Showing headlines posted by BernardSwiss

While Google Fiber has managed to get ISPs to compete in the areas it's deployed, the project has also managed to spawn a new, misleading but entertaining phenomenon I've affectionately labeled "fiber to the press release." In a fiber to the press release deployment, a carrier (usually one with a history of doing the bare minimum on upgrades) proudly proclaims that they too will soon be offering 1 Gbps broadband. The announcement will contain absolutely no hard specifics on how many people will get the upgrades, but the press will happily parrot the announcement and state that "ISP X" has suddenly joined the ultra-fast broadband race. Why spend money on a significant deployment when you can have the press help you pretend you did?

Windigo, as the attack campaign has been dubbed, has been active since 2011 and has compromised systems belonging to the Linux Foundation's kernel.org and the developers of the cPanel Web hosting control panel, according to a detailed report published Tuesday by researchers from antivirus provider Eset. During its 36-month run, Windigo has compromised more than 25,000 servers with robust malware that sends more than 35 million spam messages a day and exposes Windows-based Web visitors to drive-by malware attacks. It also feeds people running any type of computer banner ads for porn services.

A European telecom law approved by a committee today is intended to prevent Internet service providers from blocking or slowing down Web applications, but lets ISPs charge content providers for higher quality of service.

Critics say this allowance will create an Internet "fast lane" and undermine the principles of net neutrality, that Internet service providers should treat all traffic equally. The European Parliament's Industry Committee announced its vote in favor of the "Connected Continent" legislation, saying that "Internet providers should no longer be able to block or slow down Internet services provided by their competitors."

(Be sure to check out the mouse-over text, which refers most particularly to the 'sudoers' man page...)

Jugaad Innovation: Entrepreneurs in the developing world use ingenious workarounds to innovate amid scarcity, like the $25 fridge made of clay that needs no electricity. Author Navi Radjou argues this "jugaad" innovation can teach western business a thing or two.

Connecting the World: What's the best way to get Silicon Valley engineers to design for the developing world? Make them use the same patchy networks and basic devices their customers use. Journalist Mat Honan explains how low end tools are helping connect the world.

When we briefly got our hands on Valve's prototype Steam Controller earlier this year, we found the face buttons placed right up against the lip of the circular touch pads more than a little awkward to use. Now, Valve is showing images of a new version of the controller that replaces those buttons and the planned touchscreen on the face of the controller with new analog directional and action buttons that resemble the layout of many other gaming controllers.

According to a report from The Wall Street Journal, Microsoft and Google are both out to stifle any device that doesn't have a firm allegiance to either Android or Windows. The report says that both companies have told Asus to end its dual-OS product lines and that Asus is complying. The WSJ says Asus' newest dual-boot product, the Transformer Book Duet TD300, which we wrote about during CES 2014, will never see the light of day. Asus' all-in-one PCs, the Transformer AiO P1801 and P1802, will be pulled from the market.

In a historic decision on Friday, the United States has decided to give up control of the authoritative root zone file, which contains all names and addresses of all top-level domain names.

For the past seven years, an annual hacker competition that pays big cash prizes has driven home the point that no Internet-connected software, regardless of who made it, is immune to exploits that surreptitiously install malware on the underlying computer. The first day of this year's Pwn2Own 2014 and the companion contest that ran concurrently stuck with much the same theme, with successful hacks of the Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari browsers and Adobe's Flash and Reader applications...

... During day two, Chrome was on tap to be tested. If it is successfully felled, it wouldn't be the first time. Meanwhile, George "GeoHot" Hotz, the hacker who famously bypassed the copyright restrictions of the Sony PlayStation 3, reportedly became the fourth contestant to defeat Firefox during day two. Update: Vupen has reportedly pwned Chrome as well.

The inventor of the world wide web believes an online "Magna Carta" is needed to protect and enshrine the independence of the medium he created and the rights of its users worldwide.

Sir Tim Berners-Lee told the Guardian the web had come under increasing attack from governments and corporate influence and that new rules were needed to protect the "open, neutral" system.

New demand dwarfs licensing fees charged by Microsoft, and it will go to the jury.

It should aid porting Windows games to other platforms, but it won't be revolutionary.

If Canada's government can't muster faith in US cloud computing, why should you?

In August 2011, the federal government announced plans to consolidate more than 100 different email systems used by over 300,000 employees into a single, outsourced email system. While the email transition is currently underway -- Bell won the nearly $400 million contract last year -- the decision quietly sparked a trade fight with the United States that placed the spotlight on the risks associated with hosting computer data outside the country.

By the end of part 1, we had purchased a domain name, set up a basic server, and done a bare-bones installation of Postfix and Dovecot. Here in part 2, we've got three primary tasks: Acquire and install an SSL/TLS certificate for our mail server; Perform some basic Postfix configuration so that it can function as an MTA and work with Dovecot; Perform some basic Dovecot configuration, including setting up three virtual users and their mail directories. Let's get started.

The patent exchange was spun in positive terms, as something that would boost Twitter's intellectual property portfolio to help it defend itself from other threats against competitors. The exchange does do that, but this "deal" wouldn't have happened but at the end of IBM's massive patent gun, which was pointed at Twitter right before its IPO.

The scourge of the remote access trojan (RAT)—those predatory apps that use Web microphones and cameras to surreptitiously spy on victims—has formally entered the Android arena. Not only have researchers found a covert RAT briefly available for download in the official Google Play store, they have also detected a full-featured toolkit for sale in underground forums that could make it easy for other peeping Toms to do the same thing.

The specific RAT in Google Play was disguised as a legitimate app called Parental Control, according to Marc Rogers, principal security researcher at Lookout Mobile, a provider of antimalware software for Android phones. He doesn't know exactly how long it was available on Google servers, but he believes it wasn't long.

Personal Audio LLC has recently become one of the more well-known "patent trolls" due to its broad claims to owning basic podcasting technology. The company has filed lawsuits in East Texas, claiming that its patents on "episodic content" technology, which stem from founder Jim Logan's failed "Magazines on Tape" business, entitle it to royalties from podcasters large and small.

That got the company special attention from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which crowdfunded a challenge to the Personal Audio patents. EFF asked donors to help raise $30,000 to file an "inter partes review" at the US Patent and Trademark Office. That goal was quickly surpassed, and EFF ultimately received about $80,000 from more than 1,300 donors upset about the "podcasting patent."

For many years, we've highlighted how copyright maximalists have abused the international trade process to expand copyright monopolies around the globe. If you're interested in the history there, I highly recommend the book Information Feudalism: Who Owns the Knowledge Economy?, which details much of the history.

Now anyone is entitled to their own opinion and views of the world, but it is alarming to see that the very people who are in charge of formulating the rules that will shape our use of the digital environment for years to come are basing their ideas on a rather simplistic model of the Internet, that looks at the Internet as if it was yet another push medium in the the line of newspapers, radio, CDs or television.

As we noted last year, Intellectual Ventures started out insisting that it was a licensing company, not a patent troll. But it soon spoiled that story by filing more and more lawsuits, probably because it was running out of cash. A couple of weeks ago it laid off workers, too. But however rough things have been for Intellectual Ventures recently, they are likely to get a lot worse. That's because Congress looks like it might finally try to reform the patent system in a meaningful way that makes life harder for patent trolls. That's doubtless why Intellectual Ventures opened up a Washington DC office last year; and it also probably explains the following move, as reported in The Hill: