Please stop 'helping' us ~ By John Stossel

When will the political do-gooders realize that the most vulnerable people in society can't take any more of their kindness? (John Stossel, from this column)

John Stossel explains how the law of unintended consequences has affected lower income people with the passage of the CARD Act. When Congress passed the CARD Act, it made it more difficult for many people to get credit, and thus they turn to other sources for emergencies, and end up paying by far more in interest for their money. Todd Zywicki, law professor at George Mason University, says the following to the credit card reformers:

"In the 1960s, the second-biggest revenue source of organized crime was illegal lending. Is that the world we want to go back to, where we get rid of payday lending, and we're so morally outraged that we're going to put people in the hands of the leg-breakers and the loan sharks? They charged an interest rate that was well over 1,000 percent, and their collection techniques were a lot tougher than your local pawn shops."

Please stop 'helping' us

JOHN STOSSEL

By John Stossel

December 29, 2010 ~ 1:00 am Eastern

© 2010

Last year, Congress passed the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure (CARD) Act. It was supposed to really end the alleged abuses perpetrated by the credit-card companies. The law forbids some penalties and interest-rate increases on existing balances.

It is one of President Obama's proudest achievements.

"Enough's enough," he said. "It's time for strong, reliable protection for our consumers."

Reform, he said, would not come at the expense of honest businesses. "Unless your business model depends on cutting corners or bilking your customers, you've got nothing to fear."

Finally! Protection! A new bureaucracy will stop greedy credit-card companies from unfairly penalizing you. And it won't threaten the credit business. Yippie!

How has it worked out?

Not so well. George Mason University law professor Todd Zywicki points out that the new restrictions hurt more consumers than they help.

Since the Card Act passed, mortgage and Treasury bill rates have dropped a little, but credit-card interest went up – from 13 percent to nearly 15 percent. Some banks also stopped offering credit to some people. JPMorgan Chase cut off 15 percent of its customers.

So the real result of this "consumer" regulation? "Hundreds of thousands of people can't get cards who used to be able to have cards, and all the rest of us now have to pay more," Zywicki said.

But maybe the people who can't get credit cards are better off because they couldn't handle credit wisely?

"Just to say they don't have a credit card doesn't mean that they don't have credit," Zywicki retorts. "They'll just go to more expensive places – the local payday lender or the local pawn shop."

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Big Brother in your ... underwear? ~ By Phil Elmore

It may have been a little birdie (a tweetie bird?) that whispered in my ear that the following video may have inspired Phil's column today:

They will track you ... Someday.

Video provided by TheREALjohnny2k

As Phil says, you won't wake up some morning to find that we're in a police state, or hear federal agents knocking down your door after tracking you to your home... Okay, well actually, I guess that can already happen. But I digress. Anyway, this column isn't a fear-mongering warning that the government is getting ready to take us over and place chips in all of us (yet). Actually, this is more to let you know that your privacy and protection from thieves could be in jeopardy.

But hey, if this column about RFID chips in our underwear was like a crisis I can't let go to waste, I should tell you about a column I wrote a few years ago, "Setting the Stage - Part 3 - Your ID, Please." In that piece, I wrote:

And in the mean time, technology has been developed that would make it possible to have implantable chips that would have this data, and probably a lot more, embedded under your skin. Not only will there be the data, but there is also the ability to put Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) compatibility on these chips. In other words, every person that has this chip would be able to be located and/or tracked.

So, was I just trying to foster hysteria and conspiracy theories? Or, was it just to let you know that the technology is here and it's being enhanced as the time of implementation could be growing near? Just sayin'...

Obviously, just tucking your RFID-equipped cards into such a wallet or sleeve doesn't solve all your problems. You've still got to be aware of the risks. You've got to conduct yourself responsibly as an informed, reasonably – dare I say it – paranoid consumer, at least in regard to your personal data.

In 2008, I predicted in Technocracy that as the cost of the technology decreases and the transponders themselves become even smaller, it is inevitable that RFID tagging and tracking will become an even greater part of the lives of American citizens. This dilemma hasn't changed. You're not paranoid, as the old saying goes, if everybody out there really is out to get you. Your enemies, in this case, are data thieves ... and they truly are out to get your ones and zeroes.

