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Submission + - TSA missed Boston bomber because his name was misspelled in a database (nbcnews.com) 3

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the primary conspirator in the Boston Marathon bombing that killed three people, slipped through airport security because his name was misspelled in a database, according to a new Congressional report.

The Russian intelligence agency warned US authorities twice that Tsarnaev was a radical Islamist and potentially dangerous. As a result, Tsarnaev was entered into two US government databases: the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment and the Treasury Enforcement Communications System (TECS), an interagency border inspection database.

A special note was added to TECS in October of 2011 requiring a mandatory search and detention of Tsarnaev if he left the country. "Detain isolated and immediately call the lookout duty officer," the note reportedly said. "Call is mandatory whether or not the officer believes there is an exact match."

"Detain isolated and immediately call the lookout duty officer."

Unfortunately, Tsarnaev's name was not an exact match: it was misspelled by one letter. Whoever entered it in the database spelled it as "Tsarnayev." When Tsarnaev flew to Russia in January of 2012 on his way to terrorist training, the system was alerted but the mandatory detention was not triggered. Because officers did not realize Tsarnaev was a high-priority target, he was allowed to travel without questioning.

Submission + - Nokia turns to Android to regain share in Emerging Markets (wsj.com)

Submitted by puddingebola
puddingebola writes: Nokia is preparing to release it's first Android phone, as the lost market share in emerging markets from the death of Symbian has never been recovered. Windows Phone could never be adapted to the entry level devices that have driven growth in these markets, necessitating the move. From the article, "Nokia was once the king of cellphones in emerging markets. But it has lost ground because it was slow to respond to Android's popularity in many countries. In India, where Nokia's Symbian-powered phones held a big share of cellphone sales just a few years ago, Android was installed on 93% of new smartphones shipped there last year, according to estimates from research firm IDC."

Submission + - VMware and Google partner to bring Horizon View Desktop to Chromebooks (infoworld.com)

Submitted by puddingebola
puddingebola writes: With companies looking to transition away from Windows XP, VMware and Google are partnering to deliver the virtual desktop of Horizon view to thin client, Chrome OS Chromebooks. From the article, " Google is hoping that companies opt for the Chromebook/Horizon combo as a way to replace aging Windows XP devices but still keep running the legacy desktops and apps they need. That's the scenario painted by Caesar Sengupta, vice president of product management, Chrome OS, when I spoke to him earlier today. "What we've found," he told me, "is that a lot of companies are adopting Chromebooks for cloud deployments because they're easy to manage and very secure. But those companies still have some legacy applications left over, and they want to figure out how to get these legacy apps to their users. We make it very easy to transition from where they are right now to move to a cloud world without having to make too many changes.""

Submission + - What ever happened to the FIDO Alliance? (networkworld.com)

Submitted by alphadogg
alphadogg writes: The FIDO Alliance first showed up a year ago saying it was going to revolutionize e-commerce online authentication by promoting a new multi-factor authentication protocol. Turns out the revolution in security is slow in coming, but the industry group is making some progress. The Fast IDentity Online Alliance, as it’s officially known, started with six members, including PayPal chief information security officer Michael Barrett and the start-up Nok Nok Labs, but now has about 100 members, including Google. Nok Nok is building prototype code to support the new authentication specification called the Online Security Transaction Protocol (OSTP). The idea behind OSTP is it would add a way to let the user with a FIDO-enabled device to voluntarily go beyond simple passwords and logins to evoke a wide range of additional device information, ranging from the trusted platform module to a webcam or biometrics, in a cryptographic process to share that secret as part of a back-end authentication process. The value is creating a multi-factor process on the fly is it could make e-commerce transactions, in particular, much safer.

Submission + - Flappy Bird Story, Overall Success & What's The Reason App 'Died' (creativeshory.com)

Submitted by creativeshory
creativeshory writes: Dong Nguyen, the mysterious developer of the world’s most popular free app, who drew global attention on this past weekend when he suddenly tweeted "I cannot take this anymore" and pulled the game from the app stores. In an interview with Forbes, Nguyen said the app is 'gone forever’ because it was becoming too addictive for people. It was also causing him a lot of stress.
Nguyen told Forbes reporter Lan Anh Nguyen, "I just wanted to create a game that people could enjoy for a few minutes. But it happened to become an addictive product. I think it has become a problem. To solve that problem, it's best to take down Flappy Bird. It's gone forever. Nguyen also said the app was disturbing his personal life.”

Submission + - Steve Jobs' Lisa Mouse Recovered From 30-Year-Old Time Capsule (iclarified.com)

Submitted by lewisakeith
lewisakeith writes: In 1983, Steve Jobs gave a talk at the Aspen International Design Conference discussing various technologies and used his Lisa mouse to navigate through the presentation. After the talk, Jobs and other conference attendees donated various items to a Time Capsule that would be buried as the 'Aspen Time Tube'

Submission + - It's lights out for the National Security Agency (benswann.com) 2

Submitted by rastos1
rastos1 writes: State lawmakers in Maryland have filed emergency status legislation that seeks to cut the NSA’s Ft. Meade headquarters off from all material support stemming from the state. House Bill 1074 (HB1074) would ban the NSA facility from all public state utilities, ban the use of NSA collected evidence in court, ban universities from partnering with the NSA and ban all political subdivisions from assisting the NSA from within the state. Any state entity, employee or contractor refusing to comply with the law would be immediately fired and banned from all future contracts within the state.

Submission + - Microsoft Rumored to Integrate Android Apps

Submitted by phmadore
phmadore writes: Windows Phone has been struggling for market share, largely due to a serious lack of developers willing to invest their time in what one might consider a niche market. Statistically speaking, Android has more than 1.1M apps to Windows Phone's pitiful 200,000+. Well, according to unnamed sources informing the Verge , Microsoft may soon integrate/allow Android applications into both Windows and Windows Phone. The irony is so thick here you can cut it with a million dollar bill.

Submission + - Charles Seife's Jihad Against Human Space Flight Defies Scientific Conclusions (yahoo.com)

Submitted by MarkWhittington
MarkWhittington writes: Now that Robert Park is in the winter of his life and James Van Allen is dead, an unlikely person named Charles Seife, not a scientist but rather a professor of journalism, has taken up the banner of the jihad to destroy NASA's human spaceflight program.

In an article in Slate and a later post on his personal blog, Professor Seife compared the space agency to a Panda, cute but in danger of extinction. The reason, he suggests, NASA's "fixation" on human space flight. Like Van Allen, Park, and a slew of politicians before him, Seife would see NASA's human space flight ended and space exploration solely conducted by robots.

To be sure space probes like Mars Curiosity, Cassini, and the Chinese Chang'e 3 have astonished the world with their scientific discoveries. But those feats do not in any way negate the utility of people as space explorers. Indeed, a 2004 study by the British Royal Astronomical Society concluded that human explorers are crucial for gaining a scientific understanding of the space environment and its phenomenon.

Submission + - Supercell Earned $30 Million a Month in 2013 from Just Two Smartphone Games (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by DavidGilbert99
DavidGilbert99 writes: Supercell, the Finnish smartphone games company behind Clash of Clans and Hay Day, has revealed that it has earned $30 million every month of 2013, putting the $50,000 earned by Flappy Bird every month in to perspective. And it looks like 2014 will be an even bigger year for the company, with leaks this week showing the company is now earning $5.15m a day and the company's third ever game — Boom Beach — set to launch next month.

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