breadcrumbs

Beware of Greeks Bearing Bugs

Just read a piece on the CNN International site about the digital security systems being used at the upcoming Athens Olympics. Sounds like Athens is going to have more bugs in it than a cheap tropical hotel. According to the article, the system:

... gathers images and audio from an electronic web of over 1,000 high-resolution and infrared cameras, 12 patrol boats, 4,000 vehicles, nine helicopters, a sensor-laden blimp and four mobile command centers.
Spoken words collected by the cameras with speech-recognition software are transcribed into text that is then searched for patterns along with other electronic communications entering and leaving the area -- including e-mail and image files.

Apparently the speech-recognition software understands Arabic, Farsi and all major European languages including English and Greek. It can also tell the difference between the sound of a flat and a gunshot. The story reads like a cross between a promo for the surveillance industry and a fascist wet dream. Man, if I were an Athenian, I'd be a little freaked about this bug-infested Trojan horse that slipped in along with the Games.

Except Maybe Jerry Lewis

My favourite part of a funny, interesting story about sex and booze at the Olympics on scotsman.com:

Edith Thys, an American skier at Calgary and Albertville, agrees that the partying gold should probably go to the Canadians, but she awards the licentiousness medal to the French. "They are by far the most promiscuous," says Thys, "but only with each other. I’m not sure if that’s because they wouldn’t sleep with anybody else, or because nobody else would sleep with them."