Private Investigator News: California nursing homes to begin posting federal star ratings - latimes.com

"Patients and visitors at California nursing homes will be greeted with something new come the new year: publicly posted ratings of each facility. The federal ratings give facilities one to five stars depending on quality of care, much like restaurants display letter grades evaluating health and safety compliance.

The new law is intended to ensure that patients and their families are aware of the evaluations. Nursing home officials also must post information explaining the ratings and how to obtain information about the nursing home's state licensing record from the Department of Public Health's website."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator Research Links - Oct - Dec 2010

• Conducting Research on Social-Networking Websites in California

  "Handbook on Conducting Research on Social-Networking Websites in California –"
  

• Creating a Cellular Device Investigation Toolkit: Basic Hardware and Software Specifications
  

• Forensic Examination of Digital Evidence: A Guide for Law Enforcement
  

• Twitter API Viewer
  

• Audio with slideshows
  

• Scholar Universe - Database of academic faculty, medical researchers and scientific experts
  

• Academia.edu - Find people, bios, research
  

• Berkeley Information Network Catalog

  Bay Area community, activities, resources, events indexed.
  

• State Financial Disclosure Reports - The Center for Public Integrity

  Personal Financial Disclosure reports filed by members of the executive, judicial and legislative branches in the 50 states.
  

• Historical Newspaper Database - The Library of Congress

  "This site allows you to search and view newspaper pages from 1860-1922 "
  

• Facebook Search » Find Posts, Photos, People, Pages, Groups & Events

  Public profiles search. No signin needed.
  

• Sources for Unclaimed Property
  

• Credit and Collection News
  

• Nationwide Mortgage Licensing System & Registry

  Verify a mortgage company or individual license.
  

• Community Care facilities and services directory

• Search, Save & Analyze Tweets

  Uses Twitter search engine and query modifiers. Automatically updates and archives tweets by your search terms.
  

• US Government publications online

  "MetaLib, a service of the Catalog of U.S. Government Publications! MetaLib is a federated search engine that searches multiple U.S. Federal government databases, retrieving reports, articles, and citations while providing direct links to selected resources available online. "

• CA County Codes

  "California County Codes" These are the first two numbers on a DMV abstract for the court code.
  

• California Department of Corrections Inmate Locator
  

• Requesting Public Records? Threats Work Best, UA Study Finds

  "Requesting Public Records? Threats Work Best, UA Study Finds "
  

• Real Time Search - Social Mention

  Real-time social media search and analysis

  
  

Links are here. RSS for all links.

Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Car cameras to record California state roadways

"Cameras proliferate this data-driven age, replacing hazy recollections with clear digital images.

Starting on New Year’s Day, 2011, this will be increasingly true on California’s roadways when AB 1942 takes effect, legalizing the use of “video event recorders” in our cars.

For several years, police agencies have used these kinds of devices to document the conduct of officers during traffic stops. Going forward, vehicle owners can install them to create evidence of collisions and other hazardous driving conditions."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Calif. Legislature shields records - Bloomberg

"A letter written by a lobbyist to a lawmaker; an e-mail pitch by a campaign donor; memos sent by party leaders directing legislators how to vote on a bill.

Those are just a few examples of documents that would shed light on how the California Legislature conducts the public's business. But California lawmakers, like their counterparts in Congress and several other states, keep those and other types of correspondence secret under a special law covering legislative records."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Delaware Supreme Court recognizes right to obtain identities of limited partners

"The Delaware Supreme Court has upheld a lower court ruling that ordered a limited partnership to provide a list of its limited partners to one of those limited partners. The limited partner who sought the list complied with the procedures in the partnership agreement. The limited partner wanted to use the list to contact other limited partners to investigate potential claims against the limited partnership's general partner. The general partner, in resisting the request, relied on a privacy policy in a private placement memorandum issued to prospective investors advising that the general partner does not disclose non-public personal information about investors in the limited partnership. The Delaware Supreme Court ruled that the non-disclosure restrictions in the private placement memorandum did not override the right expressly afforded to limited partners under the partnership agreement." Read more
Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Truth In Caller ID Passes Congress

"The House of Representatives passed the 'Truth in Caller ID' bill yesterday. The House accepted the Senate version of the bill, (S 30) and will send it on to the President for his signature.

The good news is that the Senate bill retains language that limits the use of 'spoofing' of caller ID information only 'with the intent to defraud, cause harm, or wrongfully obtain something of value'. NCISS opposed the earlier House-passed caller id bill (HR 1258) because it had troublesome language that would have included a ban on spoofing with the intent to 'defraud or deceive'. Our legislative committee was concerned that any use of spoofing could be considered by courts to be intended to deceive. Investigators would lose a valuable tool."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: EEOC files credit history lawsuit

"The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) filed a lawsuit yesterday charging Kaplan Higher Education Corporation with discrimination for using credit histories in making hiring decisions. The EEOC said Kaplan, a Washington Post subsidiary, has rejected applicants on the basis of credit histories since at least 2008. The Commission said the practice "has an unlawful discriminatory impact because of race and is neither job-related nor justified by business necessity". As a result of this practice, the lawsuit charges that Kaplan refused to hire a class of black applicants nationwide." Read more
Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Smartphone Apps are tracking devices

"Few devices know more personal details about people than the smartphones in their pockets: phone numbers, current location, often the owner's real name—even a unique ID number that can never be changed or turned off. These phones don't keep secrets. They are sharing this personal data widely and regularly, a Wall Street Journal investigation has found." Read more
Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Asher's new database service available next year

A year later than announced, TLO.com is scheduled to launch February 2011 with free trials available to private investigators. Read more
Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Do’s and Don’t’s of Monitoring the Activities Of Employees on Social Networking Sites

"Fifty three percent of the employees surveyed believe that an employee’s social networking page is not their employer’s business, and nearly one-third said they never consider what their boss would think before posting material online.

Social media content is also becoming a new source of evidence in employment cases. Employers view such material as a unique way to identify false statements employees make in these cases. Employees, however, often view their employer’s interest in such content as an invasion of their privacy.

These divergent viewpoints are creating new tensions in the workplace and new issues for the courts to address."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Social Networks in Personal Injury Litigation

"In the personal injury arena, information derived from social networking sites is most frequently sought or employed to contest a claim of physical limitation or emotional suffering, although it has, on occasion, been used by a plaintiff against a defendant as an alternative to more traditional website information in connection with representations concerning professional capabilities, inappropriate comments made by the professional or, in a case involving a University of Texas fraternity, the initiation activities posted by a fellow student which resulted in a student's death."
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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: 6th Circuit decision limits government access to emails

"The fraud case against Berkeley Premium Nutraceuticals might be the beginning of the end of a law that allows government agents to read e-mails without a search warrant.

An appeals court in Cincinnati this week upheld the criminal conviction of Berkeley's top executive, Steven Warshak, but it also cast doubt on the way federal investigators peeked at hundreds of corporate e-mails to build their case against him and other company officials.
The ruling by the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals is significant because it declares for the first time that private e-mails are entitled to the same constitutional protection as letters, phone calls and other forms of communication."


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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Facebook's Friend Finder: The Largest People Database?

"While most of the press around Facebook's recent enhancements centered on the emergence of new profiles, the world's default social network has recently rolled out a number of other changes that make the site further revealing in terms of what you share, and more interesting, let you tap into the nearly 600 million people on the site to find new connections. The new friend finder, which encourages you to find new people in your hometown, school, employer or more, even lets you tap one degree away and find friends of friends. The result is a rich people discovery database that makes friending more likely thanks to shared connections."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Vermont bill would make DUI videos a public record

"Bennington County Sen. Dick Sears has drafted a bill to ensure video of DUI arrests is a public record following a denial by the Department of Public Safety of a request to release footage of State Auditor Thomas Salmon's arrest.


Sears, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he hopes the bill will make all DUI arrest videos public.

"I don't know why there should be any discussion about releasing it," Sears said. "I don't know what good it does to try and play that game. And I don't know why it should be $45."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: What rules apply to searching the California DMV database?

