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20th May 2011 Archive

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  • Apple to support reps: Don't confirm Mac infections

    Secret memo outed as OS X attacks spike

    Apple officials have instructed members of the company's support team to withhold any confirmation that a customer's Mac has been infected with malware or to assist in removing malicious programs, ZDNet's Ed Bott reported on Thursday. He cited an internal document titled "About 'Mac Defender' Malware," which was last updated on …

    Security 20 May 00:23

  • Stargazers spot dark energy

    Still real, we think

    The distribution of galaxies and the time it takes for galactic clusters to form are behind a University of Queensland claim confirming the existence of dark energy. Dark energy has been predicted as a defender of Einsteinian models of the universe, ever since the 1990s when astrophysicists identified the accelerating …

    Science 20 May 01:00

  • Firefox add-on with 7m downloads can invade privacy

    Ant Video secretly tracks every website visited

    A high-rated Firefox extension with more than 7 million downloads secretly collects data about every website the open-source browser visits and combines it with uniquely traceable information tied to the user, an independent security researcher said. The undisclosed behavior of the Ant Video Downloader and Player add-on takes …

    ID 20 May 04:00

  • Creative Sound Blaster Tactic 3D Sigma gaming headset

    Review Spatial delivery

    Having just played Darkspore, and somewhat underwhelmed by the music and ambient sounds, I am definitely not above lowering games' scores slightly based on sound quality. At times it appears that audio is the developers’ last thought and, likewise, I’ll admit that choosing the latest graphics card or mouse takes precedence over …

    reghardware 20 May 06:00

  • Blighty's first touch-to-pay phone goes on sale today

    Orange-led axis wins UK mobe tapcash race

    Orange has won the race to get UK punters paying with a wave of the phone, launching its Barclaycard-backed Quick Tap service today on the back of MasterCard's PayPass network. As of this morning you can use a mobile phone to pay for stuff in the UK, assuming it's the right mobile phone, and you have a Barclaycard account, and …

    Mobile 20 May 06:00

  • Symantec buys Clearwell tech that makes lawyers poorer

    eDiscovery: Will probably turn out to be illegal

    Days after Iron Mountain sells its way out of the eDIscovery market Symantec is buying its way in, with a $390 million purchase of Clearwell. Symantec, which sells backup, archiving, security, file and volume management software and is in a hardware-selling joint venture with Huawei, thinks the addition of eDIscovery products …

    CIO 20 May 08:03

  • Playboy sneaks NAKED LADIES onto iPad

    Entire back catalogue in fondleslab format

    Playboy has whipped open the bathrobe on its latest plan to combat falling sales and the ready availability of free net smut – an online version of the magazine's entire 57-year back catalogue. Those wishing to cough $8 a month (or $60 a year, $100 for two years) for the iPlayboy service are promised "every issue, every …

    Music and Media 20 May 08:30

  • Sharp: Aquos phone to go global

    Well, if your definition of 'global' is limited to Asia...

    Sharp has promised to release its TV-branded Aquos phone worldwide. Well, that's what how the press release is headlined, though it only mentions Japan and China in the text itself. The Aquos connection is literal: the phone has an HDMI port so it can be hooked up to one of Sharp's LCD TVs - or anyone else's for that matter …

    reghardware 20 May 08:54

  • LinkedIn goes ballistic following IPO

    Stockbrokers get stuck in door in rush to buy

    Social-networking-for-suits site LinkedIn saw its shares go ballistic to double in price yesterday after the company's IPO. The offering set a $45 per share price but in early trading the stock was changing hands for more than $120. The price settled at $94.25 on the New York Stock Exchange making the whole company worth just …

    Financial News 20 May 08:56

  • Sony's Thai website pwned by phisher scoundrels

    Wrong week to be a Sony security type

    Security researchers have discovered a phishing site running on Sony's servers. A fraudulent site running off the hdworld.sony.co.th domain is targeting an Italian credit card company, F-Secure reports. The incident means that another Sony property, in this case its Thai website, has been hacked. The incident is nothing like …

    Enterprise Security 20 May 09:07

  • German salesmen rewarded with meticulously organised orgy

    Good work this year, Hans – have a prostitute

    Those of you who feel you're not sufficiently well rewarded for all your hard work should consider alerting your boss to the employee incentive techniques of German insurance outfit Ergo. Back in 2007, the company's Hamburg-Mannheimer International subsidiary decided it would be a nice gesture to whisk 100 "particularly …

    Bootnotes 20 May 09:32

  • Big Brother man: TV viewers will swap privacy for content

    Big Tent Hideous two-way reality-TV/Facebook panopticon foreseen

    The man who brought Big Brother to the UK this week painted a nightmare vision of the future where people trade their personal information for the chance to watch TV programmes. Peter Bazalgette, former chief creative officer of Endemol turned digital media investor, said old advertising models could not much longer support TV …

    Music and Media 20 May 10:01

  • Ricoh reveals paper-bright colour e-paper

    Hue well done?

