Cybercrime has very quickly become a booming industry worth an estimated $100 billion a year. In this extract from Zero Day Threat, a new book about the complicity of big corporations in online crime, USA Today reporters Byron Acohido and Jon Swartz explain the mechanisms of a notorious online scam.
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NASA launches its first weather satellite. It would send back the first TV images of earth from space and prove the utility of observation satellites.
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Smivs writes “The BBC are getting set to fund a dig at Stonehenge in Wiltshire, England. The two-week dig will try to establish, once and for all, some precise dating for the creation of the monument. An article from the BBC news website explains how the dig will investigate the significance of the smaller bluestones that stand inside the giant sarsen pillars. ‘Researchers believe these rocks, brought all the way from Wales, hold the secret to the real purpose of Stonehenge as a place of healing. The researchers leading the project are two of the UK’s leading Stonehenge experts — Professor Tim Darvill, of the University of Bournemouth, and Professor Geoff Wainwright, of the Society of Antiquaries. They are convinced that the dominating feature on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire was akin to a “Neolithic Lourdes” — a place where people went on a pilgrimage to get cured. Modern techniques have established that many of these people had clearly traveled huge distances to get to south-west England, suggesting they were seeking supernatural help for their ills.’”
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A bunch of tech firms are asking the FCC to allow them to make use of valuable spectrum that is unused, but controlled by television broadcasters (who don’t want to give it up). The FCC has been open to such an idea for many years. Broadcasters own a ridiculously large portion of spectrum, with large parts of it totally unused. The “white space” was designed to prevent interference by not letting anything work on spectrum anywhere near broadcast spectrum. However, many are pointing out that with today’s technology, that spectrum could be put to use without any interference. Microsoft and Google have both been big proponents of opening up that white space for use. In order to help show that the interference bogeyman wasn’t a real issue, they’ve sent prototype devices to the FCC to test. Unfortunately, they seem to have trouble keeping those devices in operation. Back in August the FCC noted that the device didn’t work, and now a new device from Microsoft has also stopped working.
Now, to be totally clear, the problems with these devices have nothing to do with causing interference. The devices haven’t been shown to cause interference — just to have trouble working. But, of course, the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) quickly used these failures to slam the idea of freeing up the whitespace, even though there’s still no evidence of interference. With the way the NAB has acted around this issue and the recent XM-Sirius merger debate, you have to conclude that the NAB thinks everyone out there is just completely stupid, and will believe any false or misleading statement it makes. Otherwise it makes no sense for the NAB to make the types of claims it makes on a regular basis. These devices are prototypes, and production devices will be totally different. Either way, the point is not whether the prototypes can keep working, but whether there’s interference. That said, it would probably make sense for Microsoft to test these devices a bit more before tossing them over the wall to the FCC.
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A ruling in a long-running copyright infringement case brings good news for the RIAA, as a judge supports the group’s argument that merely offering a song for distribution is enough to infringe the distribution right under the Copyright Act. The EFF tells Ars that the ruling will “grease the wheels” of the RIAA’s litigation machine.
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It’s not at all clear what’s going on yet, but apparently
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billybob2 writes “PolishLinux.org has an extensive screenshot review and commentary on the development version of the Free and Open Source KDE desktop. Highlights include the ability to run any desktop applet prepared for Mac OS X inside Plasma, on-the-fly annotation and rating of files from within the Dolphin file manager. It also has an improved GUI for the Amarok music player, flexible 3D eye candy configuration in KWin, and improved support for both accessing digital cameras via the Solid hardware layer and the DigiKam photo manager.”
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U.S. Special Ops undergoes a clandestine effort to establish its own blogging arm.
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A woman in Florida is claiming that it’s a violation of her First Amendment rights that a library is restricting the amount of time patrons can spend on a computer. She’s also upset that they’re asking for ID before you can log on. The library says they’re doing this to keep the wait down for a computer, but the woman says it’s to keep homeless people and other low income people from using computers. It may be difficult case to prove, as it hardly seems like the library is preventing people from using the computers altogether — just limiting how long they can use them in a single sitting. Even then, the limit of two and a half hours, does seem pretty long. The requirement for an ID might be an issue, if there are people with no IDs, but it’s still difficult to see this as a First Amendment issue.
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The American Heart Association says skip the mouth-to-mouth breathing for CPR. Just call 911 and press rapidly and deeply on the victim’s chest until help arrives.
