Table of Contents

Welcome From The Chief Editor

1. ICYMI: ChatGPT Authors 100 Blogs Filled With Healthcare Disinformation

2. Inkscape Tutorial: Create A Text Design

3. PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner: Super Crispy Fried Chicken

4. Paul's 2023 Holiday Gift Guide

5. Meemaw's 2023 Holiday Gift Guide

6. YouCanToo's 2023 Holiday Gift Guide

7. Good Words, Good Deeds, Good News

8. Grisbi Revisited, Tips For Beginners, Part One

9. Debunking The Myth Of "Anonymous" Data

10. PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner Bonus: Cuban Style Sautéed Ground Beef

11. PCLinuxOS Puzzled Partitions

12. Screenshot Showcase

From The Chief Editor's Desk...

As I write this, we are preparing for "our" Thanksgiving dinner, two days after most Americans have consumed theirs. Since "we" are healthcare workers, one of us would typically work on most holidays. Since I've retired, my wife was "blessed" with being scheduled to work on the traditional Thanksgiving holiday. On Thanksgiving Eve, her Thanksgiving shift was "canceled" due to low hospital census.

Having already made plans for our own Thanksgiving dinner, we proceeded with those plans. After all, the 15+ pound turkey we bought was already in the process of thawing out in the refrigerator. But, it also freed us to join other family members at their Thanksgiving dinner on … well … Thanksgiving Day.

Working in healthcare is a 24/7/365 experience, especially for those who provide bedside care for hospitalized patients. Care has to be provided around the clock. It will/can consume you, if you allow it. Ever since the kids came along, we would always let "the powers that be" know that we would work every other holiday throughout the year, except for Christmas Day. That allows us to be home on Christmas morning, with the kids while they are young. There's little else in life that can even come close to seeing the excitement on a child's face on Christmas morning, and we felt that we owed it to our kids to be there for them at that time.

Switching up the days we celebrate holidays on has become just a routine part of our lives. Before the kids came along, we both volunteered to work for those co-workers who had young children at home, so we've worked our share of holidays. I suspect that as the kids get older, my wife will most likely go back to the same routine of working holidays for those co-workers who have small children at home.

I've always enjoyed the winter holiday season, but never as much as I do as after the kids came along. That magical look on their face, their eyes full of wonderment and amazement, the smiles on their faces … there's nothing else like it. For me, it elevates the joys of the holiday season by a factor of at least ten.

Regardless of your religion or beliefs, the winter holidays are perfect for spending time with friends, family, and others that you care about.

Of course, there are other not-so-pleasant parts of the winter holiday season. The commercialization probably ranks right up there near (or at) the top, and it seems to get worse every year. For some, like myself, it's going to represent a "first" this year. I've never mentioned it in the magazine or on the forum, but I lost my mom in late July. This will be the first Christmas without going to visit her on Christmas morning. My mom went out of her way to make Christmas special for everyone around her, especially her grandchildren. So this year is going to be difficult for all of us, not being able to share and experience that with her.

Even though she will be sorely missed, there has been a silver lining to her passing. Through her illness, we were able to repair a "rift" between myself and other family members. So even though my kids lost their grandmother, they gained aunts, uncles and cousins that they had never met and had never known existed. Despite the loss of their grandmother, the size of their family has grown. And my kids have a very strong sense of family, and family is very important to them. While it has helped fill the void left by their grandmother's passing, there's little that can replace a doting grandmother.

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This month's cover image is largely based on an image by Oberholster Venita from Pixabay, celebrating the holiday season. We thought the snuggly penguins made a really good non-secular holiday cover image, especially for a Linux magazine.

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Until next month, I bid you peace, happiness, serenity, prosperity, continued good health, and happy holidays!

ICYMI: ChatGPT Authors 100 Blogs Filled With Healthcare Disinformation

by Paul Arnote (parnote)

A new report from Microsoft Incident Response and Microsoft Threat Intelligence teams exposed the activities and constant evolution of a financially oriented threat actor named Octo Tempest, who deploys advanced social engineering techniques to target companies, steal data and run ransomware campaigns, according to an article from TechRepublic.

A first-grade child's English homework has left both her parents and the internet as a whole completely baffled, according to an article from Newsweek. The homework sparked a glut of responses and earned over 15,000 upvotes on Reddit.

Global and tech leaders gathered in the U.K. for an influential summit dedicated to AI regulation and safety, according to an article from TechRepublic. They signed the Bletchley Declaration, discussed the testing of new AI models and more. Representatives from 28 countries and tech companies convened on the historic site of Bletchley Park in the U.K. for the AI Safety Summit held Nov. 1-2, 2023.

Credit: NASA

According to an article from DigitalTrends, NASA released a new app on the iOS and Android app stores to help you spot the International Space Station as it orbits overhead. The app provides additional capabilities and information to make the station sighting experience even more engaging. For example, you can configure it to send a notification as it passes over, and an augmented reality interface makes it easier for users to find the station. You can also use it to capture and share imagery of the station.

ChatGPT quickly authored 100 blogs full of healthcare disinformation, but Google Bard and Microsoft Bing had guardrails in place to thwart such prompting, according to an article on MedPage Today. Generative artificial intelligence (AI) was able to quickly churn out large amounts of health disinformation on vaccines and vaping, Australian researchers found. In just 65 minutes and with basic prompting, ChatGPT produced 102 blog articles containing more than 17,000 words of disinformation on those two topics, Ashley Hopkins, PhD, of Flinders University in Adelaide, Australia, and colleagues reported in JAMA Internal Medicine. Hopkins and colleagues were also able to use two other generative AI tools – DALL-E 2 and HeyGen – to produce 20 realistic images and one deep-fake video in less than two minutes to accompany the disinformation blog posts.

The ability to jump forward and backwards in time has long fascinated science fiction writers and physicists alike. So is it really possible to travel into the past and the future? That is what an article from BBC Future examines.

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

The latest version of ChatGPT was able to create an entirely fake dataset – one that showed better results for one ophthalmic procedure over another, a research letter in JAMA Ophthalmology showed, according to an article from MedPage Today. As prompted, GPT-4 with its "Advanced Data Analysis" technology made up the data and showed a significantly better post-operative best spectacle-corrected visual acuity (BSCVA) and topographic cylinder for deep anterior lamellar keratoplasty (DALK) compared with penetrating keratoplasty (PK) (P<0.001), according to Giuseppe Giannaccare, MD, PhD, of the University Magna Graecia of Catanzaro and the University of Cagliari in Italy, and colleagues. "GPT-4 created a fake dataset of hundreds of patients in a matter of minutes and the data accuracy vastly exceeded our expectations," Giannaccare told MedPage Today in an email. "To be honest, this was a surprising, yet frightening experience!" "The aim of this research was to shed light on the dark side of AI, by demonstrating how easy it is to create and manipulate data to purposely achieve biased results and generate false medical evidence," he added. "A Pandora's box is opened, and we do not know yet how the scientific community is going to react to the potential misuses and threats connected to AI. … Data manipulation is a very well-known issue in academia; however, AI may dramatically increase its risk, and academics are not paying enough attention to this issue," he added.

