http://pokerati.com/2009/07/15/way-outside-the-wsop-main-event-day-8/

http://pokerati.com/?p=10608

The moment the poker world has been waiting for nearly two weeks comes to a climax this afternoon with the final 27 players in the Main Event playing down to the November Nine. Here’s how the final three tables will look when play kicks off around 12 noon (database results courtesy of The Hendon Mob:

(Table 1)
Seat 1: Jesse Haabak - 2,750,000
Seat 2: Ian Tavelli - 4,385,000
Seat 3: James Calderaro - 6,475,000
Seat 4: Jonathan Tamayo - 3,300,000
Seat 5: Warren Zackey - 5,485,000
Seat 6: Eric Buchman - 10,005,000
Seat 7: Leo Margets - 1,530,000
Seat 8: Tommy Vedes - 5,070,000
Seat 9: James Akenhead - 8,615,000

(Table 2)
Seat 1: Phil Ivey - 11,350,000
Seat 2: Jeff Shulman - 10,170,000
Seat 3: George Caragiorgas - 1,615,000
Seat 4: Nick Maimone - 1,545,000
Seat 5: Andrew Lichtenberger - 5,625,000
Seat 6: Marco Mattes - 5,285,000
Seat 7: Joseph Cada - 6,565,000
Seat 8: Darvin Moon - 20,160,000
Seat 9: Jordan Smith - 4,510,000

(Table 3)
Seat 1: Jamie Robbins - 9,795,000
Seat 2: Antonio Esfandiari - 4,470,000
Seat 3: Francois Balmigere - 1,440,000
Seat 4: Ludovic Lacay - 5,610,000
Seat 5: Steven Begleiter - 11,885,000
Seat 6: Ben Lamb - 9,410,000
Seat 7: Antoine Saout - 11,135,000
Seat 8: Kevin Schaffel - 11,245,000
Seat 9: Billy Kopp - 15,970,000

When play resumes, there will be 7:17 left in the 50,000/100,000/10,000 level, moving to 60,000/120,000/15,000.

Here’s the chart of the players that made the money:

Updates resume starting at noon over at www.wsop.com and Pokerati will have other news during the day, so come back later, please.

Page 2 contains excerpts from Nolan Dalla’s tournament report:

2009 World Series of Poker Presented by Jack Link’s Beef Jerky
Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino
Las Vegas, Nevada
Official Report

Event #57
World Championship
World Series of Poker Main Event
No-Limit Hold’em
Buy-In: $10,000
Number of Entries: 6,494
Players Remaining: 27
Total Net Prize Pool: $61,043,600
Number of Places Paid: 648
First Place Prize: $8,546,435
July 3–November 10, 2009

Tournament Highlights:

Day 7 Headlines

1. World Series of Poker Continues – Down to 27 Players in the Main Event

2. And on the Eighth Day – Darvin Moon Retains His Chip Lead

3. Logger from Western Maryland Still Atop the WSOP Leaderboard – Darvin Moon Primed to Become the Next Moneymaker

4. Seven-Time Gold Bracelet Winner Phil Ivey (Las Vegas, NV) Currently in Fourth Place

The Main Event Continues

– The 2009 WSOP Main Event continued with the play and conclusion of Day 7. The day played all the way down to three tables. All 64 players who started play on Day 7 were already guaranteed $90,344 in prize money. Now, after 12 days and 60 total hours of tournament play, all finishers are guaranteed at least $352,832 in prize money.

– Day 7 began with 64 players. The day ended with 27 survivors.

– Tables are usually played nine handed. Three tables remain.

– This was the 47th day of the 2009 WSOP. Play continues for one more day, plus the finale to be played in November. There will also be four gold bracelet events played at WSOP-Europe, to be held in London in September.

– Tomorrow (Wednesday) begins at noon and will play down to nine players, which constitutes the final table. This year’s final table will make up the 2009 “November Nine.” Following tomorrow’s play down to nine players, the tournament takes a 115-day recess.

– Play on Day 7 began on July 14, 2009 at 12:05 pm.

Play on Day 7

– Following 2009 WSOP champion Peter Eastgate’s elimination in Day 6, no more former world champions remain alive in the Main Event.

