In a move that calls to mind the start of the most serious unrest in nations across the Middle East over the last year, David Cameron, Britain's prime minister, told Parliament Thursday that authorities may shut down social media websites like Facebook and Twitter, in hopes that it would return calm to their streets.

The remarks came one day after British authorities discussed turning off the messaging function on BlackBerry phones, which they suggested may remove a tool protesters and rioters were using.

"Everyone watching these horrific actions will be struck by how they were organized via social media," Cameron told Parliament. "Free flow of information can be used for good. But it can also be used for ill.

"So we are working with the Police, the intelligence services and industry to look at whether it would be right to stop people communicating via these websites and services when we know they are plotting violence, disorder and criminality. I have also asked the police if they need any other new powers."

'We will not allow a culture of fear to exist on our streets,' prime minister says, adding more than 1,200 arrests have been made

Declaring "we will not allow a culture of fear to exist on our streets," Prime Minister David Cameron said Thursday that police across Britain had so far made more than 1,200 arrests over the country's worst civil unrest in memory. Police levels London would remain elevated at 16,000 through the weekend, Cameron told an emergency session of parliament.

He promised tough measures to stop further violence and said "nothing should be off the table," including water cannons and plastic bullets. "The whole country has been shocked (by the riots). ... It is criminality, pure and simple, and there is absolutely no excuse for it," Cameron told lawmakers in the House of Commons.

He said riot-hit businesses would receive help to get back on their feet, and promised to look to the United States for help in fighting the street gangs he blamed for helping spark Britain's riots.

Personal info for 92,000 customers exposed

Citigroup's Japanese credit card unit said personal information for more than 92,000 of its customers was illegally sold to a third party.

The information exposed included the names, account numbers addresses, phone numbers birthdates, and sex of 92,408 credit card holders, Citi Cards Japan warned in an advisory (PDF) issued Friday. The personal identification numbers and card security codes were not accessed.

Certain elements of the Anonymous hacktivist group are to launch an attack on Facebook on 5 November, in retaliation for alleged collusion by the social network with government agencies and security firms to allow them to spy on Facebook users.

News of a fresh campaign, dubbed Operation Facebook, broke overnight, with many sources referring to a YouTube video actually posted on 16 July.

The video features a digitally generated voice speaking over an Anonymous logo, warning that Facebook will be "destroyed" and encouraging any would-be hacktivists to "join the cause and kill Facebook for the sake of your own privacy".

"Facebook has been selling information to government agencies and been giving clandestine access to information security firms so that they can spy on people from all around the world," it continues.

"Some of these so-called white hat infosec firms are working for authoritarian governments such as those of Egypt and Syria. Everything you do on FB stays on FB regardless of your privacy settings."

The ruthless Taliban terrorists who shot down a U.S. helicopter in Afghanistan - killing 30 Americans - have been hunted down and killed, officials said Wednesday.

Ten Taliban insurgents, including one believed to have fired the rocket-propelled grenade that took down a chopper loaded with elite troops, were obliterated in an airstrike by coalition forces.

"This does not ease our loss," Marine Corps Gen. John Allen said in announcing the successful strike. "But we must and we will continue to relentlessly pursue the enemy."

The commandoes were being ferried in to help an Army Ranger unit pinned down in a Tangi Valley firefight Saturday as they sought to kill a high-ranking Taliban commander.

Plants are dying in the middle of central Tokyo and it could be because of the increase in radiation. One irony of the radioactive fallout from Fukushima is that people in Japan are starting to pay more attention to nature. The picture to the right was taken on the sidewalk of Hakusan Dori in Bunkyo-ku in Tokyo, and was uploaded on July 30. The air radiation in Bunkyo-ku has been higher than the official Tokyo number (measured in Shinjuku-ku, western central Tokyo), along with several other eastern "ku" (special wards of Tokyo). The person who took the picture says, "About 30% of azaleas on the sidewalk are completely dead. Ginkgo leaves are browning."

Japan is considering the possibility of creating a back-up capital city in case they need to abandon Tokyo. A new panel from Japan's Ministry of Land and Infrastructure will consider the possibility of moving some of Tokyo's capital functions to another big city, like Osaka. They talk about earthquake threats, which are quite real, but mention nothing about the persistent radiation driving parts of the government out of the city.