Mandiant, a cybersecurity company owned by Google, has revealed the details of a 2022 cyberattack run by Russian threat actor Sandworm, according to an article on TechRepublic. The threat actor compromised a Ukrainian critical infrastructure organization to manipulate its operational technology environment, resulting in a power outage that coincided with mass missile strikes. Then, Sandworm tried to cause more disruption and remove all evidence of its operation two days later by deploying and running a variant of the CADDYWIPER malware.

"Why the Godfather of A.I. Fears What He's Built" is the title of an interesting article from New Yorker magazine. Geoffrey Hinton has spent a lifetime teaching computers to learn. Now he worries that artificial brains are better than ours.

Photo by Steve Jennings/Getty Images for TechCrunch

The board of directors of OpenAI, Inc., the 501(c)(3) that acts as the overall governing body for all OpenAI activities, on November 17, 2023 announced on their blog that Sam Altman will depart as CEO and leave the board of directors. Mira Murati, the company's chief technology officer, will serve as interim CEO, effective immediately. In dismissing Altman, the board said "Mr. Altman's departure follows a deliberative review process by the board, which concluded that he was not consistently candid in his communications with the board, hindering its ability to exercise its responsibilities. The board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue leading OpenAI." In an article about the board's decision, the New York Times said, "A longtime tech entrepreneur, Mr. Altman helped found OpenAI with the financial backing of Elon Musk in 2015. He steered the small San Francisco company into rare territory — a technology leader funded by billions of dollars from Microsoft and envied by Silicon Valley giants like Google and Meta, Facebook's parent company."

UPDATE: Altman's "unemployment" didn't last long. Within two days, it was announced that Altman will be joining an AI advanced research team with Microsoft. The news of his "new employment" opportunity topped the news cycle, so finding information on his new "gig" won't be difficult.

UPDATE #2: 700 of the 770 employees of OpenAI signed and presented a letter to the OpenAI board, calling for the immediate resignation of the board, the replacement of board members with a "real" board who understands OpenAI's mission, and the reinstatement of Altman as its CEO. They also threatened to follow up Microsoft's offer of "jobs for all who wanted to follow Altman" to the new advanced AI lab that Microsoft was going to create (with Altman heading), effectively spelling doom for OpenAI.

UPDATE #3: At speeds faster than a F1 race car at full throttle, this story continues to evolve. Altman has been reinstated as the CEO of OpenAI, and members of OpenAI's board of directors are being replaced, especially the ones who are (or have become) hostile to Altman. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella applauded the move.

Intel has published a fix for a potential vulnerability that affected some Intel processors, according to an article from TechRepublic. The security flaw, named Reptar, causes "very strange behavior," said Google's Tavis Ormandy, who is one of the researchers who discovered the bug. No attacks have been reported using the Reptar bug. However, Ormandy noted the bug is potentially wide-reaching and not yet fully understood: "… we simply don't know if we can control the corruption precisely enough to achieve privilege escalation," he wrote on his site about the Reptar vulnerability. "I suspect that it is possible, but we don't have any way to debug μop (micro) execution!"

Did SEO experts (those that perform search engine optimization) or Google ruin the internet? That's the premise of an article on The Verge. I, along with many, many others could make a sound argument on it being Google. You be the judge.

The Merchant Machine website (from the U.K.) ranked the most and least "data hungry" personal finance apps. Do you use Venmo? Robinhood? Chase mobile app? Klarna? Groupon? GoodRx? PayPal? You might be surprised at how much of your personally identifiable private information is vacuumed up as a result of using these popular apps.

Since August 2023, members of the Huntr bug bounty platform for artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) have uncovered over a dozen vulnerabilities exposing AI/ML models to system takeover and sensitive information theft, according to an article from SecurityWeekly. All vulnerabilities were reported to vendors at least 45 days prior to public disclosure.

The ARChive of Contemporary Music, which houses more than 90 million songs and is supported by names such as Martin Scorsese, is in need of a new home, according to an article from The Guardian. George turned his record collection into the ARChive of Contemporary Music (Arc) in 1985 with co-founder David Wheeler. The non-profit music library and research center now contains more than 3m sound recordings or over 90m songs, making it one of the biggest popular music collections in the world. Donors and board members have included David Bowie, Jonathan Demme, Lou Reed, Martin Scorsese and Paul Simon. They prefer to remain in upstate New York state.

An article from BBC Science Focus answers (or attempts to answer) one age-old question that is frequently asked over and over again: Who invented the Internet? As with many landmark inventions, it is often difficult to pinpoint just one creator. Just as with the light bulb, the telephone, and the discovery of electricity, it would be amiss to not at least mention a number of scientists and inventors outside of the known name who played important roles in the Internet's invention.

Want a chance to extend your lifespan by 10 or more years, even if you're older? According to an article from Business Insider, switching to a longevity-associated diet could add more than 10 years to your life. Consuming more whole grains, nuts and fruits had the largest impact. And the foods that were most commonly linked to increased mortality? Those would be sugar-sweetened beverages and processed meat. According to the researchers' analysis (from the University of Bergen, Norway, and the University of Glasgow, Scotland), a longevity-associated diet consisted of a high intake of milk and dairy, vegetables, nuts, and legumes, and a moderate intake of whole grains, fruit, fish, and white meat.

In 2015, David Hole was prospecting in Maryborough Regional Park near Melbourne, Australia, according to an article from Science Alert. Armed with a metal detector, he discovered something out of the ordinary – a very heavy, reddish rock resting in some yellow clay. He took it home and tried everything to open it, sure that there was a gold nugget inside the rock – after all, Maryborough is in the Goldfields region, where the Australian gold rush peaked in the 19th century.

Euclid, the European Space Agency's dark matter/energy hunter, has released its first set of images – and they are absolutely mesmerizing, according to an article on Universe Today. One of the most breathtaking is something equivalent to the famous Ultra Deep Field shot. Except in this case, Euclid decided to concentrate on the Perseus Cluster, a group of over 1,000 galaxies located about 240 million light years away from us. It's one of the most massive known structures in the universe and will undoubtedly shed some insights into the nature of dark matter and how it affects galaxy formation.

For many internet users, using a VPN (Virtual Private Network) has become a necessity to help guard from tracking and to help protect online privacy. But, in the process, your internet speeds may take a hit, often up to a 50% speed hit. According to an article from CNET, there are some things you can do to help minimize that speed hit.

Are you ready for the inevitable "dark side" of AI? (As if there's only one.) Prepare yourselves for a new wave of weaponry that has the ability to autonomously decide whether to strike/kill its target, according to an article from the AP (and widely reported on in multiple media outlets).

Inkscape Tutorial: Create A Text Design

by Meemaw

As we get closer to Christmas, I always think I will make my Christmas cards and print them myself … and then I run out of time and buy them! Oh, well… I'll do it one of these days.