– At the start of play on Day 7, six former WSOP gold bracelet winners were still alive in the Main Event. They included: Phil Ivey (7 wins), Tom Schneider (2 wins), Antonio Esfandiari (1 win), Blair Rodman (1 win), Jordan Smith (1 win), and Prahlad Friedman (1 win).

– Players competed for nearly four complete levels. Play ended towards the end of Level 29. There are 7 minutes 17 seconds remaining. Next, at Level 30, blinds will be 50,000-100,000 with a 10,000 ante. The average stack size is currently 7,215,556.

– Day 7 started with a field of 64 players and ended with 27 survivors. This means only about .41 percent of the original 6,494 starters survived past the seventh day.

– Only one female started the day still in contention. Leo Margets (Barcelona, Spain) began play ranked in 18th place. She survived and is currently in 26th place. Margets will need to make a big move on Day 8 to make the November Nine. Only one female in history has made it to a Main Event final table – Barbara Enright in 1995.

– Former gold bracelet winner Blair Rodman, from Rancho Mirage, CA was eliminated in 34th place.

– Dennis Phillips (St. Louis, MO) who finished third in last year’s Main Event, was eliminated in 45th place.

– 2007 WSOP “Player of the Year” and two-time gold bracelet winner Tom Schneider, from Scottsdale, AZ was eliminated in 52nd place.

– Former gold bracelet winner Prahlad Friedman (2003, $1,500 Pot-Limit Hold’em), from Malibu, CA was eliminated in 64th place.

– Players who survived Day 7 will return to continue their quest for the 2009 world poker championship gold bracelet and $8.5 million in first-place prize money on July 15th, starting at noon.

– Seven-time WSOP gold bracelet winner Phil Ivey remains in contention, currently ranked in fourth place.

– Card Player magazine editor Jeff Shulman remains alive in the Main Event, currently ranked in seventh place. He finished seventh in the 2000 WSOP championship.

– Play on Day 7 ended at 10:40 pm.

A Breakthrough Year for France?

France is blessed with many talented poker players. However, in the 40-year history of the WSOP, only one French player has made it to a Main Event final table. That took place in 1998 when Marc Brochard finished in eighth place. In 2003, poker pioneer Bruno Fitoussi finished in 15th place. Other than those two showings, France has been shut out of championship celebrations.

This year could be a breakthrough year for France. Of the 27 remaining players, three are from France. Antoine Saout, from Saint Martin des Champs, is presently in 6th place. Lacay Ludovic, from Paris, is in 15th place. Francois Balmigere, from Toulouse, is in 27th place. Interestingly, Ludovic and Balmigere attended college together, but became professional poker players.

France appears to have a very bright future in poker, as all three of the French players are under the age of 25.

Two Notable Corrections:

– Bradley “B.J.” Craig (Cleveland, OH) finished in 50th place. This was his first time to cash at the WSOP. There is another player named Bradley Craig (Stitbulle, ON Canada) who cashed in a WSOP event in 2005, who is a different player.

– There are two tournament players named Thai Tran. The 49th-place finisher in the Main Event was Thai K. Tran, from Houston, TX. The player asks that all his records be updated with the name THAI K. TRAN.

About the Day 7 Chip Leader (Darvin Moon)

Darvin Moon remains as the chip leader after seven days of play. He lives in the small eastern Maryland town of Oakland. Moon owns and operates a small logging company with other family members. Most of his days are spent in pine forests scattered throughout the Maryland panhandle. He is married and was cheered on by his wife, who was sitting in the crowd. This is Moon’s first time to play in the WSOP. It was also his first time to visit Las Vegas.

Moon lost his lead early in the day and fell to around tenth place in the standings. Just when it appeared he might crumble and fade away, Moon managed to win a few big hands and stay near the top of the leaderboard. He won a few big pots late in the day to regain his chip advantage over Billy Kopp (Erlanger, KY), who is currently in second place.

An Interview with Darvin Moon
Question: How did you get to the WSOP?

Moon: I won my seat at the casino in Wheeling (WV). We started going out there last year. I came in ninth one time last year. This time, I played three times (trying to qualify for a seat to play in the Main Event). I finished third the first time, and then busted out the next time. The third time, I won my seat.

Question: How long have you been playing poker?

Moon: About three years. I watch poker on TV a lot. And I pay attention to it.

Question: What is your usual poker game?

