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Fly Clear To Breeze Through Airport Security

With the U.S. terrorist threat level at orange airport security lines can be time consuming. If you are a frequent traveler like I am you probably are not a big fan of waiting in lines while unexperienced travelers struggle to learn the ropes. Clear, a New York-based identity verification startup founded in 2003, looks to speed up airport security checkpoints by pre-screening travelers.

Attensa 2.0: Free Enterprise RSS Reader

Attensa, a Portland-based company, has continued to improve upon its enterprise RSS feed reader solution which I highlighted previously, by releasing Attensa 2.0. Attensa believes that an Outlook integrated feed reader is a core requirement for large corporations.

Attensa 2.0 offers all of the same features of the previous 1.5 version including the ability to leverage "attention" click stream data to fight information overload as the most influential information is bubbled to the top. Attensa 2.0 offers the ability to set desktop alerts to deliver server alerts, out of inventory updates, pricing changes or other specify needs. Attensa responded to feedback from its Attensa 1.5 corporate integrations and now offers audio and video podcasts inline. Inline audio and video enabled corporations to easily enable podcasts for corporate training and other internal uses as enclosures do not send users to external sites or intranets sites for playback. The screen-shot to the left shows an audio file being played inline.

Attensa 2.0 is being offered with forum support and a PDF user guide for free! Additional support and access to the Attensa knowledge base can be purchased for $24.95 per year per client. For more information on Attensa 2.0 check out these articles on TechCrunch and the Attensa Blog.

Second Life Breach Leaks Real Life Data

Second Life, the online virtual world, recently encountered a privacy breach. According to a bulletin posted by Linden Labs, the San Francisco-based parent company, decided to take a proactive approach to reponding since they admittedly did not know what information of its over 660,000 users was accessible by hackers.  Cory Ondrejka, CTO of Linden Lab had this to say:

"We're taking a very conservative approach and assuming passwords were compromised and therefore we're requiring users to change their Second Life passwords immediately. While we realize this is an inconvenience for residents, we believe it's the safest course of action. We place the highest priority on protecting customer data and will continue to take aggressive measures to protect the privacy and security of the community. "

This incident reminded me that your online life which could include blogging, your online photos, email, calendar, search queries, phone conversations via VoIP or in this case your Second Life information is not totally separate from your first life, your real life. Therefore, privacy and safety should still be something that is taken into account while performing actions online.