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25th May 2011 Archive

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  • Server sales grow thanks to big boy boxes

    Mainframes and Unix machines catch the upgrade wave

    Server peddlers and their reseller partners the world over are breathing sighs of relief as their first-quarter bonus checks now seem safe and sound, according to a report by the box counters at IDC. In the first quarter, worldwide server revenues rose by 12.1 per cent to $11.9bn, the fifth consecutive quarter of revenue …

    Channel Register 25 May 00:00

  • Google preps mobile payments launch

    Coming Thursday, it seems

    Reporters in New York are dusting off their outdoor clothes for a Google “partner event” which rumours day will be the venue for the launch of a mobile payments platform. Mobile payment is a Holy Grail of the tech sector: phone makers get a feature that will differentiate their devices for a week or so; the card giants get a …

    Mobile 25 May 00:11

  • Intel floats hybrid cloud scheme for SMB apps

    Cloudwashes local server workloads

    There are 22 million small and medium businesses in the world, and the last thing that Intel wants them to do is say to hell with servers and move all their workloads and data to public clouds. So Intel has come up with a clever scheme that will let service and application providers cloudwash their traditional SMB setup – i.e …

    Small Biz 25 May 00:29

  • CEO of Aussie Microsoft JV exits ahead of A$5bn float

    Bean-counter wanted?

    The head of ninemsn, the JV between Microsoft and Nine Entertainment Co, Joe Pollard has abruptly left the company as Nine prepares for a strongly mooted A$5 billion float. Pollard, who has a marketing background, was appointed CEO to the online venture in 2008 amid a flurry of executive departures and staff retrenchments. …

    Financial News 25 May 01:00

  • Groundhog day: more Sony breaches

    Barnstorming hackers continue diabolical mystery tour

    Talk of “isolated incidents” went by the board in the last couple of days, with Sony and Sony-affiliated sites compromised in Canada, Japan and Indonesia. Let’s do the rounds: • Canada – The Hacker News reports a breach at a Sony-Ericsson mobile store, conducted through an SQL injection attack and yielding details of around 2 …

    Enterprise Security 25 May 01:30

  • Bradley Manning accuser to meet with prosecutors

    Lamo goes to Washington

    The ex-hacker who reported WikiLeaker Bradley Manning to US authorities is scheduled to meet with military prosecutors next week, Wired.com reported Tuesday. “I'm finally going to meet with the JAG officer to go over the preliminaries for the actual testimony and how they want to play out my role,” Adrian Lamo was quoted as …

    Government 25 May 04:00

  • Samsung must cough up Android prototypes to Apple

    The battle of rounded corners

    A US federal judge has handed Apple a procedural victory in its legal spat with Samsung by ordering the Korean giant to provide Cupertino's legal team with product samples and packaging for two of its tablets and three of its phones. The order grows out of Apple's lawsuit against Samsung for "slavishly" copying its iPhone and …

    Mobile 25 May 04:12

  • Virgin Media TV Powered by TiVo

    Review Sky+ killer in the making?

    TiVo is synonymous with hard disk video recording, at least in its native US. To date, its profile was lower in the UK, though a few thousand models of the original UK model were sold about ten years ago, winning it a loyal if small fanbase. Cisco's Virgin's TiVo box: PlayStation 3-like curves and minimalist styling That …

    reghardware 25 May 06:00

  • Telecom NZ splits in two

    Groundhog day as roll out starts on Kiwi broadband network

    Telecom New Zealand will spin off its network operations, branded Chorus, into a separate listed company by year end. The split comes at New Zealand’s incumbent telco embarks on building part of a national government funded ultrafast broadband network after securing a tender for 70% of the deployment. Work on the network will …

    Telecoms 25 May 06:32

  • Oz paper in todger-based trivia quiz outrage

    'What is the official currency of Vietnam?'

    Oz's Canberra Times proved unusually entertaining last Wednesday when its 10-question "Trivia Quiz" offered readers the chance to brush up on their todger-related general knowledge. The first poser was: "Which private detective has been played by Richard Roundtree and Samuel L Jackson...?" Yup, you've got it. Try this: "What …

    Bootnotes 25 May 08:15

  • NASA kills comms with deceased Mars rover

    Bids farewell to Spirit

    NASA will today end attempts to contact its Spirit Mars rover, killed by lack of sunlight during a "stressful" Martian winter. The agency last heard from Spirit on 22 March 2010, when it transmitted from the sand trap in which it had been stuck since April 2009. The orientation of its solar panels led scientists to conclude it …

    Space 25 May 08:52

  • Fusion-io backers to get rich(er)

    One BEEELLION dollars... On day one!