Moon: there are about 70 of us around who play around. We do benefits at places like the Elks Club, American Legion, and the fire departments. I also play in Wheeling (WV).

Question: You really came out of nowhere to seize the chip lead. How did you do it?

Moon: It’s easy to play when you get hands like I was getting. It’s just unbelievable. It’s like a dream. I got pocket aces and flopped trips, and someone was betting into me. But I had pocket kings one time and the other guy pushed all in over the top of me. I just mucked my hand pre-flop. I mean, he has to have aces. What else can he have? That’s just my style. I play tight. When I get them I bet and when I don’t, I fold.

Question: You must feel like a kid in a candy store here at the WSOP.

Moon: Oh yeah. I’m nervous. I mean, this is my first time in Las Vegas. It was my first time on a big plane.

Question: How did it feel to play on the main ESPN stage under the spotlight of television cameras?

Moon: It didn’t bother me at all. I mean, I am nervous. But I am more nervous out there than I am here. I focus on the cards and I am comfortable playing. I walk down that hall and everybody that’s won and everybody is big time and a name. And they walk right by you and you say, ‘wow, here I am playing with these guys. It’s a dream come true.

Question: Why are you wearing a New Orleans Saints (NFL) cap?

Moon: I like cheering for the underdog. They were underdogs for a long time. But now they are doing good and I am sticking with them. We are located right between Pittsburgh and Baltimore. It is mostly Steeler fans where I live. And I wear this hat to mess with them.

Question: Let’s say you get offered ninth place right now. You can make a deal and you will get $1 million for ninth, plus you get to be part of the November Nine. Would you take the imaginary deal?

Moon: No. No. Ninth place? I got my goals set. It’s not first. But it’s not ninth, either. I’ll be happy. I don’t care if I go out the first hand tomorrow. I’ve had fun. It’s been worth every minute of it. I just like to play and it’s unreal. It’s something I can’t even dream of doing, and here I am.

– Here’s how the previous end-of-day chip leaders have fared:

Day 1-A: Redmond Lee (London, UK) – eliminated, did not cash
Day 1-B: Brandon Demes (Tempe, AZ) – eliminated, did not cash
Day 1-C: Joseph Cada (Shelby Township, MI) – currently in 12th place
Day 1-D: Troy Weber (West Terre Haute, IN) – eliminated, did not cash
Day 2-A: Andrew Gaw (Philippines) – eliminated, did not cash
Day 2-B: Amir Lehavot (Weston, FL) – CASHED IN 226th PLACE
Day 3: Bertrand Grospellier (Nancy, France) – CASHED IN 122nd PLACE
Day 4: Matt Affleck (Seattle, WA) – CASHED IN 80th PLACE
Day 5: Warren Zackey (Johannesburg, South Africa) – currently in 16th place
Day 6: Darvin Moon (Oakland, MD) – currently in 1st place (retained chip lead)
Day 7: Darvin Moon (Oakland, MD) – TBD

Meet Billy Kopp (Second Place in WSOP Main Event)

Billy Kopp is from Erlanger, KY. He is 23-years-old and is attending the University of Kentucky as a full-time student. He is close to receiving a degree in hospitality management and tourism.

Kopp was the chip leader late on Day 7, but feel to second place when Darvin Moon (at another table) made a late run and regained his chip lead. Currently, Kopp has nearly 16 million in chips while Moon is atop the leaderboard with 20 million. Other rivals are all 12 million in chips, and less.

Kopp has come close to victory recently. He was the runner up at the WSOP Circuit championship held at Harrah’s New Orleans in May. Kopp admits to being brought into the game about six years as part of the so-called “Moneymaker effect,” which brought millions of new players to poker.

When asked about the surroundings of playing in the WSOP Main Event, Kopp remarked confidently: “I am not really intimidated by anybody. I think it is my ball game….I think I can play with the best of them.”

Meet George Caragiorgas (Currently in 24th Place)

Poker tournaments are often won by players who come from the middle of the pack or are far behind at a critical stage of the competition. Most recently, Jerry Yang and Joe Hachem began play at the final table with a low stack, yet somehow managed to stage memorable comeback victories. George Caragiorgas, from Montreal, Quebec (Canada) has to be hoping for a similar result. He will start Day 8 ranked 24th in the chip count, with 1,615,000 (the chip leader has more than 20 million).

