The rand tumbled to a four-week low against the dollar on concern the global economy will slow as European leaders struggle to stem the region’s debt crisis, damping demand for South Africa’s commodity exports.
South Africa’s currency weakened as much as 1.4 percent to 8.2661 per dollar, the weakest level since Oct. 20, and traded 1 percent down at 8.2306 as of 3:12 p.m. in Johannesburg. Against the euro, the rand retreated 0.7 percent to 11.0955.
Commodity prices declined for the first time in three days, according to the Standard & Poor’s GSCI Index. The uncertain global economic outlook created by the European debt crisis is putting pressure on the prices of commodities including iron, Marius Kloppers, chief executive of BHP Billiton Ltd., the world’s biggest mining company, said today.
“The risk posed to the global economy by the sovereign debt crisis in Europe is high and increasing,” John Cairns, a currency strategist at Rand Merchant Bank in Johannesburg, said in a research note. “The risk of a major fallout and negative consequences for the rand is high.”
German Chancellor Angela Merkel today rejected French calls to deploy the European Central Bank as a crisis backstop, defying global leaders and investors calling for more urgent action to halt the turmoil. The euro-area economy is heading toward a “mild recession” by the end of the year, ECB President Mario Draghi said on Nov. 3.
Recession Risk
The lack of action and decisiveness in the E.U. to address the debt crisis in that region risks a global recession, South African Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said today.
“Every single day, the lack of action, the lack of decisiveness, the inability of the European authorities to put together a substantial enough package of solutions is creating more doubt, more uncertainty and the potential for a recession to return at least to some parts of the world, if not the globe as a whole,” Gordhan said in an address at the University of Stellenbosch, near Cape Town.
South Africa’s benchmark stock index declined 0.6 percent today, led by commodity exporters including BHP Billiton and Anglo American Plc. Raw material exports account for about 45 percent of South Africa’s foreign currency earnings, according to South African Revenue Service data.
South Africa is “export-oriented which makes it exposed to slowdown risks,” Benoit Anne, the London-based head of emerging-market strategy at Societe Generale SA, said by e-mail. SocGen recommends selling the rand against the Turkish lira.
South Africa’s 6.75 percent bonds due 2021 declined, pushing the yield up three basis points, or 0.03 percentage point, to 8.08 percent.
2011年11月17日 星期四
2011年11月6日 星期日
America's Illegal Immigration Debate Misses The Mark
No Republican campaign speech ever goes on for long without mention of illegal immigration and the desire to quell it. Though the debate itself invo kes a clear and present problem, the persistent use of it as a political jumping point without consideration or offering of reasoned solutions, continues to cloud the reality of its underreported dark side. From drugs to human trafficking, the lax state of our border security reflected in our inability to control illegal immigration, has taken a great toll on this nation. Secure borders are more than just keeping desperate, freedom seeking people out of the country but one would be hard pressed to hear the reality of the problem on the stage of the ongoing political circus featuring so many aspiring performers.
As the debate of illegal immigration rages on, many States have enacted anti-immigration policy mandates focusing on preventing people from living in this nation without documentation. Some of these mandates suggest that all those who are here illegally, despite their former domestic situations they suffered for in their countries of origin or their current productivity levels in this one, should be deported; bar none. From Arizona to the Carolinas, many citizens are voicing concern for the by product of routing out those here illegally: Racial and cultural profiling. Even though some here illegally are in fact, blights on their communities, many are positive additions to this great nation much like their "legal" counterparts on both accounts.
This argument which seems to contradict The New Colossus poem etched upon our Nation's iconographic Statue of Liberty, stems from claims that illegal immigrants take up too much space on the rosters of social assistance and when considered in combination with the crime incurred by them, has resulted in both our economic and judicial systems becoming overburdened and unsustainable. Supporting this claim, many incarceration statistics point to a larger level of crime and gang membership among this immigrant class which has done nothing to discredit but rather, justify the argument against illegal immigration into this nation. What these debates should produce though, instead of merely helping to demonize an entire people, is making clear that when jobs are few, children are hungry and pay rates are as low as they are for most of these immigrants; crime is a natural affectation.
Many have used the preceding statistics to justify immigration reform but like Andy Warhol's question of "Does art imitate life or does life imitate art?"; do these individuals actually commit more crime per capita or does racial profiling and harsher judgment of them induce more arrests and convictions? When the police hawk and harass these people, as in the always patrolled ghettos across this nation, arrests will innately become more numerous especially considering the ever growing laws in this nation making even common actions "illegal". If the "forces that be" want to harass and arrest these people along their determined course to demonize them, they certainly have the judiciary on their side.