    Here's a snap of Ricoh's colour e-paper, which, the company claims, is two-and-a-half times brighter than anyone else's colour e-paper. There's not much colour e-paper out there at the moment, you may have noticed, so Ricoh's boast is a mite hollow. It also reckons its offering has "about four" times as wide a colour gamut …

    reghardware 20 May 10:02

  • Mobile operators argue with Ofcom over termination rates

    They're too high! No, you fool, they're too low!

    The UK's bigger operators are taking Ofcom to the Competition Appeals Tribunal, arguing for higher termination rates - except Three, which wants the opposite. Vodafone and Everything Everywhere are challenging Ofcom's position on termination rates, with an appeal to the CAT that's supported by O2. The three operators reckon …

    Mobile 20 May 10:25

  • Government hires Guardianista as digital chief

    'Prize on offer too great to ignore'

    The government has hired Mike Bracken as its new digital boss. Bracken, who up until last week held the role of digital development director at the Guardian newspaper, will be based in the Cabinet Office from 5 July. He is tasked with improving UK.gov's "online presence" as well as extending the number of public services …

    CIO 20 May 10:34

  • Videogames give kids the munchies

    Super eatboy

    Studies show that gamers who spend longer playing videogames tend to have a higher rate of obesity than more casual players. In fact, most gamers are fat and miserable. Apparently. But while an unhealthy Fifa 11 habit could be a rational explanation for a child's lack of exercise, several researchers now suggest gaming has a …

    reghardware 20 May 10:41

  • BOFH: Attack of the Global Corporate Overlords

    Episode 6 Chaos at Mission Central

    "There's going to be a takeover!" the PFY gasps, crashing into Mission Control. "I thought you saw them off the premises," I reply, "although quite what you sawed off you never made clear. Thanks for that." "No, the company – it's being taken over!" "Really? Says who?" "Says everyone. It's all over the building!" …

    BOFH 20 May 11:00

  • New Mac fake-defenders similar to Windows scareware

    Added feature: Porn, drug sites opened at random

    Researchers at Microsoft have discovered striking similarities between the recently emerged wave of scareware packages targeting Mac fans and the longer established rogue anti-virus applications for Windows. MacDefender falsely warns that Mac OS X machines are infected with malware in a bid to trick prospective marks into …

    Malware 20 May 11:13

  • LA Noire

    Review Looking for clues

    If you were expecting Grand Theft Auto or Red Dead Redemption dressed in police uniform, then I'm sorry to disappoint you. LA Noire is far removed from its Rockstar stablemates. Sure, it bears all the hallmarks of gaming's master craftsman: the peerless synergy of narrative, art direction and game design, the unabashed depiction …

    reghardware 20 May 11:33

  • Desktop Linux: the final frontier

    Strange new worlds

    Depending on who you talk to, 40 to 75 per cent of the world’s web servers are Linux-based. That is some serious market penetration. But even in organisations running Linux on their servers the operating system is on just 20 per cent of desktops. Despite its success in the back office, Linux has not yet made such an impact on …

    Open Source 20 May 11:35

  • Gov urged to extend rural mobe, broadband coverage

    Tory: My primitive string-belted constituents need these things

    A parliamentary motion urging Ofcom to extend next generation mobile broadband to 98 per cent of the UK received cross-party support during a debate in the House of Commons yesterday. Tory MP Rory Stewart - who last year got in a spot of bother for describing his Cumbria constituency as partly "primitive" and saying that some …

    Telecoms 20 May 11:36

  • Science fiction beams up into the British Library

    Worlds: Alien, Future, Parallel, Virtual, Perfect and End Of

    The British Library exhibition of the history of science fiction opens today. The exhibition takes the long view of the genre starting with Lucian of Samosata's A True Story, a satirical trip to outer space powered by a giant water jet. The exhibition is divided into Alien Worlds; Future Worlds; Parallel Worlds; Virtual …

    Music and Media 20 May 11:40

  • Remastered 4K, 3D Titanic steams towards cinemas

    Difficult - if not impossible - to master it any more

    James Cameron has confirmed that the 3D version of his 1997 epic Titanic will hit cinema screens on 6 April next year. In a statement, the director said: "There's a whole generation that's never seen Titanic as it was meant to be seen, on the big screen. And this will be Titanic as you've never seen it before, digitally …

    Music and Media 20 May 12:00

  • Down and dirty in a monster data centre

    Cloud El Reg goes on tour with Rackspace

    At 66,000 servers worldwide and counting, it’s hard to remember that 10 years ago Rackspace didn’t exist. Now its customers in its Slough data centre alone include the Ministry of Defence and Lloyds TSB. Use an Oyster card, or buy insurance from Confused.com, and your data is stored on one of the 16,000 Rackspace servers in the …

    Enterprise Tech 20 May 12:15

  • Using the internet in the People's Republic of China

    Our man reports from inside the Great Firewall

    China makes no secret of its desire, and ability, to control internet access, but even at a glance it's clear that the Great Firewall Of China leaks like the proverbial sieve. We had the chance to try our hand at breaching that wall on a recent trip to visit Huawei in Shenzhen. Our hosts kindly supplied us with China Mobile …

    Networks 20 May 12:30

  • Twitter revamps privacy controls, 3rd-party app access

    'Just say no' to uncomfortable intrusions

    Third-party Twitter applications will have to ask users' permission before processing their private messages following a change in the company's permissions policy. Twitter users often use applications (apps) designed by third-party companies to send and receive private messages on Twitter. Twitter will now force some …

    Networks 20 May 12:38

  • Google gets ready to crush quote-comparison websites

    And prepares to hoover up even more of your information

    Google has unveiled the next step in its plans to push into the market for online financial services with a price comparison site for mortgages and bank accounts. The search engine first dipped a toe into the market with a mortgage price comparison tool back in 2009. It has since launched products that offer surfers an …

    Financial News 20 May 12:59

  • El Reg iPhone app rated a flaccid 12+

    Bootnotes bureau protests 'Mild Sexual Content' slur

    It won't have escaped your notice that Vulture Central has unleashed a veritable shedload of mobile apps to deliver The Register to a range of devices, including one for the Jesus Phone and iPad. Well, we at the Bootnotes bureau were horrified to learn the latter is "Rated 12+ for the following: Infrequent/Mild Alcohol, …

    Bootnotes 20 May 13:24

  • Nintendo Wii price plummets below £100

    RRP cut, retailers slash it further

    The price of the Nintendo Wii plunged today, with some retailers pushing the price of a bundle under the £100 mark. With Nintendo's next console sure to hit shelves in 2012, the price-cut was inevitable. It was reported earlier this month that from 20 May, new bundles would be available and £50 would be slashed from the …

    reghardware 20 May 13:53

  • £1.1bn Royal Navy warship finally armed, sort of

    Analysis HMS Daring's third captain 'very pleased'

    HMS Daring, first of the £1.1bn+ Type 45 destroyers now coming into service with the Royal Navy, has finally fired her primary (and only significant) armament, the Sea Viper missile system. The glad news comes five years after the ship was launched, three years after she was accepted into the Royal Navy and well into the tenure …

    Government 20 May 14:22

  • Endeavour mission specialists wrap first ISS spacewalk

    'Nauts commence sorting out leaky station air-con

    NASA 'nauts Greg Chamitoff and Drew Feustel have wrapped the first of four spacewalks planned for Endeavour's STS-134 mission to the International Space Station. The pair's EVA lasted 6 hours, 19 minutes, during which they first installed an "ammonia jumper cable that will connect the cooling loops of the station's port-3 and …

    Space 20 May 14:25

  • IT suppliers fear new GP consortia will 'create difficulties'

    HP bigwig: Suppliers need 'continuity of requirements'

    Suppliers of IT systems to England's NHS may face difficulties in the market if the planned reorganisation causes big differences in requirements, according to the manager responsible for health at one of the largest vendors of government IT. Graham Lay, vice president for government, healthcare and transport at HP Enterprise …

    Public Sector 20 May 14:42

  • Who's nicked Vaz's fondleslab?

    Parliament really is awash with thieves

    Keith Vaz, MP for Leicester East and chair of the Home Affairs Committee, is outraged that some scrote has nicked an iPad and actual, real laptop from his offices. No word on whether the office was locked or not but Vaz is outraged at the lack of security, according to the Beeb. He said a "more robust approach" to security was …

    Government 20 May 15:02

  • Arrays assaulted by acceleration appliances

    Blog Waiting to be lunch

    Pesky acceleration appliances are proliferating and saying they can get better I/O out of storage arrays than the arrays themselves. We can imagine the array vendors sighing and saying: "Here we go again. When will these cachers ever learn?" The pitch is that store arrays are being overwhelmed by virtualised servers and there …

    Blocks and Files 20 May 15:14

  • Hollywood to 'retell' Carrie

    Brian DePalma's 1976 effort evidently not up to scratch

    Film fans who consider Brian DePalma's 1976 movie Carrie an inadequate interpretation of the Stephen King novel will be delighted to learn that MGM is planning a "retelling". According to the Hollywood Reporter, the studio has teamed up with Screen Gems for the project, and brought on board playwright Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa to …

    Entertainment 20 May 15:28

  • Google euthanizes newspaper archive scan plan

    We will organize the world's information. Except the old newspapers

    Google has shut down its five-year old effort to digitizes back issues of the world's newspapers. On Thursday, The Boston Phoenix, one of the newspapers participating in Google's program, announced that the web giant had sent an email to it and other publishers saying it is no longer accepting, scanning, and indexing microfilm …

    Music and Media 20 May 16:25

  • Apple, Amazon trademark spat turns surreal

    'Our app stores aren't app stores'

    Apple has slapped back at Amazon in their messy legal tête-à-tête over whether the online megaretailer's Appstore for Android is a violation of Apple's trademark for the term "app store" – and its arguments are becoming increasingly surreal. "Apple denies that the mark APP STORE is generic and, on that basis, denies that the …

    Mobile 20 May 17:10

  • Explosion in iPad factory kills two, injures more

    Updated More pain for Foxconn workers

    An explosion at the Chinese factory that manufactures Apple's iPad, among other devices, has reportedly killed two three* and injured 16, three seriously. The explosion at the Foxconn plant near Chengdu in southwest China occured around 7pm local time, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal. Foxconn told the WSJ that …

    Business 20 May 17:39

  • Google nabs patents from defunct mini-phone maker

    Pays $4.9 million for Modu shell

    Google has paid $4.9 million to acquire the patents of defunct Israeli phone maker Modu, according to a report from an Israeli newspaper. Calcalist reports (Google Translate) that the web giant will purchase "dozens" of patents from the shell of Modu after a deal was approved by an Israeli court. When we asked Google to …

    Mobile 20 May 18:50

  • Massachusetts PCs infected by data-hungry worm

    How nasty was it? Let us count the ways

    Computers operated by the state of Massachusetts were infected for more than three weeks with a sophisticated piece of malware that security researchers say stealthily stole more than a gigabyte's worth of sensitive data over the past 10 days. Not all of the banking credentials, email passwords and other data lifted by the …

    Malware 20 May 19:50

  • Will Red Hat come back to haunt the Open Virtualization Alliance?

    Open...and Shut IBM and friends RHEV anti-VMware crusade

    In an attempt to cripple VMware's lead in enterprise virtualization, a posse of tech leaders decided to band together behind Red Hat's KVM in the Open Virtualization Alliance (OVA), announced this Wednesday. The irony, however, is that these same companies may come to rue their propping up of an already strong competitor, one …

    Virtualization 20 May 20:12

  • Norway's military computers targeted in serious attack

    Hack followed Libya bombing

    Norwegian military officials said they were targeted in a serious computer attack that struck in late March, one day after the country's F-16 fighter jets participated in bombings on Libya, according to published news reports. On March 25, about 100 military employees received an email in Norwegian that included an attachment …

    Security 20 May 20:14

  • Twitter and unnamed Twitterers sued by anonymous man

    'CTB' in bid to muzzle microblog

    Twitter and certain Twitter users have been sued in the High Court in London by an individual referred to only by the initials "CTB". The initials are meant to maintain the anonymity of the individual, but the same initials were used in a previous suit brought by a professional footballer in the UK who has won a so-called " …

    Music and Media 20 May 22:05