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2009-10-03T18:22:00.002+05:30

Wikipedia Competitor Being Tested by Google

2007-12-15T16:42:00.000+05:30

Sources: Newyork Times

SAN FRANCISCO — Google is testing a new Web service intended to become a repository of knowledge from experts on various topics, one that could turn into a competitor to Wikipedia and other sites.

It attracts a following, the service could accelerate Google’s transformation from a search engine into a company that helps create and publish Web content. Some critics said that shift could compromise Google’s objectivity in presenting search results.

The service, called Knol, which is short for knowledge, would allow people to create Web pages on any topic. It is designed to include features that permit readers to submit comments, rate pages and suggest changes. However, unlike Wikipedia, which allows anyone to edit an entry, only the author of a “knol,” as the pages in the service would be called, would be allowed to edit. Different authors could have competing pages on the same topic.

Google said that a main idea behind the project was to bring attention to authors who have expertise on a particular topic.

“Somehow the Web evolved without a strong standard to keep authors’ names highlighted,” Udi Manber, vice president for engineering at Google, wrote in an announcement of the test Thursday evening on a Google corporate blog. “We believe that knowing who wrote what will significantly help users make better use of Web content.”

Mr. Manber said the goal of Knol was to cover all topics, from science to medicine to history, and for the articles to become “the first thing someone who searches for this topic for the first time will want to read.”

That is often the role played by Wikipedia pages, which frequently turn up at or near the top of results presented by Google and other search engines.

“I think Google is looking at the growth of sites like Wikipedia, that aggregate knowledge, and feels it has to play in that space,” said Danny Sullivan, a search expert and editor of the Web site Search Engine Land.

Several other services have taken different approaches in their efforts to become repositories of knowledge on various topics. They include Yahoo Answers, Squidoo, Mahalo and About.com, which is owned by The New York Times Company.

Despite the existence of these services, as well as countless free tools for experts and ordinary people alike to share what they know online, Mr. Manber said Google thought many people who possessed useful knowledge did not publish it “because it is not easy enough to do that.”

Google declined to make Mr. Manber or anyone else available to discuss Knol, saying the project was an experiment that like many Google tests, might never be opened to the public.

While many technology analysts and bloggers noted that Knol appeared to be a direct competitor to Wikipedia, Jimmy Wales, that site’s founder, shrugged off the potential challenge.

Mr. Wales said that Google’s service would encourage competing, opinionated articles on any topic, whereas Wikipedia strived for objectivity and had a single article per topic that represented the collective knowledge of its authors.

“I’m looking forward to seeing what it ends up looking like,” Mr. Wales said.

Knol and Wikipedia would be different in other ways. While Wikipedia is a not-for-profit and ad-free endeavor, Knol has a more commercial bent: Authors could choose to have Google place ads on their pages and would get part of the revenue.

“At some point, Google crosses the line, where they are not only a search engine, but also a content provider,” Mr. Sullivan said. Technically speaking, he said, authors, not Google, would create Knol pages. “But it matters how it appears,” he said. “I do a search on Google, I go to some place that Google hosts and I also find Google ads.”

What’s more, Mr. Sullivan said, Google’s goal of making Knol pages easy to find on search engines could conflict with its need to remain unbiased. Google already carries content generated by users in a variety of services, including YouTube, the photo storage site Picasa and Blogger.

New infos about Need for Speed

2007-06-12T15:30:00.001+05:30

Evenly we reached some news about the upcoming "Need for Speed" title. The new part of the Racing-series is called "ProStreet". Executive producer Larry LaPierre: „The scope of the game is it to build the perfect tuned car to participate on showdowns all over the world. You have to own in several disciplines to Race against the best streetracers in the world."

Microsoft Surface the new Digital Transformation.

2007-05-30T18:02:00.000+05:30

ABOUT MICROSOFT SURFACE

Microsoft Surface represents a fundamental change in the way we interact with digital content.

With Surface, we can actually grab data with our hands, and move information between objects with natural gestures and touch.

Surface fetures a 30-inch tabletop display whose unique abilities allow for several people to work independetly or simultaneously. All without using a mouse or keyboard.

Want to know more about surface. Excited to grab some photographs and feel the live experiance. Click on the link below.

http://www.microsoft.com/surface/

Google Might Prepare a Search Engine to Save Our Lives - New signs of a revolutionary technology

2007-05-25T14:45:00.000+05:30

Adam Bosworth, Vice President, gave a speech at the 2007 American Medical Association of Informatics offering some obvious signs that Google prepares new and revolutionary technology. Adam Bosworth sustained that all the customers should profit from a health system based on three aspects: discovery, action and community. First of all, the customers must be allowed to find any required health information with ease just like typing a single word. Then, the clients should be enabled to personalize their search queries and find more relevant results. The third aspect, the one related to the community, should put the searcher in connection to other consumers and allow him to learn from their health matters.

"Now imagine that when looking up by condition and doctor and procedure or medicine or both, you could see how others had fared. Then most of these people would have seen this, the evidence would have quickly mounted and been overwhelming, and this terrible tragedy would have been nipped in the bud.As this rolls out and consumers truly can discover what is the state of the art and what they should know about their treatments, where they are being treated, how they are being treated, and how they will mange their diseases or recovery, this consumer awareness will lead to far greater consumer control, far better health data, and inevitably, to a very different health world than the current one," Adam Bosworth said in his speech.

It looks like Google is more and more attracted by health systems and different technologies that can revolutionize our lives because it is the second time in two days when the Mountain View company talks about an innovative technology. Yesterday, Google's CEO Eric Schmidt sustained that the firm is working on an impressive search engine that will be able to answer common questions such as "What job shall I choose?".

Google Maps Updated, Google Earth Is Next - One more improvement for the search giant's product

2007-05-24T14:23:00.000+05:30

Enlarge pictureGoogle Maps, the web-based service that allows users to view maps and satellite imagery, received one more update to improve its functionality. As you know, the product is able to provide driving directions but sometimes, the suggestions are not very useful to some users. For example, a scooter rider cannot drive onto a highway because his maximum speed is not allowed on this type of roads. That's why Google decided to design one more feature for the driving suggestions and provide directions with the possibility of avoiding the highways. The function is available in the Get Directions menu just under the Search Results tab showing the optimal route. Of course, some directions can take you on a longer route but it can be somehow useful as you avoid the highways and the prohibited roads.

"When you click the the "Avoid Highways" checkbox, the route instantly updates to one that tries very hard to stay off of interstates, motorways, and other major roadways. This may give you a much longer path, but one that you may find more suitable. If it isn't what you want, you can uncheck the box and quickly revert to the normal route to help plan your trip," Barry Brumitt, Software Engineer, said today.

If you want to take a test drive of this new feature, you can try searching for the route between Seattle and the Google office in Kirkland. As you can see, the filter appears under the Search Results tab and will remove some roads from the list. The update is currently available only for Google Maps, but I believe the search giant will make it compatible with the downloadable application Google Earth soon, as the competition in this category becomes more important. A few weeks ago, Yahoo improved its Maps service, including high-resolution photos for a lot of European countries.

Nokia goes green with charger alerts

2007-05-15T23:26:00.000+05:30

New handsets display 'Please unplug the charger' message. Source: www.vnunet.com
Nokia has clambered onboard the green bandwagon with three mobile phones that encourage users to unplug the charger from the wall socket when not in use.

The Finnish giant estimates that two-thirds of the total energy consumed by mobiles is wasted as a result of people leaving the charger idle in a live socket once the phone has been unplugged.

"We want to reduce this waste and are working on reducing to an absolute minimum the amount of energy our chargers use," said Kirsi Sormunen, vice president of environmental affairs at Nokia.

Nokia aims to reduce the amount of electricity a charger consumes while still plugged into the mains, but not the phone, by an additional 50 per cent by 2010.

Nokia phones already have an onscreen alert to say when charging is complete. The new alert appends the words 'Please unplug the charger' and provides an audible beep. However, the company was unable to say how this would work for the millions of people who charge their phones overnight while asleep.

The alerts will be implemented initially on Nokia's 1200, 1208 and 1650 models, targeting high-volume sales in developing markets like India, China and Latin America.

Nokia said that the new alert will be rolled out across the whole range at a later date.

Microsoft claims patents on Linux kernel

2007-05-14T23:06:00.000+05:30

Source: www.vnunet.com
Microsoft is claiming that open source software infringes on hundreds of its patents, and plans to make the open source community pay to use them.

Brad Smith, Microsoft's senior vice president and general counsel, said in an interview with Fortune magazine that the company is beginning to take action over 235 patent violations in open source code. Smith claims that the Linux kernel violates 42 of Microsoft's patents, that the graphical user interface falls foul of another 65 and that OpenOffice infringes 45. Email programs account for another 15 violations.

"Numbers are not where the action is," said Eben Moglen, long time counsel to the Free Software Foundation and former head of the Software Freedom Law Center. "The action is in very tight qualitative analysis of individual situations."

Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer has already warned of a forthcoming legal battle, but this is the first time that Redmond has been so specific. "The only real solution that [the free-software] folks have to offer is that they first burn down the bridge, and then they burn down the patent system," said Smith.

"That to me is not a goal that's likely to be achieved, and not a goal that should be achieved."

Microsoft began stepping up its patent programme in 2002, the year that Smith became general council. In 2002 it filed for 1,411 but by 2004 it had risen to 3,780 and has now passed 5,000.

The company is no stranger to patent law disputes. From April 2004 through to March 2007 the company paid $1.25bn to Sun Microsystems, $536m to Novell, $440m to InterTrust, $60m to Burst.com, $6m to private inventor Carlos Amado, $115m to z4 Technologies, $74m to Korean company P&IB, and most recently, $1.52bn to Alcatel-Lucent over patents allegedly infringed by Microsoft's software.

However, the US Supreme Court may also have a role to play. Last week the court ruled that many patents were not sufficiently novel to be patented and it has yet to rule on the software patent issue.

How cybercrime operations work - and why they make money

2007-04-24T13:54:00.000+05:30

Source: Out-Law.Com. By: Guillaume Lovet

Cybercrime has become a profession and the demographic of your typical cybercriminal is changing rapidly, from bedroom-bound geek to the type of organised gangster more traditionally associated with drug-trafficking, extortion and money laundering.

It has become possible for people with comparatively low technical skills to steal thousands of pounds a day without leaving their homes. In fact, to make more money than can be made selling heroin (and with far less risk), the only time the criminal need leave his PC is to collect his cash. Sometimes they don't even need to do that.

In all industries, efficient business models depend upon horizontal separation of production processes, professional services, sales channels etc. (each requiring specialised skills and resources), as well as a good deal of trade at prices set by the market forces of supply and demand. Cybercrime is no different: it boasts a buoyant international market for skills, tools and finished product. It even has its own currency.

The rise of cybercrime is inextricably linked to the ubiquity of credit card transactions and online bank accounts. Get hold of this financial data and not only can you steal silently, but also – through a process of virus-driven automation – with ruthlessly efficient and hypothetically infinite frequency.

The question of how to obtain credit card/bank account data can be answered by a selection of methods each involving their own relative combinations of risk, expense and skill.

The most straightforward is to buy the ‘finished product’. In this case we’ll use the example of an online bank account. The product takes the form of information necessary to gain authorised control over a bank account with a six-figure balance. The cost to obtain this information is $400 (cybercriminals always deal in dollars). It seems like a small figure, but for the work involved and the risk incurred it’s very easy money for the criminal who can provide it. Also remember that this is an international trade; many cyber-criminals of this ilk are from poor countries in Eastern Europe, South America or South-East Asia.

The probable marketplace for this transaction will be a hidden IRC (Internet Relay Chat) chatroom. The $400 fee will most likely be exchanged in some form of virtual currency such as e-gold.

Not all cyber-criminals operate at the coalface, and certainly don’t work exclusively of one another; different protagonists in the crime community perform a range of important, specialised functions. These broadly encompass:

Coders – comparative veterans of the hacking community. With a few years' experience at the art and a list of established contacts, ‘coders’ produce ready-to-use tools (i.e. Trojans, mailers, custom bots) or services (such as making a binary code undetectable to AV engines) to the cybercrime labour force – the ‘kids’. Coders can make a few hundred dollars for every criminal activity they engage in.

Kids – so-called because of their tender age: most are under 18. They buy, trade and resell the elementary building blocks of effective cyber-scams such as spam lists, php mailers, proxies, credit card numbers, hacked hosts, scam pages etc. ‘Kids’ will make less than $100 a month, largely because of the frequency of being ‘ripped off’ by one another.

Drops – the individuals who convert the ‘virtual money’ obtained in cybercrime into real cash. Usually located in countries with lax e-crime laws (Bolivia, Indonesia and Malaysia are currently very popular), they represent ‘safe’ addresses for goods purchased with stolen financial details to be sent, or else ‘safe’ legitimate bank accounts for money to be transferred into illegally, and paid out of legitimately.

Mobs – professionally operating criminal organisations combining or utilising all of the functions covered by the above. Organised crime makes particularly good use of safe ‘drops’, as well as recruiting accomplished ‘coders’ onto their payrolls.

Gaining control of a bank account is increasingly accomplished through phishing. There are other cybercrime techniques, but space does not allow their full explanation.

All of the following phishing tools can be acquired very cheaply: a scam letter and scam page in your chosen language, a fresh spam list, a selection of php mailers to spam-out 100,000 mails for six hours, a hacked website for hosting the scam page for a few days, and finally a stolen but valid credit card with which to register a domain name. With all this taken care of, the total costs for sending out 100,000 phishing emails can be as little as $60. This kind of ‘phishing trip’ will uncover at least 20 bank accounts of varying cash balances, giving a ‘market value’ of $200 – $2,000 in e-gold if the details were simply sold to another cybercriminal. The worst-case scenario is a 300% return on the investment, but it could be ten times that.

Better returns can be accomplished by using ‘drops’ to cash the money. The risks are high, though: drops may take as much as 50% of the value of the account as commission, and instances of ‘ripping off’ or ‘grassing up’ to the police are not uncommon. Cautious phishers often separate themselves from the physical cashing of their spoils via a series of ‘drops’ that do not know one another. However, even taking into account the 50% commission, and a 50% ‘rip-off’ rate, if we assume a single stolen balance of $10,000 – $100,000, then the phisher is still looking at a return of between 40 and 400 times the meagre outlay of his/her phishing trip.