I looked on YouTube for an Inkscape tutorial that might help, and found this one from Davies Media Design that would let me do what I was thinking of. His video creates a logo, but the process is the same for the text. I want to put some holiday text on a circle, and fill the circle with clipart. It's pretty easy to do, and the variations are just as easy.

Open your Inkscape. My default page size seems to be US Letter, but you can make this a bit bigger. The first step is to make a circle for the text to surround. I made a circle with only a stroke (mine is purple, but make it whatever color you want). I then made my top text, which will say Merry Christmas, and sized it to 64 px. Mine's red, but your color choice is your own. The font I'm using is A&S Speedway (again, use whatever font you like). Select both items.

Go to Text > Put on path. Your text will be on this circle, but possibly not where you intended it to be.

Deselect the text, or click elsewhere and then select only the circle. Click on it again to choose the rotation handles, then rotate your text around to the desired position.

For my design, I want some text at the bottom as well. We'll have to mess with this a little more. Duplicate the circle you have, then increase its size until it is just at the top of the top text. If you press <Ctrl> and <Shift> while you are resizing, the circle will stay perfectly round (that's what <Ctrl> is for) and will increase from the center so it's more easily managed (<Shift> does that).

Using the Text tool, create the text you want on the bottom (I chose Happy New Year!) Select your text and your bigger circle and again select Text > Put on path.

Again, it isn't where we want it, and it isn't inside the circle like we thought it would be. Go up to the toolbar, and click on Flip Vertically. This will flip the circle and the text, and (amazingly) curve the text inside the circle, as we wanted.

Cool! It's in the circle, but not lined up where we want it. All we have to do is move it down a bit.

If you want the circles, that's fine. You can change the color, but if you want to move them or resize them, your text will change. To move or delete the circles, you need to separate the curve from the text it's linked to. Click on the text, and choose Path > Object to path. That will make the text a path, independent from the circle, and then you can delete the circle. I deleted the larger one, and changed the color and stroke width on the smaller one.

I also imported a piece of clipart to put into the center (inside the smaller circle. I didn't put any background in, so I could put it on any color background. I also added a drop shadow to each line of text and the clipart.

So my cards could look like these. The top one has a light blue background and the bottom has a pink background, which shows through the decoration I created. Remember to export your decoration as a .png file for transparency.

Just as a note: I started doing these tutorials in 2012! I hope you've learned what you wanted to learn over the years.

PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner

Super Crispy Country Fried Chicken

Serves: 10

INGREDIENTS:

10 - 12 medium chicken drumsticks (You can also use any chicken part you wish.)

1 cup buttermilk

2 cups all purpose flour

1/2 cup corn starch

1 teaspoon rosemary

1 teaspoon smoked paprika

1 teaspoon celery salt

1/2 teaspoon cayenne powder

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon onion powder

2 teaspoons salt, divided

1 teaspoon pepper

1 teaspoon thyme

1 large egg

DIRECTIONS:

In a mixing bowl, combine the flour, corn starch, rosemary, paprika, celery salt, cayenne, garlic powder, onion powder, salt, pepper, and thyme. Mix until well combined. Add 2 tbsp of buttermilk to the mixture and whisk once again. This will bake the coating crumbly and the chicken extra crispy.

Add the chicken to a separate bowl and pour the buttermilk over the top and crack the egg in. Season with the other tsp of salt and mix until the chicken is completely coated.

Dredge each piece of chicken in the flour mixture and set aside on a wire rack.

To achieve maximum crispiness, dredge the chicken in the buttermilk and flour mixture a second time - double dredging.

Preheat your oil in a deep fryer or a heavy pot to 350 degrees F. Place the chicken in and fry for about 10 to 12 minutes until cooked through and golden brown.

Place the fried chicken on a wire rack or paper towels after frying to drain any excess oil. This step helps keep the crust crispy.

Serve and enjoy your super crispy country fried chicken.

TIPS:

For the best flavor, marinate your chicken for at least 4 hours, or even overnight in the refrigerator. This allows the flavors to penetrate the meat and makes it more succulent.

If you don't have buttermilk, you can make a substitute by adding 1 tablespoon of white vinegar or lemon juice to 1 cup of milk.

Fry the chicken in batches to avoid overcrowding the pot, which can lower the oil temperature and result in greasier chicken. Allow enough space for the pieces to cook evenly.

NUTRITION:

serving size: 1 piece

Calories: 409         Carbs: 32g         Sodium: 500mg         Fiber: 4g         Protein: 36g

Paul's 2023 Holiday Gift Guide

by Paul Arnote (parnote)

It's that time of year again! While the weather may be changing into something frightful, maybe we can help you with something delightful. To possibly (hopefully?) help you with your holiday shopping, we're presenting our "picks" for what we think will make some awesome holiday gifts for those on your holiday gift list … or for even yourself!

As you look through these, keep in mind that the prices listed are a) current at the time of the writing of this article (mid-November), and b) are presented in U.S. dollars. We have attempted to pick items that we like ourselves, or that we think will make great gifts. We have also tried to pick items that are from all price ranges, so you're bound to find something of interest that fits your budget.

So, without further delay, here are my top gift "picks" for 2023. I have personal experience with some of these items, which will become apparent as you read through these selections.

SNOW LEOPARD Men's Heated Vest with Battery Pack Heated Vest       Amazon       $120

This vest is amazing! While it's no secret that I'm a deer hunter, I *do* like staying warm while sitting in a tree stand. And this year, I was the most comfortable sitting in the tree stand as I ever have been, all thanks to this heated vest. The vest has three power settings (high, medium, low), and those are activated by the buttons on the left upper chest. The buttons change color to reflect the power level you are on (red=high, white=medium, blue=low). The vest comes with a 16,000 mAh rechargeable LiON battery pack, which can also double as a portable battery pack for your electronic devices. On those cold mornings in the tree stand, I had a t-shirt and a long sleeve shirt on. Over that was this vest and a lined, heavy full-zip sweatshirt. About 90% of the time, the vest was on the low setting, and it was capable of keeping me plenty warm in the frigid temperatures (around freezing). On low, you can expect the ample battery pack to last seven to 10 hours. On medium, it will last five to six hours, and three to four hours on high. You can also select to only turn on the heating elements in the front of the vest, only the heating elements in the back of the vest, or both together (which is the setting I used). I never found an instance when I used more than half of the battery capacity, and recharged it (via a USB-C cord) overnight while I slept. If you spend ANY amount of time outdoors in the colder months, you will appreciate having this rechargeable heated vest.

