TV News LIES

The family of a prisoner who was executed in Ohio on Thursday using an untested combination of medical drugs that appeared to cause him prolonged distress are planning to sue the state for inflicting cruel and unusual punishment, in violation of the US constitution.

Dennis McGuire, 53, was put to death using an untested two-drug protocol involving the sedative midazolam and painkiller hydromorphone. Before the execution, which took an abnormally long 25 minutes, Ohio courts were warned by an anaesthesiologist who served as an expert witness for McGuire that the procedure and the doses of drugs to be used would inflict untold suffering upon the inmate. The state decided to go ahead.

Hackers used cheap, off-the-shelf malware to breach security at U.S. Target stores and compromise data for more than 110 million customers, a tech website said.

Target confirmed last weekend malicious software was embedded in point-of-sale equipment at its checkout counters to collect secure data as credit cards were swiped during transactions. Brian Krebs, of the Krebs on Security website, reported Thursday the malware has been determined to be BlackPOS -- also known as "reedum" -- which uses a memory-scraping technique to collect secure data, temporarily stored in Windows OS computers during a transaction.

The United Methodist Church has formally charged another clergyman for presiding at the same-sex wedding of his son.

The Rev. Thomas Ogletree will be tried March 10 for violating church law against officiating at gay unions, his spokeswoman, Dorothee Benz, announced Friday. It's the second high-profile United Methodist trial in recent months over same-sex relationships. In December, pastor Frank Schaefer of central Pennsylvania was defrocked after he officiated at his son's gay wedding. The church considers homosexuality "incompatible with Christian teaching."

The National Security Agency has implanted software in nearly 100,000 computers around the world — but not in the United States — that allows the U.S. to conduct surveillance on those machines, The New York Times reported Tuesday.

The Times cited NSA documents, computer experts and U.S. officials in its report about the use of secret technology using radio waves to gain access to computers that other countries have tried to protect from spying or cyberattacks. The software network could also create a digital highway for launching cyberattacks, the Times reported.

General Motors said it would recall 370,000 2014 Silverados and GMC Sierras due to a fire risk that involves a software problem.

The company said the trucks were expected to idle with only two cylinders of the engine running. But a software problem causes more than two cylinders to continue running, the Detroit News reported Saturday.

Attorney General Eric Holder is recognizing the marriages of more than 1,000 same-sex couples in Utah that took place before the Supreme Court put those unions on hold.

Holder’s action will enable the government to extend eligibility for federal benefits to these couples. The attorney general says families should not be asked to endure uncertainty regarding their benefits while the courts decide the issue of same-sex marriage in Utah.

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