Tech Thoughts Daily Net News – July 12, 2012

Lifehacker Pack for Windows: Our List of the Best Windows Apps – Finding the right Windows app for your needs among the hoards of options can be tough. In our third annual Lifeahcker Pack for Windows, we’re highlighting the must-have apps for every occasion. As always, we have the good folks at Ninite helping us out this year, creating a one-click installer for the 2012 Windows Lifehacker Pack. You can download the entire pack at once, or just pick the apps you want, and Ninite will install them all at once—perfect for new Windows installations or setting up your friends with a good set of apps.

Facebook Expands Free Antivirus Offerings – Facebook has expanded its antivirus program to allow users to proactively request help if they suspect their account has been compromised.

Windows 8 release confirmed for October: Here’s how to get the best upgrade deal – For the first time, Microsoft is offering two very alluring upgrade paths: You can upgrade a new Windows 7 computer to Windows 8 for just $14.99 — or, you can upgrade the Windows 8 Release Preview (which is free!) for just $40.

Social Network Privacy Settings Compared – Facebook, Google+, and Twitter all have settings that let you tweak what others can see on your profile–but navigating them can be a bit of a mess. Here’s a guide.

How to Maximize Battery-Life While Traveling – If you take an iPhone, iPad, or MacBook along when you travel, you know how much of a challenge it can be to keep your device powered up. Here are a few tips.

How to replace your laptop DVD drive with an SSD – When it comes to upgrades, CPUs get all the attention, but odds are that turning your boot drive into an SSD will do more for your everyday performance. David Cardinal shows you how to do it right.

Nexus Q Living Room Battle: Google vs. Apple TV vs. the Rest (Chart) – How does the Nexus Q compare against the current living room superstars such as Apple TV? Here is a feature rundown.

Cisco Apologizes for Privacy ‘confusion,’ Makes Cloud Service an Opt-in Feature – Cisco Systems has taken a step back from its Cisco Connect Cloud service, removing it as the default setting for management of its Linksys EA Series Wi-Fi.

Microsoft details Windows 8 backup system, hoping people will use it this time – Less than five percent of consumer PCs use Windows Backup, Microsoft has said, explaining why it has introduced a system of continuous backup in Windows 8. The new system, File History, backs up content stored in the Libraries, Desktop, Favourites and Contacts folders to a chosen external storage device, by default every hour. In a blog post on Tuesday, Microsoft programme manager Bohdan Raciborski said the new approach was necessary as the old one had failed, leading many people to lose valuable data.

DNSChanger Doomsday Threat Fizzled–Just as It Should Have – You might see the whole DNSChanger ordeal as overblown. On the other hand, the information campaign worked.

Security:

Microsoft Urges Users to Shut Down Windows Gadgets or Risk Attack – Gadgets and Sidebar allow users to add visual information and small programs to the Windows desktop, including clock faces and RSS feed readers. Now, Microsoft has issued a Fix It solution to disable Gadgets and the Sidebar. These features, if left enabled, may allow the execution of arbitrary code, and could allow attackers to take complete control of a person’s system, Microsoft warns in a Knowledge Base article.

Trojan found being offered on Google Play for weeks – Symantec researchers have recently discovered Android malware being offered on Google Play, posing as legitimate game apps “Super Mario Bros.” and “GTA 3 Moscow City.” The two apps have been posted on Google Play on June 24, and have since then been downloaded by some 100,000 users.

Formspring breach and leak triggers massive password reset – Formspring, a social Q&A website popular with teenagers, is the latest site to have its servers breached and the passwords of its users compromised by hackers. According to a blog post by Formspring CEO Ade Olonoh, the company was notified that 420,000 password hashes that seem to belong to its users have been posted to a security forum, and immediately began an internal investigation. The company immediately disabled the passwords of all of its 28 million members.

Hackers post 450K logins likely pilfered from Yahoo – Credentials posted in plain text appear to have originated from the Web company’s Yahoo Voices platform. The hackers say they intended the data dump as a “wake-up call.”

Stolen passwords re-used to attack Best Buy accounts – Customer re-use of the same user name and password across multiple sites is being blamed for attacks on customer accounts at BestBuy.com.

