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11th December 2012 Archive

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  • Is 'activestor' Icahn circling sickly HP?

    Time for Hewletts and Packards to step up, take it private

    Active investor Carl Icahn – who has done more than his fair share of shaking up companies that he believes are not run properly – is rumored to be mulling a stake in HP. Hopefully not through its heart. Icahn may or may not be interested in grabbing a big piece of the venerable IT gear maker, and if he were, he certainly …

    Servers 11 Dec 00:34

  • Russian ransomware strikes Queensland doctor

    Seven years of patients' files encrypted by crooks

    A medical practice in the Australian state of Queensland, the Miami Family Medical Centre, has been hit by ransomware said to originate in Russia. ABC News reports staff arrived at the practice last week, turned on computers and found messages proclaiming that patients' records had been encrypted. Seven years' worth of …

    Security 11 Dec 01:08

  • GhostShell hackers release 1.6 million NASA, FBI, ESA accounts

    Hacktivist crew signs off for Christmas

    The hacking collecting GhostShell has announced it has finished operations for the year, but has signed off with a dump of around 1.6 million account details purloined from government, military, and industry. "ProjectWhiteFox will conclude this year's series of attacks by promoting hacktivism worldwide and drawing attention to …

    Security 11 Dec 01:19

  • Dell tunes up servers for high freaky traders

    Making a PowerEdge sit up and shark on Wall Street

    When you run a high-frequency trading operation, milliseconds are millions of dollars lost or gained. So speed is just as important as the algorithm you come up with to make your trades. That's why supercomputer makers Appro (just eaten by Cray), Silicon Graphics, and Penguin Computing in 2010 launched special overclocked …

    Servers 11 Dec 01:39

  • New transistor tech could beat silicon and save Moore's Law

    IEDM Indium gallium arsenide tapped for smaller, faster chips

    Boffins at MIT's Microsystems Technology Laboratories have developed the world's smallest transistor made of indium gallium arsenide, a substance they say could replace silicon as the go-to material for building tomorrow's ultra-fast, ultra-small microchips. The tiny transistor is just 22nm in length, according to a report by …

    Hardware 11 Dec 01:48

  • Toshiba reveals spin transfer RAM

    Beats SRAM power consumption by 90% thanks to perpendicular magnetization

    Toshiba has revealed it has developed a model for transfer torque magnetoresistive random access memory (STT-MRAM)  and has claimed it has, for the first time, beaten the power requirements of static random-access memory (SRAM). STT-MRAM has been on memory-makers' radar for a few years, and works by imparting spin – the …

    Storage 11 Dec 03:22

  • Last moon landing was 40 years ago today

    Apollo 17 touched down on December 11th

    No matter how impressed you are by Curiosity's martian trundlings or the various private space programs showing us all the final frontier isn't just the province of governments, the fact remains that as of today it's 40 years since a human set foot on the moon. December 11th, 1972, was the day when Apollo 17 touched down on …

    Science 11 Dec 05:02

  • Bye Bye Moto: Google pulls plug on Motorola Korea

    R&D job cuts in the offing as restructuring continues

    Motorola Mobility has followed Taiwanese handset giant HTC out of the South Korean market, as parent company Google looks to streamline its operations and return the business to profitability. The firm said it will be closing “most” of its operations, including R&D and consumer mobile device marketing, with only around 10 per …

    Business 11 Dec 05:35

  • Parliament: Snoop Charter plan 'too sweeping', 'misleading', 'suspicious'

    'Goes much further than it need or should'

    Theresa May's communications data draft bill is far too broad and needs to be slimmed down, concluded MPs and peers who have spent many months scrutinising the Home Secretary's lambasted plans to massively increase the surveillance of online activity in the UK. The joint committee, chaired by Lord Blencathra, said: Our …

    Law 11 Dec 05:55

  • Storage disks now shipping at over 7 Exabytes a quarter

    University of Maximegalon to regain parking lots at last?

