Submission + - Your Privacy is a Sci-Fi Fantasy (infoworld.com)
Gunkerty Jeb writes: What if our personal information wasn't digital and the collectors weren't machines?
Submission + - Thieves to steal "broadband batteries" (pcpro.co.uk) 2
Barence writes: "British broadband customers routinely have their service disrupted because of thieves stealing the copper telephone cabling. Now a new potential threat has emerged: battery theft. The former chief technologist of BT has claimed that the company's fibre broadband cabinets will become a target for battery thieves.
"Fibre to the cabinet is one of the biggest mistakes humanity has made," Dr Cochrane told the Lords' Select Committee on Superfast Broadband. "It ties a knot in the cable in terms of bandwidth and imposes huge unreliability risks.
"Once the local bandits have recognised that there is a car battery in the bottom, you can bet your bottom dollar that a crowbar will be out and the battery will keep disappearing.""
"Fibre to the cabinet is one of the biggest mistakes humanity has made," Dr Cochrane told the Lords' Select Committee on Superfast Broadband. "It ties a knot in the cable in terms of bandwidth and imposes huge unreliability risks.
"Once the local bandits have recognised that there is a car battery in the bottom, you can bet your bottom dollar that a crowbar will be out and the battery will keep disappearing.""
Submission + - Agencies Use Beta Open Source Project For Public Dataviz
cweditor writes: Several public agencies are using the beta open-source project Weave to put data visualization and analysis into the hands of planners, community activitists and other citizens. Metro Boston's DataCommon rolled out last month, allowing users to build dataviz dashboards where mousing over one visualization module also highlights or slices data in others. Portals in Connecticut, Rhode Island and Arizona, among other places, are under development. More Weave refinements are on the way, says the project head, including real-time collaboration and connecting maps with collections of documents (whether or not they've been geocoded).
Submission + - Air cooling planned for exascale data center
cweditor writes: The U.S. Department of Energy's Berkeley Lab has begun building a new computing center that will one day house exascale systems. The DOE doesn't know what an exascale system will look like. The types of chips, the storage, the networking and programming methods that will go into these systems are all works in progress. But what the DOE does have an idea about it is how to cool these systems: the Bay Area's crisp climate; that is, pulling in outdoor air.
Submission + - CIA-backed Cleversafe Announces 10-Exabyte Storage (computerworld.com)
Lucas123 writes: Cleversafe, a vendor of an object-based file system that has received backing from the CIA's investment arm, said today that it has developed a storage architecture that can scale to 10 exabytes of capacity. While the current reference configuration is just tens of petabytes in size spread among data centers in eight states, the company said it can store exabytes of data among geographically dispersed data centers under a single domain name, offering administrators a single pane of glass. Of course, building out the storage system would require $705 million just for spindles; in all, it would cost billions of dollars to complete. But, the company said it has Fortune 50 companies, and others, that are interested.
Submission + - Is The Wireless Well Running Dry? (computerworld.com)
Lucas123 writes: The number of wireless devices in the U.S. has, for the first time, exceeded the number of people. Wireless networks are edging near capacity, not just in the U.S., but all over the world. Credit Suisse conducted a survey that reveals mobile networks in North America were running at 80% of capacity, with 36% of base stations facing capacity constraints. The average globally for base station capacity utilization, the report said, was 65%.The problem is going to get worse before it gets better as advancements in connected cars, smart grids, machine-to-machine communication, and domestic installations such as at-home health monitoring systems, wireless demands will only increase.
Submission + - Corporate boardrooms open to eavesdropping
cweditor writes: One afternoon this month, a hacker toured a dozen corporate conference rooms via equipment that most every company has in those rooms: videoconferencing. Rapid7 says it could 'easily read a six-digit password from a sticky note over 20 feet away from the camera' and 'clearly hear conversations down the hallway from the video conferencing system.' With some systems, they could even capture keystrokes being typed in the room. Teleconferencing vendors defended their security, saying the auto-answer feature that left those sytsem vulnerable was an effort to strake the right balance between security and usability.
