http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry1534.html Could this be the end of pump and dump spammers? A new advanced Recurrent Pattern Detection system has successfully trapped the new wave of PDF image spam, while Texas law enforcement has been successful in bringing two pump and dump scumbags to justice.

http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry1519.html A laptop belonging to the company that handle the Duchy payroll has been stolen. No biggies, other than this is the company owned by the future King of England, whose personal and financial details reside upon the laptop. A company spokesperson has told journalist types that this could "pose a security threat if a technical expert was able to breach its password protection." Well duh.

According to Davey Winder writing at http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry1498.html the latest concept in Wii video game control could be pants, or boxers if you prefer. And let's not forget the bra either. It certainly brings a whole new meaning to gripping your joystick or twiddling with buttons to get excited during gameplay. As he says in the story "you will have to be really careful about who you invite over for a gaming session when that game is controlled by players physically touching each other in the underwear department. Even the invitation itself is probably best made to real close friends only, as you might feel uncomfortable asking strangers for a game of Pong in their panties." It appears that someone has designed a Wii controller that comes in two parts, one in a bra and the other in gents boxers. Mapping the game controls to the first device, a bra, was simple enough: "touching the left breast made the pong paddle go left and the right breast made the paddle go right." This has developed into two controllers, both with six sensors a piece. For the men it is the ladies bra, which they do not wear but rather stand behind their partner to control. For the ladies it is a pair of boxer shorts with strategically placed buttons. And before you ask, no I really don't fancy a game of Pong with you!

According to Bill Andad (http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry1497.html) the concept of a soldier with a battery powered radio hiding in the bushes and reporting back to base for enemy troop position information is, other than in the movies, long gone. Instead, it would seem, the US Army is relying upon a Microsoft SharePoint portal over satellite instead. Andad writes: "The US Army South has successfully deployed Corpora's iOra Application Acceleration software alongside its Microsoft SharePoint platform to provide improved in-the-field access to operational information and collaboration with their main command post at Fort Sam, Houston. The network acceleration solution has enhanced the army's ability to coordinate its humanitarian, theater security co-operation and anti terrorism operations in Southern and Central America according to a press release from Corpora that I received today. The Army's SharePoint deployment relies on this acceleration technology to provide soldiers with round-the-clock access to operational information wherever they are, sending each other links to pages they have created on SharePoint. This critical information can be more safely stored, kept more up to date and made more accessible to whoever needs it than it was when the military relied on that old technology of email."

According to a blog posting here: http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry1491.html Google has gone on the attack after Privacy International published an interim report daring to suggest that Google privacy sucked so bad it was bottom of the entire list of Internet companies researched. The blog author claims that: "Google is slated for many reasons relating to privacy, including some worrying ones such as personal user information being retained for an indefinite period of time but without the use having an option to delete it, and the recording of search strings and IP addresses of its users with no clear policy regarding when that data is deleted, thought to be between 18 and 24 months." and "PI obviously knew that a Google storm was going to break as a result of this, because it states within that interim report "we are aware that the decision to place Google at the bottom of the ranking is likely to be controversial, but throughout our research we have found numerous deficiencies and hostilities in Google's approach to privacy that go well beyond those of other organizations. While a number of companies share some of these negative elements, none comes close to achieving status as an endemic threat to privacy." plus "But perhaps it was not expecting to receive information from two European journalists who, independently of each other, revealed that Google representatives had contacted them with the claim that "Privacy International has a conflict of interest regarding Microsoft." It then goes on to publish, in full, an open letter from Privacy International demanding an apology and that Google cease and desist. I love it when you get a big organisational flame war going like this, and can hardly wait until Monday morning for the Google response, although I guess it is going to be along the lines of get stuffed.