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An anonymous reader writes “Norway’s yes-to-OOXML may tip the vote in favor of accepting it as an ISO-standard, but the committee chairman just faxed a formal protest to the ISO. ‘I am writing to you in my capacity as Chairman (of 13 years standing) of the Norwegian mirror committee to ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 34. I wish to inform you of serious irregularities in connection with the Norwegian vote on ISO/IEC DIS 29500 (Office Open XML) and to lodge a formal protest. You will have been notified that Norway voted to approve OOXML in this ballot. This decision does not reflect the view of the vast majority of the Norwegian committee, 80% of which was against changing Norway’s vote from No with comments to Yes.’”
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In this exclusive video, Wired.com visits Potenco’s headquarters to check out the latest version of their pull-cord power generator, which promises to bring off-grid electricity to the developing world for powering clean lighting and charging gadgets.
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Wired.com readers have nominated entrepreneur and self-help author Timothy Ferriss as the greatest self-promoter of 2008.
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Although Google Docs has been steadily gaining features since its launch, one major limitation is that it can’t be accessed offline. Actually, make that “couldn’t.”
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katterjohn writes “After almost 10 years of work, Wireshark 1.0 has been released. Wireshark is the award-winning protocol analyzer, formerly known as Ethereal. The release features several security fixes and an experimental package for Max OS X Intel.”
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We’ve certainly seen some dumb trademark lawsuit threats lately, but T-Mobile parent Deutsche Telekom’s supposed threats to Engadget may take the cake. It’s not that extraordinary for a company to trademark a distinct color that it uses in its logo, and that’s exactly what T-Mobile did last year with a trademark (in Germany only) on the color magenta. Now, it’s important to realize that this doesn’t mean T-Mobile “owns” that color or can forbid anyone else from using it. It really just means that competing providers offering similar goods and services might run into trouble for using the same color, potentially leading to consumer confusion. When this news broke, plenty of people got up in arms, suggesting that T-Mobile “owned” magenta, which just isn’t true. However, it does look like its lawyers think it gives them rights far beyond what it actually does.
According to Engadget, Deutsche Telekom lawyers have sent a nastygram to Engadget, because the blog uses magenta in the logo for its sister site, Engadget Mobile. Of course, it’s hard to believe that anyone would go to Engadget Mobile and believe it was somehow affiliated with T-Mobile. The logos are quite different, and the services they offer (obviously) are totally unrelated. In fact, this whole thing seemed so ridiculous that I assumed it was an April Fool’s joke — though the folks at Engadget insist it’s not. And, if you want icing on the cake, last year Engadget was one of a few sites that defended T-Mobile for its magenta trademark when it became news last year.
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Ars Technica is pleased to announce the launch of “Directions: a Web Symposium,” a brand new community program that will bring together technical folks from across the computing industry to enter into two-week conversations with our community on a series of forward-looking topics.
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Lev Grossman writes to tell us that Neal Stephenson, author of greats like Snow Crash and Cryptonomicon, has another novel due for release in September. The catalogue copy gives us a small glimpse at what may be in store: “Since childhood, Raz has lived behind the walls of a 3,400-year-old monastery, a sanctuary for scientists, philosophers, and mathematicians–sealed off from the illiterate, irrational, unpredictable ‘saecular’ world that is plagued by recurring cycles of booms and busts, world wars and climate change. Until the day that a higher power, driven by fear, decides that only these cloistered scholars have the abilities to avert an impending catastrophe. And, one by one, Raz and his cohorts are summoned forth without warning into the Unknown.”
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A founder of the torrent-tracking site calls music industry numbers “pure fantasy” as the case moves forward in Swedish court.
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I have to admit that about the only surprising thing in the news last week from BMI that ringtone sales are likely to drop this year is the fact that it took this long. Since 2004 we’ve been wondering when people would get around to realizing that just because a ringtone is on a phone, it doesn’t change the basic economics (which are even worse, as the industry kept trying to push the price of ringtones higher to “save” the industry). With users finally realizing that they can transfer songs they have elsewhere onto their phones as ringtones, the desire to pay huge fees just to prop up the recording industry just isn’t going to work any more. No wonder the industry is now jumping on the music tax plan.
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Without saying why, the Environmental Protection Agency suspends IBM’s right to bid for contracts. Since other agencies typically follow suit, the company is essentially prevented from accepting government work for an unspecified period of time.
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apostle5406 writes to mention that the “Freenet” project (a global peer-to-peer publishing network) has unveiled their first release candidate. “Freenet 0.7 is a ground-up rewrite of Freenet. The key user-facing feature in Freenet 0.7 is the ability to operate Freenet in a “darknet” mode, where your Freenet node will only talk to other Freenet users that you trust. This makes it much more difficult for an adversary to discover that you are using Freenet, let alone what you are doing with it. 0.7 also includes significant improvements to both security and performance.”