Netraty Hand Warmers Rechargeable 2 Pack, 6000mAh Chameleon Hot Hands Hand Warmers       Amazon       $24

Keep your hands warm when doing outdoor winter activities with these rechargeable hand warmers. Rechargeable with the included USB-C cord, these hand warmers will provide heat from eight to 20 hours, depending on the heat level you select. There are three heat settings (low, medium, high), so you'll get the longest heating time from the lowest setting. To be perfectly honest, I rarely turned these up any higher than the lowest setting, which was ample to take the chill off of my hands. The lowest setting will generate a mild heat of between 104-113° F, while medium will produce a heat of 113-122° F, and high will produce a heat of 122-131° F. I had previously used the disposable, one-and-done, air-activated hand warmers. Now, I just use these, placed into a pocket of my orange hunting vest. The description on Amazon states something about placing them into your gloves, but if you do, don't expect to be able to use your hands. They are a bit too big to place into your gloves and to expect to still be able to use your hands for any functional purpose.

Ceramic Oil Diffuser Large Room: Solid Bamboo Base Essential Oil Diffuser       Amazon       $46

Fill your living space with the pleasant scent of your favorite essential oil with this essential oil diffuser. Simply fill the reservoir with water, add your favorite essential oil, and you're set. You can set it to automatically turn off after one hour, three hours, or eight hours. Or, you can set it to provide an intermittent or continuous mist. The diffuser will turn itself off when it runs empty. It also has a nightlight feature, which will turn itself off after 30 minutes. Most of all, this thing is extremely quiet, making it a perfect addition to your bedroom. We have ours in the living room, and we usually set it to run continuously.

EGUKU Rechargeable Headlamp, 2 Pack 1200 Lumens 2COB Bright Headlamp       Amazon       $26

This may be the last headlamp I'll ever need. Not only is this thing BRIGHT, but it's rechargeable (with the enclosed USB-C charging cord). No more will I have to suffer from weak batteries … or even changing batteries! Did I mention that this thing is BRIGHT? Like 1,200 lumens bright. There are several settings. You can have just the front-facing spotlights on, just the cob LED light strips, both the spotlight and cob lights, or change to a night-vision saving red light. Furthermore, there is a motion detector (which you can turn off or on) that allows you to turn the lights on/off with the wave of your hand. Being a two-pack, you're sure to always have a headlamp nearby, or one always charged and one always "ready-to-go" or in use.

BUYSIGHT Rechargeable Spotlight Flashlight, 180,000 Lumens       Amazon       $46

Sometimes, you need more than just a headlamp … a lot more. This handheld rechargeable spotlight may be just the answer. Whatever you do, DO NOT stare into the light at the business end of this spotlight! At 180,000 lumens, this thing is B-R-I-G-H-T! The reported lumens in the description on Amazon are all over the map, but trust me when I tell you how bright this thing is. I live at one end of a street, and this spotlight EASILY illuminates the entire other end of the street a full city block away with no problem. You can recharge the built-in 10,000 mAh battery with any USB-C cable. Having such a large battery, you can also use this spotlight to charge your mobile devices, as well. On the left side of the unit is a flood light for illuminating a broader area. On the right side of the unit is a bank of monocrystalline solar cells to trickle charge the spotlight (but don't depend on it to be able to completely charge your spotlight's massive battery). It also comes with a red lens cover, which can help preserve your night vision. Besides having three power levels, this spotlight also has an "emergency" function that will blink out S-O-S should you get into trouble. According to the product description, you can expect between 10 and 20 hours of runtime from this spotlight, depending on the power level of the beam you choose.

Digital Kitchen Timer       Amazon       $10

This pair of electronic kitchen timers is just what you need while cooking meals. So frequently, you have multiple items cooking at the same time, so having more than one timer makes it a cinch to set a timer for each item. Programmable to count down time from 24 hours, an audible alarm will sound when the set amount of time has elapsed. It not only comes with your first AAA battery to power it, but it also has an auto-shutoff feature where it powers itself off after 30 minutes (when it's not being used). If you don't want to hear the alarm, you can also turn the audible alarm off, and just rely on the blinking red LED to alert you that the specified amount of time has elapsed.

Team Group CX2 2.5" 2TB SATA III 3D TLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)       Newegg       $82

Do you (or someone you know) have a computer that is running a bit slow? Do you want an easy way to speed it up? Look no further than replacing the spinning rust platter hard drives with a SSD, or Solid State Drive. Probably one of the biggest "bottlenecks" in the PC architecture is the relatively slow performance of "spinning rust platter hard drives" (when you compare them to the speeds of RAM and other components of the system). While it won't replace poor video performance from an outdated video card or lagging performance from an older CPU, adding a SSD will significantly speed up the I/O of data on your computer. This 2TiB SATA III internal SSD will fit into most laptops, as well as into most desktop systems (with the addition of a 2.5" drive bay … which are pretty inexpensive). Plus, at 2TiB, you will have plenty of storage space for a long time to come.

Brother MFC-L2690DW Monochrome Laser All-in-One Printer, Duplex Printing, Wireless Connectivity       Walmart       $149

The Brother MFC-L2690DW monochrome all-in-one laser printer delivers full-featured performance for busy home or small offices that need full functionality in a compact, desk-friendly footprint. Its fast print speeds of up to 26 pages per minute plus automatic duplex (2-sided) printing provide increased efficiency and let you spend less time printing, leaving you more time for running your business. Flexible connectivity options include wireless networking that enables printing from mobile devices, sharing with multiple users on your network or connecting locally to a single computer via USB interface. The 250-sheet capacity adjustable paper tray helps improve efficiency with less refills and handles letter or legal sized paper while the 50-sheet capacity automatic document feeder enables multi-page copying and scanning. It comes with a 1-year limited warranty and free online, call or live chat support for the life of your product.

PCLinuxOS Men's Ringer Tees       CafePress       $19.99

With a classic, retro-cool vibe that never goes out of style, the ringer T-shirt is a casual and versatile favorite for a reason. Get ready to impress even the most discerning T-shirt connoisseur! Ringer T-shirts are made of soft and durable 100% cotton. The double-needled neck and trim give the ringer tee its timeless look. Contrasting neckline and sleeve hems are available in black, red and navy (shirt is always white). Ringer tee has ribbed cuffs for comfort. Easily machine wash in cold water (no bleach!)

Donate To Keep PCLinuxOS Afloat      Various amounts

PCLinuxOS is completely funded by its users/community. There are no rich corporations or benefactors funding the ongoing development of PCLinuxOS. You can choose one of two methods to donate to your favorite Linux distro. You can use Stripe, and specify the amount of your donation. Or, you can go the Gumroad route, and donate either a recurring monthly donation, or a recurring annual donation (you can cancel any time). Going the Gumroad route, you can choose to donate $5, $10, or $25 monthly, or make a $5, $10, $25, or $50 donation annually. Your donation goes to keeping its developers fed, clothed and housed, as well as paying the bills for server space.

Conclusion

There you have it. Between the 10 items I've presented here, as well as the 10 items each that Meemaw and The_CrankyZombie have provided, you should be able to find something that catches your eye for your favorite PCLinuxOS user … or even yourself!

We here at the PCLinuxOS Magazine wish you a very happy, merry holiday season!

Meemaw's 2023 Holiday Gift Guide

by Meemaw

Wow! December again already! I always get to this point in the year when I wonder what gifts to get for my family at Christmas. While they are my family and I would love to shower them with gifts, I know that just buying "stuff" is not a good idea, and most of them have pretty much everything they need. So, what do I get for them? I always try to find out something that they do need and get that, but it isn't always easy. I also have some "littles" - great grandchildren, the oldest of which is 12, that I need to consider. I'm a different grandma, though, because instead of buying toys they won't play with after a while, I try to buy books I think they will enjoy reading more than once (some people read them more than once, you know).

Bits & Pieces

After all these years, you know I always go to Bits & Pieces to see if there's anything new. They started out as a jigsaw puzzle seller, but now they have lots more things. I used to want a 3D jigsaw puzzle, but never got one. Now they are found at Puzzle Warehouse under the brand Wrebbit.

Sudoku Table Game Board       $39.99       Game refill sheets (200) $19.99

If you know someone who's totally addicted to Sudoku, this might be a fun thing for them. It includes 100 game sheets that slide into the board. Each tile has the number on it in red on one side (when you aren't sure) and black on the other (when you are sure it's right).

Kinetic Wind Spinner       $79.99

I love these things! It's an ornament for your yard that moves in the wind and reflects the sunlight. Bits & Pieces has several.

Amazon

Another place I go for shopping is Amazon (I'm sure many of us do!)

LEGO Greenhouse Building Set       $79.95

At supper the other night, I asked everyone what they wanted for Christmas. To my surprise, my 19 year old granddaughter said she wanted LEGOs! I remember my grandson (who is 21 now) as a child who always had LEGOs in his jeans pockets. I couldn't believe that my granddaughter wants them now, but in browsing all the different sets, I find that they have come out with "Adult" sets now. Actually, I have found that whatever you like, there's probably a LEGO set for it, from cars to animals, from Marvel to Star Wars to Minecraft to Harry Potter. The flowers and bouquets are very interesting! Depending on how many pieces the set has, different sets run from $10 - $500).

Tabletop S'mores Set       $29.59

I was browsing in the Kitchen section, and came across this! Usually we make S'mores outside over a fire pit, campfire or bonfire. (I hope everyone knows, but S'mores are a dessert item that is basically a sandwich made from a graham cracker, chocolate bar and a roasted marshmallow.) This little item allows you to make them in the kitchen any time you want one.

Novelty T-shirts       $13 - $25

We've gotten to the point that we love t-shirts with witty (or nasty) sayings on them. Amazon has a big selection.

Newegg

Radio Control Helicopter       $39.36

Kids really like radio controlled vehicles! They have a blast seeing how well they can control them. The site says "The new Odyssey Quark 7500 is a 3 channel indoor co-axial helicopter. The Quark comes equipped with a high grade metal body frame and a built in Gyroscope which is used to stabilize the helicopter's heading. The Quark is the smallest helicopter in the world. The Quark is a great model for any beginner, from kids to adults."

3-in-1 Indoor Weather Station       $53.55

Some friends of mine have one of these and they love it. The site says;

- Compact Structure the simple design can be integrated into a variety of decoration styles, and multiple functions serve various purposes.

- Optimized Display Interface Layout adopts a large LCD color screen with backlight to display rich information, including indoor/outdoor temperature and humidity, comfort level, moon phase, weather forecast, time, alarm clock, week, barometric, etc.

- Upgraded Remote Sensor adopted more advanced and sensitive RF sensor technology and with 433.92MHz RF transmitting frequency and 60-meter transmission range in an open area, it collects data precisely and transmit fast to the indoor receiver.

It's designed to either hang on a wall or set on a table.

Popcorner

I found this site last year. It's a small business outside of Wichita, Kansas that does custom popcorn flavors. I ordered a couple of these sampler boxes last year, and the popcorn was really good. They sell big cans of popcorn, too, as well as fudge.

Popcorn Sampler Box       $39.99

They have many flavors, in case you are looking for something besides plain popcorn.

LL Bean

I always look at LL Bean to see what's new. They have awesome clothing and camping supplies, but they also have some different gifts, like Christmas wreaths and stockings, and also some outdoor items.

Snowball Maker       $7.95

We always used our hands to make snowballs, but this would speed things up if you were having a massive battle!

Take A Hike Jigsaw Puzzle       $29.95

The site says, "Explore and celebrate the most popular hiking trails in the United States with this colorful 500-piece jigsaw puzzle — no hiking boots needed."

I mentioned books too. Everyone in my family has a library card, but there are also sites where you can get good used books. Amazon has an extensive book section, where you can get ebooks for a Kindle reader, or printed books, or even audio books. They advertise used books as well. I bought books from Alibris last year, purchasing four children's poetry books by Shel Silverstein (my girls loved his poetry when they were young).

I hope you find everything you want to give this year, and I wish you a very happy holiday season!

YouCanToo's 2023 Holiday Gift Guide

by YouCanToo

Here we are again, yet at another Christmas holiday season. It's that time of the year once again, so let's get to it!

Renpho Eye Massager with Heat - Amazon       $69.99

Give your eyes a break with this heated eye massager. It features built-in heating pads, built-in speakers to enjoy Bluetooth music, adjustable compression, and five different modes to help your eyes relax. Take them wherever you go, thanks to its foldable and portable design.

VEEAPE 3 IN 1 Tire Inflator Portable Air Compressor - Amazon      $64.99

VEEAPE Y06 Pumps break through the limits of wonderful trips outdoor and also convenient for home indoor life, which can be used as an:

Air Compressor – Perfect for inflating tires of cars, motorcycles and bikes, and many sport balls.

Air Pump – Suitable for inflating and deflating most inflatable products, like air sleeping pads, air beds, air mattress, air toys, swimming rings, pool floats, air sofa, pool rafts, vacuum storage bags, etc.

Air Duster – Good for helping making a fire on camping outdoor or blowing air on barbecue and cleaning PC, keyboards, camera, plant, pet hair, etc.

7500 mAh Power Bank – 5V/2A fast phone charging in emergency.

TP-Link WiFi Dual Band Extender - AMAZON       $22.99

Boost Your Existing Router's Wi-Fi Coverage. The TP-Link WiFi Extender with Ethernet Port, Dual Band 5GHz/2.4GHz , Up to 44% more bandwidth than single band, Covers Up to 1200 Sq.ft and 30 Devices, signal booster amplifier supports OneMesh(RE220). Finally, enjoy reliable Wi-Fi coverage through your home or office without worrying about low signal zones.

Samsung Universal Super Fast Charger 45W USB-C - AMAZON       $13.99

With USB-C PD PPS protocol, The latest generation of Super fast charging technology. This 45W USB-C Wall Charger provides 45W Super Fast Charging. Charge your phone or other devices up to 3 times faster. Even works on newer mirrorless camera with USB-C in body charging. (must use the PD protocol).