By Phil Elmore

Posted: July 29, 2010 ~ 1:00 am Eastern

© 2010

You know that many of the credit cards in your wallet contain Radio Frequency Identification, or RFID, chips. You may drive a car with an RFID transponder on your windshield, used for certain automated toll systems. Even your identification may contain such technology. But what will you do when RFID chips have been embedded even in ... your underwear?

Two years ago, RFID technology was the topic of the very first Technocracy column here at WorldNetDaily. Every word of what I wrote then still applies, but the technology of RFID tracking has continued to move forward inexorably in the intervening years:

According to the old aphorism about boiling a frog, if you toss a live frog into a pot of boiling water, he'll sense the immediate danger and jump out. If, however, you place the frog in tepid water and slowly increase the temperature until he's dead, the frog won't know what's happening until it's too late. This is the cultural danger that RFID represents. If we woke up tomorrow to face armed guards and identity checkpoints just to travel our states' major highways from city to city, we'd protest about the police state erected as we slept. We'd balk at the notion of handing over detailed travel plans to stone-faced government enforcers, and we'd rail against the invasion of privacy when told we must submit itineraries to the authorities. Yet RFID technology makes it possible to gain this same information – and thus to achieve this same level of potential cataloging and control concerning citizens' movements – completely passively and conveniently.

In that column, I warned you about such applications as vehicle transponders for toll-taking and medical RFID tags used to track people and animals. Public awareness of RFID is rising, even as the technology becomes more widespread. While you'll obviously have every warning (you hope) when your government wants to plant a chip in your wrist, you may not realize that your big-box retail store wants to implant the same chip in your pants and shirts.

Just days ago, USA Today reported that Wal-Mart is introducing a new, more widespread RFID inventory tag system. "Wal-Mart Stores ... is putting electronic identification tags on men's clothing," wrote Anne D'Innocenzio for the Associated Press. "But the move is raising eyebrows among privacy experts." She goes on to explain, "The tags [which give Wal-Mart employees direct and real-time control over inventory levels] work by reflecting a weak radio signal to identify the product." But as AP reported, Katherine Albrecht of Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering, worries that such inventory tags in individual clothing items could allow stores to track individual customer's movements. The actual privacy risk of the inventory system, of course, hinges on whether the RFID tags are easily removable or somehow embedded in the clothing.

New RFID risks are as close as your back pocket. When my new New York state driver's license arrived, this "enhanced" identification came with a built-in liability. It's RFID-enabled, meaning its built-in chip contains an identification number that can be scanned wirelessly. The license arrived in a small foil-lined envelope with the words "RADIO FREQUENCY PROTECTIVE SLEEVE" emblazoned across it. Beneath this are the words:

The RIFD tag does not include any personal information, only a unique reference number. Keep the card in sleeve when not in use.

This begs the question: If the RFID chip in your driver's license does not contain any personal information, why must it be protected by the sleeve at all?

Last year, Popular Mechanics ran an article on the unique security risks of RFID-enabled credit cards. "[A] team of researchers at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst," wrote Joel Johnson, "was recently able to construct scanners capable of skimming both the cardholder name and card number from a variety of first-generation RFID credit cards. Then they found a way to transmit that data back to a card reader, tricking it into accepting a 'purchase.'" What's worse, recounted Johnson, was that "many of the supposedly encrypted cards sent card numbers, expiration dates and cardholder names in plain text – which could be read through the envelopes the cards were mailed in."

Concerned consumers have been taking their personal data security into their own hands for a while now. On YouTube, you'll even find some people yanking the RFID chips out of their cards. While this may seem drastic, it's understandable considering the attitude of the companies issuing the RFID cards themselves. Adam Savage of Mythbusters claims the banks behind the credit-card companies intimidated his network into killing a planned episode on the insecurity of RFID bank cards.

So what can you do?

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The credit card mess - By Roger Hedgecock

The American consumer was the driving wheel of the economy for the last three decades. Fueled by rising real estate prices, lower taxes and the tech boom, jobs were plentiful, credit was available at record low rates and relaxed terms and the livin' was easy. Well, not any more. New regs on credit card companies don't take affect until 7/1/10. read more | digg story