Google Adds Full Flash Sandbox to Chrome 21 – Attackers have spent the last few years learning the ins and outs of Adobe Flash, looking for all of its weak spots, unintended behaviors and any other oddities that will enable them to exploit it. That’s been a profitable investment for them, but browser manufacturers and Adobe have been taking steps to change that, with the latest one being Google’s decision to place Flash in a full sandbox inside of Chrome.

Company News:

Google’s $199 Nexus 7 Tablet Confined to Google’s Store – Google’s Nexus 7 tablet can now be ordered on retail websites worldwide but, so far, the less expensive US$199 model remains exclusive to Google’s Play online store.

Kabbage Gets Social for Online Lending – Online lender extends bigger cash advances to entrepreneurs that engage their customers via social media.

F5, Partners Offer Service to Detect, Fix Web App Vulnerabilities – In hopes of giving customers some insight into what F5’s Big-IP Application Security Manager (ASM) Vulnerability Mitigation Assessment service can do, the vendor is offering businesses free application vulnerability assessment scans, which will identify threats and create an XML file that can be used by Big-IP ASM to mitigate the issues.

Google reverses course, stops harassing Opera users – After taking flak (and raising antitrust concerns) for pushing some users of alternative browsers to switch to Chrome, Google has made its error messages more neutral.

Webopedia Daily:

URL – Abbreviation of Uniform Resource Locator (URL) it is the global address of documents and other resources on the World Wide Web. The first part of the URL is called a protocol identifier and it indicates what protocol to use, and the second part is called a resource name and it specifies the IP address or the domain name where the resource is located. The protocol identifier and the resource name are separated by a colon and two forward slashes.

Off Topic (Sort of):

Bruce Schneier: Trust, security and society – Human societies run on trust. Every day, we all trust millions of people, organizations, and systems — and we do it so easily that we barely notice. But in any system of trust, there is an alternative, parasitic, strategy that involves abusing that trust. Making sure those defectors don’t destroy the very cooperative systems they’re abusing is an age-old problem, and we’ve developed a variety of societal pressures to induce cooperation: moral systems, reputational systems, institutional systems, and security systems. Understanding how these different societal pressures work — and fail — is essential to understanding the problems we face in today’s increasingly technological and interconnected world. Here’s Bruce Schneier’s keynote from Hack in The Box Amsterdam 2012:

Cleansing Your Digital Shadow: A Nearly Impossible Task – Have your embarrassing moments been immortalized online? Getting them removed is even harder than you think — even when you do everything right.

How terahertz laser scanners will spy on you in airports – It seems like every time I set foot in an airport, there is some new machine I need to stand in, walk through, or put my shoes on. Soon, if the Department of Homeland of Security has its way, airport security might be augmented with a laser that scans you from 50 meters away — a lot like a Star Trek tricorder.

Hack the diagnostics connector, steal yourself a BMW in 3 minutes – Reports say BMW leaves coded key info accessible through the OBD connector — which is completely open. Other automakers and their owners may be at risk, too. It’s “under investigation,” BMW says.

Font inspiration from film and television – Inspired by a font you see in film or TV shows? Ryan Boudreaux shares some of the places you can track down free versions of these fonts to use in your web designs.

Inside the touchscreen cockpit of the future – Forget dials and switches. The aircraft cockpit of 2030 will be built around a massive touchscreen display, according to concept tech at this year’s Farnborough International Airshow.

Today’s Quote:

“It is when power is wedded to chronic fear that it becomes formidable.”

–     Eric Hoffer

Today’s Free Downloads:

Wise Registry Cleaner 7.36 – Wise Registry Cleaner scans the Windows registry and finds incorrect or obsolete information in the registry. By fixing these obsolete information in Windows registry, your system will can work better and more quickly.

WinPatrol 25.0.2012.1 – WinPatrol takes snapshot of your critical system resources and alerts you to any changes that may occur without your knowledge. WinPatrol was the pioneer in using a heuristic behavioral approach to detecting attacks and violations of your computing environment.

The Immense Success of the Mobile Gaming Industry

Everywhere you look, you see people engulfed in their smartphones, shouts of joy and frustration coming from playing mobile games like Angry Birds, Draw Something and Cut the Rope. In just a few years, mobile gaming has literally exploded into a multi-million dollar industry (the industry is predicted to break 18 billion in total revenue by 2016).

Instead of just being the applications that game developers made because they couldn’t produce something for a console or the computer, mobile gaming now comprises a huge chunk of the gaming sector.

