4th January 2013 Archive

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'Holey code, Batman!' Microsoft to patch 12 vulns on Tuesday

Christmas zero-day flaw not included

Microsoft has issued its pre–Patch Tuesday report, saying it will issue seven patches fixing 12 code flaws next week – but it won't provide a permanent fix for the exploit discovered during the recent holidays that is already being used in the wild. "With 2013 starting on a Tuesday, our monthly bulletin release is upon us a …

Security 4 Jan 00:13
Wi-Fi, WiGig Alliances to wed, breed 60GHz progeny

Beyond mere Wi-Fi into a hella-fast world of wireless wedlock

The Wi-Fi Alliance and the Wireless Gigabit Alliance have announced that they will merge, combining their efforts to promote and set standards for 60GHz wireless technology "Combining the expertise of Wi-Fi Alliance and WiGig Alliance will deliver a terrific user experience with 60GHz solutions," Wi-Fi Alliance president and …

Hardware 4 Jan 01:08
Polaroid plans retail Fotobars to print out your pics

Tries 20th century solution to company woes

In a bizarre business plan that had El Reg checking if it weren't April already, Polaroid has announced a plan to open 10 shops in the US this year offering photo printing from customer's smartphones. Visitors to the retail units, dubbed Fotobars, will be able to upload their photos from cameras and smartphones wirelessly to …

Hardware 4 Jan 01:28
Browser makers rush to block fake Google.com security cert

Turkish authority's goof could compromise data

Google and other browser vendors have taken steps to block an unauthorized digital certificate for the " *.google.com" domain that fraudsters could have used to impersonate the search giant's online services. According to a blog post by software engineer Adam Langley, Google's Chrome team first discovered a site using the …

Security 4 Jan 01:46
Satnav-murdering Google slips its Maps into car dashboards

If you must have fleshy drivers at least we can tell them where to go

Hyundai and Kia will be dropping Google Maps into dashboards of their US models, demonstrating the integration next week. The cars will hit the showrooms next year. Google Maps and Google Places will find space in the 2014 Sorento CUV from Kia while Hyundai will integrate the apps into its Blue Link platform used across the …

Applications 4 Jan 07:02
Lights, camera, infection: HACKERS get Bollywood makeover

Virus comedy-thriller but no sign of Angelina Jolie, boo

Bollywood producers have announced plans to make a malware-themed movie. The comedy-thriller titled Mickey Virus is set in Delhi and the plot revolves around hackers and computer virus infections. The film, due out later this year, will reportedly star local TV anchorman Manish Paul in his big screen debut. It's unclear how …

Media 4 Jan 08:06
US court ungags Yelp reviewer who dissed builder

Negative review can stay - BUT if it's not true, you're in trouble

Negative reviews are okay, a Virginia court has ruled in a case hailed as a triumph for free speech. Justices Lemons, Goodwyn and Powell of the Supreme Court of Virginia ruled (PDF) that a woman's negative review of a building contractor on Yelp should not be taken down until a court has ruled that it is libellous. A 7 …

Law 4 Jan 09:05
Social media and the channel marketing Fear Factor

Around half of resellers swerve Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn Campaigns

Are your favourite vendors helping you to market successfully? We just published a report for our clients where we highlight best practices in marketing enablement, based on a series of interviews with 10 channel partner marketing executives. The majority of these were companies with over $10bn in revenues - so they could …

The Channel 4 Jan 09:42
Bringing Iron Man to life: Exoskeletons, armour and jet packs

Power without the muscle of Banner and Captain America

Radiation that gives you super-strength instead of disfiguring or killing you, spider bites that empower you to fight crime instead of threatening your life with a potentially fatal allergic reaction: when it comes to superheroes we need to suspend a decent amount of disbelief. But what about Marvel's The Avengers, the United …

Science 4 Jan 10:02
Up your wormhole: Star Trek Deep Space 9 turns 20

Defiantly different yet still boldly going

I’ve always been strangely fascinated by Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Now celebrating its 20th anniversary - amazing how time flies, even when you’re not an agent of the Federation Department of Temporal Investigations - it’s the densest and most mythology-rich of all the Star Trek TV shows. Often ambitious and audacious, it won …

