Waledac Botnet Now Completely Offline, Experts Say
57 minutes agoTrailrunner7 writes "After Microsoft's actions to take down the Waledac botnet last month, there was some question ab...
(show more)
Trailrunner7 writes "After Microsoft's actions to take down the Waledac botnet last month, there was some question about whether the operation was much more than a grab for headlines that would have little effect on actual spam levels or malware infections. But more than three weeks after the takedown, researchers say that Waledac has essentially ceased communications and its spam operations ha...
(show less)
US Sits On Supply of Rare, Tech-Crucial Minerals
1 hour agoWe've recently discussed China's position as the linchpin of the world's supply of rare earths, and their rumblings a...
(show more)
We've recently discussed China's position as the linchpin of the world's supply of rare earths, and their rumblings about restricting exports of of these materials crucial to the manufacture of everything from batteries to wind turbines. Now an anonymous reader sends this MSNBC piece on the status of the US's supply of rare earths. "China supplies most of the rare earth minerals found in techno...
(show less)
Microsoft Previews IE9 — HTML5, SVG, Fast JS
2 hours agosuraj.sun sends this an excerpt from CNET on Microsoft's preview of IE9 in Las Vegas just now. "At its Mix 10 confere...
(show more)
suraj.sun sends this an excerpt from CNET on Microsoft's preview of IE9 in Las Vegas just now. "At its Mix 10 conference Tuesday, Microsoft gave programmers, Web developers, and the world at large a taste of things to come with its Web browser. Specifically, Microsoft released what it's calling the Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview, a prototype designed to show off the company's effort to im...
(show less)
Jobcentre Apologizes For Anti-Jedi Discrimination
3 hours agoAn anonymous reader writes "Chris Jarvis, 31, is described as a Star Wars fan and member of the International Church ...
(show more)
An anonymous reader writes "Chris Jarvis, 31, is described as a Star Wars fan and member of the International Church of Jediism. Said church's intergalactic hoodie uniform is at odds with the strict doctrine of the Department for Work and Pensions, which may require Jobcentre 'customers' to remove crash helmets or hoods for 'security reasons.' Following his ejection, Jarvis filled out a complai...
(show less)
Designer Builds Coffin For Xbox's Suffering RROD
3 hours agoangry tapir writes "The Xbox 360 RROD coffin is created by Aussie designer Alexis Vanamois, and it does exactly what ...
(show more)
angry tapir writes "The Xbox 360 RROD coffin is created by Aussie designer Alexis Vanamois, and it does exactly what it says on the tin. It's the ultimate final resting place for 'bricked' Xbox 360 consoles that have suffered the Red Ring of Death; it even has a cavity for your controller!"
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
(show less)
Blind Soldier Uses Tongue To 'See'
3 hours agoZen found this story about a blind soldier using a lollypop-sized tongue sensor to 'see.' The system actually enables...
(show more)
Zen found this story about a blind soldier using a lollypop-sized tongue sensor to 'see.' The system actually enables him to walk and read unaided. The guy says, "It feels like licking a nine-volt battery or like popping candy. The camera sends signals down onto the lollypop and onto your tongue, you can then determine what they mean and transfer it to shapes."
Read more of this story...
(show less)
Google Readying To Pull Out of China
4 hours agoSagelinka writes "Both Google and the Chinese government appear to be leaking word that the search firm may soon shut...
(show more)
Sagelinka writes "Both Google and the Chinese government appear to be leaking word that the search firm may soon shutter its operations there as negotiations between the two break down. Google first threatened to halt its operations in China after disclosing in January that an attack on its network from inside China was aimed at exposing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists. At ...
(show less)
Blazing Fast Password Recovery With New ATI Cards
5 hours agoAn anonymous reader writes "ElcomSoft accelerates the recovery of Wi-Fi passwords and password-protected iPhone and i...
