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24th April 2008 Archive

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  • Web infection attacks more than 100,000 pages

    UK Civil Service, UN and EPA among the plagued

    Hackers have injected malicious code into hundreds of thousands of reputable web pages, turning them into launchpads for attacks that silently install malware on the machines of those who visit them. The UK's Civil Service and the United Nations were among those who had been hacked. This Yahoo search returned 173,000 results …

    Enterprise Security 24 Apr 2008, 00:51

  • Unlocked iPhones help drive Apple Q2

    Don't cry for me AT&T...

    Announcing its second quarter financial results today, Apple confirmed the obvious by saying a "significant" number of iPhones are being purchased from its outlets with the express intention of unlocking them. That trend, coupled with higher-than-expected demand, has resulted in inventory shortages, the company claimed. COO …

    Financial News 24 Apr 2008, 01:16

  • Microsoft's Ruby lead sounds Balkanization alarm

    Wanted: a Guy Steele Jr, for Ruby

    The guy leading Microsoft's port of Ruby to .NET has warned of a potential Balkanization of Ruby, which could impair the language's success. In an interview, John Lam said Ruby could benefit from "a Guy Steele Jr" to help define the language, and help establish a common specification that everyone could refer to. Computer …

    Software 24 Apr 2008, 06:02

  • Plate armour to protect PS3

    Not bullet-proof

    Defending yourself from virtual bullets in Metal Gear Solid 4 will be hard enough, but keeping your PlayStation 3 free from everyday scrapes is another matter. Thankfully, Amazon’s now selling console armour to do just that. The breastplate-like cover is punched out from aluminium and clips onto the console’s curved face. A …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 07:29

  • Slang splurge forces voice-recognition revision

    One is not amused

    If you leave a voicemail on your mate’s phone arranging for a couple of jars in the local rub-a-dub without the trouble'n’strife and then your pal doesn’t arrive, it could be because you’re using too much slang. Innit. According to the company behind SpinVox, a system that converts voicemails into text messages, Brits now use …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 07:33

  • UK net registry battles coup d'etat

    Updated The power struggle at the heart of Nominet

    Nominet, the not-for-profit registry for .co.uk web addresses, is facing an attempted coup by a group of members who want to force its bosses to hand back millions of pounds in surplus fees. The company took the rearguard step on Monday of writing to all its 3,000 members encouraging them to turn out to vote in ongoing …

    Law 24 Apr 2008, 08:02

  • AMD introduces bug-fix three-core Phenoms

    Less than a month after the previous versions

    AMD has rolled out a trio of tri-core processors, all revised versions of the Phenom X3 CPUs it introduced last month. The new line-up comprises the 2.4GHz 8750, the 2.3GHz 8650 and the 2.1GHz 8450. They're priced at $195, $165 and $145, respectively. All three contain 'B3' cores, an improved version of the 'B2' X3s released …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 08:37

  • US court says IP addresses are private

    Want a subpoena? Take it to the grand jury

    A US court has ruled that users have a "reasonable expectation of privacy" in their internet surfing records and that police must obtain warrants from higher than usual courts in order to force ISPs to hand over records. The Supreme Court of the state of New Jersey said that information about a person's use of the internet was …

    Law 24 Apr 2008, 09:20

  • Pioneer picks Panasonic as plasma telly partner

    Firms to combine R&D efforts

    Pioneer and Panasonic are to align their plasma TV operations and integrate their research and development efforts, the new partners said today. The announcement comes a month after Pioneer said it was to end in-house plasma panel production. At the time, it said it made the decision because of the difficulty it foresees in …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 09:29

  • Sydney skies menaced by deadly raygun disco-ball

    Avant-garde public artwork almost downs traffic chopper

    Most readers will be aware by now of the recent spate of laser-pointer yobbo dazzle harassment attacks on aircraft in Australia. Now, however, aviators above Sydney are being threatened by a new brand of malefactor - municipally-funded modern artists. It seems that Sydney traffic-chopper reporter Vic Larusso fell victim to the …

    Policing 24 Apr 2008, 09:35

  • Sony to bring GTA IV PS3 bundle to Blighty

    Five days to go...

