Submission + - Microsoft contributes code to Samba under GPL (itwire.com)
An anonymous reader writes: It looks like pigs will finally fly. Microsoft has contributed code to the Samba project — under the terms of the GPLv2 or later.
Submission + - Spanish Firm Wins Tablet Case Against Apple (blogspot.com)
pmontra writes: A Spanish company has won a legal case against Apple and will be able to sell an Android tablet that Apple had claimed infringes on the iPad patent. It is now seeking damages from Apple for a temporary seizure of its products by Spanish customs. Furthermore they are pursuing an antitrust complaint against Apple, alleging abusive anticompetitive behavior.
Submission + - Apple Lawyers Threaten Luxembourg Bistro (itworld.com)
itwbennett writes: "In today's edition of David v. Goliath, Apple lawyers have sent cease and desist letters to a tiny health food restaurant in Luxembourg named AppleADay. For their part, the owners of AppleADay, with help from a lawerly friend, have promised that they would continue to sell only food, not computers. Of course, Apple knows as well as anyone that promises are made to be broken, having famously promised Apple Corps, the Beatles' production company, they would never get into the music business."
Submission + - Klout.com CEO Responds to Critics, Death Threats (foxnews.com) 1
Velcroman1 writes: Over 100 million users rely on Klout.com to measure their social media influence — the site defines people by a single number: 1 represents the least influential, 100 the most influential. The website calculates your Klout score based on true reach, how many people you influence, amplification, how much you influence them, and network impact, the full influence of your network. Scientists then jam all that information in an algorithm to create your ever-changing, sometimes frustrating, Klout score.
And the Web is up in arms over recent changes to the algorithm that determines it, including an #occupyklout Twitter protest movement. “http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/community/2011/11/03/klout-ceo-fernandez-responds-to-critics-gives-tips-and-talks-future/">I got everything short of death threats,” CEO Joe Fernandez said recently.
And the Web is up in arms over recent changes to the algorithm that determines it, including an #occupyklout Twitter protest movement. “http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/community/2011/11/03/klout-ceo-fernandez-responds-to-critics-gives-tips-and-talks-future/">I got everything short of death threats,” CEO Joe Fernandez said recently.
Submission + - The Queen sets a code-breaking challenge (i-programmer.info)
mikejuk writes: Queen Elizabeth II has made her first ever visit to Bletchley Park, the home of the UK's World War II code-breaking efforts and now a museum. To mark the occasion The Queen has issued a code cracking challenge of her own "The Agent X Code Book Challenge" aimed at getting children interested in cryptography. Perhaps a royal programming or general technology challenge is next....
Submission + - Cheap GPUs Rendering Strong Passwords Useless (zdnet.com) 1
StrongGlad writes: Think that your eight-character password consisting of lowercase characters, uppercase characters and a sprinkling of numbers is strong enough to protect you from a brute force attack? Think again! The modern GPU can be leveraged as a powerful tool against passwords once considered safe from bruteforce attack.
Take a cheap GPU (like the Radeon HD 5770) and the free GPU-powered password busting tool called 'ighashgpu' and you have yourself a lean, mean password busting machine. How lean and mean? Working against NTLM login passwords, a password of "fjR8n" can be broken on the CPU in 24 seconds, at a rate of 9.8 million password guesses per second. On the GPU, it takes less than a second at a rate of 3.3 billion passwords per second. Increase the password to 6 characters (pYDbL6), and the CPU takes 1 hour 30 minutes versus only four seconds on the GPU. Go further to 7 characters (fh0GH5h), and the CPU would grind along for 4 days, versus a frankly worrying 17 minutes 30 seconds for the GPU.
Take a cheap GPU (like the Radeon HD 5770) and the free GPU-powered password busting tool called 'ighashgpu' and you have yourself a lean, mean password busting machine. How lean and mean? Working against NTLM login passwords, a password of "fjR8n" can be broken on the CPU in 24 seconds, at a rate of 9.8 million password guesses per second. On the GPU, it takes less than a second at a rate of 3.3 billion passwords per second. Increase the password to 6 characters (pYDbL6), and the CPU takes 1 hour 30 minutes versus only four seconds on the GPU. Go further to 7 characters (fh0GH5h), and the CPU would grind along for 4 days, versus a frankly worrying 17 minutes 30 seconds for the GPU.
Submission + - Pranksters Post Giant Windows Logo on Apple Store 1
theodp writes: Working calmly in broad daylight and filming their efforts for YouTube posterity, a fake construction crew attached a large Microsoft Windows logo to the black facade of a soon-to-open Hamburg Apple Store. Neat hack in the MIT vein, but next time the crew might want to take along a pic of the Windows logo — with the adrenaline flowing, some of the colors got rearranged and were hung upside down.
Submission + - Google Translate API rescued - but at a price! (i-programmer.info)
mikejuk writes: article thumbnail
Google has responded to the cries of anguish from developers unhappy at the termination of the Google Translate API with a surprisingly foresighted and generous offer — you can have the Translate API but you will have to pay for it!
