Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Vodafone releasing iPhone in Australia, Italy, India, and seven other countries
Vodafone today announced it has signed an agreement with Apple to sell the iPhone in ten of its markets around the globe. Later this year, Vodafone customers in Australia, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, Italy, India, Portugal, New Zealand, South Africa and Turkey will be able to purchase the iPhone for use on the Vodafone network.
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Oracle Warns of Critical db Server Vulnerabilities
atabase server giant Oracle plans to ship a major security update on Tuesday, April 15 to cover more than 40 vulnerabilities in a wide range of products.
The fixes are part of the company's quarterly CPU (critical patch update) and will cover severe vulnerabilities across hundreds of Oracle products.
According to Oracle's advance notice, 17 of the 41 flaws were discovered in its flagship Oracle Database, including two for Oracle Application Express.
"Two of these vulnerabilities may be remotely exploited without authentication, i.e., may be exploited over a network without the need for a username and password," the company warned.
The fixes are part of the company's quarterly CPU (critical patch update) and will cover severe vulnerabilities across hundreds of Oracle products.
According to Oracle's advance notice, 17 of the 41 flaws were discovered in its flagship Oracle Database, including two for Oracle Application Express.
"Two of these vulnerabilities may be remotely exploited without authentication, i.e., may be exploited over a network without the need for a username and password," the company warned.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Colombian Man Sentenced for Computer Fraud
Colombian man who used keylogging software in a lucrative identity theft scheme has been sentenced to nine years in prison and ordered to pay restitution of US$347,000.
Mario Simbaqueba Bonilla, 40, pleaded guilty in U.S. federal court in January to conspiracy, access device fraud and aggravated identity theft. His scheme, which he carried out alone and with a co-conspirator between 2004 and 2007, had more than 600 victims worldwide, including employees of the U.S. Department of Defense, according to the Department of Justice.
Bonilla installed keylogging software on hotel business-center computers and Internet lounges in order to steal passwords and other personal data. Then he and his partner used complex computer intrusion methods to steal money from accounts. After transferring the money to credit and debit cards or cash, Bonilla used it to buy electronics and pay for luxury travel to Hong Kong, France, Jamaica, the U.S. and other places, according to the Justice Department. The court pegged the actual and attempted losses from the scheme at $1.4 million.
Bonilla was arrested by federal agents last August when he flew into the U.S. with a laptop, purchased with stolen funds, that contained personal and financial information on more than 600 people.
Mario Simbaqueba Bonilla, 40, pleaded guilty in U.S. federal court in January to conspiracy, access device fraud and aggravated identity theft. His scheme, which he carried out alone and with a co-conspirator between 2004 and 2007, had more than 600 victims worldwide, including employees of the U.S. Department of Defense, according to the Department of Justice.
Bonilla installed keylogging software on hotel business-center computers and Internet lounges in order to steal passwords and other personal data. Then he and his partner used complex computer intrusion methods to steal money from accounts. After transferring the money to credit and debit cards or cash, Bonilla used it to buy electronics and pay for luxury travel to Hong Kong, France, Jamaica, the U.S. and other places, according to the Justice Department. The court pegged the actual and attempted losses from the scheme at $1.4 million.
Bonilla was arrested by federal agents last August when he flew into the U.S. with a laptop, purchased with stolen funds, that contained personal and financial information on more than 600 people.
Monday, April 14, 2008
Bush's Cyber Secrets Dilemma
There's a problem facing the Bush administration: It has $30 billion to spend over the next five to seven years to keep the U.S. safe from hackers and cyberspies. But to extend that protection to the nation's critical infrastructure--including banks, telecommunications and transportation--it needs the cooperation of the private sector.
And among corporate executives, even those who want to help are wary: How can the business world participate in the government's cyber initiative, they ask, if the government remains intensely secretive?
"There's very little transparency as to the government's plans," says Bruce McConnell, a former information technology policy director for the White House's Office of Management and Budget who now works as a private consultant. "To protect critical infrastructure, we need to create trustworthy mechanisms for sharing information. That can't happen when one side's position is secret."