    IDC's third quarter 2012 disk storage tracker reports that shipped disk storage capacity passed 7 exabytes for the first time in a total disk storage market that grew 3.7 per cent to just under $7.9 billion in revenues. Total disk storage systems capacity shipped reached 7,104 petabytes, growing 24.4 per cent year over year. …

    Storage 11 Dec 07:03

  • Huawei to build R&D centre in Nokia’s back yard

    Finland facility will focus on Android AND Windows Phone 8 UIs

    Shenzhen-based telecoms giant Huawei has revealed plans to double its European workforce and set up a new R&D centre in Nokia’s backyard of Finland, in a clear sign of the growing global footprint of Chinese smartphone vendors. The firm confirmed to The Reg it will increase staff numbers from 7,000 to around 14,000 in the next …

    Business 11 Dec 07:06

  • Apple's iOS 6 maps STILL muddle Mildura

    Directions now head in right direction, but Oz town still in wrong spot on the map

    Travellers relying on their iPhones and iOS 6 to find the Australian town of Mildura are now in less danger finding themselves in a hostile, waterless, environment. Apple has tweaked maps on the iPhone so that travellers seeking the Mildura are directed to the actual town and not the geo-wonk-only namesake we spotted earlier …

    Networks 11 Dec 07:17

  • Earthworm Jim

    Antique Code Show Groovy!

    I can’t think of one person I’ve met who didn’t enjoy the run and gun fun of Earthworm Jim. Released in 1994 on both the Super Nintendo and Sega Megadrive (Genesis) it made my eyes pop. The graphics were revolutionary (and surreal) and it’s certainly one of the most popular platform games ever made. It went on to spawn a cartoon …

    Games 11 Dec 08:00

  • Mother of All Whistlers: Virgin Media superhub. Listen to recordings

    Audio Majestic whine

    Virgin Media is resorting to sending its subscribers to Maplins and other electrical outlets to deal with its now long-standing whistling power supply problem that has blighted the company's troublesome* SuperHub modem/router combi kit. Netgear, which supplies the equipment to the telco, has failed to comment on what has gone …

    Broadband 11 Dec 09:00

  • Silicon Roundabout £50m THING to spew 200 startups A YEAR

    Mentoring and incubating Blighty out of recession

    Prime Minister David Cameron and Mayor of London Boris Johnson have unveiled plans to establish a £50 million "technical and creative institute" around the area dubbed the Silicon Roundabout at Old Street in London. The plans, set out at a conference organised by LSE Cities, propose an architecture-designed scheme housing 200 …

    Government 11 Dec 09:29

  • The Sons of Kahn and the assembly language of the internet

    Stob C# hath become a lonely path. And the Beast hath shut its gates against us

    Editor's Note: Verity Stob's Chronicles of Delphi [King James ed.] began in 1996. The most recent translations can be found here: The Sons of Kahn and the Pascal spring and here: Sons of Kahn: The Apocrypha. Zany adventures with Zarco and Marco And the users of Delphi had become old with the passage of years, and had taken …

    Verity Stob 11 Dec 10:00

  • Another Usenet download haven axed, Leeds pirates avoid jail

    Legalmovies.tv wasn't actually that legal

    Two Leeds brothers behind the pirate download links website filmzzz.com have received suspended prison sentences for copyright infringement. The men, Faraz Saddiq, 27, and Ayaz Saddiq, 26, also operated legalmovies.tv and presented both online outlets as legit operations. In reality, the websites merely pointed to unlicensed …

    Law 11 Dec 10:28

  • Yo, storage geeks: Fancy a bit of scale-out fun time?

    Storagebod Xmas comes early... for me at least

    Recently I’ve been playing with a new virtual appliance; well new to me in that I’ve only just got my hands on it. It’s one of the many that our friends in EMC have built and it is one which could do with a wider audience. A few years ago Chad Sakac managed to make the Celerra virtual appliance available to one and all, and a …

    Storage 11 Dec 11:01

  • Boffins spot 7 ALIEN WORLDS right in our galactic backyard

    Confirmed Milky Way exoplanets could be home to ETs

    Boffins are putting together a new catalogue of all the confirmed planets that could harbour extraterrestrial life, with seven worlds in our Milky Way making the list so far. The Habitable Exoplanets Catalog, a project of the Planetary Habitability Lab at the University of Puerto Rico, looks at the planets spotted by the High …

    Science 11 Dec 11:34

  • Deputy PM: Rip up Snoop Charter, 'go back to the drawing board'

    Bruised Home Sec admits she'll 'accept the substance' of gripes against net spy law

    Home Secretary Theresa May said she will "accept the substance of recommendations" for her draft surveillance law after the Deputy Prime Minister told her to rewrite it - and a parliamentary report slammed it as "suspicious" and "too sweeping". A joint select committee of MPs and peers, in a report published this morning, …

