DeeQ - Slashdot User

Submission + - Google Toolbar users warned of phishing hack (pcadvisor.co.uk)

Submitted by Clown of the Month on Wednesday December 19, 2007 @04:44AM

Clown of the Month writes: A bug in the Google Toolbar could allow criminals to steal data or install malicious software on PCs, a security researcher claims.

Submission + - Wiimote as multi-touch display controller (gearlog.com)

Submitted by Tmack on Wednesday December 19, 2007 @02:22AM

Tmack writes: While hard-hacks with the Wiimote is somewhat Old News, this particular implementation is quite interesting. Using the infrared camera on the 'mote, pens with LED's instead of ink, and an LCD projector, Johnny Chung Lee of Carnegie Mellon University has created some software to use them as a cheap (relatively speaking) multi-touch display. Any surface you can project onto becomes an interactive multi-touch display, as demonstrated in the video in the page linked above. He has the software available for download from his website, along with some other neat projects.

Submission + - Nanowires boost laptop battery life to 20 hours

Submitted by brianmed on Wednesday December 19, 2007 @12:16AM

brianmed writes: Stanford researchers have found a way to use silicon nanowires to reinvent the rechargeable lithium-ion batteries that power laptops, cell phones, MP3 players and other portable devices. The new version, developed through research led by Yi Cui, assistant professor of materials science and engineering, produces up to 10 times the amount of electricity of existing lithium-ion batteries.

Submission + - Judge rules TorrentSpy destroyed evidence (arstechnica.com) 2

Submitted by

Come play kdice

on Wednesday December 19, 2007 @12:09AM

Come play kdice writes: "A federal judge has handed the MPAA a resounding victory in its copyright infringement lawsuit against TorrentSpy. Judge Florence-Marie Cooper entered a default judgment against Justin Bunnell and the rest of named defendants in Columbia Pictures et al. v. Justin Bunnell et al. after finding that TorrentSpy "engaged in widespread and systematic efforts to destroy evidence" and lying under oath about said destruction. After being sued, TorrentSpy mounted a vigorous defense, including a countersuit it filed against the MPAA in May 2006, but, behind the scenes, the court documents paint a picture of a company desperately trying to bury any and all incriminating evidence. TorrentSpy has announced its intention to appeal, but its conduct makes a reversal unlikely."

Submission + - TorrentSpy loses Calif. copyright lawsuit (news.com) 1

Submitted by

mytrip

on Tuesday December 18, 2007 @06:02PM

mytrip writes: "A federal judge has ruled against the BitTorrent indexing service TorrentSpy.com saying that its hiding and destruction of evidence made a fair trial impossible.

A Los Angeles court agreed with the Motion Picture Association of America's attorneys that the extraordinarily harsh sanction of terminating the case was necessary because TorrentSpy operators' actions impacted the ability for the movie studios to prove its case.

"The court finds that plaintiffs have suffered prejudice, to the extent that a rightful decision is not possible," the ruling said.

"Defendants' conduct during discovery in this case has been obstreperous," the court concluded. "They have engaged in widespread and systematic efforts to destroy evidence and have provided false testimony under oath in an effort to hide evidence of such destruction."

TorrentSpy operators intentionally modified or deleted directory headings naming copyrighted titles and forum posts that explained how to find specific copyrighted works; concealed IP addresses of users; and withheld the names and addresses of forum moderators, the court found. They had earlier been fined $30,000 for violations of discovery orders and were warned of severe sanctions if they continued to ignore the orders.

The court's decision is a "significant victory for the major Hollywood studios," John Malcolm, executive vice president and director of worldwide antipiracy operations for the Motion Picture Association of America, said in a statement. Illegal copying and bootlegging costs the industry $11 billion globally, according to the MPAA."

Submission + - MS bundles broken random number tool in Vista SP1 (theregister.co.uk)

Submitted by DeeQ on Tuesday December 18, 2007 @08:46AM

DeeQ writes: Microsoft plans to bundle a cryptographically flawed pseudo random number generator in its upcoming service pack for Windows Vista.

