polls showing the midterm elections could be dismal for Democrats, the president has promised to unveil a series of new measures on the economy.

In addition to Monday’s announcement in Milwaukee, Obama will travel to Cleveland Wednesday to pitch a $100 billion proposal to increase and make permanent research and development tax credits for businesses, a White House official said.

While the idea is popular in Congress, coming up with offsetting tax increases or spending cuts has been a stumbling block. Similar to his proposal to pay for the infrastructure investments, Obama will ask lawmakers to close tax breaks for oil and gas companies and multinational corporations to pay for the plan.

Other stimulus measures the administration is considering include extending a law passed in March that exempts companies that hire unemployed workers from paying Social Security taxes on those workers through December. Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has proposed extending the exemption an additional six months.

Obama is also continuing to prod the Senate to pass the small business bill that calls for about $12 billion in tax breaks and a $30 billion fund to help unfreeze lending. Republicans have likened the bill to the unpopular bailout of the financial industry. And the president wants to make permanent the portion of George W. Bush’s tax cuts affecting the middle class.

Wary of the public’s concern over rising deficits, the administration insists a second stimulus plan, similar to last year’s $814 billion bill, is not in the works.

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One of the most contentious issues in the vast literature about alcohol consumption has been the consistent finding that those who don’t drink actually tend to die sooner than those who do. The standard Alcoholics Anonymous explanation for this finding is that many of those who show up as abstainers in such research are actually former hard-core drunks who had already incurred health problems associated with drinking.

But a new paper in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research suggests that – for reasons that aren’t entirely clear – abstaining from alcohol does actually tend to increase one’s risk of dying even when you exclude former drinkers. The most shocking part? Abstainers’ mortality rates are higher than those of heavy drinkers. (See pictures of booze under a microscope.)

Moderate drinking, which is defined as one to three drinks per day, is associated with the lowest mortality rates in alcohol studies. Moderate alcohol use (especially when the beverage of choice is red wine) is thought to improve heart health, circulation and sociability, which can be important because people who are isolated don’t have as many family members and friends who can notice and help treat health problems.

But why would abstaining from alcohol lead to a shorter life? It’s true that those who abstain from alcohol tend to be from lower socioeconomic classes, since drinking can be expensive. And people of lower socioeconomic status have more life stressors – job and child-care worries that might not only keep them from the bottle but also cause stress-related illnesses over long periods. (They also don’t get the stress-reducing benefits of a drink or two after work.)

But even after controlling for nearly all imaginable variables – socioeconomic status, level of physical activity, number of close friends, quality of social support and so on – the researchers (a six-member team led by psychologist Charles Holahan of the University of Texas at Austin) found that over a 20-year period, mortality rates were highest for those who had never been drinkers, second-highest for heavy drinkers and lowest for moderate drinkers. (Watch TIME’s Video “Taste Test: Beer With Extra Buzz.”)

The sample of those who were studied included individuals between ages 55 and 65 who had had any kind of outpatient care in the previous three years. The 1,824 participants were followed for 20 years. One drawback of the sample: a disproportionate number, 63%, were men. Just over 69% of the never-drinkers died during the 20 years, 60% of the heavy drinkers died and only 41% of moderate drinkers died.

These are remarkable statistics. Even though heavy drinking is associated with higher risk for cirrhosis and several types of cancer (particularly cancers in the mouth and esophagus), heavy drinkers are less likely to die than people who have never drunk. One important reason is that alcohol lubricates so many social interactions, and social interactions are vital for maintaining mental and physical health. As I pointed out last year, nondrinkers show greater signs of depression than those who allow themselves to join the party.

The authors of the new paper are careful to note that even if drinking is associated with longer life, it can be dangerous: it can impair your memory severely and it can lead to nonlethal falls and other mishaps (like, say, cheating on your spouse in a drunken haze) that can screw up your life. There’s also the dependency issue: if you become addicted to alcohol, you may spend a long time trying to get off the bottle. (Comment on this story.)

That said, the new study provides the strongest evidence yet that moderate drinking is not only fun but good for you. So make mine a double.

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Apple became the biggest fish in the very small touchscreen tablet pond when it launched the iPad this past spring. But more fish will arrive starting mid-month when Samsung launches its Galaxy Tab mobile device in Europe (US and Asia will get it “in the coming months”). After being rumored and teased for weeks, Samsung officially unveiled its entry into the burgeoning market at the IFA show in Germany on Thursday.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab is a 7″ widescreen touch tablet powered by Android 2.2. The Tab will use the same TouchWiz UI used on Samsung’s line of Galaxy S smartphones, which gives it a very iOS-like look and feel. Also following the iPad’s lead, the device has a metal back, black bezel, bottom speakers, and even a 30-pin connector.

At the heart of the device is the same 1GHz ARM processor and PowerVR GPU core that powers the Galaxy S phones, and is in most respects equivalent to Apple’s A4 processor. It also includes 802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth 3.0, and 3G connectivity; assisted GPS capabilities; accelerometer, gyroscope, and magnetometer sensors; and comes with either 16GB and 32GB of built-in flash storage.

However, there are a few areas where the Galaxy Tab separates itself from the iPad. The display is a 1024 x 600 pixel, 7″ diagonal 16:9 wide touchscreen. The smaller size makes the overall device smaller, and at under 5″ wide it’s almost pocketable. The smaller size also gives the device a higher pixel density of 171ppi versus the iPad’s 132ppi, though its widescreen orientation does sacrifice screen real estate. Those that primarily use the device for viewing HD content, however, will really appreciate this design choice.