In large operations, offshore accounts are invariably used to accumulate the criminal spoils. This is more complicated and far more expensive, but ultimately safer.

The alarming efficiency of cybercrime can be illustrated starkly by comparing it to the illegal narcotics business. One is faster, less detectable, more profitable (generating a return around 400 times higher than the outlay) and primarily non-violent. The other takes months or years to set-up or realise an investment, is cracked down upon by all almost all governments internationally, fraught with expensive overheads, and extremely dangerous.

Add phishing to the other cyber-criminal activities driven by hacking and virus technologies – such as carding, adware/spyware planting, online extortion, industrial spying and mobile phone dialers – and you’ll find a healthy community of cottage industries and international organisations working together productively and trading for impressive profits. Of course these people are threatening businesses and individuals with devastating loss, financial hardship and troubling uncertainty – and must be stopped.

On top of viruses, worms, bots and Trojan attacks, organisations in particular are contending with social engineering deception and traffic masquerading as legitimate applications on the network. In a reactive approach to this onslaught, companies have been layering their networks with stand alone firewalls, intrusion prevention devices, anti-virus and anti-spyware solutions in a desperate attempt to plug holes in the armoury. They're beginning to recognise it's a failed strategy. After all, billions of pounds are being spent on security technology, and yet security breaches continue to rise.

To fight cybercrime there needs to be a tightening of international digital legislation and of cross-border law enforcement co-ordination. But there also needs to be a more creative and inventive response from the organisations under threat. Piecemeal, reactive security solutions are giving way to strategically deployed multi-threat security systems. Instead of having to install, manage and maintain disparate devices, organisations can consolidate their security capabilities into a commonly managed appliance. These measures combined, in addition to greater user education are the best safeguard against the deviousness and pure innovation of cyber-criminal activities.
Original article

Mac security falls under hacker attack at conference

2007-04-23T13:37:00.002+05:30

Date: April 22, 2007 Source: macworld.com
A hacker managed to break into a Mac and win a $10,000 prize as part of a contest started at the CanSecWest security conference here.

According to the security blog Matasano Chargen, Shane Macaulay and Dino Dai Zovi won the contest by gaining shell access to a Mac by pointing the Mac’s Safari browser at a specially-constructed Web page.

“Currently, every copy of OS X out there now is vulnerable to this,” said Sean Comeau, one of the organizers of CanSecWest.

The conference organizers decided to offer the contest in part to draw attention to possible security shortcomings in Macs. “You see a lot of people running OS X saying it’s so secure and frankly Microsoft is putting more work into security than Apple has,” said Dragos Ruiu, the principal organizer of security conferences including CanSecWest.

Initially, contestants were invited to try to access one of two Macs through a wireless access point while the Macs had no programs running. No attackers managed to do so, and so conference organizers allowed participants to try to get in through the browser by sending URLs via e-mail.
Original article

Paris Hilton computer virus.

2007-04-17T13:47:00.000+05:30

Date: April 16, 2007. Source: glosslip.com

Even your computer isn’t safe from Paris Hilton’s cooties. A new virus, disguised as an email has been spamming computers with promises of the over-exposed heiress doing what she does best: posing naked. According to this article, a computer security firm has discovered a malicious virus that attacks the user’s system after being opened from their email.

Security firm Sophos said a new attack is using a lure of images of celebrity heiress Paris Hilton in a state of undress in order to invade users’ systems. Spammed email messages with subject lines such as “Hot pictures of Paris Hilton nude,” and containing images of porn star Jenna Jameson, have begun circulating this week, Sophos said. The emails link to a website containing the Troj/Iffy-B trojan horse, which links to more malicious code exploiting the animated cursor bug patched by Microsoft this week.
Original article

Virtualisation security risks being ignored

2007-04-12T19:03:00.000+05:30

By Ellen Messmer, Network World (US)। Source:- Techworld।com

Companies rushing to deploy virtualisation technologies for could wind up overlooking many security issues and exposing themselves to risk, Gartner has warned.

"Virtualisation, as with any emerging technology, will be the target of new security threats," said Neil MacDonald, a vice president at Gartner, in a published statement.

Virtualisation software offers the ability to run multiple operating systems, or multiple sessions of a single operating system, on a single physical machine, whether server or desktop. But virtualisation software, such as hypervisors, present a layer that will be attacked and security strategies need to be put in place in advance, Gartner warns.

"Many organisations mistakenly assume that their approach for securing virtual machines will be the same as securing any OS and thus plan to apply their existing configuration guidelines, standards and tools," MacDonald said. While this is a start, a closer look at securing virtual machines is required, especially since needed tools may be "immature or non-existent," according to Gartner.

MacDonald will be presenting a detailed analysis of the security ramifications of virtualisation at the upcoming Gartner Symposium/ITxpo in San Francisco later this month.
Among the specific points about virtualisation and security which Gartner will address at the conference are:

- Loss of separation of duties for administrative tasks.

- Patching and signature updates and protection from tampering.

- Limited visibility into the host OS and virtual network to find vulnerabilities and correct configuration.

- Restricted views into "inter-VM traffic" for inspection by intrusion prevention systems.

- Mobile VMs and security policy.

- Immature and incomplete security and management tools.

Gartner speculates that the "rush to adopt virtualisation for server consolidation efforts" will result in many security issues being overlooked. That, in combination with the lack of available security tools for virtualisation, will mean "as a result, through 2009, 60 percent of production [virtual machines] will be less secure than their physical counterparts."

McAfee predicts rapid malware evolution.

2007-04-12T18:55:00.001+05:30

The latest research report from McAfee has painted a frightening picture for enterprise IT administrators, predicting a rapid maturation of cybercrime and the technological means being used to carry out attacks.

According to McAfee's ‘semi-annual’ Sage journal, a roundup of the company's ongoing security research, everything from spam to spyware will become more dangerous over the course of 2007 as hackers look for new ways to exploit end users' machines in their quest for fast cash.

As was the case in 2006, the drive for profits among hackers and malware code writers will dominate development of the threat landscape over the next 12 months, McAfee experts said.

Gangs of thieves around the globe are connecting online in greater volumes than ever before, helping their attacks to arrive on enterprise doorsteps faster and in greater volumes - and with increasing sophistication.

"The overall trend remains more attacks geared toward making money that make use of malware or support people making malware," said Dave Marcus, security research manager with Avert Labs.

"What is surprising is the service and support that's going on around the malware industry; there are more sites selling custom Trojans with support contracts and attacks coded to target banks of the buyer's choice and more malware suppliers offering patches and variants to their users."

Marcus said it is impossible to tell if there are a number of tightly-organised hacker groups worldwide as only a few intentionally identify their own work by leaving clues or outright signatures bearing their names. What is more likely, said the researcher, is that loosely-knit groups of malware writers and fraudsters are forming on underground messaging systems and then disbanding after carrying out waves of attacks.

Among the specific trends outlined in the report are expectations for the continued growth of botnets with the co-operation among hackers adding to the problem via group efforts to develop and refine threat code in the same manner that open-source contributors work in a community. The vast majority of botnets will continue to target flaws in Microsoft products and propagate themselves through buffer overflows, according to the report.

McAfee expects that 2007 will also be the year when attackers truly begin aiming their work at smart phones, the more PC-like handheld devices finding their way into the hands of an increasing number of enterprise users.

The best managers are not afraid of looking dumb

2007-03-27T19:58:00.000+05:30

Ever noticed that some managers believe they are supposed to know everything about their area of responsibility? They don't usually last very long. Often their organizations don't either.

Great managers and leaders realize that they can never know everything. And they're comfortable with that. Poor managers feel that asking questions is a sign of weakness. That makes them uncomfortable.

When discussing this issue, I've had otherwise smart people tell me things like:

"The troops need to feel that there's someone with their hand on the tiller. They'd be concerned if they realized that we don't have a great plan that considers every eventuality."
"If I show that I don't know something, people are going to realize that they may know more than I do. They'll lose respect for me."
"When there's a problem, I'll hear about it anyway - no sense in creating havoc when things are going along fine."
At some level, these bosses feel that the rest of the folks they work with are a lesser species, or at least much lower on the IQ scale. They think the 'lower level people" can't handle the truth that no one is infallible. In most cases, these bosses think they've made it to where they are because they do things better, are smarter, and can figure things out much more quickly than those with whom they work. This attitude will nearly always doom them to failure, while ensuring that many of those around them are going down with them.

History is littered with once-great looking leaders tanking their organizations or businesses or even companies. In nearly all cases it was due to the arrogance of the boss. (e.g.: Bill Ford of the now flailing auto company) On the other hand, there are many really good examples of crappy situations being turned around by leaders who weren't inhibited by any superiority complexes and who spent a lot of time asking questions to help them make the right changes in direction.

The great management guru Tom Peters called this management by wandering around. He said, and I've found it to be a truism, that you can tell the best organizations by how much time the bosses spend outside of their meetings and offices talking to people. What a concept - actually asking for the advice of those at lower levels on the org charts!

I love the story of Anne Mulcahy, the chair and CEO of Xerox, a self-described 'concensus manager' (a style much more typical of women than men by the way), who took over when the company was $18B in debt and the shareholders wanted to sell it in pieces because it didn't seem 'fixable.' She spent a whole year asking anyone and everyone what they thought should be done. She asked other companies' heads, her salespeople, the engineers, customer service guys - anyone. And now that company is regarded as having a great future by many pundits. Plus, she's pretty well regarded by her employees. A nice save.

It's an axiom of management: Most leaders will tend to look upward to the next level of management for positive reinforcement and direction while at the same time ignoring those below them. Doesn't matter what level one is at - most individuals will say that, "if only the people up there would ask for some advice, we could tell them how to fix it."

Kind of ironic.
- john

Please post ur comments.

What’s the Most Secure OS? Surprise! It’s Windows.

2007-03-27T19:46:00.000+05:30

The startling conclusion that Microsoft has the most secure OS isn’t mine (although I don’t find it all that fantastically unlikely), but that of some observors who came to that conclusion after looking at Symantec’s Internet Security Threat Report Volume IX (http://www.symantec.com/enterprise/theme.jsp?themeid=threatreport) that covers the second half of 2006.

Here's a quick look at a few of the relevant numbers; see what you make of them:

For the period of July 1, 2006, through December 31, 2006
Windows had 12 severe threats with the total of 39 vulnerabilities fixed in an average of 21 days.
Mac OS X had 1 severe threat but Apple had an average 66 day turn-around for the entire 43 vulnerabilities reported.
Red Hat Linux was actually faster than OS X with a 58-day average time to fix a total of 208 vulnerabilities.
Of those Red Hat threats, 2 were critical and 130 were rated medium severity.
HP-UX had 98 vulnerabilities and needed an average of 101 days to fix them.
Still, pity the poor Sun users who waited an average of 122 days for fixes of the 63 Solaris vulnerabilities.

Mozilla users rejoice - the average time to patch a vulnerability was the best of any browser, only 2 days, vital if you are facing a zero-day threat.

What shouldn't come as a surprise is Symantec's report that the biggest vulnerability threat is found in the newest hot branch of software - Web apps!

Another unsurprising (at least to me) part of the report was the first paragraph of the Executive Summary:

"Over the past two reporting periods, Symantec has observed a fundamental shift in Internet security ctivity. The current threat environment is characterized by an increase in data theft and data leakage, and the creation of malicious code that targets specific organizations for information that can be used forfinancial gain."

Also, right in line with my recent report here on the California Secretary of State's exposure of hundreds of thousands of individuals' Social Security Numbers on their official Web site, Symantec reports that the government sector in total was responsible for 25 percent of the identity theft activity related to online security breaches.

Comming in second as the biggest threat to your personal identity were educational-related sites, with medical sites taking a close third.

Of course those are the groups that keep the largest amount of personal information outside the three highly centralized credit reporting agencies, so perhaps it really shouldn't be surprising to anyone that the most data theft came from the places with the most personal information.

77% of all Web browser attacks were aimed at Internet Explorer (the biggest target obviously, so no surprise there).

There is a lot of useful information to be gleaned from this Symantec report and every security professional needs to download and study a FREE copy. It not only tells you what category of threats you need to protect against most, it also includes a lot of useful information about which regions have the most infected computers (and that therefore you should be especially wary of Web sites in those areas and emails from people in those locations. By the way, the U.S. is the origin of more attacks than any other country (probably has the most computers also) and, on average, China has the most bot-infested computers in the world, but the U.S. ranks second in the number of infected systems while Israel has the highest percentage of hackers per PC.

But there is good news for IT security managers too; the home user is the subject of targeted attacks more than 90 percent of the time, which means that your workers aren't.

SPAM now makes up about 59% of all email traffic and 65% of that is in English (a lot of it pretty broken English in my experience).

A really alarming statistic was that Symantec had only identified 1 zero-day threat in the first half of 2006 but the security company documented 12 in the second half.

The report also details the percentages of each kind of malware detected and has a vast amount of useful information, not the least of which is the headline-making finding that Microsoft is currently the best performing company when it comes to the speed of fixing vulnerabilities in a major OS.

I would only be fair to remind everyone that Microsoft also mainly sticks to a regular monthly security patch release, with only an occasional mid-month release in extreme cases. I wonder what Microsoft's numbers would have been if they released patches as soon as they were available?

I also feel compelled to point out that the #1 ranking was based only on the speed with which the companies responded to threats, not the severety of the threats or how much trouble the patches caused.

Nevertheless, this report from a company that is finding itself more and more in competition with Microsoft in the security market (and therefore probably isn't cutting Microsoft any slack) is certainly a good one for the folks at Redmond.

So, why does nearly everyone seem to believe Microsoft is so slow to provide patched code?

I feel it is just just like Detroit, which now makes pretty good cars and trucks but is still considered by many to turn out inferior quality products; it may take a LONG time to convince people that Windows is actually pretty secure and Microsoft is very responsive to threats.

Detroit will have to keep proving that it can make reliable vehicles for a long time to overcome the advantage some foreign makes have. (Turning out more popular designs with better gas mileage couldn't hurt either - I'm NOT Detroit-bashing - I have a lot of old Detroit Iron, including some with very big displacement engines from the muscle-car era - several 460's and one 455.)

