well they killed dozens of soldiers in iraq not with bullets but with poise at the u.s. military's largest contractor has been found guilty of negligence for using a deadly anti corrosion chemical in its water purification plant now they want taxpayers to pay the military families who lost their loved ones. and they promised they'd be back in two thousand and thirteen now the hacktivist group anonymous is making digital waves again this time they're petitioning to the white house to consider didio west's attacks as a form of protest. and swimming against the current al gore is selling his news network to al jazeera for a cool five hundred million and alternative energy lover such as himself can do

a lot of good with that money if only the cash wasn't pumped from qatari oil profits we'll explain. it's thursday january tenth four pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wall and you're watching our team. well starting off today with a defense contractor that wants taxpayers to foot the bill for its toxic mistakes k.b.r. was tasked with the rebuilding iraq's oil infrastructure after the u.s. invasion a comet alley water treatment center ran by the contractor was laced with a substance called sodium diet chromate k.b.r. told us soldiers guarding the place that it was a mild irritant well turns out it's not mild but deadly the substance is an extreme carcinogen one of the soldiers stationed there died of cancer

a few years ago and in november a jury found k.b.r. guilty of poisoning a dozen soldiers the jury ordered the company to pay eighty five million dollars in damages but now k.b.r. is saying it's not responsible for paying the bill taxpayers are why k.b.r. says it entered into an indemnification agreement with the government which protects it from being sued and it's not just that eighty five million dollars k.b.r. says taxpayers should cough up the company wants fifteen million dollars it spent on legal fees to be covered too this isn't the first time the private military contractor has been in some hot water these are some things you should know about the houston based company it's a former subsidiary of halliburton it avoided paying hundreds of millions in taxes by hiring workers through other companies in the cayman islands in two thousand and nine it was charged with bribing nigerian officials to win government contracts and it was charged with installing faulty wiring that electrocuted u.s.

soldiers in iraq and that's just a few of the things we thought you should know there are more about this country's shady past and whether taxpayers will foot the bill for their mistakes i'm joined now by mike doyle an attorney for some of the soldiers against k.b.r. welcome mike boettcher is worse than sure so we're talking about eighty five million dollars plus the fifteen million to cover legal fees does this is what they were. want taxpayers to pay into this amount to a taxpayer bailout for k.b.r. essentially i think that's certainly what they're demanding that this really is just the first twelve hundred sixty two soldiers and the families of the two soldiers that died from their exposure the first well up to trial that's really what they're looking for is a bail out no matter what they do to actually. yes that's exactly what it sounds like is k.b.r. essentially saying through this indemnification agreement that no matter what they're guilty of that they're not responsible well we do know that this going into

the bedroom certainly did when they were on the ground but we found out as the case developed from the testimony of the kid your lawyer that they thought they had cut a deal with the government after initially no big deal to go ahead and no matter what they do will misconduct by the highest officers whoever they killed soldiers allies iraqis taxpayer. wow well i mean this sounds like a ridiculous thing to agree to why would anyone agree to terms of such an agreement you know i can't really speak to why it happened i can tell you that it was it was classified by the army up until just december twenty first of last year for over nine years and i don't think there's a really good answer that's been given about why it was given after they've initially been given this no bid contract worthless right there's a lot we don't know we were not able to see it but they are trying to use this as justification to have taxpayers cover to cover their mistakes k.b.r.