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Sometimes an upgrade doesn’t feel so good. Condemned 2: Bloodshot fixes many of the original’s problems, but is the end result really a better game?
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The former vice president is behind an ambitious advocacy campaign that calls on the United States to severely reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.
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Ruggedized Casio cellphone subjected to trauma ranging from football hits to soccer kicks.
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Two heart drugs, Vytorin and Zetia, have combined for $5 billion in sales but a long-term study has found that they might not work any better than older, cheaper meds.
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Roland Piquepaille writes “According to Haaretz, an Israeli team of computer scientists has developed software that ranks facial attractiveness of women. Instead of identifying basic facial characteristics, this software has been designed to make aesthetic judgments — after training. The lead researcher said this program ‘constitutes a substantial advance in the development of artificial intelligence.’ It is interesting to note that the researchers focused on women only. Apparently, men’ faces are more difficult to grade.”
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Slowly but surely, the pounds are melting away. However, Nintendo could beef up its exercise game with a few easy additions.
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Back in February, there were reports that the entertainment industry had somehow convinced the UK gov’t that the “file sharing issue” should be the responsibility of ISPs, rather than the record labels whose obsolete business model caused the problem in the first place. The UK gov’t then issued a very public
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University of California scientists are building a distributed earthquake-detection system that uses the accelerometers inside many notebooks, including MacBooks.
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eldavojohn writes “Is there life on Mars? Maybe not, but a better question might be whether or not it has ever existed on Mars? Scientists are claiming that the best indication for this will be in newly found evaporated salt deposits on Mars which they can use to check for cellulose. Here on earth, tiny fuzzy fibers have been found in salt dating back almost 250 million years making it the oldest known evidence of life on earth. Jack Griffith, a microbiologist from UNC, is quoted as saying, ‘Cellulose was one of the earliest polymers organisms made during their evolution, so it pops out as the most likely thing you’d find on Mars, if you found anything at all. Looking for it in salt deposits is probably a very good way to go.’”
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Creative Labs’ sound cards won’t work on Windows Vista machines, due to a malfunctioning driver — and the company is zeroing in on a customer who has fixed the problem.
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Dutch citizens apologize to the world for the message contained in Geert Wilders’ controversial video.
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Sony BMG has been caught using pirated Windows administration software. It’s an embarrassing development for a company that has fought so hard to keep its own content from being pirated.
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An anonymous reader writes “April 1st is the ultimate holiday for a geek — a little hands-on DIY, a little hacking and a lot of sub-par humor. Popular Mechanics and Instructables have teamed up for five pranks you can build in the office (including a stripped-down version of Gizmodo’s CES TV blackout), while Wired has its top 10 practical jokes for nerds, Lifehacker is toning it down with 10 harmless geek pranks, and Slate gets you ready for the receiving end with an April Fools’ defense kit. What’s your best prank?” Be safe, head for the bunker on 4/1 and just assume everything you hear is a lie. Everything.
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The brains behind the decision to turn the game into a movie are hoping to succeed where others have failed. From Portfolio.com
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One of the more annoying things in patent lawsuits is watching the USPTO reject patents soon after a lawsuit concludes — and having the judges in those lawsuits refuse to wait for the USPTO to weigh in. This is especially troublesome considering that so many patent re-exams result in rejected claims. It would only make sense for judges to wait until the Patent Office has had a chance to review the patent. As if to highlight that, late last week, the USPTO rejected all claims on a rather infamous “e-learning” patent held by Blackboard Inc. This comes just slightly over a month after Blackboard won a lawsuit using that very patent. It was known during the trial that the Patent Office had agreed to review it, but apparently, the judge didn’t want to wait.
Of course, Blackboard quickly came out with a statement saying this doesn’t matter, it’s already won the case, and it still expects an injunction to be issued preventing Desire2Learn from offering e-learning software. Blackboard is correct that this is just an initial rejection (meaning there are still responses and additional rounds to go), but it still seems rather weak to put out a statement saying that everyone should just ignore the rather significant questions the USPTO has just raised about the patent in question.
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Adobe has released an alpha version of the AIR runtime for Linux and has officially joined the Linux Foundation in order to collaborate on the advancement of rich Internet application technologies for Linux.