The cryptographically weak Dual_EC_DRBG approach, which is based on the mathematics of elliptic curves, was one of four "deterministic random bit generators", approved by the NIST in March.

Flaws in the approach (Dual_EC_DRBG) first emerged in August at the Crypto 2007 conference when cryptographers Dan Shumow and Niels Ferguson demonstrated that two constants in the standard used to define the algorithm's elliptic curve have a relationship with a second, secret set of numbers.

Anyone who had access to the second set of numbers would have a kind of skeleton key able to unlock any instance of Dual_EC_DRBG. Suspicions that this weakness might be used as a backdoor have been fueled by the NSA's support of Dual_EC_DRBG in the standards-setting process.

Random number generators are important because the correct operation of SSL and other protocols relies on their randomness.Crypto guru Bruce Schneier, who previously described the weakness as a backdoor, notes that the Dual_EC_DRBG approach will be implemented in Windows Vista SP1.

Submission + - Wave power goes commercial in California (news.com)

Submitted by

Josh Fink

on Tuesday December 18, 2007 @08:08AM

Josh Fink writes: "The folks over at news.com have an interesting piece on wave power. Pacific Gas & Electric is planning on building a wave farm 2.5 miles off the coast of California's Humboldt County. The deal is with Finavera Renewables, and will produce 2 megawatts of power. Not enough to run your DeLorean, but it is still something. The article also reports that if everything goes according to plan and the initiative succeeds, Finavera will increase the electric production to 100 megawatts. The plant will begin producing power in 2012 and has the potential to reduce CO emitions by 245 tons each year."

Submission + - Two Laptops Per Child: A New Commercial Concept (osweekly.com)

Submitted by

tobs

on Tuesday December 18, 2007 @04:33AM

tobs writes: "According to an OSWeekly.com article, OLPC is fostering a new industry — commercial, low-cost notebook computers. The article states, "This notebook seems to capture what most people are using them for — browsing the Internet and communication. However, it only has a couple of gigabytes of storage just enough for most people to get all that excited about. I tend to question the value here, especially considering the payment put forth is not refundable. So, is this to be the future of Linux notebooks? I doubt it. I see this as more of a solution in rural areas of the world. With that said, perhaps there is a market for a 'kids notebook' in first world countries, but only time will tell."

Submission + - Is Ubuntu playing trademark policy games? (classhelper.org) 7

Submitted by

palegray.net

on Tuesday December 18, 2007 @12:02AM

palegray.net writes: "The subject could just as easily be stated "Does Ubuntu understand its own trademark policy?" or alternately "Does Ubuntu really want community support and involvement?" I thought so a week ago. If you're interested in the full write-up of the whole affair, check this page. It contains copies of all the emails I sent to Ubuntu's "trademarks" email address regarding this matter, along with copies of the replies I received.

First, a little bit of background on myself and how this situation started. I'm a pretty big nerd, and I mean that in more than just your general "loves computers and programming Linux applications" sense. I also happen to enjoy puzzles of all types, word games, and kite building. Yes, kite building, especially miniature kites that can be flown in very light winds (or even indoors, in some cases).

I decided it might be a good idea to offer some small kites for sale that were decorated with various open source and Linux themed logos. Given the amount of support the Ubuntu project gives to education, especially considering their focus on education through the Edubuntu project, I thought their logo would look nice on small kites designed for Linux enthusiasts and school-age children. The way I see it, the more kids are exposed to operating systems like Ubuntu, and the less they're forced to use Microsoft products, the better off we all are in the long run. Who knows, maybe a simple kite might spark some kid's curiosity...

So I decided to do the right and proper thing by asking for permission to use the Ubuntu logo on small kites. After a few email exchanges with the folks at Ubuntu, my request was flatly denied with no commentary on my stated interpretation of their trademark policy and the procedure one should use for requesting licensed use of their logos.

What does the Slashdot community think of this? I offered to contribute a percentage of any revenue generated from the kites to the Ubuntu (or Edubuntu, whichever they prefer) project, but received no acknowledgment of that offer. What gives?"

