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Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft (probably) didn't just buy Unix (itworld.com)

Submitted by jfruhlinger
jfruhlinger writes: Word came down this morning that, when Attachmate bought Novell, certain intellectual property rights were sold to a Microsoft-led consortium as part of the deal. Since Unix is the most valuable piece of IP Novell owns, there was a certain amount of panic that suddenly Redmond is in charge of this foundational technology for Linux and a number of other open source projects. But, while MS is being cagey, Brian Proffitt doubts that Unix was part of the IP package that was sold — and believes that Linux would be safe even if it were.

Submission + - Google Killed my Business

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Hello,
My name is Cris Mitchell and i'm the publisher of an educational website for Photographers called ProPhotoResource.com, We currently have over 12k photographer members across the globe.

This weekend it was brought to our attention that the google bots had detected some javascript on our site that had been exploited by a hacker and was said to contain malicious software, at which point Google took a broadstroke action to temporarily blacklist our site, circumventing our homepage with a with a REPORTED ATTACK PAGE GRAPHIC. In our haste to bring the site back into the good graces of the mighty google, we removed every bit of supposedly malicious code and patched the software that was causing the problem. Google search results for ProPhotoResource.com also claim the same thing. We were only notified by Google after they took such actions.

As mentioned above, ProPhotoResource.com was scrubbed and cleaned of any offending code within minutes of the notification and we have now been waiting over two days for a review of the site to restore our name and get us back online.

While some might feel that Google are doing internet citizens a service, in actuality they are killing small businesses just like mine in the process. We have spent over 5 years building good will on the internet which has now been completely obliterated by a simple 'fully automated' process, with no throat to choke when the process breaks.

What is most infuriating with this matter is that it only took Google seconds to disrupt my site, but who know's how long to restore it. There are no published reinstatement times listed on their site that we could find. Some folks report the process taking up to 4 weeks to complete the review. Judge, jury and executioner will be played by a 'fully automated' script. No SLA, no license agreement, and nobody to call to explain the situation.

While some members and Twitter followers of @CrisMitchell claim that google has not taken us OFFLINE because you can still reach the site by choosing to ignore the warning or by using another browser such as Internet Explorer, this is only partially true because ignoring the warning breaks the CSS and all the links in the site. Our records also indicate only 16% of our visitors are using the Internet Explorer browser. To us this is the equivalent of standing on the street corner and saying "Kiss me it's just a Cold Sore" It's just not gonna happen.

While we completely understand the severity of the situation at the same time there are no published contact numbers on the google website of who to contact to expedite this matter,in the mean time we are losing existing and potentially new members to our site.

Over the weekend we have received an outpouring of support and sympathy from other small business owners who have gone through the same issue, many who did not have the resources to recover and had to shut down their websites.

If you feel this is a newsworthy story, I welcome the opportunity to speak with you further about our situation.

In the interim, I thank your for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,
Cris Mitchell
Publisher
ProPhotoResource.com

Submission + - Feds bust GM hybrid car tech theft to China scheme (networkworld.com)

Submitted by coondoggie
coondoggie writes: An FBI investigation has lead a Michigan couple to be charged with stealing hybrid car information from GM to use in a Chinese auto outfit. A federal indictment charged Yu Qin, aka Yu Chin, 49, and his wife, Shanshan Du, aka Shannon Du, 51, of Troy, Michigan with conspiracy to possess trade secrets without authorization, unauthorized possession of trade secrets, and wire fraud. One of the individuals was also charged with obstruction of justice, said Barbara McQuade, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan in a statement. GM estimates that the value of the stolen documents is over $40 million.
Security

Submission + - "horrendous flaw" found in popular forum software (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by katarn
katarn writes: A simple hack to vBulletin software allows even unskilled people easy access the main administrator username and password. Internet Brands, owner of vBulletin software, has released a fix, but many sites remain vulnerable. Many notable firms use vBulletin software, and this bug could be used to compromise the email addresses and other personal information of thousands of people.

Submission + - Fibers that can hear and sing (kurzweilai.net)

Submitted by apsec112
apsec112 writes: Fibers that can detect and produce sound have been developed by scientists at MIT’s Research Lab of Electronics. The heart of the new acoustic fibers is a plastic commonly used in microphones. The asymmetry of the molecules is what makes the plastic “piezoelectric,” meaning that it changes shape when an electric field is applied to it. The same mechanism that allows piezoelectric devices to translate electricity into motion can work in reverse, generating electricity. Applications could include wearable microphones, biological sensors, and large-area sonar imaging systems with much higher resolutions.
Censorship

Submission + - China censor software team verging on collapse (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by katarn
katarn writes: Apparently domestic and international pressure, security vulnerabilities, and a 2.2Bn lawsuit over alleged stolen code have taken their toll on China's Green Dam software censorship program. Green Dam is a separate program from the "Great Firewall of China", which remains firmly in place. According to Green Dam program partners, funding for the project has not been renewed. The project development team has been shut down and the installation and aftercare team is facing closure. Unsurprisingly there has been no official comment from official Chinese authorities.
Media

Submission + - Court Rules Against Resale on Copyright Works (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by eldavojohn
eldavojohn writes: Ars has some very interesting developments from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in regards to "first sale" doctrine. It appears that in order to resell a copyrighted item — even an item with a logo — you should have to track down the original distributor of said item to be given consent to resell it. Of course, the EFF and other cried outrage and stepped in to change this sort of outlandish thinking but if it remains it could be the end of used books, games, music, movies, etc.
Security

