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If youve ever wondered whether the National Security Agency (NSA) is monitoring your internet activity at any given moment, theres now an app for that.

A Canadian project by Internet Exchange Maps, called IXmaps, tracks the internet exchange points your information passes through. These points are buildings where your information passes along a wire and can be collected by the NSA.

Yes, a physical wire. Though we generally think of the internet as a cloud, all of our data travels along large wires and data points before it gets to its destination. Since our data travels through these wirescalled traceroutesits much easier for the NSA to intercept, track, and store it for whatever means the agency finds necessary. Its highly likely the NSA has listening posts at traceroute-connected buildings in New York and Utah.

IXmaps allows you to see if your web traffic passes through one of these suspected listening posts.

Screengrab via IXmaps

Per the U.S. Constitution, U.S. citizens are granted a certain amount of internet privacy. These rights protect citizens from the tyrannical seizure of information collections from internet data. Whether or not those rights are acknowledged in NSA tracking is a different story, though, given the documents leaked by Edward Snowden.

For non-U.S. citizens, though, theres absolutely no protection and no boundaries for what the NSA can collect. IXmaps is a Canadian project, originally created to help Canadian citizens map their internet data. The Canadian constitution provides similar privacy protections to its citizens.

For financial and political reasons, many Canadian internet routes pass across the border into the U.S.a phenomenon known as boomerang routingbefore going back into Canada to its original destination. Since Canadian citizens have no privacy rights in the U.S., their data is often collected and stored without question.

IXmaps recently went public again after undergoing a redesign, and its working to expand its maps to across the globe, but that depends on individuals tracking and submitting their own traceroutes to the database.

H/T Motherboard

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Here's how to tell if your web traffic travels through an NSA listening point - The Daily Dot

March 28, 2017

The spokesman for House Intel Chairman Devin Nunes says Tuesdays close door session with FBI Director James Comey is cancelled

(WASHINGTON, DC) The U.S. House of Representatives Intelligence Committee will not hold on Tuesday a closed briefing with the directors of the FBI and National Security Agency, a spokesman for the committee's Republican chairman said on Monday.

Representative Devin Nunes, the committee's chairman, last week said he cancelled a public hearing on the committee's investigation of Russian influence on the 2016 election because it was necessary to hold the closed session with Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey and NSA Director Mike Rogers.

"Director Comey and Adm. Rogers could not come in tomorrow as wed hoped, so the Committee will continue to try to schedule a time when they can meet with us in closed session," Jack Langer, a spokesman for Nunes, said in a statement.

CNN reports that though Mr. Nunes cancelled the Tuesday close door meeting, he still plans to hold a private briefings with FBI Director James B. Comey and National Security Agency Director Mike Rodgers in the near future.

Reuters copy, TRUNEWS contribution

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Closed House intel hearing with Comey and NSA cancelled - TRUNEWS

Eagle Technology Media Release

AUCKLAND 29th March 2017

Students in both primary and secondary education in New Zealand now have free access to Esris ArcGIS Online software through the roll-out of a multimillion dollar enablement program to schools across America, Europe and now Australia and New Zealand. ArcGIS Onlinelets students and teachers explore and analyse data using maps. Eagle Technology, distributor for Esri in New Zealand and the South Pacific launched the Esri Program for Schools with an announcement at the Auckland Regional Esri User Conference today.

Mark Allan, CEO, Eagle Technology, says the free software brings the same technology widely used in both government and the private sector to the classroom.

In 2014 Esris founder and President, Jack Dangermond, joined then-president Barack Obamas ConnectED program. The 2013 initiative sought to make American schools more technologically savvy, and encouraged private technology companies to make in-kind contributions to the programme. Esris offer to donate ArcGIS Online to every school in the United States has resulted in the uptake by more than 4000 schools, and has encouraged Dangermond to take it to other parts of the world as the Esri Program for Schools.