    Sony has jumped onto the Grand Theft Auto IV bandwagon and created a PlayStation 3 bundle pack that includes game and console, to ensure would-be gangsters opt for PS3-based drive-bys. Aside from a copy of the game, the package also includes a 40GB PS3 and one SixAxis wireless controller – minus the rumble. Sony's bundle …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 09:57

  • YouTube has a little local difficulty in Arabia

    Cache from chaos

    A security snafu on YouTube allowed users in the UAE to view the account pages and preferences of other users. The bug also created a means to jump into Gmail in cases where surfers had linked their YouTube and Gmail accounts. The issue appeared to only crop up locally, within the UAE, and only for users of the Etisalat …

    Security 24 Apr 2008, 10:10

  • The web rip-offs nobody cares about

    Column Online, no one can hear you cry

    The problem with web crime is "who cares?" It doesn't matter if we're talking about identity theft or credit card fraud, if it's done to you, you may well have to weep alone. The simple economics of crime make it impossible to show a payback for any individual scam. Take the simple question of buying something off a web " …

    Policing 24 Apr 2008, 10:16

  • Border Agency plans Olympic identity card

    Access card to be 'inclusive and far reaching'

    The Border Agency is developing a "pretty inclusive and far reaching" Olympic accreditation card for the 2012 games. The card will provide access to both the county and to the venues, chief executive Lin Homer told the Secure Document World conference in London on 23 April 2008. When asked by GC News about the extent of the …

    Government 24 Apr 2008, 10:24

  • Samsung rolls out Pebble player

    Rock and roll

    A futuristic MP3 player has washed ashore from Samsung, and it’s dubbed the Pebble. Samsung's Pebble MP3 player: odd looking The wacky gadget is also known as the S2, and it supports a variety of formats, including MP3, WMA and Ogg. The topside is raised just like, well, a pebble, but the device’s underside sinks in and …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 10:54

  • OLPC sweet talks Microsoft

    Sprinkles Sugar on top of Windows

    The One Laptop Per Child Foundation (OLPC) is adapting its Sugar software package to make it compatible with Microsoft’s operating system. The group’s founder Nicholas Negroponte said in an email yesterday that it was agreed after months of discussions with the software giant that the XO Laptop, which currently only runs on a …

    Software 24 Apr 2008, 10:55

  • Sony Bluetooth Walkman NWZ-A826K

    Review Better late than never?

    Available in three flavours - 4, 8 and 16GB - the pithily named NWZ-A826K is Sony's latest post-ATRAC assault on the MP3 player market, an attack launched once again under the now rather faded Walkman banner. One can only imagine the gnashing of teeth that goes on at Sony when anyone mentions that in the 1990s we all had a …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 11:02

  • Spread your database connections with PHP PDO

    Less is more

    PHP is one of the most commonly used scripting languages on the web - about 35 per cent of websites use PHP. Databases, meanwhile, are undergoing something of a renaissance thanks to web development. Often one database is used during the development stage of a web application and another database is used in production - MySQL …

    Software 24 Apr 2008, 11:02

  • Brown gov will make 'big commitment' to carbon capture

    Big as in small

    The Brown government, having previously stated that it is one of very few national administrations worldwide taking the idea of carbon capture seriously, has reportedly disclosed that its seriousness will not take the form of cash. A Prime Ministerial adviser says the government will commit "tens of millions" to a pilot carbon …

    Environment 24 Apr 2008, 11:24

  • Amazon spits out healthy Q1 results

    Bats gloomy recession ball into the stands

    Online retail giant Amazon racked up impressive first quarter revenue and profit growth, and said today it has – so far – not been affected by an economic slowdown in the US. Q1 profit was up 30 per cent on a healthy 37 per cent climb in revenue, buoyed by increased customer purchases through the firm’s free-shipping schemes …

    Financial News 24 Apr 2008, 11:34

  • Autonomy shares drop despite solid results

    Punished for missed targets

    Autonomy saw its shares drop more than ten per cent on results for the first quarter, showing good revenue growth but slightly weaker than expected profits. The Cambridge company made revenues of $105.1m, up 61 per cent on a year ago, and a net profit of $16.4m, up 60 per cent, for the first quarter ended 31 March 2008. …

    Financial News 24 Apr 2008, 11:35

  • Motorola debuts 3G Z8 kicker

    Stylish moves

    Motorola is having another stab at crafting a handset with attitude, by developing a third-generation model of its original Z8 “kick slider”. The latest model is called the Z8m and sports the all important kick, or curve, that it’s claimed improves call quality by bringing the microphone closer to the user’s mouth. Motorola' …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 11:38

  • Murdoch's chief hacker testifies in California

    But what colour was his hat?

