24th March 2009 Archive

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Ex-EA man schools iPhone game makers

GDC 09 Ask yourself 'What would Nintendo do?'

With an average of 165 apps released for the iPhone each day, it seems like everyone and their Aunt Mable has suddenly become a mobile developer - and all for a platform less than a year old. Apple created an exceedingly easy path for independent game makers to enter the ecosystem with its iTunes App Store. But for developers …

Mobile 24 Mar 00:15
Worm breeds botnet from home routers, modems

More than 100,000 hosts invaded

Security researchers have identified a sophisticated piece of malware that corrals consumer routers and DSL modems into a lethal botnet. The "psyb0t" worm is believed to be the first piece of malware to target home networking gear, according to researchers from DroneBL, which bills itself as a real-time monitor of abusable …

Security 24 Mar 00:20
~~Bush~~ Obama sides with RIAA in P2P fight

No change to believe in

Barack Obama's Department of Justice (DOJ) has sided with the Recording Industry Ass. of America (RIAA) in its lawsuit against a Massachusetts man accused of illegally downloading seven songs. Here we go again. The previous occupant of the White House also sided with the RIAA, in a similar case that ended in a mistrial - but …

Music and Media 24 Mar 00:51
Novell kicks out SUSE Linux Enterprise 11

Getting Mono and getting high

Commercial Linux distributor Novell today takes the wraps off SUSE Linux 11, its riff on Linux for servers and desktops that now sports a commercially supported extension for the Mono runtime environment and a variant that provides high availability clustering of servers. The Mono Extension to SUSE Linux is the first time that …

Operating Systems 24 Mar 04:02
Medion tower makes supermarket debut

'Eggs, bacon, bread, milk, PC...'

Just shy of £500 is rather a lot to spend on the weekly shop, but get yourself down to budget supermarket Aldi this week and the sum will get you a whopper of a Medion PC. Medion's Akoya P4340 D: coming to an Aldi near you The Akoya P4340 D tower PC is based on a 2.8GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor supported by a meaty 4GB of …

Reg Hardware 24 Mar 07:02
Taking the bull by the balls: A NetApp history

Review Surefire Hitz, or a load of WAFL?

People hungry for storage technology details will not be impressed by Dave Hitz's history of NetApp, How To Castrate A Bull. All they will learn about WAFL, Hitz's seminal invention underpinning NetApp's filer success is that it is "Absolutely wonderful technology that our non-technical customers don't really want to hear about …

Storage 24 Mar 09:02
Lawyer-client privilege no bar to surveillance, say Lords

Yes sir, I can bug you

The state is allowed to bug communication between lawyers and their clients, the House of Lords has said. The UK's highest court ruled that spy law the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) allows lawyers' conversations to be bugged. Lawyers are allowed to withhold the details of communication with their clients from …

Government 24 Mar 10:21
Failed tax system still causing grief

More help needed for vulnerable

The Public Accounts Committee has found the government's tax system overpaid tax credits by £7.3bn in the first four years of the scheme and is still clocking up £1bn a year in overpayments. Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs is trying to recover some £4.3bn of that from some of the most vulnerable families in the country. …

Government 24 Mar 10:26
Ofcom finds few using e-gov

Online services? Meh

The communications regulator has found that fewer than half the UK population have used online government services. In a report published on 20 March 2009, Ofcom says that 42 per cent of those interviewed had used the internet to search for information about government or local council services, or used online services such as …

Government 24 Mar 10:35
O2, Vodafone in cabinet bunk-up

No, really, this is huge

O2 and Vodafone successfully confused the media yesterday by announcing a network sharing deal, despite the fact that the deal extends to little more than linking up air-conditioning units and power supplies while the networks remain obstinately separate. The deal, which was announced yesterday, involves extending the existing …

Mobile 24 Mar 11:04
El Reg Street View snappers caught on camera

Surveillance feedback loops threaten fabric of time and space

It's been live for less than a week, but Google's Street View has already got the press and privacy outfits in a bit of a tizz over the possible implications of having the UK's highways and byways, and indeed the citizens unfortunate enough to have been walking Blighty's leafy boulevards when the Orwellian Opel came a-calling, …

Bootnotes 24 Mar 11:12
Nokia unfolds 7205 Intrigue

With 'hidden-until-lit' display

Nokia has launched a rather intriguing clamshell phone, a colourful little talker called the 7205 Intrigue. Nokia's 7205 Intrigue The phone’s black exterior has been partnered with what’s described as a “hidden-until-lit” external display, the idea being that folk won’t realise that the outside of your phone has a display …

Reg Hardware 24 Mar 11:19
Adamo battery not hot-swappable

Those damn screws...

Dell’s recently unveiled Adamo laptop emulates Apple’s MacBook Air in more than just looks. It’s been revealed that the PC giant's latest laptop doesn’t feature a user-removable battery either. Dell's Adamo: users, you can't change the batter This means that, should buyers have a fault with their Adamo battery, the machine …

Reg Hardware 24 Mar 11:30
London health authority put on notice over data breach

ICO fumes over dumped PCs with patient records

A north London health authority has been given until the end of the month to improve its information security policies following an embarrassing information security blunder last year. The Information Commissioner's Office has given Camden Primary Care Trust until the end of the month to pull up its socks following a breach of …

ID 24 Mar 11:41
Brainscan boffins build blunder-warning hat

'Danger, Prime Minister! Do not trust the economist!'

Brain brainboxes in America and the Netherlands have come up with two significant pieces of research this week. Doubt is cast on any hopes for an early recovery from the present global economic crisis: but then a ray of light appears from another direction. A clue as to why the economy is in the toilet? The gloomy news …

Biology 24 Mar 11:50
All aboard for six gig SAS

Hitachi GST and Atto get involved

The six gig SAS bandwagon is gathering pace, with Hitachi GST announcing a 6Gbit/s small form factor (SFF) enterprise drive and Atto announcing six gig SAS host adapters. Originally the Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) interconnect ran at 3Gbit/s, but a second generation of the standard doubled its speed to 6Gbit/s, making it better …

Storage 24 Mar 12:01
Pot Noodle boils up instant doner kebab

'The ultimate man food snack'

There's great news today for those of you who like to go out on the lash and then get your laughing gear around death wrapped in pitta bread but sometimes can't even be arsed to hit the pub before partaking of late-night nutrition: You'll soon be able to avail yourselves of a doner kebab-flavoured Pot Noodle. Indeed, the …

Bootnotes 24 Mar 12:04
ContactPoint rollout grinds to a halt, again

Come on, while we're young

ContactPoint, the child protection database set up after the murder of Victoria Climbie, has been delayed for the third time. The brakes were first put on the project after the loss of 25m records by Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs which led to a general review of the government's shoddy data security practises. It was …

Government 24 Mar 12:10
EMI rejigs digital unit, waves goodbye to ex-Google CIO

Douglas Merrill in and out in under a year

EMI Music split with its digital head yesterday after the troubled record company decided to move the unit he oversaw into its main business operations. Ex-Google CIO Douglas Merrill joined the firm less than a year ago. Terra Firma boss Guy Hands, whose private equity company bought the record label for close to $3.5bn in May …

Music and Media 24 Mar 12:16
Police ad urges: 'Trust no one'

Analysis A nation of bin-rummagers?

A new ad campaign by the Metropolitan Police warns the public to be on the alert for strangers who look at them in a funny way, and to check the contents of their neighbours’ bins. Suggestions that the campaign may be a tad alarmist have been dismissed, the police arguing they are only doing what is necessary to protect the …

Policing 24 Mar 12:17
Pure Digital Evoke-2S DAB and FM radio

Review Quality sound

With its ‘chip company that also makes radios’ label firmly in the past, Pure Digital can now move on to produce products at the top end of the market. But to justify its premium price of £170, the "luxury" Evoke-2S needs to deliver a something special. Fortunately for Pure, it does just that. Pure's Evoke-2S: focused on …

Reg Hardware 24 Mar 12:41
Police union leader calls for 'killer games' sales ban

World would be better off without violent videogames

A senior German police official has called for violent videogames to be banned. Heini Schmitt, head of the Hessen branch of the German police union, wants sales of these games to be blocked because, he claimed, “in every situation in which a violent rampage has occurred”, the perpetrator had an “addiction to so-called killer …

Reg Hardware 24 Mar 12:42
Orange and 3 talk back to Carter

Vodafone and O2 saying nowt

The first responses to Lord Carter's report on enabling Digital Britain are in, and Orange has offered to connect up the UK if Ofcom agrees to hand over a decent slice of 900Mhz. The responses so far made public include both Orange and 3, allowing them to explain why they need more 900MHz spectrum while everyone else complains …

Mobile 24 Mar 12:43
LibDems want gov action on killer lorries of death

Sock'n'scandal wearers focus on real issues

The Liberal Democrats, Britain's other opposition, is calling for urgent government action on the threat of killer lorries of death, which are apparently routinely smashing into railway bridges and menacing primary schools thanks to dodgy satnav. The LibDems reckons satnav devices "frequently direct large vehicles down narrow …

Bootnotes 24 Mar 13:06
ID cards not compulsory after all, says Home Office

Blunkett plan finding favour?

Plans to make ID cards compulsory for UK citizens at some point in the middle distance have been officially abandoned, apparently. According to the Home Office's revised counter-terrorism strategy document, published today, "It is not our intention that identity cards should be mandatory for UK nationals." This in some senses …

Government 24 Mar 13:19
Windows Home Server fixes bugs with Power Pack 2

Some improvements too

Microsoft has rolled out the latest update to Windows Home Server (WHS) with today’s release of Power Pack 2. The minor update comes loaded with fixes for known bugs as well as a handful of tweaks to the product’s feature set. Microsoft has made improvements to remote access configuration, enhanced functionality for computers …

Operating Systems 24 Mar 13:21
Facebook encourages ISP customer protests over Phorm

But doesn't commit to opt-out

Facebook's privacy chief today urged customers of BT, Carphone Warehouse and Virgin Media who are unhappy about their ISP's plans to work with Phorm in monitoring and profiling web use to "make their feelings known". Chris Kelly was speaking at the e-Crime Congress in London this morning. Asked for a response to the open …

Telecoms 24 Mar 13:27
eCard scammer avoids jail

Phishing scam targeted AOL subscribers

A US fraudster who used fake electronic greetings cards to spread malware has avoided a jail sentence for his crimes. Thomas Taylor of West Haven, Connecticut, was sentenced to four years of probation for his part in a malware-powered ID theft scam targeting AOL users. He was further ordered to pay $33,714 in restitution to …

Crime 24 Mar 13:34
Online retailer offers Sim-free iPhone 3Gs

They don't come cheap, though

Play.com is punting unlocked iPhones for folk who don't fancy being tethered to O2. The downside: freedom from carriers doesn't come cheap. The 8GB iPhone 3G, for example, costs £550. Play wants £600 for the 16GB version, though it currently has no models of that capacity in stock, according to its website. Play claims the …

Mobile 24 Mar 14:13
Seagate re-armours small business storage

Update BlackArmor NAS offers bare metal restore

Seagate has introduced a line of network-attached, workstation and portable disk storage products with encrypted contents under its BlackArmor brand. These represent a follow-on from Seagate's BlackArmor full disk encryption portable dsk drive. First to be announced are two NAS or networked storage server products, with the 2- …

Small Biz 24 Mar 14:21
Home Office details early ID vendors

Put 3M and nCipher on your Christmas list

The Home Office has listed 3M and nCipher as providers to the early stage of the National Identity Scheme. Home secretary Jacqui Smith said that as well as Thales' £18m contract for development of technology and processes – which was publicised last year – nCipher will be paid about £1.3m for a contract to provide "public key …

Government 24 Mar 14:31
China bans YouTube again

We're not afraid of the internet

The Chinese government has again blocked access to YouTube just over a year after it shut off access to the site for hosting footage of the Tibet protests. China's firewall allows sporadic access to services like YouTube, but access was shut off on Monday. A Foreign Ministry spokesman said the Chinese government was not afraid …

Government 24 Mar 14:59
Discovery crew prep for return to Earth

ISS mission accomplished, undocking tomorrow

Space shuttle Discovery will tomorrow undock from the International Space Station ahead of a scheduled return to Kennedy Space Center at 13:44 EDT (17:44 GMT) on Saturday. The shuttle's STS-119 mission to deliver and fit the final solar arrays to the orbiting outpost was done and dusted yesterday with a third and final …

Space 24 Mar 15:09
Romanian hacking group downs tools

HackersBlog crew weary of the road

A controversial Romanian hacker group famous for exposing security shortcomings on corporate and anti-virus websites has disbanded. The HackersBlog collective said it was calling it a day because their unpaid work in exposing SQL injection vulnerabilities was eating up the members' free time and had become boring. Well then, …

Enterprise Security 24 Mar 15:11
Samsung introduces NC10-successor netbooks

2GHz Atom chips on board?

Samsung has unveiled two 10.1in “mini notebooks” - netbooks to you, me and Intel's lawyers - for buyers that value portability above all else. Samsung's N110: 2GHz Atom on board? The N110 and N120 are both based on unspecified Atom processors - almost certainly the faster models Intel's expected to ship next month - and …

Reg Hardware 24 Mar 15:21
Sony hints at eco-friendly HD TV future

Exclusive Motion-sensing screen cut-off to be standardised?

Sony is set to make its TVs more environmentally friendly, and all you have to do is lie down and go to sleep. Sony's Bravia WE5: scans for viewer movement The electronics giant recently launched the 100Hz Bravia WE5 “Eco” TV, which is fitted with a motion-sensor that tells the set to switch its display off if you’ve fallen …

Reg Hardware 24 Mar 15:27
Review Samsung B2700 Bound rugged mobile phone

Anyone who's ever splashed a few drops of water on just the wrong bit of their pricey new phone can see the advantage of rugged design. It's rarely pretty, it's never svelte, but you don't need to venture into a war zone to appreciate the benefit of a more secure approach to portable electronics. Samsung's Bound: outward …

Reg Hardware 24 Mar 15:27
DARPA at phase 2 on human 'regeneration' tech

Zaphod Beeblebrox™ extra limbs for multitaskers?

Famed US military mad-professor bureau DARPA has inked a second deal with Massachusetts researchers to develop ways of "regenerating" human body tissues cut, shot or blown off in combat. The new biotech therapies would employ the same methods used by newts in growing replacement limbs. News of the award comes courtesy of the …

Biology 24 Mar 15:39
Penguin-free Linux 2.6.29 kernel released

Tasmanian devil gives Tux the boot (for now)

Linus Torvalds has released a new version of Linux that temporarily kills off Tux, the cutesy Penguin mascot. Yesterday the big daddy of Linux announced the availability of Linux kernel 2.6.29, which comes with support for a preliminary version of the Btrfs filesystem. Support for the filesystem created by Chris Mason has …

Operating Systems 24 Mar 15:53
GSMA scores 2, concedes 3, with EU

But who is playing for consumers?

MEPs have reached an informal agreement on European roaming, conceding the cost of data and 30-second billing to the mobile-industry, but standing firm on caps and the price of a text message. Officially the agreement is between the EU presidency, currently held by the Czech Republic, and the MEPs comprising the Industry …

Mobile 24 Mar 16:29
Michael Dell licks chops over Bigger Indigo

IBM-Sun deal 'an enormous opportunity'

While every man and his dog in the IT industry was been commenting on Cisco Systems entering the server business, the IT vendor community has been pretty mum about the rumors of IBM looking at acquiring rival Sun Microsystems for perhaps as much as $8bn. Until now. Reuters is reporting from Tokyo that Dell CEO Michael Dell is …

Servers 24 Mar 17:35
PGP email marketing gaffe creates message storm

Aren't you supposed to be experts at this stuff?

PGP irritated its security conscious customers on Tuesday by making the schoolboy error of sending out an email marketing message to a list of around 300 recipients without using the bcc field. As a result of the slip-up, all the recipients of the marketing email (extract below) learned the email addresses of other potential …

Security 24 Mar 17:55
Mr. WebTV gives games thin-client treatment

GDC 09 Crysis on your netbook

An intriguing new game service called OnLive may bring obsolescence to the gaming console question: "But will it run Crysis?" OnLive, which is expected to launch later this year, was unveiled yesterday at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. The technology is basically thin-client computing for video games, …

Music and Media 24 Mar 19:23
Cisco pitches new world server order

The California School of Economics

If you had to sum up the sales pitch that Cisco Systems is polishing up as it prepares to deliver its "California" Unified Computer System, it would look something like this: California will save you money, even if we charge a premium for server capacity. Cisco, of course, has not admitted that it will in fact charge a premium …

Servers 24 Mar 19:45
Kiwi telecom inks contract with convicted hacker

Akill's killing

New Zealand's No. 2 telecommunications company has hired a 16-year-old botnet herder less than 12 months after he pleaded guilty to six computer hacking and fraud charges following an international investigation. Owen Thor Walker could have received up to five years for his offenses. Now, he has received a contract to provide …

Security 24 Mar 19:50
Red Hat aims open-source at IT discomfort zone

OSBC Strike while the Meltdown is hot

Red Hat has told open-source vendors they shouldn't hesitate when selling against proprietary rivals during the current economic downturn. The company's chief executive, Jim Whitehurst, has said that open-source faces a limited window of opportunity, before IT budgets recover inline with a general economic improvement. Once …

Applications 24 Mar 20:12
Google, Mozilla back 3D interwebs

GDC 09 Accelerated API

Open-standards industry consortium the Khronos Group is forming a working group meant to bring accelerated 3D graphics to the interwebs. Known as Accelerated 3D on Web, the working group was announced on Tuesday at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. The goal is to create an open, royalty-free standard that will …

Applications 24 Mar 21:39
UK boffins to breed syntho-blood from human embryos

As syntho-blood exec fakes terminal cancer

Led by the Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service, a team of British scientists is planning a three-year research project that seeks to fashion synthetic human blood from embryonic stem cells. It's a welcome announcement. The synthetic human blood biz needs a transfusion of its own. Earlier this month, a former synthetic- …

Science 24 Mar 22:06
Newfangled rootkits survive hard disk wiping

BIOS attack targets PC nether region

Researchers have demonstrated how to create rootkits that survive hard-disk reformatting by injecting malware into the low-level system instructions of a target computer. The researchers, from Core Security Technologies, used the techniques to inject rootkits into two computers, one running the OpenBSD operating system and the …

Malware 24 Mar 22:17
Kiwis scrap 'three strikes' P2P policy

Frenchie copyright law gets rewrite

New Zealand has temporarily abandoned its plans to enact a French-style "three-strikes" internet policy that forces ISPs to disconnect customers repeatedly accused of illegally downloading copyrighted materials. Kiwi's controversial section 92a of the Copyright Act was shown the door by Prime Minister John Key on Monday …

Music and Media 24 Mar 23:33
Novell boss in semi-apology over Microsoft pact

OSBC Lost in the moment

It was a short presentation that focused dryly on "opportunities" for open source in something he called the "service-driven data center." But when he turned to the need for Linux to inter-operate with Windows in this service-driven data center, Novell's chief executive Ron Hovsepian delivered an apology - of sorts - for his …

Operating Systems 24 Mar 23:38
Google goes long with new search pages

Lengthy snippets dabble in paradox

Google has pushed out two (minor) changes to its web-dominating search engine. Search-results pages now offer longer site descriptions, and a longer list of searches is provided that may or may not improve your initial query. According to a blog post from the Mountain View Chocolate Factory, both changes will "help guide users …

Music and Media 24 Mar 23:53