Nzimmer911 - Slashdot User

Skype protocol has been reverse engineered -> 0

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 02 2011, @09:35AM

An anonymous reader writes "Skype has been in the news a lot recently, mainly due to rumors of it being acquired a few months before a planned IPO. We thought Facebook and Google may pounce on the company for as much as $4 billion, but then Microsoft turned up, put $8.5 billion on the table, and walked away with their very expensive prize.

Now Microsoft own the most popular VoIP service out there, and surely plans to make it an integral part of their operations and products going forward. At the same time, one researcher has decided he wants to make Skype open source by reverse engineering the protocol the service uses.

In fact, he claims to have already achieved that reverse engineering feat on a new skype-open-source blog. The source code has been posted for versions 1.x/3.x/4.x of Skype as well as details of the rc4 layer arithmetic encoding the service uses.

While his intention may be to recreate Skype as an open source platform, it is doubtful he will get very far without facing an army of Microsoft lawyers. Skype is not an open platform, and Microsoft will want to keep it that way. Posting reverse engineered code online is not going to go down well in Redmond and this is surely a blog that will disappear shortly."
Link to Original Source

China Monitoring Foreign Officials/Activist Email-> 0

Submitted by Gunkerty Jeb on Thursday June 02 2011, @09:26AM

Gunkerty Jeb writes "Search giant Google has again sounded the alarm about sophisticated attacks emanating from mainland China and targeting officials within the U.S. and Asian governments, as well as human rights activists and journalists.

The company claims to have disrupted a sophisticated campaign of e-mail account takeovers with origins in Jinan, China, that affected hundreds of Gmail users. The campaign was not directed at Google's infrastructure or systems, but likely relied on phishing attacks and malware to harvest user login credentials. The campaign appears to have been designed to monitor the content of users' email correspondence."
Link to Original Source

Pirated Games Costing Industry-> 0

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 31 2011, @03:38PM

An anonymous reader writes "Study says games console piracy cost the industry £1.45 billion in 2010.

Speaking on behalf of the games industry, the Association of UK Interactive Entertainment (UKIE) has said that piracy in 2010 cost the industry around £1.45 billion. Not stopping there, they also stated that they believed piracy (not the economic downturn) should also be accountable for 1000 fewer jobs.

"When people play a pirated game that money goes to a criminal, not to the industry." UKIE director Michael Rawlinson said.

Pirated games can only be played on modified games consoles and can be bought relatively cheap or downloaded at no cost.

Later speaking to GamesIndustry Rawlinson said that for every game sold, 4 are pirated. "Based on information received from a number of publishers we have estimates of games piracy running at between 4:1 against legitimate sales"

However he Backtracked on previous comments to the BBC and said "We took a conservative position of saying if this is only 1:1 across all titles it would have a retail equivalent value of £1.45 billion. We did not say this was the loss to industry

After resorting to "guess" work when it comes to statistics and being interrogated on them, he went on to say that they will be commissioning further research to determine the full extent piracy is causing.

"What is clear is people who 'share' games via P2P networks or buy illegal copies are not buying the real product, and this reduces retailer sales."

So, there you have it, another industry moment of nonsense statistics and drivel. Determined as ever to state that we live in a world were every single download of a game, movie or whatever is directly linked to the cost of a brand new copy of the same. Legit "Trading" of games, music etc never enters the equation.

Source: UniteTheCows"
Link to Original Source

Comment: Re:How long will IPv6 last? (Score 1) 406

by Nzimmer911 on Tuesday December 21 2010, @08:52PM (#34636468) Attached to: Military Pressuring Vendors On IPv6

Working at Best Buy does not qualify you as a "network technician". If you do not fall into CyprusBlue's categorization of people that feel comfortable while sitting behind a stateful firewall product then you should pursue a new line of work. I bet that it's is relatively "safe" selling microwaves over in the appliance section. Oh wait...they have ip addresses you can be scared of exposing too! Oh Noes! The Big Bad Internets Are Going to Haxor My Microwaves!! /puts on tin hat

Comment: Re:internet radio?? (Score 1) 262

by Nzimmer911 on Tuesday August 31 2010, @08:44AM (#33425346) Attached to: MPEG LA Announces Permanent Royalty Moratorium For H264

Can you say Pandora? It's flash based and there is extensive support using dedicated hardware.

3 drinks a day keeps the Doctor away!-> 0

Submitted by Nzimmer911 on Monday August 30 2010, @02:07PM

Nzimmer911 writes "Heavy drinkers outlive non-drinkers according to a 20 years study following 1,824 people."
Link to Original Source

Comment: Your Favorite Youthful Indiscretion? (Score 0, Flamebait) 706

by Nzimmer911 on Wednesday August 18 2010, @02:58PM (#33292098) Attached to: Google's CEO Warns Kids Will Have to Change Names to Escape "Cyber Past"

Flaming farts? Star Wars Kid?

Comment: Re:Strange rebuttal (Score 1) 265

by Nzimmer911 on Friday August 13 2010, @11:58AM (#33241238) Attached to: Google Responds To Net Neutrality Reviews

Can you read? "Free from regulation" does not mean "elimination of net neutrality". Net neutrality regulation is useful in wired networks because consumers can't speak with their wallets by changing providers in many areas due to very limited competition. In the wireless space they can, making a regulation free market the best option to allow providers to tweak the most performance out of the limited bandwidth available in wireless spectrum.

Comment: RTFA and it's comments (Score 5, Informative) 177

by Nzimmer911 on Wednesday July 21 2010, @09:51AM (#32977130) Attached to: China Says Google Pledged To Obey Censorship Demands

They didn't bow at all. In Google's own words in the article's comment section: This piece suggests that Google has "bowed" to censorship. That is not correct. We have been very clear about our committment to not censor our products for users in China. The products we have kept on Google.cn (Music, Translate, Product Search) do not require any censorship by Google. Other products, like web search, we are offering from Google.com.hk, and without censorship Lucinda Barlow, Head of Public Affairs, Google AU/NZ - July 21, 2010, 2:43PM

Comment: Re:Incredible (Score 1) 957

by Nzimmer911 on Wednesday June 30 2010, @09:07AM (#32743170) Attached to: The worst I've ever been in trouble w/ the law ...

It's ok masmullin, I'm sure you enjoy driving your minivan 63 in a 65 with 3 screaming kids in the back. We each choose the lifestyle which we percieve will provide the most long term fulfillment. Mine includes things like extreme sports, rare steak, world travel (invading Iraq trip was involuntary), and my A4 going 100mph a few times a week. My experiences make me much more apt to react properly when (and if) I do find myself in a situation on the roadways, or off, that falls outside the expected. I'll trust my experience, reaction time, awareness, and intensity to pull me through the situation. Enjoy living inside the 'accepted norm' and adhering to the letter of the law, and I wish you luck dealing with the unexpected when it does pop up.