Toronto Electricians and Electrical Contractors

EFF Tells Bay Area Regional Transit: Reject Proposed Face Surveillance Scheme Around the country, communities concerned about privacy and surveillance are seeking to secure a robust role for public community oversight to constrain the co-optation of local police departments by electronic surveillance. EFF supported recent victories for community control in Oakland and Berkeley , CA, before recommending today that the Bay Area Regional Transit (BART) Board reject recent proposals to expand surveillance on the BART system.  The Board considered two proposals today. One was for a hastily crafted “ Safety and Security Action Plan ,” including a provision for a “Physical Security Information Management system” (PSIM) that “would be capable of monitoring thousands of simultaneous video streams and automating response recommendation.” The other was for a face surveillance scheme that seems to lack any awareness of the profound threat it could present to privacy, dissent, communities...

Topple Track Attacks EFF and Others With Outrageous DMCA Notices At EFF, we often write about abuse of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) takedown process. We even have a Hall of Shame collecting some of the worst offenders. EFF is not usually the target of bad takedown notices, however. A company called Topple Track has been sending a slew of abusive takedown notices, including false claims of infringement levelled at news organizations, law professors, musicians, and yes, EFF. Topple Track is a “content protection” service owned by Symphonic Distribution . The company boasts that it is “one of the leading Google Trusted Copyright Program members.” It claims : Once we identify pirated content we send out automated DMCA takedown requests to Google to remove the URLs from their search results and/or the website operators. Links and files are processed and removed as soon as possible because of Topple Track’s relationship with Google and file sharing websites that are ...

EFF Amicus Brief: The Privacy Act Requires the FBI to Delete Files of Its Internet Speech Surveillance U.S. law makes clear that the government cannot keep surveillance records on a person or group because of their political views or the way that they express their First Amendment rights. Unfortunately, the FBI has flouted these laws by maintaining records of its probe of two people whose website criticized U.S. policy in the Middle East. EFF is urging a court to make this right. EFF filed an amicus brief in support of an ACLU of Northern California lawsuit to enforce privacy protections that Congress put in place in the 1970s against government surveillance.  Rigorous enforcement of this law is needed to prevent the FBI from maintaining information it collects on the Internet about our First Amendment activity for many years after that information is no longer relevant to an ongoing investigation. After the FBI tracked Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and other civil rights acti...

For most data center and network administrators, life has not been easy over the last several years. Work demands that stem from supporting 24/7 mission critical data center environments have made maintaining a sensible work/life balance nearly impossible. As data centers keep growing in size and capability (without a corresponding increase in staff in many cases), that pressure will continue to mount.   According to a 2014 IT Admin Stress Survey conducted by Opinion Matters , mission critical environments impact the work/life balance for data center managers and administrators in several ways: 38% of survey participants admit to missing social functions due to demands at work 35% report missing time with families due to work demands on their personal time 25% have reported suffering from stress-related illness 24% attribute a relationship damage or failure due to their job Fortunately, since this survey was administered, new breakthroughs in technology have emerged that...

Written by Guest Blogger, Isdiyanah Dulkifli  I started my first job in June 2018 as an Energy Generation Program associate, which is a graduate program at Schneider Electric Singapore. As part of my on-boarding process at Schneider Electric , I attended a tea session with my company’s country President, as well as briefings from Vice Presidents in various functions. I thought I should note down some advice as a way to remind myself as well as my peers who are embarking on our first job; be it in management associate programs or starting out in a specific position. Together, not only will these tips guide my early development in my new job, but also I hope it will help my peers and other young talents who are starting a career journey. 1.) Be a Sponge I think we have probably heard this reminder many times, even prior to starting our first job, but it is definitely one of the most important pieces of advice to remember. Being a sponge means we will be driven to seek and a...

Large ISPs, Flushed with Capital, Blame Consumer Protections for Their Disregard of Rural America Companies like AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon are going around to state legislatures and telling them that any laws they pass that protect consumers will harm their ability to deploy networks in rural America. They claim that any legislator eager to protect their constituents from the nefarious things that can be done by companies that control access to the Internet is somehow hurting residents most desperate for an Internet connection. But their lack of willingness to invest has nothing to do with laws like net neutrality or privacy, because today they are nearly completely deregulated, sitting on a mountain of cash, and have no shown intention of connecting rural Americans to high-speed Internet while their smaller competitors take up the challenge. The Tax Cuts from Congress Gave Them Billions in New Profits Followed by No New Plans to Roll out New Networks Congress cut corporate ...

Captive Audience: How Florida’s Prisons and DRM Made $11.3M Worth of Prisoners’ Music Disappear The Florida Department of Corrections is one of the many state prison systems that rely on private contractors to supply electronic messaging and access to electronic music files and books for prisoners. For seven years, Florida ’ s prisoners have bought music through Access Corrections, a company that took in $11.3 million selling songs at $1.70 each — nearly twice what the typical song costs on the marketplaces available to people who aren ’ t incarcerated. This is hardly exceptional: prisons also charge extremely high rates for phone calls. The FCC briefly capped this at $1/minute (much higher than normal calling rates), only to have the Trump FCC abandon the policy rather than fight a court challenge. Florida prisoners used Access Corrections ’ $100 MP3 players to listen to their music purchases and access their other digital files. But the Florida Department of Corrections has t...

At first, the class was like any other at Georgia’s Quitman County Schools. Kids sat in desks while an adult lectured. But despite appearances, this was no ordinary lecture. Schneider Electric organized STEM activities for kids in this Quitman County high school class. These activities are part of Quitman County’s energy performance contract with Schneider Electric and designed to engage students in a STEM-inspired engineering shadowing program focused on energy conservation. “I am always amazed at the level of engagement we get from students when we get out of the classroom,” says Quent Mather, Schneider Electric project development manager. “That’s why I think it’s very important to host these hands-on and real-life learning experiences.” Quitman Superintendent, Victoria L. Harris, Ed.S., couldn’t agree more. “We’re always looking for ways to expand our STEM curriculum so when we found out Schneider Electric offered this opportunity we couldn’t have been happier,” she says. “The ...