Submission + - Medical Imaging with a Hacked LCD Projector (youtube.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Grad students at UC Irvine have built a spatial frequency domain imaging system using parts from a cheap LCD projector and a digital camera. The system can be used to check the level of bruising or oxygenation in layers of tissue that aren't visible to the naked eye, according to an article in Chemical and Engineering News. An accompanying video shows the series of patterned pulses that the improvised imaging system makes in order to read hemoglobin and fat levels below the surface of the skin. A more sophisticated version of the imaging system is being commercialized by a startup within UC Irvine, called Modulated Imaging. The article and video also describe infrared brain scanners that can non-invasively check for brain bleeds, and multiphoton microscopes that produce stunning images of live skin cells.
Submission + - Why Iowa Caucuses Don't Matter (computerworld.com)
Lucas123 writes: When you look at the data, it reveals that the Iowa Caucus really has no impact on who becomes the Republican nominee. Results won't indicate anything beyond who's popular among Iowa Republican activists ... although not for the reason many skeptics cite. It's not the number of people participating that makes Iowa meaningless as a predictor, but its skewed sample. This skewed sample problem shows up in its failure to reflect the eventual winner, according to Computerworld's Sharon Machlis. In other words, Iowa voters are not a random sample of American voters and thus do not reflect all U.S. voters in ways that matter to the ultimate outcome.
Submission + - Sci-FI Brothel to Open 90 Miles From Las Vegas (inquisitr.com)
Gustavicles writes: "Ever thought about what it would be like to be with the woman who saved the galaxy from the evil empire? It seems as if Dennis Hof, owner of the Moonlite Bunny Ranch in Nevada wants to give you the opportunity.
Hof has bought a run down old brothel about 90 miles north of Las Vegas, and he plans on rennovating the whole area and turning it into an Area 51 themed brothel, where any Sci-Fi sex fantasy you have can be fulfilled for the right price.
Nevada is the only State in the US that allows legal prostitution. There are more than 2 dozen brothels throughout the State (although prostitution is technically illegal in Clark County (where Las Vegas is located).
Hof is also planning on bringing in some heavyweights to get the Area 51 Brothel going. The Las Vegas Review-Journal is reporting that Hof is getting some help from one one of the illicit sex trade’s top experts, madam Heidi Fleiss.
“She’s the chief alien design queen,” Hof told the paper.
Hof is no stranger to making his brothel’s famous, his Moonlite Bunny Ranch is the setting for the HBO reality show called Cathouse"
Hof has bought a run down old brothel about 90 miles north of Las Vegas, and he plans on rennovating the whole area and turning it into an Area 51 themed brothel, where any Sci-Fi sex fantasy you have can be fulfilled for the right price.
Nevada is the only State in the US that allows legal prostitution. There are more than 2 dozen brothels throughout the State (although prostitution is technically illegal in Clark County (where Las Vegas is located).
Hof is also planning on bringing in some heavyweights to get the Area 51 Brothel going. The Las Vegas Review-Journal is reporting that Hof is getting some help from one one of the illicit sex trade’s top experts, madam Heidi Fleiss.
“She’s the chief alien design queen,” Hof told the paper.
Hof is no stranger to making his brothel’s famous, his Moonlite Bunny Ranch is the setting for the HBO reality show called Cathouse"
Submission + - European Supervolcano Showing Signs of Life, Can D (inquisitr.com) 1
Gustavicles writes: "A massive volcano in Germany is showing signs of life, and it has some scientists worried. The Laacher See Volcano which sits under a lake near Bonn has the potential of raining ash and fire over, wellpretty much all of Europe.
Scientists say the Laacher See Volcano is similar in size to Mount Pinatubo, which erupted in Indonesia in 1991. Mount Pinatubo was considered the biggest eruption of the 20th century, causing global temperatures to cool by 0.5 degrees Celsius for an entire year!
