It turns out that the company sporting the motto "don't be evil" has been asking parents nationwide to disclose their children's personal information, including Social Security Numbers, and recruiting schools to help them do it, all by entering an art contest.
The Contest is called "Doodle-4-Google". The company is even offering prize money to schools to enlist their help. Google even “OK’s” and “partners with” the following after school activities per their FAQ (I wonder how much who paid whom?):
“The Contest is also open to students who participate in one of the following “After School Programs” and are also enrolled in a U.S. School as defined above: (i) Boys & Girls Clubs of America; or (ii) Girl Scouts of the USA.” They avoided the Boy Scouts, though.
It sound like fun? Don't you want your kid to enter too?
OK! Who’s Eligible?
“4. Eligibility. The Contest is open to students enrolled in private or public elementary and secondary schools (grades K– 12) as well as home schools (grades K-12) in the 50 United States and the District of Columbia, excluding U.S. territories (collectively, “U.S. School(s)”). The Contest is also open to students who participate in one of the following “After School Programs” and are also enrolled in a U.S. School as defined above: (i) Boys & Girls Clubs of America; or (ii) Girl Scouts of the USA. Registration opens January 19, 2011. Registration ends March 2, 2011 at 11:59:59 P.M. Pacific Time (PT). Only one doodle per Entrant is allowed. In the case of duplicate or multiple entries from the same Entrant, then the first entry to arrive at the designated submission address (as determined by the “received by” date) will be accepted as the entry into the Contest. Internet access is required to register for the Contest. At the time of submission of a Doodle, each Entrant must: (i) be a U.S. citizen or a permanent U.S. legal resident (e.g., must be able to show proof of legal permanent residence, for example, a “green card”); (ii) be enrolled in a U.S. School (defined above); (iii) have obtained his or her parents’ or legal guardians’ prior permission and have agreed to be bound by these Rules on the Parent Consent Form.”
The reason Google gives for doing this competition in their FAQ says it's because "We love to encourage and celebrate the creativity of young people..." etc. isn’t that nice?
W a i t a minute:
A huge database of names and addresses of American children, especially one that includes their dates of birth and SSNs, would be worth many millions to marketing firms and retailers, wouldn’t it?
You see, what Google knows (and many parents don't know) is that a person's city of birth and year of birth can be used to make a statistical guess about the first five digits of his/her social security number.
“Part of the security problem lies with the method used to assign SSNs. The researchers note that only four digits of the nine digit SSN are random. The first three digits are called the Area Number (AN) and the next two are the Group Number (GN). ANs are allocated to specific states and GNs to specific birth years. Given the date of birth and place of birth, researchers need only guess at the final four digits.” - Alessandro Acquisti and Ralph Gross Carnegie Mellon University.
So…. with the form you see above, you’ve just given Google your child’s Social Security Number. They don’t even have to guess. And you were worried about computer security?
So: If you can obtain those last four SSN digits explicitly, you've unlocked countless troves of personal information from someone who didn't even understand that such a disclosure was happening. This kind of data can be linked with other databases to target advertising, but Google wouldn’t do that, surely? Faster than a long tailed tom cat in a room full of rockers, I say.
It's worth many times more than what Google will spend on prizes (each State Finalist gets a T-shirt! The winner gets a Wacom tablet! Wow!). Maybe the TShirt should look like this?
To be strictly fair, Google hasn’t disclosed any such plan, nor has evidence surfaced exposing one. The entry form is one half page followed by five pages of legal mumbo-jumbo in (you guessed it) small print.
Google could have plans to just throw the data away, right? Maybe “the last 4” was inadvertently added to the competition form? There are all sorts of innocent and inconceivable explanations for this, aren’t there? So why (from their FAQ) is “Doodle 4 Google is still designed to work with schools across the nation (public, private and home schools).” Why not schools outside the USA? Maybe because those kids have no “last four”?
So, one question keeps haunting me: “Why the hell does Google need the “last four”?”
Additional links:
http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/secu/article.php/3828716/Social-Security-Numbers-Easy-to-Hack.htm
http://www.google.com/doodle4google/faqs.html
Theory:
Google capitulates to government demand for information LINK
Which in turn implies Google is in bed with the CIA LINK
Thus leading to the rumor the CIA has reactivated Operation Mockingbird and is using Google to implement it LINK
Anderson Cooper reactivated Operation Mockingbird in Egypt LINK
Anderson Cooper happens to be gay
Googles logo has the same colors as the gay pride rainbow
The gay pride rainbow happens to share the same colors as the Microsoft/Windows logo
Conclusion
Anderson Cooper and Bill Gates are lovers who are in bed with the CIA and secretly running Google in a plan for world domination.
