14th December 2004 Archive

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UK customers get your skates on

Cash'n'Carrion Last order date today

We're winding up this year's ecommerce frenzy with a gentle reminder to our UK customers that tomorrow, 15 December, is the last date on which you can order Cash'n'Carrion kit for pre-Christmas delivery. So, if you're looking for some last-minute prezzie ideas, get down the El Reg merchandising tentacle and flash the plastic. …

Site News 14 Dec 2004, 09:33
Women are crap with PIN numbers - shock survey

One PIN to rule them all

Women take security less seriously than men when it comes to choosing PINs for their bank cards. A poll of over 500 British men and women, by internet security testing specialist NTA Monitor, found that women are more likely to choose one PIN for all their cards. Two thirds of the women questioned used the same PIN for all their …

Security 14 Dec 2004, 10:04
Toshiba unveils 80GB 'iPod drive'

Clever 'perpendicular recording system' boosts storage capacity

Toshiba today paved the way for 80GB iPods when it said it will ship an 80GB 1.8in hard drive in Q3 2005 - a year after it introduced the 60GB version that can currently to be found inside the iPod Photo. The Japanese manufacturer didn't mention any customers by name of course, but having supplied Apple with micro hard drives …

Storage 14 Dec 2004, 10:05
Eurostar brings Wi-Fi to termini

Today, London Waterloo; next year, Paris and Brussels

Cross-channel rail operator Eurostar has rolled out wireless Internet access at its London Waterloo and Ashford stations. Eurostar's station access points come courtesy of a deal with the company's Wi-Fi partner Broadreach Networks, which operates the ReadyToSurf wireless and fixed-line access brand. Users can now buy access …

Wireless 14 Dec 2004, 10:42
Mentec buys British Great Plains reseller

Bulking up

Mentec, an Irish reseller, is bulking up its Great Plains business, with the acquisition of Leicestershire dealership Sytation. The Irish papers say it is paying €5m. The enlarged company will be the second biggest reseller of Microsoft's Great Plains accountancy software in Europe. Sytation will retain its name, but is to be …

Channel Register 14 Dec 2004, 10:44
Tunable surfaces prevent Wi-Fi leaks

No more borrowing access points

Last year a man in Canada was arrested for downloading child pornography onto his laptop, but he used someone else's wireless access point to access the illegal material. That same year federal officials accused a man from Michigan of conspiring to steal credit card numbers from the Lowe's chain of home improvement stores by …

Wireless 14 Dec 2004, 10:46
Online extortion works

Opinion Pay up, or your server gets it

Online extortion is quietly affecting thousands of businesses, for a very simple reason: it works. The big question then becomes, how will you and your company decide to respond? Many of us have seen Kenneth Branagh's excellent 1989 motion picture adaptation of Shakespeare's Henry V, and the general impression that most people …

Enterprise Security 14 Dec 2004, 10:50
MPAA to serve lawsuits on BitTorrent servers

Targeting movie sharers, not enabling technology

The Motion Picture Ass. of America (MPAA) will today launch a legal attack on BitTorrent users in a bid to prevent ripped DVDs being shared across the network. The lawsuit will target BitTorrent server operators, Reuters reports rather than downloaders, indicating this is less an assault on the technology and more on the people …

Music and Media 14 Dec 2004, 11:17
Blunkett names kite as B52 base terror weapon

Tooled-up drug-crazed anarchists...

Our trustworthy and truthful Home Secretary has finally set the record straight recording dangerous "armed anarchists" who were searched by Gloucestershire police under anti-terror legislation at RAF Fairford, which is used as a B52 base, last year. Pride of place in the armoury of the drug-crazed Trotskyite crusties, apparently …

Music and Media 14 Dec 2004, 11:27
Guildford runs out of broadband

Join the queue

A "sudden surge" in demand for DSL broadband in Guildford has left BT on the hop and net users twiddling their thumbs waiting for high-speed net access. BT Wholesale, which provides DSL that is resold by ISPs such as AOL UK, Tiscali and Wanadoo UK, has confirmed that all capacity at its Guildford telephone exchange has been used …