Question: You are currently one of the shorter stacks. What is your strategy for tomorrow?

Caragiorgas: I have to wait for a good spot to put my money in. Then, I have to hope for the best. If I can accumulate a couple of chips, that’s good because you can’t do much (at this stage) with 1.7 million in chips. If I can get 4 or 5 million in chips, we can play some poker. Right now, it is either push or fold.

Question: What’s your story, George?

Caragiorgas: I was born in Greece. My family came to Montreal, Canada when I was three years old. So, I’ve been living in Montreal for the last 33 years. I am married to Fotini and I have two little girls. I am in the restaurant business and I just love poker more than you can possibly imagine.

Question: What kind of restaurant?

Caragiorgas: A Greek restaurant. It’s called Marathon, like the race. It’s in Montreal.

Question: You were here at the WSOP back in 2006. What do you remember?

Caragiorgas: Yeah, I was here back in 2006 when Jamie (Gold) won. It was my first time here. I was a lot more nervous then, than I am now. I was, I can’t explain it, but my poker level has drastically improved in the last three years. I am a much better poker player now. I just came with a dream back in 2006. It was a good rush three years ago. I finished like 300 spots from the money (Note: Caragiorgas made the top 1,000 out of more than 8,700 who entered). Coming that close to the money given there were nearly 9,000 players was quite a feat. But, I managed to do a little better this time around.

Question: So, what do you expect to happen tomorrow?

Caragiorgas: My strategy is pretty simple. I just have to wait for a good spot. I have to stick it in with what I hope is the best hand and hope it holds up. I am definitely going to put my money in good, that’s for sure.

Question: Anything else to add?

Caragiorgas: Yeah, just one thing. I am really loving life right now.

ESPN WSOP Broadcasts

– ESPN has been broadcasting its WSOP coverage since 2003. This year, four events will be featured. These events include the $40,000 buy-in 40th Anniversary No-Limit Hold’em Championship, the World Champions Invitational, the third-annual Ante-Up for Africa charity tournament, and the Main Event.

– Although the number of WSOP events receiving broad coverage has been reduced to four, the total number of broadcast hours is actually the same as last year. More coverage will be given to the Main Event, since the world championship receives the greatest amount of viewer interest.

– The total amount of time the WSOP will be broadcast this year is 32 new and original hours of coverage.

– Debut WSOP broadcasts on ESPN will remain in their customary Tuesday night time slot.

– The 2009 WSOP broadcasts will begin on July 28th.

WSOP Main Event (Final Table Records)

MOST LIFETIME FINAL TABLE APPEARANCES

Doyle Brunson (5)

1976 1st
1977 1st
1980 2nd
1982 4th
1983 3rd

Jesse Alto (5)
1988 9th
1985 6th
1978 5th
1986 4th
1984 3rd

Johnny Moss (5)
1974 1st
1971 1st
1985 7th
1979 5th
1980 4th

Dan Harrington (4)
1995 1st
1987 6th
2004 4th
2003 3rd

T.J. Cloutier (4)
1988 5th
1998 3rd
1985 2nd
2000 2nd

Stu Ungar (4)
1997 1st
1980 1st
1981 1st
1990 9th

Note 1: Johnny Moss’ victory in 1970 is not included amongst final table records, since the winner that year was determined by a vote.

Note 2: Crandall Addington actually holds the record with nine Main Event final table appearances. However, most of these did not include a prize-money payout (field sizes were considerably smaller during the 1970s when most of Addington’s appearances occurred).

Note 3: Final table appearances were counted only if the player also received a payout.

Note 4: WSOP Main Event final tables were played six-handed during a 16-year span. However, the top nine finishers during those years are included in final table records.