The end result will be Lady Ga-Ga streamed into every home and office, the complete emulsification of all banded pirates and having them reprogrammed into more acceptable icons such as motorcycle cops and indians, ala Village People, and the complete pacification of the rest of the world except on Saturday Nights, because ..you know..they still want us to get our groove on.
Damn! He figured it out! Time for Plan "B"
Most theories are just kooks let out of the asylum. But YOURS! It has panache' and style! I like it!
I'll bet that you have no idea just how close to the truth your theory is.... tho you're not likely to see the unauthorised but deliberate release of a Cooper-Gates sex tape any time soon.
However, the bit about Lady Ga Ga is pretty spot on and a sex tape of her with a serious Madonna lookalike, and once and for all proving that she is a hermaphradite, could go viral if the GoogleIA frees up the secret footage taken in the back of her limo.
Oh, and Doc, Po` is not so pleased with you right now... for embarrassing him with that pic showing him wearing odd boots. "Odd socks is one thing," he said: "you can hide them with yer boots... but there ain't no hiding odd boots.
And another thing, passersby didn't realise just how near 'the end' really was....
.... behind that placard, not only was he wearing no pants, he forgot his underwear as well.
Well today is no better.... the red glow bouncing back off the mirror means I can't see the stubble... and shaving by touch has resulted in quite a few nicks
... which is some feat with an electric shaver.
Anyhow, mrs starkers seems to think that if I fess up to what I did after being so vehement, the red face might subside enough that paramedics down the shopping centre first aid room won't be rushing to get the oxygen mask on me next time.
First off, I need to explain that I was placed under extreme duress when very valid reasons were given as to why I should concede.
Well here goes nothing.... I bought myself a mobile/cell phone.
Now before you bastards go calling me a weakling woos or a turncoat on my own principles, I put up a determined resistance and employed various evasive manouvres before finally caving in. I mean, when I've made up my mind I stick to my guns and neither hell or high water with budge me... usually. However some certain people know how to persuade me otherwise...
For example, mrs starkers was at the phone shop counter looking at the available options for me, and I decided that I needed to go to the toilet, where I hid for a while hoping she'd give up on the idea. No such luck! She got one of the security guards and told him that I might be loitereing in one of the centre's male toilet facilities and that he should return me to her immediately, which he did while giving me some rather peculiar looks.
When it was decided that I should have a basic $29.00 unit connected to Vodaphone, I threw a tantrum, stamped my feet and sobbed uncontollably fo about half an hour. Hmmph, I figured the store clerk would call security on me for a second time and have me ejected, but again, no such luck. She recognised that I was old school and was understanding of my fear of the new technology. Shit, I even got down on the floor and performed several 360's on my shoulder, but I probably looked more like a disabled breakdancer with a nervous tic than a tantrum chucker, so I gave in and bought the fucken phone.
Okay, bullshit aside, I was convinced to get a mobile phone because we have been spending way too much calling Bianca down in Tassie and we wanted to reduce our communications costs to put OUR money to better use.... and unlimited text and voice using Vodaphone to Vodaphone will certainly do that. I have mine,Shaunna has hers and Bianca picks hers up on Monday when she returns from a camp.
Up until now, we have had to ring Bianca using our landline to ring her mobile because Telstra [our major telco] won't use the fully functional landline already present at her address because they didn't installt it. No, they want her to spend $360 to put in 10 metres of cable to a property she neither owns or intends to remain at... and without Telstra's co-operation, none of the other telcos can provide her a service.
Also, my son and his partner are with Vodaphone, as are some rellies of Shaunna's, so it makes sense that we opt into the same network and plan to take advantage of almost unlimited contact.
So why do I need a Vodaphone mobile if Shaunna already has one? Well we're not always together and if I need to remind her to pick up some bread or milk on the way home, I'm nor racking up the landline bill. Also, if Shaunna is out and incommunicado for various reasons, and Bianca [or others] need to get in touch cheaply, there's now a second option,
Oh, and if anyone thinks I've abandoned my safety concens, I have taken precautions while using my new mobile. First off, before I even use it, I don a protective wetsuit with a thermal reflection barrier and full-face mask. Then I use a 4 metre stick when I need to push any buttons; and thirdly, I put it on speaker phone and stand on the opposite sidse of the room... to be sure, to be sure.
You lot mightn't place any credence on any of this cell phone antenna radiation doing queer shit to peoples brains, but I'm not taking any chances.
