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Submission + - Controversial Torrent Streaming App 'Popcorn Time' Shuts Down, Then Gets Reborn (torrentfreak.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A piece of software called 'Popcorn Time' drew a lot of attention last week for encapsulating movies torrents within a slick UI that made watching pirated films as easy as firing up Netflix. The app ran into trouble a few days ago when it was pulled from its hosting provider, Mega, and now Popcorn Time's creators say they're shutting it down altogether. They say it was mainly an experiment: 'Piracy is not a people problem. It’s a service problem. A problem created by an industry that portrays innovation as a threat to their antique recipe to collect value. It seems to everyone that they just don't care. But people do. We’ve shown that people will risk fines, lawsuits and whatever consequences that may come just to be able to watch a recent movie in slippers. Just to get the kind of experience they deserve.' However, the software itself isn't a complete loss — the project is being picked up by the founder of a torrent site, and he says development will continue.

Submission + - ICANN considers using '127.0.53.53' to tackle DNS namespace collisions (computerworld.com.au) 1

Submitted by angry tapir
angry tapir writes: As the number of top-level domains undergoes explosive growth, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is studying ways to reduce the risk of traffic intended for internal network destinations ending up on the Internet via the Domain Name System. Proposals in a report produced on behalf of ICANN include preventing .mail, .home and .corp ever being Internet TLDs; allowing the forcible de-delegation of some second-level domains in emergencies; and returning 127.0.53.53 as an IP address in the hopes that sysadmins will have a WTF moment and Google it.

Submission + - Apple Drops Snow Leopard Security Updates, Doesn't Tell Anyone (computerworld.com)

Submitted by Freshly Exhumed
Freshly Exhumed writes: As Apple issued an update for Mavericks, Mountain Lion, and Lion yesterday, Snow Leopard users have not seen a security update since September, 2013. This would not be noteworthy if Apple, like a host of other major software vendors, would clearly spell out its OS support policies and warn users of such changes, but they have not. Thus, the approximately 20% of Mac users still running Snow Leopard now find themselves in a very vulnerable state without the latest security updates.

Submission + - Netflix packets being dropped every day because Verizon wants more money (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: We've been hearing more and more reports of ISPs throttling Netflix and other high-bandwidth services lateyly. The ISPs have denied it, and even Netflix itself seems to believe them. If that's the case, what's going on? Well, according to this article, the blame still lies with the ISPs. While they may not be explicitly throttling connection speeds, they're refusing to upgrade network connections as they demand more money from content distributors. For example, Netflix pays Cogent to distribute their internet traffic. Cogent has an agreement with Verizon to exchange traffic — which works fine until the massive amount of traffic from Netflix makes it a lopsided arrangement. Verizon wants more money from Cogent, and one of their negotiating tactics is simply to stop upgrading their infrastructure so that service degrades. 'There are about 11 Cogent/Verizon peering connections in major cities around the country. When peering partners aren't fighting, they typically upgrade the connections (or "ports") when they're about 50 percent full, Cogent says. ... With Cogent and Verizon fighting, the upgrades are happening at a glacial pace, according to Schaeffer. "Once a port hits about 85 percent throughput, you're going to begin to start to drop packets," he said. "Clearly when a port is at 120 or 130 percent [as the Cogent/Verizon ones are] the packet loss is material."'

Submission + - Seattle PD mum on tracking by its new WiFi mesh network

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The Stranger reports that Seattle's police department has installed a WiFi mesh network paid for by the Department of Homeland Security.

FTA: The SPD declined to answer more than a dozen questions from The Stranger, including whether the network is operational, who has access to its data, what it might be used for, and whether the SPD has used it (or intends to use it) to geo-locate people's devices via their MAC addresses or other identifiers.

Submission + - Tesla Fires and Firestorms: Let's Breathe and Review Some Car Fire Math (greencarreports.com)

Submitted by cartechboy
cartechboy writes: There are about 150,000 vehicle fires reported every year in the U.S. — 17 every hour. But when that vehicle fire is a Tesla, the Internet notices. There have now been three fires among roughly 20,000 Tesla Model S electric cars in the road so far. The stock is down, the Feds are asking questions and the Internet is floating in Tesla news. It may be time to check the facts and review some math (hint: we're looking at roughly one fire for every 33 million miles driven so far) and then breathe. Then look at what we know, what we don't know, and what we should know.

