I started my morning by screaming at my computer.  Not because someone was wrong on the internets, this time it was in outrage (yet again) at the hopelessness of the news media.

It was only a week ago I was ranting and raving on Twitter about how differently the same story was being reported by varying news outlets, some (ABC) making the science based medicine stories very negative while others (SMH, Telegraph, Reuters, AFP etc) giving a more realistic and positive story.  Today though it wasn’t so much the reporter’s incompetence or bias, but rather it was the sheer idiocy of the editor.

“Hotmail: now Gmail and Yahoo! hacked”

No, they weren’t hacked.  They weren’t cracked either.  Hacking and cracking both require a compromise of the business’ systems.  That in no way shape or form took place.  What happened is that the users were phished. Continue reading →