The NSA's Latest Slide Show, Hackers Hacked off at Feds, Prohibition Still Around in Chicago: P.M. Links

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  Credit: Uncalno / Foter / CC BY

  A newly released slide from the National Security Agency appears to confirm a surveillance method observers have long believed had been taking place – the ability to access communications from fiber optic cables as the data flows through it without having to access it directly from online service providers.

• Hackers at the annual Def Con convention in Las Vegas are asking the feds to stay away this year due to discomfort over the revelations of surveillance being brought forth by Edward Snowden. I attended the conference once many moons ago (so long ago that one of the displays in the conference hall was somebody noodling around on a private hacked Everquest server).  They made a game essentially out of people trying to figure out who there was actually federal agent of some sort. It seemed like it was mostly in good fun, but I bet the mood has changed since then.
• In Chicago, a lawyer is suing the city for allowing a wine shop to open in a community that voted more than 30 years ago to ban booze and be "dry."
• Cory Booker has raised $4.6 million in three months in New Jersey in his chase for Frank Lautenberg's old Senate seat.
• Mass protests continue in Egypt, but now it's due to supporters of evicted President Mohammad Morsi, who want him back in power.
• The White House has threatened to veto the farm bill if it omits food stamps. Republicans have proposed stripping the food stamp funding out and dealing with it separately.

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