Media 4 Jan 10:20
Microsoft: We're SO SORRY for Media Center TV guide titsup

Telly info now back for Brits, Irish on todo list

Microsoft has apologised for deleting TV guides on Windows Media Center. The data wipe left customers in the UK and Ireland "distraught" and struggling to record their favourite shows. After The Register raised the issue yesterday, Microsoft has now restored the programme guides in the UK and said it will tackle Ireland next. …

Software 4 Jan 11:02
Google wriggles out of FTC search smackdown. Now to Europe!

Analysis Fight or flight time for commissioner Almunia

The dust has yet to settle on yesterday's ruling in which the US Federal Trade Commission cleared Google of biasing its search results to nobble its competitors. But rival Microsoft is already accusing the ad giant of failing to be a "responsible" leader and is claiming victory in the lengthy antitrust case. Google may have …

Policy 4 Jan 11:33
She's a beauty! Super WATER-RICH Mars rock FOUND

Pic Meteorite is missing link to Red Planet's wet past

A Martian meteorite nicknamed Black Beauty contains more water than any other rock found from the Red Planet. Martian meteorite Black Beauty Credit: NASA The space stone, discovered in Morocco, is believed to come from the Martian crust 2.1 billion years ago, during the planet’s Amazonian era. Beauty, also designated NWA ( …

Science 4 Jan 12:03
Review: Lego Lord of the Rings game

One brick to rule them all

Being half Scottish, many of my summers were spent camping in the glens. After the daily grind of hitting each other with sticks, getting bitten by midges and eating fried spam, my sister would fill our evenings by reciting The Lord of the Rings – from memory! Being a more committed geek than me, by the age of 14 she had somehow …

Games 4 Jan 12:28
Eric Schmidt's Norks outing poorly timed, tuts US govt

'A private affair' Awkward!

The timing of Google chairman Eric Schmidt's planned visit to North Korea has been slammed by the US government. The search supremo is due to head out to the super-secretive internet-unfriendly nation soon after the launch of a long-range rocket by the Kim Jong-un-led country. "Frankly, we don't think the timing of this is …

Government 4 Jan 13:10
Sinofsky's new blogski: Windows 8 king reborn as management guru

Ex-Microsoft exec knows all about 'bringing products to market'

What next for the technology executive who saddled his previous employer with a controversial flagship operating system, polarised management and swiftly left under a cloud? Telling others how to build successful products, of course. Former Windows chief Steve Sinofsky has launched himself as a product development expert with …

Management 4 Jan 13:39
EMC flies in Azure bods for TOP SECRET 'data plane' project

But will new agent Bourne shoot to kill Atmos?

We hear from insiders that EMC has a new all-encompassing storage system in development that includes object storage. It's based in Seattle, it's called the Bourne Project, and EMC no doubt hopes it will kick ass like the eponymous hero of the movies. But there's some doubt surrounding the new project's impact on current …

Storage 4 Jan 14:02
This photo slide scanner costs €60... The bundled malware? That's free

Pre-pwned device on sale riddled with worms

German firm Tchibo has admitted to selling a photographic slide scanner that came pre-packaged with malware. The €60 (£48) 35mm slide scanner, sold by retail outlets and through Tchibo's online store, and manufactured by electronics accessory maker Hama, was infected with the infamous Conficker worm. In an advisory to …

Security 4 Jan 14:32
El Reg's 'Chuck Norris' faces down charging elephant

Provocative pachyderm becomes unit of rocket thrust

Reader Miguel Barreiro has proposed that the El Reg Standards Soviet adopt the charging adult elephant as an official unit of force following its deployment as a measurement of thrust of Copenhagen Suborbitals' HEAT-1XP rocket motor. The engine in question is the "most powerful amateur rocket ever flown", and according to a …