Hardcore gamers are all about the massively expensive computer rigs with eye-popping graphics and console gamers load up their massive TVs, but casual and hardcore gamers alike can be found with their heads buried in the latest mobile game. Even people who don’t really play games are into flinging stylized birds at discolored pigs. Smartphones have successfully turned nearly everyone into a gamer.

Handheld Market Share

Back in the day, the handheld gaming market was cornered by the console makers. While the Nintendo DS and Play Station Portable still have a presence in the market, mobile gaming on smartphones is chipping away at it more and more. Far more people have a smartphone than a DS, after all, and they are always going to have it on them for every-day use.

As the technology in smartphones advances, the complexity and appeal of mobile games continues to grow, utilizing touch screens, hi-definition, and motion sensitive controls. It is more practical for an individual to simply open an application on a phone to play a game for a few minutes than to dive into a highly specialized and complicated one on a separate device.

Branding and Captive Market

Businesses have a variety of options to take advantage of the focus that mobile gaming gives them. First, it doesn’t take as long to develop a mobile game as it does to create an AAA computer game and is much more inexpensive. Where months and years of preparation go into console and computer games, mobile games are intended for short term usage thus can be more simplified and quick to produce.

Branding and product integration is always front and center, and since the game requires interaction their focus will remain on the task at hand. By creating such a simple and identifiable interface, logos, and characters, it is easier for the user to relate and retain the information they have just engaged in. As a result, other doors are opened for further game updates, individual products about the game, and connections to other organizations.

Generating Income

Mobile gaming can turn a profit in a few different ways, by offering the application for an upfront price or through micro transactions. With micro transactions, you offer the game for free or a low cost, then provide the user with ways to purchase in-game items and other content to upgrade gameplay.

Another popular route is to offer up a “lite” version of a game to give users a small taste of the game, but not the entirety. Showcasing the graphics and the game options pulls in the user, but the game ends before too much can be accomplished. Then, to play more, they are redirected to purchasing the full version of the game for a designated price.

When it comes down to generating the bulk of its profit, the mobile gaming and application industry as a whole is centered around the nominal fee idea. Individuals will pay a small price, 0.99 cents or 1.99, for a game or application, and since the cost is so low users almost don’t care to spend it. But, with thousands and millions of users buying the application, alongside micro transactions, the amount adds up to be very lucrative.

Angry Birds: a mobile gaming empire

Rovio, the developers of Angry Birds, went through a lot of flops before they hit upon the mobile gaming success that was Angry Birds. Fifty-one games before they struck gold, in fact. They based Angry Birds off of concept art that had a special appeal and focused their efforts on the iOS application market.

It took some time to gain traction, but the game took off when they created a YouTube trailer, a lite version of the game and got featured on the front page of the app store. From there, Angry Birds captured the hearts and minds of everyone in the mobile gaming world, expanding its branding to clothing, plush toys, books and various other spin off games.

How have they done so well? By providing free updates for the game’s audience, adding hundreds of free levels, and by creating spinoffs such as Seasonal Angry Birds and Angry Bird Space, Rovio has maintained the devotion of a short attention span audience. Remaining in the spotlight of the industry and pushing the boundaries of the game and the system it runs on, Angry Birds has become a massive success, being downloaded over 600 million times and with 30 million active players daily. It’s not hard to see why mobile game development has taken off since the introduction of the first iPhone in 2007.

This guest post is contributed by Grady Winston. Grady is an avid writer and Internet entrepreneur from Indianapolis. He has worked in the fields of technology, business, marketing, and advertising – implementing multiple creative projects and solutions for a range of clients.

Tech Thoughts Daily Net News – July 11, 2012

Judges don’t buy the “I’m an idiot about Facebook privacy settings” defense – The “I’m an idiot about Facebook settings” argument isn’t being swallowed in court, as illustrated in this recent case.

RecImg Manager, Free Software Designed for Windows 8 – RecImg Manager creates a backup snapshot of just the Windows 8 operating system and installed software. During recovery, RecImg Manager reinstalls only Windows 8 and its components, which means documents, videos, music and other personal files remain untouched and intact – nothing is lost.

