TJX: What if it hadn't happened?

Albert Gonzalez, the man accused of hacking into major retailers such as TJX Cos., Hannaford Brothers Co. Inc. and 7-Eleven plead guilty today in Boston district court. It's been a long-road for him to come to justice, and it makes us think about how things would be different had that "major" hack into TJX's servers not happened. How long would it have taken for something like PCI compliance to happen?

That singular event was the major catalyst behind PCI compliance and the need to secure data relating to credit cards. In many ways, it was an after-thought before.

From Mass High Tech:
Accused of conspiracy in the hacking attacks on payment systems supporting companies such as retailers TJX Cos., Hannaford Brothers Co. Inc. and 7-Eleven, Albert Gonzalez, 28, of Miami, today pleaded guilty to the final charges against him in U.S. District Court in Boston.

Federal prosecutors said that Gonzalez, who allegedly controlled servers that gained access to the corporate servers and then gave information to hackers that would use malware to launch attacks on the victims, pleaded guilty to two cou...

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What are the odds of a semantic web?

  Book of Odds samples semantic web

A local Massachusetts company is putting down odds that they can make a go at it in the Semantic Web (sometimes referred to as Web 3.0):

What are the odds of being struck by lightning? Bitten by a rabid dog? Run down by a bus? Audited by the IRS?

Book of Odds Inc., a Boston company set to launch publicly tomorrow, is answering questions like these using semantic search — a technology long touted as ‘Web 3.0.’ On the semantic web — so the idea goes — search engines and applications will know what users are looking for, much in the same way humans understand one another based on context and other cues.

Instead of changing the face of computing technology, Book of Odds has a narrower goal: untangling the perplexing probabilities at the heart of human anxieties and dreams. For example, the odds of delivering twins are 1 in 31.1 — but how does that compare to something I can understand a little better?

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Facebook: Who you know; Twitter: What you know

A recent study by TubeMogul found that users clicking onto videos links sent via Twitter spend significantly longer watching those videos than those arriving from Digg or Facebook.

With Facebook, you are more likely to know the person posting the link, but maybe your friends don’t post interesting links. Facebook video links get one minute and 14 seconds of viewing.

For video links shared via Twitter, however, users spend a full minute and 38 seconds watching them.

Why? Because Facebook focuses on who you know, while Twitter focuses what you know.

See full article on Social Media Today.

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Digitas Expands Health Unit in Boston, London

Digitas Health, a unit of digital marketing agency Digitas, has new offices in both Boston and London, the company said Monday. Digitas Health Boston will be located within Digitas’ Boston-based headquarters.

“The health care system worldwide is being revolutionized by digital channels that change the very nature of how pharmaceutical companies and brands relate to patients and doctors alike. As budgets shift rapidly to favor these new channels, our clients are pushing our work across borders at an increasing pace,” said David Kramer, CEO of Digitas Health, in a prepared written statement.

See full article on Boston Business Journal....

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What's Your Contingency Plan?

  Holiday fire in datacenter shuts down one of the largest online credit card processors; causes havoc with e-commerce sites

Today, a fire in Authorize.net's datacenter shut down their credit card processing capability.

Authorize.net is one of the largest credit card processors used by online website vendors, and without an ability to process credit cards these merchants can lose thousands of dollars per day in lost sales. Most news is sketchy, but a few comments on bulletin boards focus around the surprise there was no contingency plan in place. This is one of those examples that you don't realize you need a contingency until it happens!

As of noon ET, the payment gateway's site was down as well as their ability to process cards. Reports say they're targeting 1PM ET for their servers to be back up....

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