Likewise, Microsoft is going to have to keep being the fastest to patch its most basic product for a long time to convince people that it is really doing a good job.

(Making a much smaller and highly secure alternative to Vista would also be a good place to earn some points - at least with me.)

How about YOU? What do you think of the implications in this Symantec report?

Please post ur comments on this article. What u feel.

Yahoo jumps ahead of Google on mobile search

2007-03-22T13:28:00.000+05:30

Takeaway: Part of Yahoo Go mobile platform, OneSearch service said to deliver localized search results quickly and easily.

Yahoo introduced on Monday a new Internet search system for mobile phone users that delivers locally relevant answers, a move that vaults it ahead of what rival Google now offers.

Starting in the United States, with international markets to follow later this year, the Sunnyvale, Calif.-based company said it planned to take advantage of the inherently local nature of many Web searches performed on phones.

"We are now putting search on every mobile phone that has a browser," said Marco Boerries, senior vice president of Yahoo's Connected Life business unit. "We are delivering the results consumers want with just one search, not a list of Web links."

Yahoo, which has been playing catch-up to Google in computer Web search, has been making strides in recent months to overtake its rival in the fast-emerging mobile Web market.

As networks grow faster and most handsets now come with Web browsers, Internet companies are moving aggressively to bring search, e-mail, mapping and other familiar online services to phones. The mobile Web promises to offer a handier way than bulky computers for many consumers to connect to the Internet.

OneSearch, as Yahoo calls its mobile phone service, differs from how computer Web search delivers raw sets of links. OneSearch was among the mobile features that Yahoo highlighted in January at the Consumer Electronics Show, where the company touted its Yahoo Go 2.0 mobile platform.

Shortcut to local information
Instead Yahoo serves up a list of actual information, such as news headlines, images from Yahoo's Flickr photos site, business listings, local weather and links to other Web sites.

Rather than showing popular movies or critical reviews, for example, Yahoo search lists local theaters playing a particular movie, user ratings of the film and news headlines related to the movie. Users only need to enter a zip code or city name for Yahoo oneSearch to begin delivering local search results.

Google takes a user several more steps to reach the same information as Yahoo oneSearch.

"This is not a knock on Google per se, but Yahoo has taken that a very specific starting point--your town or neighborhood," said Gartner analyst Mike McGuire. "The context of many mobile phone searches is going to be very local. That starting point is key, like road traffic in my area."

The Internet media company said it has begun offering its oneSearch service on the 85 percent of existing U.S. mobile phones with Web browsers, expanding beyond deals it has with major handset makers to put Yahoo services directly on new and upcoming phones.

"We can now literally cover hundreds of millions of phones in the United States," Boerries said.

Search results appear on a single page and are prioritized into categories, based on calculations Yahoo computers make about the kind of information the user is trying to make.

So far this year, Yahoo has signed deals to feature its Yahoo Go software, including the oneSearch service, with four of the world's top five mobile handset makers: Nokia, Motorola, Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics.

"The pace is something we are going to continue throughout the year," Boerries said.

Yahoo promises to help a range of advertisers reach mobile phone customers as they search. Because searches take place on the phone, consumers can directly call the advertiser to do business with one click on a Web page.

OneSearch runs sponsored advertising tied to Web search results and display advertisements, or mini-banner ads designed for mobile phone screens.

"The latest version of Yahoo search is pretty darn good," McGuire said. "The next question is how they drive revenue," he said, adding that it may take several quarters before Yahoo sees any meaningful impact in its quarterly financial results.

Earth killer not seen in stars

2007-03-12T19:06:00.001+05:30

The risk that an asteroid capable of wiping out humanity will crash into Earth is minuscule, new calculations suggest, but the chances of a smaller one destroying a city or setting off a catastrophic tsunami remain unclear and may be higher than previous estimates.

The calculations were presented at a meeting in Washington, leading scores of scientists present to conclude that NASA needs to move aggressively to meet a congressional deadline for identifying most of the potentially hazardous smaller asteroids and to develop ways to deflect them if they hone in on Earth.

But in a report released to Congress Thursday, the space agency had said it does not have the funds to do the precautionary work, called for in its 2005 authorization bill.

The agency said it is technically feasible to meet the congressional goal of identifying most small "near Earth objects" by 2020, but it would have to rely on telescopes built for other purposes and on spacecraft being developed by other agencies. It did not address who would fund research on ways to destroy or divert an asteroid before it became a danger.

"Due to current budget constraints, NASA cannot initiate a new program at this time."

The NASA document was immediately criticized by the chairman of the House of Representatives' Committee on Science and Technology, Bart Gordon, who said "it's clear that NASA's recommended approach isn't a credible plan to achieve the goal specified in the NASA Authorization Act."

The chair of the Planetary Defense Conference, William Ailor of the Aerospace Corp, a nonprofit established by Congress to support the US Air Force's space defense program, said scientists generally agree that the risk to Earth from large asteroids is small.

Researchers have identified more than 700 of these potential "planet killers" - out of an estimated 1,000 - and found that not one is on a collision course with Earth.

"But with the smaller ones, the asteroids in the [140-meter diameter] range, we're finding more and more," Ailor said Thursday. "They're hard to detect, and it's hard to predict where they are headed, but they can do a great deal of damage."

NASA estimates that there are as many as 100,000 of the smaller asteroids in near-Earth orbit and that about 20 are "potentially hazardous."

The most recent significant asteroid to crash into Earth hit Tunguska, Siberia, in 1908, exploding with the force of a 15-megaton nuclear bomb and creating a blast area 100 kilometers across.

Pete Worden, director of NASA's Ames Research Center and keynote speaker of the conference at George Washington University, said a similar asteroid landing on Washington would destroy the city and most of its suburbs. He said researchers have calculated the risk of "death by asteroid" to be about the same as dying in an airplane crash if you fly once a year.

NASA officials and scientists at the conference said most smaller asteroids cannot be spotted with current telescope technology.

Two telescope projects under development could provide high-powered help to find such asteroids, but both lack NASA participation and secure funding.

To meet the congressional goal, researchers said, NASA would have to build a similar telescope of its own or launch a satellite observatory that could watch Earth from an orbit near Venus.

Both the NASA report and the conference tackled the technically complicated and emotionally charged question of how to deflect an asteroid. NASA concludes that the most effective way would be detonating a nuclear bomb nearby - a tactic the agency called 10 to 100 times more effective than other possibilities.

But sending a nuclear device into space carries risks, which led to NASA's conclusion that firing an unarmed missile to physically knock the asteroid off course is the most "mature" technology. It also described as potentially promising the concept of a "gravity tractor" - a satellite that would orbit near the asteroid and would, through its gravitational pull, change the asteroid's trajectory.

THE WASHINGTON POST

Sony's Not Giving Up on the 20GB PS3

2007-03-06T13:15:00.000+05:30

You may just recall a rumor about the 20 GB PS3 not selling very well. In fact, both PS3 models (20GB and 60GB) don't sell, but the 20GB model in particular is close to becoming a history lesson. Even if the rumor suggested a retrieving of 20GB PS3s off the market, Sony's David Karraker denies such happenings: “The type of model found in stores is completely up to what the retailer orders, so if they don't see a big demand for a particular SKU, they simply don't order it from us. We continue to manufacture both.”

Really now...? Why on Earth would Sony still produce the 20GB model of PS3 if nobody wants it? No retailer is saying they want it and even if people buy some of Sony's shelf sitters it's always the 60GB model. Looks more like a defense mechanism that Sony has developed. Anyway, the PAL regions aren't getting them so obviously Sony is making less 20GB PS3s and more of the 60GB ones so their loss shouldn't be so great.

An article posted on NextGeneration entitled “Sony: 20GB PS3 Not Dead Yet,” says that Sony loses a lot of money on the 20GB PS3 issue, as iSuppli’s November 2006 analysis said that the hardware maker loses $306.85 per 20GB model sold versus $241.35 for the 60GB PS3. So if these are the facts, and these are the figures, why is Sony so keen on still manufacturing 20GB PS3s?

Cellphones with a “Shut UP” Button

2007-03-05T13:10:00.000+05:30

Have you ever been in the middle of a conversation and you desperately wanted to tell the person you are talking with to shut up but you didn't do it because your heart didn't let you put the guy (girl) down like that? There is a solution now to those kinds of awkward situations: a brilliant patent has been filed on July 13th 2006 for a cellphone “shut up” button by Jonathan D. Moscato from New York.

Just imagine the many uses one can give to such a brilliant invention: tell your wife to shut her yap with just a push of a button, shutting the mouth of anyone that slightly nags you on the phone without having to go yourself through such a task.

One push of a button and silence would come down and you will happily continue whatever you were doing at the moment you were so rudely interrupted in, with no remorse or any other after-thoughts. Just push the button and it will carry over without asking what you want it to say because it already knows what his job is: telling the guy on the other end to shut the fu*k up!

Although this might seem the masterpiece of a mad man, I think he's done a very good job. The ways one can use this button are not strictly limited to such cases because, if its inventor would think to also implement a way to record your own message, you could also use it as a way to warn the person you are talking with that you can't continue the conversation due to some unexpected events.
You can see the image attached to the patent in the left and, to further understand the purpose of this invention, read a part of the patent's text where the inventor describes the way in which this button will be used: “The Driver-Attentive Notification System was invented to allow a driver who is conversing on a cell phone to purposefully inform a remote caller to temporarily reduce her conversation intensity level when faced with an attentive condition. The device works when the driver presses an activation switch, which causes the notification system change to an activated state and then sends a notification message to a remote caller to inform her to temporarily reduce her conversation intensity level. A resume message is also sent to the remote caller when the driver changes the notification system back to the deactivated state. This message is sent to inform the remote caller that it is ok to resume her normal conversation intensity level.”

Notice the way he describes it as if it would be about a wife nagging his husband on the phone :). I told you the guy is brilliant and if you didn’t believe me in the beginning, you will surely do that now.

Just think about this invention arriving on mobile phones: it will totally revolutionize the way we talk to each other mainly because the ones that often raise their voice while speaking, probably thinking they can't be heard, will be more careful when addressing you. If they won't, then the magic “shut up” button watches over and it will definitely know what to tell them in case they make the wrong move :).

Nike runs with an iPod

2007-03-02T12:59:00.000+05:30

Joggers can soon link their iPod Nano to their sneakers to get real-time, audible athletic data and track progress.Photos: iPod gets sporty

Your Nikes can now talk to your iPod.

Apple Computer CEO Steve Jobs and Nike CEO Mark Parker on Tuesday unveiled new products that connect the Nike+ Air Zoom Moire, a new running shoe outfitted with a sensor and receiver, with an iPod Nano to report running data in real time and track joggers' progress.

The Nike+iPod Sport Kit, which will be available through the Apple Store in about three months, is expected to cost $29.

"Information on time, distance, calories burned and pace is stored on the iPod and displayed on the screen," according to a statement released by Apple. This information is also reported via iPod users' headphones as they run.

Runners can program a particular workout into their iPod Nano using "The Nike+ Experience" software, available July 13. While running, a woman's voice will inform runners of their progress. When the workout is done and the iPod is synced with the runner's computer, progress is charted.

The announcement took place at a New York event with Lance Armstrong, the Tour de France bicycling champion, who is training for his first New York City Marathon.

"If you can incorporate time, distance and calories burned together, and make it function for both the fitness runner and the high-level athlete, it will take working out to a whole other level," Armstrong said in a statement.

Dazzling new Saturn images released

2007-03-02T12:29:00.000+05:30

This photo released by NASA Thursday, March 1, 2007, shows an image of the planet Saturn obtained with the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera on Jan. 19, 2007, as the planet's shadow stretches completely across the rings.

PASADENA, Calif. - The international Cassini spacecraft has beamed back to Earth never-before-seen angles of Saturn from high above and below its majestic rings. The planet is fully surrounded by the rings in images released Thursday by NASA.

"Finally, here are the views that we've waited years for," Cassini scientist Carolyn Porco of the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo., said in a statement.

"It just doesn't look like the same place. It's so utterly breathtaking, it almost gives you vertigo," Porco said.

Cassini snapped the images while in a highly inclined orbit during the past two months.

The $3.3 billion Cassini mission, funded by NASA and the European and Italian space agencies, was launched in 1997. It is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.

Phishing Is More Popular than E-mail Viruses

2007-01-31T19:38:00.000+05:30

The security of our systems is the main concern for multiple security companies that are continuously working on an application that can protect us against all kinds of threats. Nowadays, several internet users are attacked by viruses, Trojans, phishing attempts or other infected files so we urgently need a powerful tool to defend our computers. Many computer owners think that it’s enough to install a well known antivirus solution and a firewall but, in some cases, it can make your system even more vulnerable. What happens if the installed programs contain security flaws that can be exploited by attackers? Well, it depends on the level of the vulnerability but we should all be afraid of these situations.

Some time ago, several publications announced that authorities from all around the world decided to take action against computer frauds like spamming, phishing and other internet attacks. Then, it was reported that two persons were arrested for sending SMS spam to mobile devices from all around the world. Recently, a new case was confirmed sustaining that a couple sent almost 1.6 million spam messages to e-mails in the US, earning money and information that was then redirected to other companies.

It’s obvious that the number of internet attacks is increasing every day. Security company MessageLabs released an advisory to publish statistics about the recent security reports, sustaining that phishing attacks are more numerous than other internet attacks.

“Following the massive growth in spam during the last few months of 2006, spam levels remained high across most of the world. In January, spam levels reached 75.8 percent (1 in 1.32 emails), a 1.5 percent increase since December. Due to MessageLabs Traffic Management controls, this figure is lower than the “true” spam number of 84.5 percent,” it is mentioned in the security advisory.

The security company also reported that e-mail spamming is also more popular in January than in December, being increased with almost 1.5 percent. “In January 2007, the global ratio of spam in email traffic from new and unknown bad sources, for which the recipient addresses were deemed valid, was 75.8 percent (1 in 1.32 emails), an increase of 1.5 percent since December. This figure is lower than the “true” spam number since MessageLabs Traffic Management controls the bandwidth given to absolutely known bad sources of spam. It effectively pushes the spam back to the spammers’ networks, slowing the ability to send lots of spam. The amount of spam hitting MessageLabs honey-pots is closer to 84.5 percent,” MessageLabs reported.