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Don Wolf writes “Computer forensics is a rapidly growing discipline and an even faster growing business. Whether it’s the natural progression of technological science pertaining to crime or perhaps the digression of a few elite information security professionals, computer forensics is every so slowly gaining credibility in the otherwise PhD dominated field of criminal science. Computer evidence continues to be showcased in some of the most high-profile and controversial court cases in history, from the murder case of Lasie Peterson to the multi-billion dollar Enron scandal. Whether society will allow it or not, computer forensics geeks will play pivotal roles in the prevalence of justice.” Keep reading for the rest of Don’s review.
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Aloha Airlines, which filed for bankruptcy protection a couple of weeks ago, says it is folding its tent after 61 years of service in the islands. If you’re holding tickets, here’s what you should do.
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Software maker Adobe has released a version of its web-enabled AIR software for Linux, a move the company hopes will result in a wave of more innovative, forward-thinking applications on the free operating system.
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coondoggie writes to tell us that researchers from Penn State and New Mexico Tech have unraveled the mystery of lightning diversity. A new “Lightning Mapping Array” has been able to show detailed models on how lightning acts. “About 90% of lightning occurs inside clouds and is not visible to the casual observer, researchers said. The researchers wondered if lightning that appears within clouds and the lightning that escapes upward or downward shared the same development mechanisms, researchers said. Lightning forms in clouds when different areas of the cloud become either positively or negatively charged. Once the electric field near a charged area exceeds a certain propagation level, lightning occurs. The type of lightning depends on where the charge builds and where the imbalance in charge exists in the clouds. The mechanism behind different types of lightning is what the new model shows, researchers said.”
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News.com’s Tim Leberecht wonders if crowdsourcing has “jumped the shark,” pointing out that everybody and his dog seems to have a crowdsourcing program in place, and wonders if consumers are getting tired of the gimmick. I think the problem here is the way the question is being framed. If a company views crowdsourcing as just a one-off opportunity to get some free labor out of its customers, then obviously customers are going to get tired of it. But that’s the wrong way to look at it. What crowdsourcing is about, ultimately, is improving communications with your customers, and among the customers themselves. Asking your customers to become more involved in various aspects of your business — offering product advice to one another, providing feedback on new products, or offering ideas about advertising strategies — increases customer loyalty by demonstrating that your company is actually engaged with its customers and responsive to their concerns. If your “crowdsourcing program” is limited to the marketing department, you’re throwing away much of the potential value of the concept. Building strong relationships with customers and fostering online discussion about your products is at least as valuable as any cheesy ads a “make your own ad” contest might produce. Advertising gimmicks “jump the shark,” but strong relationships with customers never do.
Timothy Lee is an expert at the Techdirt Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Timothy Lee and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.
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In a reversal of the usual, a small company (PointDev) is accusing a large one (Sony/BMG) of ripping off almost half the software it uses, at least as piracy is defined by French law.
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It’s no secret that Apple seems to have a fantastic brand identity. New survey results lend more support to Apple’s brand impact by asking customers how they feel about different companies. Microsoft, unfortunately, did not fare so well.
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alphadogg writes “Every day is something like April Fools’ Day at the University of California, Berkeley joke recommendation site, dubbed Jester. Now on Version 4.0, the site tosses visitors a handful of jokes to rate on a scale of “less funny” to “more funny.” It then recommends jokes based on the user’s taste (or lack thereof), dynamically making recommendations based on the user’s most recent ratings. Jester’s more than a joke jukebox though. Underlying it is a Berkeley-patented “collaborative filtering algorithm” dubbed Eigentaste , now on Version 5.0. The more people who use the system and rate jokes, the more data Berkeley researchers have to advance their understanding of recommendation systems, like those used by Amazon.com and other Web sites.”
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Virgin Media is in talks with the British recording industry to start booting file-swappers after a “three strikes” policy. Anything beats government mandates, it seems.
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eldavojohn writes “The San Francisco Chronicle is running an interesting story about Google’s involvement with the CIA, NSA, NOAA and several other agencies. This has been speculated before although now Google seems to have several contracts open with several agencies. From the article, “When the nation’s intelligence agencies wanted a computer network to better share information about everything from al Qaeda to North Korea, they turned to a big name in the technology industry to supply some of the equipment: Google Inc. The Mountain View company sold the agencies servers for searching documents, marking a small victory for the company and its little-known effort to do business with the government. ‘We are a very small group, and even a lot of people in the federal government don’t know that we exist,’ said Mike Bradshaw, who leads Google’s federal government sales team and its 18 employees.”"
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An angry Creative has ordered one modder to cease rolling and distributing his own driver sets. His crime? Restoring certain functionality to X-Fi and Audigy cards under Vista after Creative said it was impossible to do so.
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