Telecoms 14 Dec 2004, 11:48
Sony, Samsung agree to share toys

Patent cross-licence deal cover all but cutting-edge techs

Sony and Samsung have entered into a far-reaching technology licensing agreement that opens stacks of each company's intellectual properties to the other. However, the deal doesn't preclude the outbreak of legal fights between the two companies in future since key "differentiation technologies", such as Sony's PlayStation …

Channel Register 14 Dec 2004, 11:52
Tories come out in support of UK ID card scheme

Nice stake, Michael - is it a good fit?

After considerable infighting the Tory Party has come out in favour of ID cards, but with sufficient hedging for the party, if not Tory leader Michael Howard, to press the eject button should the ID scheme turn out to be not such a good idea after all. The support, which will mean the party votes in favour of the ID card bill on …

Music and Media 14 Dec 2004, 12:24
Oracle finally has its prize

The curtain falls

For the past 18 months, Oracle has been locked in a battle to acquire rival PeopleSoft involving courtroom drama, poison pills, personal enmity and, recently, the departure of PeopleSoft's CEO Craig Conway. In a move that many saw as the confirmation that PeopleSoft would agree the sale to Oracle, chairman and founder of the …

Applications 14 Dec 2004, 12:34
Kodak EasyShare DX7590

Review Can it appeal to novice and pro alike?

The Kodak DX7590 is an updated version of the DX6490 launched last year and the most obvious change from the model it replaces is the extra pixels: the resolution has been bumped to five megapixels, writes Doug Harman. The camera is slightly Jekyll and Hyde, in that it offers a dual personality, with two levels of control. The …

Reviews 14 Dec 2004, 14:01
T-Mobile widens UK airport Wi-Fi cover

Something to do when your flight's delayed

T-Mobile has expanded its initial foothold in the UK's major airports, extending the reach of its Wi-Fi hotspots to cover the whole of Heathrow, Gatwick and Glasgow airports, along with the international departure lounges at Stansted, Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Southampton. T-Mobile announced its first foray into the UK's airports …

Mobile 14 Dec 2004, 14:47
Bestselling programming guides, going cheap

Reg Offers Save 30 per cent and claim your free book

Welcome to this week's round-up from The Register Bookshop. We’re continuing our exclusive offer of key titles at low/exclusive prices. We’ve compiled the second part of the titles which have been your bestsellers throughout 2004 from the The Register Bookshop. This week the best sellers cover Programming, Networking and ‘ …

Site News 14 Dec 2004, 14:54
Gait advances in emerging biometrics

I can tell by the way you walk

"Great Juno comes; I know her by her gait." William Shakespeare, The Tempest Retinal scans, finger printing or facial recognition get most of the publicity but researchers across the world are quietly labouring away at alternative types of biometrics. Recognition by the way someone walk (their gait), the shape of their ears, …

ID 14 Dec 2004, 15:07
BT denies fiddling prices on Advent Calendar sales promo

URL 'manipulation' yields unpublished discounts

BT has denied that it's fiddling prices on its online "Advent Calendar" promotion, in response to a snowstorm of customer complaints. The promo at BT Shop promises that punters can "save up to 30 per cent on your Christmas gifts with our fantastic daily offer". All people need to do is click on the Advent calendar for the day …

Financial News 14 Dec 2004, 15:12
UK forecasts 96% e-gov hit rate

Electronic services aplenty

The vast majority of government services will be available electronically by the end of next year, according to a report from the Cabinet Office. It says that 96 per cent of the services earmarked by the government as "suitable for e-enabling" will meet the 2005 deadline set by Tony Blair. The Cabinet Office says the outlook …

Public Sector 14 Dec 2004, 16:00
'Horoscopes' is AOL's most searched word

People like hairstyles too

America Online today released its most popular search terms, which showed that Britney Spears has reclaimed the title of most searched person of 2004 from rapper 50 Cent. Platinum recording artist and teen movie star Hilary Duff was the most searched person by children and teenagers, while Usher was the most searched male. …

Music and Media 14 Dec 2004, 16:02
Intel confirms dual-core desktop 'Smithfield'

But is it two Prescotts in one package or a single-die part?