    Christopher Tarnovsky has been testifying in the ongoing case between the News-Corp-Owned NDS and DISH Network Inc, which accuses Murdoch's firm of hacking its pay-TV conditional access (CA) systems. Tarnovsky admits receiving $20,000 in cash, hidden inside electronics delivered from Canada, from NDS to examine their own CA …

    Applications 24 Apr 2008, 11:39

  • Coming soon: The Church of Googlology?

    WHOIS trawl reveals plans for burrito-worship sex cult

    Those among you who are increasingly concerned at Google's inexorable rise to total domination of Planet Earth would do well to check out this report into the vast number of domain names the search monolith has acquired, many of which indicate its sinister future intentions. A good percentage of Google's domain manifest is …

    Bootnotes 24 Apr 2008, 11:41

  • Iomega pitches paperback-sized media playback HDD

    Pages of storage

    Iomega has launched an HD version of its ScreenPlay multimedia storage unit, boasting enough capacity for your entire DVD collection. The company claimed the 500GB monster holds around 2m photos, over 9000 hours of music or up to 750 hours of video – which is a lot of time spent watching the telly. ScreenPlay HD supports 480i …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 11:43

  • The terror dam of doom that looms over Boise, Idaho

    America's terror vulnerability capital - no, really

    It shouldn't come as a surprise that some American scientists think terrorism can be defined by equations and a priori vulnerability factors. Close study of terrorist action and behavior is too dull for many in the US counter-terror business, so it's better to have numbers; insurance men, newspaper reporters and government …

    Policing 24 Apr 2008, 11:55

  • Anti-Scientology crusader vaporized from YouTube

    'Help me, Stephen Colbert. You're my only hope'

    YouTube has vaporized a popular user account dedicated to criticizing The Church of Scientology. Last Thursday, the world's most popular video sharer removed the 10,000-subscriber-strong "Xenutv1" channel run by Mark Bunker, a television journalist/well-known Scientology naysayer. Earlier in the week, Bunker posted a teaser …

    Music and Media 24 Apr 2008, 12:12

  • Lib Dem mayor candidate jumps aboard muni Wi-Fi failboat

    Targeting the key tight-fisted cappuccino-drinker vote

    Brian Paddick, the Liberal Democrats' London mayoral hopeful, has pledged to build a city-wide free Wi-Fi network, despite the high failure rate of similar projects internationally. The former plod said he would fund the £7.5m scheme by cancelling Transport for London's advertising budget. Each borough would have its own start …

    Telecoms 24 Apr 2008, 12:17

  • Central e-crime unit waits for Home Office approval

    Amber light

    Police hope the Home Office will approve plans to create a central e-crime unit in the UK. Ministers are yet to agree £1.3m in start-up funding for a Policing Central E-Crime Unit (PCEU), proposed by ACPO (the Association of Chief Police Officers) and the Metropolitan Police. The Metropolitan Police's head of e-crime, …

    Policing 24 Apr 2008, 12:41

  • Sky One to resurrect Blake's 7?

    Scripts in development, says broadcaster

    Sky One has provocatively given the go-ahead for the development of two 60-minute scripts which could see the return to the small screen of cult TV classic Blake's 7, the BBC reports. Blake's 7 ran from 1978 to 1981 on the Beeb, and is best remembered among chaps of a certain age for the presence of Jacqueline Pearce as the …

    Entertainment 24 Apr 2008, 12:42

  • Motorola losses grow over flabby Q1

    Devices drag figures down

    Motorola has posted figures for the first three months of 2008, with a rise in losses, and handset sales down 39 per cent. Overall, the net loss comes to $194m, or about nine cents per share, on revenues of $7.45bn. This compared to the $181m it lost in the same period last year on revenues of $9.43bn. In the devices division …

    Mobile 24 Apr 2008, 13:10

  • Microsoft could go it alone without Yahoo!

    Ballmer won't up bid

    Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer yesterday dropped the biggest hint yet that Redmond could turn its back on rival Yahoo! if its hostile bid to buy the internet search engine is rejected. The Wall Street Journal reports that Ballmer, speaking after a conference in Milan, said: “We know what Yahoo! is worth to us. We offered a lot of …

    Applications 24 Apr 2008, 13:26

  • Why has Sony bought Gracenote?

