Pakistan issued a ban on the social networking website, Facebook, due to the posting of a contest that solicited images of the Prophet Muhammad. According to most Muslims, images of the Prophet Muhammad are blasphemous.

Since, Facebook has blocked access to that particular content for Pakistan only and issued an apology. A Pakistani court in Islamabad has stated that access to the site should be restored.

A centralized censorship system has been an object of consideration within the Pakistani Government recently. The system would resemble that of which is already in use by the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.

The US Department of Defense will now allow social networking and Web 2.0 social tools access within it’s Non-Classified Internet Protocol Router Network (NIPRNET). A statement “Responsible and Effective Use of Internet-based Capabilities” (DTM 09-026) was released on February 25th to formally allow social networking use within the non-classified network–unifying the policy across military branches for social network usage. This memorandum will also provide unified authority for public affairs communication for the military within social networking websites and tools.

http://www.ironpaper.com/current/2010/02/pentagon-allows-social-media-within-non-classified-network/

This graph represents US job loss from December 2007 through January 2010. This graph shows job loss from the Bush Presidency through January 2010 of the Obama Presidency. The source of the data is the Bureau of Labor Statistics, US, 02/12/2010.

Blue Cross has decided to raise premiums by as much as 39% even though they recently set record profit levels up to $4.7 billion dollars last year. In addition, the insurer has refused to provide reason for the huge increase in premiums.

As a result, Congress and state insurance regulators are planning to investigate the increase in premiums.

As a result, many Americans will be forced to cut back on coverage or forgo health care altogether.

Following the Google investigation of recent hacking attacks, which resulted in the discovery of potential Chinese government involvement or acceptance, the US State Department will formally protest to the Chinese Government demanding an explanation. “We will be issuing a formal demarche to the Chinese government in Beijing on this issue in the coming days,” said state department spokesperson PJ Crowley. “It will express our concern for this incident and request information from China as to an explanation of how it happened and what they plan to do about it.”

Yahoo and other US companies have also come forward with cases that potentially point back to China.

Google has already threatened to pull out of China following the hacking attempts and security violations which intruded on intellectual property rights. The hacking attempts included illegal access of human rights workers using Gmail.

Google announced that the company is no longer willing to censor its Chinese search engine – google.cn. In response to the hacking attempts, Google demanded that China allow it to operate within censorship restrictions. A Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman,  Jiang Yu, asseted the internet in China was “open.” Some of the current censorship restrictions that the Chinese Government require of web operators include removing content covering: 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, Tibetan independence or Falun Gong, among others.

Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman has taken sides. He will oppose health care reform and the Democratic Party in a dramatic and historical way. Some have criticized Lieberman for being a strong asset to the Republican Party. One thing is clear, Lieberman is standing up for health insurance companies. It appears that his goal is to find a way to water down significant health care reform and the public option.

One of Lieberman’s top campaign contributors is the lobbyist group for Triwest Healthcare Alliance, which contributed $50,000 in 2008 (Source: Senate Office of Public Records LD-203 disclosure database; data from 2008).

Lieberman announced today that “if the bill remains what it is now, I will not be able to support a cloture motion before final passage.”

“I told Senator Reid that I’m strongly inclined–i haven’t totally decided, but I’m strongly inclined–to vote to proceed to the health care debate, even though I don’t support the bill that he’s bringing together because it’s important that we start the debate on health care reform because I want to vote for health care reform this year. But I also told him that if the bill remains what it is now, I will not be able to support a cloture motion before final passage. Therefore I will try to stop the passage of the bill.”

On October 15th, Americans are required to declare all off-shore bank accounts. Some estimates suggest that there may be as much as tens of billions of dollars hidden in the off-shore accounts of private citizens.

Many wealthy citizens have already announced their hidden accounts. Approximately 4,000 clients of UBS and other private banks have come forward.  Many others may be weighing the risks of each option. If they declare their accounts, they could be hit with penalties. If they get caught, they may risk going to jail.

United States authorities challenged the long-standing tradition of banking secrecy in Switzerland. The IRS is going to be gentle with those who come forward by Oct 15th, it says. Fines will be 5% to 20% of their tax bills rather than the typical 50%.

Regina E. Dugan, the Director of the Pentagon’s research section(Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), has began to tour college campuses to build research relationships. With the Bush Administration secrecy was the modus-operandi. The Pentagon must put it’s best foot forward to win back these relationships with the scholarly world.

So far the schools listed on the tour include: University of California, Berkeley; Stanford University; the University of California, Los Angeles; Virginia Tech; Texas A&M, and the California Institute of Technology.

Secrecy was not the only reason for the severance of Pentagon / university relationships. Under the leadership of Anthony J. Tether, a number of controversial research projects were the focus of the government, which included the proposed Total Information Awareness system.

The Federal Trade Commission is seeking increased transparency with product endorsement on blogs and social networks. Paid product endorsements on blogs, Twitter, Facebook and other social websites will need to reveal their sponsorship, otherwise they will be faced with fines, a lawsuit or other penalties.

The new guidelines will come into effect on December 1st. The FTC however has not disclosed how bloggers or product endorsers should reveal their sponsorship.

Although customs has possessed the right to inspect high tech gadgets like laptops and digital cameras, they have not always exercised that right.

From now on, high tech gadgets will undergo inspections from the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) as they pass across the border from Mexico to the United States.

Customs and Border Protection will be looking for cyber threats, terrorist plots, bulk cash smuggling and counterfeited trademarks specifically.