spokesperson said it was necessary to enter into this agreement because the conditions in iraq are dangerous well it's no secret that despite declaring mission accomplished in iraq the country has increasingly been unstable in the coming months and years. in light of that would you say that's a valid argument. you know like so the whole business about why they should get this bailout how they got it that's not really something that we dealt with directly but i can say this there are a number of contractors today including k.b.r. that are doing all kinds of work with military without this kind of bail out of her . with a similar indemnification agreement is that is that what you're saying no what i'm saying is there's many con matter of fact contractors today doing many of the same type of jobs that don't have this extra add on bailout agreement that k.b.r. that don't have it yet so you know without really being able to say for sure you know why they go out of the first place i think it is pretty clear that it's not

something that that's necessary to get contractors do this work and be competitive for right how many more defense contractors that would you say are in these kinds of agreements kusum most agencies are not allowed to to engage in these agreements but the pentagon is exempt. you know my understand and this is really something that we found out it wasn't part of our trial wasn't part of our cases you might expect or at least as katie or they felt that if the jury in our case knew that going in and k.b.r. knew that no matter who they harmed or injured they were scot free it might influence the jury about how they did business but we've heard since then that somewhere around a group of a dozen of these type of devotees have been issued over the years. we had the touched upon earlier past actions of k.b.r. and if you look at them looks like their main motivation is profit and the health and well being of those that they were tasked to protect seems like a secondary motivation this isn't the first time they've come under scrutiny so why

would the government continue to do business with the election so that's that's a government decision i mean obviously the there is certainly good work done by folks for k.b.r. on the ground in different areas we know that what they did or are mentally was exactly the opposite we also know that at least in what happened in carmel valley they were very much focused on the board which was primarily geared towards getting it done fast and i think the evidence showed that that led to some bad decisions. what is the likelihood that now k.b.r. they're trying to have the taxpayers foot the bill what's the likelihood that that will in fact happen or that the company will be held responsible and to cover those damages. well i know i can speak for the better ones than in the families that were sent that they feel very strongly that cave your should not be able to push this all taxpayers that being said i know the government has. to be or being able to collect under this bailout agreement and that's

a separate case that was just fall after our trial in november now k.b.r. they were found guilty welcome news for these families these dozen soldiers that were killed and their families and the community is affected. what's their reaction now to k.b.r. is the response that the taxpayers should be covering this well you might expect having fought so hard for so many years to to hold your countable they have a different viewpoint of k.b.r. and i think that disgust and really just it's really unfortunate that they're trying to say to kind of believe by the next step we're just saying ok fine no matter what we do we're going to dump it off the taxpayers and i think every one of the veterans the family members that talk to bill that's just another evasion of accountability for k.b.r. all right mike what is next for for this law so well right now that the organ case which was the first twelve folks to get up to trial episodes are still under fifty

more split between a few more organs and a case pending here in houston texas for indiana organizational court as well as some british troops who are also exposed out there those are on appeal right now on some immunity issues entirely separate and once those get resolved we expect to go to trial with the remainder since possible all right i want to mention the n.c.a.a. now has a provision in there that would prevent indemnity agreements such as the one that k.b.r. entered into from happening in the future how confident are you that this provision might prevent instances like this from happening again. well i you know there are going to a lot of good developments from a jury holding your annibal in this case that particular war you're talking about the past actually didn't pay any type of deals it just meant that congress would have to get notified they couldn't be done in secret couldn't be classed a lot of drama drawl to report out later so that's

a really big step i don't know that these will go away or nationally need to go away but certainly it will get a lot more scrutiny than they are right and i guess that part of the n.b.a. wasn't even approved so perhaps those protections are and aren't even there mike really appreciate you coming on the show we'll continue to follow this very important story that was attorney. attorney mike doyle with a brazen. thank you liz thanks a lot. also ahead here on our take it's not exactly hacking by d.d. o. s. attacks sure can be annoying for web site creators but can the method be considered a form of protest that story next.

i'm. let me let me hear one wouldn't let me ask you a question for. the. what work is what we have in the body we are very nice to. be true to this place space thing there is again during the break we'll be right we talk about surveillance.

