IRS used Google Maps to spy on taxpayers and organizations

Agents from the IRS are using Google Maps as part of their tool kit to audit taxpayers and organizations, The Daily Caller has learned.

A redacted IRS letter dated Sept. 8, 2011 [Priv. Ltr. Rul. 2013-13-031] reveals that at least in one case the IRS’s examiners used photos of a property, obtained through Google Maps, as evidence to revoke the 501(c)(4) status of a homeowner’s association.

Article here. and Article here. 

Driver arrested in Ohio for car's secret compartment filled with . . . nothing

Norman Gurley, 30, is facing drug-related charges in Lorain County, Ohio, despite the fact that state troopers did not actually find any drugs in his possession.
Ohio passed a law in 2012 making it a felony to alter a vehicle to add a secret compartment with the “intent” of using it to conceal drugs for trafficking.

article here.

Secret NSA court order released allowing collection of internet data

A secret court order that authorized a massive trawl by the National Security Agency of Americans' email and internet data was published for the first time on Monday night, among a trove of documents that also revealed a judge's concern that the NSA "continuously" and "systematically" violated the limits placed on the program.

article here. 

NSA's data collection doesn't apply to US Citizens -- until it does.

The NSA (National Security Agency) is harvesting hundreds of millions of contact lists from personal e-mail and instant messaging accounts around the world, many of them belonging to Americans, as reported in an article in the Washington Post yesterday. 

From the article: Although the collection takes place overseas, two senior U.S. intelligence officials acknowledged that it sweeps in the contacts of many Americans. They declined to offer an estimate but did not dispute that the number is likely to be in the millions or tens of millions.

Less web anonymity in the future, thanks to new facebook change

Less web anonymity in store: if you're a facebook user, and you'd "hidden" yourself from a timeline search, you won't be able to use that setting any longer. Article here.

Whether users will be happy with this change doesn't matter to Facebook, as usual. To Facebook, it's all about the other user's experience, and how easy it is to find people.  "People told us that they found it confusing when they tried looking for someone who they knew personally . . . " Facebook said in a blog post.