An anonymous reader writes "Cenzic released its report revealing the most prominent types of Web application vulnerabilities for the first half of 2009. The report identified over 3,100 total vulnerabilities, which is a 10 percent increase in Web application vulnerabilities compared to the second half of 2008. Among Web browsers, Mozilla Firefox had the largest percentage of Web vulnerabilities, followed by Apple Safari, whose browser showed a vast increase in exploits, due to vulnerabilities reported in the Safari iPhone browser." It seems a bit surprising to me that this study shows that only 15% of vulnerabilities are in IE.

daria42 writes "British sci-fi author Charles Stross has confessed that he has long hated the Star Trek franchise for its relegation of technology as irrelevant to plot and character development — and the same goes for similar shows such as Babylon Five. The problem, according to Stross, is that as Battlestar Galactica creator Ron Moore has described in a recent speech, the writers of Star Trek would simply 'insert' technology or science into the script whenever needed, without any real regard to its significance; 'then they'd have consultants fill in the appropriate words (aka technobabble) later.'"

Bimal writes "After a short three-month beta program, Microsoft is officially releasing Microsoft Security Essentials, its free, real-time consumer anti-malware solution for fighting viruses, spyware, rootkits, and Trojans. MSE is available for Windows XP 32-bit, Windows Vista/7 32-bit, and Windows Vista/7 64-bit. 'Ars puts MSE through its paces and finds an unobtrusive app with a clean interface that protected us in the dark corners of the Internet.' The software received positive notes when in beta, including a nod from the independent testing group AV-Test." But reader CWmike notes that Symantec is trash-talking Microsoft's free offering. Jens Meggers, Symantec's vice president of engineering, dismissed MSE as a "poor product" that will "never be up to snuff." Meggers added, "Microsoft has a really bad track record in security." The GM of Trend Micro's consumer division sniffed, "It's better to use something than to use nothing, but you get what you pay for."

CWmike writes "The Free Software Foundation today launched a campaign against Microsoft Corp.'s upcoming Windows 7 operating system, calling it 'treacherous computing' that stealthily takes away rights from users. At the Web site Windows7Sins.org, the Boston-based FSF lists the seven 'sins' that proprietary software such as Windows 7 commits against computer users. They include: Poisoning education, locking in users, abusing standards such as OpenDocument Format (ODF), leveraging monopolistic behavior, threatening user security, enforcing Digital Rights Management (DRM) at the request of entertainment companies concerned about movie and music piracy, and invading privacy. 'Windows, for some time now, has really been a DRM platform, restricting you from making copies of digital files,' said executive director Peter Brown. And if Microsoft's Trusted Computing technology were fully implemented the way the company would like, the vendor would have 'malicious and really complete control over your computer.'"

History's Coming To writes "xkcd creator Randall Munroe has revealed on his blag that the acclaimed stick-figure comic will be produced in real dead-tree book form. Fantastic news for all fans of comedy, maths, science, and relationship screw-ups — especially given that the book will be sold in aid of the charity 'Room To Read.' Rumors that the book contains a joke in the ISBN remain unconfirmed." The NY Times article that Munroe links (registration may be required) is from April of this year, and I am amazed that this community didn't note the story at that time. The book will be published by breadpig, which was created by Alexis Ohanian, one of the founders of reddit.

Harry writes "Rumor has it that RadioShack is planning to re-brand itself as The Shack later this year, after eighty-eight years under the old name (most of them with a space in between 'Radio' and 'Shack'). I hope it's not true, because I don't think the move would do a thing to make the retailer a better, more successful business." Where will we go to buy soldering irons and those RCA to headphone jack adapters now?

Professor_Quail writes with this interesting excerpt: "Oxford scientists have created a transparent form of aluminum by bombarding the metal with the world's most powerful soft X-ray laser. 'Transparent aluminum' previously only existed in science fiction, featuring in the movie Star Trek IV, but the real material is an exotic new state of matter with implications for planetary science and nuclear fusion."

Back in January we covered the Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot, or EATR. The EATR gets its energy by "engaging in biologically-inspired, organism-like energy-harvesting behavior which is the equivalent of eating. It can find, ingest, and extract energy from biomass in the environment ..." So many news outlets picked up the story and ran it with titles alluding to the robot "eating flesh" or even "eating corpses" that a company spokesperson put out a press release saying, "This robot is strictly vegetarian." The statement says in part, "RTI's patent pending robotic system will be able to find, ingest and extract energy from biomass in the environment. Despite the far-reaching reports that this includes 'human bodies,' the public can be assured that the engine Cyclone has developed to power the EATR runs on fuel no scarier than twigs, grass clippings and wood chips — small, plant-based items for which RTI's robotic technology is designed to forage. Desecration of the dead is a war crime under Article 15 of the Geneva Conventions, and is certainly not something sanctioned by DARPA, Cyclone or RTI."

angry tapir writes "China has banned the use of shock therapy to treat Internet addiction after its use at one hospital sparked nationwide controversy. The hospital drew wide media coverage in recent months after Internet users claiming to have received the treatment wrote in blogs and forums about being tied down and subjected to shocks for 30 minutes at a time."

An anonymous reader writes "Comcast has finally launched its DNS Redirector service in trial markets (Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Oregon, Texas, Utah, and Washington state), and has submitted a working draft of the technology to the IETF for review. Comcast customers can opt-out from the service by providing their account username and cable modem MAC address. Customers in trial areas using 'old' Comcast DNS servers, or non-Comcast DNS servers, should not be affected by this. This deployment comes after many previous ISPs, like DSLExtreme, were forced to pull the plug on such efforts as a result of customer disapproval/retaliation. Some may remember when VeriSign tried this back in 2003, where it also failed."

theodp writes "Back in 1992, the SIIA released Don't Copy That Floppy!, a goofy video in which anti-piracy rapper MC Double Def DP convinces a young lad not to copy a game by appealing to his sense of right and wrong. Now, to address what it calls 'new generations and new temptations,' the SIIA has uploaded a trailer for a new anti-piracy rap video — Don't Copy That 2 — that will be released this summer. To underscore the video's it's-not-just-a-copy-it's-a-crime message, the new film is a tad darker than the original. A smug teen who's downloading files from 'Pirates Palace' and 'Tune Weasel' finds his world turned upside down when automatic weapons-toting government agents break down the door and take his Mom away in handcuffs. The teen finds himself in a prison jumpsuit forced to tattoo shirtless adult inmates who eventually turn on him, physically attack him, and make him run for his life back to his jail cell (image summarizing his plight)."

Kemeno writes "Blizzard has announced that they will be dropping LAN support for Starcraft II, citing piracy and quality concerns. Instead, all multiplayer games will be hosted through their new Battle.net service. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this move, but wasn't LAN play how the original Starcraft became popular? Blizzard said, 'More people on Battle.net means ... even more resources devoted to evolving this online platform to cater to further community building and new ways to enjoy the game online. World of Warcraft is a great example of a game that has evolved beyond anyone's imagination since their Day 1 and will continue to do so to better the player experience for as long as players support the title. ... We would not take out LAN if we did not feel we could offer players something better.'"