Attacks by scammers appear to make sophisticated use of language ideology to abuse trust relationships. Language that indexes Africans allows perceived “authenticity” to be constructed in a way that breaks down a victims’ defenses — a variety of linguistic devices are used as attack tools.
Much of the success of a cross-cultural scam therefore comes from the ways in which attackers seem able to take advantage of victims’ ethnic, racial, religious, and especially linguistic stereotypes. The scams invite people to empathize and assist someone foreign in a struggle to save their heritage or their health. Victims are lured into the most remarkable investment opportunities as scammers portray themselves as hapless victims of interethnic warfare, or as simple bank clerks who have discovered unclaimed fortunes. The trusting individuals who embark on interethnic adventures soon find their bank accounts plundered, their life savings gone.
We propose use of language pattern analysis to help. Applying the tools of linguistic anthropology to a collection of five years’ worth of “African” scam email messages, we believe we have discovered a pattern for many of the linguistic and cultural devices through which the relevant stereotypes are accessed.
This paper discusses the linguistic pattern used by scammers, revealing language ideologies in question. It also demonstrates how linguistic anthropology can be applied to the challenge of developing linguistically and culturally adaptive controls for communication security.
I was evaluating a Wii and was getting all excited about the new system (boxing is a real workout — I think they should have called it “unboxing”) until I ran into this little detail:
The Wii console can communicate with the Internet even when the power is turned off. The WiiConnect24 service delivers a new surprise or game update, even if the system is idle.
Another case where power-down means that your screen goes dark, but the system keeps its links alive and might send/receive data or updates without your approval or knowledge. Wonder how much testing they did through filters. Is your network ready for controlling these Wii packets? And that’s not to mention the future VoIP plans rumored for the Wii.
these asphalt acres are getting their day in the sun, with search giant Google joining other companies in planting groves of pole-mounted solar panels between the rows of Saabs and SUVs, generating clean power and providing a little shade at the same time.
Google’s Mountain View, California, headquarters is getting a 1.6-megawatt solar system — enough to power about 1,000 homes — that will feed about 30 percent of the complex’s power demand.
I like the fact that someone realized that stringing together small arrays on roof-tops makes sense but should not be the limit, especially when you look out over a sea of perfectly flat parking spaces. I also thought of at least two benefits beyond those mentioned in the article:
Shading the asphalt and cars, which reduces wear from the sun and may even provide some shelter from rain. How dumb are we as a civilization to park cars on black asphalt and then run cooling systems to compensate, when harvesting the sun would achieve the same result with additional benefits?
Emergency-backup source of energy for business continuity.