Davey-Dave

I’ve been following Seth Godin’s Blog for about a year now, on and off. It’s mostly on now that I have him in my RSS reader. He has sage advice for anyone who is in marketing, or is alive.

Today, his post is relevant to the “Life has a reset button” theme here, so I thought I’d cross post it here. However, I think this can be extended to anyone, at anytime, not just recent college graduates.

Davey-Dave went dark in March and has been caught up in a domain name quagmire of privacy mails, domain registrars and hosting companies. Trying to get all three companies involved to work together wasn’t possible so I had to wait for the name “davey-dave” to expire so I could re-register it with my new (faster!) web hosting service (dreamhost.com).

All of the old posts are still here, though the photos probably aren’t. I may or may not get around to fixing that. For now, visit my photography website: http://PhotoIntl.com

Anyway, the big news in my life at the moment is I have hit the reset button again and am applying for a second assignment in the U.S. Peace Corps. It’s late, I’m tired and I’ll fill in the details this weekend.

Fa!

Credit Card Compromise Covered Up

I’m taking a departure from my normal topics to bring you some important information.

While everyone was watching the inauguration, it came to light that millions upon millions of credit and debit cards were compromised. A processing company, Heartland Payment Systems in New Jersey, lost the capture data for up to 40% of their data during 2008 and the early part of 2009. Heartland processes more than 100,000,000 transactions a month. Experts are calling it massive and saying this is the largest data security breach in history. A source inside the industry estimates that one hundred million credit cards are effected by this breach. Heartland initially stated that the personally identifiable information was not stolen; information such as social security numbers, birthdates, billing addresses, phone numbers. According to the source, that claim “is even being questioned now”.

Interestingly, it’s difficult to find information online. It seems the breach has been quietly swept under the carpet. The website set up by Heartland speaks of openness and fairness but provides no details of the breach such as the number of cards or institutions effected, nor does it suggest a course of action for customers. Instead, it reads more like a quarterly report touting its accomplishments. It refers to itself as the victim (not the card holders) and takes no responsibility for security vulnerabilities.

Lack of Fact
The reason for the absence of details is simple: no one is asking. Frustratingly, very little information online. It is receiving little or no coverage by the major news agencies. Information seems to be only available via secondary as a public service through locals news sources, mostly, who are contacted by banks and credit unions, who are themselves contacted by the credit agencies. To highlight this, here are results from several major news sources:

• The New York Times has posted an article in the Technology section with the headline, “…Some Data Was Stolen”.
• Also in the technology section, The Associate Press, the main national news source for most local newspapers, radio and television stations, has published only one report with the curiously quiet headline “Heartland Says It Has Closed Security Hole“.
• The Wall Street Journal mentions it in passing because Heartland Payment Systems was the Dow’s largest decliner for the day.
• This one really hurts: The Economist doesn’t even mention Heartland or Credit Card Breach anywhere on their site.
• To it’s credit, Blumeburg has had the most complete coverage. They have posted one article but it has had three updates as they continue to follow the story.

On the other hand, local and foreign news agencies are following the story carefully. So if you live in places like Gardner or Enid or Scottsbluff or as remote as Canada then you might be getting this story as front page coverage. Sad!

I don’t consider myself an alarmist or conspiracist. However, I want to know why editors are putting “Princess Michelle’s” outfit on the front page while is burying this story.

What You Can Do
The source suggests checking your account daily to watch for suspicious activity. You should receive a letter from your financial institution stating whether or not your card is effected. If you notice any curious activity, the phone number on the back of the card can be used to ask questions or report a problem. Besides that, I’d recommend making a phone call, shooting off an email or writing a post to your favorite news source and ask them, “What’s the story?!”

[Full disclosure: I'm not a reporter. Also, I'm no fan of the AP as a news source. I think it is watered down and perhaps even censored.]

Now that I’m back, I’m living out of my backpack. I spent the holidays mostly alone while house sitting for my sister. Don’t get me wrong, it suited me this holiday season. I’m not ready to reintegrate just yet and the thought of seeing my family after two years in the PC followed by a month in SE Asia sounds more like an interview that a reunion.

And interviews…. I really thought I’d figure out what was next by now. I did a little job searching online, mostly to see what’s out there.

But at the same time, I had another browser window opened to an eBay search for old Norton motorcycles. A long road trip is actually what I’d want right now.

It occurred to me that purchasing a motorcycle would give me something I have none of right now: a key. Being homeless, jobless and carless offers one some freedom; freedom from responsibility. But in this culture, responsibility is somewhat equated with importance, and, by extension, wealth. A key is a symbol of these things. I’m satisfied, for the moment, without them.

Well. We’ve just completed day two in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. This is the first place we have not booked extra days in. While it’s “nice and all” there’s nothing really keeping us here. It’s a little more expensive than Siem Reap, our accomodations aren’t nearly as nice, the beggars and tuktuk drivers are more aggressive, the whole town is under construction (the famous water front along the Tonelé Sap River is walled up for instance) and frankly, it’s not as nice as the other places we’ve been.

When I say “nice” I am speaking in terms of both beauty and friendliness. The waiters are smug and a shouting match broke out across the street from where we were having lunch. A few times it looked like it was going to break into a fist to cuffs.

Of course, we might have just hit the city at the wrong time of the year or something. And I might be a little grumpy from dehydration.

What else we’ve seen of Cambodia has been absolutely wonderful. I hope to come back knowing that the Cambodia we leave tomorrow morning will be a much different place when I return. Like (same same but different than) Vietnam, it is going through major social, political and economic changes very rapidly now that it has (again) opened to The West.

As much as I’ve loved Cambodia, Siem Reap and Angkor especially, I am looking forward to Thailand, a place I’ve wanted to visit for a very long time.

Street Vendor

Like yesterday, another photo from Hoi An, Vietnam. A street vendor selling nuts and dried ginger. Don’t let the the old lady rouse fool you… behind that grin lies a shrewd business woman.

There are now problems in Mumbai which was an alternate airport. So Troy and I will probably spend mode time in Cambodia and the last week in Hong Kong with his sister. We’re super safe.

Troy and I are currently in Hoi An, Vietnam. We’re thousands of miles away from the troubles in Thailand but headed in that direction. In fact, our flights out of Asia are supposed to be from Bangkok, which is closed now, but that’s still three weeks away and a lot could change.

Our plans are for another seven days in Vietnam followed by ten days in Cambodia and a weeks in the south of Thailand. We’ll keep tabs and adjust our plans as necessary.