– Here is the current status of all current and former WSOP “Player of the Year” champions who played in this year’s Main Event. All have been eliminated:

2005: Daniel Negreanu – eliminated on Day 1
2006: Allen Cunningham – eliminated on Day 2
2007: Tom Schneider – CASHED IN 52nd PLACE
2008: Erick Lindgren – eliminated on Day 2
2009: Jeffrey Lisandro – eliminated on Day 3

– Here is the status of those players with notable results from this year’s WSOP:

David Bach (HORSE World Championship winner) – eliminated on Day 2
Alex Bolotin (“Ante-Up for Africa” championship winner) – eliminated on Day 3
Darryll Fish (cashed 7 times at this year’s WSOP) – eliminated on Day 2
Jeffrey Lisandro (won three gold bracelets this year) – eliminated on Day 3
Ville Wahlbeck (finished 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 6th in four events) – eliminated in Day 4
Greg Mueller (won two gold bracelets this year) – eliminated on Day 4
Phil Ivey (won two gold bracelets this year) – STILL ALIVE (currently in 4th place)

– Here is the current status of last year’s “November Nine” (2009 Main Event Final Table participants). All have been eliminated. Three of the nine players cashed:

Ivan Demidov – eliminated on Day 2
Peter Eastgate – CASHED IN 78th PLACE
Kelly Kim – CASHED IN 423rd PLACE
Craig Marquis – eliminated in Day 1
Scott Montgomery – eliminated on Day 2
Dennis Phillips – CASHED IN 45th PLACE
David “Chino” Rheem – eliminated on Day 1
Ylon Schwartz – eliminated on Day 2
Darus Suharto – eliminated on Day 3

– Here are the nations represented among the 27 survivors:

US – 19 players
France – 3 players
UK – 1 player
Canada – 1 player
Germany – 1 player
Spain – 1 player
South Africa – 1 player

– Daily elimination percentages are as follows:

DAY ONE: 68 percent of the original starters in this tournament survived the first day / 32 percent were eliminated.

DAY TWO: 31 percent of the original starters survived the second day / 27 percent were eliminated from the start of day amount.

DAY THREE: 12 percent of the original starters survived the third day / 60 percent were eliminated from the start of day amount.

DAY FOUR: 6.2 percent of the original starters survived the fourth day / 48.2 percent were eliminated from the start of day amount

DAY FIVE: 2.8 percent of the original starters survived the fifth day / 55 percent were eliminated from the start of day amount

DAY SIX: 1 percent of the original starters survived the sixth day / 65.4 percent were eliminated from the start of day amount

DAY SEVEN: .2 percent of the original survivors survived the seventh day / 58 percent were eliminated from the start of day amount

Playing on Day 1 – A, B, C, or D – Does it Matter?

Which of the four Main Event starting days is the most advantageous? The data has been run and the numbers are now in. Statistics from the past two years of Main Events show there is almost no correlation between the starting day and the odds of finishing in-the-money. Here are the numbers:

2009:
Day 1A: 121 cashes out of 1116 entrants –10.8 percent
Day 1B: 84 cashes out of 873 entrants — 9.6 percent
Day 1C: 162 cashes out of 1696 entrants — 9.5 percent
Day 1D: 281 cashes out of 2809 entrants — 10 percent

2008:
Day 1A: 122 cashes out of 1299 entries — 9.4 percent
Day 1B: 117 cashes out of 1158 entries — 10.1 percent
Day 1C: 187 cashes out of 1936 entries — 9.7 percent
Day 1D: 240 cashes out of 2461 entries — 9.7 percent

World Series of Poker Statistics

– WSOP Tournament Director Jack Effel estimates the total number of hands dealt out in this tournament through Day Seven to be about 480,000.
– Players have come to the WSOP from at least 115 different nations and territories. By contrast, only 80 nations were represented at the most recent Winter Olympic Games.

Related Posts

• Who’s Rooting for Whom? (1)
• Schneider Out in 52nd (1)
• November Nine Picks by Pokerati…Two Days Early (7)
• (Way) Outside the WSOP - Main Event Day 7 (0)

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/viewfromthewing/2009/07/15/united-20-off-mileage-award-sale/

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/viewfromthewing/?p=4196

Details aren’t available online yet, but Flyertalkers discovered it (and Lucky has mentioned it as well). United’s “FALL 2009 ECON AWARD SALE - MPW039″ is now live — a 20% discount on coach awards flown entirely on United flights between August 18 and November 18.

So a good time to redeem if you like to redeem for coach, and if you’re a 1K who already has some coach redemptions on United flights and award space is still available for those flights you can call back and reticket and save some points (1Ks only, of course, as anyone else would have to pay a fee to redeposit the miles).

