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IBM

Submission + - IBM Physicists Report New Breakthrough for Quantum Computing (ibtimes.com)

Submitted by markmark57
markmark57 writes: In the past seven weeks, IBM physicists using superconducting technology at temperatures around absolute zero have achieved computing at a coherent state, physicist Mark Ketchen said.
The experiment lasted for only a ten-thousandth of a second, the IBM researcher said. The attempt to achieve a quantum state was stable, or coherent, enough to suggest that if repeated and made to last longer, a working quantum computer could be made.
Canada

Submission + - SOPA on Steroids: Canadian Music Labels Declare War on the Internet (michaelgeist.ca)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The Canadian music industry is demanding SOPA on steriods for Canadian copyright law seeking reforms that would create liability risk for social networking sites, search engines, blogging platforms, video sites, and many other websites featuring third party contributions. If that were not enough, the industry is also calling for a new iPod tax, an extension in the term of copyright, a removal of protections for user generated content, parody, and satire, as well as an increase in statutory damage awards. Taken together, the music industry demands make SOPA look like some minor tinkering with the law.
Security

Submission + - Look Mom, I'm a Thespian: How to Use Acting Skills as a Social Engineer (ethicalhacker.net)

Submitted by ddonzal
ddonzal writes: Regular columnist for The Ethical Hacker Network, Chris Hadnagy of www.social-engineer.org, offers advice of how to be a better human hacker by utilizing tricks not found in normal tech books as he writes,"Social Engineering is a complex beast. It is not simply lying or telling someone a deceitful story to get them to give over their passwords. Social Engineering (SE) is defined, well at least by me, as any act that influences a person to take an action that may or may not be against their best interest. With that definition in mind there are many different principles that influence SE and the skills needed both physically and psychologically.

The concept behind this column is to provide the tools, techniques and direction to the readers that would like to either incorporate more SE into their current work or to become a full-time social engineer. I would like to take this month’s article to talk about at least one of the psychological principles involved in SE that should be considered foundational and required. It makes a huge difference in your ability to be successful."
Programming

Submission + - Stroustrup Reveals What's New in C++ 11 (infoworld.com)

Submitted by
snydeq
snydeq writes: "Bjarne Stroustrup discusses the latest version of C++, which, although not a major overhaul, offers many small upgrades to appeal to different areas of development. From the interview: 'I like the way move semantics will simplify the way we return large data structures from functions and improve the performance of standard-library types, such as string and vector. People in high-performance areas will appreciate the massive increase in the power of constant expressions (constexpr). Users of the standard library (and some GUI libraries) will probably find lambda expressions the most prominent feature. Everybody will use smaller new features, such as auto (deduce a variables type from its initializer) and the range-for loop, to simplify code.'"
Digital

Submission + - Arizona Law Would Require Disclaimers on Retouched Photos (azcentral.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: An Arizona state representative has proposed a law, H.B. 2793, that would ban digitally enhanced images in advertising without a disclaimer alerting consumers to fact that the image has been changed. Although the text of the bill targets all advertising images, proponents of the bill say it is aimed at unachievable or unhealthy depictions of women, which they claim negatively impacts the self image of young women. Photographer Mark Meyer has pointed out some of the folly in adding disclaimers to something as ubiquitous as digitally altered images in advertising.
Facebook

Submission + - Facebook Has 25 People Dedicated to Handling Gov Info Requests (forbes.com)

Submitted by nonprofiteer
nonprofiteer writes: A profile of Facebook's CSO reveals that his 70-person security team includes 25 people dedicated solely to handling information requests from law enforcement. They get thousands of calls and e-mails from authorities each week, though Facebook requires police to get a warrant for anything beyond a subscriber's name, email and IP address. CSO Joe Sullivan says that some gov agency tried to push Facebook to start collecting more information about their users for the benefit of authorities:

"Recently a government agency wanted us to start logging information we don’t log. We told them we wouldn’t start logging that piece of data because we don’t need it to provide a good product. We talked to our general counsel. The law is not black-and-white. That agency thinks they can compel us to. We told them to go to court. They haven’t done that yet.”
Science

Submission + - Faster-Than-Light Neutrino Update: Still Hope for Warp-Drive Fans? (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by sciencehabit
sciencehabit writes: The CERN particle physics laboratory in Geneva has confirmed Wednesday's report that a loose fiber-optic cable may be behind measurements that seemed to show neutrinos outpacing the speed of light. But the lab also says another glitch could have caused the experiment to underestimate the particles' speed. The other effect concerns an oscillator that gives its readings time stamps synchronized to GPS signals. Researchers think correcting for an error in this device would actually increase the anomaly in neutrino velocity, making the particles even speedier than the earlier measurements seemed to show.

Submission + - N. Korea's High-Tech Counterfeits (yahoo.com) 2

Submitted by ESRB
ESRB writes: N. Korea is apparently able to produce high-quality counterfeits of US dollars--specifically $100 and $50 bills. It's suspected that they possess similar printing technologies as the US and buy ink from the same Swedish firm. The article also advocates a move to all digital payment/transfers by pointing out both forms are only representations of value and noting it would cripple criminal operations such as drug cartels, human traffickers, and so forth.
Blackberry

Submission + - RIM Trying to Woo Customers With Porn, Gambling Apps? (cio.com)

Submitted by
AZA43
AZA43 writes: "Everybody knows that BlackBerry-maker RIM is hurting these days. But is it hurting enough to try to attract new customers with the promise of porn and/or gambling apps? A new rating system added to RIM's BlackBerry App World store suggests that it just may be that desperate. The new "Adult" rating covers, "graphic sexual content, graphic nudity," " graphic violence," and gambling apps "as permitted by law." And that suggests RIM will allow this kind of content into App World, in stark contrast to Apple's no-porn-on-the-iPhone stand."
Cellphones

Submission + - 3G vs. 4G: Difference Explained

Submitted by adeelarshad82
adeelarshad82 writes: Despite the fact that terms '3G' and '4G' are used relentlessly to sell phones and tablets; to an average consumer they are the most mysterious terms in the mobile technology dictionary. In an attempt to explain these, PCMag's mobile analyst sheds some light on the history of the technology, discusses some misconceptions and explains when to go for 4G and when to buy 3G phones.

Submission + - India blames American NGOs for nuclear protests (indiatimes.com)

Submitted by saiful76
saiful76 writes: "American NGOs fund the protests that hold India back from building the nuclear reactors it needs to meet fast-growing energy needs, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said in an interview published in Science magazine on Friday." It is just political stunt or there are vested interests against India becoming efficient in nuclear energy?
Businesses

Submission + - The Dark Side of Digital Distribution (podgamer.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Game journalist Stuart Campbell has written an incisive piece on how the digital distribution model users have grown to know and love over the past several years still has some major problems that go beyond even the DRM dilemma. He provides an example of an app developer using very shady update techniques to screw over people who have legitimately purchased their app. Touch Racing Nitro, a retro racing game, launched to moderate success. After tinkering with price points to get the game to show up on the top download charts, the developers finally made it free for a period of four months. 'Then the sting came along. About a week ago (at time of writing), the game received an "update," which came with just four words of description – "Now Touch Racing Free!" As the game was already free, users could have been forgiven for thinking this wasn't much of a change. But in fact, the app thousands of them had paid up to £5 for had effectively just been stolen. Two of the game's three racing modes were now locked away behind IAP paywalls, and the entire game was disfigured with ruinous in-game advertising, which required yet another payment to remove.'
The Internet

Submission + - "Unethical" HTML video copy protection proposal draws criticism from W3C (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by suraj.sun
suraj.sun writes: A new Web standard proposal authored by Google, Microsoft, and Netflix seeks to bring copy protection mechanisms to the Web. The Encrypted Media Extensions draft defines a framework for enabling the playback of protected media content in the Web browser. The proposal is controversial and has raised concern among some parties that are participating in the standards process.

In a discussion on the W3C HTML mailing list, critics questioned whether the proposed framework would really provide the level of security demanded by content providers. The aim of the proposal is not to mandate a complete DRM platform, but to provide the necessary components for a generic key-based content decryption system. It is designed to work with pluggable modules that implement the actual decryption mechanisms.

Ars Technica: http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2012/02/unethical-html-video-copy-protection-proposal-criticized-by-standards-stakeholders.ars
Linux

Submission + - 5 Best Free Linux Terminal Multiplexers (linuxlinks.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The nuts and bolts of Linux seem destined to be increasingly hidden away from the desktop user. The continuing development of popular desktop environments offering attractive interfaces and fancy features shows no sign of abatement.

Users that want to exploit the full power of the terminal may benefit from using a terminal multiplexer. This type of application can be considered to be a text version of a graphical window manager. It enables users to run multiple text programs simultaneously, as well as offering features that allow users to switch seamlessly between these programs in operation. Terminal multiplexers also allow multiple computers to make simultaneous connections.

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