that activist group anonymous has carried out some high profile cyber attacks but now the group wants an online action called distributed denial of service or d.d. o. s. as its more common commonly known to be considered a legal form of protest and they're taking this request all the way to the white house in the form of a petition here it is they compare the action to an occupy protest and say quote and set of a group of people standing outside of a building to occupy the area they're having their computer occupy a website to slow war deny service of that particular website for a short time but titian hours are also calling for those jailed for conducting d.d. o. s. attacks to be released and the records cleared so far there's over one thousand signatures on the petition it needs many more in order to require

a response from the white house so can this really be considered a new form of protest stick joining us now is attorney j. lederman welcome there jay so first off i want to ask you what exactly a d.d. o. s. attack is that we are a lot about about them but what exactly do they do. hi thanks for having me. d.l. asks or. attack is essentially the functional equivalent of hitting the refresh button on your internet browser repeatedly so for example in a short a couple minutes last protest your computer will be. centrally clicking the refresh button over and over and what that does is that drives traffic to the website such that it takes up than when. and if there is a certain person doing it do you do your ass isn't going to do anything hence the

initial do distributed it's different than a dos which is just one person trying to nuke the web site all the distributed denial is many people. taking up a small bit of bandwidth clicking this refresh button over and over again such that what you might say the more legitimate traffic can get through it's a lot like your occupy protesters standing in front of a building and making it difficult or. for example standing in front of a bank and making it difficult for those bank customers to get into the bank at that time all right at the moment a d.d. o. s. attack is considered legal under the computer fraud and abuse act and right now there's fourteen people that have been charged under africa carrying out this very attack do you consider do you consider it to be constructed the structure the destructive oh yes quite quite destructive i mean number on it it's

telling the populace that is finding new and creative ways to redress their grievances to the government and to large corporations that. people think are perhaps controlling the government it's telling them that you are speech isn't valuable your method of protest isn't considered legitimate even though it's creative even though it's effective and even though it's harmless because in the end it is harmless even though whether those things are present your ideas don't matter that's what the government by prosecuting these cases that's what the government is saying but is it really hard left because i mean doesn't it it does affect the target whether it's by that they lose revenue or they lose their visitors it does do some harm to the target right. yeah as we're standing outside of a delay for a few moments

a legitimate patron who wanted to make a deposit into that bank the pay pal case is a is a glorious example of that because all that happened was that the website was slowed for just a little bit everyone that wanted to make their purchases through pay pal world so mentally able to do it. with a very sorry that they were inconvenienced for a few moments but really that's how democracy functions everybody had their voice heard for just a little while their message was made plain and then anyone that needed to shop for their mickey mouse slippers or whatever it was was able to do so through pay pal no harm was done to the size it was in the face servers weren't invaded credit card information wasn't taken this isn't it's come to be seen as hacking this is not hacking right so it's more of an inconvenience than causing any. causing among the

criminal harm. it's a minor inconvenience all right so now we have this petition in the works right now it's got something like one over one thousand one hundred signatures a need a lot more at the white house is at least a requirement to respond so what do you think is the likelihood of it really being recognized as a form of civil disobedience. at present i think we have. an uphill battle before we really see congress. congress taking this seriously you have to look at this through the lens of history right the c.f.a. that you talked about the computer computer fraud and abuse act was written in one thousand nine hundred six before we had h.t.t.p. protocol so basically when it was written what would happen is someone would dialogue through their modem

a particular server if you wanted to go. dark for example you had to dial up darpa and that was it you couldn't go to a browser and type in you know russia today dot com and come up with russia today and go there so the computer fraud and abuse act in and of itself is completely outmoded and isn't made to fit today's internet so the idea that they're going to just all of a sudden say oh well you know this one thing is a really good idea we need to recognize. that happening overnight i don't see it but this is brilliant and it's really i'm really. i really want to applaud the people that took this initiative because this is really the beginning of a dialogue in this direction and for that we're very glad interesting and you know we're seeing it technology. rapidly improve