    Government 11 Dec 12:03

  • Review: Samsung Series 9 super slim notebook

    An ideal Win 7 machine, get it while you can

    Samsung has taken an expensive legal hit from Apple over copying design elements in the iPhone. Yet with the Series 9, Samsung has created something a bit special. The entire Ultrabook concept took its inspiration from the Apple MacBook Air, of course. But Samsung's Series 9 has developed a confident design language of its own …

    Laptops 11 Dec 12:19

  • OMG: RIM adds VoIP to its stealth social network

    You down with OTT? Yeah you know me

    As of today teenagers and other BlackBerry users will be able to make free voice calls to each other - if they're on RIM's stealth 'social network in hardware', BBM. RIM announced the news last month, but the updated app is now available in its App World store. Users of version 7 of BBM version 7 will be able to make calls …

    Mobile 11 Dec 12:39

  • A data centre that takes care of itself? It's...the dream

    Can you build it, do you want it?

    On paper the benefits of data centre automation are easy to see. But we don't build data centres on paper. That is why our Regcast on 23 January at 11:00 GMT examines how to build a data centre and maintain it throughout its life in the private cloud environment. What, if anything, has the cloud changed? What are the costs of …

    Servers 11 Dec 12:56

  • The latest tech firm to be accused of tax dodging: Microsoft

    Updated Joins Amazon and Google on list of shame

    Microsoft is the latest tech firm to be tarred with the "immoral" tax-dodger brush after a report accused Redmond of funneling £1.7bn in UK revenues through Luxembourg and Ireland in order to legally avoid paying tax here. The Sunday Times reported that the IT giant was sending its British earnings from new operating system …

    Financial News 11 Dec 13:07

  • Big Data in creepy hook-up with big-game whales

    Open ... and Shut Data-crunchers' dark side

    My son has a problem. One might even say an addiction. No, it's not to pornography, alcohol or drugs. It's to a massively multiplayer game, one that he can't seem to stop playing, in large part because the game's developer is crunching massive quantities of Big Data to learn exactly what will keep him on the hook. Big Data, …

    Management 11 Dec 13:36

  • Project delays slam Redstone sales, profits fly as costs fall

    Turnaround gurus steer managed service player on course

    The much-used phrase that revenue is vanity and profit is sanity is applicable to Redstone's half year numbers - the P&L was back in the black - helped by cost-cutting - but the top line was hammered. The managed services player has been in turnaround mode for the past couple of years since serial biz fixer-upper gurus Tony …

    The Channel 11 Dec 13:41

  • Look out, world! Are you ready for John McAfee: THE MOVIE?

    Reader poll Antivirus thrillseeker flogs manhunt film rights

    Antivirus pioneer John McAfee, who found himself at the centre of Central America's hottest manhunt in recent history, has sold the exclusive film rights to his life story. McAfee was named by police as a "person of interest" but not a suspect following the murder of his neighbour Gregory Faull in Belize in November. McAfee …

    Security 11 Dec 14:02

  • Microsoft notices Xbox gamers actually slack-jawed TV fans, adds 43 new apps

    Xbox Live service gets new video channels

    Everyone's been waiting for a game-changing Apple TV product to come riding over the hill, but it could be Microsoft that captures the internet TV market first. In the Xbox, Microsoft already has a popular internet box that people plug into the sitting room TV. Now Microsoft is ramping up the TV and video content available on …

    Games 11 Dec 14:35

  • Phoenix IT Group injects fresh blood, hopes to heal from accounting boo-boos

    Grabs several outsiders to help pull it out of dip

    Troubled Northampton-based player Phoenix IT Services has quietly introduced new blood to the organisation. The IT services specialist recently posted numbers for the halfway (30 September) point in fiscal 2013, with sales diving £7m to £124m and operating profits falling to £9.9m from £14m (restated) in the previous year. …

    The Channel 11 Dec 14:43

  • Sheryl Sandberg offloads $41.5m in Facebook shares in just 6 weeks

    Chief Operating Officer ditched $26m as a little Xmas bonus

    Facebook's Chief Operating Officer has divested herself of MORE Facebook shares, ditching just under a million on Friday and netting a cool $26.2m. A little something for Christmas, perhaps? It bumps up the total cash haul Sandberg has made from Facebook shares to $41.5m. That's all since the end of October when the directors …

    Financial News 11 Dec 15:04

  • YES! It's the TARDIS PC!