And among corporate executives, even those who want to help are wary: How can the business world participate in the government's cyber initiative, they ask, if the government remains intensely secretive?
"There's very little transparency as to the government's plans," says Bruce McConnell, a former information technology policy director for the White House's Office of Management and Budget who now works as a private consultant. "To protect critical infrastructure, we need to create trustworthy mechanisms for sharing information. That can't happen when one side's position is secret."
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Computers Catching up
They can feel pain, breastfeed, share a laugh with the kids, even determine your mood. Now, it seems, robots can also tell if you’re hot, or not.
Researchers at Tel Aviv University say they have taught a computer to interpret attractiveness in women. The computer learned to judge attractiveness by mapping the geometric shape of facial features from 100 different images previously been rated from 1 to 7 in terms of attractiveness, by a group of 30 men and women.
By noting what features humans found attractive, the computer was then able to successfully identify good looking individuals in additional images. The ratings were also based partly on geometric symmetry in faces which have long been linked to attractiveness, as defined by humans.
The researchers say it could be used in reconstructive surgery, presumably to guide plastic surgeons in making patients as attractive as possible.
I wonder, however, if it could also be used to generate ratings on some yet to be developed website that provides an alternative to Hot or Not. Human generated ratings from the latter seem to be based more on how much skin one reveals.
Then again, robots might learn to like a little extra flesh as well.
Researchers at Tel Aviv University say they have taught a computer to interpret attractiveness in women. The computer learned to judge attractiveness by mapping the geometric shape of facial features from 100 different images previously been rated from 1 to 7 in terms of attractiveness, by a group of 30 men and women.
By noting what features humans found attractive, the computer was then able to successfully identify good looking individuals in additional images. The ratings were also based partly on geometric symmetry in faces which have long been linked to attractiveness, as defined by humans.
The researchers say it could be used in reconstructive surgery, presumably to guide plastic surgeons in making patients as attractive as possible.
I wonder, however, if it could also be used to generate ratings on some yet to be developed website that provides an alternative to Hot or Not. Human generated ratings from the latter seem to be based more on how much skin one reveals.
Then again, robots might learn to like a little extra flesh as well.
Saturday, April 12, 2008
BBC is under fire
The BBC is under fire from one of the biggest ISPs in the UK - Tiscali - which is demanding money from the broadcaster to recoup the costs of serving users of the BBC's popular TV streaming service, iPlayer.
I find it hard to understand why Tiscali thinks it should receive money - other than the possibility that it perceives the BBC as an easy target.
The BBC estimate that the service has increased the UK's use of bandwidth by between 3 and 5%. That is puny compared to the effect of peer-to-peer file sharing - much of which is illegal. A report last year found that between 50 and 80% of all traffic in the countries studied comes from peer-to-peer.
Tiscali is among the many ISPs that use a technique called traffic shaping to reduce the bandwidth available for peer-to-peer programs. Doing the same to iPlayer traffic would be simple. But not very popular.
As yet Tiscali is the only one to grumble about the iPlayer. Other ISPs have said they are so far coping with the extra demand from the it and other video services. But as streaming video gets more popular and of higher quality - in part thanks to the success of the iPlayer - ISPs will likely feel the effects.
It is plausible that one result will be changes to the way "unlimited" bandwidth packages are sold. They will have to either get more expensive, or start to disappear, with customers paying for what they use.
Installation of optical fibre systems - which will be faster than delivering broadband over phone lines as most UK ISPs do - may also become more urgent.
But our increasing appetite for bandwidth may in future become a problem for cellphone networks too. The latest generation of devices like the iPhone will make using the mobile web much easier - and online video is already part of it.
So far, advances in the capacity of the infrastructure used by phones has kept well ahead of demand. But perhaps, not long from now, wireless network operators will also start to feel their bandwidth squeezed, as people stream TV during their commutes instead of listening to music.
I find it hard to understand why Tiscali thinks it should receive money - other than the possibility that it perceives the BBC as an easy target.