SPB 4 Jan 15:04
China fines Samsung and LG for LCD price-fixing

Follows similar action from EU and US

Samsung and LG Electronics, along with four Taiwanese companies, have been fined by the government for jigging LCD screen prices between 2001 and 2006. The secret negotiations held the prices of LCD screens artificially high, China's National Development and Reform Commission found - affecting the manufacture of phones, …

Government 4 Jan 15:31
Victory on mobile belongs to Google in 2013

Open ... and Shut Data beats Apple's polish

It's clear. The way to win in mobile is to solve an exceptionally difficult problem. Apple first did it by streamlining the mobile experience through an integrated OS and app-discovery and installation experience. Google then went a step further and crunched mountains of data to make mobile services breathtakingly powerful. The …

Management 4 Jan 16:06
'SHUT THE F**K UP!' The moment Linus Torvalds ruined a dev's year

Top tip: Don't break users' apps

A Linux kernel developer found himself in a perfect storm of Linus Torvalds' sharp tongue and his intolerance for bad code. Red Hat's Mauro Carvalho Chehab was told by Linux kernel chief Torvalds to "shut the f**k up" and fix his "approach to kernel programming" after Chehab passed off a bug in the kernel as something at fault …

Operating Systems 4 Jan 16:41
Ubisoft probes sudden rash of hijack attacks on gamers' accounts

'Maybe you should log in with FACEBOOK'

Ubisoft is investigating a recent spate of hijackings of gaming accounts belonging to users of its Uplay platform. Complaints about account hijacking flared up around 30 December, leading to numerous posts on support forums. "There is no one at Ubi manning the support system, and the DRM requires access to your account," one …

Games 4 Jan 17:18
IT sector bumped up jobs in the US in December

Computer design hot, chip making not so much

Economists had been worried that late October superstorm Hurricane Sandy, which didn't show an immediate effect on the employment situation in November, would wallop job creation in December. Because of this, they predicted, the Bureau of Labor Statistics might have to go back and revise its November figures downwards when the …

Jobs 4 Jan 18:02
Minicam movie pirate gets record-breaking five years in prison

IMAGiNE crew shares over 12 years in sentences

A member of the IMAGiNE piracy crew, which specialized in recording and distributing movies filmed in cinemas using camcorders, has received a five-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to copyright infringement. Jeramiah Perkins, 40, of Portsmouth, Virginia, is the second-to-last member of the team to be sentenced to …

Law 4 Jan 20:07
US Patent Office seeks public input on software patents' future

Roundtable discussions scheduled for February

The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has asked the software community to help advise it on how to properly handle software-related patents – a move that could represent the first steps toward software patent reform. The agency published its request for comments in the Federal Register on Thursday, explaining that it …

Policy 4 Jan 21:29
Cray misses revenue targets for Q4

Blue Waters super booked, but Titan still put through paces

Veteran supercomputer-maker Cray has warned Wall Street moneymen to expect lower-than-forecast results for its 2012 financial report. Cray has been absolutely clear that the multi-petaflopping "Blue Waters" and "Titan" supercomputers being installed respectively at the University of Illinois and Oak Ridge National Laboratory …

HPC 4 Jan 21:30
Anonymous turns private eye in Ohio rape case

Releases purloined data after hacking attack

A hacking attack by self-proclaimed members of Anonymous has uncovered highly disturbing data relating to a rape case in Steubenville, Ohio, that has garnered national attention. In August a 16-year-old girl was allegedly assaulted at a series of parties in the Ohio town. Numerous pictures, tweets, and videos were broadcast of …

Law 4 Jan 22:51
Where do old supercomputers go to die? New Mexico

Encanto heads to the academic chop shop and scrap heap

Moore's Law puts supercomputers out to pasture because power – not just the cost of electricity, but the availability of juice – is the biggest constraint at the big supercomputing centers. And sometimes the lack of budget helps lock the gate, and HPC cloud computing butchers the cow. That's the case with the massive 28-rack …

HPC 4 Jan 23:01