It may come as a shock to some to learn that our border gaps present a greater threat to this nation than people entering our nation illegally. When looking at the bigger picture of border security or lack thereof, illegal immigration represents the least of our worries. Off the political talking point filled stage, the all but ignored subject of illegal drugs entering this nation over (or under) the border, through our seaports and airports adds precipitously to our nation's troubles. Drug use and the associated obsession by addicts to get a fix or acting outside of their natural selves while on them, has created an entire subculture of "criminals". Maybe if this country secured its borders and ports and stopped illegal drugs from entering, there would be fewer crimes within the spectrum of our racial and culturally diverse social palette thereby alleviating 60% of all crimes committed by residents; illegal or not .
As the debate of illegal immigration rages on, many States have enacted anti-immigration policy mandates focusing on preventing people from living in this nation without documentation. Some of these mandates suggest that all those who are here illegally, despite their former domestic situations they suffered for in their countries of origin or their current productivity levels in this one, should be deported; bar none. From Arizona to the Carolinas, many citizens are voicing concern for the by product of routing out those here illegally: Racial and cultural profiling. Even though some here illegally are in fact, blights on their communities, many are positive additions to this great nation much like their "legal" counterparts on both accounts.
This argument which seems to contradict The New Colossus poem etched upon our Nation's iconographic Statue of Liberty, stems from claims that illegal immigrants take up too much space on the rosters of social assistance and when considered in combination with the crime incurred by them, has resulted in both our economic and judicial systems becoming overburdened and unsustainable. Supporting this claim, many incarceration statistics point to a larger level of crime and gang membership among this immigrant class which has done nothing to discredit but rather, justify the argument against illegal immigration into this nation. What these debates should produce though, instead of merely helping to demonize an entire people, is making clear that when jobs are few, children are hungry and pay rates are as low as they are for most of these immigrants; crime is a natural affectation.
Many have used the preceding statistics to justify immigration reform but like Andy Warhol's question of "Does art imitate life or does life imitate art?"; do these individuals actually commit more crime per capita or does racial profiling and harsher judgment of them induce more arrests and convictions? When the police hawk and harass these people, as in the always patrolled ghettos across this nation, arrests will innately become more numerous especially considering the ever growing laws in this nation making even common actions "illegal". If the "forces that be" want to harass and arrest these people along their determined course to demonize them, they certainly have the judiciary on their side.
It may come as a shock to some to learn that our border gaps present a greater threat to this nation than people entering our nation illegally. When looking at the bigger picture of border security or lack thereof, illegal immigration represents the least of our worries. Off the political talking point filled stage, the all but ignored subject of illegal drugs entering this nation over (or under) the border, through our seaports and airports adds precipitously to our nation's troubles. Drug use and the associated obsession by addicts to get a fix or acting outside of their natural selves while on them, has created an entire subculture of "criminals". Maybe if this country secured its borders and ports and stopped illegal drugs from entering, there would be fewer crimes within the spectrum of our racial and culturally diverse social palette thereby alleviating 60% of all crimes committed by residents; illegal or not .
2011年5月18日 星期三
An online bank scam worthy of a spy novel
One moment of weakness — a single click on a bogus e-mail link or website — has cost many U.S. companies nearly $1 million apiece, the FBI said. And it has transported them into a world of international intrigue worthy of a spy novel, connecting them to a crime ring linked to six Chinese port cities near the Russian border.
In a sternly worded warning that included a remarkable level of detail for an FBI press release, the agency is warning U.S. businesses and banks to be wary of wire transfers headed to Chinese cities of Raohe, Fuyuan, Jixi City, Xunke, Tongjiang and Dongning.
It’s unclear if the stolen funds remained in China or were transported elsewhere, and U.S. security firms are currently debating the significance of the notice. But the high-dollar value of the thefts, combined with their high-profile destination — any government cybercrime warning that involves China raises eyebrows — has attracted unusual attention in the banking community.
Transactions headed to those Chinese cities should be “heavily scrutinized, especially for clients that have no prior transaction history with companies in the Heilongjiang province,” the FBI said.
Wire transfers — often in the $900,000 range — were repeatedly sent from U.S. firms to legitimate Chinese trading companies in Heilongjiang. Sending the money through international trade firms — which are believed to be victims, also — helped minimize suspicion. In a release dated April 26, the FBI said criminals had recently attempted to steal $20 million and got away with $11 million, a staggering success rate.
Online criminals have shifted their focus away from consumer accounts and onto larger business accounts, experts say. Commercial accounts have larger balances, involve more frequent transactions and the destinations for payment are much more varied, making hacker theft much harder to detect.
“These are small- and medium-sized businesses at the heart of the economic recovery who are devastated by this. In many cases banks do chose to share in losses, but it’s still devastating,” said Terry Austin, CEO of Guardian Analytics, which provides security to banks. He said his firm detected several attempted transactions that fit the scenario laid out by the FBI, including the Chinese destination cities. “This notion that banks and credit unions are under relentless attack — this is just one more example of the size and boldness of attacks — is a story that needs to keep getting told.”
Even if China is merely an intermediary step in the heists, it’s significant that the FBI chose to call out Chinese cities in its release, said Avivah Litan, a bank security analyst for Gartner.
“I have never seen a fraud alert with this much specificity,” Litan said. “It makes you think. There is definitely a Chinese connection, though we don’t really know what it is.”
She speculated that the criminals could be behind other well-publicized computer break-ins that have been blamed on Chinese hackers.
“You would think it could be the same spies for the Chinese government who have been wreaking havoc, and they need to pay for their efforts. Usually bad guys rob accounts to fund other activities. But that’s just speculation,” she said. “It also strikes a familiar chord since perpetrators originating in China are rumored to be behind the recent spate of (advanced persistent threat) attacks against security companies like RSA Security and others, some of which I hear have not been publicly disclosed. It makes you wonder if our intelligence and law enforcement agencies are closing in on loosely organized criminal Chinese rings that perpetrate various types of fraud for financial and political gain, and if the same rings are involved in multiple activities.
The highly-skilled hackers in the FBI warning managed to control computers on both ends of the transactions — hijacking computers than can access small business accounts on the U.S. side, and also computers in China that can access accounts belonging to legitimate trading firms there. That helped them cleverly cloak their activities. It also might be the reason the FBI called out Chinese cities by name, said Mickey Boodaei, CEO of Israel-based Trusteer, a security firm.
“The main reason the FBI issued a release was because they had actionable intelligence about how to ID these transactions and block them and wanted to reach a wide audience of banks and online bankers and let them know they should be really careful,” he said.
The criminals were smart enough to rotate destinations for the money quickly in an effort to further evade suspicion, the FBI said. So there’s no reason to believe hackers haven’t already moved on to other cities. All experts interviewed for this story said they thought the $11 million value of this specific heist represented just the tip of the iceberg. Litan said she believed it’s a $1 billion global problem.
“This is just a very common occurrence now at banks, with criminals robbing small business accounts and moving the money offshore,” she said.
In each case, the FBI said, the money was sent to one of three Chinese banks: “Agricultural Bank of China, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, (or) the Bank of China.”
Guardian Analytics’ monitoring software, which Austin says spotted and stopped fraudulent transactions headed to those six Chinese cities, offer a rare detailed glimpse into how the criminals operated.
The target “could be a construction company, a real estate company, a school, a church. Any business that has a commercial account that it uses that to pay suppliers and vendors,” he said.
An employee inside the firm who has the ability to wire funds through those accounts is targeted with an attack. Once he or she takes the bait — perhaps laid through a booby-trapped e-mail, or an infected website — the criminals gain access to a computer and an account at the firm authorized to wire money.
In some cases, the theft involves simply logging into an online merchant account and initiating a wire transfer. But even companies with far more sophisticated security protections have been victimized, Austin said. Some firms require dual authorization for a financial transfer, or at least a phone call for verification. The criminals are smart enough to arrange for a bypass approval, or to reroute the approval phone calls to numbers they control, he said. They even spent weeks observing an account to find out when the balance is highest and watch transaction patterns so criminal wire transfers won’t raise alarm bells, Austin said.
“They often go through a multi-step setup before the crime,” he said.
In a sternly worded warning that included a remarkable level of detail for an FBI press release, the agency is warning U.S. businesses and banks to be wary of wire transfers headed to Chinese cities of Raohe, Fuyuan, Jixi City, Xunke, Tongjiang and Dongning.
It’s unclear if the stolen funds remained in China or were transported elsewhere, and U.S. security firms are currently debating the significance of the notice. But the high-dollar value of the thefts, combined with their high-profile destination — any government cybercrime warning that involves China raises eyebrows — has attracted unusual attention in the banking community.