IT Admin’s ‘Summer Suitcase’ Is Chockful of Helpful Tech Tools – Now that summer is in full swing, IT folk are sure to be looking for some time away from the office. But even on vacation, they may need to be available to work remotely or attend to crises occurring back at the office or data center. That’s why eWEEK set out to create an “IT Summer Suitcase” list of products IT administrators can take advantage of when they’re on the go.

Porn studios accused of extortion in BitTorrent lawsuits – Porn studios have turned to extortion of BitTorrent users to make money, looking for payouts of $1,000 to $5,000 from victims too embarrassed or shamed to defend themselves in court, a class action suit claims.

NSA: Cybercrime is ‘the greatest transfer of wealth in history’ – The director of the National Security Agency (NSA) has called cybercrime “the greatest transfer of wealth in history.” As such, he urged politicians and the American population in general to support cybersecurity legislation being pushed through Congress.

Five versatile mapping applications – As someone who spends a great deal of time traveling, I find myself constantly using mapping software. One of the things that I have come to realize is that an incredibly diverse variety of mapping software is available. This article discusses five options for computer-based mapping.

Dual-Core vs. Quad-Core CPUs – Multicore CPUs first appeared on the desktop and laptop PC platforms around 2005, and since then we’ve seen as many as eight cores in high-end systems. But the question for most consumers is whether to opt for a dual- or a quad-core processor.

Tablet Encryption 101 – Thinking about encrypting your Apple or Android tablet? The process can be daunting, but here’s how to do it.

A Hands-On Guide to Advanced FreeNAS Server Configurations – Learn how to set up an FTP server, multiple user accounts, and snapshot backups on a DIY FreeNAS file server.

Security:

Multi-platform backdoor malware targets Windows, Mac and Linux users – A web-based malware attack has been discovered, targeting users of Windows, Mac and Linux. Although the amount of malware written for different operating systems can vary, it’s becoming increasingly hard to argue that it’s safe to surf the web on any OS without anti-virus protection.

10 Crazy IT Security Tricks That Actually Work – Network and endpoint security may not strike you as the first place to scratch an experimental itch. After all, protecting the company’s systems and data should call into question any action that may introduce risk. But IT security threats constantly evolve, and sometimes you have to think outside the box to keep ahead of the more ingenious evildoers. And sometimes you have to get a little crazy.

Targeted attacks focus on small businesses – 36 percent of all targeted attacks (58 per day) during the last six months were directed at businesses with 250 or fewer employees, according to Symantec.

Fraudulent Android Banking Security Tool Exposes Victims to Theft – Researchers at Trusteer have uncovered a new collection of attacks that trick users into installing Android malware disguised as a security add-on from their bank.

New Zeus Variant Targets Facebook and Google Users – ThreatMetrix reports on a new version of the Zeuss Trojan designed to take advantage of monetization features in Facebook and Google. When successful, it captures a victim’s personal data.

Company News:

SlimWare Utilities Rewrites the Rules of PC Backup and Recovery with RecImg Manager, Free Software Designed for Windows 8 – SlimWare Utilities today announced the launch of RecImg Manager, its free, PC-backup solution designed for Windows 8. RecImg Manager is a new way for users to restore and reinstall their entire Windows 8 Operating System and software in minutes without losing personal documents or files. RecImg Manager will work on any Intel-based device running Windows 8, including tablets such as Microsoft’s new Surface tablet debuting later this year. Available for free download at www.RecImg.com.

Ouya to Enter Gaming Market with $99 Android-Powered Console – Ouya to Enter Gaming Market with $99 Android-Powered ConsoleWhile the world waits for new game consoles from Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo, a newcomer plans to take them on with a $99 Android-based set-top box called Ouya. The Ouya has specs that are on par with high-end Android phones and tablets, including a quad-core Nvidia Tegra 3 processor, 1 GB of RAM and 8 GB of storage. It outputs 1080p video through an HDMI slot, uses Bluetooth 4.0 and USB 2.0 for connecting external devices and includes a wireless controller.

RIM Faces Shareholders, Touts BlackBerry 10 – RIM CEO Thorsten Heins acknowledged that the next several quarters will be “very challenging” for RIM, and stressed that BlackBerry 10 will be the start of the new era.

Dropbox Doubles Pro Storage for Same Price – Dropbox on Tuesday announced an upgrade to its Pro plans that doubles the amount of storage without a price hike. The move upgrades Pro users with 50GB and 100GB accounts to 100GB and 200GB, respectively. The 100GB option costs $9.99 per month or $99 per year, while the 200GB will run you $19.99 per month or $199 per year.

Google Releases Jelly Bean Source Code – Google on Monday released the source code for Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. The move means developers will now be able to play around with the latest version of Google’s mobile OS, which was announced last month at the Google I/O developer conference.

FTC Fines Google $22.5 Million Over Safari Tracking – Google has reportedly reached a $22.5 million settlement with the Federal Trade Commission over a recent Internet tracking dispute.

Webopedia Daily:

Split DNS – In a split DNS infrastructure, you create two zones for the same domain, one to be used by the internal network, the other used by the external network. Split DNS directs internal hosts to an internal domain name server for name resolution and external hosts are directed to an external domain name server for name resolution.

Off Topic (Sort of):

What to Never Eat at Fast Food Places, According to Fast Food Workers – The oversimplified answer is to never eat fast food (even though it can be healthier than restaurant food sometimes), but if you ever do find yourself looking at a fast food menu, Reddit members have got your back. Fast food workers share the least healthy and most unsanitary food choices at their establishments. Be prepared to be grossed out reading this thread, though.

Infographic: Social media privacy – If you’re trying to educate users in your organization about the safe use of social media, this infographic might make a good conversation-starter for a presentation.

Canadian BBQ chip incident on Foul Bay Road – A humorous news report video on two intoxicated UNI students who walked into an open garage to steal BBQ potato chips. In a display of overreaction by the Police, charges of break and enter are pending against the two women. (recommended by Michael F.)

TSA Agents at Louisville Airport Steal Deaf Man’s Candy, Call Him “Fucking Deafie” – A group of students leaving the annual conference of the National Association of the Deaf in Louisville had a rather awful experience courtesy of the Transportation Security Administration in that city’s airport. (recommended by Michael F.)

When is 7″ better than 10″? When you’re a tablet – Summary: Yes, size matters. And sometimes, less is more. When’s my Nexus 7 being delivered?

Today’s Quote:

“If you can give your son or daughter only one gift, let it be enthusiasm.”

–     Bruce Barton

Today’s Free Downloads:

HelpNDoc 3.6.0 – HelpNDoc is an easy to use yet powerful and intuitive help authoring tool. HelpNDoc provides a clear and efficient interface to build the most amazing CHM help files, WEB based documentation, PDF and Word documents from a single source without worrying about the inner working of help file generation. You just have to enter or import your documentation in the built-in word processor and hit the “Compile” button to obtain a fully functional help file which looks exactly as you designed it.

FileMenu Tools 6.3 – Customize the context menu of Windows Explorer. Add built-in utilities that perform operations on files and folders; add custom commands which run external applications, copy/move to a specific folder or delete specific file types; configure the “Send to…” submenu and more.

Thumbing Your Way To Friendship?

Grab a cup of coffee:

Dine out at your favorite restaurant:

Spend some time at the museum:

Meet at a popular diner:

Relax at the beach:

Go to a game:

Going out on a date:

Take a drive around town:

From “Is the Web Driving Us Mad?” – Thedailybeast.com/newsweek

Questions about the Internet’s deleterious effects on the mind are at least as old as hyperlinks. But even among Web skeptics, the idea that a new technology might influence how we think and feel—let alone contribute to a great American crack-up—was considered silly and naive, like waving a cane at electric light or blaming the television for kids these days. Instead, the Internet was seen as just another medium, a delivery system, not a diabolical machine. It made people happier and more productive. And where was the proof otherwise?

Now, however, the proof is starting to pile up. The first good, peer-reviewed research is emerging, and the picture is much gloomier than the trumpet blasts of Web utopians have allowed. The current incarnation of the Internet—portable, social, accelerated, and all-pervasive—may be making us not just dumber or lonelier but more depressed and anxious, prone to obsessive-compulsive and attention-deficit disorders, even outright psychotic. Our digitized minds can scan like those of drug addicts, and normal people are breaking down in sad and seemingly new ways.

I’m not convinced that the Web is driving us mad but, if the photos above are any indication it seems to be affecting our social behavior. Disconnection is rampant; discourtesy is epidemic; empathy seems to be a long forgotten phenomenon.

Just saying.

