Chinese Media Warn Against Rumors in Bo Xilai Scandal

The scandal surrounding disgraced politician Bo Xilai continues to reverberate in China, where official media Monday is calling for a tougher crackdown on online rumors.

A headline article on the front page of Monday's People's Daily newspaper says “Internet Rumors Harm People and Harm our Society.” The English-language China Daily carries a Xinhua article quoting experts calling for harsh criminal sanctions against those who spread rumors online.

Neither article specifically mentions the case of recently fallen politician Bo Xilai. But the Xinhua article says authorities detained six people for spreading rumors last month about a coup in Beijing, which was supposedly backed by Bo supporters in the central government.

The charismatic Bo is the former party secretary in the southwestern megalopolis of Chongqing. Last week's announcement that he was being fired from his position as one of the top leaders in the Chinese Communist party was accompanied by a report that his wife, Gu Kailai, is being investigated in the suspected murder of British businessman Neil Heywood in November. It also noted that Heywood had been friendly with the couple's son, Bo Guagua, who is studying at Harvard.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin could not say whether the Chinese government has been in touch with the U.S. government concerning Bo Guagua.

He said only that he is, in his words, “not aware of the specifics.”

When asked whether there has been any progress in the investigation into Heywood's death, Liu said only that the matter is being handled by judicial authorities according to law and in a timely manner.

Jeanette Barbieri, assistant political science professor at Hollins University in the U.S. state of Virginia, says the Chinese government appears to have decided that quick action is the best way to contain damage from the scandal.

“And I think the party recognizes that an incident like this can make ordinary people in China lose confidence in the Chinese Communist party," said Barbieri. "And so, they want to do damage control, they want to minimize the disruption that this sort of visible and obvious representation of discord within the party can do.”

Barbieri says Beijing wants the matter to be largely resolved before a party conference later this year, which will see an across-the-board leadership transition.

An article on the front page of the Chongqing Daily, in the city where Bo used to be the boss, said the investigation into his tenure there is a “fortunate thing” for the party and the country. It added that the most important thing now is for officials to follow party discipline and maintain social stability.

VOA News

Samsung says to unveil new Galaxy S smartphone on May 3

Samsung Electronics Co (005930.KS) said on Monday it would unveil the third-generation of its flagship smartphone Galaxy S on May 3 in London, banking on a heavy marketing campaign heading into the summer Olympics in the city.

Samsung became the world's top smartphone maker last year on the back of strong sales of Galaxy lineups and the latest edition comes after it released Galaxy S II in late April last year.

The South Korean firm sold over 40 million Galaxy smartphones since the model was released in June 2010.

Samsung, which dominates in the top end of smartphone market along with Apple Inc (AAPL.O), estimated earlier this month that its first-quarter operating profit would hit a record 5.8 trillion Korean won thanks to strong sales of Galaxy series smartphones.

Its current sponsorship deal with the International Olympics Committee runs out in 2016. It has said its market share in China doubled after the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

(Reporting by Miyoung Kim; Editing by Kim Coghill)
Reuters

Google accused of invading privacy with pictures of house numbers

Internet users are being asked to read random property numbers snapped by Google's Street View cameras, as part of new security checks.

The tests weed out "bots" by ensuring that users are human. But Google has been accused of exploiting the data submitted in by the public for commercial gain - by adding the information to its own mapping system.

Campaign groups said that the use of pictures of real house numbers presents “serious” security issues, and accused the internet company of being “underhand and crude”.

The pictures of house numbers, which are taken from doors and fences on its Street View mapping service, appear on Google’s websites when internet users are asked security questions in order to access their accounts.

In order to gain access to the page, web users are asked to identify a blurry house number by typing it into a box.

The same image is presented to other Google users around the world at the same time. If enough people submit the same number, Google accepts they have accurately read the photo and are therefore not bots.

Traditionally these security checks – of which there are estimated 200 million a day - have involved typing blurred letters or words into a box.

Nick Pickles, director of privacy and civil liberties at Big Brother Watch, condemned the use of pictures of real house numbers as security questions.

“There is a serious privacy issue with identifying the individual number of people’s homes,” he said.

Mr Pickles also accused Google of using the pictures to further its own interests.

This is because security questions that involve typing a word into a box actually form part of the technology company’s Google Books project – which aims to digitize thousands of physical books that were written before the computer age.

When people type in garbled words they are helping the technology company to translate scanned images from old books where the ink used has bled or faded, meaning that the words can not be recognised by a computer programme.

