LAS VEGAS, Nevada - July 20, 2011 - The safety of Wi-Fi networks may be in danger from small threats flying above us. An airplane hobby shop owner and an ex-Air Force official have teamed up to create a drone that cracks into both Wi-Fi and cell phones.

Built by Mike Tassey and Richard Perkins, the Wireless Aerial Surveillance Platform (WASP) is a flying drone with a 6-foot wingspan, is 6-feet in length, and weighs in at 14 pounds.

The small form factor of the unmanned aerial vehicle allows it to drop under radar and; it is often mistaken for a large bird.

SAN FRANCISCO, Kalifornia - July 18, 2011 - Infamous hacker group Anonymous launched Monday its own social network after being rejected by Google's freshly launched online community.

"Today we welcome you to begin anew," the hacker alliance said at the website anonplus.com, which it described as a platform to distribute information.

"Welcome to the Revolution - a new social network where there is no fear...of censorship...of blackout...nor of holding back."

WASHINGTON - July 24, 2011 - Hacker groups Anonymous and LulzSec, which had 16 of their alleged members arrested last week in the United States by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, don't usually respond to statements written or made about them. But when the FBI's deputy assistant director gave an interview to National Public Radio saying those arrests send "a message that chaos on the Internet is unacceptable", the hacking collective erupted with a statement of its own:

“We are not scared anymore. Your threats to arrest us are meaningless (because) you cannot arrest an idea. Any attempt to do so will make your citizens more angry until they will roar in one gigantic choir. It is our mission to help these people and there is nothing - absolutely nothing - you can possibly to do make us stop,” said the group Anonymous.

BOSTON, Massachusetts - July 21, 2011 - Civil libertarians are raising the alarm over the state’s plans to create a Big Brother database that could map drivers’ whereabouts with police cruiser-mounted scanners that capture thousands of license plates per hour - storing that information indefinitely where local cops, staties, feds and prosecutors could access it if they choose.

“What kind of a society are we creating here?” asked civil rights lawyer Harvey Silverglate, who along with the American Civil Liberties Union fears police abuse. “There comes a point where the surveillance is so pervasive and total that it’s a misnomer to call a society free any longer.”

WASHINGTON - July 20, 2011 - The National Security Agency is working on a computer system that can predict what people are thinking.

"Think of 2001: A Space Odyssey and ITS most memorable character, HAL 9000, having a conversation with David. We are essentially building this system. We are building HAL. The system can answer the question, 'What does X think about Y?'"

These are the words of an unnamed researcher who discussed an amazing artificial intelligence system she was building at the NSA.

CONWAY, Massachusetts - July 20, 2011 - Dozens of police departments nationwide are gearing up to use a tech company's already controversial iris- and facial-scanning device that slides over an iPhone and helps identify a person or track criminal suspects.

The biometric technology, which seems to take a page from TV shows like MI-5 or CSI, could improve speed and accuracy in some routine police work in the field. However, its use has set off alarms with some who are concerned about possible civil liberties and privacy issues.

By Barbara Ehrenreich and Tom Engelhardt

July 10, 2011 - Last week, William Wan and Peter Finn of the Washington Post reported that at least 50 countries have now purchased or developed pilotless military drones. Recently, the Chinese had more than two dozen models in some stage of development on display at the Zhuhai Air Show, some of which they are evidently eager to sell to other countries.

LONDON, England - July 5, 2011 - It's a standard scenario across the world - the computer crashes and we scream exactly what we think at the flickering screen.

But we may soon have to learn to bite our tongues - or risk the wrath of being shouted at by the machine we've just cursed.

This is because scientists are building a voice-activated device that can interact with people in a “natural and intelligent way”.

Artificial intelligence will help it become familiar with a user's voice, with the ultimate goal that it can understand, speak and behave like a human.

by Kaitlyn Moore

June 25, 2011 - Corporations play a big role in our day-to-day activities and they are constantly making decisions that have a profound effect on our daily lives. For example: a corporation makes the decision to empty its chemical vats into a nearby river - the water supply is poisoned and residents of the adjacent town fall sick; or a corporation makes the decision to cut costs to increase profits and initiates a round of layoffs - the community that was formed around the corporation is decimated. We have often been appalled, angry, and go on rants about the evil of corporations but according to Simon Baron Cohen, evil is not the issue.

AUCKLAND, New Zealand - July 4, 2011 – Dakta Green, the premiere activist in New Zealand on behalf of decriminalization of marijuana possession and legalization of cannabis for medical use, has been sentenced to 8 months in prison for the courageous stand he has taken against pot prohibition laws.

He has been isolated from the outside world; authorities are making it difficult for him to receive phone calls or even mail.  He would very much appreciate your letters and postcards.