For millions across the globe, the idiosyncratic practice of updating one’s status on Facebook or Twitter has become a ubiquitous component of everyday life. ... Updates about our whereabouts seem like fairly innocuous tidbits about our lives. But their crux is the same across the board: You’re announcing, “I’m not home.” ... [BLOG MODERATOR'S NOTE: This is the first All Consuming post by our new Public Affairs Intern, Darius Schwarz. I admire his wit but think I'd lose playing Scrabble with him.  "Ubiquitous," a fancy word for "existing everywhere," reportedly has a point value of 21 and can easily hit a double word score, if you can pull it off. -- Kristin]

If you saw a stranger peering into your windows at home or rifling through your desk at work, you’d call the cops. But many of us have no idea what happens to all the bits and bytes of information we send over our computers, iPhones and Blackberries. Take Facebook, for example ...

Thanks to John Stark at the Bellingham Herald for picking up a report out of Idaho about more than 100 people who were hooked by a phishing scam. The victims were duped by fake text messages informing them that their debit cards had been frozen and telling them to call a number to provide account information. ...

Nearly 11,000 seniors from across Washington state were on the phone today with Attorney General Rob McKenna as part of a TeleTown Hall sponsored by AARP Washington!