Submission + - What Features Belong in a "Smartwatch" Like Apple's Rumored iWatch? (slashdot.org)
Nerval's Lobster writes: "If the rumors are true, and Apple is indeed hard at work on a newfangled timepiece (dubbed the "iWatch"), what unique features could such a device offer a public already overloaded with all sorts of handheld devices? Answer that question, and you’re perhaps one step closer to figuring out why Apple—again, if the rumors are true—decided to devote millions of dollars and the precious hours of some very smart people in the effort. This article suggests voice control (via Siri), biometrics, mobile payments, and other possible features, but there must be loads of others that someone could think up."
Submission + - Internet Still Under Attack by UN, FCC Comish Fears (foxnews.com)
Velcroman1 writes: At a United Nations conference in December, 89 countries voted in favor of international government regulation of the Internet. Specific regulations have not been agreed upon, but FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell said he fears the U.N. may seek further rulings at a 2014 conference in Busan, Korea. "You’ll have international bureaucrats making engineering and business decisions," McDowell said. The U.N. has no power to force the United States to adopt any Internet regulation, and the U.S. refused to sign the December treaty, along with 55 others countries. But if a large number of countries agree on regulations, the Internet could become fragmented, with very different rules applying in different regions of the world. "That becomes an engineering nightmare," McDowell said.
Submission + - Finnish anti-piracy site pirates thepiratebay content (piraattilahti.fi)
An anonymous reader writes: Finnish copyright lobby TTVK Ry, that earlier ordered the artist promotion site http://promobay.org/ to be censored as "thepiratebay subpage" and later admitted that it's legal (http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-promos-unblocked-in-finland-with-music-industry-blessing-130206/) and got the police to confiscate 9-year-old's winnie the pooh laptop on suspicion of having illegally downloaded a single album (http://torrentfreak.com/police-raid-9-year-old-pirate-bay-girl-confiscate-winnie-the-pooh-laptop-121122/) launched an anti-piracy website http://piraattilahti.fi./ The site closely resembles thepiratebay, and if you take a closer look, you'll notice that css has been directly copied from thepiratebay.se, complete with original site name in comments (http://piraattilahti.fi/css/css.css, pastebin mirror: http://pastebin.com/pV2rjNyb)
Of course one interesting question is, how on earth did they manage to pirate thepiratebay content, considering that they managed to get court orders for major ISP's to censor access to thepiratebay? (http://torrentfreak.com/court-issues-new-blocking-order-against-the-pirate-bay-120611/)
Of course one interesting question is, how on earth did they manage to pirate thepiratebay content, considering that they managed to get court orders for major ISP's to censor access to thepiratebay? (http://torrentfreak.com/court-issues-new-blocking-order-against-the-pirate-bay-120611/)
Submission + - Ask Slashdot: Is the bar being lowered in Universities? 2
An anonymous reader writes: I am in my late 20s, live in the US, work in the IT industry, and am going to school to upgrade from an associate's degree to a bachelor's degree. One of my classes is a web based course that requires students to write blogs. I am not attending one of those questionable for profit schools. This is a state funded, large, public university. In this course I have noticed poor writing skills are the norm rather than the exception. It is a 3rd year course, so students should have successfully completed some sort of writing course prior to this one. Blog posts, which students are graded on, tend to be very poorly written. They are not organized into paragraphs, have multiple run-on sentences, and sometimes don't make sense. I do not know what grades they are receiving for these posts. Slashdot, is what I am seeing the exception, or the norm? Is the bar being lowered for university students, or am I just expecting too much?
Submission + - Finnish anti-piracy group copies HTML, style sheet from Pirate Bay (afterdawn.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Finland's main anti-piracy group, TTVK, has put a fake Pirate Bay website online . All of the links direct the user to a Finnish anti-piracy message. If you check the source code of the fake BitTorrent website, you can find its largely copied outright from the Pirate Bay website, with the best example being a style sheet that starts with the comment "The main style sheet for the thepiratebay.se".