Mr Pickles said that there is no such ‘public interest’ use in retyping house numbers.

Rather, Google uses the affirmative identification of a house number to sharpen up the image on its Street View or Google Maps service.

"It is clear that Google sees the people who use its services as a commodity to be used up. To use the public as unwitting data loggers is both underhand and crude.

"The 'Don't be evil' mantra appears to have been replaced with a thirst for knowledge," he said.

A Google spokesman confirmed that it has launched a global trial using house numbers as security questions. He said that the pictures are only used in 10 per cent of all questions.

The spokesman said that there are no security risks as the pictures of the numbers are cropped very closely. All pictures are taken from public roads and highways, he added.

When someone types the number in correctly, Google will then sharpen up the online image, the spokesman said.

“We are currently running an experiment in which characters from Street View images are appearing in CAPTCHAs [the security system that Google owns].

“We often extract data such as street names and traffic signs from Street View imagery to improve Google Maps with useful information like business addresses and locations,” the spokesman said.

Google said that it runs hundreds of trials such as this all the time. The aim is to make gaining access to websites safer, the spokesman said.

The point of security systems such as CAPTCHA is to stop legitimate websites being flooded with unwanted internet spam.

The Telegraph

Oklahoma father, two children among 5 killed in weekend storms

A father and his two children in a trailer, plus two other people who were in a car in the same Oklahoma town, were killed in a string of tornadoes that tore through parts of the Midwest on Saturday and early Sunday.

Those fatalities in Woodward are the only ones known to have resulted from this weekend's storms. But millions of people were bracing for even more severe weather late Sunday afternoon and night.

The states in the "bull's-eye" for the most dangerous conditions Sunday will likely be Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa, according to the Storm Prediction Center. CNN Meteorologist Alexandra Steele added that some bigger cities -- including Green Bay, Chicago, St. Louis, Little Rock and Houston -- could see isolated tornadoes, large hail and damaging winds.

About 5 million people from Wisconsin to Texas "need to be on guard," Steele said.

The National Weather Service received 122 reports of possible tornado touchdowns Saturday and early Sunday in Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska and Iowa.

Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback told CNN that "97 tornadoes touched down" in his state; the National Weather Service has not confirmed the exact number of twisters.

Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin declared a state of emergency for 12 counties, including Woodward, where the deaths occurred.

Up to 250 emergency responders came into the small city of Woodward, conducting a door-to-door search to ensure there were no more fatalities, said City Manager Alan Riffel.

Mayor Roscoe Hill said 37 people were injured, including several critically, when the storm struck the northern Oklahoma community -- which has about 12,000 people, in a county of 20,000, and sits about 85 miles west of Enid -- shortly after midnight. Matt Lehenbauer, director of emergency management for Woodward, said 29 people have been treated for injuries.

"This thing comes in the middle of the night. It caught us asleep, mostly," Hill told CNN.

In addition to leveling 89 homes and 13 businesses, Riffel said the storm "took out" the transmitter for the public siren and tornado notification system, and "we lost our manual override" when the electricity was knocked out.

"We don't know if it would have saved those killed, but I'm sure we could have woke people up with sirens if they were working," said Hill.

The dead includes a father and his two children, who were inside their trailer at the Hidden Valley Mobile Home Park when the tornado rolled through, according to Hill.

The other two people killed were in a car that rolled over several times.

"It's hard to visualize" such a tragedy, Hill said.

Officials credited working early warning systems elsewhere in the region with preventing more fatalities.

Advisories from the system were issued two days in advance, rather than just a matter of hours, and were "remarkably accurate," said Brownback, the Kansas governor. "People took it very seriously."

In southwest Iowa, officials evacuated the entire population -- roughly 300 people -- of the town of Thurman after a suspected tornado struck Saturday, damaging or destroying three out of every four homes.

By early Sunday morning, many Thurman residents who took up temporary shelter at a high school in nearby Tabor were again in the path of a storm that spawned suspected tornadoes in neighboring Kansas.

A sign in a park that bears the town's name is one of the few things still standing, said Mike Crecelius, Fremont County's emergency management director.

"That's about all there is. About 75% of the homes are damaged or destroyed," he said. "From the looks of things, there won't be a tree left in that town either."

Across the south and central Plains, storm chasers broadcast images of funnel clouds roaring through rural landscapes.

In the basement of 30-year-old Lacy Jay Hansen's home in downtown Wichita, Kansas, she and her family donned bicycle helmets and crouched against a corner as a suspected tornado churned its way toward her home.