The other side of the coin – 100 year-old Idaho woman on Jay Leno show. You’ll love this lady – she has a view or two you might share – even on on “thumb texting.”

A shout out to my good buddy Mike for sharing these photos. Since these photos came by way of email, I’ve not been able to track the originating site. If they originated at your site, please let me know so that I can link back and credit you accordingly.

Tech Thoughts Daily Net News – July 10, 2012

10 Ways to Protect Yourself Online – Most of you, like me, didn’t contract DNSChanger, just as you probably don’t find yourself often engaging in life or death battles with malware, ever-threatening your volatile data’s viability. This, with affection, is for the rest of us: the ones who still use “password” as their password for anything, or run their wireless networks like public swimming pools.

Top 10 Ways to Speed Up Your Slow Technology – As fast as your technology may have been on day one, it’s probably not quite so speedy now. That doesn’t mean you can’t restore it to its former glory. Whether it’s your desktop, laptop, or mobile device, here are 10 great ways to speed up your slow technology.

Aggressive Ad Providers Spy on 80 Million Mobile Users – Some ad networks buried in free apps harvest data and perform sketchy activities on cell phones; find out which app categories are the most common culprits. More than 50 percent of free apps embed advertising in their offerings provided by ad networks, according to Lookout Mobile Security. Some of those networks access personal information on the phones they’re running on without clearly explaining what they’re doing to users, recent research by Lookout revealed.

Researchers find web tracking up, privacy down – It’s not your imagination. A new report from researchers at UC Berkeley says web trackers have stepped up their efforts to follow you, and they show no signs of slowing down. There’s also some evidence to suggest that the advertisers and analytics companies behind this major increase in web tracking are shifting their focus away from cookies, which can be easily detected and blocked, and are using HTML5 local storage instead.

Keep Your Programs Protected – Even though everyone’s heard about data breaches caused by unpatched security holes, most people don’t keep all their programs updated. Luckily, Secunia Personal Software Inspector 3.0 takes care of the job for you by identifying outdated programs and automatically updating them.

Should I Update My BIOS? – Although you can update today’s BIOSes, doing so is more dangerous than updating drive-based software. If something goes wrong, it could render the PC completely unbootable; you won’t even be able to boot a live Linux flash drive or reinstall Windows. There’s probably a way to bring the PC back to life, but it won’t be easy.

Government Requests for Wireless User Data Top 1.3 Million – Wireless carriers received at least 1.3 million requests for customer information from federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies last year, according to new data. The news comes shortly after Twitter released its first transparency report, which detailed government data requests as well as takedown notices from countries around the world. Google recently did the same, too.

Bank’s shoddy security was to blame for $588,851 online robbery, US appeals court rules – A Maine construction company that saw its online bank account fraudulently drained of almost $600,000 might get some of it back due to what a US federal court has deemed shoddy security systems at its bank.

July 4th fireworks fiasco in San Diego? Computer virus gets the blame – A botched Independence Day fireworks show is blamed on a computer problem. But was it a computer virus?

Security:

Bogus reminder about tomorrow’s meeting carries malware – Bogus emails warning users not to forget about a meeting scheduled for the next day have been hitting inboxes and trying to make the recipients download malware, warns Sophos. The emails in question are very simple and, bizarrely enough, the message seems to be coming from MySpace:

New Android Trojan secretly buys apps – Researchers of mobile security company TrustGo have recently unearthed a new type of Android malware whose goal is to surreptitiously buy apps and other content from China Mobile’s Mobile Market without alerting and needing the permission of the user. Dubbed MMarketPay, the Trojan comes repackaged with a number of legitimate travel and weather apps, and is currently offered on no less than nine online Chinese Android markets.

Fake anti-piracy warnings hitting UK users with money requests – Even though Ofcom stated that it expects the first notification letters to be sent in early 2014, online scammers bet on the fact that not many users keep close tabs on the situation and took it upon themselves to impersonate the enforcers of said act by sending out emails accusing the recipients of pirating various content and trying to make them pay a non-existent penalty:

ISPs Report Minimal DNSChanger Impact – After all the chatter about the DNSChanger Trojan knocking hundreds of thousands of Web users offline, major U.S. ISPs confirmed that it has thus far been much ado about nothing.