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/viewfromthewing/2009/07/15/30-bonus-on-american-express-transfers-to-northwest/

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/viewfromthewing/?p=4192

Now that Northwest Worldperks is an American Express Membership Rewards transfer partner, Northwest is offering a 30% bonus on transfers through July 31. Registration is required prior to transfer in order to earn the bonus.

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/viewfromthewing/2009/07/15/us-airways-double-miles-for-shopping/

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/viewfromthewing/?p=4189

US Airways is offering double miles on shopping transactions through August 31, no registration required.

That means 5000 miles for a Netflix signup, 6000 miles for opening a Sharebuilder account, 40 miles per dollar at FTD, and of course double the listed miles at all Dividend Miles Mall merchants.

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/viewfromthewing/2009/07/15/two-new-starwood-discount-offers/

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/viewfromthewing/?p=4186

Starwood is offering up to 50% off of bookings made by July 20 for stays between July 16 and October 20. Now, this is up to 50% off of rack rate, which means it will sometimes be a small savings off the rates you’ll otherwise find from Starwood’s website. But it’s worth checking rates under this promo. The rates are available in North America, South America and Asia Pacific. Some hotels place a 4 night maximum stay under the rate, and seven nights generally at resorts. They’re advance purchase, non-cancellable rates.

Another interesting offer is Starwood’s $100 spa credit per night offer for hotels in the Southeast, Florida, and Carribean. Bookings must be made by July 31 for stays through September 30. Rates will likely be a bit higher than booking without this package, but if you have designs on a spa you’ll likely get some significant benefit. As always, compare the regular rate with the promo rate to see whether it’s worth it in your case. (Hat tip on this one goes to Laura.)

http://feeds.sfgate.com/click.phdo?i=a3081937d56a7d8ec8b90a7357e2d872

http://pokerati.com/2009/07/14/way-outside-the-wsop-main-event-day-7-evening-update/

http://pokerati.com/?p=10606

After the remaining 29 players in the Main Event returned from dinner break, it took nearly a full level to get down to 27 players. Darvin Moon will return Wednesday at noon the chip leader with over 20,000,000 in chips. Billy Kopp will be in 2nd with nearly 16,000,000 chips. Phil Ivey will be in 4th place with just over 11,000,000 in chips. The remaining notables: Jeff Shulman (10,170,000), James Akenhead (8,600,000), Ludovic Lacay (5,6100,000) and Antonio Esfandiari (4,400,000).

Chip counts and the table draw will be available later today, check out wsop.com or Pokerati for further news.

Related Posts

• Who’s Rooting for Whom? (1)
• Schneider Out in 52nd (1)
• November Nine Picks by Pokerati…Two Days Early (7)
• (Way) Outside the WSOP - Main Event Day 7 (0)

Did you ever play manhunt?

Spud?

Hegel in no way solved the Kantian dilema in his Phenomenology of Spririt. Discuss.

http://xkcd.com/610/

http://www.oblomovka.com/wp/2009/07/14/living-on-the-edge-returns-the-ridiculousness-of-credit-card-security/

http://www.oblomovka.com/wp/?p=1343

I’m giving my “Living on the Edge” talk next week at OSCON. I keep telling myself it will be the same as last year’s OpenTech presentation (I pitched it to O’Reilly as “the same talk, with some of the jokes in a different order”), but of course a year has passed, and someone will launch something on Monday, and I will have to re-write it all three times, and change “Ruby” to “Haskell” in the topical jokes.

The highlight from last year’s talk was being constructively heckled by e-money expert David Birch (I believe I idly posited the switch to the Euro as the sort of centralised, high-co-ordination venture that I, out of a foolish consistency, believe can never succeed, and yet regularly do. He yelled that actually it hadn’t. My other example is Unicode, which only today I discovered has some issues of its own.)

I read David now because I can never accurately predict his opinion, which means either it’s all signal, or he is in fact a natural source of randomness, both of which are highly valuable. Here is his latest piece on the history of credit card fraud, which posits that given that everyone knows that credit cards are nigh un-protectable, it’s time we came up with something better.