If you want to read more information and the latest statistics mentioned in the MessageLabs advisory, you should follow this link.

Make Google Laugh

2007-01-17T14:52:00.000+05:30

Google tries to provide more and more services from all categories to help their clients improve the performance of their internet activities. The company also designed several tools to allow users to earn money, AdWords and AdSense representing two of the most popular advertising platforms in the entire internet world. Google is the developer of the SOAP API for PHP, an interesting tool that provides the development of PHP projects that can be included into website’s content to improve their functionality. One of the developers that used this tool is Geoff Peters who designed an interesting idea meant to measure jokes popularity.

Google Laugh is based on a simple idea: when you type a joke into the box provided by the developer and hit search, Google will analyze the popularity of certain keywords using the search engine’s technology.

“Geoff Peters created a website called “Make Google Laugh."* The premise? You enter a joke (or anything else) into the text box, hit submit, and then let the tool tell you how funny that was using the Google SOAP API. I copied a joke from the joke generator and achieved an incredible score of 67.28% with it. Geoff allowed me to republish the “top secret” inner workings of Google Laugh Rank, or what you may want to call it: “It chooses a few words from the entered text and does some various searches for popularity and GoogleShare ratios for certain humor keywords,” said Philipp Lenssen, the blogger that found this service.

After I tested the service for the first time, I must say that the website’s loading time is very high so it takes a lot of time until Google Laugh shows how the funny percentage of your joke. I also tried to write some short jokes but it seems like the service gives a higher rank for larger jokes because it analyzes more certain words.

AMD’s RD790 Is on Its Way

2007-01-10T16:51:00.000+05:30

More details about AMD’s upcoming RD790 chipset started to emerge on various websites this week. As some of you know, the RD790 is the successor to AMD’s previous 580X chipset (also known as CrossFire Xpress 3200). RD790 will only have a new northbridge since it will be paired with the existing SB600 southbridge.

The first news related to RD790 is that AMD has decided to install 42 PCI Express lanes. Thirty-two of them are available to two PCIE x16 slots for CrossFire operation and according to AMD, will be compatible with PCIE 2.0 standard.

Ten PCIE lanes will remain for the rest of PCIE x1, x2, x4 slots and integrated PCIe devices but only 6 of them will be used for the PCIE bridges while the remaining 4 will interconnect the southbridge. RD790 has also been tuned to support HyperTransport 3.0 and Socket AM2+. AMD has already started to ship reference boards to manufacturers. There are two boards available: Mako and Wahoo. Mako used the AM2/AM2+ socket while Wahoo will be AMD’s first 4x4 platform. Mako will use two full-speed PCIe x16 slots, one physical PCIe x16 slot (x4 electrically), one physical PCIe x4(2 lanes shared with Gigabit Ethernet and SATA) and one PCI slot.

Wahoo is the new 4x4 which will support 1207+ CPUs. Wahoo will feature a slightly different PCIe lane configuration with one full-speed PCIe x16 slot while the secondary slot can work in x8 or x16 mode. The third physical PCIe x16 will also work in x8 mode. Lastly, the motherboard will include one PCIe x1 and one PCI slot.

Yahoo Purchased Mybloglog.com

2007-01-10T16:42:00.000+05:30

Blogs are very popular nowadays because it allows owners to write articles, thoughts or some simple messages that can be read by anybody and commented by the entire community. As you may know, the most popular blog community on the internet is owned by Google that recently released the final version of the Blogger. It provides you multiple features that are meant to increase the functionality of the blog, such as the possibility to redirect your blog to your domain.

The rivalry between Google and Yahoo is known in the entire world. Because Google already owns the most popular blog service in the entire internet world, Yahoo decided that it’s the perfect time to buy a service that will create a social network.

Mybloglog.com is a service similar to Blogger, allowing users to host their own blogs and post a message, article or all kinds of messages offering to readers the possibility of making comments and rating the article. Forbes was the first company that announced the acquisition, saying that it seems like the transaction was made for approximately $10 million.

“The Internet portal has purchased Mybloglog.com, an Orlando, Fla.-based website that enables readers of web pages to leave information about themselves, building a social network among fans of such things as News Corp’s MySpace pages, commercial web publications, or personal weblogs, or blogs. Mybloglog also looks at reader behavior inside blogs, like what is being read and where readers go next, delivering information it can sell to web advertisers,” Forbes said.

The company’s chairman Scott Rafer said that Mybloglog.com currently owns 45.000 blogs with more than 33.000 registered users and 3 million readers every day. It’s obvious that Yahoo’s acquisition was quite smart, but the giant portal must organize and manage the company so that Mybloglog.com can challenge Blogger.

Samsung Mass Releases 16Gb Chips

2007-01-04T12:52:00.001+05:30

If you prefer the abbreviation, you can call them SSDs. The new memory chips made by Samsung bump the density of the previous NAND flash generation from 8 Gb to 16 Gb. In a 16 x 16 Gb configuration, future devices will reach the capacity of 32 GB. With some initial plans of launching the first SSDs in March 2006 being left in the dust, the actual launch date has been postponed to the time when Vista will come out. Furthermore Samsung has only recently received the Windows Hardware Qualification Lab (WHQL) for the SSD. As a result mass production of the 16 Gb chips is planned to ramp in the first part of 2007.

The manufacturer claims that its 1.8" and 2.5" SSDs could reach data read speeds of 57 MB/s and sustained write speeds of 32 MB/s, which is about twice as fast compared to a magnetic 1.8" hard disk drive. Actual tests have shown that Samsung’s SSDs cannot sustain the numbers that were claimed but they reach about 50MB/s in transfer mode. And that’s pretty good. Moreover, the SSD consumes only 0.9 watts under full load and that could translate into longer battery time.

But that’s not all. Actually, the SSDs have another 2 advantages on their side. First comes the fact that the access time is practically inexistent (typical for a flash device). And then there’s the fact that they can absorb a lot of shocks without taking any damage since there are no moving parts inside them. With the coming of Vista, Samsung plans to introduce small 2.5” SSDs (a 4GB model should come out in 2 weeks) which will work alongside normal drives and will support Vista’s ReadyBoost technology. You can imagine that this addition could shorten the boot times by 50% so I guess that SSDs will probably be a big hit in 2007.

A Robot to Study Antarctica's 6,000 m Depths

2007-01-04T12:46:00.000+05:30

It will deliver information about sediments and life at those chilling depths.

British researchers have now at their disposal a deep-diving remote operated vehicle (ROV) which will reveal for the first time the mysteries of the Antarctic from 6.5km (four miles) depth.

Isis will offer details about the effects of glaciers on the ocean floor and will spot the animals that inhabit these waters in a three weeks mission starting in mid-January. Isis will be placed on the British Antarctic Survey's ship, the RSS James Clark Ross, and it will explore the Marguerite Bay area on the west side of the Antarctic Peninsula.

The submarine vessel, based at the National Oceanography Centre (NOC), Southampton, was designed in the US in collaboration with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) and is inspired by the WHOI's Jason II ROV. “Isis was built to withstand enormous pressure,” explained Peter Mason, the Isis project manager at NOC.

Its measurements: 2.7m (9ft) length, 2m (6.5ft) high and 1.5m (5ft) wide, and weighs about 3,000kg (6,600lb); 10 kilometres of cable connect it to its "mother ship"; this way the scientists control the vehicle and receive the collected data in real-time. “On the ROV were lights, cameras to produce high-quality video and still pictures, sonars for acoustic navigation and imaging, and two remotely controlled manipulator arms to collect samples or place scientific instruments on the sea-bed”, said Mason.

“Isis also had extra capacity to carry a range of scientific tools, such as borers, nets etc, so that scientists could tailor the vehicle to their research needs.”

Isis will make a detailed investigation of the sea-floor sediments, which have been delivered to Marguerite Bay by the massive ice-sheets that covered the bay during the last glaciation, about 20,000 years ago, in order to better understand the past glacial activity in the Antarctic. "The environmental history of the Antarctic is held in these sediments," said professor Julian Dowdeswell, director of the Scott Polar Research Institute at the University of Cambridge. "Using the ROV, we can look at the sea-floor and its sub-surface structure on a very detailed scale."

Professor Paul Tyler, a deep-sea biologist at NOC, said: "I'm interested in the effects of glaciers on the sea-bed and how this affects the fauna - the animals. I'm also interested in how the animal life in Antarctica changes as one goes deeper and deeper into the water. Using the real-time imagery from the ROV, we will be able to look at what is happening as it happens, helping us to answer questions such as why some creatures exist at one depth and not another.”

"We are hoping to see a whole bunch of large creatures such as star fish, sea cucumbers, sea fans, sea pens, etc, that inhabit the deep shelf slope and abyssal depths."

"Essentially no-one has explored Antarctica using a ROV at these depths."

Next Isis mission will be on the deep-sea floor off the Portuguese coast.

Image credit: National Oceanography Centre, Southampton

Must read leave letters ------ TOO GOOD

2007-01-02T18:28:00.000+05:30

This is a collection of leave letters and applications written by people in various places of India...

1. Infosys, Bangalore: An employee applied for leave as follows:
Since I have to go to my village to sell my land along with my wife, please sanction me one-week leave.

2. This is from Oracle Bangalore: >From an employee who was performing the "mundan" ceremony of his 10 year old son: "as I want to shave my son's head, please leave me for two days.."

3. Another gem from CDAC. Leave-letter from an employee who was performing his daughter's wedding: "as I am marrying my daughter, please grant a week's leave.."

4. From H.A.L. Administration dept:
"As my mother-in-law has expired and I am only one responsible for it,please grant me 10 days leave."

5. Another employee applied for half day leave as follows:
"Since I've to go to the cremation ground at 10 o-clock and I may not return, please grant me half day casual leave"

6. An incident of a leave letter
"I am suffering from fever, please declare one day holiday."

7. A leave letter to the headmaster:
"As I am studying in this school I am suffering from headache. I request you to leave me today"

8. Another leave letter written to the headmaster:
"As my headache is paining, please grant me leave for the day."

9. Covering note:
"I am enclosed herewith..."

10. Another one:
"Dear Sir: with reference to the above, please refer to my below..."

11. Actual letter written for application of leave:
"My wife is suffering from sickness and as I am her only husband at home I may be granted leave".

12. Letter writing: -
"I am in well here and hope you are also in the same well."

13. A candidate's job application:
"This has reference to your advertisement calling for a ' Typist and an Accountant - Male or Female'... As I am both(!! )for the past several years and I can handle both with good experience, I am applying for the post.

One more to add on to laughter

leave application wriiten by an employee to his boss.
"I am suffering from health, fever came to me, leave me today" Your's Feverly

Windows Vista Activation Crack

2006-12-28T18:03:00.000+05:30

Hacking the Windows Vista activation process is the latest trend in cracking procedures for the Microsoft operating system. Just today I distinguished yet another crack method that stands up from the amorphous mass of hacks, cracks, workarounds and tricks designed to circumvent, disable, skip, postpone or mirror the Windows Vista activation. From the “frankenbuild” crack to a spoofed online KMS server and to a local KMS server, the activation hacks aim to extend, rearm or copy the genuine Windows Vista activation process.

The latest crack method involves permanently stopping the countdown timer integrated in the operating system. Microsoft delivers Vista as a fully functional product for a 30 day trial period. Following that, an inactivated operating system will go into reduced functionality mode.

“The Time Stop Vista test crack works on all 32-bit x86 Windows Vista edition such as Vista Ultimate and Vista Home Premium. Success rate in 64-bit (x64) environment is likely to be low. The crack will make the time left to activate Vista to become always 43200 minutes (30 days), and will not countdown or reduce,” reads a fragment of the crack.

Unlike other alternatives, this activation crack does not require the user to introduce a product key. “It’s possible to access Windows Update if you install Windows Vista with default product key (no product key entered when installation). During the first 3 days of activation grace period after installing Windows Vista, Microsoft has designed it in such a way that Vista will allow greatest flexibility for users to install required drivers and application during this period, so Vista won’t prompt any reminder message for activation. After crack, Vista OS will always run with 30 days left for activation, thus there will not be any watermark or reminder to activate,” is further explained in the crack.

According to the Time Stop Vista activation crack, the method will bypass Windows Genuine Advantage validation, because Microsoft will not be able to differentiate between genuine inactivated copies of Vista and those that have been cracked.

Core 2 Duos Will Hit 3GHz

2006-12-26T17:45:00.000+05:30

I love the end of the year. And it’s not just about presents. Ok, actually it is. But the word “presents” could mean a lot of things. For example, INTEL has just published its latest roadmap and it features a 3GHz 1333FSB Conroe on top of the list. Now how about that for a present?

The roadmap also holds some surprises. Core 2 Duo E6390 is gone and so is the E6650. Actually, the later has been renamed, INTEL decided to call its newest CPU Core 2 Duo E6550. Aside from the naming changes it still has a 1333 MHz front-side bus and the clock is the same 2.33 GHz. The 3GHz top of the line CPU (E6850) still holds the number one position in this roadmap. For now.

New to this roadmap are Intel Core 2 Duo E6420 and E6320 processors that come clocked at 2.13 GHz and 1.86 GHz like the Core 2 Duo E6400 and E6300. However, the Core 2 Duo E6420 and E6320 spot 4MB of L2 cache instead of the 2MB found on their oldest brothers. The two processors are expected to come out in the 2nd quarter of 2007. Pricing for the Core 2 Duo E6420 and E6320 will be set at $183 and $163.

The roadmap also contains information regarding the value Core 2 Duo E4x00 series. The Core 2 Duo 4400 and 4200 were going to replace older NetBurst parts. However it seems that the Core 2 Duo E4200 has left the building. Instead of the Core 2 Duo E4200 is a new E4300 clocked at 1.8 GHz on an 800 MHz FSB. It’s expected to enter the market in January with a price tag starting at $163. The price will probably go down ($113) after the launch in order to keep the product from competing with the faster E6300/6320 and later with E4400.

The Core 2 Duo E4400 is the fastest CPU to feature the 800MHz FSB. It is expected to arrive later in 2007 and it will have a 2.0 GHz clock speed. The price will be $133 in 1,000 unit quantities.

Google-Partnered Dell Laptop

2006-12-26T17:42:00.000+05:30

Google is a company that is continuously developing software solutions, but the search giant never got involved into the developing process of hardware products.