a lot more and more of our lives are being conducted on line so as this kind of continues to be the trend do you can you expect this to be the future of protesting were protesting will also move into the the digital and cyber realm. absolutely i think this is the first step into. a much larger. digital protests we've called them digital sit ins the idea and now that anyone that's even the smallest this tech savvy. the boss doesn't pass the grandma test meaning we were just what people say to mean it's so easy that your grandma can do it presuming that grandma is not a tech savvy grandma so the fact that these types of avenues exists means that more and more people are now exposed to the democratic process

this is a really good thing for a lot of people it's hard to get people out into the street out rallying in front. of i mean i keep using a bank is an example out in front of the proverbial bank that i'm using it's significantly less hard to get ten thousand people to do a deed os from their computer for a plan time for a short amount of time where we're in. there let their voices are heard in unison and more than that because it doesn't require a physical lucas' people from around the country and around the world can now participate in these things interesting i really appreciate you coming on the show and telling us all about the site was attorney jail lederman thank you thanks for having me. well the cable network al-jazeera has close a deal with liberal leaning current t.v. and the deal is

a lucrative one for al gore with reports he'll be getting one hundred twenty five million dollars from the sale al-jazeera of course is financed by the government of cutter and has been criticized for biased reporting which reflects the foreign policy of the qatari government a former employee is now speaking out about such selective reporting longtime berlin corresponded octo-mom sullivan recently resigned and said in an interview with d.w. quote the problem is that the ins her organization lacks internal structures that would immunize immunize it against what presumably an attempt by the owner or the editors to interfere politically and things that should have been and old in a journalistic manner well as we mentioned al-jazeera is fueled by carter in oil rich country interesting that they're now paying off al gore whose legacy is his dedication to fight global warming one of his notable accomplishments in this

mission is his nobel peace prize winning movie entitled an inconvenient truth. to get this little boy. to live is what use its day. but perhaps the. to answer your oil agenda.

back in a minute. to go so i'm going to. go i'm going. to get. worse so you're going to slide out to give it to the radio guy in fort lauderdale a minute from a quick process i want you to watch closely to get you never seen anything like this i'm told. the so.

we just put a picture of me when i was like nine years old because if you tell the truth. to confess and i am a total get a friend that i love bradman get. interesting. but he

was kind of a yesterday. i'm very proud of the. place .

and that is unwelcome news for people concerned by the growing number of drones flying in the skies above normally we view these drones at the top of the technology food chain but not anymore german defense for ryan metal has developed a new laser weapon system that can shoot fast moving drones from a far the two laser weapons used radar in optical systems to detect and track drones the lasers then shot to drones at a far distance from bright out of the sky during tests run metal plans to integrate an automatic cannon to the laser system and try to mount it on various vehicles to make the whole thing mobile but let's say you fear drones yet can't afford that laser system with the power to cut through the steel girder is there anything out there for you you can probably afford a new hoodie new york to new york artist adam harvey is unveiling

a clothing line designed to make the wear close to invisible to surveillance drone the line is called stealth where harvey created it in collaboration with fashion designer joanna bloomfield the clothes include an anti hood hoodie an anti drone hoodie excuse me and matching scarf that confuse thermal imaging the way most drones see a t. shirt protects the wearers organs from x. rays and a pocket blocker stop cell phones from sending or receiving signals harvey told the magazine rhizome that he sees the clothes as a way for people wearing them to feel protected kind of like armor only the twenty first century would a sweatshirt protect you more from a potential enemy then a knight's armor that's why sure might not be able to be your best bet when it comes to laser weapon systems though and we are going to leave it off there but for more on the stories we covered you can always check out our you tube channel and that address is youtube dot com slash r t america you can also check out our

website our teeth dot com slash usa and you can follow me on twitter outlives wall we'll be right back here in a half hour. well . science technology innovation all the latest developments from around russia we've gone to the huge earth covered. the worst for those things. white out of a day radio guy and call mateo minestrone click off watch the watch what we're about to go good you've never seen anything like this on call.

good afternoon welcome to capital account i'm laurin leicester here in washington d.c. these are headlines for friday january fourth two thousand and thirteen.