BOSTON/Boston Common - Approximately twenty members of the Free Software Foundation and supporters of free open source software gathered at the entrance to Boston Common from the Public Garden Wednesday to erect a giant trash bin into which they threw representations of proprietary software like Microsoft Windows 7, Mac OS X and the iPhone. The demonstration marked the launch of their Windows 7 Sins campaign, which identifies seven negative cultural impacts of Microsoft's proprietary software ecosystem and encourages users to use free software instead.

AN OPEN MEDIA BOSTON INVESTIGATIVE REPORT. Verizon's default wireless security for subscribers to its FiOS Internet and DSL High Speed Internet service has been shown to include several critical security flaws and weaknesses that Verizon phone support agents do not disclose to its customers. These weaknesses are exacerbated by poor training and installation practices that leave users vulnerable to network infiltration, identity theft and data loss.

BOSTON - In an August, 2007 newspaper article, former Boston Globe national legal affairs correspondent Charlie Savage wrote that the federal Department of Homeland Security is “funneling millions of dollars to local governments nationwide for purchasing high-tech video camera networks, accelerating the rise of a ‘surveillance society’ in which the sense of freedom that stems from being anonymous in public will be lost, privacy rights advocates warn.”

BOSTON - A suit brought against three MIT students last week by the MBTA prevented them from presenting their findings on Boston subway security vulnerabilities at the DEFCON conference in Las Vegas. Professional security researchers have expressed concerns that the gag order and the treatment of the students as criminals may dissuade researchers from identifying vulnerabilities in public systems for fear of litigation. As a result, vulnerable systems may remain unfixed and pose a risk to those who use them.