– 12 – The 86 (Photometry Group 3, Variability Level 2) variable objects inside the stellar box are red, with optical colors of R − I ≳ 1 (i.e., V − I ≳ 2), so they must be dominated by red giants or main-sequence stars. The red and asymptotic giant branch stars include the OGLE Small Amplitude Red Giants (OSARGs; e.g., Soszy´ nski et al. 2004) with I -band amplitudes of ∼ 0 . 1 mag and periods between 10 and 1000 days, the Long Period Variables (LPVs; e.g., Soszy´ nski et al. 2009) with amplitudes of up to ∼ 3 mag and periods 10-1000 days, and the Long Secondary Period variables (LSPs; e.g., Soszy´ nski 2007) with periods 30–1000 days. However, given their absolute magnitudes of M$_{I}$ ≈ − 4 mag, they would have to be at a distance of ∼ 200 kpc to match the observed R , I , and IRAC magnitudes. Since this scenario seems unlikely, the variable objects inside the stellar box could be the main- sequence flaring M dwarfs (e.g., Kowalski et al. 2009) with absolute magnitudes of M$_{I}$ ≈ 7 mag, and distances of up to 1 kpc. Based on Kowalski et al. (2009), we expect to find ∼ 10 M dwarf flares in our data. The R − I and I − [3 . 6] colors of the variable objects inside the stellar box are inconsistent with the galaxy templates from Assef et al. (2010b). We have not pursued these sources in any detail because they are almost certainly quotidian variable stars and false positives. The estimated false positive rate of 58% is very high. Next, we examine the variability of sources whose X-ray, MIPS 24 µ m or radio fluxes indicate that the source is an AGN. The color distributions of these sources are shown in Figure 6 and the variability statistics are summarized in Table 4. Here we focus on Photom- etry Group 1 since we are not dependent on having mid-IR colors to interpret the results. First, we see that a significant fraction of the X-ray sources show mid-IR variability, with 12% (= 12 . 1% × (1 − 0 . 04) accounting for false positives) being variable even with no limits on the mid-IR photometric uncertainties. The higher fractions in Photometry Groups 2 and 3 are largely due to our improved ability to detect a given level of variability as we require smaller photometric uncertainties. The MIPS quasar candidates, which are found to be either AGNs ( ∼ 80%) or optically unresolved star forming galaxies upon spectroscopic examination, also show high variability rates, with 11% (= 11 . 7% × (1 − 0 . 05)) of the Photometry Group 1 objects showing variability at Variability Level 2. The variable fraction again increases as we go to the brighter photometric groups. The two sets of radio sources show significantly lower levels of variability. This is consistent with the results of Hickox et al. (2009) and Griffith & Stern (2010) who show that, as compared to X-ray and mid-IR selected AGNs, radio-selected AGNs have lower Eddington ratios and are much less likely to be AGN domi- nated. Thus, variability in radio-selected AGNs will be more challenging to discern relative to the photometric noise due to the host galaxy. Finally, we compare the variable sources with the template types used to estimate the source redshifts in the AGES survey, as shown in Figure 7 and summarized in Table 5. This is somewhat redundant with the previous two tests because the objects targeted as