Too smart or smart enough?
One security researcher had a brilliant idea. He would take out a vanity license plate reading NULL. To everyone around him, it would be a joke. To the California DMV, it would give him a free pass.
The idea was that if the DMV computer system saw a plate called NULL, it would assign all tickets to the waste bin. He was a little too smart for his own good because the opposite happened. He was immediately assigned every ticket for an unplated car, he told the conference Def Con. Pretty soon he had about $15,000 in traffic tickets.
The police and the DMV told the snarky researcher to change his plate. He refused. So, the private company that administers the database removed the fines, but fines are still showing up.
Since fines are being removed now, Bruce Schneier, of Schneier on Security, wonders if he really does have a way to get rid of all his traffic fines.
National Blueberry Popsicle Month
With all of the notable things celebrated and remembered in any given month who would have thought that the month of September is National Blueberry Popsicle Month.
At age 11, Frank Epperson of Oakland, California, probably had no idea a simple mistake would make him an icon in the world of frozen treats. In 1905, Epperson accidentally left a glass of powdered soda and water with a mixing stick in it on his porch during a cold night. When he woke the next morning, he found his first creation of the ice pop. Blueberry to be exact. In 1923, Epperson patented the concept of ice pops. He initially called the treat “Epsicle” and later called it the “Popsicle.” A couple of years later, Epperson sold the rights to his invention to the Joe Lowe Company in New York City.