Submission + - Cisco warns attendees that its database was hacked (networkworld.com)

Submitted by Julie188
Julie188 writes: Thousands of people got a nasty e-mail this morning from Cisco. The company was warning people that its attendee registration database for its Cisco Live 2010 event was hacked. Cisco Live 2010 is the company's annual user conference, held last week in Las Vegas with an estimated 18,000 in attendance. If it's not embarrassing enough for a company that sells security gear to get hacked, the e-mail also went out to people who didn't register and didn't attend the event. That raises questions about exactly what database was pried open and how bad the damage is. Cisco's e-mail said the hole was quickly closed and only business-card type information was exposed.
United States

Submission + - Grove Says Startups Aren't Answer to Job Creation

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens
Hugh Pickens writes: "Andy Grove, co-founder and former CEO of Intel, writes in Bloomberg that the idea that high tech startups are the key to job creation in the United States is mistaken and explains why the great Silicon Valley innovation machine hasn’t been creating many jobs lately. According to Grove startups are a wonderful thing, but as much as Americans love the idea of two guys in the garage inventing something that changes the world, startups cannot by themselves increase tech employment. "Equally important is what comes after that mythical moment of creation in the garage, as technology goes from prototype to mass production," writes Grove. "This is the phase where companies scale up. They work out design details, figure out how to make things affordably, build factories, and hire people by the thousands. Scaling is hard work but necessary to make innovation matter." Grove says that the US has forgotten that scaling was crucial to its economic future and that abandoning “commodity” manufacturing like tv sets, lithium-ion batteries, and memory chips to foreign manufacturers have locked the US out of tomorrow’s emerging industries. The solution says Grove is to levy an extra tax on the products of offshored labor and develop a system of financial incentives including a "Scaling Bank" that would make funds available to companies that will scale their American operations. "Such a system would be a daily reminder that while pursuing our company goals, all of us in business have a responsibility to maintain the industrial base on which we depend and the society whose adaptability — and stability — we may have taken for granted. ""
Mozilla

Submission + - How to Lock Down Firefox for Good (threatpost.com)

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: Firefox has gained a lot of ground on Internet Explorer in the last few years, thanks largely to its reputation as a more secure browser. But Firefox has more than its share of security and privacy issues, as well. Settings change all the time, and new versions break things constantly. So how do you lock the browser down without being a security expert? Here's a quick guide, developed with US-CERT, to locking down Firefox for secure surfing.
Security

Submission + - Hack Exposes Pirate Bay User Data (krebsonsecurity.com)

Submitted by tsu doh nimh
tsu doh nimh writes: Hackers from Argentina recently broke into the database for thepiratebay.org, the Internet's largest torrent search engine, exposing user names, Internet addresses, and (MD5) hashed password data on more than 4 million users, according to Brian Krebs. He interviewed the leader of the group, which is also marketing a new browser exploit kit called "Impassioned Framework," as saying they briefly considered what the information would be worth to the RIAA and MPAA, before going public with the breach. From the story: "Probably these groups would be very interested in this information, but we are not [trying] to sell it,” Russo told KrebsOnSecurity.com in a phone interview. “Instead we wanted to tell people that their information may not be so well protected.”
Security

Submission + - Hotels the industry leader in credit card theft. (nytimes.com)

Submitted by katarn
katarn writes: A study released this year found that 38 percent of the credit card hacking cases last year involved the hotel industry. At hotels with inadequate data security, the greatest amount of credit card information can be obtained using the most simplified methods. It doesn’t require brilliance on the part of the hacker. Most of the chronic security breaches in the hotel industry are the result of a failure to equip, or to properly store or transmit this kind of data, and that starts with the point-of-sale credit card swiping systems.
Software

Submission + - Security hole in software used for school spying (wired.com)

Submitted by katarn
katarn writes: In yet another wrinkle in the case of the Pennsylvania school district accused of spying on students through their laptops, the software used by the school district has been demonstrated to have security vulnerabilities which could completely compromise any computer running the software. I can only guess the furor around incident has gained attention from security experts which wouldn't have ordinarily been received. Perhaps all publicity really isn't good publicity after all.

This story has been covered on Slashdot numerous times, as different aspects have been uncovered:
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/02/18/1846222/PA-School-Spied-On-Students-Via-School-Issued-Laptop-Webcams
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/02/20/1445216/FBI-Probing-PA-School-Webcam-Spy-Case
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/02/21/2010213/PA-School-Defends-Web-Cam-Spying-As-Security-Measure-Denies-Misuse?from=rss
Security

Submission + - Hacker attacks disable cars (bbc.co.uk) 1

Submitted by katarn
katarn writes: In what probably isn't a great shock to us, main stream media realizes modern automobiles can be hacked in many ways. More of interest though, they were even able to disable the brakes (assumedly this was on a car with anti-lock breaks). Refreshingly, the article isn't fear mongering, and states "Cars benefit from the fact that they are (hopefully) not connected to the internet (yet) and currently are not able to be remotely accessed". One can only hope (perhaps in vain) that as cars become more connected they would be designed so that the electronics could not override the brakes. Of course once you have physical there are many ways an auto can be damaged or disabled even without being an electronics cracker. In my mind this type of attack could be much subtler and harder to detect; instead of physically cutting a brake line, the brakes could be programmed to only fail when needed the most, such as when anti-lock would normally be activated.
detect; instead of physically cutting a brake line, the brakes could be programmed to only fail when needed the most, such as when anti-lock would normally be activated.

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