    Fusion-io could capitalise on the flash flood to become a billion dollar company on its first day as a public company. It aims to sell shares on its IPO day for $13 to $15, and that would capitalise the company at up to $1.17bn, according to Bloomberg. With Fusion selling 10.8 million shares, it hopes to raise up to $212m, $ …

    Storage 25 May 08:53

  • Brit expats aghast as Denmark bans Marmite

    'What am I supposed to put on my toast now?'

    Marmite-loving Brit expats living in Denmark have expressed their shock and dismay at the government's decision to ban the legendary yeast-based spread, on the grounds that it contains "too many vitamins". The Danish Veterinary and Food Administration has invoked a 2004 law concerning nosh "fortified with added vitamins". …

    Bootnotes 25 May 09:09

  • BT's fibre-to-the-premises trials hit duct roadblock

    Rollout pushed back as 7-hour job turns into 2-day hassle for some customers

    BT has been forced to delay the rollout of its fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) technology, after roughly a quarter of its trials found engineers taking two days to blow cables into customers' homes. The telco's "superfast" broadband programme director Johnny McQuoid told The Register that some of the trials were taking twice as …

    Telecoms 25 May 09:21

  • Military set to lead on US domestic cyber-security

    NSA, Cyber Command have 'unparalleled expertise'

    The US military will play a leading role in defending homeland America from cyber attacks, and this will include providing cybersecurity to key infrastructure on US soil. Robert J Butler, deputy assistant secretary of defense for cyber policy, briefed senators in Washington on the plans yesterday. Butler stated that the …

    Enterprise Security 25 May 09:30

  • Vodafone touts low-tech phone for app-phobes

    Talk'n'text - and not much else

    Say hello to the Vodafone Emporia RL1, a 60 quid handset designed solely for voice calls and texting - and none of that app nonsense. And with large, clearly labelled buttons, the RL1 is not only geared toward the smartphone-phobic but also folk whose eyes and motor skills might not by up to touchscreen navigation. The 92g …

    reghardware 25 May 09:35

  • Apple admits scareware problem, at last

    Says up to 125,000 customers contacted it with 'malware-like' problems

    Apple has finally held its hands up and admitted that the MacDefender scareware package might be a problem, abandoning the line that support workers must on no account suggest to users that their machine might be infected with malware. Contrary to this (unsustainable) line, Apple has now published an advisory explaining how to …

    Enterprise Security 25 May 09:37

  • Cabinet Office shakes up PSN

    New governance arrangements for Public Sector Network

    The Cabinet Office has created a new governance regime for the Public Sector Network (PSN) as the next step in its development. Work on various elements of the PSN, which is being developed as a 'network of networks' from existing commercial infrastructure to promote collaborative working, will be distributed among the major …

    Government 25 May 09:41

  • Is the IT Dept failing users?

    Desktop Can it catch up with personal devices?

    The number of tools the enterprise can deploy to enhance productivity is huge. And even if the tools are generally simple to use, they are also mind-bogglingly complex under the skin. Balls in the air Each tool, including the desktop PC, has to interact with all the others securely, quickly and seamlessly. It is such a a …

    Desktop Strategy 25 May 10:00

  • UK.gov 'falls short' of legal obligation to enforce EC cookies Directive

    Issues only 'partial notification' to Brussels

    On the eve of a new European Union directive on web cookies coming into force tomorrow, the UK government has issued only a "partial notification" to Brussels' officials on how it will implement the changes into UK law, The Register has learned. The Commission's spokesman Jonathan Todd confirmed to us this morning that it was …

    Government 25 May 10:01

  • Telcos team to test '4G' in Cornwall

    Large Throughput Expected?

    BT and Orange/T-Mobile owner Everything Everywhere will be trialling LTE mobile connectivity later this year, in Newquay. The area, favoured by surfers, will presumably soon get the thumbs-up from web surfers too. Ahem. Both partners are calling the trial a test of 4G technology, though there's no discussion as whether the …

    reghardware 25 May 10:17

  • Gadgets give granny disease to kids

    Arthritis strikes gaming youngsters

    Youngsters are increasingly suffering from arthritis-like pains due to their excessive use of games consoles and mobile phones, it has been claimed. The revelation came from the European League Against Rheumatism (EULAR), which holds its annual conference in London this week. Consultants reckon roughly 90 per cent of British …

    reghardware 25 May 10:23

  • Zuckerberg: Give me your children

    Give me the child before 7 and I will give the leads to advertisers

    Mark Zuckerberg has revealed his determination to allow under-13s onto Facebook, whatever politicians, regulators and the rest of the grownups say. Speaking at an education summit in the US, the 27-year-old said the "educational benefits" of his social network made it a must-visit site for everyone old enough to push a mouse …

    Music and Media 25 May 10:40

  • French spooks have access to UK forces' travel data

    Also Germans. And Yanks of course

    Contractors working for the Ministry of Defence hold personal information on hundreds of thousands of service personnel and other MoD employees on computer systems located abroad, it has been revealed. Approximately 180,000 personal records are held in France and more than 310,000 are held in the USA, with thousands more in …

    Enterprise Security 25 May 11:06

  • Asus teases with MacBook Air-esque Eee PC

    Super skinny netbook inbound?