    Oiling the machine

    $260m is a lot to pay for a pile of information about a dying music format - but Sony might just have made the deal of the century. The entertainment giant now has the biggest store of music metadata in the world, with the acquisition of Gracenote. The deal is expected to be completed in May. Gracenote has its roots in CDDB: a …

    Music and Media 24 Apr 2008, 13:47

  • Canadian man in Taser trouser inferno shocker

    Plods claim victim had combustibles stashed in pants

    Taser-wielding Canadian police inadvertently caused a horrific underpant conflagration at the weekend, according to reports. In the course of subduing a non-compliant Ontario citizen, the officers - as is nowadays routine practice - fired a miniaturised flying cattleprod module into his body and passed a high voltage current …

    Bootnotes 24 Apr 2008, 14:09

  • Clash vet pens 'Don't tase me bro!' ditty

    'It's gonna go like this - dun-dun-dun... Aaaargh!'

    Former Clash guitarist Mick Jones has immortalised in song the legendary "Don't tase me, bro!" arrest of Andrew Meyer, the student who decided it was a good idea to get shouty at senator John Kerry and received a solid tasering for his trouble: According to Reuters, Jones has penned the ditty for his second album with …

    Music and Media 24 Apr 2008, 14:11

  • Sony and Sky plan summer release for video download scheme

    Watch satellite telly on a PSP

    Sony and broadcaster Sky have confirmed that a video download service will be launched for the PSP during the ice-cream season, bringing satellite TV to the portable games console. Go!View enables gamers to access a variety of Sky’s telly content, including films, which are downloaded onto the PSP through a PC. Users choose …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 14:48

  • LG spills Secret beans

    Pssst

    LG can’t keep a secret, but it’s hoping to shift a few. The South Korean handset manufacturer today launched Secret, a phone it actually unveiled a couple of weeks back. The slider phone is the latest addition to LG’s Black Label series, which already includes the Chocolate and the Shine. We already knew the phone had a five- …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 15:05

  • Vodafone and China Mobile team to build mobile Web 2.0

    All your widget are belong to us

    Vodafone and China Mobile are setting up a Joint Innovation Lab (JIL) to establish standards for Web 2.0 widgets in the hope of creating truly cross-platform mobile apps. Mobile web browsing is something of a dead end. No matter how great your scaling technology, most websites won't work properly on the smallest screen. So …

    Mobile 24 Apr 2008, 15:17

  • Honda android to conduct symphony orchestra

    Foo Bah-Bah-Bah-Baaah!

    Detroit Symphony Orchestra conductor Thomas Wilkins could be getting worried, because the US classical music ensemble has orchestrated plans to replace him - temporarily at least - with a Honda robot. Next month, the car manufacturer’s Asimo - which stands for Advanced Step in Innovative Mobility, apparently - will conduct the …

    Reg Hardware 24 Apr 2008, 15:23

  • Colliding galaxies mark Hubble anniversary

    New set of galactic pile-up snaps released

    Aficionados of galactic pile-ups can avail themselves today of a set of 59 Hubble images of colliding galaxies, released to commemorate the 18th anniversary of the space telescope's launch. The dramatic snaps, constituting the "largest collection of Hubble images ever released to the public", include this close encounter …

    Space 24 Apr 2008, 15:24

  • Home Office defends 'dangerously misleading' Phorm thumbs-up

    Updated 'Protecting the public'

    The Home Office today defended advice it gave BT and Phorm that their "Webwise" agreement to track millions of broadband subscribers will probably be legal if consent is obtained. Meanwhile, it has emerged that neither BT nor Phorm sought any government advice on the wiretapping trials conducted in autumn 2006 and summer 2007 …

    Government 24 Apr 2008, 15:51

  • 'We could wake up smarter' - Ballmer hints at Win XP reprieve

    Vista-shy customers raise your hands

    Windows XP could yet be reprieved from end-of-life, if enough customers demand it, said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer today. Speaking at a news conference in Belgium Ballmer said: "XP will hit an end-of-life. We have announced one. If customer feedback varies we can always wake up smarter but right now we have a plan for end-of- …

    Software 24 Apr 2008, 16:03

  • Sun chum Oracle pushes database buyers to IBM

    Comment T2+ blunder spells Rock disaster in waiting

    A couple of years back, Oracle chief Larry Ellison and then Sun CEO Scott McNealy held an event in Redwood City to renew their vows. Oracle signed on to ship Java for ten more years, and Sun started bundling Oracle's database on its servers at no charge. That last bit was meant to give Sun an edge over hardware rivals, although …

    Servers 24 Apr 2008, 17:02

  • Ubuntu launchpad for Affero?

    Google test case

    The controversial Affero general public license could get an unexpected boost from Ubuntu developer Canonical. Mark Shuttleworth, Canonical's chief executive, has said AGPL is "a strong candidate" for the eventual open source release of Launchpad, Canonical's developer collaboration tool. The issue arose in a forum discussion …

    Software 24 Apr 2008, 17:28

  • Sun buys low-power x86 disaster Montalvo

    Exclusive Asymmetrical chip assets

    Sun Microsystems has bought chip start-up Montalvo Systems for an undisclosed sum. A notice seen by The Register states that Sun "has acquired the technology assets" of the chip company, which has been working on a low-power x86 processor design. The Montalvo crew and IP will slot into Sun's Microelectronics business unit. " …

    Servers 24 Apr 2008, 18:14

  • Unmasking the Neighborhood Network Watch

    Is it art or a plot to spy on America's Wi-Fi networks?

    Emery Martin is a man on a mission. The 23 year-old resident of Brooklyn has spearheaded the Neighborhood Network Watch, a grassroots group advocating the monitoring by volunteers of open Wi-Fi networks "to make sure that terrorists may not be using your own home network to plan the next attack on our nation or your very own …

    Policing 24 Apr 2008, 18:41

  • Eye-o-Sauron™ border beam barrier tech too crap to keep

    Migrant scan towers to be rebuilt from ground up

    Functionaries at the US Department of Homeland security (DHS) have officially confirmed that the troubled first-generation Eye-o-Sauron™ huddled-mass tracking border protection system - aka Project 28 - is too useless even to use as a basis for future equipment. A just-accepted $20m pilot barrier in the Arizona desert will be …

    Government 24 Apr 2008, 18:44

  • Random people to monkey with Yahoo! search engine

    Mail and Mobile next

    Yahoo! has rolled out a limited preview of its Search Monkey platform, a way for third-party web developers to "enhance the functionality, appearance and usefulness" of Yahoo! Search results. The company likes to say that this new platform has "opened up" its search engine. With Search Monkey, first announced in February, …

    Developer 24 Apr 2008, 19:19

  • IBM's SVC unit will get thin provisioning

    Capacity diet planned but not specified

    IBM, we've learned, intends to add thin provisioning capabilities to its SAN Volume Controller (SVC), a long-overdue feature for some of Big Blue's virtualized arrays. The news arrives from the business blog of IBM's Barry Whyte, retorting a cranky blog entry of EMC's Barry Burke — who in turn was lashing out against various …

    Storage 24 Apr 2008, 20:08

  • Blade dishes loss-less Ethernet wonder

    Making the FCoE dream happen

    Blade Network Technologies has announced RackSwitch, the first loss-less Ethernet switch, needed for FCoE storage networking. RackSwitch is a top-of-rack product that provides Ethernet switching for an entire rack of blade servers and storage. The gigabit and 10 Gbit Ethernet ports in it are aggregated into a single virtual …

    Storage 24 Apr 2008, 20:20

  • FreeBSD developer Kip Macy charged with tenant terror

    Landlord rage

    Prominent FreeBSD developer Kip Macy has been charged with waging a campaign of terror against people renting apartments in a six-unit building he owns. He stands accused of cutting out floor supports to retaliate against a tenant who went to court to keep from being evicted. According to San Francisco prosecutors, Macy also …

    Operating Systems 24 Apr 2008, 21:37

  • LaCie's rugged rubber drive hits 500GB

    Rubber baby hard drive bumper

    Rubber hard disk fetishist LaCie has upped the capacity of its ruggedly designed portable drive to half a terabyte capacity. Quite resembling an orange inflatable raft, the unit now packs a 500GB Hitachi Travelstar 2.5-inch drive into the Neil Poulton-designed chassis. The LaCie Rugged features a scratch-resistant aluminum …

    Storage 24 Apr 2008, 21:49