Google Blogoscoped reported that Kirby Witmer sent to the company a screenshot that represents a Google-partnered Dell laptop. The user said he started the computer for the first time after the acquisition and he was redirected to a start-up image that mentioned the laptop was built in partnership with Google.

The computer also had multiple solutions provided by the search engine giant like Google Desktop with its Sidebar as well as the Google Toolbar, a browser add-on that allows users to visit websites being protected by a pop-up blocker and other useful utilities.

“The splash screen reads “Welcome to your new Dell PC – in partnership with Google” and lists “several useful Google products that come pre-installed on this computer”, including Google Desktop, Dell’s personalized Google homepage, and the Google Toolbar. As Kirby’s screenshot shows, the Windows taskbar has a little “Search with Google” box (courtesy of the Google Desktop program),” Google Blogoscoped said.

It is the first time when Google is involved in such activities but you cannot name the search engine giant as a hardware manufacturer company because the screenshot shows us that Google provided only software solutions for the Dell laptops.

I can’t say if every owner of a brand new Dell laptop finds all these Google software solutions useful because most of them are installing only the programs that coincide with their need.

Personally, I would like to be able to install my favorite applications, without preinstalled software coming from the companies that made partnerships with the laptop provider. You can view the screenshot published by Google Blogoscoped posted at the end of this article.

2006-12-23T19:51:00.000+05:30

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL OF U.

Click on the link to get Christmas Wishes in 350 differant languages.

http://www.flw.com/merry.htm

An Insight on Microsoft Product Codenames

2006-12-23T19:32:00.000+05:30

The key to understanding Microsoft product codenames is to accept that they are built on a content of ambiguity. The use of codenames has a superficial impact both on the actual product and the perception of the public in relation to that product. “We use code names because plans change. Code names are a "bucket" we can fill with meaning over time. At some point, when the release becomes concrete enough, we give the product a name and announce it,” revealed Brian Keller, a Technical Evangelist for Microsoft Visual Studio Team System.

Keller additionally gave an insight on the codenames associated with the Microsoft Visual Studio line. Everett, Whidbey, Orcas and Rosario are all code names that the Microsoft Visual Studio Team used in correlation with the various editions of Visual Studio.

“For the past several years we've been using north west locations as code names. The pattern is that with each release the location gets further from Seattle (not sure why we decided to do that but that's the pattern). Everett (the code name for VS2003) is a city just North of Seattle - there's a big Naval base there: aircraft carriers, the works, pretty cool. We really didn't have much of a code name for VS2002 - I can't actually remember why, we just referred to it as VS.NET. After Everett, came Whidbey (VS2005 and an island just off the coast north of seattle) and now we are working on Orcas (another island a bit further north west),” added Keller.

Rosario is the latest addition to the Visual Studio codename family, and also a resort on Orcas Island. Rosario refers to the Visual Studio version that will follow Orcas. “We created the Rosario code name to describe some work that we (VSTS) really want to get done and doesn't fit in the Orcas release. In a sense Rosario is a place holder code name. As Orcas unfolds and the rest of the division turns their attention to what is next for them too, we may see changes in what we currently believe our Rosario plan is. For now we'll plow ahead with what we think we are doing,” explained Keller.

Dell Laptops Can Catch Fire

2006-12-23T19:29:00.000+05:30

It seems that the “Sony Incident” has a really nasty habit of repeating itself. While in NEC’s case the issue was related to some faulty PSUs, it seems that Dell has some problems too. And this time, it’s all about the batteries again. On one of its websites, Dell warns of a having "potential issue" with some of its Latitude, Inspiron, Precision and XPS notebook batteries. The notebook batteries have Sony cells and that says it all. The following words come directly from their website:

Dell has identified a potential issue associated with certain batteries sold with Dell Latitude™, Inspiron™, XPS™ and Dell Precision Mobile Workstation™ notebook computers. In cooperation with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission and other regulatory agencies, Dell is voluntarily recalling certain Dell-branded batteries with cells manufactured by Sony and offering free replacements for these batteries. Under rare conditions, it is possible for these batteries to overheat, which could pose a risk of fire.

Potentially affected batteries were sold with the following models of Dell notebook computers or separately as secondary batteries:

Latitude: D410, D500, D505, D510, D520, D600, D610, D620, D800, D810
Inspiron: 500M, 510M, 600M, 700M, 710M, 6000, 6400, 8500, 8600, 9100, 9200, 9300, 9400, E1505, E1705
Precision: M20, M60, M70, M90
XPS: XPS, XPS Gen2, XPS M170, XPS M1710

In addition, these batteries MAY have also been provided in response to service calls. The batteries were shipped to customers between April 1, 2004 and July 18, 2006. The words "DELL" and "Made in Japan" or "Made in China" or "Battery cell made in Japan, Assembled in China" or "Assembled in Taiwan" are printed on the back of the batteries.

So, in case you have a laptop with Sony LiIon cells, make sure that you send back the battery to Dell. The replacement is free of charge and you’ll end up with a brand new one.

What Can You Do If Someone Is Pretending to Be You on Yahoo

2006-12-23T19:26:00.000+05:30

Yahoo is probably the largest online community with millions of users registered for multiple services such as Messenger, Mail or Yahoo Personal. No matter the service you use, Yahoo’s database is huge containing an enormous amount of details.

Because of the number of the accounts created by its users, Yahoo is receiving periodically complaints sent by different persons that sustain their usernames were stolen or somebody else is using their accounts.

The company tries to resolve every issue and to help the user but sometimes this is impossible because the user cannot prove he owns a specific account. To avoid these situations and to inform you about the ways for resolving these issues, Yahoo wrote an entire chapter in its documentation.

“Yahoo! has many members worldwide, and due to the popularity of certain aliases, similar subscriber IDs are occasionally created. However, if you feel that someone is impersonating you, please cite specific examples where that person makes representations that he or she is actually you. With this information, we can investigate the situation further and take the appropriate action as determined by our Terms of Service,” Yahoo says.

“If that person is using Yahoo! Message Boards, please use our reporting form and also include examples of your posts on the board. When citing these examples, please make sure to include the name and/or URL of the message board, message board post number(s), and Yahoo! ID of the person you feel is harassing you,” the company said about the Yahoo Message Boards Service.

The giant portal also offered help for Yahoo Mail issues, allowing you to report incidents when you’re suspecting some for stealing your identity or misrepresenting himself or herself as you in an email sent via Yahoo! Mail. You are able to use an incident form that will require you information about contact methods and the abuse you want to report.

Sony outsources IT development to India

2006-12-20T13:22:00.000+05:30

Sony Europe is outsourcing several of its core IT development functions to India-based Satyam Computer Services.

Satyam announced on Wednesday that SAP application development, enterprise application integration and testing services for the European wing of the Japanese electronics giant will be carried out at the Indian outsourcer's new offshore-development center (ODC) in Bangalore.

According to Satyam, the move will "enable the Sony Infrastructure Services team to focus on core activities such as platform enhancement, optimization and innovation" while Satyam handles IT development for Sony sales and distribution, warehouse management, finance and business intelligence systems.

Satyam's European vice president, Som Sarma, said on Thursday that the company had been "setting up development centers for companies of Sony's stature for several years," citing as an example a deal struck seven years ago with General Electric.

Sarma called the Sony deal a "milestone" for ODCs. "The fact that Sony has decided to go ahead with an investment inside Satyam shows the maturity of offering such a service at such a high level," he said. He added that the center was expected to employ between 55 and 80 staff by the end of the financial year.

"The larger the ODC gets, the more (cost) benefits the company gets from a risk management on the people perspective," Sarma said, adding that a growing ODC operation would mean that Sony "would not feel the pinch" if a staff member leaves.

Sony has had a poor year financially, largely caused by the delayed release of the PlayStation 3 console and the hugely expensive recall of millions of computer batteries after some caught fire.

A Sony representative told ZDNet UK on Friday that the Satyam deal is "not something that Sony wants to comment on."

Tata Motors & Thonburi of Thailand set up joint venture in Thailand

2006-12-20T13:16:00.000+05:30

Tata Motors, India’s largest automobile company, and Thonburi Automotive Assembly Plant Co. (Thonburi), the Thailand-based independent assembler of automobiles, today announced formation of a joint venture company in Thailand to manufacture, assemble and market pickup trucks.

The joint venture agreement was signed today by the Managing Director of Tata Motors, Mr. Ravi Kant, and the Managing Director of Thonburi, Mr. Robru Viriyaphant.

The joint venture, in which Tata Motors will hold 70% of the equity and Thonburi 30%, will get vehicles manufactured in Thonburi’s manufacturing facility. It will go on stream in a year’s time.

The joint venture will facilitate Tata Motors address the Thailand market, the second largest pickup market in the world after the US. Both partners will jointly manage the operation. The pickup trucks will conform to international standards in quality and safety, and will be marketed in Thailand and exported to other potential markets in the region.

The Chairman of Tata Motors, Mr. Ratan N. Tata, said, “Introduction of Tata Motors pickup vehicles and a manufacturing facility in Thailand provide a unique opportunity to the company. We believe the joint venture will make meaningful impact in this most competitive market for pickup vehicles.”

The Managing Director of Thonburi, Mr. Robru Viriyaphant, said, “The cooperation with Tata Motors offers Thonburi the opportunity to expand our business portfolio. Tata vehicles have dominated the Indian commercial vehicle market for decades and the company is now aiming for a stronger presence internationally. We are proud to be a part of this expansion strategy because of our great confidence in Tata products and technology. The new pickup truck will be the right product for both domestic and export markets.”

About Tata Motors
Tata Motors is India's largest automobile company, with revenues of US$ 5.5 billion in 2005-06. With over 4 million Tata vehicles plying in India, it is the leader in commercial vehicles and the second largest in passenger vehicles. It is also the world's fifth largest medium and heavy truck manufacturer and the second largest heavy bus manufacturer. Tata cars, buses and trucks are being marketed in several countries in Europe, Africa, the Middle East, South Asia, South East Asia and in Australia. Tata Motors and Fiat Auto have formed an industrial joint venture in India to manufacture passenger cars, engines and transmissions for the Indian and overseas markets. Tata Motors already distributes Fiat-branded cars in India. The company’s international footprint include Tata Daewoo Commercial Vehicle Co. Ltd. in South Korea; Hispano Carrocera, the reputed bus and coach manufacturer of Spain in which the company has a 21% stake; and a joint venture with Marcopolo, the Brazil-based body-builder of buses and coaches. Tata Motors has research centres in India, the UK, and in its subsidiary and associate companies in South Korea and Spain.

About Thonburi Group
Thonburi established its first automotive operation in 1941. Thonburi is one of the largest independent assemblers in Thailand, and currently assembles passenger cars for Mercedes Benz. They produced 4,150 passenger cars and 250 buses in 2005 with net revenues of US$208 million. The group has over 2,000 employees. The Thonburi Group has served the Thai automotive market as importer, distributor, retailer, assembler, body builder, mass transportation service provider and supplier and contractor for military vehicles. The group also has businesses in insurance, vehicle leasing and financial services. Thonburi is dedicated to build and maintain cultural heritage projects for the preservation of Thai culture, traditions and architecture.

China sheds light on 3G rollout, shares leap

2006-12-20T13:15:00.000+05:30

China may dish out its first 3G license as early as this month, a senior industry executive said on Tuesday, as shares of China Telecom and Netcom soared on hopes that Beijing would finally take the leap after three years of false starts.

Until Tuesday, officials and executives had shed little light on Beijing's time frame or technology of choice for rolling out the country's first third-generation telecommunications network--which allows blazing Internet speeds and streaming video--beyond saying it would come "soon."

But on Tuesday, China Netcom--the smaller of the country's two fixed-line operators--told reporters at the ITU Telecom World 2006 in Hong Kong that it expected to win a 3G license in December or the first quarter of 2007.

That renewed speculation Beijing was--after years of delays--on the brink of a nationwide 3G rollout.

Wang Xudong, who heads the Ministry of Information Industry, was quoted as saying in the China Daily on Tuesday that the government might issue long-awaited 3G mobile licenses "very soon."

Netcom Chief Executive Zuo Xunsheng told reporters the firm would have no technical difficulties rolling out a network based on TD-SCDMA--China's unique, domestically developed 3G technology--if granted a license.

He added he was sure larger fixed-line rival China Telecom would also secure a mobile 3G license.

"We will definitely get a mobile license. The quickest is by the end of the year, or next year's first quarter," Zuo said.

Expectations that the country's two big fixed-line operators could be the first to start a 3G wireless business in China sent stock in the larger of the two, China Telecom, up by 15.6 percent to close at 4.01 Hong Kong dollars (about 52 cents). Netcom saw its shares finish up 8.5 percent, at 16.16 Hong Kong dollars (about .09).

Both beat a 2.12 percent gain in the index for Chinese companies listed in Hong Kong. China Telecom's value swelled by .62 billion, while Netcom's market value expanded .1 billion on the day.

"The fixed lines will get 3G first to compensate for their limitations in the past," said Steve Cheng, associate director at Shenyin Wanguo.

"They're way behind China Mobile," he added, referring to the world's largest cellular carrier, an investor favorite.

The fixed-line carriers are likely to get the 3G license as analysts believe the government wants to level the playing field and offer them growth prospects.

Microsoft Updates to Stop Vista Piracy

2006-12-19T12:42:00.000+05:30

The Redmond Company is taking action against the windows Vista piracy phenomenon. In this context, Microsoft has announced the release of an update designed to counteract a fully functional workaround to activating Windows Vista. A member of the Windows Genuine Advantage team admitted that the Redmond Company has been analyzing a number of different workaround attempts to activate Windows Vista. Out of them, the WGA team narrowed the number of functional workarounds to only two.

“One of these workarounds we have affectionately named "frankenbuild" because it involves cobbling together files from an RC build and with an RTM build to create a hybrid that bypasses activation. The other workaround involves the use of some virtualization technology and our practices for activating larger business customers,” stated the WGA team representative.

The update released by Microsoft will only affect the pirated copies of Windows Vista that have been activated via the "frankenbuild" method. As of yet, activating business versions of the operating system through spoofed KMS servers will still be functional.