The BBC estimate that the service has increased the UK's use of bandwidth by between 3 and 5%. That is puny compared to the effect of peer-to-peer file sharing - much of which is illegal. A report last year found that between 50 and 80% of all traffic in the countries studied comes from peer-to-peer.
Tiscali is among the many ISPs that use a technique called traffic shaping to reduce the bandwidth available for peer-to-peer programs. Doing the same to iPlayer traffic would be simple. But not very popular.
As yet Tiscali is the only one to grumble about the iPlayer. Other ISPs have said they are so far coping with the extra demand from the it and other video services. But as streaming video gets more popular and of higher quality - in part thanks to the success of the iPlayer - ISPs will likely feel the effects.
It is plausible that one result will be changes to the way "unlimited" bandwidth packages are sold. They will have to either get more expensive, or start to disappear, with customers paying for what they use.
Installation of optical fibre systems - which will be faster than delivering broadband over phone lines as most UK ISPs do - may also become more urgent.
But our increasing appetite for bandwidth may in future become a problem for cellphone networks too. The latest generation of devices like the iPhone will make using the mobile web much easier - and online video is already part of it.
So far, advances in the capacity of the infrastructure used by phones has kept well ahead of demand. But perhaps, not long from now, wireless network operators will also start to feel their bandwidth squeezed, as people stream TV during their commutes instead of listening to music.
Saturday, April 5, 2008
Microsoft caught spying
If you used the instant-messaging system MSN messenger in June 2006, all your chats were being collected and being passed (anonymised, of course) to researchers at Microsoft Research, a paper in the physics pre-print server arXiv reveals.
But their results aren't headline grabbing - they show people are more likely to chat with others in the same geographical location, age group and of the same sex. As the arXiv blogger points out, more interesting is the fact the researchers struggled with the size of their dataset:
"The sheer size of the data limits the kinds of analyses one can perform," they write. The 4.5 terabytes of chat logs took 12 hours to copy onto an eight-processor server for processing.
The US security services have made moves to assemble databases of online communication that will surely dwarf that - watching over phone calls, social networking sites and emails.
Extracting useful information - not just generalities like the study mentioned above - is going to require massive amounts of storage and processing power. The spying game just isn't the same any more. How long before James Bond is seen acting on a tip-off from network theorists with ranked armies of servers at their backs?
Tom Simonite, online technology reporter
But their results aren't headline grabbing - they show people are more likely to chat with others in the same geographical location, age group and of the same sex. As the arXiv blogger points out, more interesting is the fact the researchers struggled with the size of their dataset:
"The sheer size of the data limits the kinds of analyses one can perform," they write. The 4.5 terabytes of chat logs took 12 hours to copy onto an eight-processor server for processing.
The US security services have made moves to assemble databases of online communication that will surely dwarf that - watching over phone calls, social networking sites and emails.
Extracting useful information - not just generalities like the study mentioned above - is going to require massive amounts of storage and processing power. The spying game just isn't the same any more. How long before James Bond is seen acting on a tip-off from network theorists with ranked armies of servers at their backs?
Tom Simonite, online technology reporter
Soccer robots compete for the title
Robot soccer is an ambitious high-tech competition for universities, research institutes and industry. Several major tournaments are planned for 2008, the biggest of which is the 'RoboCup German Open'. From April 21-25, over 80 teams of scientists from more than 15 countries are expected to face off in Hall 25 at the Hannover Messe. In a series of soccer matches in several leagues, they will be putting the latest technologies on display. The tournament is being organized and carried out by the Fraunhofer Institute for Intelligent Analysis and Information Systems IAIS in Sankt Augustin.
For a machine, a soccer match is a highly complex endeavor. Robots must be able to reliably recognize the ball, the sidelines and the goalposts in addition to distinguishing between their teammates and opponents. To this end, they are outfitted with all sorts of high-tech equipment: cameras and sensors scan the robots' surroundings, internal processors convert data to define game tactics and defense strategies, and innovative engines allow the automated players to sprint across the field and unexpectedly fake out their opponents.