"It turned right in the nick of time for us, striking this other neighborhood," she said, later learning the storm destroyed a friend's house several miles away.

Eleven months ago, Hansen, her husband and son were in Joplin, Missouri, visiting their ailing grandfather in a hospital when a tornado ripped through, killing 158 people.

"None of us were supposed to be there," she said. "We've always taken it seriously. But ever since then, we take it more seriously."

The tornado that tore through Joplin was one of 1,691 tornadoes that killed a total of 550 people in 2011, according to the National Weather Service. Last year was the 4th deadliest tornado year in U.S. history.

The tragedy in Joplin triggered stronger warnings by the weather service about life-threatening storms. More than 24 hours before the storms began rolling across the Midwest on Saturday, the service was cautioning residents of the storm's potential damage.

At the Marriott in downtown Wichita, Johnny Williams watched over eight children in an interior ballroom where they'd taken shelter.

The group, from Oklahoma City, was in town for a basketball camp at the time

"We play together as a team, and we believe together as a team," Williams said. "We really believe everything will be all right."

The storm caused flooding in parts of downtown Wichita, and McConnell Air Force Base also sustained damage, authorities said.

Wichita resident Katie Sykes sent CNN iReport a photo of what she called "the river in my front yard."

"About midnight I was in my basement, and I come upstairs and I see the water -- it looked like a river,' she said.

"When I was little we prepared for storms, hearing the sirens and then going to the basement. And going through this experience I felt like a little kid, young and scared."

A roof collapsed at a facility for Spirit Aero Systems, which produces fuselages and other equipment for Boeing aircraft, and damage was also reported to a Hawker Beechcraft building, which manufactures high-performance business jets and turbo-prop planes.

At the Wichita Mid-Continent Airport, a suspected tornado tossed baggage carts across runways, Sedgwick County spokeswoman Kristi Zuckovich said. There was no structural damage and the airport was fully operational Sunday, she said.

Country singer Miranda Lambert's concert Saturday night at the Intrust Bank arena in Wichita was interrupted by an apparent tornado. She was taken off the stage and fans were kept inside, said Lt. Jason Gill of the Sedgwick County Sheriff's Office.

Later, Lambert tweeted, "We made it y'all. Thanks for coming out and for making it through the delay with a smile."

Six mobile homes were destroyed in Wichita County, officials said. Authorities searched Sunday morning to be sure everyone was accounted for.

Earlier, a confirmed tornado struck a hospital in Creston, Iowa, blowing out windows and damaging the roof, said John Benson of the Iowa Homeland Security and Emergency Management agency. There were no major injuries reported, and patients were relocated to other area hospitals.

CNN

Robin Gibb in a coma with pneumonia

The Bee Gees star Robin Gibb is in a coma after contracting pneumonia while being treated for cancer.

The 62-year-old singer's family have been keeping vigil at his bedside at a hospital in Chelsea, west London.

They are understood to include his wife, Dwina, brother Barry, 65, daughter Melissa, 37, and sons Spencer, 39, and Robin-John, 29.

Gibb had surgery on his bowel 18 months ago for an unrelated condition, but a tumour was discovered and he was diagnosed with cancer of the colon and, later, of the liver.

It had been thought his cancer was in remission as early as last month, but the latest deterioration in his health coincides with reports of a secondary tumour.

A statement on the singer's website RobinGibb.com said: "Sadly the reports are true that Robin has contracted pneumonia and is in a coma. We are all hoping and praying that he will pull through."

Gibb's twin brother and bandmate, Maurice, died from the same bowel condition that initially led doctors to operate on Robin.

His younger brother Andy, who was not part of the Bee Gees but a successful singer in his own right, died in 1988 from heart failure at 30.

Robin Gibb has enjoyed a musical career spanning six decades, from humble beginnings as part of a sibling trio in 1950s Manchester to his most recent classical venture, a requiem for the Titanic.

In the interim, he sang some of the 1960s and 1970s greatest hits, including Massachusetts, I've Gotta Get a Message to You, Lonely Days, How Can You Mend a Broken Heart, How Deep is Your Love and Stayin' Alive. The Bee Gees are best remembered for their contribution to the soundtrack of the 1977 film Saturday Night Fever.

Gibb last performed on stage in February, supporting injured servicemen and women at the Coming Home charity concert held at the London Palladium.

He had been due to premiere his classical work, The Titanic Requiem, this month with son Robin-John, but the event went ahead without him because of his poor health.

The Guardian