Submission + - Simple Bug Exposed Verizon Users' SMS Histories

Submitted by Trailrunner7
Trailrunner7 writes: A security researcher discovered a simple vulnerability in Verizon Wireless’s Web-based customer portal that enabled anyone who knows a subscriber’s phone number to download that user’s SMS message history, including the numbers of the people he communicated with.

The vulnerability, which has been resolved now, resulted from a failure of the Verizon Web app to check that a number entered into the app actually belonged to the user who was entering it. After entering the number, a user could then download a spreadsheet file of the SMS activity on a target account. Cody Collier, the researcher who discovered the vulnerability, said he decided right away to report it to Verizon because he is a Verizon customer and didn’t want others to have access to his account information.

“I am a Verizon Wireless customer myself, so upon finding this, I immediately looked for a way to contact Verizon. I wouldn’t want my account information to exposed in such way,” Collier said via email.
Transportation

Submission + - 175 MPH Student-Built EV Smashes Speed Record (byu.edu) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A team of Brigham Young University students recently smashed the world land speed record for electric vehicles by hitting a top speed of 175 miles per hour in their self-built electric car. The car, named “Electric Blue,” reached high speeds thanks to lithium iron phosphate batteries and its streamlined design, which is capped by a tail fin for speed and agility.

Submission + - 80% of Arctic Ozone Lost (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by
iONiUM
iONiUM writes: "From the article, 'About 20km (13 miles) above the ground, 80% of the ozone was lost, they say. The cause was an unusually long spell of cold weather at altitude. In cold conditions, the chlorine chemicals that destroy ozone are at their most active.'
This is the first time in history that the Arctic ozone has been depleted to such extensive levels. This will mean high UV problems for Russia, Greenland and Norway."
Games

Submission + - PSN Pass for All future PS3 Multiplayer Games (gamepolitics.com)

Submitted by zeroshade
zeroshade writes: Sony has confirmed that going forward, all games will use the PSN Pass to force used game buyers to pay an extra $10 just for the right to play the multiplayer component of any used games they buy for the PS3.
Businesses

Submission + - If Search is Google's Castle, Android is the Moat

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens writes
Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Warren Buffet once said that the best businesses were economic castles protected by unbreachable moats. Now Erick Schonfeld writes that if Search is Google’s economic castle, Android is a moat, Chrome browser is a moat, and Google Apps is a moat — all free products, subsidized by search profits, intended to protect the economic castle that is search. "Android, as well as Chrome and Chrome OS for that matter, are not “products” in the classic business sense. They have no plan to become their own “economic castles," says Benchmark Capital VC Bill Gurley. "They are not trying to make a profit on Android or Chrome. They want to take any layer that lives between themselves and the consumer and make it free (or even less than free)." So don’t measure the success of Google’s new businesses by how much revenue or profit they generate directly but measure it by how much they shore up Google’s core search business. "Google is [ ] scorching the earth for 250 miles around the outside of the castle to ensure no one can approach it. And best I can tell, they are doing a damn good job of it.""
The Internet

Sweden Sees Boom In Legal Downloading 121

Posted by kdawson from the encouraging-them dept.
Quantos writes with word that in Sweden, in addition to a drop in traffic following the introduction of the IPRED anti-file sharing law, the country also saw a doubling of legal downloads. "The sale of music via the Internet and mobile phones has increased by 100 percent since the Swedish anti-file sharing IPRED law entered into force last week, according to digital content provider InProdicon. '...I don't know if this is only because of IPRED, but it is definitely a sign of a major change,' said managing director Klas Brännström. InProdicon provides half of the downloaded tunes in Sweden via several online and mobile music services." Meanwhile The Pirate Bay's anticipated VPN service has seen over 113,000 requests for beta invitations since late last month; 80% are from Sweden. Traffic numbers may begin to rise again once the service goes live.

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