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23rd December 2010 Archive

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  • Of Wikileaks and data theft

    Maladroit is as maladroit does

    Private First Class Bradley Manning may be one of the most celebrated whistleblowers ever but he is also, if he really is the Wikileaks source, a damn fine data thief. The corollary of that is that the United State military is a an awful guardian of classified data. Manning, a US army intelligence analyst, is believed to have …

    Blocks and Files 23 Dec 08:39

  • Serial acquirer Kelway hoovers up ISC Computers

    Fourth deal since January 2009

    ICT services group Kelway has breached the £300m turnover mark after hoovering up ISC Computers. The buy came as serial acquirer Kelway said it would end the year with revenues up 40 per cent on the year to almost £250m. Kelway emphasises ISC's private cloud and virtualisation expertise. It has 280 employees, and turns over …

    Channel Register 23 Dec 09:20

  • MS warns over zero-day IE bug

    Exploit circumvents added security defences

    Microsoft warned on Wednesday of a new zero-day vulnerability in Internet Explorer. The flaw creates a means for hackers to inject malware onto vulnerable systems, providing surfers are first tricked into visiting booby-trapped websites. As such the flaw poses a severe drive-by download risk. All established version of IE ( …

    Enterprise Security 23 Dec 09:36

  • Skype still staggering after major blackout

    Supernode snafu continues to cause problems

    Skype is the process of recovering from a major outage that left users across the world unable to log into the VoIP service on Wednesday. Many computers that act as supernodes, the systems that provide directory information on Skype, were taken offline "by a problem affecting some versions of Skype". As a result many Skype …

    Applications 23 Dec 10:23

  • Councils show true grit in the face of ... FOI requests

    Road salt info requests lost in 'confidentiality' blizzard

    Local Councils may not be getting any cannier at ordering in salt to coat the roads during the current unprecedented cold spell – but they’re certainly getting a lot cleverer at covering their tracks when it comes to answering Freedom Of Information requests. Last year, it was the BBC that caught them unawares, using FOI to …

    Government 23 Dec 10:35

  • Boffins build medical control centre with Kinect

    Forceps. Scalpel. Clamps. High-score

    Microsoft's Xbox 360 Kinect add on isn't just for gaming. Swiss scientists have used open source drivers to develop a prototype remote control mechanism for medical equipment. The experimental rig uses both gestures and voice commands, as the following video from the developers, at the Institute of Forensic Medicine at the …

    reghardware 23 Dec 10:36

  • Yahoo! buzzing over 'nonce Pope's' Christmas message

    Seasonal outbreak of discomfort and joylessness

    Yahoo!'s buzz service took a pop at the papacy overnight, apparently informing its readers: "Nonce Pope to deliver Christmas message on the BBC". Buzz, for those who haven't noticed, is a Digg-alike service allowing Yahoo! users to flag up content – and crucially giving them the ability to add in their own headline. And for …

    Bootnotes 23 Dec 10:48

  • Stephen Fry security whoopsie leads to prank fart book order

    Exclusive Blundering thesp also requests homeopathic goat tome

    Hoppity-skippety technology commentator of all our hearts Stephen Fry has made a regrettable security blunder. After filming in Oxford at the famous Bodleian Library yesterday, the enthusiastic luvvie was granted a reader's card – a rare privilege, as normally access to the archives is granted only to members of Oxford …

    ID 23 Dec 11:15

  • Hackers get to work with Apple's AirPlay

    Stream punks

    It's been a busy week or so for coders hacking AirPlay, Apple's media streaming protocol. We've seen code posted to allow streaming from Macs to Apple TVs, from iPads to Linux boxes running XBMC, and now we have an iPad-to-Windows link enabled. The app you need is AirMediaPlayer, with runs under Windows XP, Vista and 7, and it …

    reghardware 23 Dec 11:22

  • London's tube demands faster-than-NFC ticketing

    500 milliseconds not quick enough for the Underground

    London Underground has been telling NFC World that existing NFC implementations just aren't fast enough, so it will be sticking with plastic cards for a while. An Oyster card tapped against the reader takes between 200 and 300ms to authorise, before the gates snap open as a prelude to grabbing your bag as you pass though, but …

    Mobile 23 Dec 11:41

  • LG pitches Blu-ray media streamer ahead of CES

    BD, 3D and DLNA all in one

    In a bid to beat the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) rush, LG has today announced some of the products it will announce at the show in Las Vegas next month. Specifically, a couple of 3D-capable home theatre systems and a 3D Blu-ray Disc player. The 3D BD box is worth a closer look: it has an on-board 250GB hard drive for …

    reghardware 23 Dec 11:42

  • Asus to punt Core i5 Windows 7 tablet

    Aimed at ARM-less big biz

    Asus has revealed that the tablet it is going to announce at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) next month will run Windows 7 and pack in an Intel Core i5 processor. The gadget will be called the Eee Slate EP121, and it'll sport a 12in multi-touch display. It'll have an HDMI port, a webcam, expandable storage and "at least …

    reghardware 23 Dec 12:06

  • Apple iPad 2 said to sport über speaker

    Hopes for USB port, SD slot dashed?

    Apple's iPad 2 will be slightly smaller than the current model, be a little less curvy - think of the latest, flat-backed iPod Touch rather than the angular iPhone 4 - but don't expect it to sport either the rumoured USB port or SD card slot. So claims Japanese website Macotakara, citing Chinese moles. The big gaps seen on …

    reghardware 23 Dec 12:29

  • Dell buys Big Blue-based health cloud piccy firm

    Love the service, hate the hardware

    Dell is buying InSite One, a SaaS (Storage-as-a-Service) for the US health market, and getting a cloud storage services platform extensible to other markets. Dell already has its UCA (Unified Clinical Archive) product, which it plugs as a way for healthcare organisations to archive PACS (Picture Archiving and Communication …

    Channel Register 23 Dec 12:32

  • Double-clicking patent takes on world

    Who's that trip-trapping over my bridge?

    Hopewell Culture & Design reckons it owns the act of double-clicking, and is suing Apple, Nokia, Samsung and just about everyone else for breaching its patent. It's not double-clicking per se that US patent 7,171,625 covers, just the act of clicking twice on an already-selected component to action a request for additional …

    Developer 23 Dec 12:37

  • ICO waves stick at climate boffins over FoI compliance

    University staff trained on small print of the act

    The Information Commissioner's Office has made its first move to force a public sector organisation to improve its compliance with the Freedom of Information Act. It has required the University of East Anglia (UEA) to sign a commitment to further improve the way it responds to FoI requests. Until now, the ICO has only …

    Law 23 Dec 12:43

  • DARPA working on eyes-in-the-back-of-your-head hat

    'Full Sphere Awareness' to use software mini-cameras

    Maverick Pentagon boffins have decided to build a miraculous gadget – perhaps as small and lightweight as a pair of sunglasses – which will endow the user with zoom vision, various forms of nightsight, and act as a heads-up display besides. Perhaps best of all, the proposed kit would also offer "full sphere awareness" – that is …

    Developer 23 Dec 13:01

  • Microwaved hard disc, run-over PC and other data disasters

    There's nowt as thick as folk

    Recovering data after a user had somehow managed to microwave a hard disk or dropped a PC from a second floor window were among the more unusual data recovery problems successfully tackled by Disklabs during 2010. Other bizarre cases included helping a client who had managed to drive over his computer. Disklabs has put …

    Storage 23 Dec 13:58

  • Steve Jobs gets Obama love

    Mac tycoon a jewel in free-market crown, according to world leader

    Steve Jobs is the kind of rich guy America should celebrate, according to Barack Obama. "We celebrate somebody like a Steve Jobs, who has created two or three different revolutionary products," he said in a digression from a speech about the US economy, "We expect that person to be rich, and that's a good thing. We want that …

    Bootnotes 23 Dec 14:02

  • Hacker charged over siphoning off funds meant for software devs

    Accused of diverting Mystic River of cash

    An alleged hacker has been charged with breaking into the e-commerce systems of Digital River before redirecting more than $250,000 to an account under his control. Jeremey Parker of Houston, Texas, 35, is charged with fraudulently obtaining more than $274K between December 2008 and October 2009 following an alleged hack …

    Developer 23 Dec 15:00

  • Massive new US spy airship 'could be used to carry big cargoes'

    Mighty Brit-designed vessel could swap height for grunt

    The huge LEMV* surveillance airships now being built by British designers for the US Army may be able to carry substantial cargoes as an alternative to sky-spy equipment, according to reports. Might not just be a spy-eye but a sky truck, too. Aviation Week, in an update on the LEMV programme, quotes project chief Alan …

    Science 23 Dec 15:23

  • Santander mixes up 35,000 bank statements

    Massive data blunder means bank might have to pay up

    The High Street bank Santander has blamed printers for a blunder that saw it send 35,000 bank statements to the wrong addresses. It has written to customers to warn them, but played down potential security problems. "Due to a technical error at our printers, a number of current account statements dated December 18 have …

    IT Director 23 Dec 15:45

  • IBM strikes panglossian license deal with Voltaire

    Just buy Mellanox and get it over with

    Maybe IBM should just stop fooling around and buy Mellanox Technologies already. Ahead of its own acquisition by InfiniBand and Fibre Channel networking specialist Mellanox, InfiniBand switch rival and Ethernet switch wannabe Voltaire has inked a licensing and development agreement with Big Blue. Voltaire was cagey about …

    Data Networking 23 Dec 16:25

  • Mozilla betas facelifted open source license

    Now with more Apache code love

    Mozilla has released a beta version of the MPL 2.0, the first update to its open source license in more than a decade. Mozilla chief lizard wrangler Mitchell Baker calls this a "feature complete" beta, saying it "addresses all major known issues". The license is shorter and simpler than the aging MPL 1.1. The beta draft drops …

    Developer 23 Dec 17:52

  • HPC mavens sell excess super cycles

    The Cheshire HPC utility

    Supercomputing labs the world over are feeling the budget pressure like the rest of us, especially those supported by public funds. With this in mind, OCF – an HPC system integrator based in Sheffield – has come up with a plan that will help labs make a little money to cover their cost: sell capacity to outsiders for a fee. To …

    HPC 23 Dec 18:00

  • UN defends human right to WikiLeaked info

    Rejects calls for 'illegitimate retributive action'

    The United Nations has responded to the ongoing WikiLeaks kerfuffle, urging member states to – ahem – remember the basic human right to access information held by governments and other public authorities. In issuing a joint statement on Wikileaks with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the United Nations (UN) …

    Government 23 Dec 22:03

  • Oracle revisits Sparc T processor roadmap

    Time to overclock, boys

    Three weeks ago, Oracle co-founder and chief executive officer, Larry Ellison, gave us all a preview of the upcoming Sparc T series processor roadmap as part of the rollout of the Sparc SuperCluster, an Exadata-style parallel database machine based on the current Sparc T3 processors. In the wake of Ellison's revelations, Rick …

    Servers 23 Dec 22:08