Charter flight reservation emails carry dangerous malware payload – Once again, email users are being reminded to be wary of unsolicited email attachments – as a criminal gang spams out an attack designed to infect Windows computers.

Company News:

Microsoft’s Windows 8 Coming in Late October – Waiting with bated breath for Windows 8? Microsoft today officially revealed that the highly anticipated operating system will be available this fall, as was widely rumored. Windows 8 will be released to manufacturing the first week of August and the first PCs running the new operating system will go on sale at the end of October.

Trend Micro Brings Cloud Security to Windows Server 2012 – Worry-Free Business Security Services integration provides a glimpse at how Microsoft envisions its role in connecting SMB IT infrastructures to the cloud.

Google Nexus 7 Tablet on Sale: Staples Takes Pre-Orders – Staples says it will carry the Google Nexus 7 tablet in its brick-and-mortar stores later this month, and that Google’s 7-inch Android tablet is now available for pre-sale on its website. The office-supply retailer’s site is accepting orders for the Nexus 7, which is expected to begin shipping on July 12. It’s currently selling the Nexus 7 with 16GB of storage for $249.

Microsoft acquires maker of large multitouch displays – Microsoft’s agreed to buy Perceptive Pixel, which makes huge multitouch displays, and says it’s hoping to get the price of the screens down to make them more mainstream.

Samsung eyes October debut for Windows RT tablet – Although Microsoft’s Surface launch may have prompted a number of vendors to ditch plans for RT-based devices, Samsung is reportedly still eyeing an October launch date for an ARM-powered Windows 8 tablet.

Webopedia Daily:

Systems Integrator – Abbreviated as SI, an individual or company that specializes in building complete computer systems by putting together components from different vendors. Unlike software developers, systems integrators typically do not produce any original code. Instead they enable a company to use off-the-shelf hardware and software packages to meet the company’s computing needs.

Off Topic (Sort of):

Is The Web Driving Us Mad? – No one is arguing for some kind of Amish future. But the research is now making it clear that the Internet is not ‘just’ another delivery system. It is creating a whole new mental environment.” Measured piece, despite the headline.

Som Sabadell Flashmob – On the 130th anniversary of the founding of Banco Sabadell we wanted to pay homage to our city by means of the campaign “Som Sabadell” (We are Sabadell) . This is the flashmob that we arranged as a final culmination with the participation of 100 people from the Vallès Symphony Orchestra, the Lieder, Amics de l’Òpera and Coral Belles Arts choirs. (recommended by Michael F.)

Mozilla is Wrong. There is Still Room for Open Source Thunderbird Innovation – While I have tremendous respect for Mozilla, I respectfully disagree with Mozilla’s assessment of the situation. There is still a lot of room for innovation in email. Who among us is truly happy with their email experience today?

5 Insanely Frivolous Uses of DNA Technology – Sure, science fiction is full of horrifying genetic experiments gone wrong, but in the real world, manipulating DNA can result in some amazing things. Hell, the cost of testing DNA has come down so much that you can now buy a kit at Walmart for $27. Really. So now that this technology is in the hands of the masses, we can dismiss the ridiculous fears of a Gattaca-type dystopia where our own genes can be used against us in horrifying ways. Because really, what’s so horrifying about using DNA technology for …

Mobile Payments, Online Bill Payment Usage Grows: IDC – Mobile payments have more than doubled in popularity, reaching more than 33 percent of U.S. residents, according to the results of a report, “Business Strategy: Results from the 2012 Consumer Payments Survey” by IT research firm IDC’s Financial Insights division. More than half of those who made a mobile payment used PayPal Mobile (56 percent), with Amazon Payments and Apple’s iTunes service statistically tied at about 40 percent, according to the report.

Today’s Quote:

“It’s not true that life is one damn thing after another; it is one damn thing over and over.”

–      Edna St. Vincent Millay

Today’s Free Downloads:

Advanced IP Scanner – Free IP scanners abound, and most will tell you what’s attached to your network. But if you want one that s easy to use that will wake up and shut down PCs and other devices attached to your network, look to Advanced IP Scanner.

Skip Firefox’s Add-On Compatibility Check with This Small Extension – Now that Firefox is updating every few weeks, it’s annoying to have it sit there and check if all your add-ons are compatible with the new version—especially if you’ve forced them to turn themselves on anyway. This simple extension disables the compatibility check so you can update Firefox faster and get to browsing.