Students can access instructional materials for using ArcGIS online, and explore data related to topics including World Population, Tropical Storms and Interpreting the Landscape (using topographic maps of NZ National Parks). At launch, there will be twelve exercises, or geoinquiries, adapted by Eagle for the New Zealand education curriculum, in addition to global content.

Says Allan, Whereas GIS is strongly associated with geography, it has a much wider application as a system of record, engagement and insight in real world environments for business but also for how we live in our communities. It is being used to manage the environment, but also right down to tackling human problems such as poverty and crime. Esri refers to its GIS as The Science of Where. Students may be introduced to GIS through geography or history in a school, but may find it embedded in their future careers through many different channels.

More about Esri Program for Schools

ENDS

About Eagle Technology Group Eagle Technology Group Ltd is a privately held New Zealand-owned systems integration and information management company established since 1969. It has approximately 90 employees with offices in Auckland and Wellington. Eagle Technology has a has a long-established and successful geospatial technology practice in Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and related technologies, as well as a unique understanding of on premise ICT infrastructure, communications and Field Force Management, managed services expertise and Cloud applications. Eagle Technology is the distributor for global software leader Esris ArcGIS platform in New Zealand and the South Pacific. Its traditional client base is in government, local government and enterprise class commercial organisations.

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Roll-out of free GIS software for schools | Scoop News - Scoop.co.nz (press release)

Microsoft Security Essentials, the free Microsoft antivirus software for Windows Vista and Windows 7, has always been a firm "better than nothing" option. That may have finally changed, if the latest evaluation from AV-TEST is any indication.

Credit: Microsoft

The German lab's latest twice-yearly Windows 7 results are in, and while Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) still isn't the best way to secure your computer, it's within spitting distance of the top spot. (Usual contenders such as Bitdefender, Kaspersky Lab, Norton and Trend Micro took top honors, but you probably could have guessed that.)

AV-TEST conducts regular evaluations of antivirus software on a variety of operating systems. Up until now, the company's results have been deservedly unkind to MSE (and to its Windows 8.1/10 sibling, Windows Defender), dinging it for poor antivirus protection, even though the free Microsoft program's usability and system impact are often pretty good.

In the latest round of tests, however, MSE scored a very respectable 16.5 out of a possible 18: five in Performance, 5.5 in Protection and a perfect 6 in Usability. The program blocked at least 99.3 percent of widespread threats, and an impressive 100 percent of zero-day vulnerabilities, in two rounds of evaluations conducted in January and February.

MORE: Best Antivirus Software and Apps

Still, if you're looking for the absolute best protection that money can buy, you'll have to go with Bitdefender Internet Security, Kaspersky Internet Security, Norton Security or Trend Micro Internet Security, all of which got perfect scores of 18. F-Secure Safe and Quick Heal Total Security were right behind them, with 17.5 each. All six programs earned AV-TEST's "Top Product" honors. (All Windows antivirus packages from those vendors should offer the same level of protection.)

At the other end of the spectrum, Microworld eScan Internet Security Suite, Intel McAfee Internet Security Suite and Comodo Internet Security Premium scored 15, 14.5 and 13 points respectively. Each one earned a good-enough-for-government-work 4 out of 6 in Security, but fell down on the Performance and Usability Sections.

The home screen of Microsoft Security Essentials. Credit: Microsoft

Aside from Microsoft, all the other programs tested fell between 16.5 and 14.5: AhnLab V3 Internet Security, Avast Free Antivirus, AVG Internet Security, Avira Antivirus Pro, BullGuard Internet Security, ESET Internet Security, G Data InternetSecurity, K7 Computing Total Security and ThreatTrack VIPRE Internet Security Pro. If you have any of these programs, you probably don't need to worry much about your system's security.

In fact, even if you have the three lowest-ranking programs, you're probably still protected pretty well. Every program scored at least a 10 across the board, which earns it an AV-TEST Certification and (at least tentative) recommendation. However, MSE, which can be downloaded for Windows 7 and Windows Vista here, did better than each in the malware-protection sector.

