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Submission Summary: 0 pending, 16 declined, 4 accepted (20 total, 20.00% accepted)

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Australia

Submission + - Aus internet filter delayed for election (theage.com.au)

Submitted by MichaelSmith
MichaelSmith writes: Australian communications minister Stephen Conroy has delayed the planned implementation of internet filtering until 2011. The likely reason for this is to neutralize it as an issue in the 2010 election, which is expected to happen before October. Interestingly Optus, Telstra and iPrimus have pledged to block child-abuse websites voluntarily but the article doesn't say how they plan to do that.
Software

Submission + - Transport ticketing system as job creation (theage.com.au)

Submitted by MichaelSmith
MichaelSmith writes: Screw ups in the new Melbourne ticketing system are so common they aren't really funny any more but this one almost had me ROFLing.
Staff at the firm making myki have had to manually add one cent to 87,261 cards so that they can be used on Sundays, when seniors are entitled to free travel. The myki system requires all users — even those getting a free ride — to have a positive balance on their card. 'This exercise took several weeks and was carried out by existing myki customer service staff...."

Geez guys write a loop. Learn some perl. Or fix the original requirement.

Submission + - The Wifi AP names people use (glitch.tl) 1

Submitted by MichaelSmith
MichaelSmith writes: I code on the tram, going to and from work and I noticed that there are a lot of wifi access points along the way. So one week I made it my job to write an automatic scanner which runs from a cron job every minute during commuting times. My backup script pushes the new AP names to my web server and you can read it on line.
It is a mixture of the straightforward, naive and funny, with a few pop culture references along the way. The first column in the file is the number of access points with that name. The second column is the AP name, in brackets to pick up white space.
Idle

Submission + - Look out for paragliding terrorists (indianexpress.com) 1

Submitted by MichaelSmith
MichaelSmith writes: Intelligence sources are reporting that south Asian terrorist organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba has purchased 50 para gliders from suppliers in Europe. This article in the Indian Express discusses possible attacks in India using this novel vector, but other targets can't be ruled out.

One possibility would be to use a high building or terrain to fly right over perimeter security at a public event. Para gliders can use convective lift as well, but the pilot needs to be experienced. The article discusses suicide attacks so this may put a limit on the sophistication of the flying involved.

Submission + - MP horrified by altered bin Laden pic (abc.net.au)

Submitted by MichaelSmith
MichaelSmith writes: The FBI has apparently used elements from a photograph of Spanish member of parliament Gaspar Llamazare to help compose an age advanced image of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. The FBI says:

"FBI special agent Jason Pack said a forensic artist had been unable to find suitable features from the FBI's database of photographs and used a picture from the internet instead.
"The forensic artist was not aware of the identity of the individual depicted in the photograph," Mr Pack said, adding that the image would be taken off the FBI website."

Mr Llamazare is not happy about his face being used in this way and has complained to the US Embassy in Spain.

Submission + - Nine containers of PETN punctured in Nth Carolina (abc.net.au)

Submitted by MichaelSmith
MichaelSmith writes: A major US port was shut down after nine containers of "highly explosive material" were accidentally punctured, officials said, urging that part of the city be evacuated.

The accident happened around 4:45am (local time) when a forklift punctured the imported containers during offloading in Morehead City, North Carolina, Mayor Jerry Jones said.

The chemical involved was pentaerythritol tetranitrate, known as PETN, he said, adding it was "highly explosive, but not airborne".
Security

Submission + - US Army files found on second hand MP3 player

Submitted by MichaelSmith
MichaelSmith writes: A New Zealand man who bought a second hand MP3 player from a store in the US found it loaded with the names and personal details of American soldiers, as well as a mission briefing and information about equipment.

Chris Ogle says he will return the unit to the US Defence Department if asked, and that it never worked as a music player anyway.

A slightly different version of the story is available from TVNZ.
Portables

Submission + - Asus Eee sold out in Australia (theage.com.au)

Submitted by MichaelSmith
MichaelSmith writes: After two days on sale in Australia the Asus Eee Linux based laptop has nearly sold out. According to the article some families have bought two or three units and some schools have made multiple purchases. A scan of the Eee user forums suggests that installations of windows are not the hottest topic of conversation about this device.
Sun Microsystems

Submission + - Worm exploiting Solaris telnetd vulnerability

Submitted by
MichaelSmith
MichaelSmith writes: "Several news sites [ itwire zdnet itnews] are reporting that a worm is starting to exploit the Solaris Telnet 0-day vulnerability. From the itnews article: By adding simple text to the Telnet command, Ullrich explained that the system will skip asking for a user name and password. If the systems are installed out of the box, they automatically come Telnet-enabled."
Censorship

Submission + - Australian Army chief approves of blocked web site

Submitted by MichaelSmith
MichaelSmith writes: More than a year ago a former member of the Australian Defense Force set up a web forum for ADF members. Recently the site was blocked by the Department of Defense, presumably as part of routine workplace filtering. The interesting bit is that the the head of the Australian Army, General Peter Leahy wants the block removed. In the process he blames the "geeks" in the DOD for filtering the site, though I, for one, am not taking that personally. From his perspective a geek is probably anybody not in the ADF.

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