pribut - Slashdot User

Facebook Photos Lead To Cancellation of Quebec Woman's Insurance 645

Posted by timothy on Sunday November 22, 2009 @08:51AM from the public-option dept.

No. 24601 writes "A Quebec woman on long-term sick leave, due to a diagnosis of depression, lost her health benefits after her insurance provider found photos of her on Facebook smiling and looking cheerful at parties and out on the beach. Besides all the obvious questions, how did the insurance company access her locked Facebook profile?"

Ten Things Mobile Phones Will Make Obsolete 778

Posted by timothy on Saturday November 21, 2009 @08:02PM from the try-finding-a-payphone-now dept.

An anonymous reader writes "recombu.com has an article examining ten things mobile phones will make obsolete, including phone booths, wristwatches and handheld games consoles. It's interesting to see how many devices have been absorbed into mobile phone technology, and it raises the question: are we better off having everything in one device? The author poignantly concludes that while it's great to have so much power at our fingertips, it does mean that some of us will rely on mobile phones for even basic mental tasks, which is great until the battery runs out." See also Isaac Asimov's The Feeling of Power.

First Malicious iPhone Worm In the Wild 135

Posted by timothy on Saturday November 21, 2009 @04:37PM from the because-some-jerks-are-clever dept.

An anonymous reader writes "After the ikee worm that displayed a picture of Rick Astley on jailbroken iPhones, the first malicious iPhone worm (Google translation; original, in Dutch) has now been discovered in the wild. Internet provider XS4ALL in the Netherlands encountered several of such devices (link in Dutch) on the wireless networks of their customers and put out a warning. After obtaining a copy of the malware it was discovered that the jailbroken phones, which are exploited through openSSH with a default password, scan IP ranges of mobile internet providers for other vulnerable iPhones, phone home to a C&C botnet server, are able to update themselves with additional malware and have the ability to dump the SMS database as well. Owners of a jailbroken iPhone with a default root password are advised to flash to the latest Apple firmware in order to ensure no malware is present."

Comment TMization: Patent to be applied for on mispellings (Score 1) 110

by pribut on Friday May 15, 2009 @09:46AM (#27965447) Attached to: Dean Kamen Awarded Patent For Robot Competition Rules

I want to patent the concept of mispelling and making up words. This patent will include both deliberate mispellings and makeups such as "coopertition" and confabulations which arise from the deep subconscious.

While some are aware of the term "Spoonerism", Spooner is long dead and not around to patent this. Since many of these are also associated with Trademarks, we could call it TMization.

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