That’s not a new viewpoint, but he makes a novel (to me) point. Fraud is a few points of cost for retailers and banks, which they are generally okay to swallow, but because fraud is now more scalable, those few points — which round up to billions when taken nationally or globally — have become a public order, organized crime, issue. (Not sure if I entirely believe this yet, but that doesn’t stop it being interesting). Some other nuggets are Paypal’s counterintuitively low fraud rate compared to traditional payment systems, and a link to a fantastic piece by Stephen Wilson summarizing the reasons why credit card security is lousy, and why organizations use all the wrong private data on you to confirm who you are. Quoting from Wilson’s list of personal data:

Biographical information, like name, address and DOB, needed by a bank or service provider to establish and maintain a relationship with distinct customers

Identifiers, like bank account numbers, that serve as a proxy for biographical data to manage different customers.

[BTW I contend that the major Internet security and privacy problems would be remedied if pure identifiers could be relied upon, so we didn't need to ask customers for piles of corroborating details.]

Authentication data, like passwords, PINs and biometric templates, whether static or one-time, used to establish the legitimacy of someone claiming to be associated with biographical data or an identifier [Note that the CVCs started out as authenticators but now they're so widely divulged and leaked that they're really just identifiers. Asking for CVCs over the web is frankly inane, symptomatic of sloppy ad hoc security; we might as well move to 19 digit credit card numbers].

Service history, like account balance and transaction details, which are private between the customer and the service provider, and in the case of banking actually represents the entirety of the product.

And all the other personal information (family details, telephone numbers, work details, preferences, affiliations …) that accumulates, and which can be used for good (like tailoring customer service, or cross-selling with consent) or evil (cross-selling without consent, spamming, surreptitious linking across different domains, identity theft etc).

I love that throwaway comment that service history is “the entirety” of the banking product. That’s so profoundly true.

http://playthisthing.com/pandemic-2

It seemed appropriate to wait until now to release a light management game about being a mutating virus that destroys all of humanity. This is the game Prince Phillip was born to play.

The game gives you a world map and lets you look at different countries, the shading of the countries shows you how deeply infected the populations are. You simply spend evolution points earned with infections over time to buy and sell symptoms, making your disease as transmissable as possible without being too noticable and triggering a global panic. Then once you´ve gotten in to every major region, you can mutate into an extremely deadly condition that nearly wipes out humanity. A globalist aesthetic replete with a conspiracy-chic soundtrack loop gives the game a thriller feel even as you sit back and watch.

Of course, this is a fairly shallow game were it not for the psychological effects, made ever deeper now, of dealing with the collective dissonance of pandemic paranoia. Once you´ve decoupled emotions of fear and panic from the underlying mechanics of pandemics and virology, you should read some of the material describing evidence that this whole Swine Flu thing is a big scam at best, or at worst an atrocity of overruled personal sovereignty where the cure is more lethal than the problem.

(N.B.: Not to be confused with the boardgame Pandemic.)

http://www.upgradetravelbetter.com/2009/07/14/what-a-shock-your-e-passport-isnt-secure-after-all/

http://www.upgradetravelbetter.com/?p=3436

Backtracking from earlier claims that e-passports are “totally secure,” the U.S. State Department is now urging travelers to keep their RFID-chip enabled passports in “radio-opaque sleeves” to protect owners from having their information skimmed by unauthorized readers within a 30-foot range.

The State Department’s warning comes with the caveat that “hackers won’t find any practical use for data,” because personal information i encrypted. But that encryption has already been cracked.

So now the data and the accessibility of the chip have been compromised. Why are we using this technology, again?

Implementation of this technology means more hassle, more concern about your data, and, frankly, less convenience. Great.

As Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, notes, “By obliging Americans to use these sleeves [...] the government has, in effect, shifted the burden of privacy protection to the citizen.”

And while this is a completely remote possibility for everyday travelers…

In 2006, a mobile security company, Flexilis, conducted an experiment in which the transponder of a partially opened e-passport triggered an explosive planted in a trashcan when a dummy carrying the chipped passport approached the bin. A video of the experiment was shown that year at a security conference.

I like the old, non-IED-triggering plain-vanilla passports better.

The whole RFID controversy is so frustrating because it’s completely unnecessary. You don’t need a chip to create a counterfeit-resistant document in the first place. But by addressing one problem — counterfeiting — it creates a swath of new problems.

If you want to be sure, remember that there’s really only one surefire way to prevent your e-passport from broadcasting your personal information: Break the chip. Pound it with a hammer.