"Q: I’m divorcing a law enforcement officer, who has taken abuse of power to a whole new level and no one seems to care.
What are the laws regarding license plate queries? My Ex, or his buddies, “ran” all of my friends and family through CLETS in order to gather information. When I contacted the DMV and filed a formal complaint, I was told it was a “family court issue.”

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Pennsylvania Office of Open Records orders release of birthdates

"Reporter Dylan Purcell, on behalf of the Philadelphia Inquirer, asked the Pennsylvania Office of Administration ("OA") to provide him with a list state employees and salaries. The OA granted the request, but only provided Purcell with the employees' years of birth, rather than a full birth date including the day and month born. Purcell appealed to the Office of Open Records ("OOR"), arguing that the dates of birth of state employees are public records. The OOR agreed with Purcell, and issued a final determination ordering the OA to provide Purcell with the state employees' full dates of birth."

"The final determination, Purcell v. Pennsylvania Office of Administration, AP 2010-0845 (OOR 10/29/10) summarizes prior appellate decisions, legislative history, and OOR final determinations that address whether dates of birth of public employees are public records."

"The OOR dismissed the OA's constitutional argument because no appellate court in Pennsylvania has held that individuals have a constitutional right to privacy in their dates of birth. In response to the OA's arguments that state employees may fall victims to physical violence or stolen identities, the OOR noted that the OA failed to cite a single instance where a public employee was a victim of a crime, including identity theft, due to the release of their date of birth."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Visa to Use Your Phone's Location to Prevent Credit Card Fraud

"Sure, you like all the great benefits of having your phone know where you are. Looking up directions or local weather information becomes that much faster. But outside companies and agencies are equally delighted to have access to your location information--and not just to send you coupons. Increasingly, they’re going to be using that information for purposes that have nothing to do with your convenience and fancy.

Some of those purposes you’ll like. Others you might not be so keen about. One you’ll probably be okay with was just announced by Visa Europe. The credit card company is going to start using information about the location of customers’ mobile phones to prevent credit card fraud."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Washington county Assessor removes home photos from website

"Responding the concerns about privacy and safety, Island County Assessor Dave Mattens decided to take down photographs of homes from the office's online database."


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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Texas Supreme Court rules government workers' birthdates are private

"The Texas Supreme Court dealt a blow this morning to transparency when it ruled the public has little interest in government employees' dates of birth."

"The decision sweeps aside rulings by the trial and appellate courts, which ruled that government employee dates of birth are public records. It also means that government workers will enjoy special protections while the state continues to sell the very same information about members of the public for millions of dollars each year."  
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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: California to ship more prisoners out of state

"California, under pressure to reduce the number of inmates in its crowded prisons, has steadily increased the number of convicts it sends to private institutions outside the state since Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger began the program in 2006."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Prison Inmate Profile Shows Off Contraband On Facebook

"Just when you thought you’d seen your fill of Facebook chutzpah, along comes a new example. Like Justin Walker posting photos showing off all kinds of things he wasn’t supposed to have inside of his prison cell — since when have inmates had the ability to access social media?

The Oklahoma Department of Corrections caught up with Justin Walker and moved him to stricter confines. But that came well after he uploaded to Facebook cell-phone photos showing him with a bag of marijuana and a blade, among other prohibited items."

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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator

Private Investigator News: Vermont AG declines to appeal public records ruling

"The Vermont Attorney General's Office will not appeal a judge's decision making public a police video of the driving while intoxicated arrest of State Auditor Thomas Salmon last year.

Washington Superior Court Judge Geoffrey Crawford ruled last month that the video is a public document under Vermont public-records law, and it was released just five days before the Nov. 2 election.
Nonetheless, the state had 30 days to appeal to the Vermont Supreme Court the adverse ruling. The deadline expired during the weekend.

Attorney General William Sorrell said Monday that the state would wait for a different public records case to send to the state's highest court."
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Location Oakland, Ca | San Francisco, Ca | California - Private Investigator