Investigators are treating the explosions as acts of vandalism, not terrorism, Shields said.

"Under the Criminal Code, it would be characterized as mischief, which is an intentional vandalism. We don't want to characterize this as terrorism. They were very isolated locations and there would seem there was no intent to hurt people," he said.

It's not all good, though. Here's a story from Philadelphia, where a subway car is criticized because people can see out the front. Because, um, because terrorist will be able to see out the front, and we all know how dangerous terrorists are:

Marcus Ruef, a national vice president with the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, compared a train cab to an airliner cockpit and said a cab should be similarly secure. He invoked post-9/11 security concerns as a reason to provide a full cab that prevents passengers from seeing the rails and signals ahead.

"We don't think the forward view of the right-of-way should be available to whoever wants to watch ... and the conductor and the engineer should be able to talk privately," Ruef said.

Pat Nowakowski, SEPTA chief of operations, said the smaller cabs pose no security risk. "I have never heard that from a security expert," he said.

At least there was pushback against that kind of idiocy.

And from the UK:

Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon has said the government is prepared to go "quite a long way" with civil liberties to "stop terrorists killing people".

He was responding to criticism of plans for a database of mobile and web records, saying it was needed because terrorists used such communications.

By not monitoring this traffic, it would be "giving a licence to terrorists to kill people", he said.

I hope there will be similar pushback against this "choice."

He explains all the district's hydrants, including those in Alexander Ranch, have had their water turned off since just after 9/11 -- something a trade association spokesman tells us is common practice for rural systems.

"These hydrants need to be cut off in a way to prevent vandalism or any kind of terrorist activity, including something in the water lines," Hodges said.

But Hodges says fire departments know, or should have known, the water valves can be turned back on with a tool.

One, fires are much more common than terrorism -- keeping fire hydrants on makes much more sense than turning them off. Two, what sort of terrorism is possible using working fire hydrants? Three, if the water valves can be "turned back on with a tool," how does turning them off prevent fire-hydrant-related terrorism?

More and more, it seems as if public officials in this country have simply gone insane.

From The Canadian Press:

“Continued inspections across the country have revealed that garbage and other items … are still being dropped inside the top panel openings of some X-ray machines,” says a bulletin issued earlier this year by the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority.

“Likewise, warning labels and hazard warning signs are being damaged and are sometimes completely removed from the units.”

The rebuke, obtained under the Access to Information Act, is the second time officers have been warned about dropping junk into the X-ray scanners. An earlier bulletin in August 2006 raised the same issue.

“Effective immediately, screening personnel caught performing any above-listed act, or similar act of vandalism to CATSA equipment will be immediately restricted from performing all screening functions.”

Any offending officer could be permanently removed from the job, the document says.

Next time you fly via a Canadian airport see if the screeners can toss out an empty coffee cup or wrapper for ya. Just for giggles.

Article Link

Here is the final list of the top ten cybersecurity threats for 2008:

— On-line masquerading to abuse, attack, blackmail, bully, extort, or molest others.

— Criminal fraud by password and identity theft via phishing, spyware, malware and theft of hardware.

— Criminal use of botnets and botnet-like technologies for economic gain, for example email spam and denial of service attacks.

— Cyberterrorism, bulling, vandalism and other forms of electronic violence and malfeasance.

— Subversion of democratic political processes.

— Criminal manipulation and subversion of financial markets.

— Spying and theft of data by governments, industry, terrorists and other criminals.

— Denial-of-service attacks by criminals and terrorists.

— Sabotage, theft and other attacks by disgruntled employees and insiders.

— Natural disasters, accidents or errors without malicious intent.

Acknowledgements and References

A special word of appreciation for the reviews, comments and suggestions from the Certified Information Systems and Security Professionals (CISSPs) community and the LinkedIn professional network.

In particular, comments and suggestions from Gary Hinson, Bill Marlow, Eugene Schultz, Mike Smith, Lea Viljanen, and Alex Voytov were used to refine and improve the list.  Thank you.

This project was motivated by my friend and colleague in Thailand, Dr. Prinya Hom-anek.

An on-line Google spreadsheet of the comments on The Top Ten Cybersecurity Threats for 2008 - Final Draft and my resolution of the comments can be found here.