Intel today publicly confirmed the existence of 'Smithfield', the dual-core desktop processor it expects to ship mid-2005 and which started appearing on the company's internal roadmaps this past Summer. However, the chip giant also acknowledged, again for the first time, that the chip may not be known as the Pentium 4. Even if …

PCs 14 Dec 2004, 16:27
Insight exits PlusNet, raises £15.8m

PlusNet snuggles up to BT

Insight Direct, the UK arm of US reseller giant Insight Enterprises, has raised around £15.8m by selling its remaining 45 per cent stake in Sheffield-based ISP PlusNet through a share placong. PlusNet also announced that it has added an extra 9,000 new broadband users since the end of September, taking its total ADSL customer …

Telecoms 14 Dec 2004, 16:43
The new world's A to Z, courtesy of Google

A is for Amazon, P is for Paris Hilton

Out with the old, and in with the new. With the new year fast approaching, it seems timely to review the huge changes that have overtaken society thanks to a decade of widespread internet use. And who else is best placed to deliver such an far-reaching overview than Google itself? Words are added to and taken out of the …

Music and Media 14 Dec 2004, 16:44
Symantec eyeing Veritas for $13bn - report

Data protection on the grandest scale

There could be another high profile software merger on the way with rumors circulating today that Symantec will buy Veritas Software for more than $13bn. Such a deal would create the ultimate data protection vendor. Symantec specializes in anti-virus and network security applications, while Veritas is a major player in the data …

Applications 14 Dec 2004, 17:40
MS NAP aims to kill off Nimda-style outbreaks

More recruits for network dewormer initiative

Microsoft has recruited 18 more security and networking suppliers for Network Access Protection (NAP) scheme. NAP, due to ship with Longhorn in 2007, provides a policy enforcement bolt-on to Windows that allows admins to restrict access to networks to machines without up-to-date OS patches or anti-virus updates. NAP is designed …

Enterprise Security 14 Dec 2004, 18:14
ICANN goes domain crazy

New .mobi and .jobs, a shift in the ownership of .net

Internet overseeing organisation ICANN has rediscovered its love of top-level domains, announcing this week that it has put another two through to final approval stages, as well as approving the document that will be used to decide the new owner of all .net domains next year. A special meeting of the Board yesterday resolved …

Financial News 14 Dec 2004, 18:28
Oracle gets really, really virtual with VMware

Partitioning together

Oracle and virtual server software maker VMware have taken an inevitable step toward tightening their relationship. The companies announced a broad agreement that will see them cooperate on product development, support and marketing for Oracle's database and server software and VMware's virtual server - aka partitioning - …

Applications 14 Dec 2004, 19:01
Software patents: the UK Patent Office pleads its case

Sceptical audience

The definition of technical contribution will have to be tested in the European Court of Justice before anyone can say exactly what the European Directive on computer implemented inventions means. Before it gets to that stage, however, the government and the UK Patent Office have agreed that the issue needs to be explored more …

Developer 14 Dec 2004, 19:18
IBM secures China server biz with Great Wall

Lenovo loved and then attacked

After making a big splash in the Chinese PC market, IBM has now taken care of the server side of the house by forming a new joint venture with Great Wall Computing. IBM will own 80 percent of International Systems Technology Company with Great Wall picking up the other 20 percent. The new company replaces an old joint venture …

Servers 14 Dec 2004, 21:31
Finnish police raid BitTorrent site

'Millions of euros' of downloads

Police in Finland have raided the operations of a popular BitTorrent file download site, seizing equipment and at the houses four people who ran the site. Police also raided the houses of 30 volunteers who helped moderate the site. According to our early translation of a report of the raids, the 34 people had been arrested, but …

Music and Media 14 Dec 2004, 23:51