The Morning Report -- Friday February 1st, 2013

Hackers Infiltrate The Times -- Beyonce Lip-Syncs -- Sen. Hagel Hearings -- Hackers Take Down Amazon -- 3D Printers and Gun Control -- Hispanic Population > White Population --  Ron Jeremy In Hospital -- Alabama Child Hostage -- Texas DA Shot, Killed -- Have It Your Way: BK & Horse Meat -- Mexican Oil Company Explosion

CHINESE HACKERS ATTACK THE NEW YORK TIMES

AP Images

 SAN FRANCISCO — For the last four months, Chinese hackers have persistently attacked The New York Times, infiltrating its computer systems and getting passwords for its reporters and other employees.

fter surreptitiously tracking the intruders to study their movements and help erect better defenses to block them, The Times and computer security experts have expelled the attackers and kept them from breaking back in.

The timing of the attacks coincided with the reporting for a Times investigation, published online on Oct. 25, that found that the relatives of Wen Jiabao, China’s prime minister, had accumulated a fortune worth several billion dollars through business dealings. 

BEYONCE SAYS SHE LIP-SYNCED NATIONAL ANTHEM

Getty Images

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) –Beyonce stepped in front of the media Thursday to preview her halftime performance at theSuper Bowl.

After a brief greeting, the superstar asked the audience to stand and immediately belted out an unaccompanied rendition of the “The Star-Spangled Banner” which was received with hoots and applause.

She was promptly asked about her much-discussed rendition of the national anthem at President Barack Obama’s inauguration last week. Her critically praised performance came under scrutiny less than a day later when a representative from the U.S. Marine Band said she wasn’t singing live and the band’s accompanying performance was taped.

CNN: SENATORS 'SHOCKED' AT HOW ILL-PREPARED HAGEL WAS

AMAZON DOWN: ONLINE RETAILER BRIEFLY WENT DARK

Getty Images

First Twitter, now Amazon. Major website have been falling left and right on Thursday.

At about 2:40 p.m. ET, the homepage for Amazon, the world's largest online retailer, went down for approximately a half an hour. Shoppers looking for clothes or books were redirected to a blank page that said "Service Unavailable."

The website "Down For Everyone Or Just Me," not to mention an outpouring of tweets, confirms it, though Amazon URLs besides Amazon.com appeared to be working. As of publication, the site is working again.

3D PRINTERS INSERTED INTO GUN DEBATE

Pictured: FormLabs 3D Printer

A 24-year-old law-school student is bringing a new weapon to the fight over gun control: three-dimensional printers.

The notion may sound far-fetched, but Cody Wilson and a small team of Second Amendment defenders are working to develop ways for people to circumvent some gun-control proposals by furnishing the know-how to make weapons parts at home using 3D printers.

Mr. Wilson has already proved it is possible to make plastic versions of the high-capacity ammunition magazines that President Barack Obama and other mostly Democratic lawmakers are looking to ban. Four days before Mr. Obama unveiled his gun-control agenda, which includes a proposal to ban the sale of high-capacity ammunition magazines, Mr. Wilson appeared in a YouTube video firing a Colt M-16—the rifle long favored by the U.S. Army—with a 30-round plastic magazine made by a 3D printer.

CALIFORNIA HISPANIC POPULATION OUTNUMBER WHITE POPULATION BY 2014

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - California's Hispanic population will equal that of whites this year before becoming the state's largest demographic group in 2014 for the first time since statehood in 1850, a government report showed on Thursday.

That change in the most populous U.S. state will make it the third where whites do not comprise a plurality of the population, after New Mexico and Hawaii.

The shift is occurring alongside nationwide growth in the Hispanic population, which grew to 16.7 percent of the total in 2011 from 12.5 percent in 2000, according to U.S. Census figures.

It also comes amid a national debate on immigration that Democratic President Barack Obama waded into this week when he outlined his goals for immigration reform in a speech in Las Vegas.

PORN STAR RON JEREMY HAS HEART ANEURYSM

Filmmagic

Porn icon Ron Jeremy will remain on a respirator the next few days as doctors assess his recovery from heart-related surgery, a family member told the Daily News Thursday.

"Right now everything is in a holding pattern," Jeremy's 94-year-old dad Arnold Hyatt said. "He's heavily sedated and intubated. The doctors are waiting to see what develops. They anticipate it will be two or three days before they take him off the respirator."

The legendary lothario, 59, drove himself to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center near Beverly Hills around 2:30 a.m. Wednesday after experiencing chest pain, his manager previously told The News.

ALABAMA BOY STILL HELD IN BUNKER

CNN

Midland City, Alabama (CNN) -- Somewhere underneath this red southeastern Alabama dirt is a little boy.

A kindergartner, snatched from the safety of his school bus by a gunman and stashed in an underground bunker;

A boy who needs daily medication;

A child that this Bible Belt community of 2,300 is praying for.

Many details have been released about the man suspected to be the boy's abductor:

How he was supposed to have been in court to face charges that he'd shot at his neighbors over a minor property dispute;

TEXAS DISTRICT ATTORNEY SHOT, KILLED IN FRONT OF COURT HOUSE

A

An assistant district attorney in North Texas was shot and killed as he arrived at the courthouse where he worked on Thursday.

The Associated Press reports:

"Mark Hasse, 57, had exited his vehicle in the parking lot behind the Kaufman County Courthouse annex and was walking toward the building when he was shot multiple times just before 9 a.m., said Kaufman County spokeswoman Pat Laney. Hasse was taken away in an ambulance, but Laney did not know if he died at the hospital or en route.

"Investigators were searching for two suspects believed to have fled in an older model Ford Taurus either brown or silver in color. Officials didn't immediately indicate any motive for the shooting in Kaufman, located about 33 miles southeast of Dallas."

BURGER KING FINDS HORSE MEAT AT EUROPEAN SUPPLIER

 Burger King announced Thursday that it had terminated its relationship with European supplier Silvercrest Foods after finding traces of horse meat in beef patties at a Silvercrest facility.

Silvercrest provided beef for Burger King restaurants in the United Kingdom, Ireland and Denmark. Burger King said that while samples of beef from restaurants in these countries showed no evidence of contamination, four samples from a Silvercrest plant in Ireland showed "very small trace levels of equine DNA."

Burger King (BKW) said the tainted product was never sold in restaurants, and appeared to have originated from a sub-contracted supplier in Poland.

BLAST KILLS 25 AT MEXICAN OIL PLANT BLAST

AP

MEXICO CITY — An explosion rocked the headquarters of Mexico's state-run oil monopoly Pemex, killing 25 people, injuring 101, and damaging three floors of Mexico's second tallest building before sending plumes of smoke into the Mexico City skyline.

The blast ripped through the lower level of a building adjacent to the Pemex tower in central Mexico City at about 3:45 p.m. local time (4:45 p.m. ET) Thursday, forcing the evacuation of 3,500 employees, company officials said.

The cause of the blast has not been confirmed. Local media reported that machinery exploded in the basement of an administrative center next to thePemex tower in Mexico City, which has more than 50 floors.