“Piracy is evolving and has made the expected jump from Windows XP to Windows Vista,” commented David Lazar, director of Genuine Windows. “We are already starting to see some workarounds to the Vista licensing requirements. The update that we are releasing today does not specifically address that, but we are working on an update that will specifically address the KMS workaround.”

“For me, it's an interesting moment. We've been investing a lot of resources into continuously evolving our approach to piracy. One of the key "pillars" we focus on is what we call the Engineering pillar - this is essentially the body of work that shows up in the products themselves (as opposed to policy or education efforts). With the release of Windows Vista we're putting into place a number of new anti-piracy innovations. And with these first work arounds we're getting to see those innovations in action,” added the WGA representative.

Via the Windows Update client, the "frankenbuild" activated copies of Windows Vista will be forced into a validation check. Microsoft informed that it has already blocked the release candidate keys for unauthorized systems and that consequently the frankenbuild Vista copies will fail validation and lose certain capabilities and functionality. Following a 30 days period, the operating system will be moved into reduced functionality mode.

“If they don't produce a new product key within 30 days, they will then only be able to access their system in what we call reduced functionality mode - a mode which limits their use to one hour with their default web browser. I want to be clear here that even though they can only use their browser for an hour, we will never limit their access to their data. A user can always -boot their PC into what is called Safe Mode. Safe Mode is a mode of using Windows that has limited driver, display and networking support - but allows a user access to all their files,” concluded the WGA representative.

Vista Is the Last Windows

2006-12-19T12:41:00.000+05:30

Will Microsoft say hasta la Vista to other operating systems with the release of Windows Vista? Yes. Yes, at least according to a prediction of market analysis company Gartner. Gartner produced the forecast that Windows Vista will be the last major release of a Microsoft operating system.

In fact, the prediction is tailor fitted on the Microsoft's plans for future releases of the operating system. Representatives from the Redmond Company, starting with CEO Steve Ballmer and Chairman Bill Gates have revealed - while Windows Vista was still in its development stage - that the five year gap from XP to Vista will be a singular event in the company's history.

But Vista will by no means be the last edition of the Windows operating system. In fact, the upcoming variant of the OS is codenamed Windows Fiji and it’s a pit stop toward Windows Vienna.

Gartner's prediction is focused on the monolithic deployments of the Microsoft operating systems. In this regard, Microsoft will reveal incremental updates to the operating system. According to Gartner, Microsoft will gear its process involving the development and release of operating systems toward a modular strategy.

Introducing flexibility in the updating process of the operating system is synonymous with the making Windows Vista the Everest of operating system releases, considering that Vista features in excess of 50 million lines of computer code.

The Windows development organization, headed by Steven Sinofsky, Senior Vice President, Windows and Windows Live Engineering, Microsoft will introduce more segmented upgrades to the operating systems. Windows Vista Release candidate 1 is planned for availability by the end of 2007. The next release of the operating system, be it Windows Fiji or Windows Vienna, is planned for 2008.

A Worm in ur Yahoo mail.

2006-12-15T17:14:00.000+05:30

Hi friends, these daz if u have check your bulk messages if yahoo then u would find some mails with attachment of format .PIF
Its a worm Its description is When W32.Sality.U is executed, it performs the following actions:

Drops the following file:

%System%vcmgcd32.dll (Detected as W32.HLLP.Sality)

Note: %System% is a variable that refers to the System folder. By default this is C:WindowsSystem (Windows 95/98/Me), C:WinntSystem32 (Windows NT/2000), or C:WindowsSystem32 (Windows XP).

Appends the following lines to the file %Windir%System.ini:

[MCIDRV_VER&rsq
b;
DEVICE=[RANDOM_
NUMBER]

Note: %Windir% is a variable that refers to the Windows installation folder. By default, this is C:Windows or C:Winnt.

Injects this .dll file into all running processes.

Resides in memory and infects all portable executable files it finds.

Microsoft to Release Modular Operating Systems

2006-12-15T16:46:00.000+05:30

The key word in the titles is modular. When thinking of a Microsoft modular operating system you have to think about a software that is at the opposite pole of Windows Vista. While Vista is a mononolithic OS, the forthcoming operating systems from the Redmond Company will be modular in nature.

Recently, Gartner predicted that Windows Vista will be the last Windows release of this magnitude and that the Redmond Company will shift its operating system strategy toward incremental upgrades and flexible updates.

Confirming Gartner's prediction, Microsoft has filed for a patent with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for a modular operating system. The title of Microsoft's patent applications is “System and method for delivery of a modular operating system.” A Microsoft modular operating system will make Windows Vista with in excess of 50 million lines of code, the last of its kind.

“An operating system and method for use include a core function module, or basic kernel, providing fundamental operating system support and one or more add-on modules that allow customization of the operating system as desired. Add-on modules may provide support or extended capability to the computer including hardware, applications, peripherals, and support. A digital signature may be used to confirm the integrity of an add-on module prior to installation. Certification may be verified to determine if installation of the add-on module is authorized. By withholding certification, a service provider may manage illegal or undesired modifications to a provided computer. Digital rights management may be used to enforce terms of use of the add-on module in keeping with licensing arrangements,” reads an excerpt from Microsoft's patent.

Instead of releasing a complete operating system, Microsoft will fragment the product, delivering a universal and basic core OS, and allowing the users to built upon the nucleus OS with additional operating system segments. In this manner, users will be enabled to buy the fundamental Windows Modular operating system and then add components, capabilities, features, each fragment with its own price tag and license.

Need For Speed Carbon Still Can't Get Passed FIFA 07

2006-12-13T13:23:00.000+05:30

Is FIFA 07 that good? Why is it the best selling title for two weeks running? NFS Carbon can't get passed it, not to mention PES 6 or Call of Duty 3.

The first two in the best-selling game titles classification are FIFA 07, followed by Need For Speed Carbon for the second week running. Both games are produced and developed by EA, so I guess it’s safe to say that EA is boasting and rubbing it
into Konami's face. I mentioned Konami because they also have a title in the top
three, Pro Evolution Soccer 6 to be exact.

PES switched places with Call of Duty 3, as PES was last week at number 4, position now secured by Activion's shooter. A new entry in this classification is Nintendo's The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, which has managed to squeeze in front of The Sims 2: Pets.
WWE Smackdown vs Raw 2007 trails behind The Sims, and surprisingly as it may seem, Gears of War is only on the 8th position, after last week secured the 6th spot.

Closing the top ten are Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy, at number 9 and Happy Feet on the 10th spot of the classification. Another surprise is Ubisoft's Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas which has disappointed in sales, securing only a shameful 11th spot. Last week it was at number 9, but that is still low for such a long-awaited and much praised title.

Nintendogs: Dalmatian and friends is also present in this classification but I can't find Pokemon anywhere. That's a shame!!

MSN Is Unsafe

2006-12-12T13:03:00.001+05:30

MSN is a search engine that has a high level of risk associated with the returned search results, according to data from McAfee. The Santa Clara-based security company has updated its study of search engine safety dating from May 2006. The McAfee study reveals that Yahoo returns the largest volume of dangerous results and that MSN is a close second.

“The investigation, conducted by McAfee SiteAdvisorTM, studied the five major U.S. search engines (Google, Yahoo!, MSN, AOL, Ask) and found that the overall chance of clicking through to a risky site declined by 12.0%. Still, McAfee estimates that consumers click through to risky sites more than 268 million times each month. The study was co-authored by Ben Edelman, noted spyware researcher and an advisor to McAfee,” stated the security company in a press release.

While 5.1% of the results returned by Yahoo put its users at risk, MSN reveals 4.6% of unsafe results to searches. Google and Ask.com each return a 4.2% risky results, while AOL is the safest search engine with only 3.6% unsafe results. The unsafe results refer to websites that have failed SiteAdvisor's safety tests, by distributing adware, spam and other items of malicious code, as well as sites that engage in various practices that can be interpreted as malicious in nature from sending a high amount of non-spam emails, to displaying popup ads and to asking the users to alter the browser settings.

“It's good to see that clicking on search engine results has gotten modestly safer,” said Chris Dixon, director of strategy, McAfee SiteAdvisor. “But when almost one of 12 sponsored links still clicks through to a risky site, there remains significant room for continued improvement.”

With this report, McAfee delivers a blow to an already down MSN search. Microsoft's search services have been losing their grip on the search market, and MSN/Live Search is down to a share of 8.8%. The conclusion that Microsoft's delivers unsafe searches in a proportion of 4.6%, putting users at risk will not help Microsoft to regain the lost search customer base.

Motorstorm Developer Looking Towards PlayStation 4

2006-12-12T13:01:00.000+05:30

I know that you are waiting for PS3 Motorstorm to be released, but the game's developer, Evolution Studios, is l ooking more towards the PlayStation 4.

Chief Executive Martin Kenwright believes that is important to look ahead and reveals in a GamesIndustry.biz interview that Motorstorm plans for the future. He says that the market place will be changing beyond recognition in the next five years.

Kenwright explains that people are looking at the PS3 right now, but as his company wants to stay ahead of the game, they are already thinking about the PS4. Another subject he tackles is video game sequels. Kenwright says that sequels are the bane of the game industry. If one game is good, then gamers expect ten more like it. In his opinion, this is harming the marketplace irreparably.

Then, he complains that publishers are risk averse and don't want to collaborate with small video games developers. He adds that things are going to change and that the future will see a much more creative partnership between game developers and publishers.

Kenwright concluded by saying that people are waking up now to the fact that sequels are actually high risk rather than low risk. Frankly, I would have liked to find out more about Motorstorm from this interview and not some developer's mumbo-jumbo.

Microsoft Didn't Create “Zune”

2006-12-12T12:54:00.000+05:30

Zune is on everyone's lips these days, be it in a context of criticism or... Let's be fair, there is no or. But who do we have to give credit to for coming up with the name? Surprisingly enough, not Microsoft. If it would have been up to them, Zune would have been called Portable Windows Media Player, or something else equally dull and with corporate nuances.

Actually, the person that created the name isn't getting any credit at all. The Zune name originated within Lexicon Branding, a Sausalito-based branding company. BlackBerry, Pentium, PowerBook, and OnStar are among their impressive creations.

“The creative strategy was quite simple: Don't try to be like iPod or to beat iPod. Instead, create a new word that will help Microsoft to create a distinct personality,” revealed David Placek, founder and CEO of Lexicon.

Three Lexicon teams, two people each were put to work on designing a brand identity for Microsoft's portable player. Two of the teams worked under the presumption that they were creating names for a Sony player and an MTV broadband experience while only one knew that Microsoft was behind the project.

“Additionally, the Lexicon Research Network of 60 Ph.D. linguists in 39 countries was tapped to provide insights into the latest brands in music and video entertainment and to give us suggestions as to words, word parts, sounds and metaphors that might be applied to a next generation entertainment system,” Placek added.

Microsoft Unveils XNA Game Studio Express

2006-12-12T12:40:00.000+05:30

Under the slogan “Your World. Your Game”, the Redmond Company announced the immediate availability for download of the XNA Game Studio Express 1.0. Together with the XNA Game Studio Express, Microsoft unveiled the XNA Creators Club that can be accessed via a $49 four-month subscription or via a 99$ annual subscription from Xbox Live Marketplace.

“The XNA Creators Club is really the first of its kind — an opportunity to join a community of other developers who are empowered to bring their game ideas to life on a next-generation console system,” said Chris Satchell, general manager of the Game Developer Group at Microsoft. “When it comes to encouraging development on XNA Game Studio Express and through the XNA Creators Club, the limits are truly endless. What users will see today is just the beginning of the plans we have to revolutionize game development one creative game idea at a time.”

The XNA Game Studio Express is a free download based on the Visual C# 2005 Express Edition and Microsoft .NET Compact Framework. The Microsoft XNA Game Studio Express is designed to deliver a video game deployment platform to the general public.“Xbox Live Arcade has opened up a wealth of new publishing opportunities for established and independent developers alike, so it made perfect sense to also extend this privilege to hobbyists and amateur programmers,” said Greg Canessa, group manager of Xbox Live Arcade at Microsoft. “We have a tremendous opportunity to shine the spotlight on up-and-coming talent through the ‘Dream-Build-Play’ contest, and we can’t wait to share their creativity with our gaming community around the world.”

Orkut: The new danger

2006-12-09T19:26:00.000+05:30

Orkut, the online portal, owned by Google finds itself at the centre of debate. A nineteen-year-old student has been accused of making a fake account of a girl. Can we prevent the misuse of this technology by not posting our numbers and pictures?

ABHISHEK NEVER IMAGINED that the prank he played on his classmate would land him in jail. Abhishek, a management student and still in his teens, was arrested by the Thane police following a girl’s complaint about tarnishing her image in the public forum - Orkut. The report after being published in Mumbai Mirror has created a stir among the Orkutians and opened up a whole new box of debate.

The incident Abhishek had created a fake account in the name of the girl with her mobile number posted on the profile. The profile has been sketched in such a way that it draws lewd comments from many who visit her profile. The Thane Cyber Cell tracked down Abhishek from the false e-mail id that he made to open up the account.

The question In this case, the girl has not posted her picture or mobile number in the fake profile. A brief search in the Orkut profile will reveal many such profiles with pictures of beautiful girls. My guess is that many of these girls are not even aware of the fact that their profile exists. These are created by some other people. I will term this as “rape of the image”. Now the question is “Can we really prevent this rape?”

The debate The Mumbai Mirror’s report on the issue came with tips to the Orkut users. Police Sub-Inspector Ravindra Chauhan has been quoted as saying, “Orkut users should not put up their photographs on the site. They should not reveal personal information in their profile. Also no cellphone numbers or identity should be mentioned in the scrap book, as it is open to all.” But whether this really can be a way out, is debatable. “What about the hundreds of CVs I send to the unknown agencies everyday? They even contain my mobile number”, says Aditi, a DU student and a hardcore Orkut addict. She does have a point.