Submission + - Browser Based Hacking MMO (hackwars.net)

Submitted by

bcoe

on Monday December 17, 2007 @07:56AM

bcoe writes: "http://www.hackwars.net/about.php This intriguing new MMO Game uses programming as a play mechanic. Level-up, to gain new API calls, which can apparently be used to hack your opponents more effectively. The programming of scripts is done in a C style syntax, looks as slick as it is nerdy."

Submission + - EU, US Strike a Deal Over Internet Gambling Ban (techluver.com)

Submitted by

Tech.Luver

on Monday December 17, 2007 @07:26AM

Tech.Luver writes: "The European Commission, in a blow to European online gaming companies, on Monday struck a deal for compensation from the United States over a US decision to close its gambling markets to foreign operators. The EU and US agreed on a compensation package to be offered by the US in response to its withdrawal in WTO of GATS commitments on gambling and betting services, including on-line gambling. A bilateral agreement was signed in Geneva, which provides EU service suppliers with new trade opportunities in the US postal and courier, research and development, storage and warehouse sectors. ( http://techluver.com/2007/12/17/us-european-union-strike-compensation-deal-over-online-gambling-ban/ )"

Submission + - The 'malware economy' evolves (zdnet.co.uk)

Submitted by

superglaze

on Friday December 14, 2007 @12:04PM

superglaze writes: "ZDNet UK has a feature on how the malware economy is turning into a recognisable traditional IT economy. Leasing botnets? Malware support? Welcome to the new age of computing. As the piece suggests, it's all gone Darwinian."

Google's OpenSocial Too Late To Be a Win? 82

Posted by Zonk on Friday December 14, 2007 @10:44AM from the a-nice-way-to-have-a-chat dept.

DeeQ writes with a link to a post on News.com's social networking blog. Author Caroline McCarthy wonders if Google's OpenSocial initiative has missed its moment in the sun. It's been something like six weeks now since the search giant offered up its open-source social media initiative ... but where have been the usual swift victories? Moreover, OpenSocial isn't done yet, and it's not expected until sometime next year. In the meantime Facebook is capitalizing on Google's delay, and other networks are stepping in as well. "Kraus adds that some of the independent platform strategies would be necessary even if OpenSocial were finalized. One of them is LinkedIn's 'InApps,' which also aims to spread LinkedIn's data and influence outside the business-oriented social network through partnerships with other Web sites. 'OpenSocial so far is really about how developers embed their application into a social network,' Kraus explained. 'A good chunk of LinkedIn's APIs is about how LinkedIn extends their social-networking data into other sites.'"

Submission + - Internet, Open Source in the Third World (wordpress.com)

Submitted by

sanay

on Friday December 14, 2007 @09:11AM

sanay writes: "This article represents the general aspect of the internet services provided in 3rd world countries like Nepal and also gives general information of Nepal. It highlights how international internet bandwidth gets relayed via satellites to third world countries and how open source softwares like Linux/Unix, FreeRadius, Apache, Squid, Bind, HTB, etc, are playing a big part in bringing the internet content to the rest of the population. The high price of international bandwidth using Satellites and it's negative performance due to high altitudes are also reviewed and how a third world country like Nepal is trying to improve them. It also looks at how the Internet and the World Wide Web can play a very useful role in shaping the future of these third world countries."

Submission + - That Which We Call Free (z505.com)

Submitted by

L505

on Friday December 14, 2007 @09:07AM

L505 writes: "GNU and FSF (Free Software Foundation) founder Richard Stallman posted a message on OpenBSD mailing lists. The subject was "real men don't attack straw men", and the email suggested that some of his comments were being misrepresented. He says, "one question particularly relevant for this list is why I don't recommend OpenBSD. It is not about what the system allows. (Any general purpose system allows doing anything at all.) It is about what the system suggests to the user." He also said that he knew of no non-free software included in the base OpenBSD system, but claimed there was non-free software in the ports collection, "if a collection of software contains (or suggests installation of) some non-free program, I do not recommend it." http://kerneltrap.org/OpenBSD/That_Which_We_Call_Free"

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