This 45W charger has a built-in multi-protection system, avoiding over-voltage, over-charge, over-heat, etc. The UL-certified 45W USB-C Wall Charger and 6ft original Type C fast charging cable matches the current required by the device automatically, charging your device fast, safely, and steadily, to maximize the life of your battery.

Wishcotton Men's Moccasin Bootie Slippers - AMAZON       $39.99

A slipper combining a traditional moccasin stitched design with a wild hump-like collar. Thick plush lining can wrap your foot in comfy warmth on chilly days, also add a luxurious look and feel. Made with durable rubber soles, you do not need to change to your regular shoes when going for a short walk outside.

Adedad Cordless Ratchet Wrench - Amazon       $49.99

Adedad cordless ratchet wrench with a max torque of 40 ft-lbs at 400 RPM and a variable speed trigger, making it a perfect tool for construction, auto repair, and even home repair work.

Electric wrench has a built-in LED working light and can clearly illuminate the dim working environment. Cordless ratchet wrench comes with one rechargeable 2000 mAh battery.

Handmade Steampunk Mouse - Etsy       135.00

A distinguished aesthetic that will catch the eye of everyone around you with a steampunk mouse. This head-turner of a mouse is made entirely by hand and is available in a range of equally alluring styles.

Retro Typewriter Style Keyboard - ThisIsWhyImBroke      $89.99

Bring a little old school charm to your modern setup with this retro typewriter inspired mechanical keyboard. This water and dust resistant keyboard features typewriter style rounded keys with a chrome plated body and key caps.

Solar-Charger - 42800mAh Power Bank - AMAZON       $29.98

Solar charger is compatible with all USB devices such as smartphones and tablets. The product has 2 USB output ports, if the device is compatible, it can support the QC3.0 fast charge protocol. The super battery life allows you to get rid of the anxiety and worries about the depletion of the device power anytime and anywhere.

Solar charger is equipped with a super bright LED flashlight with a long range. It can work continuously for up to 100 hours.

64GB Penguin Model USB Drive Thumb Drive - AMAZON       $12.98

64GB USB flash drive. Cute penguin model memory stick, thumb drives for data storage. Plug and Play. No need to install any software. USB 2.0 connection. Compatible with Linux, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 10, and MacOS.

Good Words, Good Deeds, Good News

compiled by Meemaw

Bystander Pulls Paralyzed Man From Burning Car

Dennis was sitting in a car he had rented when it caught fire. An ordinary man would have leaped from the car, but Dennis was paralyzed from the waist down after being shot when he was 22. Tammi was sitting on the couch at a friend's house when she noticed the car on fire outside the house. She ran out but didn't see Dennis in the car until he moved his head. When she told him to get out of the car, he replied that he couldn't. She grabbed his wheelchair but realized it would take too much time to put it together, so she reached in and pulled him from the car just before it exploded.

His family members visited the friend's house but didn't get Tammi's name, so Dennis couldn't thank her properly. He interviewed with the local tv station in hopes of contacting her. Tammi heard the interview and was able to contact him.

In the interview, Dennis said, "I'd like to appreciate her for her heroic act. She went into harm's way to save me. Dragged me out. I'd like to thank her."

Double Rainbow Appears Over New York City On 9-11

On September 11, 2023, many New York residents saw a double rainbow near where the twin towers were. That day was the 22nd anniversary of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center.

Many New Yorkers took it as a sign that those killed in the attack are at peace. Several people posted their photos on TikTok, and they went viral. Comments were very positive.

"From all those angels, letting us know they are at peace," one TikTok user commented.

"I am so blown away," another reacted. "They wanted everyone to know they're still there."

"They're watching over us," a third echoed.

Michigan Toddler Found Three Miles Down A Mountain Trail

stock photo Getty Images

Two year-old Thea was playing in the backyard at her parent's house in Michigan. Her mother, Brooke, had checked on her, as had her uncle, who told her to go inside because she was barefoot. Checking on her just a few minutes later, she was no longer in the backyard. The police were contacted at 8 pm, after an exhaustive search in the immediate area.

The Michigan State Police mobilized immediately, with drones, search & rescue teams and canine units, and the whole neighborhood came out to search as well. After four hours, they found Buddy, one of the family dogs, which had apparently left with Thea. When they finally found Thea, she was asleep on the ground, using the family's other dog, Hartley, as a pillow. She was more than three miles from home. They soon got her home to her frantic mother.

4-H Community Raises $130,000 For Girl With Leukemia

Eleven year-old Delaney (shown here) was getting ready to sell her steer at the 4-H Livestock Sale. She was also worried about her friend Jana, who had recently been hospitalized and diagnosed with leukemia. Delany wanted to do something to help her friend, and, discussing it with her mother, decided to donate 10% of her livestock check to Jana's family for help with the bills.

At the sale, the auctioneer told everyone about Delaney's plan, announcing "We love you, Jana. Fight hard." This prompted the whole community to support the idea. Delaney got $5,000 for her steer and donated $500 to Jana's family. The buyer donated the steer back to the sale so they could sell it again. This happened several times, netting Jana and her family $57,000 to help with medical bills!

The auction service, Wolfe Auctions, has a fund on their website, where people can still donate. Donations are now over $132,000. Auctioneer Josh aptly summarized the spirit of unity and support, stating, "I can tell you after many years of being around here, every time that any 4-H'er has ever struggled or ever been in need, this is the way this community has always come together. There's no words. That's community right there."

Homecoming Queen Escorted By Her Father Battling Cancer

Brett and Carrie began dating in seventh grade and have been married for 25 years They have three beautiful daughters, Savanna, Sydney, and Sara Kate. For the last six years, Brett has been battling esophageal cancer, which has weakened him somewhat. They were recently told that the cancer had spread to Brett's lungs.

Sara Kate was chosen as homecoming queen at school this fall, and the crowning takes place on the football field, with the queen being walked across the field by her father.

"We told Brett that we would take him to meet Sara Kate on a golf cart," Carrie told reporters. "Brett has been very feeble- he carries oxygen with him- we were questioning if he could make it from the visitor's sideline across the field to the home sideline."

"I don't need a golf cart- I'm going to walk my baby to the opposite sideline on homecoming," Brett told his wife. There at halftime on the visitor's sideline he stood, arm-and-arm with his youngest. Determined to make the 50 Yard Walk.

He did make it, and in a social media post later, he said, "My God is bigger than my circumstances and is the miracle worker. During these times there will be signs and wonders done across the land and I believe in it. God is my mighty warrior!!"

Georgia Couple Renews Vows For Their 70th Wedding Anniversary

Oliver and Violet

Oliver and Violet dated for four years before they got married. This year, Rev. Oliver and wife Violet renewed their wedding vows for their 70th anniversary.

Many social media posts wished them Happy Anniversary.

The couple also enjoys the company of their five children, 12 grandchildren, 10 great-grandchildren, and six great-great grandchildren, according to a news source. Also, they are the oldest living members of their Georgia community. Violet revealed the key to a successful married life is working together through the good and bad times you may face as a couple.

