Widespread access to the internet may be coming to Native communities

Washington, D.C. - Representative Deb Haaland, D-N.M., co-chair of the Native American Caucus, joined Representatives Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz and Tom Cole, R-Okla. to introduce the Bridging the Tribal Digital Divide Act of 2020 the week of Feb. 10 to accelerate the deployment of broadband services to Native communities and bridge the digital divide facing Native communities.

The bill would expedite the deployment of affordable broadband service on Tribal lands by coordinating and improving the effectiveness of federal resources.

According to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), less than half of households...

School could be moving

It was Monday morning, Feb. 10, the start of a new week at the Sacred Heart Catholic School of Gallup. Teachers were gathering their supplies, preparing their lessons. Everything felt routine. That’s when Father Mitchell Brown and Father Matthew Keller entered and requested that the teachers and the principal meet in the library.

The small assembly of about 12 people listened as Brown and Keller read a note about starting a parish school, which would move the school from 515 Park Ave. to the Sacred Heart Cathedral site at 555 S. Woodrow Dr. An artist’s rendering lays out ambitious plans of a new school at the site.

Hozho Academy, currently located at 306...

Avoid romance scams

Valentine’s Day and other opportunities for romance can be exciting, but they can also lead to heartbreak, embarrassment, and financial loss if you’re not careful.

Criminals search dating sites, apps, chat rooms, and other social media networking sites attempting to build “relationships” for the sole purpose of getting your money or your personal information.

Romance scams, also called confidence fraud, affected 114 victims in N.M. in 2019 resulting in a loss of more than $1.6 million, according to the FBI’s Internet Crimes Complaint Center.

To avoid becoming a victim, the FBI Albuquerque Division recommends the following:

Only use reputable...

Watch out for smishing, pharming, fraud with your paycheck

Internet-enabled crimes and scams show no signs of letting up, according to data released by the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) in its 2019 Internet Crime Report. The last calendar year saw both the highest number of complaints and the highest dollar losses reported since the center was established in May 2000.

New Mexico had 2,037 victims and $17,983,833 in losses in 2019.

In 2018, New Mexico had 2,127 victims for $8,617,772 in losses.

IC3 received 467,361 complaints in 2019—an average of nearly 1,300 every day—and recorded more than $3.5 billion in losses to individual and business victims. The most...