Oh, and just to clarify things here, I did NOT get a phone with Google's bloody Android OS on it.
No amount of cajoling, persuasion, coersion or blackmail was gonna get me submitting to one of those.
Nope, it's just a basic Nokia with calls and text.... a phonebook.
Doesn't have a built in camera and no Bluetooth... no fancy touch screen and no video capabilities.
Nope.... wasn't paying for all that stuff
It does, however, have a built in flashlight.... which could come in handy.
Yup, if I have one or ten too many shandies down the pub and come home late, I'll be able to find the keyhole.
Couldn't resist, mate... too good to pass up. I actually think getting the Vodaphone was a good idea, and who knows when an emergency strikes, right?
If it was an Android? You'd never hear the end of it.
After reading this ^ I'm not feeling so red faced, though I think I've still a way to go. Let's put it this way, I don't need to turn om the toilet light if I have to get up in the middle of the night to pee... such is the glow from my red face.
I'm rather hoping it'll subside completely by the end of the week, but yoou know how it is, vowing you'll never, ever do something and suddenly you have. It's a bit like how Monica Lewinsky vowed she'd never put pork in her mouth.... and we all know what she did on her knees in the Oval Office.
Okay, maybe my indiscretion wan't of that magnitude, but it's a bitter pill to swallow when you've always prided yourself on being inflexible where it counts. Now it feels like flexibility is all I have... like my rigidity has deserted me. Hmmm, I wonder if there's a Viagra variant that'll help my self-esteem to get back up? Being a doctor n' all, you'd know that! Is there such a pill for that, or do I have to go into therapy?
Um, let's just say this.... if it had been an android, I'd have booked myself into the nut farm and asked them to fit my strait jacket so I'd not have the hands free to operate it.
And while I'm there, I'd ask for some very intensive avarsion therapy... just in case I somehow got tempted to push the buttons with my nose... or any other protrusions.
Oh, hang on a minute. If I'm in a strait jacket [with my hands incapacitated and the underneath the crotch strap] that's one protrusion less to worry about.
Naaah.... you've got the cell phone with the flashlight feature, right?
Yes there is: Laughter! Thank G-d for that, Cap'n.
Or large cell phone bills.... won't be able to dial, right? And speaking of laughter and bills...
Donald Duck and Daisy Duck were spending the night together in a hotel room and Donald wanted to "enjoy some closeness" with Daisy.The first thing Daisy asked was, "Do you have a condom?"Donald frowned and said, "No."Daisy told Donald that if he didn't get a condom, they could not have "closeness"."Maybe they sell them at the front desk," she suggested. So Donald went down to the lobby and asked the hotel clerk if they had condoms."Yes, we do," the clerk said and pulled a box out from under the counter and gave it to Donald.The clerk asked, "Would you like me to put them on your bill?"
"Thit No!" Donald quacked, "I'll thuffocate!"
Yeah, but I'd have to hold it in my mouth cos I need both hands.
And no, I'm not bragging... one hand to hold the equipment, and the other to hold my eyelids open.
Yup, thank goodness for that.... and I'm doing my best to encourage it here/at WC. Sadly, tho, not too many positive responses have been forthcoming and all is quiet on the Western front... again. Or should I say "still"?
Millions of members/users... and oh so many lurkers.
Well, I want to say Congrats to you Starkers. You the man. The advantages greatly outweigh the negatory. The sky has lost it's red hue. To bad, it was pretty.
And wondering how you know how many folks are lurking? I've tried to look for it, to no avail??
I'm wondering what kind of collar he selected to go with that leash. I'm betting studded or perhaps lace?
1880's... B.C.E.
Difficult to give him a hard time... he takes it too gracefully (for my taste)
When I figure out how to use it.
So far, I've learned how to turn it on and answer a call.
It's quite simple.... you add up how many responses there are [which often are very few] and guesstimate there's 6 million users across the SD forums. Come the end of it, you figure out there's 10 or so people who responded.... leaving 6 million or so lurkers.
That ain't the half of it! After the tantrum in the phone shop, hiding out in the dunny and the uncontrollable sobbing, I told this cop the story and tried to get hin to intervene in what I felt was spousal abuse, but he just laughed, called me a big girls blouse and dragged me by the ear back to the phone shop.... kicking and screaming into the 80's, as you so aptly put it.
Believe me, it was one of the most traumatic experiences of my life, having to buy a mobile phone.
It was horrendous, and to think, I'm on my last sedative now.
I'll have you know that it is studded white lace with a thin leather border leather to set it off.
