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Submission + - Control Your Apps Without Your Finger

Submitted by VincenzoRomano
VincenzoRomano writes: There's a nice article about a new approach to human interaction to your mobile phone (and maybe your other computers),
Basically you won't need to swipe your fingers over smallish touch screens.
You'll move your arms, hands and fingers (or whatever else applies) in the air or will shake the handset.
The phone camera(s), the G-sensor, the compass and so on will be used by a software to understand the gestures and to translate them into control commands.
This breakthrough comes from a company called GestureTek, a non-startup company in this field.
The idea seems to be brilliant, but a number of issues are just behind the corner, like privacy and politeness in crowded places.
Science

Submission + - Should Dolphins Be Treated As 'Non-Human Persons'? (physorg.com) 3

Submitted by krou
krou writes: Should dolphins be treated as 'non-human persons'? Behavioural studies indicate dolphins think of the future, have self-awareness, and distinct personalities, complex social structures 'with individuals co-operating to solve difficult problems or to round up shoals of fish to eat, and with new behaviors being passed from one dolphin to another'. This and more has led two scientists, zoologist Lori Marino and Diana Reiss, professor of psychology at the City University of New York, to claim that this understanding of dolphins may 'mean it [is not] ethical to keep dolphins in aquatic amusement parks for our entertainment, or to kill them for food'. Thomas White, professor of ethics and business at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, has gone so far as to claim that dolphins should be treated as "non-human persons". Would /.'ers agree? What are the implications of such a move?

Submission + - Researcher Exposes Google's Spyware Connections

Submitted by Task Heavy
Task Heavy writes: A prominent anti-spyware researcher is calling on Google to sever its ties with an advertising partner that covers popular sites with pop-up PPC advertisements promoting those same sites. According to Ben Edelman, an assistant professor at the Harvard Business School and a staunch anti-spyware advocate, Google is charging advertisers for what he described as "conversion-inflation" traffic from the WhenU spyware program.

Submission + - Discovery To Launch First 3D TV Network In U.S. (discovery.com) 1

Submitted by Deathsoldier11
Deathsoldier11 writes: Three of the world's leading media, technology and entertainment companies — Discovery Communications, Sony Corporation and IMAX Corporation — today announced a joint venture established to develop the first 24/7 dedicated 3D television network in the U.S. The partnership brings together three leaders with an extraordinary collection of award-winning 3D content, technology expertise, television distribution and operational strength to deliver a high-quality three-dimensional viewing experience to home television audiences. The joint venture intends to launch the network beginning in the U.S.
Security

Submission + - Hackers Buying Own Data Centers for Botnets (threatpost.com) 3

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: The malware writers and criminals who run botnets for years have been using shared hosting platforms and so-called bulletproof hosting providers as bases of operations for their online crimes. But, as law enforcement agencies and security experts have moved to take these providers offline, the criminals have taken the next step and begun setting up their own virtual data centers. "It's gotten completely out of hand. The bad guys are going to some local registries in Europe and getting massive amounts of IP space and then they just go to a hosting provider and set up their won data centers," said Alex Lanstein, senior security researcher at FireEye, an antimalware and anti-botnet vendor. "It takes one more level out of it: You own your own IP space and you're your own ISP at that point."

Submission + - Online Drug Traffic and Registrar Policy (circleid.com)

Submitted by
Pigskin-Referee
Pigskin-Referee writes: "Policy Change at Godaddy

One line, 14 words may signal the beginning of the end for pill spammers in
the U.S. and elsewhere. Last week we witnessed the modification of Godaddys
Terms of Use(TOS) to include a specific prohibition against sites selling
drugs without a prescription. This is the first such policy we are aware of
and may soon become normal policy at U.S. Registrars and possibly all
Registrars. This is clearly the result of constant pressure from KnujOn and
other groups. Godaddy is following through with its policy by dumping
hundreds of core illegal pharmacy sites and the spammers are already
complaining in their underground forums."
Lord of the Rings

Submission + - Lord of the Rings Blu-Ray Release Date Set (pastemagazine.com)

Submitted by MrWa
MrWa writes: It's finally coming: the original theatrical version of The Lord the Rings will be released on Blu-Ray in April. The nine disc set will include all three movies and retail for near $100! Cue complaints about not releasing director's cut version in three, two, one...

Comment Re:I love this joke (Score 2, Funny) 379

by jggimi (#30431874) Attached to: French Military Contributes To Thunderbird 3
In the Great War, new technologies in small arms was brought to the field: The American Springfield, the British Enfield, the French Lebel, and the German Mauser. Many of these arms, and the internal technologies and engineering used, were seminal. One can find arms made today with designs that are rooted directly in features from some of these weapons.

Among collectors of WWI memorabilia, it is generally considered that the Springfield is the superior target rifle, the Mauser the superior hunting rifle, the Enfield the superior battle rifle, and the Lebel the superior lamp stand.
Spam

Submission + - The Coming Spam Pandemic (threatpost.com)

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: Many spammers now have large staffs of people working on nothing but building out completely fake personas for non-existent users on social networking sites and blog networks. The spammers use these personas to create accounts on Twitter, Facebook, Blogspot and other sites that have high levels of user interaction. But these are not the easily identifiable spambots and fake profiles that have been cluttering these sites from the beginning. Instead, the personas have all of the attributes that one would expect in a real user, such as clearly defined interests, specific geographic locations, favorite bands and movies. "Their goal is to be right down the middle, not too high or too low on the radar," said Robert Hansen, a security researcher who discussed the new tactics during a webinar Wednesday put on by Black Hat and Dark Reading. Hansen, who has spoken with some of the spammers using these techniques, said that they can create as many as 500,000 to a million new personas in a single day.
Security

Submission + - Hackers Find Home in Amazon EC2 Cloud (infoworld.com)

Submitted by snydeq
snydeq writes: Security researchers have spotted the Zeus botnet running an unauthorized command and control center on Amazon's EC2 cloud computing infrastructure. This marks the first time Amazon Web Services' cloud infrastructure has been used for this type of illegal activity, according to threat researcher Don DeBolt. The hackers got onto Amazon's infrastructure by hacking into a Web site hosted on Amazon's servers and then secretly installing their command and control infrastructure.
Cellphones

Submission + - Cell phones don't increase chances of brain cancer (smh.com.au)

Submitted by mclearn
mclearn writes: A very large, 30-year study of just about everyone in Scandinavia shows no link between mobile phone use and brain tumours, researchers reported on Thursday. Even though mobile telephone use soared in the 1990s and afterward, brain tumours did not become any more common during this time, the researchers reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Some activist groups and a few researchers have raised concerns about a link between mobile phones and several kinds of cancer, including brain tumours, although years of research have failed to establish a connection.

"From 1974 to 2003, the incidence rate of glioma (a type of brain tumor) increased by 0.5 per cent per year among men and by 0.2 per cent per year among women," they wrote. Overall, there was no significant pattern.
Idle

Submission + - Play with LEGOs, get arrested by SWAT team (jeremybell.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: 6 SWAT, 2 uniformed officers, 2 undercover, a chopper in the air, surrounding streets blocked off with five cop cars, two ambulances and a dozen cops. That's what it takes to stop a man packing LEGOs. Jeremy bought himself one of these, someone saw him playing with it in the office and the rest is history.

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