The story only gets worse, and this one could eventually bring down the Japanese government, which withheld important information from residents of Tsushima. Tamotsu Baba, the mayor of Namie, said that the withholding of information was akin to "murder." Japan's system to forecast radiation threats was working from the beginning but they did not warn the people when a radiation plume hit the Karino Elementary School. The school, just over six miles from the plant, was not cleared out. Instead it was turned into a temporary evacuation center.

The Department of Homeland Security is planning to duplicate the FBI's Terrorist Screening Database to expand an extensive database called Watchlist Service -- and no one can know if they're on the list

Privacy is a major concern in today's day and age, whether regulators are calling Facebook out on its invasive features like facial recognition or consumers are worrying about new camera technology like license plate recognition and red light camera.

Now, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is giving the American people a whole new list of worries in the realm of privacy. According to recent reports, DHS is planning to duplicate the FBI's Terrorist Screening Database to expand an extensive database called Watchlist Service, which will include names, birthdays, photos and biometrics of the accused. The new watchlist will combine four different DHS systems of records including IDENT, which is managed by the US-VISIT Program; Treasury Enforcement Communication System (TECS), which is managed by Custom and Border Protection (CBP) Passenger Systems Program Office; Transportation Security Threat Assessment System managed by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), and the TSA's Secure Flight Records.

The problem is that the DHS has proposed to exempt the Watchlist Service from Privacy Act provisions, which means that a person will never know if they are listed.

Police launch murder probe as three men die after being hit by car while guarding their neighborhood

Prime Minister David Cameron said Wednesday that police had drawn up contingency plans to use water cannons if necessary amid ongoing rioting in the U.K.

Every action necessary will be taken to return order to the streets on Britain, Cameron said, adding that the water cannons would ready to be deployed within 24 hours.

"We will do whatever is necessary to restore law and order onto our streets," Cameron said in a somber televised statement. "Nothing is off the table."

While thousands of extra police officers on the streets kept a nervous London quiet Wednesday after three nights of rioting, looting flared in Manchester, Birmingham and several other cities.

In Birmingham, police launched a murder investigation after three men were hit by a car while apparently protecting their neighborhood early Wednesday, according to reports.

I don't want to say I told you so, but I did. Ok, so maybe I didn't tell YOU, but I've said often enough over the years that one of the benefits to the British state of the occupation of the six counties of Ulster was the opportunities for training their foot soldiers in 'Urban warfare' - training that could later be applied to the 'mainland'.

As part of this training during the last 30 years of the 20th century, British soldiers and the sectarian Northern Ireland police force (the RUC) fired thousands of 'rubber bullets' or 'baton rounds' (as they were later called) at unsuspecting members of the Irish community. At least 18 people were killed by these 'non-lethal' rounds, including 8 children, and hundreds more were left paralyzed, brain damaged and blind.

The first 'baton rounds' were made of teak wood and used in the crown colony of Hong Kong during periods of intense labor strikes and anti-British protests in the 1960′s. These wooden rounds were deemed "too dangerous" for use in Northern Ireland, so hard rubber was used instead, with no less lethality however. A case in point: Emma Groves, an Irish Catholic, was sitting in her home one evening when British soldiers were conducting raids in the area. Emma was apparently playing the song 'Four Green Fields' loudly on her record player when a British soldier fired a rubber bullet through the window from about 10 feet away striking Emma in the face. She was blinded.

Although official regulations stated that rubber bullets should be fired from no less than 20 meters and at the ground in front of the target in order to minimise damage and target the lower body, in practice they were often fired at close range at the upper body, including the head. Between 1970 and 1974, 55,000 of these were fired on the streets of Northern Ireland, virtually all of them at members of the Irish community and with little or no cause. The first fatality was an 11-year-old boy, shot from 5-6 metres. In what would become common practice among soldiers and police, a witness said a large 'D'-style battery had been used instead of the rubber bullet to increase its weight and impact.

from the sorry,-that's-unconstitutional dept

A year ago, we wrote about a legal challenge concerning the constitutionality of a California law that requires police to collect and store DNA of anyone arrested (not convicted). A California state appeals court has now struck down the law, saying that it's a violation of the 4th Amendment. Considering all of the rulings lately that seem to have done away with the 4th Amendment, it's nice to see one going in the other direction, though I'm sure there's still going to be an appeal. And, unfortunately, the article linked above suggests that this ruling will likely get reversed on appeal, noting that a federal appeals court (third circuit) recently ruled on the same issue, and said it's fine to collect DNA from arrestees. Still, while this court ruling is still in effect in CA, we might as well quote the judge: