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3rd August 2009 Archive

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  • World whines as AT&T muzzles 4chan, Google

    Fail and You Ma Bell and the /b/-tards

    The American Telephone and Telegraph Corporation had a hell of a week. In a spectacular display of the raw power liberated when organizational incompetence is mixed with the moral elasticity that can only be bred in an oaky cask of middle management, the company not only showed the world that it can do whatever it damn well …

    Networks 3 Aug 2009, 05:03

  • Qnap TS-219P Turbo Nas

    Review A box of delights?

    There are two main criticisms that can be levelled at Qnap’s TS-209 range of Nas boxes: they have poor file transfer speeds and poor access to the hard drives. The TS-219P tackles those issues head on with a faster 1.2GHz Marvell processor, compared with a 500MHz Marvell chip in the TS-209P, and sensible hot-swappable bays. …

    Hardware 3 Aug 2009, 08:02

  • Boston student fined thousands for Napstering

    Silly Joel

    A Boston University student has been found guilty of breaking copyright laws by downloading and uploading songs using Napster and Kazaa. Joel Tenenbaum admitted downloading 30 songs and must pay Universal Music, Warner Music and Sony $22,500 (£13,438) per song. He could have faced up to $150,000 per track, and seems to view …

    Law 3 Aug 2009, 08:16

  • PerlMonks suffers unholy hack

    Tidings without comfort or joy

    Web developer site PerlMonks is obliging users to change up their passwords, following a successful hacking attack. The community website, which provides a forum for users interested in Perl programming and related subjects, such as web applications and system administration, posted a notice (extract below) admitting the …

    Security 3 Aug 2009, 09:13

  • Analyst cops feel of Apple's iTablet

    Drums beat louder

    Apple’s iTablet will appear in shops this November, according to a mystery analyst who claims to have already touched the much-rumoured device. The “veteran analyst” described the device as a slate-style computer that impresses with its display of HD video content, Barron's, the US financial magazine, reports. “It's better …

    Hardware 3 Aug 2009, 09:32

  • CRB check failures rocket ahead of massive expansion

    One disastrous, mysterious month

    The Home Office's Criminal Records Bureau wrongly denounced or cleared more than 1,500 people in the last year, almost three times as many as the previous 12 months. The embarrassing figures have emerged ahead of a massive increase in the number of people who will be subject to background checks when the new Vetting and …

    Government 3 Aug 2009, 09:54

  • Oxfordshire reveals ANPR traffic camera sites

    Police traffic spycams unmasked by default

    A council using automatic numberplate recognition to manage traffic has released the locations of the cameras, having previously refused to do so. Oxfordshire CC said it has spent £700,000 installing ANPR cameras to manage traffic within and around Oxford. In the last few weeks it has put up six electronic signs on roads …

    Government 3 Aug 2009, 10:18

  • Microsoft ditches Windows 7 E plans

    Does IE hokey-cokey as Brussels keeps schtum

    Microsoft has dumped the Internet Explorer-free version of Windows 7 that it had planned to release to the European market in the hope of appeasing antitrust regulators. The company confirmed on Friday that after receiving nothing more than a shrug of the shoulders from the European Commission, following Microsoft’s offer to …

    Operating Systems 3 Aug 2009, 10:22

  • Intel denies Atom Z cull

    Updated Yes, but are they allowed in netbooks?

    Intel has rejected claims that it is stopping the supply of Atom Z processors to netbook manufacturers before Christmas. A spokeswoman for the chip giant told Register Hardware that “Rumours of ‘industry sources’ stating that Intel is no longer taking orders for Atom Z processors or ending production by end of year are 100% …

    Hardware 3 Aug 2009, 10:29

  • Archbishop condemns Facebook, email, footballers

    The devil is in the contact details you know

    The leader of England and Wales' Roman Catholics took aim at social networking, rampant individualism and overpaid footballers this weekend. Vincent Nichols, the recently installed Archbishop of Westminster, told the Sunday Telegraph that social networks, along with mobile phones and texting, were in danger of "dehumanising" …

    Media 3 Aug 2009, 10:31

  • Hain breaks ranks with Cabinet over McKinnon extradition

    Deputy PM tries to defuse growing row

    Cabinet splits are appearing as political pressure over the extradition of Pentagon hacker Gary McKinnon grows. Peter Hain, the Secretary of State for Wales, broke ranks with his colleagues last weekend to call for McKinnon to be tried in the UK, the Daily Mail reports. The move follows a rejection by two senior judges of …

    Government 3 Aug 2009, 10:37

  • German boffins create 'flight simulator for flies'

    Boche blowflies enjoy wraparound immersive VR

    Scientists in Germany have developed what they describe as "a flight simulator for flies", in which tethered insects experience virtual scenarios presented to them on a small wraparound screen. Week one, day one, and the Blowfly Top Gun Trophy race was still wide open. The research is not, as one might speculate, intended …

    Science 3 Aug 2009, 10:49

  • Google guns for MS Office with billboard campaign

    Ad broker turns ad maker

    Mountain View plans to slap Google Apps adverts on billboards in major US cities from today in its latest attempt to woo businesses away from Microsoft’s Office suite. The search giant, which has been stretching its tentacles into more and more areas comfortably occupied by Redmond, will promote its $50 per worker, per annum …

    Applications 3 Aug 2009, 11:32

  • Government claims on immigration ignore IT industry

    Points mean prizes for would-be citizens

    The UK's points based immigration system is ignoring the increase in intra-company transfers and failing to recognise people with real skills and business experience who lack paper qualifications, according to a Home Affairs Committee report. The government has released proposals on the UK's application system for citizenship …

    Government 3 Aug 2009, 12:02

  • Apple accused of lowering cone of silence over iPod flame out

    Wanna refund? Take the vow of silence

    Apple has been accused of attempting to gag a traumatised iPod user, whose player burst into flames and tried to go into orbit. According to The Times, Ken Stanborough, 47, from Liverpool, complained to the firm after his daughter's iPod self-combusted shortly after being dropped. “It made a hissing noise,” Stanborough said …

    Hardware 3 Aug 2009, 12:09

  • Spinnaker vets strike out on storage adventure

    Famous five leave NetApp

    Avere, a 2008 startup founded by Spinnaker vets from NetApp, has developed a system which attempts to combine the performance of solid state drives with the low cost of hard disk drives, in an architecture that dynamically tiers data onto the most appropriate media. That sounds like Compellent, dynamically moving data blocks …

    Storage 3 Aug 2009, 12:20

  • NASA announces $1.5m prize for eco-plane inventors

    Flying machines go green diddly green green

    US space agency NASA has announced a competition for green aircraft designers, in which low-carbon flying machines will contend for a $1.5m prize at a contest to be held in California in two years' time. You didn't want that flying car, did you? Have an electric plane (well, glider) instead. The compo is to be run by NASA's …

    Science 3 Aug 2009, 12:28

  • Fake ATM scam rumbled by Defcon hackers

    Black hats in Fear & Loathing conference moment

    White hat hackers attending the DefCon conference in Vegas last week uncovered the presence of a fake ATM in the show's venue. Fraudsters placed a fake ATM kiosk in the Riviera Hotel Casino at an unknown time prior to the conference. The scam was uncovered after eagle-eyed hackers noticed something wrong with the machine. " …

    Security 3 Aug 2009, 12:38

  • Nissan turns over new Leaf

    Leccy Tech First electric car

    Nissan has whipped the dust sheets off its first electric car. Nissan's first electric car, Leaf, will arrive in the UK during 2011 The curiously named Leaf is goes on sale in Japan and across North America next year. Nissan UK has confirmed to Register Hardware that the car will breeze into Blighty during 2011. …

    Science 3 Aug 2009, 12:45

  • Chip group says 2009 will be terrible, but not awful

    SIA says sales up sequentially in Q2

    Worldwide chip sales showed a sequential increase in June, thanks in part to the economic stimulus programs initiated by various governments of the world, the Semiconductor Industry Association declared today. The SIA reckons that in the second quarter of this year, worldwide chip sales were $51.7bn, which is a 17 per cent …

    Hardware 3 Aug 2009, 13:08

  • Exploding iPod backfires on Apple

    Owner flees to The Times

    Apple is accused of trying to silence a father and his daughter with a legal gagging after the girl’s iPod Touch had inexplicably exploded. Ken Stanborough,47, from Liverpool, told The Times that Apple would refund his money only if the pair signed a confidentiality agreement banning them from talking publicly about the …

    Hardware 3 Aug 2009, 13:09

  • Server virtualization – what could possibly go wrong?

    Workshop Rise of the Virtual Machines

    Indisputably, server virtualization has a lot going for it. The challenge does not lie in its faults, given that no technology is perfect. Rather, when we researched this topic we found that the level of competence and/or experience around virtualization is not particularly high. So what could go wrong? Top of the list - …

    Software 3 Aug 2009, 13:10

  • T-Mobile UK starts shifting iPhones on the quiet

    Exclusive, what exclusive?

    T-Mobile UK has started supplying iPhone 3G handsets to selected customers, while O2 UK continues to believe it has a UK exclusive on Apple's last-generation handset. Apple's 3G handset won't be available to just any T-Mobile customer - only high spenders who threaten to leave need apply, and only 150 of those a week will be …

    Phones 3 Aug 2009, 13:35

  • Google boss quits Apple board in wake of Chrome OS

    Schmidt's 'effectiveness significantly diminished'

    Apple announced today that it has finally severed ties with Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who had been on the firm's board of directors since August 2006. The decision to cut Schmidt loose hardly comes as a surprise. In May Mountain View confirmed reports that the US Federal Trade Commission was probing whether overlapping board …

    Financial News 3 Aug 2009, 13:46

  • ISPs scorn government net snoop plan

    'Disingenuous' Home Office slapped again

    The government's plans to massively increase surveillance of the internet have come under fire again, this time from the ISPs it wants to deputise as its snoopers. LINX, a major internet peering cooperative, said in its submission to the Home Office's consultation on the Interception Modernisation Programme (IMP) - which …

    Government 3 Aug 2009, 13:51

  • Fujitsu staff to vote on strike call

    Union threatens action over pay and pensions

    The Unite union is holding a ballot of its members working for Fujitsu to consider strikes and other industrial action. Staff at Fujitsu services have already been hit with a pay freeze for the financial year. Contractors have been forced to take a 15 per cent rate cut. Unite is asking its 2,000 members working for Fujitsu …

    The Channel 3 Aug 2009, 14:00

  • Start-up aims to out-perform STEC

    Piles into SAS SSD fray

    Another start-up wanting to take a pot at STEC, the leader in the storage array solid state disk market, has emerged. Pliant Technology is focussing on the SAS interface, leaving Fibre Channel the sole preserve of STEC. STEC dominates what is called the enterprise flash drive (EFD) market, with OEMs such as EMC, HP, IBM and …

    Storage 3 Aug 2009, 14:20

  • Pre-release BlackBerry Onyx tips ups for sale on the web

    Bold claims from owner

    An unreleased BlackBerry smartphone, which purportedly succeeds the RIM's Bold, is available for sale online. The owner wants £900 for this pre-release Onyx Pictures of the Onyx – also known as the 9020 - have been doing the rounds online for several months. But this single pre-release device is believed to be the first …

    Phones 3 Aug 2009, 15:02

  • Mars rover stalks mystery space alien object

    Droid crawler in thrilling chase vs. (immobile) 'cobble'

    NASA's interplanetary robot rover "Opportunity", prowling the haematite steppes of the Meridiani Planum on Mars, has crept up on and photographed a mysterious space boulder or "cobble". Astro boffins theorise that the object may be alien in origin, rather than from the red planet. Alien robot meets extramartian space boulder …

    Science 3 Aug 2009, 15:02

  • HP shuffles Blighty management pack

    Steve Gill heads to Korea

    Hewlett-Packard has hired Nick Wilson as its new UK and Ireland managing director, replacing Steve Gill. The company confirmed the reshuffle today. HP told The Register that Gill had been shifted to a new role in Korea, where he will lead the management team. Prior to that, Gill had held the keys to Wilson's new office for …

    The Channel 3 Aug 2009, 15:15

  • Ridley Scott signs up to direct Alien prequel

    Green light for xenomorph origins story

    Ridley Scott, the original director of science fiction horror classic Alien, has signed up with Fox to helm an upcoming prequel. Plot details for the film remain a closely guarded secret, aside from the fact that its events will occur before the Nostromo answers a fatal "distress call" that leads to a deadly encounter with a …

    Bootnotes 3 Aug 2009, 15:17

  • Micron preps fat DDR3 server memory

    New technology memory gadgetry for servers

    Memory maker Micron Technology says that it has cooked up the first DDR3 main memory modules for servers to make use of a new technology, called load-reduced dual-inline memory module (LRDIMM) packaging. The new packaging will not only allow server makers to put fatter memory sticks into their boxes, but more of them than they …

    Servers 3 Aug 2009, 15:18

  • Nintendo gets jiggy with Facebook

    But what about the children?

    Is nothing safe from Facebook, the networking site that makes our children anti-social, perhaps suicidal? Today the company teams up with Nintendo to make it easier for DSi owners to upload pics taken on their handhelds directly to their Facebook profile. This is available through a free system update - which may also wipe out …

    Games 3 Aug 2009, 15:49

  • Facebook IP protection is only for companies that join

    Site cannot comprehend anyone not wanting to

    Companies which were promised the chance to protect their trade marks from being used as Facebook addresses have been told they can now only do so by signing up for a Facebook page. When Facebook allowed users to customise web addresses to include their name after the domain name Facebook.com, it said that it was putting …

    Small Biz 3 Aug 2009, 16:00

  • Twitter starts filtering links to malware sites

    Block and tackle

    Micro-blogging site Twitter has begun filtering links to known malware sites. The tactic, noticed by security researchers on Monday but yet to be officially announced by Twitter, is designed to prevent surfers straying onto sites packed with dangerous exploits. Adoption of the approach follows the increased targeting of …

    Security 3 Aug 2009, 16:01

  • Sun deals Sparc boxes, x64 iron

    The sound of silence

    On the verge of being eaten by Oracle, Sun Microsystems has been unusually - but understandably - quiet on the marketing and announcement front. But that doesn't mean Sun is not wheeling and dealing and tweaking its server lineup as technology moves forward. It apparently just means Sun is not paying for public relations any …

    Servers 3 Aug 2009, 16:39

  • China seals town after plague deaths

    Virulent, rare disease

    Chinese health officials have sealed off a town in a sparsely populated area of north-central China to halt the spread of an aggressively deadly strain of plague. As of Sunday, two men have died from the outbreak, and another 10 - most of them relatives of the first dead man - are under quarantine. The disease is pneumonic …

    Science 3 Aug 2009, 17:31

  • Microsoft craves iPhone developers for Windows Mobile

    Offers advice on being uncool

    It's been a year since Microsoft said it had a serious problem in making Windows Mobile cool enough to attract application developers and consumers. And since then, Redmond has done little to rectify the problem. Last summer, Microsoft crowed it had thrashed RIM and Apple in the mobile market, but in 2008, Windows Mobile lost …

    Developer 3 Aug 2009, 20:30

  • Apple tablet spooks world of PCs

    Opinion What a difference an iPhone makes

    That long-awaited Apple tablet/netbook/media-pad/ebook/whatever has yet to be confirmed let alone offered for sale, and it's already scaring the bejesus out of the competition. And for good reason. As we reported earlier today, an unnamed "veteran analyst" who claims to have had the rare honor of actually laying hands on the …

    Hardware 3 Aug 2009, 20:31

  • AES encryption not as tough as you think

    Cipher attack shaves safety margin

    Cryptographers have found a new chink in the widely used AES encryption standard that suggests the safety margin of its most powerful cipher is not as high as previously thought. In a soon-to-be-published paper, researchers Alex Biryukov, Orr Dunkelman, Nathan Keller, Dmitry Khovratovich, and Adi Shamir show that the 256-bit …

    Security 3 Aug 2009, 23:50