    'It doesn't roll along on wheels, you know'

    No, it won’t allow you to enter the Vortex, “that mysterious region where time and space are”, as Terrance Dicks so aptly put it, “one.” Nor, even if you max out the available storage options, will it give you space enough to hold the entire Matrix. Its CPU is not APC. But - let’s be honest - you don’t buy a PC casing that …

    Hardware 11 Dec 15:40

  • Dr Alex Moulton: 'An inspiration for generations of engineers'

    Obit Inventor of small-wheel bike, Mini suspension dies at 92

    Dr Alex Moulton, the engineer and inventor famous for designing small-wheeled bicycles and car suspension gear, has died at the age of 92. Moulton pioneered full-suspension small-wheel bikes, which were super popular in the 1960s and are still being built by hand in Bradford on Avon by The Moulton Bicycle Company. He also …

    Hardware 11 Dec 16:02

  • Stephen Hawking gets $3m physics prize from Mail.ru tycoon

    'Failed physicist' Russian tech baron throws millions at CERN boffins too

    Renowned physicist Stephen Hawking has won a Russian entrepreneur's $3m special Fundamentals Physics Prize for his lifetime of achievements. Seven scientists who led the effort to find the Higgs boson at CERN's Large Hadron Collider also won, bagging another of the special prizes from Yuri Milner. Milner, who describes …

    Science 11 Dec 16:37

  • Pica8 bundles up OpenFlow controller, switches for SDN newbies

    Making software-defined networks easy

    Ethernet switch maker Pica8 was one of the vendors that first jumped onto the OpenFlow software-defined networking bandwagon. But with all the major switch makers making noise about how they are doing SDN, Pica8 has to do something. Its rivals are setting up SDNs using open source OpenFlow virtual switches or controllers or by …

    Data Networking 11 Dec 17:06

  • 'Kids' apps STILL siphoning too much info from mobes' - FTC boss

    Apple and Google under fire for poor standards

    Mobile apps are still collecting children's personal details from their phones without their consent, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) warned today in a report on privacy intrusions. The watchdog analysed 400 popular children's apps available for Google Android and Apple iOS devices, and found that the applications continue …

    Mobile 11 Dec 17:54

  • Bio-integrated circuitry melds man and machine

    IEDM Flexible circuitry mimics skin, brain, human tissue

    If you want to marry rigid silicon with soft, stretchy human tissue, it's best to create silicon devices that can conform, stretch, and live in harmony with living flesh. So says University of Illinois professor John Rogers, who provided an update on his work with bio-integrated and transient electronics to the attendees of …

    Science 11 Dec 18:28

  • Girl gang targets Microsoft's Seattle stores for $5,000 theft spree

    Sounds like a job for the Rain City Superhero Movement

    Seattle police are on the lookout for a group of female thieves who are targeting Microsoft retail stores on its home turf. The police report says that the gang, which consists of six women and a man, have so far stuck five times in the last two months, Q13 Fox reports. So far they've stolen an estimated $5,000 in purloined …

    Security 11 Dec 19:28

  • Intel launches Atom S Series at servers

    ARM doesn't have 64-bit (yet), so it isn't a server chip (yet)

    As expected, Intel is closing out the year in the server arena with the launch of its "Centerton" Atom S Series processor, what the company's top brass is billing as the first Atom-based processor aimed at servers. The Atom S1200, as the first generation is known, is also the foundation from which Intel will build a bulwark …

    Servers 11 Dec 19:56

  • Microsoft rolling out Windows Phone 8 update in Europe

    Rumored to fix rebooting, Wi-Fi issues

    European Windows Phone 8 customers have reportedly begun receiving the first over-the-air update to Microsoft's latest mobile OS, just six weeks after the platform's formal launch on October 29. As first reported by Windows Phone Central, the update is being pushed out to international versions of the HTC 8X handset. Those …

    Mobile 11 Dec 20:59

  • Attacker steals ‘old passwords’ from Oz defence academy site

    Security fail sparks usual hypegasm

    An attack on Australian Defence Force Academy systems operated by the University of New South Wales (UNSW), has spilled 20,000 user records. The systems were compromised in November, with UNSW notifying staff and students within a day, but has only now come to light. The attacker, whose “Darwinaire” tag was also seen in a …

    Security 11 Dec 21:28

  • Samba 4 arrives with full Active Directory support

    Free Windows Server alternative gains modern features

    The team behind the Samba Project has released version 4.0 of its open source Windows interoperability software suite, the first version to offer full compatibility with Microsoft's Active Directory protocols. The Samba stack is by far the most popular solution for networking non-Microsoft platforms with Windows machines, but …

    Data Networking 11 Dec 23:46