The Volcano has historically erupted once every 10,000 – 12,000 years. The last eruption was 12,900 years ago.
It is hard to say exactly how devastating the Laacher See Volcano would be to Europe, but some scientists who were willing to talk about it said it would basically be TOTAL devastation. Cities all over Europe such as London, Berlin, Paris and others would be completely covered in ash."
Scientists say the Laacher See Volcano is similar in size to Mount Pinatubo, which erupted in Indonesia in 1991. Mount Pinatubo was considered the biggest eruption of the 20th century, causing global temperatures to cool by 0.5 degrees Celsius for an entire year!
The Volcano has historically erupted once every 10,000 – 12,000 years. The last eruption was 12,900 years ago.
It is hard to say exactly how devastating the Laacher See Volcano would be to Europe, but some scientists who were willing to talk about it said it would basically be TOTAL devastation. Cities all over Europe such as London, Berlin, Paris and others would be completely covered in ash."
Submission + - Saudi hackers exposed 18,000 Israeli credit card n (ynet.co.il)
sergei83 writes: The Israeli news site Ynet reports that Saudi hackers have published files which according to their claims contain personal information of more than 40,000 Israelis including more than 18 thousand credit card numbers.
On Monday evening the hackers took control of a popular Israeli sports website "One" and have published on its homepage links to files containing the personal information.
The hackers have identified themselves to be part of the Anonymous group, however, an Israeli Anonymous group member Guy Shefer commented that he had contacted his group counterparts who had denied any involvement in the incident.
On Monday evening the hackers took control of a popular Israeli sports website "One" and have published on its homepage links to files containing the personal information.
The hackers have identified themselves to be part of the Anonymous group, however, an Israeli Anonymous group member Guy Shefer commented that he had contacted his group counterparts who had denied any involvement in the incident.
Submission + - Securing Android for the Enterprise (net-security.org)
Orome1 writes: While many companies use IPsec for secure remote access to their networks, no integrated IPsec VPN client is available on Android. Apple has already fixed this shortcoming in iOS, in part, because it wanted make the iPhone attractive for businesses. The Android operating system doesn’t just lack an integrated IPsec VPN client, it also makes installing and configuring third-party VPN software quite complicated. IPsec VPN clients have to be integrated into the kernel of each device, and the client software has to be installed specifically for a memory area. This means that the firmware of each Android smartphone or tablet has to be modified accordingly. Until a “real” IPsec VPN client is available, Android users can use their devices’ integrated VPN clients based on PPTP or L2TP, which is deployed over IPsec. A “real” IPsec VPN connection, however, is more secure because it encrypts data prior to authentication.
Submission + - US Fears Chinese Malware Hidden in Imports (internetevolution.com)
hapworth writes: Sources close to the Obama administration say the White House believes China has been delivering malware-contaminated computer and network hardware to targeted companies. According to author Robert McGarvey, the situation is so serious that experts are recommending companies unplug key computers from their networks, to make sure data stays in-house; and at least one government agency in Washington, DC, isn't allowing Chinese-made computers on the premises. A retired security official quoted in the story notes that the truly worrisome thing is that these hidden bugs are hard to detect: "What you might find is hardware that just is a little off spec, and in that variation is the vulnerability. But you probably won’t even know it is there."
Submission + - User Poll Shows Tablets, eReaders Top Tech Gift Gu (computerworld.com)
Lucas123 writes: Every year, Computerworld polls its readers on what types of tech gear they want to give and/or receive for the holidays. While the top five categories they chose are pretty much the same as in 2010 — tablets, e-readers, smartphones, laptops and HDTVs — the products themselves have changed significantly. For example, Android powerhouses such as the Samsung Galaxy Nexus phone and the Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime tablet are strong contenders this year while in years past Apple's iPhone 4S and iPad 2 topped the lists.