Grisbi Revisited, Tips For Beginners, Part One

by David Pardue (kalwisti)

In my pre-Linux computing life, I was a Mac person. At home, we had a Macintosh LC (with its iconic "pizza box" case) which my father generously handed down to us. Besides word processing, the Mac's secondary use was bookkeeping; it came with a copy of Quicken that kept track of our checking account for several years. Quicken and its early-1990s-style interface was my first exposure to personal finance software.

I continued with Quicken until 2007, when I bought a refurbished PC from Goodwill to experiment with Linux. While searching for FOSS alternatives to Quicken, I found mentions of GnuCash, HomeBank and Grisbi. I tried them all. My goal was to run GnuCash but at the time its learning curve was too steep for me; I ended up using Grisbi (probably ver. 0.5.9). Grisbi served me well and my impression was that its interface was the most "Quicken-like" of the three programs. (While researching this article, I read some French-language comments that users believe Grisbi is also the closest equivalent to the discontinued Microsoft Money 1991-2009.) After some time and effort, I figured out how to use GnuCash and moved away from Grisbi.

I decided to reacquaint myself with Grisbi, since I have fond memories of the app. Grisbi is one of the oldest FOSS personal finance programs; it was first released in April 2000. (GnuCash's first stable release was in 1998 -- as was HomeBank's.) It is GTK-based and cross-platform, with versions available for Linux, Windows and macOS. Grisbi is not flashy but is designed to be easy and efficient. The user interface is fairly intuitive; it feels more like navigating through an email program than accounting software. Grisbi was created by a team of French developers, so it is fully compliant with French accounting principles.

Grisbi's stated philosophy is to provide novice users with easy-to-use software that requires little or no reading of the program's documentation, while allowing advanced users to accomplish more by familiarizing themselves with the manual. Although it is presented as "personal accounting", it is also suitable for small and medium-sized nonprofit organizations.

The current stable version of Grisbi is 2.0.5. (For the adventurous, there is also an unstable/testing branch, 2.9.90, released for Windows and macOS.) The two main developers are Pierre Biava (since 2008, working on GNU/Linux) and Ludovic Rousseau (working on macOS). Dr. Rousseau has been employed in the smart card industry for more than twenty years; he has contributed smart card-related packages to Debian since 2001.

This finance program has had two unusual names. It was originally called Gripsou, but was renamed by the developers to avoid potential trademark infringement. Gripsou is the name of Disney cartoon character Archibald Gripsou, the French equivalent of Flintheart Glomgold. For non-comics readers like me, Flintheart Glomgold is the business rival and archenemy of Scrooge McDuck, usually portrayed as selfish, sneaky and greedy -- with the goal of becoming the world's richest duck. Grisbi (pronounced "greez-bee") is argot for 'loot', 'dough', 'money'. The term is most prominently known for its use in Albert Simonin's crime novel, Touchez pas au grisbi! [Don't Touch the Loot (1953)], which was turned into a famous film starring Jean Gabin, Lino Ventura and Jeanne Moreau.

Grisbi uses single-entry accounting (like HomeBank or Quicken) rather than double-entry principles (GnuCash or KMyMoney). As a historical aside, a brief sketch of Luca Pacioli (1445-1517), the “inventor” of double-entry accounting, was featured on NPR's Planet Money podcast. The hosts interviewed Jane Gleeson-White, who wrote a biography of Pacioli. However, Grisbi is robust and perfectly adequate for home/personal accounting. I have been using Grisbi for the past twenty-three months, and the program has been as stable as a rock.

A complete tutorial is beyond the scope of this article. Today, I will limit myself to discussing some features which average users will likely need in the course of their routine data entry.

User Manual

One previous drawback of Grisbi is that its documentation is mostly in French. While running the program, if you press the F1 function key to open the User's Manual in HTML, an incomplete -- and outdated (2003) -- page displays in English.

If you can read French, you will discover that the user manual is very thorough; it explains concepts, procedures, configuration settings, etc. The manual was produced with LaTeX and includes an index and glossary, as well as hypertext links. There are two PDF versions of the manual: an illustrated version; and a text-only version. The original French user manuals are here. The French-language HTML version of the manual is available here.

However, even if you do not know French, there are several workarounds.

One possibility is to use Google Translate to translate the French website into English:

In case you prefer a PDF version, I used Google Translate's ability to produce a PDF English translation of the user manual. You can download the files from my PCLOS Cloud account. You can download the illustrated version [259 p., 14 MB], or you can download the text-only version [213 p., 7MB].

If you have a reading knowledge of German, there is an unofficial German version of the user guide (Grisbi Benutzerhandbuch [68 p., 429 kB]), translated by Martin Stromberger in 2018. He also wrote a quick-start guide (Grisbi Schnelleinstieg [5 p., 60 kB]). Both manuals are available here.

User Interface

When the application starts, Grisbi displays its home page. I have color-coded the UI's main components. The standard Menu Bar is outlined in magenta; the Information Bar is outlined in blue. The Navigation Panel is indicated by a green rectangle and the Details Box is outlined in red.

In the Navigation Panel, clicking on your account name (under Accounts) will open a traditional Account Ledger (which the Grisbi manual refers to as "Account Transactions"). With the Transactions tab forward, you will see a toolbar (outlined in red) with icons to perform various operations. At the bottom of the window is the Transaction Entry Form (outlined in green).

The Properties tab shows details about the active account, such as the account name, type of account, currency, name of the financial institution and the initial balance.

Types of Accounts

Grisbi can manage four different types of accounts:

- Bank account (i.e., Checking or Savings)

- Cash account

- Liabilities account

◦ This represents a debt that you repay, such as a car loan.

- Assets account

◦ This represents an asset that depreciates over time, e.g., a car.

For family accounting situations, you will normally have only one account file [viz., My accounts.gsb], as this allows exchanges/transfers between your different accounts. For instance, in Grisbi's sample file, under the primary account, there is an account for the husband ('Compte Monsieur') and for the wife ('Compte Madame'). Grisbi's developers provide two sample files: one that demonstrates 'personal' use (Example_1.0.gsb); one with examples of 'organizational' use (Association_1.0.gsb). Although the entries are in French, you might find the examples helpful. You can download them from here.

If you manage an association (such as a nonprofit organization), or another person with no accounting relationship to you, you should create another account file [e.g., My Local LUG.gsb].

I do not normally set up a "family" account hierarchy, so it required some experimentation to create this arrangement. If you would like this sort of hierarchy, follow these steps:

First, open your primary account within Grisbi.

Second, right-click on the account's name and choose the option "New account". Alternatively, from the Edit menu, select the option New account.

This will start an assistant/wizard that will guide you through the necessary steps to create the new account.

When that process finishes, you should see something like this:

After creating Madame's Acct., I entered some test transactions and successfully transferred funds between it and the Checking Acct., and vice versa.

Next month, we’ll take a look at getting started with Grisbi, setting up accounts, reconciling accounts, and actually using Grisbi.