(show more)
An anonymous reader writes "ElcomSoft accelerates the recovery of Wi-Fi passwords and password-protected iPhone and iPod backups by using ATI video cards. The support of ATI Radeon 5000 series video accelerators allows ElcomSoft to perform password recovery up to 20 times faster compared to Intel top of the line quad-core CPUs, and up to two times faster compared to enterprise-level NVIDIA Tesl...
(show less)
MySpace To Sell User Data
5 hours agoOnlyJedi writes "Hot on the news of Netflix canceling its latest contest over privacy concerns, news has spread that ...
(show more)
OnlyJedi writes "Hot on the news of Netflix canceling its latest contest over privacy concerns, news has spread that MySpace is going in the opposite direction. Apparently, the one-time leading social network is now selling user data to third party collection firms. From the article, the data that InfoChimps has listed includes 'user playlists, mood updates, mobile updates, photos, vents, revie...
(show less)
11th Circuit Eliminates 4th Amend. In E-mail
6 hours agoArtefacto writes "Last Thursday, the Eleventh Circuit handed down a Fourth Amendment case, Rehberg v. Paulk, that tak...
(show more)
Artefacto writes "Last Thursday, the Eleventh Circuit handed down a Fourth Amendment case, Rehberg v. Paulk, that takes a very narrow view of how the Fourth Amendment applies to e-mail. The Eleventh Circuit held that constitutional protection in stored copies of e-mail held by third parties disappears as soon as any copy of the communication is delivered. Under this new decision, if the governm...
(show less)
Deposit Checks To Your Bank By Taking a Photo
7 hours agoPickens writes "The Mercury News reports that consumers will soon be able to deposit a check by snapping a photo of i...
(show more)
Pickens writes "The Mercury News reports that consumers will soon be able to deposit a check by snapping a photo of it with a cell phone and transmitting an encrypted copy to their bank. Although some critics contend paperless deposits are an attempt by the banking industry to eliminate 'float,' the standard one- or two-day waiting period between the time someone writes a check and the time the...
(show less)
FCC's Broadband Plan May Cost You Money
8 hours agoAt ten minutes past midnight the FCC released their National Broadband Plan. Judging by the available coverage, few r...
(show more)
At ten minutes past midnight the FCC released their National Broadband Plan. Judging by the available coverage, few reporters spent the night poring over it. The BBC at least posted something in the morning hours, but it quotes Enderle, so that gives you some idea of its sourcing. Business Week notes the plan's cool (not to say frigid) reception among broadcasters. Dave Burstein of FastNet News...
(show less)
UK Internet Filtering Bill Watered Down
11 hours agosuperapecommando writes in with news that in the UK, Liberal Democratic peers will soften their filtering amendment t...
(show more)
superapecommando writes in with news that in the UK, Liberal Democratic peers will soften their filtering amendment to the Digital Economy Bill, to allow those wrongfully accused of illegal filesharing to sue the rightsholders in court. The previous version of the Bill had drawn instant criticism from some of the world's largest technology companies, including eBay, Google, and Yahoo, who signe...
(show less)
Golden Nanocages To Put the Heat On Cancer Cells
14 hours agoElectricSteve writes "Researchers have been searching for a highly targeted medical treatment that attacks cancer cel...
(show more)
ElectricSteve writes "Researchers have been searching for a highly targeted medical treatment that attacks cancer cells but leaves healthy tissue alone. The approach taken by scientists at Washington University in St. Louis is to use 'gold nanocages' that, when injected, selectively accumulate in tumors. When the tumors are later bathed in laser light, the surrounding tissue is barely warmed, b...
(show less)
Ushahidi Crowd-Sources Crisis Response
18 hours agoWe mentioned late last year how open source software called Ushahidi — which means 'testimony' in Swahili — developed...
(show more)
We mentioned late last year how open source software called Ushahidi — which means 'testimony' in Swahili — developed for election monitoring in Kenya was being used to similar effect in Afghanistan. Now reader Peace Corps Online adds a report from the NY Times that Usahidi's is now becoming a hero of the Haitian and Chilean earthquakes. "Ushahidi is used to gather distributed data via SMS, ema...
(show less)