There are now nine leagues, each of which has its own technological focus. In the middle-size league, robots get around on wheels. Four players and a goalkeeper compete for each team on a 20 x 14-meter pitch with standard soccer goals. They must be able to function completely independently and are equipped with internal camera systems that process information in real time. What's more, the robots can move up to two meters per second.
Other automated soccer players, such as Sony's robotic dog Aibo, run on four mechanical paws. And two-legged robots have been competing against each other at the RoboCup since 2005. "These humanoid robots have come a long way in recent years," says.
Dr. Ansgar Bredenfeld, who is in charge of the RoboCup at IAIS. "Just like real players, they fall down and get up again, go after the ball autonomously and score goals".
The RoboCup is more than just a soccer tournament. Since 2006, there has been a 'RoboCup(at)Home' category, a competition for service robots. In a replicated room, the robots must access refrigerators, collect garbage and recognize people. And in the 'RoboCup-Rescue' category, rescue robots must complete an obstacle course.
"RoboCup stimulates technological development in a way that wouldn't otherwise be possible," says Professor Stefan Wrobel, Executive Director of IAIS. "A number of components that were originally designed for robot soccer have since made their way into other applications, for instance in localization technology for inspection robots." Robots that can mow the lawn on their own or collect samples from the ocean floor for marine scientists are also equipped with RoboCup technology. For more Tech News, Reviews, Gadgets, Gizmos do visit http://www.212articles.com.
Source : http://www.fraunhofer.de/EN/index.jsp
For a machine, a soccer match is a highly complex endeavor. Robots must be able to reliably recognize the ball, the sidelines and the goalposts in addition to distinguishing between their teammates and opponents. To this end, they are outfitted with all sorts of high-tech equipment: cameras and sensors scan the robots' surroundings, internal processors convert data to define game tactics and defense strategies, and innovative engines allow the automated players to sprint across the field and unexpectedly fake out their opponents.
There are now nine leagues, each of which has its own technological focus. In the middle-size league, robots get around on wheels. Four players and a goalkeeper compete for each team on a 20 x 14-meter pitch with standard soccer goals. They must be able to function completely independently and are equipped with internal camera systems that process information in real time. What's more, the robots can move up to two meters per second.
Other automated soccer players, such as Sony's robotic dog Aibo, run on four mechanical paws. And two-legged robots have been competing against each other at the RoboCup since 2005. "These humanoid robots have come a long way in recent years," says.
Dr. Ansgar Bredenfeld, who is in charge of the RoboCup at IAIS. "Just like real players, they fall down and get up again, go after the ball autonomously and score goals".
The RoboCup is more than just a soccer tournament. Since 2006, there has been a 'RoboCup(at)Home' category, a competition for service robots. In a replicated room, the robots must access refrigerators, collect garbage and recognize people. And in the 'RoboCup-Rescue' category, rescue robots must complete an obstacle course.
"RoboCup stimulates technological development in a way that wouldn't otherwise be possible," says Professor Stefan Wrobel, Executive Director of IAIS. "A number of components that were originally designed for robot soccer have since made their way into other applications, for instance in localization technology for inspection robots." Robots that can mow the lawn on their own or collect samples from the ocean floor for marine scientists are also equipped with RoboCup technology. For more Tech News, Reviews, Gadgets, Gizmos do visit http://www.212articles.com.
Source : http://www.fraunhofer.de/EN/index.jsp
Yet another Tech Blog
Well yet another Tech blog as through my experience I have concluded its an undying need cause the speed of changing technology and the range of products , hardware and software that is taking our life but surprise every single day.
Thus, this blog will provide a platform News and Reviews on Latest Gizmo, Gadgets, Software , Hardware, SEO (Search Engine Optimization), tech tools and all the latest and most interesting Technology related news which you will find very significant.
Thus stay put as this is the beginning of Tech Storm thats hiding your way.
Can you save yourself from it .....
Thus, this blog will provide a platform News and Reviews on Latest Gizmo, Gadgets, Software , Hardware, SEO (Search Engine Optimization), tech tools and all the latest and most interesting Technology related news which you will find very significant.
Thus stay put as this is the beginning of Tech Storm thats hiding your way.
Can you save yourself from it .....
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