LITTLE ROCK — QUOTE OF THE DAY “A systemic failure has occurred, and I
consider that totally unacceptable.” President Barack Obama,
on the security breach that purportedly allowed a Nigerian man to carry explosives onto a U.S. airliner Article, 1AHacker pleads guilty in another case
BOSTON - A computer hacker who helped orchestrate the theft of tens of millions of credit- and debit-card numbers from major retailers in one of the largest such thefts in U.S. history pleaded guilty Tuesday in the last of three cases brought by federal prosecutors.
Albert Gonzalez, 28, a one-time federal informant from Miami, faces a prison sentence of up to 25 years under the terms of separate plea agreements.
Tuesday’s plea stemmed from a case that was originally filed by federal prosecutors in New Jersey but was later transferred to Boston. It charged Gonzalez with conspiracy to gain unauthorized access to computer servers at Hannaford Brothers Inc., a Maine-based supermarket chain;
convenience store giant 7-Eleven Inc.; Heartland Payment Systems Inc., a New Jersey-based processor of credit and debit cards; and two unnamed companies.
Gonzalez pleaded guilty in September in two other cases that were combined in Boston. Those cases included charges that he hacked into the computers of prominent retailers such as TJX Cos., BJ’s Wholesale Club, OfficeMax, Boston Market, Barnes & Noble and Sports Authority.
San Francisco pier sea lions now few
SAN FRANCISCO - More than 1,000 sea lions that used to hang out on a pier in San Francisco Bay are now mostly gone.
Jeff Boehm of the Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito said there were more than 1,700 sea lions on Pier 39 in October, a record.
But by Thanksgiving, the lions had largely disappeared, and now only about a dozen remain.
Boehm said the fact that so many sea lions stayed for so long is even stranger than their disappearance. He guessed that the animals stuck around to eat their favorite foods such as anchovies and sardines and left to follow the food source.
He expects that they will be back by the spring.
Gastrointestinal anthrax a 1st in U.S.
CONCORD, N.H. - Antibiotics and vaccines are being offered to about 80 people in New Hampshire as authorities investigate the nation’s first known case of gastrointestinal anthrax.
Officials still don’t know how the woman contracted the disease but are focusing on a drum circle gathering she attended last month. She was diagnosed Saturday.
Officials have shut down the United Campus Ministry center in Durham, where anthrax spores have been found on two drums and an electrical outlet. They said Tuesday that vaccines and antibiotics will be available to people who attended the event or live or work in the building.
Dr. Elizabeth Talbot, an adviser to the state’s public health division, said one theory to explain the infection is that the spores became airborne through vigorous drum playing, and the woman swallowed them.
Front Section, Pages 5 on 12/30/2009