    Asus looks set to take the fight to Apple's 11in MacBook Air with an ultra-skinny Eee PC netbook, due to be announced next week at the Computex show in Taipei. The Asian PC maker's Facebook page teases a slimline Eee - the line's "next evolution", apparently - but Italian-language site Notebook Italia has a snap of what the …

    reghardware 25 May 11:24

  • BT and EE join together for Cornish LTE

    Mobile and fixed internet collide in the fourth generation

    BT and Everything Everywhere are working together to build a trial network in Cornwall, providing fixed and mobile internet access over the same network and via the same infrastructure. That infrastructure, comprising two base stations, will cover 25 square kilometres around the Cornish village of St Newlyn East. BT said that …

    Mobile 25 May 11:26

  • Netflix overtakes Bittorrent as traffic champ

    Copyright-holders should wake up and smell the coffee

    Is solving the copyright "wars" really so difficult? New traffic research shows that Netflix has overtaken Bittorrent as America's favourite internet application, knocking http into third place. "P2P is here to stay," note the authors in Sandvine's Global Internet Report, Spring 2011 edition, which shows that demand for legal, …

    Music and Media 25 May 11:30

  • EU belatedly cancels funding for Symbian OS

    All our your money is for talking robopets

    The European Commission has cancelled plans to throw €22m of taxpayers' money at Symbian. In November, Eurocrats threw the doomed OS a lifeline by anointing Symbian as the "Embedded Operating System for Europe", in what was called the Symbeose research project. Real life overtook the decision. Nokia dissolved the Symbian …

    Operating Systems 25 May 11:50

  • ASA smackdown for Yahoo! Thelma & Louise

    Speedy driver-babe Yahooligans rouse (some) public ire

    The UK's advertising regulator has slammed the brakes on a Yahoo! ad which is said encourage irresponsible driving. The ASA received a complaint about "an ad on a login screen, for an email service provider, [which] was headed 'Faster is funner. Introducing the 2x faster New BT Yahoo! Mail. Find out more about BT Yahoo! Mail …

    Music and Media 25 May 11:55

  • Software licensing, virtualisation and the cloud

    Tech Panel Survey time, folks

    If you've got a few minutes to spare, let us know your thoughts on the software licensing models you use today and whether you believe they restrict your ability to serve your users. You can get started by clicking here. This is the rationale for our study, which we will publish in The Register in a few weeks. For most …

    Infrastructure 25 May 12:00

  • Outland

    Review Dark matters

    A quick check of the map confirms the hero’s next objective – a mere two levels above him. What the map doesn’t reveal are the obstacles standing between him and that adventure-progressing goal. How Inca-pacitiating Skilfully evading not one, but two spike traps with graceful fleetness of foot, the hero finds himself …

    reghardware 25 May 12:00

  • Timing attack threatens private keys on SSL servers

    Elliptic-curve curveball crypto mobe method menace

    Security researchers have discovered a "timing attack" that creates a possible mechanism for a hacker to extract the secret key of a TLS/SSL server that uses elliptic curve cryptography (ECC). Elliptic curve cryptography is a type of public-key algorithm that uses the maths of elliptic curves rather than integer factorisation …

    Enterprise Security 25 May 12:07

  • Nokia caters for kings with golden smartphone

    Midas touch

    Nokia has announced a gold-clad smartphone for spritely spenders, where image is everything and thirst is nothing. The Nokia Oro - essentially the Nokia C7 with a gangster twist - is a phone you'd expect to find in every pimp's pocket. While Nokia has previously offered gold models of mobile phones, namely the Nokia 6700, the …

    reghardware 25 May 12:27

  • Endeavour spacewalkers come face-to-face with VADER

    US Air Force claims improbable backronym crown

    Endeavour mission specialists Drew Feustel and Mike Fincke today completed the third STS-134 mission spacewalk at the International Space Station. "It's great to be back outside. It's the most beautiful planet in the universe," said Fincke as he gazed down on Earth. "Nice view, isn't it?" chipped in Feustel. Having admired …

    Space 25 May 13:56

  • UK finally ratifies Cybercrime Convention during Obama visit

    No Russia + No China = No point

    President Obama and UK prime minister David Cameron agreed to work more closely on cybersecurity following a meeting between the two government leaders on Wednesday. The UK underlined this commitment with a much-delayed ratification of the Budapest Convention on Cybercrime. The convention, which embodies a commitment to …

    Crime 25 May 14:19

  • Server virtualisation is not enough

    What needs to change to build a private cloud?

    The server computing architecture that lies at the heart of what we now refer to as private cloud has been considered several times over. The game-changer – the capability that makes private cloud possible today – is virtualisation, which enables logical workloads to be fully abstracted from machines. The famous Moore’s Law …

    Infrastructure 25 May 15:27

  • Cookies law: Only two EU states implement full measures – so far

    Brussels frets as just Denmark, Estonia comply

    A pattern is emerging that shows European Member States greeting Brussels with a collective thumbs-down on its cookies law. So far, the Commission has had just two submissions from countries that have agreed to fully adhere to the amendments to the e-Privacy Directive. "Denmark and Estonia have notified measures to implement …

    Government 25 May 15:28

  • White Space competitors fight dirty

    Microsoft kicked our TV off the air

    Microsoft and Spectrum Bridge, both competing to provide databases of available White Space radio frequencies, stand accused of demonstrating surprising incompetence in managing their own meagre spectrum use. Filings with the FCC argue that neither Microsoft nor Spectrum Bridge should be allowed to run White Space databases, …

    Wireless 25 May 15:49

  • Unpatched IE bug exposes sensitive Facebook creds

    'Cookiejacking' also threatens Gmail, Twitter

    A security researcher has devised an attack that remotely steals digital credentials used to access user accounts on Facebook and other websites by exploiting a flaw in Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser. Independent researcher Rosario Valotta demonstrated his “cookiejacking” proof of concept last week at the Hack in the Box …

    ID 25 May 18:30

  • MokaFive's VDI bares it all

    VMware munch time

    Virtual desktop infrastructure upstart MokaFive – which has the audacity to do VDI mostly on the client with only out-of-band management residing on central servers – has delivered its bare-metal hypervisor for its MokaFive Suite 3.0, augmenting hosted VDI that it has been selling for more than two years. The MokaFive …

    Virtualization 25 May 19:38

  • MongoDB daddy: My baby beats Google BigTable

    The web is built on objects. Not tables

    After a decade as chief technology officer at DoubleClick – the internet ad giant he cofounded in 1995 – Dwight Merriman set out to build a "platform cloud" along the lines of Google App Engine or Microsoft Azure. But this was before people called them platform clouds, before anyone knew about App Engine or Azure. It was late …

    Platform 25 May 19:41

  • McKinnon's mum applauds Obama extradition stance

    Prez voices 'confidence' in UK legal system

    The mother and attorney for Gary McKinnon voiced optimism about the prospects of blocking the accused NASA hacker's extradition to the US after President Barack Obama said he would respect the UK legal process. “We have proceeded through all the processes required under our extradition agreements,” Obama said during a press …

    Crime 25 May 20:55

  • Down Under gamers get closer to 18+ rating

    More sex, drugs and violence please

    Australian gamers are poised to get access to hard core R18+ games like Mortal Kombat Reboot following the release of long anticipated draft guidelines from the government supporting the introduction of a new classification for computer games. Until now the Australian gaming industry and its users have been caught in a …

    Law 25 May 21:32

  • Citrix preps own version of OpenStack

    Mounting Project Olympus

    Citrix has announced that it will offer its own version of OpenStack, the open source "infrastructure cloud" platform originally created by NASA and Rackspace. On Tuesday, during a conference with reporters, Citrix chief marketing officer Wes Wasson said that the company would be a "flag bearer" for the OpenStack project and …

    Platform 25 May 22:18

  • iOS 4 hardware encryption cracked

    ‘We don’t want this to fall into the wrong hands’

    Russian security outfit ElcomSoft is shipping a toolset that cracks open the hardware encryption protecting iOS4-based iPhones – but it's only for spooks and law enforcement. In an announcement that will have black-hats working to replicate its results, the company says its tool can “extract all relevant encryption keys from …

    Security 25 May 22:25

  • 35m Google Profiles dumped into private database

    Easy as pie

    Proving that information posted online is indelible and trivial to mine, an academic researcher has dumped names, email addresses and biographical information made available in 35 million Google Profiles into a massive database that took just one month to assemble. University of Amsterdam Ph.D. student Matthijs R. Koot said he …

    ID 25 May 23:33