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5th November 2002 Archive

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  • Scary movie 2.0

    Computer virus slasher flick

    On Halloween, "The Mangler 2.0" virus took over my TV. It's a horror movie from Artisan Entertainment now available on VHS and DVD. The screenplay was written in nine whole days, bragged the credits. It was just like real life. First off, there is this rich girl, Jo. She's angry at her never-home pop so she puts a virus into …

    Security 5 Nov 2002, 05:21

  • Bogdanov brothers deny bogosity

    Letters And we believe 'em - but only in even-numbered universes

    Igor Bogdanov has written to us denying the papers published by him and his brother form part of an elaborate hoax. It's a long email citing already-published emails; and we only reproduce these in part. Re: Physics hoaxers discover Quantum Bogosity Dear Dr Orlowski, We were quite surprised to read your conclusions about the …

    Letters 5 Nov 2002, 06:32

  • I had a ‘spreadsheet for the mind’, but forgot where I left it…

    Letters Lotus eaters

    Mitch Kapor's resurrection of Lotus Agenda - for his new open source PIM Chandler - prompted some interesting links. One reader recommends ZOE - which looks very interesting indeed. You can find ZOE here. "All I will say is that it one of those tools that when you start using it, you wonder how you ever managed without it," …

    Letters 5 Nov 2002, 09:20

  • Java pet store hit ‘planned by MS’ – memo

    Dog eats Dog

    A drive-by shooting at a pet store last week was planned by Microsoft, reckons Java expert Richard Öberg. Police say rival gangs based in Redmond, Wa. and Mountain View, Ca. have a history of trouble, often favoring pet stores to exact their retribution. But Öberg, who issued a withering critique of The Middleware Company's …

    Software 5 Nov 2002, 09:38

  • Symantec to extend security management portfolio

    A matter of policy

    Having released the first stage in its security management software strategy last month, Symantec Corp's president and COO, John Shwarz, has been talking to ComputerWire about the Cupertino, California-based company's plans to expand its management strategy. The first stage in the plan was the release of Security …

    Security 5 Nov 2002, 09:44

  • AOL buddies up to enterprises with AIM release

    Security comes later

    America Online Inc yesterday made its long-anticipated foray into enterprise-grade instant messaging, with the release of an AOL Instant Messenger enterprise server and developers' kit, backed up by a support program, writes Kevin Murphy. The offering boosts AOL's software division, comprised of its Strategic Business …

    e-Business 5 Nov 2002, 09:44

  • Court ‘not persuaded’ C&W infringes Akamai patents

    So that's a no, then

    A District Court in Boston, Massachusetts ruled Friday that Cable & Wireless Plc's content delivery network service no longer infringes patents held by rival Akamai Technologies Inc. Judge Rya Zobel denied Akamai's motion to hold C&W in contempt of court for not stopping its CDN services following a permanent injunction …

    e-Business 5 Nov 2002, 09:44

  • WorldCom black hole even more massive – court report

    Misstating the obvious

    An initial court-ordered report into the rise and fall of WorldCom Inc has detailed a corporate culture that was focused on meeting analysts' expectations at all costs and warned that further massive restatements of the company's previous financial results may be necessary. The report by Dick Thornburgh, a former US …

    e-Business 5 Nov 2002, 09:44

  • Logica CMG to cut 1,400 jobs

    Post hoc rationalisation

    The combined workforces of Logica and CMG face the prospect of more layoffs as the boards of the respective companies approved a merger and cost-cutting plan. The merger plan will see Logica buy rival CMG for £512 million in stock, creating one of the largest computer services companies in Europe. Logica said it will pay 0. …

    Business 5 Nov 2002, 10:30

  • Fujitsu admits 4.9 million (potentially) defective HDDs

    Blames Cirrus in court filing

    The papers lodged with the court in California, in the $50 million action between Cirrus Logic and Fujitsu (of Japan), confirm what observers had already guessed, that – contrary to the blasé denials of any notable problems - there is indeed an officially acknowledged problem with the MPG3xxx series of drives. And Fujitsu knew …

    Storage 5 Nov 2002, 10:43

  • Comedian lifts lid on working for Amazon.com

    TUC offers free tickets

    The TUC is giving away free tickets for people to see a comedy show about one man's experiences working for Amazon.com during the dotcom boom. Mike Daisey's 21 Dog Years – Doing Time @ amazon.com promises to reveal the real and funny story of Amazon.com from a worker's perspective - slavishly long hours "fuelled by caffeine, …

    Bootnotes 5 Nov 2002, 10:46

  • Mozilla riddled with security holes

    Playing catch up

    Details of six flaws in Mozilla, the open source browser were posted on BugTraq at the weekend. Versions of Mozilla previous to version 1.0.1 contain multiple security vulnerabilities, so users need to update their browser software. The flaws could be used by an attacker to read data off of the local hard drive, gain …

    Security 5 Nov 2002, 10:52

  • 'You're still guilty,' judge in Sun et al antitrust case tells MS

    MS fails to get 395 sins counted as irrelevant

    US District Judge J Frederick Motz has rejected a Microsoft attempt to – effectively – have a string of prior convictions expunged from its record. Yesterday the Maryland judge denied a request by Microsoft attorneys to re-open 395 of Judge Penfield Jackson's 412 findings of fact, so for the moment at least Jackson's conclusions …

    Software 5 Nov 2002, 11:20

  • DiData issues $100m convertible bond

    Share dilution looming

    Dimension Data is to issue a £100m 7-year convertible bond to fellow South African company Venfin. If Venfin converts the bond into equity, it will end up with 12 per cent of the diluted capital of the networking equipment reseller. Venfin, a technology investment firm, will earn interest of 5.375 per cent.DiData says it has …

    Channel 5 Nov 2002, 12:03

  • Fayrewood upbeat on trading

    Looking up

    Fayrewood plc, the networking/storage distie group, today announced trading in the first five months of this fiscal year has produced a "substantial increase in profitability" over the same period last year. Turnover was approx. £180m (2001 £136m). Also its German subsidiary, ComputerLinks posted better sales and Earnings Before …

    Channel 5 Nov 2002, 12:04

  • Braid fails to unpick the Web

    Korean email worm poses little risk

    An email worm, believed to have originated in Korea, is winding its way across the Net this morning. Braid.A (aka Bridex) is written in Visual Basic and usually arrives in an email message as README.EXE attachment. The worm uses an iFrame exploit to run itself automatically on unpatched versions of Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft …

    Malware 5 Nov 2002, 12:09

  • Chinese province issues swipe IDs to Internet cafe users

    Monitor Lizards

    People in the central Chinese province of Jiangxi who use cybercafes are having their online activities monitored by police. Anyone who wants to use a cybercafe must now carry an Internet identity card containing personal details including their name and address. These details are then logged onto a police database. Each time …

    Music and Media 5 Nov 2002, 12:15

  • Nokia goes head-to-head with Nintendo

    N-Gage

    The Game Boy Advance is set to get serious competition at last, with Nokia taking the wraps off a new device called the N-Gage - a handheld console styled mobile phone which is designed specifically to act as a challenge to Nintendo's dominance of the market. The new device, which looks superficially similar to the GBA but …

    Personal 5 Nov 2002, 13:18

  • Clic Linux for clustered environments

    Groupe France

    A group of French developers working under the Open Source GPL have released a Linux Operating System, called Clic, which has been specifically developed for clustered environments. The product is aimed at harnessing the power of multiple low-cost PCs and turning them into high-end computing power. And you can try it for free …

    Hardware 5 Nov 2002, 13:26

  • Personal Computer Science boss arrested in Oz

    SFO want Charles Forsyth back in the UK

    Charles Forsyth, the controversial founder of a string of failed UK computer companies, has been arrested in Western Australia, over the alleged fraud of £1m in the UK. A warrant for Forsyth's arrest was issued on October in North Yorkshire, the home of Personal Computer Science, a prominent computer builder which collapsed in …

    Channel 5 Nov 2002, 14:34

  • £40m software piracy ring smashed in Italy

    Biggest of its kind

    Police have smashed a counterfeit software ring in Italy worth almost £40m in what is described as one of the largest and most organised cases of software piracy in Europe. One person has been charged and a further 10 suspects fingered as the Italian finance police (Guardia di Finanza) and the Business Software Alliance (BSA) …

    Software 5 Nov 2002, 14:35

  • Councils fall behind in race to deliver eGovt

    'Skills crisis'

    Britain's local authorities are slipping behind in making the government's 2005 deadline to put services online, with only 28 per cent of local authority services available on the Net. That's according to Novell which reckons there's a skills crisis in local government - with nine in 10 authorities experiencing skills shortages …

    e-Business 5 Nov 2002, 15:12

  • IBM voids customer warranty on ‘toxic’ Thinkpad

    As you do

    Our thanks to reader Scott Wilcox for alerting us to the following sorry tale, posted on October 30 by a certain Steve Andre on the ThinkPad Mailing-list Archive. The author's Thinkpad, a "wonderful A30p" developed a video memory problem and he sent it off for repair to IBM. The laptop was returned with the following message, …

    Bootnotes 5 Nov 2002, 16:06

  • Sonera security staff held on snooping charges

    Riffling through staff's home phone records

    Two senior security staff at Finnish telco Sonera have been remanded in custody, charged with breaching customer privacy by allegedly riffling through private telephone records in an attempt to identify an internal mole. Helsingin Sanomat, Finland's biggest daily newspaper, reports today that the Helsinki District Court ordered …

    Security 5 Nov 2002, 16:09

  • SAN security under the spotlight

    If you've networked your storage, you'd better start thinking about security

    Having got standards programmes underway for SAN interoperability and management, the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) is turning its attention to the next key part of the puzzle: storage security. "Three things kicked it off," says Mike Alverado of Neoscale, who chairs SNIA's Storage Security Industry Forum , …

    Storage 5 Nov 2002, 17:07

  • Handspring settles Lawsuits in Motion suit

    RIMmed

    Glorified pager company RIM has succeeded in bullying Handspring into licensing the former's extraordinary invention: the "keyboard". "Specific terms of the royalty-bearing license were not disclosed," discloses a joint press release. "RIM has agreed to dismiss its pending litigation against Handspring following the …

    Personal 5 Nov 2002, 20:15