To be frank, I'd love it if somebody would give me a hard time... anybody got a few spare Viagra they're not using?
Seriously, if you can't laugh at yourself, you have no business laughing at others... and I do so love a bit of reciprocal fun poking, so I'll often set myself up as a target just to get the ball rolling.
The question is, are you ready to try video games?
Dunno, depends if they are on VHS or Beta? I'm outta luck if they're on VHS... never got around to upgrading to that.
How about laserdisk?
Laserdisk???? What's that, a piece or science fiction from 'Lost in Space' or something?
Ya know, I only upgraded to CD's a few years back, and then only because my old 78 gramaphone licked the bucket.
Think I buggered it up by applying the turntable brake at varying levels to play 45's and 33 1/3's on it.
Oh, and another reason you should NOT let your kids enter this doodle debacle is that Google is wanting a new logo.
Slimy bastards; your kid enters; does well; Google lays claim to the art; Google gets FREE logo they otherwise would have had to pay big bucks for through an agency.
See, told you they had a hidden agenda.... and what it amounts to is child exploitation; slave labour; doing shit on the sly and on the cheap.
And why do they want children rather than adults?
Simple! Children are innocent and unpolluted, and therefore have creative juices that have not been conditioned or to conform to any discipline or genre.... and that's why Google wants them. You see, while childrens art can be quite basic and even sometimes primitive, it is fresh and exciting, and Google doesn't want to be tarred with the same old brush.
So, here's what I think we should do. Withdraw all children who have already been entered and prevent others from being signed up on the dotted line. Then we encourage aging adult artists to apply for the job. I say aging artists because they are more likely to be prone to forgetfulness and C.R.A.F.T. disease.... the idea being that it'll cost Google a friggin' fortune having to pay these folk by the hour to complete the logo.
The other thing, I think we should do is get the Artists Union in on this. I mean, Google IS evil, and we wouldn't want these old folk to get exploited, now would we? I think the other thing we should do is have these folk implanted with tracking devices., just in case they overhear something at Google HQ and Google decides to take them for a drive in the country to make them disappear.
Do Not... I Repeat, Do NOT Allow Your Kids To Enter Doodle4Google
I have it on good authority, let's just say a little bird told me, that numbers of Google staff, from both the upper and lower echelons have their jobs under threat if they are found to be under-performing. They each have to undertake aptitude tests, creativity tests and general ability tests.
And that's where your kids come in.
Yup, in order to pass these tests, many Google staffers will be substituting your kids work as their own work... and naturally they'll be claiming the best entries, not only in the hope of being retained, but also in the hope of getting promotions. The next best will obviously be used to pick a new logo, and the rest will determined who will be the captive market when these kids are the breadwinners of tomorrow.
I think we may have stumbled upon the greatest case of child exploitation in history.... 'cept fer per'aps when Cap'n 'ook indentured all them thar kids ta wurk on 'e's ship in 'Peter Pan'
So people, you need to be vigilant. Even if you do not enter your child/children in the Doodle4Google thing, he or she may be sitting at the kitchen table expressing themselves artistically, and a Google Maps car is outside recording it all with powerful cameras and acute angle lenses that can see through the smallest gap in your curtains/blinds.
Orright, you've been forewarned, you know what to do. Don't let your children down and keep the curtains tightly drawn, right?
No a piece of technology from the 80s. It was the original DVDs about the size of an LP and would play movies (but you had to flip it in the middle). VCRs killed them as they could record as well - plus you did not have to "change sides" in the middle of the movie. A friend had one. I never saw the use of it and passed it by.
Hey Dr. G, 'ow be 'e me ol' mate?
There was a bloke who lived not far from me in about 83 -4, I think, and he had one. As I recall, he used to import the discs from Hong Kong, etc, and hold movie nights where he'd invite people from the neighbourhood to show of his purchase and his [then] giant 26" TV.
I never went because I didn't particularly like him. He was one of those people who had the latest and greatest of everything... and he made it his business to brag about how much it cost and that he was the first to get one. Yup, he'd let you know that he was the 'Jonses' and that you'd always be trying to keep up but never would.... smug bastard.
I had the last laugh, though, I had the first wireless remote VHS recorder in the neighbourhood... and I never let him forget it. At the time they weren't readily available in stores here in Oz, but a seaman friend of ine picked up one and a handful of movies for me while on his travels overseas.
And no, Mr Smug Bastard was not on the invite list on movie nights.
I remember those days well. Now if it is under 40 inches, it is not a TV, but a computer monitor!
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:
Sign in or Create Account