Whichever program you choose, just be sure you protect your system somehow. No matter how careful you are online, its unlikely that you can avoid every single misleading link, phishing scheme, malicious popup and hidden malvertisement that comes your way, and an AV suite is much cheaper than losing all your files.

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Free Microsoft Antivirus Software Finally Does Good Job - Tom's Guide

While about 70 percent of taxpayers are eligible to file their returns for free online, fewer than 3 percent of them take advantage of the IRS Free File program.

IRS Free File, which began in 2003, is a partnership between the IRS and a group of private tax preparation companies that allows taxpayers to prepare and file their taxes for free online.

A lot of people get scared when you start talking IRS, said Jim Argo, an AARP tax-aide volunteer of 13 years, who helped people file taxes Thursday at Peru Public Library. Probably a lot of them would be eligible for Free File, but a lot of them are intimidated by the internet.

Judy Bence, 68, of La Salle is a match for that description.

No, I dont file alone or online. That scares me, said Bence, who filed her taxes with the assistance of AARP tax-aide volunteer Linda Reff. Im not a tax-filing person. Ive never done it on my own.

Bence has toyed with the idea before and done research, but she came away overwhelmed.

I looked at it one time, and I was like, Ahh!. Bence said throwing her hands up.

She has been getting help from AARP with her taxes for the past five years.

Filing online alone can be daunting for members of younger tech-savvy generations too even those who have used Free File before.

Ryan Wetsel, 25, of La Salle who was also getting free tax help said things are just easier with the assistance of someone who knows what theyre doing.

I have filed online before, he said. It was through one of the free websites. The last two times I tried to do it myself it kept getting returned. I just decided this was easier. I tried it, then it never worked again.

According to tax-filing statistics, most people agree with Bence and Wetsel.

Fifty-eight percent of responses to a poll on http://www.newstrib.com said they dont file their taxes alone, and things are even more lopsided across the county.

Nationally, 112 million people filed income taxes in 2014, the most recent year on record on the IRS website, and few used Free File.

Around 3 million taxpayers a year use Free File, about the same number of taxpayers who use free volunteer tax prep assistance through our 12,000 locations operated by community organizations, said Anthony Burke with the IRS.

That number is also kept low by cannibalization from Free File Alliance members.

When Free File began in 2003, it was the only free software program available, Burke said. Today, many of the brand-name software providers, who also are members of Free File, offer free software outside of the Free File umbrella.

Free file qualifications

If youre wondering if you qualify for Free File ahead of Tax Day, April 18, this is what you need to know.

Taxpayers who make $64,000 or less 70 percent of taxpayers are eligible to use Free File brand-name software products, Burke said. Taxpayers who make more than $64,000 can use Free File Fillable Forms, the electronic version of IRS paper forms.

Taxpayers can access the forms at irs.gov/uac/free-file-do-your-federal-taxes-for-free.

This year, the Free File pages are optimized for various devices, which means taxpayers can now use their mobile phones and tablets, as well as their computers, to prepare and e-file their taxes, Burke said.

Eligibility guidelines are different for each of the 12 Free File partner companies. Their criteria is generally based on income, age and state residency.

Several offer both free federal and free state return software, Burke said. Active duty military personnel who make $64,000 or less can use any of the 12 software products they want.

Free local help through the AARP

While the AARP is most often associated with seniors, Argo said tax-aide volunteers with the organization help people in any age bracket.

He said volunteers are at Peru Public Library from 9 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Mondays and Thursdays, Mendota Area Senior Center 8 a.m.-3 p.m. Mondays and Thursdays and Bridges Community Center in Ottawa 8 a.m.-3 p.m. Thursdays.

More AARP tax-aide site locations can be found online at https://secure.aarp.org/applications/VMISLocator/searchTaxAideLocations.action.

Ben Hohenstatt can be reached at (815) 220-6932 or perureporter@newstrib.com. Follow him on Twitter @NT_Peru.

Read more from the original source:
Free file fear keeps tax preppers busy - LaSalle News Tribune