Submission + - Oracle to Open Source iOS, Android Ports of JavaFX (paritynews.com)
hypnosec writes: Oracle is going to open source JavaFX ports for Android and iOS soon as a part of its efforts to open source the framework. JavaFX, destined to replace Swing GUI library as the default method to develop graphical user interfaces, is a framework used to develop cross-platform rich internet applications (RIAs). The ports for iOS and Android are based on an “unreleased version of JavaSE Embedded for iOS/Android". Oracle’s Richard Bair revealed that the "first bits and pieces" for JavaFX for iOS should probably be out sometime next week. The rest of the release will be scheduled along with the release of prism. Oracle is going to leave javafx-font as closed source but, Bair has said that developers are already working towards an open source native replacement of the component through the OpenJFX list.
Submission + - STRaND-1 – World's First Smartphone-Based Satellite Set to Launch (gizmag.com)
Zothecula writes: The University of Surrey’s Surrey Space Centre (SSC) and Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL) are set to launch the world’s first smartphone-based satellite. Built around a Google Nexus One smartphone running on the Android operating system, the STRaND-1 (Surrey Training, Research and Nanosatellite Demonstrator) satellite will also be the U.K.’s first CubeSat to go into space.
Submission + - Comcast buys out GE's remaining 49% stake in NBC (philly.com)
Bob the Super Hamste writes: "On Tuesday Comcast announced that it would accelerated its acquisition of NBCUniversal and purchase the remaining 49% owned by GE for $16.7 billion.Previously GE and Comcast were expected to operate NBCUniversal jointly until mid 2014 with Comcast having the option to extend that out until 2018. So far there are not details on when the deal with be completed but the article indicates that Comcast's complete acquisition of NBCUniversal will be completed years earlier that initially thought."
Submission + - ATM Skimming Ring Compromised 6,000 Bank Accounts (net-security.org)
Orome1 writes: "U.S. federal authorities have announced the filing of an indictment against two alleged leaders of an international scheme to steal customer bank account information using “skimming” technology that secretly recorded the data of customers who used ATMs at banks in New York, New Jersey, Illinois, and Wisconsin. The ring targeted J.P. Morgan Chase (“Chase”), and Capital One, N.A. banks. Throughout the course of the scheme, they engaged in over 50 skimming incidents that resulted in the compromise of over approximately 6,000 individual bank accounts, from which the defendants made and attempted to make over approximately $3 million in unauthorized withdrawals."
Submission + - Indie dev says that she can't afford to stay indie. (sophiehoulden.com)
Gallefray writes: "Sophie houlden recently posted on her blog that she can't afford to stay indie, and released swift*stitch for free, stating that:
"Leaper, and a commissioned game (that I can’t talk about yet) may be my last games as a full time indie."
and
"I just can’t afford to keep going like this, I haven’t been able to afford the past three years really. Sales have paid for food but I’ve just racked up debt when it comes to everything else. It has gotten to the point where I try to spend time working on short projects as an attempt to make enough money to pay for the stuff I really care about making, but it doesn’t work and it’s making my games worse as a result."
Below is a link to her shop, where you can give support by buying her games:"
"Leaper, and a commissioned game (that I can’t talk about yet) may be my last games as a full time indie."
and
"I just can’t afford to keep going like this, I haven’t been able to afford the past three years really. Sales have paid for food but I’ve just racked up debt when it comes to everything else. It has gotten to the point where I try to spend time working on short projects as an attempt to make enough money to pay for the stuff I really care about making, but it doesn’t work and it’s making my games worse as a result."
Below is a link to her shop, where you can give support by buying her games:"
Submission + - New Adobe Reader zero day used in phishing attacks (scmagazine.com.au) 1
mask.of.sanity writes: Zero day holes found in Adobe Reader are being exploited by attackers in phishing campaigns.
The attack drops two dll files: One opens a PDF to distract users while the other opens a backdoor.
Adobe confirmed the latest versions of Reader and Acrobat (10.1.5, and 11.0.1) are affected.
The attack drops two dll files: One opens a PDF to distract users while the other opens a backdoor.
Adobe confirmed the latest versions of Reader and Acrobat (10.1.5, and 11.0.1) are affected.
Submission + - Obama Signs Executive Order on Cybersecurity (securityweek.com)
wiredmikey writes: President Barack Obama signed an executive order on Tuesday designed to better protect critical infrastructure from computer hackers.
Obama, in his annual State of the Union speech to a joint session of the US Congress, said his executive order would "strengthen our cyber defenses by increasing information sharing, and developing standards to protect our national security, our jobs and our privacy." The president also urged Congress to pass legislation "to give our government a greater capacity to secure our networks and deter attacks." The executive order (PDF) calls for voluntary reporting of threats to US infrastructure, such as power grids, pipelines and water systems. The directive, which follows two failed attempts in Congress to pass cybersecurity legislation, allows the government to lead an information-sharing network but stops short of making mandatory the reporting of cyber threats.
House Homeland Security Chairman Michael McCaul said he was "concerned that the order could open the door to increased regulations that would stifle innovation, burden businesses and fail to keep pace with evolving cyber threats."
Leslie Harris of the Center for Democracy & Technology welcomed the directive, arguing it "says that privacy must be built into the government's cybersecurity plans and activities, not as an afterthought but rather as part of the design."
White House officials noted that the measure would not apply to consumer-based services or information systems that do not meet the standard of "critical infrastructure." But the director of George Mason University's Technology Policy Program Jerry Brito said in a tweet that "top-down regulation is the last thing that will improve cybersecurity."
Obama, in his annual State of the Union speech to a joint session of the US Congress, said his executive order would "strengthen our cyber defenses by increasing information sharing, and developing standards to protect our national security, our jobs and our privacy." The president also urged Congress to pass legislation "to give our government a greater capacity to secure our networks and deter attacks." The executive order (PDF) calls for voluntary reporting of threats to US infrastructure, such as power grids, pipelines and water systems. The directive, which follows two failed attempts in Congress to pass cybersecurity legislation, allows the government to lead an information-sharing network but stops short of making mandatory the reporting of cyber threats.
House Homeland Security Chairman Michael McCaul said he was "concerned that the order could open the door to increased regulations that would stifle innovation, burden businesses and fail to keep pace with evolving cyber threats."
Leslie Harris of the Center for Democracy & Technology welcomed the directive, arguing it "says that privacy must be built into the government's cybersecurity plans and activities, not as an afterthought but rather as part of the design."
White House officials noted that the measure would not apply to consumer-based services or information systems that do not meet the standard of "critical infrastructure." But the director of George Mason University's Technology Policy Program Jerry Brito said in a tweet that "top-down regulation is the last thing that will improve cybersecurity."
Submission + - Britain Could Switch Off Airport Radar And Release Spectrum (techweekeurope.co.uk)
judgecorp writes: "Britain is considering switching off air traffic control radar systems and using "passive radar" instead. A two year feasibility study will consider using a network of ground stations which monitor broadcast TV signals and measure echoes from aircraft to determine their location and velocity. The system is not a new idea — early radar experiments used BBC shortwave transmitters as a signal source before antenna technology produced a transceiver suitable for radar — but could now be better than conventional radar thanks to new antenna designs and signal processing techniques. It will also save money and energy by eliminating transmitters — and release spectrum for 5G services."
Submission + - Retail copies of Office 2013 are tied to a single computer forever (geek.com) 1
An anonymous reader writes: With the launch of Office 2013 Microsoft has seen fit to upgrade the terms of the license agreement, and it’s not in favor of the end user. It seems installing a copy of the latest version of Microsoft’s Office suite of apps ties it to a single machine. For life.
On previous versions of Office it was a different story. The suite was associated with a “Licensed Device” and could only be used on a single device. But there was nothing to stop you uninstalling Office and installing it on another machine perfectly legally. With that option removed, Office 2013 effectively becomes a much more expensive proposition for many.
On previous versions of Office it was a different story. The suite was associated with a “Licensed Device” and could only be used on a single device. But there was nothing to stop you uninstalling Office and installing it on another machine perfectly legally. With that option removed, Office 2013 effectively becomes a much more expensive proposition for many.
Submission + - Ancient Languages Reconstructed by Computers (halls-of-valhalla.org)
halls-of-valhalla writes: "Researchers have developed a new software which can be used to reconstruct dead, ancient languages using probabilistic models of sound change.
This new software was tested by taking 637 Austronesian languages currently spoken in Asia and the Pacific, and attempting to reconstruct the ancient languages they're based on. The system was found to have provided a relatively accurate, large-scale automatic reconstruction of the protolanguages. A language believed to be roughtly seven thousand years old was reconstructed using a database of 142,000 words.
When compared to the results of linguists specializing in Austronesian languages, more 85% of the system's reconstructions were found to be within one character of the manual reconstruction. These are very promising results, however a linguist is still able to produce a higher accuracy, so this will be likely to become a tool used by linguists rather than a replacement for them."
This new software was tested by taking 637 Austronesian languages currently spoken in Asia and the Pacific, and attempting to reconstruct the ancient languages they're based on. The system was found to have provided a relatively accurate, large-scale automatic reconstruction of the protolanguages. A language believed to be roughtly seven thousand years old was reconstructed using a database of 142,000 words.
When compared to the results of linguists specializing in Austronesian languages, more 85% of the system's reconstructions were found to be within one character of the manual reconstruction. These are very promising results, however a linguist is still able to produce a higher accuracy, so this will be likely to become a tool used by linguists rather than a replacement for them."
Submission + - Living cells turned into computers (nature.com) 2
ananyo writes: Synthetic biologists have developed DNA modules that perform logic operations in bacteria. These ‘genetic circuits’ could, for example, be used by scientists to track key moments in a cell’s life or, in biotechnology, to turn on production of a drug at the flick of a chemical switch. The researchers have encoded 16 logic gates in modules of DNA and stored the results of logical operations. The different logic gates can be assembled into a wide variety of circuits.
Submission + - Oracle vs Google legal war begins a new chapter (thomsonreuters.com)
Dupple writes: Oracle says a U.S. judge erred when he threw out its billion-dollar copyright claim against Google over parts of the Java programming language that Google incorporated into the Android mobile platform, according to a court filing.
Oracle's intellectual property battle against Google has attracted intense interest from software developers, many of whom believe the structure of a programming language should not be subject to copyright protection.
In an appeals brief filed on Monday at the Federal U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Oracle said Google's use of Java structure was "decidedly unfair."
"Copyright protects a short poem or even a Chinese menu or jingle," Oracle wrote. "But the copied works here were vastly more original, creative, and labor-intensive."
Oracle's intellectual property battle against Google has attracted intense interest from software developers, many of whom believe the structure of a programming language should not be subject to copyright protection.
In an appeals brief filed on Monday at the Federal U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Oracle said Google's use of Java structure was "decidedly unfair."
"Copyright protects a short poem or even a Chinese menu or jingle," Oracle wrote. "But the copied works here were vastly more original, creative, and labor-intensive."
Submission + - Opera officially announces gradual transition from Presto to WebKit and Chromium (opera.com)
jeditobe writes: ...To provide a leading browser on Android and iOS, this year Opera will make a gradual transition to the WebKit engine, as well as Chromium, for most of its upcoming versions of browsers for smartphones and computers...
Please sjgn the petition to force Oera Software commit Presto engine to opensource. https://t.co/l2FNSL3E
Please sjgn the petition to force Oera Software commit Presto engine to opensource. https://t.co/l2FNSL3E
Submission + - Mobile Phone Sales Decline Despite Smartphone Boom (ibtimes.co.uk)
DavidGilbert99 writes: "Everyone is buying a mobile phone these days right? Even people in third world countries are getting connected and some people in developed countries have multiple handsets for work and personal use. So sales must be going through the roof?
Not so according to Gartner, whose latest figures suggest mobile phone sales declined by 1.7% in 2012. This was despite the smartphone market booming — up almost 40% in the final quarter of 2012 — and was down to "tough economic conditions, shifting consumer preferences and intense market competition" according to Gartner's principle research analyst Anshul Gupta."
Not so according to Gartner, whose latest figures suggest mobile phone sales declined by 1.7% in 2012. This was despite the smartphone market booming — up almost 40% in the final quarter of 2012 — and was down to "tough economic conditions, shifting consumer preferences and intense market competition" according to Gartner's principle research analyst Anshul Gupta."
