Spy Review

The hummingbird is a small, nut unique bird – its wings can move extremely fast, it can fly backwards and they can hover in mid-air. Now a Japanese researcher has Hiroshi Liu who works at the Chiba University just outside Tokyo has made a robotic hummingbird, very much like the real-life version, at least a robotic imitation of it.

He plans to equip this with a micro camera which will come in use to see things in places human being cannot reach. Say if there is a building collapse or a mine collapse, the robotic hummingbird can go through small crevices and via its camera ‘sight’ survivors. Possibly it may be used even to hunt down criminals.

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News is rife that Google is planning to shut down its China operations primarily because of a ‘highly sophisticated and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure originating from China’, says the company in its blog.

Google has refused to allow censorship of its internet searches in China, particularly after a cyber attack on the emails of Chinese human rights activists. Reuters’ reports ‘Secretary of State Hillary Clinton plans to help citizens in other countries, including China, get uncensored access to the Internet, and last week she met top executives from companies including Google, Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O), Twitter and Cisco Systems Inc (CSCO.O), an aide said on Tuesday.’

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The terror threat in air is very real as evinced by the recent attempt by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian accused of trying to ignite explosives aboard a Northwest Airlines jet. If he had gone through the full body scanner, the explosives he was carrying would most likely have been detected.

If metal detector and x-ray scanners don’t work, if strip searches are not effective, then perhaps these see-through scanners will ensure a greater degree of safety in the air. However, most people, when asked, said they preferred to be scanned rather than face a terror threat in the air.

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If you have reason to believe that somebody may be spying on you for any given reason, you can use this portable spy camera detector which will tell you if this is indeed true. If you learn that your privacy is being infringed upon, then you can take steps to rectify the situation. As it is small and hand-held it is easy to carry around.

Sometimes covert cameras may be innocuous as in CCTVs which you cannot see. At other times they may be deliberate, particularly if you are in any kind of compromising situation on the work or personal front.

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Karstel Nohl, an encryption expert, said at the Chaos Communication Conference of computer hackers that he had deciphered the secret code used to encrypt most mobile calls. He said he wanted to expose the holes in the security systems used by global wireless systems.

The German computer engineer with a doctorate in computer engineering said that the GSM code which has been in use since 1988 is not entirely secure. Earlier in August 2009, at a hackers’ forum, he had appealed to other computer hackers to help him generate the necessary volume of random combinations to crack the code.

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If you are a resident of Britain – beware! Big Brother may be watching you. There are more than 60,000 cameras deployed, operated by local councils. Director of privacy campaign group, Alex Deane, confirmed that a study aptly titled Big Brother is Watching revealed, ‘Local councils across Britain are creating enormous networks of CCTV at great expense, but the evidence for the ability of CCTV to deter or solve crimes is sketchy at best.’

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Many criminals have various tattoos and they keep one step ahead of the law by changing their tattoos, particularly if they have them at very visible places which can be used for identification purposes. Sometimes tattoos are reworked, sometimes they are ‘removed’ in a bid to make identification difficult.

But now scientists and researchers at the University of Derby have figured out ways of using digital cameras with infra-red sensitivity which will enable them to know whether the tattoo is original or has been reworked or erased.

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You have a rearview mirror when you are in the driver’s seat to see the traffic behind you and what manoeuvres you should take to go forward. That is why it is called a rearview mirror. Now if you are sitting in office the whole day in front of the computer screen, you can attach this CHIMP to it. CHIMP stands for C- chimp; H – Has; I- Invisible; M – Monkey; P – Powers.

It will enable you to see who is trying to sneak up on you, so that you can quickly change the screen, so that it looks like you are actually doing some work, while pretending to look very busy. Perhaps you may have been playing a game or were checking your personal email or just surfing the net – things which you are not supposed to be doing during office hours.

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