The truth is that in today’s world mobile numbers are far from being personal information. The proof lies in the numerous sales calls that we receive from credit card agents. On the issue of the photograph, Aditi says, “When Orkut gives an opportunity to show your face to the whole world, then why not?” When asked about the risks involved, she replied, “Who cares?” But everyone is not as carefree as Aditi. A brief search in Orkut once more will reveal profiles that have pictures of film stars, flowers, animals, sceneries and not the face of the owner. “I will never put my picture on Orkut profile,” says Mansi, whose profile in Orkut carries the picture of Aishwarya Rai. “It’s not safe, anybody and everybody can save it on their computer and can misuse it.” But here again the question lies - can we really prevent it? What happens to the hundreds of passport photographs we send with the application forms all our life? Any of them can be scanned and put up without our notice. Are we sure that all copies of the digital pictures taken at our local photography shop are deleted after we leave? “I don’t know, but there is no harm in being careful,” says Mansi.

So perhaps even in this age of globalisation and technical advancements we will hold ourselves from showing our face to the entire world for we never know who is misusing it in what way. And as the lawmakers say “We cannot do anything, until a complaint is lodged”.

U.S. warns of possible Qaida financial cyber attack

2006-12-09T19:22:00.000+05:30

The U.S. government warned American private financial services on Thursday of an al-Qaida call for a cyber attack against online stock trading and banking Web sites beginning on Friday, a source said.

The source, a person familiar with the warning, said the Islamic militant group aimed to penetrate and destroy the databases of the U.S. financial sites. The Department of Homeland Security confirmed an alert had been distributed but said there was no reason to believe the threat was credible.

The U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team issued a "situational awareness report to industry stakeholders," said Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke. The warning said the threat called for attacks to begin Friday and run through the month of December in retaliation for the United States keeping terrorism suspects at the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba.

"Denial of service is what it called for," said a Homeland Security official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

A person familiar with the warning said the threat came from a group calling itself "ANHIAR al-Dollar." The effort was related to al-Qaida and intended to avenge "Muslim brothers in the crusaders' Guantanamo prison camp," the source said. Reaction in the financial community was muted, with markets showing little or no reaction New York Republican Rep. Peter King, chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Homeland Security, said the report was "nothing to panic over, but it will be looked at very carefully."

Robert Albertson, chief investment strategist at Sandler O'Neill & Partners in New York, said it was unlikely al Qaeda members could do serious harm to financial Web sites. "I'm not saying there aren't precautions to be taken, but I just can't fathom how there would be serious havoc," he added.

Brian Jenkins, a terrorism expert with the RAND Corp., said that such threats were not unusual. "There is a regular stream of Jihadist exhortations to attack various targets," he said. "Financial organizations stay at a fairly high level of readiness anyway because of regular assaults."

A government source said regulators were being briefed on the warning.

Google Wants Another Search Engine.

2006-12-07T12:34:00.000+05:30

Google is surely one of the most important companies on the Internet market. Probably, most of us identify Google as a search engine. And it is. But, what if Google would release another search engine to compete the first one? What would be the point of creating 2 products rather than a single and more powerful one?

As SearchEngineWatch, “Google's gained a new unbranded site called SearchMash where it plans to test user interface ideas without Google's brand somehow skewing the tests.”

If you visit the site, you’ll be able to read that “SearchMash lets you search the internet in new ways. It is constantly evolving as we come up with ideas and figure out what works and what doesn't. Check back here from time to time to see what has changed, and also to tell us which ones are useful to you. Please bear with us when the site is unavailable as we are limiting its use.”

“SearchMash is an experimental search site operated by Google. The goal of SearchMash is to test innovative user interfaces in order to continually improve the overall search experience for our users. The site does not include Google branding to help us gather more objective data about user response to new interfaces,” Google said.

So, why another search engine? “Google Labs continues to be a great site for Google to launch new products that may not be ready for prime time yet, frequently and quickly.

In this case, one of the important factors we wanted to address was the influence that may come from Google branding. Creating a separate site will help us gather more objective data about user response to new interfaces,” a company representative sustained.

Google to Expand into Africa.

2006-12-07T12:23:00.000+05:30

Google is one of that companies that are dreaming to conquer the world and have an office in every country of the world.Some time ago, the company announced new offices for Google News in Norway and Sweden, a service that tends to be more popular day by day.

Today, The Sydney Morning Herald said Google wants to acquire new companies in Portugal that will allow a quick expansion into Africa.

"We want to enter Africa, not through fixed-line Internet access but through mobile access. We think it would be easier if we worked with countries that work directly with these nations. It (the Portuguese market) is a small market, which can be good to test business models, something that is difficult to do in big markets," Google head of European corporate development Anil Hansjee told Portuguese daily Diario de Noticias on Monday.

The publication also mentioned one company that can represent the target for Google’s investments. “Portugal Telecom is the leading telecommunications and multimedia services provider in Portugal. Portugal Telecom is committed to generate and distribute shareholder value and remaining one of the most solid telecommunications operator in Europe,” is it mentioned on the official website.

“Former state monopoly Portugal Telecom has around four million mobile subscribers in Africa where it operates in former Portuguese colonies as well as Morocco,” The Sydney Morning Herald mentioned.

It looks like Google’s expansion is only a matter of time because the company already attracted a huge number of fans with its products. If you have a quick look into Google Groups, you’ll observe that there are a lot of users registered from Africa, so expect for a new Google domain soon.

Axis Communications sells its first networked cameras for use on buses, trains

2006-12-07T11:52:00.000+05:30

Axis Communications, a Swedish firm with its North American headquarters in Chelmsford, introduced today its first network camera designed for use in buses and rail vehicles.

The company said Stockholm Transport, a European bus operator, is the first customer to order the Axis 209FD-R network camera for its fleet of more than 2,000 buses. Stockholm Transport plans to install between five and six cameras in each bus, Axis said.

"Buses, trains and other transit vehicles are unique environments for surveillance because they are compact spaces that are constantly in motion," Axis Communications general manager Fredrik Nilsson said in a statement. "The Axis 209FD-R is specifically engineered to operate in these conditions, enabling transit authorities to provide better protection and security for drivers and passengers."

Lotus Sametime instant-messaging now connects with AOL, Google

2006-12-07T11:50:00.000+05:30

IBM Lotus Sametime instant-messaging customers can now communicate with users of AOL's AIM and Google Talk intant-messaging communities and soon with users of Yahoo Messenger, IBM said today.

Connecting those instant-messaging communities will enable Lotus Sametime users to send and receive instant messages with more than 157 million instant-messaging users worldwide, the company said.

"According to a recent survey global survey of CEO's conducted by IBM, executives worldwide believe that to achieve effective growth, they must communicate beyond corporate walls," Michael Rhodin, general manager of IBM Lotus, said in a statement. "IBM is the first major enterprise vendor to use computing standards to connect over 70 percent of the worldwide instant-messaging user base.

Semantic Web

2006-12-06T20:38:00.000+05:30

What Is The Semantic Web?

The Semantic Web is a mesh of information linked up in such a way as to be easily processable by machines, on a global scale. You can think of it as being an efficient way of representing data on the World Wide Web, or as a globally linked database.

The Semantic Web was thought up by Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the WWW, URIs, HTTP, and HTML. There is a dedicated team of people at the World Wide Web consortium (W3C) working to improve, extend and standardize the system, and many languages, publications, tools and so on have already been developed. However, Semantic Web technologies are still very much in their infancies, and although the future of the project in general appears to be bright, there seems to be little consensus about the likely direction and characteristics of the early Semantic Web.

HTML LINKS-(Refer for better Understanding than PDF's)

http://infomesh.net/2001/swintro/

http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/Semantic.html

PDF-

http://pc235.cs.cas.cz/semweb/download.php?file=06-01-linkova&type=pdf

http://www.uivt.cas.cz/semweb/download.php?file=06-01-rimnacm&type=pdf

Vista Pushed Back to 2007 Means Delaying Office 2007 and Restructuring the Company

2006-12-06T13:21:00.000+05:30

“Microsoft Corp. today announced a broad restructuring of its Platforms & Services Division (PSD) to better align existing Windows and MSN assets with Microsoft’s overall Live strategy, and to ensure the company delivers a full range of software-based services to consumers and businesses around the world.”

This is how the Redmond giant yesterday started its press release, in which it was announced the promotion of Steven Sinofsky, previously in charge of the Office suite, and famous for his ability to launch products on time. Obviously, this restructuring is the direct result of Windows Vista’s latest delay, which has generated a new wave of criticisms aimed at Microsoft.

The new PSD organization will be made up of eight new and existing groups: the Windows and Windows Live Group, led by Steven Sinofsky, senior vice president; the Windows Live Platform Group, led by Blake Irving, corporate vice president; the Online Business Group, led by David Cole, senior vice president; the Market Expansion Group, led by Will Poole, senior vice president; the Core Operating System Division (COSD), led by Brian Valentine, senior vice president; the Windows Client Marketing Group, led by Mike Sievert, corporate vice president; the Developer and Platform Evangelism Group, led by Sanjay Parthasarathy, corporate vice president; and the Server and Tools Business Group, led by Bob Muglia, senior vice president.

As previously announced, Jim Allchin, co-president of PSD, will retire next year. Until then, Allchin and Johnson will continue to manage the division in partnership and Allchin will work closely with Valentine to deliver Windows Vista later this year. Sinofsky assumes responsibility for process and planning of future versions of Windows.

And since one bad news is not enough, the software behemoth has announced that Office 2007 will also be delayed. Both Vista and Office were slated for release at the end of the year.

br>Aside from restructuring PSD, Vista’s delay also caused a drop in Microsoft’s and other hardware producers’ stocks.

Could Microsoft Go Bankrupt?

2006-12-06T12:47:00.000+05:30

Over the last months, numerous IT articles have talked about Vista, Internet Explorer, Xbox and other Microsoft products.

Why is Vista late, why does Internet Explorer have so many bugs, what did Gates and Ballmer say, what are the chances of the new OS against Apple’s OS X, which console will win the battle, Xbox 360 or Playstation 3, and other dilemmas.

We even imagined what it would be like to have a world where Microsoft has the best OS, the best gaming console, the best MP3 player, the best search engine, the best graphics suite, the best server applications, the best online music store, the best television, the smartest cell phones and so on.

In 2005, although except for Xbox 360, there weren’t any other great products coming from Microsoft, most users felt that there was still hope for the Redmond company. The software behemoth had been defeated by Google on the online battlefield, by Apple on the OS and entertainment battlefields, but was expected to recover miraculously in 2006 and to reconsolidate its position after its competitors’ successes.

But surprise! 2006 didn’t start quite well for the company of William Henry "Bill" Gates III, in fact, it was quite disastrous. I’m not going to talk about all the problems faced by the Redmond company during the fist months of 2006, but I do have a challenge for you.

The idea is rather simple. What would happen if Microsoft failed with all of its products, or almost all of them, that are scheduled for release and in a few years, companies like Google, Apple, or IBM would invade the increasingly lower market share of the Redmond giant until the company went into bankruptcy?

Yes, I know. It’s difficult for such a large corporation to go bankrupt. Difficult, but not impossible.Within this mental exercise, we will leave aside the Xbox 360 console, which seems to be one of the few Microsoft products that have been successful lately.

Let’s start with operating systems, where Microsoft was and still is leader. An increasing number of users, even those who stood by Vista, former Longhorn, in the most difficult moments of its existence, have started to doubt the success and reliability of the new OS, and when Microsoft announced the latest delay, the kernel hit the fan. The news that Vista will be available to users in 2007 was preceded by another one, that it will not have EFI booting support, another long-awaited feature that was dropped.

If we take a look at the competitors’ solutions, we can see a healthy, safe, with extremely few bugs, on time OS X, crammed with features.

Let’s say that you are not planning to buy a Mac, thus unable to run Mac OS X, what alternative do you have? Well, Linux, of course, the operating system whose popularity is growing, despite the predictions made by the Redmond leaders. And speaking of Linux, I don’t know if you had the chance to see Kororaa Xgl, whose graphical user interface easily competes with the one promised by Vista and that already included in OS X.

The second domain of interest for Microsoft is the Internet, where considerable effort is put into developing a package of services able to rival with Google’s. The company’s engineers are working hard to release as many Live services as possible, which will replace some of the MSN ones. The most important of them is Windows Live Search, which is not necessarily bad, but it’s not something innovative or powerful either. In this case, Microsoft has once again forgotten the basic rule of Internet services, that of providing users with a fast search engine, which short loading times. It’s true that the idea of a continuous page with search results is good, but it won’t be enough.

But OSs and the Internet are the only targets for the software behemoth, digital entertainment and portable devices being equally appealing. Although it shrouded its latest creation, the UMPC, in a publicity veil which bore a striking resemblance to Apple’s, unlike the latter, the ultra mobile PC didn’t enjoy too many enthusiastic comments and it’s unlikely that things will change too much over the next months.

No doubt there will be other attempts to launch a device able to take iPod’s crown away and to prevent other high storage phone with multimedia functions to become too popular. Ballmer himself confirmed that there will be a new “all-in-one” device coming over the next 12 months.

On the server solution market, Microsoft currently has a good position, but the threat of Linux backed by giants like Novell and IBM is increasing, and the strategies used to convince the enterprise clients to switch from Windows to Linux are slowly eating away the Redmond company’s market share.

Microsoft is also involved in other fields, but those mentioned above are the most important and represent the largest part of the income.

Ok, now that you’ve read about each and every one, try to project this trend over a 10 year period. If Vista is a failure, the company will slowly, but surely lose even more ground on the OS market, if Microsoft will continue to release product like the UMPC, the portable devices will only stay in pockets of people like Gates, Ballmer and other fanatic users, and the Linux coalition will end up as leader of the server market.

Xbox 360 has had an excellent evolution, it’s true, but Playstation 3 hasn’t been launched yet, and console and game sales are not enough to fuel a company like Microsoft, with approximately 60,000 employees.

Another thing that shouldn’t be forgotten is that while Microsoft keeps failing with every product it launches, Apple, Google, IBM and others are becoming increasingly popular and are strengthening their position.

In these circumstances, I don’t believe it’s farfetched to say that if Microsoft doesn’t start making original products, that set a new trend instead of following one, the software giant should think about the possibility of going bankrupt.

Oracle Buys Portal Software. New Communications and Media Applications

2006-12-06T12:38:00.000+05:30

US software firm Oracle announced that it will acquire Portal Software Inc., a leading global provider of billing and revenue management solutions for the communications and media industry, through a cash offer for $4.90 per share, about $220 million.

"The combination of Oracle and Portal delivers the first end-to-end packaged enterprise software suite for the communications industry," said Oracle's President, Charles Phillips. "We supply technology and applications to over 90% of communications companies worldwide today, and billing is a logical and complementary addition for those customers,"added Philips.

