You would think, in the face of all the recent press about NSA’s domestic spying, the National Security Agency would be very sensitive to any more bad press regarding that subject.  You would be wrong. Either it’s time to fire their IT Dept. or they just don’t do a good job spying.

The National Security Agency’s Internet site has been placing files on visitors’ computers that can track their Web surfing activity despite strict federal rules banning most of them.

These files, known as "cookies," disappeared after a privacy activist complained and The Associated Press made inquiries this week, and agency officials acknowledged Wednesday they had made a mistake. Nonetheless, the issue raises questions about privacy at a spy agency already on the defensive amid reports of a secretive eavesdropping program in the United States.

"Considering the surveillance power the NSA has, cookies are not exactly a major concern," said Ari Schwartz, associate director at the Center for Democracy and Technology, a privacy advocacy group in Washington, D.C. "But it does show a general lack of understanding about privacy rules when they are not even following the government’s very basic rules for Web privacy."

Until Tuesday, the NSA site created two cookie files that do not expire until 2035 _ likely beyond the life of any computer in use today.

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E-mail scams grew more sophisticated this year as spammers tried new ways to lure consumers into providing personal information for apparently legitimate business transactions, according to a report from America Online Inc.

Still abundant were more traditional annoyances, such as spam offering products to sculpt your body, improve sexual performance, perfect your diet and provide remarkably low mortgage rates.

AOL’s third annual Top 10 Spam List includes examples of Donald Trump and other celebrities trying to recruit Internet users, great deals on hot technology gadgets, and personalized correspondence appearing to come from an acquaintance who needs to collect a friend’s personal financial data.

 Music giant Sony BMG has agreed to stop making CDs with much-criticized copyright protection software as part of a settlement in a class action lawsuit that was filed after users found the software made their computers vulnerable to spyware and other malicious software.

The settlement will put an end to the 20-plus cases filed by consumers against Sony since November. It will also resolve the lawsuit filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a non-profit digital rights group.

The draft of the settlement, which also included cash payments of $7.50 per user, was filed in the court in the U.S. District in New York on Wednesday.

Executives who understand technology are among the most hotly sought out employees in the business world. They are also the folks who know best what computers, phones and gadgets to buy.

At least that was our thinking one year ago, when we launched a weekly feature on Forbes.com called the Executive Toy Box. Over the last year, we have canvassed the corner suites of some of America’s largest and most innovative companies and asked the honchos what gizmo they liked best…and why. The only caveat–they couldn’t endorse a product from their own company.

Now, with more than 50 executives having weighed in, these five gadgets prove the most popular. They’re the gizmos chosen over and over again–the must-have tools of the tech exec.

And they are..

You got a new computer for the holidays and you’re itching to start using it. Before you do, check out our advice on how to turn your new system into the one you really want—which is not necessarily the one the vendor thinks you should have. To compile our tips, we looked at the latest mainstream laptops from Dell, HP, IBM/Lenovo, Toshiba, and Sony, but our advice applies to the latest desktop models as well. So read on, and enjoy your new machine—safely and economically.

Pioneer today took the wraps off of its first Blu-Ray next-generation DVD drive for PCs, which will be unveiled officially at next week’s International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas and could begin shipping by the end of January.

Pioneer’s BDR-101A disc writer gives the Blu-Ray format a leg up in its heated battle with rival HD DVD for supremacy in the optical disc market that is expected to take off in the coming year.

According to the Japanese electronics giant, the new drive will write and read single-layer BD-R and BD-RE discs and read single-layer and double-layer BD-ROM discs, without cartridge. It is designed to ensure high reliability in high-density recording and playback with Blu-Ray discs as well as with DVDs, the company said.

Time marches on, but Earth is falling behind. The solution again this year is to add a "leap second" as 2005 ticks away, so Earth can catch up with the atomic clocks that have defined time since their unerring accuracy trumped the heavens three decades ago.

This will be the first leap second in seven years, and its arrival will be closely watched by physicists and astronomers enmeshed in a prolonged debate over the future of time in a world increasingly dominated by technology.

Some experts think the leap second should be abolished because the periodic, but random, adjustment of time imposes unreasonable and perhaps dangerous disruptions on precision software applications including cell phones, air traffic control and power grids.

Nat’l. Institute of Standards and Technology Press Release here

Wikipedia’s Leap Second entry here

For little ones who simply have to know what Saint Nick is up to, electronic gadgets offer easy access to a peek at the red-suited one’s whereabouts. This year, Web phone service Vonage joins online resources that follow the path of Santa as Christmas nears.

The venerable Santa tracker supplied by North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), which has now been in operation for 50 Christmases.

NORAD’s Santa-tracking services have been available online for several years. It was originally a telephone service, since the military department that watches the skies seemed a logical place to get information on Santa’s progress.

Volunteers will answer calls about Santa’s whereabouts from 9 a.m. GMT December. 24 to 9 a.m. GMT December 25 at 1-877-446-6723, which is a toll-free call in the United States.

NBC Universal is taking control of its flagging cable venture, MSNBC, ending the decade-old broadcast partnership with Microsoft Corp., the two companies said yesterday.

Microsoft’s share will drop to 18 percent under the agreement, but it will retain 50 percent ownership in the MSNBC.com Web site, which has been far more successful than the broadcast operation in attracting viewers.

The site has about 24 million viewers a month, NBC said.

Under the restructured deal between NBC and Microsoft, NBC acquired a controlling interest in MSNBC and has the option of buying the operation outright over two years.

Stan King is going to Pittsburgh and then Los Angeles to visit family for the holidays; he has already gotten word that he needs to fix computers belonging to his cousins, his nieces and nephews in both places. District resident Laura Maschal needs to load Apple’s iTunes on her dad’s computer during her Christmas break. Robert Clemenzi, meanwhile, will be trying to fix his sister’s broadband connection during his holiday jaunt down to Asheville, N.C.

For many folks like them, having a family reputation for tech savviness means that going home for the holidays has become the time for connecting printers and figuring out why mom’s e-mail software stopped working a few weeks back. As computers have found a place in nearly everyone’s home, the annual computer checkup has become almost as much of a tradition as dad putting together the new bicycle or sister-in-law getting dragged into the kitchen to make gravy or eggnog.

“It used to be that grandma wanted you to put in a new light bulb in some hard-to-reach place,” said Maschal, who works for a local Web company, though in a non-techie capacity. “Now you have to come over to take spyware off her hard drive.”