Cybercrime Will Only Get Worse; Groups Allege Misuse of Crime Database; Employers Never Shared Suspicions About Killer Nurse; Ashcroft Is Admonished For Violating Court Order

CyberCrime Expected To Get Worse Before it Gets Better

The Washington Post reports that, in the annals of cybersecurity, 2003 should go down as one of the worst years ever, as hackers and spammers repeatedly demonstrated just how easy it is to use the latest software security holes, worms and viruses to attack businesses and trick unwitting Internet users into divulging their personal and financial information. The story warns that 2004 should be worse.Groups Allege Misuse of Crime Database

The Departments of Justice and Homeland Security are unlawfully using a national crime database to get local police departments to enforce civil immigration laws, lawyers who have assembled a federal class-action lawsuit against the practice said yesterday, according to an article in the New York Times. The story reports that the lawsuit, which they plan to file today in Federal District Court in Brooklyn, is the first to challenge the addition of civil information about thousands of noncitizens to the National Criminal Information Center database, which the F.B.I. uses to notify law enforcement agencies about people wanted for crimes.

Employers Never Shared Suspicions About Killer NurseA nurse who has admitted killing at least 30 patients went from job to job without his old employers sharing their suspicions about him with new employers, according to a story in the San Francisco Chronicle. The story reports that word of their suspicions went no further than the State Nursing Board, which said it could not, under the circumstances, tell anyone that questions had ever been raised about him.Ashcroft Is Admonished For Violating Court OrderA federal judge has admonished Attorney General John Ashcroft for violating a court order by making remarks about defendants in the nation’s first major terror trial after Sept. 11, 2001, according to a story reported by the Associated Press and published in the Boston Globe.