Portal offers billing and revenue management solution for all communications services including wireline, wireless, broadband, cable, voice over IP, IPTV, music, and video. As communications, publishing, media, and entertainment services converge, Oracle can support companies with a proven offering for billing, customer interaction, and management of digital services and content.

Last month, Oracle has announced a higher-than-expected 42% gain in quarterly profits, the biggest increase in earnings for more than a year, the net income being $765m for the three-month period ending February, informs BBC.

PeopleSoft was the first “software leader” to be acquired by Oracle. The transaction, that took place in 2004, ensured the second place in the industry, after Microsoft and before SAP, the German software company.

This was the first step of the firm’s expanding strategy. Siebel Systems ($5.85bn), Retek, also a software manufacturer, and other such companies, that are now under Oracle’s umbrella, guaranteed the success of this plan and, obviously, the biggest quarterly profit gained ever since PeopleSoft acquisition.

Virtual virus hits Second Life.

2006-12-06T12:16:00.001+05:30

The online world of Second Life suffered a massive attack of self-replicating objects, a class of threats dubbed "grey goo," which slowed down servers over the weekend.

On Sunday afternoon, the company took down the virtual world to clean its database of every instance of the digital viruses. The object manifested themselves in-world as golden rings--a nod to the objects collected by Sonic the Hedgehodge in Sega's popular video games, according to several posts on the Second Life forums.

"We are investigating reports of failed teleports, faulty L$ (Linden dollars, the currency of Second Life) balances, and clothing not appearing," the company said in a statement at 1:24 p.m. PT on Sunday. "The problem seems to be tied to heavy load on the database."

Two hours later, the company appeared to have to have the problem resolved.

The massive attack marked the third time since September that the world created by San Francisco-based Linden Lab got overrun by quickly reproducing digital objects.

The term "grey goo" comes from a hypothetical threat of nanotechnology: A self-replicating nanobot could consume the Earth's resources, transforming the world into a giant blob of grey goo. Some biotechnologists have warned about tailored viruses that could have a similar, but limited, effect. The virtual world of World of Warcraft as well has had at least one instance of a digital disease that struck down players' avatars.

Linden Lab typically refers such incidents to the FBI for investigation, a spokesperson said in an interview last month.

Be on the lookout for these security threats in 2007

2006-12-05T18:48:00.000+05:30

As the end of 2006 rapidly approaches, it's time to start thinking about what new security threats a new year will bring. In this edition of the IT Locksmith, John McCormick offers his take on 2007's biggest security worries.

2006 is waning, and it's time to gear up for a new year of security threats. Where will attackers focus their efforts in 2007? Details.....

For 0, third-world laptop stirs a big debate.

2006-12-05T13:22:00.000+05:30

When computer industry executives heard about a plan to build a 0 laptop for the developing world's children, they generally ridiculed the idea. How could you build such a computer, they asked, when screens alone cost about 0?

Mary Lou Jepsen, the chief technologist for the project, likes to refer to the insight that transformed the machine from utopian dream to working prototype as "a really wacky idea."

Jepsen, a former Intel chip designer, found a way to modify conventional laptop displays, cutting the screen's manufacturing cost to while reducing its power consumption by more than 80 percent. As a bonus, the display is clearly visible in sunlight.

That advance and others have allowed the nonprofit project, One Laptop Per Child, to win over many skeptics over the last two and a half years. Five countries--Argentina, Brazil, Libya, Nigeria and Thailand--have made tentative commitments to put the computers into the hands of millions of students, with production in Taiwan expected to begin by mid-2007.

The laptop does not come with a Microsoft Windows operating system or even a hard drive, and the screen is small. And the cost is now closer to 0 than 0. But the price tag, even compared with low-end 0 laptops now widely available, transforms the economic equation for developing countries.

That has not prevented the effort, conceived by Nicholas Negroponte, a prominent computer researcher, from becoming the focal point of a debate over the value of computers to both learning and economic development.

The detractors include two computer industry giants, Intel and Microsoft, pushing alternative approaches. Intel has developed a 0 laptop aimed at schools as well as an education program that focuses on teachers instead of students. And Bill Gates, Microsoft's chairman and a leading philanthropist for the third world, has questioned whether the concept is "just taking what we do in the rich world" and assuming that that is something good for the developing world, too.

Negroponte, the founding director of the MIT Media Laboratory, said he was amused by the attention his little machine was getting. It is not the first time he has been challenged for proclaiming technology's promise.

"It's as if people spent all of their attention focusing on Columbus' boat and not on where he was going," he said in an interview here. "You have to remember that what this is about is education."

Microsoft takes wraps off Vista for business.

2006-12-04T20:05:00.001+05:30

NEW YORK--Vista may be ready for businesses, but are businesses ready for it?

Microsoft on Thursday said its newest version of Windows, along with a revamped Office and new Exchange e-mail server, is completed and is now available to business customers. The company said it will make Vista and Office 2007 available to consumers worldwide on January 30.

"This is the biggest launch in the company's history. That's for sure," CEO Steve Ballmer said at a press conference at the Nasdaq stock exchange here.

Thursday's announcement offered little in the way of new information and served more as a rallying cry for corporate customers and the multitude of partners in the Windows ecosystem. Microsoft announced earlier this month that it had completed work on the operating system, a major milestone for the oft-delayed product that has changed markedly from the company's initial conception under the Longhorn code name.

Ballmer alluded to the many delays. "It's an exciting thing to finally be here. That's all I'll say about the past," he said.

Despite Vista's long gestation period and the length of time since Windows XP's debut--more than five years--it's unlikely that many businesses will adopt the operating system immediately. The announcement is more likely to mark the start of serious testing within companies, analysts said.

According to market researchers, only a small percentage of companies are expected to update their systems from Windows XP to Vista over the next few months. A recent poll found that 86 percent of IT decision makers surveyed said their companies plan to implement Vista, though only 20 percent plan to do so in the next year. The poll of 761 buyers, commissioned by online retailer CDW, found 51 percent of respondents saying that they would have to replace or upgrade half of their PCs to run Vista.

Given Windows XP's unexpectedly long life and the interim release of several major revisions, or "service packs," driver and third-party application support is stable. Some third-party software and many drivers for connecting to hardware have had to be rewritten for Vista. Not all are available yet. Most analysts expect big companies to wait for at least the first round of service pack updates from Microsoft before they put Vista into daily service.

Ballmer downplayed the need for companies to wait for a service pack before adoption. "We've built the highest-quality operating system we possibly can. We have many customers who are anxious to deploy. We will have a stronger, faster upgrade cycle for Vista than for Windows XP," he said.

Microsoft, undaunted, has high hopes for Vista adoption in the coming months. Ballmer said this will be the most widely marketed launch of any set of products that the Redmond, Wash.-based software maker has ever done. It will spend "hundreds of millions of dollars, a very big number," on Vista and Office 2007 marketing, he said. "It's more than we spent of Windows 95 and Office 95."

Both Vista and Office had originally been slated to arrive on store shelves and new PCs in time for this year's holiday season. However, in March, Microsoft said it would delay the mainstream launch of the products until January, with large businesses still having access to the two products this year.

All three products announced on Thursday--Vista, Office 2007 and Exchange Server 2007--are already available to business customers through Microsoft's Developer Network and TechNet services. The company will now begin selling the products through its various business licensing packages.

Ballmer said the launch marks the beginning of a long line of product releases in the coming year. "There will be an additional set of clients and servers coming in the next year. There are 30-plus new products for business customers as a result of this wave of innovation," he said.

One of those products is a new release of the server version of Windows, currently called Longhorn Server, which is expected next year.

Microsoft denies role in British Linux flop

2006-12-04T20:01:00.000+05:30

Microsoft has insisted that it did not slash its software prices to encourage England's Birmingham City Council to abort its Linux project.

Birmingham pulled the plug on its open-source desktop project after it found that an upgrade to Windows XP was cheaper. Birmingham City Council had planned to roll out 1,500 Linux PCs across its libraries, but in the end converted just 200 PCs.

Industry experts have suggested that Microsoft offered Birmingham special discounts to sway the balance in favor of XP. But Microsoft firmly denied these allegations. Asked whether Microsoft had offered special discounts to Birmingham, Nick McGrath, head of platform strategy told ZDNet UK, "No, not all. We are in discussions with every single local authority. There is a common buying framework."

McGrath added, "The decision was very much taken by Birmingham."

The Birmingham City Council itself is slightly less clear on this point. When asked whether the council managed to get a better deal from Microsoft as a result of its trial, IT chief Glyn Evans told ZDNet UK that "we did not seek a better deal from Microsoft nor was that an objective (stated or unstated) of the project." However, Evans didn't say whether any discount had been received.

Many observers have claimed that Microsoft offers inducements to local authorities to stay with Windows if they show a willingness to switch to open source.

"Microsoft is going out of its way to lower prices to get deals," said Laurent Lachal, a senior analyst at Ovum. "If it lowers it to the point where it makes no sense to deploy open source, then it is a good deal for the organization."

Bob Griffiths, international secretary at SOCITM, the association for public sector IT professionals that supported the Birmingham project through the Open Source Academy, acknowledged that Microsoft had been "involved in negotiations" with the council. He said he was unsure whether Birmingham had gained an advantage through its Linux pilot in bargaining with Microsoft, but added that other councils had successfully used that tactic.

"I'm not sure that's the case with them. But other authorities have claimed advantages," said Griffiths.

The London borough of Newham has been at the center of such suggestions after it reverted to Windows in 2004 after running a trial of Linux. It denies the allegations.

Intel completes design of Penryn chip

2006-12-04T19:52:00.000+05:30

Intel has taped out--or completed the design of--Penryn, a 45-nanometer chip that will be out toward the end of next year. The company is also in the midst of making its first Penryn samples.

"They aren't out of the fab yet, but they are in the fab," said Mark Bohr, director of process technology at Intel, referring to chip factories, known as "fabs."

Intel showed off a memory chip made on the 45-nanometer process earlier this year.

The Penryn news underscores Intel's expertise in manufacturing. The company has introduced new manufacturing processes every two years. Meanwhile, competitors such as Advanced Micro Devices have had to space out these jumps. Intel started shipping chips made on the 65-nanometer process in October 2005. AMD won't ship its first 65-nano chips until next month.

AMD, however, has claimed it will introduce 45-nanometer chips 18 months after its first 65-nanometer chips, a rapid jump that has raised eyebrows. Most companies don't even make the leap every two years. If AMD can accomplish the task, it can shave six months or so off of Intel's lead in manufacturing.

Chips made on the more advanced process are generally faster and cheaper to make. The nanometer measurements refer to the length of structures inside the chip. A nanometer is a billionth of a meter and is derived from the Ancient Greek word for dwarf.

Manufacturing isn't everything--chipmakers still have to improve their designs. But good manufacturing can help a company gain market share or stem market share losses. Intel executives like company pioneer Les Vadasz and outside analysts have said that manufacturing has played a larger role in the company's success than anticipated in the past.

HACKERS BEWARE: IE Heap overflow vulnerablity.

2006-12-04T19:40:00.000+05:30

URLMON.DLL version 6.0.2800.1565, distributed with the MS06-042 patch for Internet Explorer 6 SP1 on Windows 2000 and Windows XP SP1, contains a heap buffer overflow vulnerability due to an incongruous use of lstrcpynA. CMimeFt::Create allocates a 390h-byte heap block for a new instance of the CMimeFt class, within which there is a 104h (MAX_PATH)-byte ASCII string buffer at offset +160h:

1A4268DD push 390h ; cb

1A4268E2 call ??2@YAPAXI@Z ; operator new(uint)

When an access to a URL elicits a GZIP- or deflate-encoded response from the web server, CMimeFt::Start will attempt to copy the URL into the 104h-byte string buffer using the lstrcpynA API function, but it passes a maximum length argument of 824h (2084 decimal), a value typically used as the maximum length of a URL:

1A426199 push 824h ; iMaxLength

1A42619E push eax ; lpString2

1A42619F add esi, 160h

1A4261A5 push esi ; lpString1

1A4261A6 call ds:lstrcpynA

As a result, fields within the CMimeFt class instance as well as the contents of adjacent heap blocks can be overwritten with attacker-supplied data from the malicious URL.

URLMON.DLL in the MS06-042 patch for Internet Explorer 5 uses MAX_PATH both as the buffer size and as the maximum copy length, while URLMON.DLL in the patch for Windows XP SP2 and Windows 2003 uses 824h in both places.

This issue was originally documented as an Internet Explorer crash in Microsoft Knowledge Base Article KB923762 (http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=923762; Revision 2.0 as of August 21st), in response to numerous reports of conflicts between the MS06-042 patch and various HTTP-based software products, dating back to at least August 11th. eEye independently discovered the flaw on August 15th and subsequently reported it to Microsoft on the 17th.

Disk image flaw found on Mac OS X

2006-12-04T19:30:00.000+05:30

A vulnerability in the way Macs handle the disk image (.dmg) format could allow a system to be compromised by a remote attacker, according to the latest post by the Month of Kernel Bugs (MoKB) Project. The flaw occurs in the function responsible for opening disk images and could be exploited remotely if an attacker crafts a malformed image, places it on a Web server, and then convinces a Mac user to click on a link, according to an advisory on the MoKB Web site. The default configuration for Apple's Safari Web browser allows "safe" files to be opened after downloading. Apple has come under increasing scrutiny by vulnerability researchers.

The latest bug is the third issue disclosed by the MoKB Project, which included a significant vulnerability in older drivers for Apple's wireless Airport network hardware. A recent report by Symantec, the owner of SecurityFocus, noted an increased focus among researchers on developing exploits for Mac OS X flaws. Safari users can protect themselves from the issue by deactivating the opening "safe" files after downloading preference setting.

Tracking the Attackers

2006-12-04T19:03:00.000+05:30

In May 2005, honeynet technologies notably improved their functionality with the newly released third generation. This last generation is based on a new Honeywall version called Roo and on the new Sebek release, version 3.

Sebek is the most advanced and complex honeynet data capture tool. It is an open-source tool whose purpose is to capture from a honeypot as much information as possible of the attacker’s activities by intercepting specific system calls (syscalls) at the kernel level.