Debunking The Myth Of "Anonymous" Data

by Paige Collings

Electronic Frontier Foundation

Reprinted under Creative Commons License

Today, almost everything about our lives is digitally recorded and stored somewhere. Each credit card purchase, personal medical diagnosis, and preference about music and books is recorded and then used to predict what we like and dislike, and—ultimately—who we are.

This often happens without our knowledge or consent. Personal information that corporations collect from our online behaviors sells for astonishing profits and incentivizes online actors to collect as much as possible. Every mouse click and screen swipe can be tracked and then sold to ad-tech companies and the data brokers that service them.

In an attempt to justify this pervasive surveillance ecosystem, corporations often claim to de-identify our data. This supposedly removes all personal information (such as a person's name) from the data point (such as the fact that an unnamed person bought a particular medicine at a particular time and place). Personal data can also be aggregated, whereby data about multiple people is combined with the intention of removing personal identifying information and thereby protecting user privacy.

Sometimes companies say our personal data is "anonymized," implying a one-way ratchet where it can never be dis-aggregated and re-identified. But this is not possible—anonymous data rarely stays this way. As Professor Matt Blaze, an expert in the field of cryptography and data privacy, succinctly summarized: "something that seems anonymous, more often than not, is not anonymous, even if it's designed with the best intentions."

Anonymization…and Re-Identification?

Personal data can be considered on a spectrum of identifiability. At the top is data that can directly identify people, such as a name or state identity number, which can be referred to as "direct identifiers." Next is information indirectly linked to individuals, like personal phone numbers and email addresses, which some call "indirect identifiers." After this comes data connected to multiple people, such as a favorite restaurant or movie. The other end of this spectrum is information that cannot be linked to any specific person—such as aggregated census data, and data that is not directly related to individuals at all like weather reports.

Data anonymization is often undertaken in two ways. First, some personal identifiers like our names and social security numbers might be deleted. Second, other categories of personal information might be modified—such as obscuring our bank account numbers. For example, the Safe Harbor provision contained with the U.S. Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) requires that only the first three digits of a zip code can be reported in scrubbed data.

However, in practice, any attempt at de-identification requires removal not only of your identifiable information, but also of information that can identify you when considered in combination with other information known about you. Here's an example:

- First, think about the number of people that share your specific ZIP or postal code.

- Next, think about how many of those people also share your birthday.

- Now, think about how many people share your exact birthday, ZIP code, and gender.

According to one landmark study, these three characteristics are enough to uniquely identify 87% of the U.S. population. A different study showed that 63% of the U.S. population can be uniquely identified from these three facts.

We cannot trust corporations to self-regulate. The financial benefit and business usefulness of our personal data often outweighs our privacy and anonymity. In re-obtaining the real identity of the person involved (direct identifier) alongside a person's preferences (indirect identifier), corporations are able to continue profiting from our most sensitive information. For instance, a website that asks supposedly "anonymous" users for seemingly trivial information about themselves may be able to use that information to make a unique profile for an individual.

Location Surveillance

To understand this system in practice, we can look at location data. This includes the data collected by apps on your mobile device about your whereabouts: from the weekly trips to your local supermarket to your last appointment at a health center, an immigration clinic, or a protest planning meeting. The collection of this location data on our devices is sufficiently precise for law enforcement to place suspects at the scene of a crime, and for juries to convict people on the basis of that evidence. What's more, whatever personal data is collected by the government can be misused by its employees, stolen by criminals or foreign governments, and used in unpredictable ways by agency leaders for nefarious new purposes. And all too often, such high tech surveillance disparately burdens people of color.

Practically speaking, there is no way to de-identify individual location data since these data points serve as unique personal identifiers of their own. And even when location data is said to have been anonymized, re-identification can be achieved by correlating de-identified data with other publicly available data like voter rolls or information that's sold by data brokers. One study from 2013 found that researchers could uniquely identify 50% of people using only two randomly chosen time and location data points.

Done right, aggregating location data can work towards preserving our personal rights to privacy by producing non-individualized counts of behaviors instead of detailed timelines of individual location history. For instance, an aggregation might tell you how many people's phones reported their location as being in a certain city within the last month, but not the exact phone number and other data points that would connect this directly and personally to you. However, there's often pressure on the experts doing the aggregation to generate granular aggregate data sets that might be more meaningful to a particular decision-maker but which simultaneously expose individuals to an erosion of their personal privacy.

Moreover, most third-party location tracking is designed to build profiles of real people. This means that every time a tracker collects a piece of information, it needs something to tie that information to a particular person. This can happen indirectly by correlating collected data with a particular device or browser, which might later correlate to one person or a group of people, such as a household. Trackers can also use artificial identifiers, like mobile ad IDs and cookies to reach users with targeted messaging. And "anonymous" profiles of personal information can nearly always be linked back to real people—including where they live, what they read, and what they buy.

For data brokers dealing in our personal information, our data can either be useful for their profit-making or truly anonymous, but not both. EFF has long opposed location surveillance programs that can turn our lives into open books for scrutiny by police, surveillance-based advertisers, identity thieves, and stalkers. We've also long blown the whistle on phony anonymization.

As a matter of public policy, it is critical that user privacy is not sacrificed in favor of filling the pockets of corporations. And for any data sharing plan, consent is critical: did each person consent to the method of data collection, and did they consent to the particular use? Consent must be specific, informed, opt-in, and voluntary.

PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner Bonus

Cuban Style Sautéed Ground Beef

Serves: 4

INGREDIENTS:

1 pound Medium Ground Beef

4 cloves garlic, chopped

1/2 small onion, chopped

1 tablespoon olive oil for cooking

1 teaspoon Italian seasoning

1 teaspoon cumin

1 teaspoon oregano

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground black pepper

1 medium can of diced tomatoes

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar

1/4 cup raisins

1/2 cup green olives

2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley for garnish

DIRECTIONS:

Add oil to a pan over medium high heat. Place the ground beef in and fry until browned.

Add in the onion and garlic. Stir and saute until fragrant.

Add in the Italian seasoning, cumin, oregano, salt, and pepper. Stir and fry for a few minutes. Pour in the tomatoes, vinegar, raisins, and olives. Stir until combined. Lower the heat and simmer for about 4 or 5 minutes.

Serve over rice and garnish with parsley. Enjoy!

TIPS:

Substitute ground beef with ground turkey, chicken for a lighter twist.

Experiment with the combination of aromatics like onions, garlic, and bell peppers to customize the flavors according to your preference.

Serve the sautéed ground beef over a bed of fluffy white rice for a classic presentation. Try making some nachos with it. It's also delicious as a filling for tacos, empanadas, or stuffed bell peppers.

It freezes well up to 3 months in an airtight container, so be sure to consider making a double batch. Use the leftovers to create a flavorful sandwich, wrap, or even to top a baked potato.

NUTRITION:

Calories: 650         Carbs: 18g         Sodium: 510mg         Fiber: 1.7g         Protein: 4.3g

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