Transactions headed to those Chinese cities should be “heavily scrutinized, especially for clients that have no prior transaction history with companies in the Heilongjiang province,” the FBI said.
Wire transfers — often in the $900,000 range — were repeatedly sent from U.S. firms to legitimate Chinese trading companies in Heilongjiang. Sending the money through international trade firms — which are believed to be victims, also — helped minimize suspicion. In a release dated April 26, the FBI said criminals had recently attempted to steal $20 million and got away with $11 million, a staggering success rate.
Online criminals have shifted their focus away from consumer accounts and onto larger business accounts, experts say. Commercial accounts have larger balances, involve more frequent transactions and the destinations for payment are much more varied, making hacker theft much harder to detect.
“These are small- and medium-sized businesses at the heart of the economic recovery who are devastated by this. In many cases banks do chose to share in losses, but it’s still devastating,” said Terry Austin, CEO of Guardian Analytics, which provides security to banks. He said his firm detected several attempted transactions that fit the scenario laid out by the FBI, including the Chinese destination cities. “This notion that banks and credit unions are under relentless attack — this is just one more example of the size and boldness of attacks — is a story that needs to keep getting told.”
Even if China is merely an intermediary step in the heists, it’s significant that the FBI chose to call out Chinese cities in its release, said Avivah Litan, a bank security analyst for Gartner.
“I have never seen a fraud alert with this much specificity,” Litan said. “It makes you think. There is definitely a Chinese connection, though we don’t really know what it is.”
She speculated that the criminals could be behind other well-publicized computer break-ins that have been blamed on Chinese hackers.
“You would think it could be the same spies for the Chinese government who have been wreaking havoc, and they need to pay for their efforts. Usually bad guys rob accounts to fund other activities. But that’s just speculation,” she said. “It also strikes a familiar chord since perpetrators originating in China are rumored to be behind the recent spate of (advanced persistent threat) attacks against security companies like RSA Security and others, some of which I hear have not been publicly disclosed. It makes you wonder if our intelligence and law enforcement agencies are closing in on loosely organized criminal Chinese rings that perpetrate various types of fraud for financial and political gain, and if the same rings are involved in multiple activities.
The highly-skilled hackers in the FBI warning managed to control computers on both ends of the transactions — hijacking computers than can access small business accounts on the U.S. side, and also computers in China that can access accounts belonging to legitimate trading firms there. That helped them cleverly cloak their activities. It also might be the reason the FBI called out Chinese cities by name, said Mickey Boodaei, CEO of Israel-based Trusteer, a security firm.
“The main reason the FBI issued a release was because they had actionable intelligence about how to ID these transactions and block them and wanted to reach a wide audience of banks and online bankers and let them know they should be really careful,” he said.
The criminals were smart enough to rotate destinations for the money quickly in an effort to further evade suspicion, the FBI said. So there’s no reason to believe hackers haven’t already moved on to other cities. All experts interviewed for this story said they thought the $11 million value of this specific heist represented just the tip of the iceberg. Litan said she believed it’s a $1 billion global problem.
“This is just a very common occurrence now at banks, with criminals robbing small business accounts and moving the money offshore,” she said.
In each case, the FBI said, the money was sent to one of three Chinese banks: “Agricultural Bank of China, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, (or) the Bank of China.”
Guardian Analytics’ monitoring software, which Austin says spotted and stopped fraudulent transactions headed to those six Chinese cities, offer a rare detailed glimpse into how the criminals operated.
The target “could be a construction company, a real estate company, a school, a church. Any business that has a commercial account that it uses that to pay suppliers and vendors,” he said.
An employee inside the firm who has the ability to wire funds through those accounts is targeted with an attack. Once he or she takes the bait — perhaps laid through a booby-trapped e-mail, or an infected website — the criminals gain access to a computer and an account at the firm authorized to wire money.
In some cases, the theft involves simply logging into an online merchant account and initiating a wire transfer. But even companies with far more sophisticated security protections have been victimized, Austin said. Some firms require dual authorization for a financial transfer, or at least a phone call for verification. The criminals are smart enough to arrange for a bypass approval, or to reroute the approval phone calls to numbers they control, he said. They even spent weeks observing an account to find out when the balance is highest and watch transaction patterns so criminal wire transfers won’t raise alarm bells, Austin said.
“They often go through a multi-step setup before the crime,” he said.
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