Google has responded to the cries of anguish from developers unhappy at the termination of the Google Translate API with a surprisingly foresighted and generous offer — you can have the Translate API but you will have to pay for it!
Submission + - US agents illegally operating in Sweden (thelocal.se)
metacell writes: Sweden's intelligence service Säpo discovered in 2009 that two Americans were conducting illegal, under-cover investigations in Sweden., the Svenska Dagbladet (SvD) daily reported.
The two men were discovered when Säpo noticed them tracking people who it was also investigating for suspected ties to terrorist groups, the paper said, quoting several unnamed sources close to Säpo.
Washington had not informed Swedish authorities of the agents' activities in the country, and soon after their activities were discovered, the two US citizens left the country, the paper added.
The two men were discovered when Säpo noticed them tracking people who it was also investigating for suspected ties to terrorist groups, the paper said, quoting several unnamed sources close to Säpo.
Washington had not informed Swedish authorities of the agents' activities in the country, and soon after their activities were discovered, the two US citizens left the country, the paper added.
Submission + - NVIDIA CEO: WHY ANDROID TABLETS AREN'T SELLING (blogspot.com) 1
martty writes: "Nvidia's CEO is not pleased with the cool reception Android tablets have gotten so far. And he expressed frustration over marketing gaffes in an interview with CNET earlier this week. Sales of the first Android Honeycomb tablet, the Motorola Xoom, have not been impressive when compared with those of the iPad. Though Motorola claimed in late April that Xoom shipments hit 250,000, that number is far lower than the total being enjoyed by market leader Apple, which sold about 1 million iPad 2 tablets in the first weekend of sales alone.During an earnings conference call, Sanjay Jha, CEO of Motorola Mobility, articulated part of the problem, saying, "Consumers want more apps for Android tablets."
Submission + - Facebook PR Firm Edited Its Own Wikipedia Page (shitplanet.org)
metasonix writes: In the midst of all this week's flap about Facebook hiring notorious PR firm Burson-Marsteller to defame Google, I discovered something else: a Burson-Marsteller employee completely rewrote the firm's Wikipedia article to remove all the negative information. He did it openly, he violated a number of Wikipedia internal policies, another Wikipedia editor helped him, and no one was the wiser.
Submission + - Amazon Servers Used in Sony Playstation Hack (yahoo.com)
the simurgh writes: "Amazon servers may have been used to carry out the massive Playstation hack that compromised the personal information of more than 100 million Playstation Network users. According to a report from Bloomberg, sources close to the ongoing investigation say the attack was mounted from Amazon Web Service's cloud computing platform."
Submission + - Eden Games Go On Strike Against Atari (rockpapershotgun.com)
juicegg writes: Eden Games – they behind Test Drive Unlimited 2 and the V-Rally series – and have had enough of their treatment from Atari, and in the face of enormous redundancies at the company and have gone on strike today. GI.biz report that in the face of sackings, the French studio has said enough, and are refusing to work. And they’ve a few choice words to explain why.
Submission + - Google's Android Violates Linux GPL (thinq.co.uk)
Stoobalou writes: Google has been accused of lifting significant amounts of free Linux code and using it in the Android mobile OS.
Submission + - Geologists Say California May Be Next
Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Newsweek reports that first there was a violent magnitude-8.8 event in Chile in 2010, then a horrifically destructive Pacific earthquake in New Zealand on February 22, and now the recent earthquake in Japan. All three phenomena involved more or less the same family of circum-Pacific fault lines and plate boundaries—and though there is still no hard scientific evidence to explain why, there is little doubt now that earthquakes do tend to occur in clusters: a significant event on one side of a major tectonic plate is often—not invariably, but often enough to be noticeable—followed some weeks or months later by another on the plate’s far side. "It is as though the earth becomes like a great brass bell, which when struck by an enormous hammer blow on one side sets to vibrating and ringing from all over. Now there have been catastrophic events at three corners of the Pacific Plate—one in the northwest, on Friday; one in the southwest, last month; one in the southeast, last year." That leaves just one corner unaffected—the northeast. And the fault line in the northeast of the Pacific Plate is the San Andreas Fault, underpinning the city of San Francisco. All know that the San Andreas Fault is due to rupture one day—it last did so in 1906, and strains have built beneath it to a barely tolerable level. Although geologists believe a 9.0 quake is virtually impossible along the San Andreas, a network of "strike-slip" faults smaller and more fragmented than the great chasm that exists where two continent-sized plates of the Earth's crust meet along the Japanese islands, USGS studies put the probability of California being hit by a quake measuring 7.5 or more in the next 30 years at 46 percent, and the likelihood of a 6.7 quake, comparable in size to the temblors that rocked San Francisco in 1989 and Los Angeles in 1994, at 99 percent statewide."
