A study published earlier this week reporting that males commit two-thirds of research fraud has raised a lot of troubling questions. Who are these Lance Armstrongs in lab coats, and why are they almost always men? Published in mBio, the online journal of the American Society for Microbiology, the study examined annual reports by the United States Office of Research Integrity, and identified 228 individuals who have committed misconduct of some sort (94 percent involved fraud). In the words of the researchers, led by the University of Washington’s Ferric Fang: Analysis of the data by ... Read More
Psychologist’s Resignation Throws Results into Question
July 17, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment
To kick off 2011, we reported on some fascinating new research that found being physically higher influences people to act more altruistically. But those results, authored by social psychologist Lawrence Sanna, have now been thrown into serious question. According to Ed Yong of nature.com, one of the world’s top science writers, Sanna has resigned from the University of Michigan faculty and written the editor of the Journal of Experimental Psychology, Joel Cooper, asking that three of his articles—including the one showing that links literal elevation with moral uplift—be ... Read More
Spotting Election Fraud Gets Smarter, Cheaper
March 15, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment
International election monitors have observed a number of high-profile, highly suspect victories over the past few years: Hamid Karzai’s in 2009, Alexander Lukashenko’s in 2010, Vladimir Putin’s earlier this month. Observers have flagged ballot inconsistencies and missing vote totals and voter intimidation. But hardly anyone seems deterred. “It’s very hard to conduct free and fair elections in a new democracy, even in old democracies,” said James Long, a doctoral candidate at the University of California, San Diego. “This is kind of curious because for 20 years, elections ... Read More
#OWS: What Took So Long?
October 24, 2011 • By • Leave a Comment
Among the many issues raised by the Occupy Wall Street movement, perhaps the most basic is: What took so long? Why did three years elapse between the time reckless financial traders nearly brought down the global economy and large numbers of people began collectively expressing outrage? A new psychological study provides at least a partial answer. It finds people are strongly motivated to perceive the socioeconomic system they live under as fair and just, and links this pro-status-quo impulse with a reluctance to protest against the Wall Street bailout. “It is extremely difficult for ... Read More
Scamming Grandma Sadly Common
June 26, 2011 • By • Leave a Comment
It began late one evening when Harriet, already in bed, answered a call from someone claiming to be a police officer. The caller said that Harriet’s grandson was in a car accident while traveling in Canada and needed some money to tow and fix the car. “Could you please wire some money to us so we can get him on his way home? “Oh, and please, Grandma,” the alleged officer said, “don’t tell his parents, since they didn’t know he was taking this trip.” By the way, Grandma, what a big checking account you have! Yes, it’s a scam. Sometimes the caller claims to be a lawyer ... Read More
Magical Elixirs and Beneficial Bracelets
March 5, 2011 • By • Leave a Comment
A few days ago I was walking through the local shopping mall and a salesperson staffing one of those ubiquitous kiosks approached me with an intriguing offer. He claimed I could improve my balance, brain functioning and stamina — for only $30 — by wearing a special wristband. Somehow this silicone bracelet with two “ionized holograms” harnesses our natural energy flow and restores our electrical fields, which may have become unbalanced. Really? Just ask hundreds of successful sports figures. Really. How does it work, you ask? Well, here’s the “science” behind the original ... Read More
Pyramid Power, or Pennies for a Pony
July 12, 2010 • By • Leave a Comment
When I was a kid, I read somewhere that if I put a penny in my piggy bank on day one and doubled it each day, by the end of the month I’d be a millionaire. Wonderful, I thought. I only needed to take 127 pennies from my weekly allowance in the first week; not too bad a burden when there were only three more weeks to go before I could afford a pony for my sister’s birthday! Of course, with some better math skills and skeptical thinking, it dawned on me that on day 26 I would have to put over $335,000 in the bank to reach a million the very next day, a little more than I would collect in ... Read More
When Bad Things Happen to Good Rogues
March 28, 2010 • By • Leave a Comment
Setting a rogue to catch a rogue. That arresting phrase is the kernel of one of the United States' most important anti-fraud laws — the False Claims Act — enacted by Congress in1863. It's sometimes known as the Lincoln Law; the president wanted to crack down on unscrupulous defense contractors in his day who were selling the blue coats bum mules, decrepit horses, misfiring rifles, dud ammo and rancid rations. This law is still in force and allows even those unaffiliated with the government to file a claim of fraud against government contractors, under the so-called qui tam principle. ... Read More
An ePassport is a Fiendishly Slippery Thing
March 24, 2010 • By • 1 Comment
When America and the EU introduced "ePassports" in the mid-2000s, the documents had no security, not even basic encryption, which meant that the holder's details were being offered up to the world at large. The passports had RFID chips to let machines read basic information, including photos and fingerprints, and for the first time in history, a traveler — at least in theory — could have his identity details "skimmed" by any hacker wielding a fairly cheap RFID receiver. Use of RFID, or radio-frequency identification, has exploded over the last few years. The chips turn up in ... Read More
New Hope, Indeed!
March 18, 2009 • By • Leave a Comment
Last week our David Rosenfeld used the story of Horatio Bernard, an immigrant from Liberia, to outline the trajectory of the subprime crisis. Mr. Bernard, in hoping to find solace in the federal HOPE for Homeowners program, instead, and inadvertently, tapped into the private New Hope Modifications, one of a number of private efforts — usually with hope in their names — that offer sketchy efforts to rescue homeowners facing foreclosure. We say "sketchy" to be charitable — Mr. Bernard is now out thousands of dollars he couldn't afford to fritter away, and is squatting in the row ... Read More