The device also includes both rear- and front-facing cameras; the iPad’s omission of cameras has been heavily criticized. At the rear is a 3MP autofocus camera with LED flash, while the front has a 1.3MP fixed focus camera. In addition to stills, the Tab can record 720 x 480 resolution video.

To expand storage, the device accepts up to 32GB MicroSD cards.

On the software side, the Tab includes the mobile version of Flash 10.1—Apple’s iOS devices famously lack Flash compatibility—but the jury is still out on whether that is a benefit or not. The Tab is compatible with a wide variety of audio and video formats for media playback, including being the first DiVX-certified tablet. Like Samsung’s other Galaxy devices, it features the innovative Swype soft keyboard. And Samsung is targeting the popularity of the iPad as a full-color e-reader by including a Kobo-developed “Readers Hub” which is compatible with ePub, PDF, Kobo, and Adobe DRM’d content, including books, magazines, and newspapers. By virtue of running Android 2.2, it also includes all the Google apps like Navigation and Latitude, and can access software from the Android Marketplace.

Samsung’s Galaxy Tab is the first in a number of Android tablets that have been announced or rumored for release late this year or early next year. Samsung has not yet announced pricing, exact ship dates, or carrier partners for 3G data service, but it says the device will first launch in Europe in mid-September, to be followed by US and Asia sometime later this year.

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How amazing would it be if you could walk into McTaco King and order that mid-morning bacon taco meal with Mountain Dew Big Gulp from your mobile device?  Just imagine… as you approach the restaurant, a menu pops up on your screen, the phone makes suggestions and helps you super-size your order, before you even set foot in the restaurant!

This advertiser’s wet dream is about to become reality, thanks to WPS (Wi-Fi Positioning System) infrastructure pioneered by CIA front companySkyhook (formerly Quarterscope) and currently being implemented by several other intelligence-connected companies, including Facebook, Google, Apple, and Navizon (which is supplying data to Microsoft).

WPS geolocates wireless network devices using a database of known wireless access points, such as in coffee shops.  Since at least 2004, WPS companies like Skyhook and Google have been war-driving for access point data.  More about the technical aspects of this later.

How did you conclude that Skyhook is an intelligence front company?

Follow the money.

In 2008 former CIA director George Tenet became Managing Director of Allen & Company, an investment bank that provided funding for Skyhook’s WPS development and Google’s IPO (Initial Public Offering) in 2004, while he was still director of the CIA.

Skyhook was also funded by shadowy investment firm Alliance Capital.  Frank Savage, Alliance Capital’s former board chairman, also served on the board of Lockheed Martin and Enron. Alliance was Enron’s largest shareholder.

Regardless of where the seed money came from, you can now buy this WPS data commercially.  Intelligence agencies are putting a lot of effort into developing new tracking and identification technologies.  Once they turn these technologies loose on society, the corporations exploit them, resulting in even more personal data being exchanged on private networks, which intelligence agencies can snoop on at will with their NSA Internet vacuum cleaners.

What exactly is WPS and how does it work?

Nearly every modern network connected device (phone, computer network card, cable modem, wireless router, bluetooth headset, etc), has a unique number called a MAC address(Media Access Control, not Apple) built in.

Please note that even if a mobile device doesn’t obtain an IP address when connecting to wi-fi, merely conducting a normal SSID (Session ID) scan can result in exchanging MAC addresses with access points.  Wireless devices scan for access points automatically, if you leave the default settings, resulting in the mobile obtaining the MAC addres of the access point and potentially revealing its own MAC, depending on the type of scan.

MAC addresses are embedded in beacon frames, which are part of the hardware link between wireless devices.  Under exactly what circumstances would MAC address be transmitted by the mobile during a SSID scan, rather than scanning passively?  I don’t know, but we’ll put that idea on the back burner for now.

Here is the relevant thing you need to know about them: they are unique and can identify any network connected device, wired or wireless, bluetooth, 802.11, etc.  The good news is you can change a device’s MAC address.†  The bad news is, that doesn’t really matter because that new number can be immediately correlated with your voice print and other biometric signatures in realtime by the mobile device (see Iphone trojan link below)

WPS is not generally used alone for geolocation. Hybrid systems including GPS and cell triangulation are more commonly used to geolocate. the advantage of adding WPS is that you can be located anywhere there’s a known wi-fi, such as inside buildings. and you can be triangulated more accurately than cell + GPS using a large number of access points.  How often have you been in an urban setting and seen 10 or 20 or more access points in the list?  If the exact location of those access points are known, they can all be used together to triangulate the mobile more precisely.

So my phone trades MAC addresses with a restaurant’s Wi-Fi. They show me the daily specials.   Aren’t there potential benefits to something like this?

Yes, there are many potential benefits to advertisers, law enforcement, and intelligence agencies who want to track masses of people.  WPS is going to dovetail beautifully with the NSA’s Main Core and Apple’s new biometric Iphone trojan.

The only potential benefit to you is that you will not have to speak to the person behind the counter and your latté will be ready faster.

Intelligence agencies and DARPA are creating an AI surveillance cloud right before our eyes.  Don’t think that because you don’t have an Iphone means the 3 people sitting around you haven’t had their trojans activated to identify your voice print and snoop on your conversation.

We already know how this ends.  You better not be reading qbit.cc either or you’re going on their shit list!

† But why is it that on Apple OSX 10.4 you can’t change the MAC address of your wireless card even as root?  It simply fails with no error and keeps the original MAC address.  I will find the answer to this question.

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