Bite Back Against Banking Bandits With Puppy Linux

Woof, Woof! That’s the sound of Puppy Linux as it starts. A good sound as it turns out; it reminds me as to why I’ve just booted my computer from this amazing little Linux distro – safety, security, and a substantially increased chance that I’ll hang onto the paltry funds in my bank accounts.

Puppy Linux is not a one trick pony – although, I tend to use it for one thing only (at the moment) – Online Banking. More on this in a moment*.

This is a very well trained Puppy:

Easy – Just use a CD or USB flash to boot a PC. Puppy Linux is downloadable as ISO, an image that can be burned to CD or DVD.

Fast – Because Puppy is small, it can live in your PC’s memory and be ready to quickly execute your commands, whereas in other systems, programs are first read from drive storage before being executed.

Save Money – Even if your PC has no hard disk (ex, broken hard disk), you can still boot Puppy via CD or USB and continue working. Old PCs that no longer work with new systems will still work good-as-new with Puppy.

Do More – Puppy boots in less than a minute, even in old PCs, and it does not require antivirus software. Administering Puppy is quick and minimal. With Puppy, you just have to take care of your data, which you can easily save to USB flash (Then forget about your operating system!). Your data can be read by other computers.

Do Magic – Help your friends suffering from computer malware by booting Puppy and removing malware from their PC (use antivirus that is built-in or can be installed in Puppy). Example – bad Autorun.inf is easily removed by Puppy (Just delete it as well as its companion exe program). If your friend thinks that she has lost data from her corrupted hard disk, boot Puppy and try saving her data!

Carry Anywhere (Portable) – Because Puppy is able to live in CD/DVD or USB flash, as well as save data to these same devices, you can carry your programs and data with you.

The Puppy Desktop – Not flashy; not eye candy – but functional and efficient.

In the following illustration, I’ve clicked on the Browser icon (SeaMonkey is the native Browser), to open this site. I considered showing my online banking connection – in a moment of madness.  

*Not to be argumentative – wait, I will be argumentative. The Internet, and its related technologies (connected devices, and so on), has become a massive playground for outrageous hype and sheer BS. It’s like listening to a used car salesman. Nowhere, is this more evident than in the orbit of security technology.

Outrageous claims of “total protection” based on stale data; ranking security suites as if # 1 was truly more effective than # 2……

As if the premise is – system security is a static environment in which knowledgeable users operate in their own best interests.

As if cybercriminals are sitting still, and not releasing highly sophisticated attacks on a daily basis.

As if application vulnerabilities are not discovered virtually on a daily basis.

So, am I being argumentative just for the sake of it? Not bloody likely.

Qualys Inc. releases a Consensus Security Vulnerability Alert @RISK Newsletter on a weekly basis (to which I subscribe), that sets out the most recent vulnerabilities for which exploits are available in the cybercrime marketplace.

Here’s a small sampling of the latest –

Title: Trojan uses new C&C obfuscation technique
Description: The Polish CERT has observed a new Trojan spreading in the
wild via a number of different social media techniques. While not
particularly novel in that regard, this particular piece of malware is
interesting in the way that it contacts its command and control servers.
Instead of using the address provided in a DNS query response, the
malware takes that value and transforms it into a different IP address,
which is then used to contact the C&C. This technique, if it becomes
widespread, has interesting implications for malware detection at the
network level.

Title: Symantec PcAnywhere 12.5.0 Login and Password Field Buffer Overflow
Vendor: Symantec
Description: The host-services component in Symantec pcAnywhere 12.5.x
through 12.5.3, and IT Management Suite pcAnywhere Solution 7.0 (aka
12.5.x) and 7.1 (aka 12.6.x), does not properly filter login and
authentication data, which allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary
code via a crafted session on TCP port 5631.

Title: Banking trojan spreading via phishing attacks
Description: The Sourcefire VRT has discovered a new Trojan being
dropped on users via a large-scale UPS-themed phishing attack. The
Trojan, which attempts to steal credentials for several major financial
institutions, also drops other malicious binaries on the infected
system. Its C&C communications are of particular interest, as its
authors chose to use the hexadecimal string “0xDEADBEEF” – which is
commonly used by attackers and researchers alike as a way to follow user
input through system memory – as a protocol marker of sorts.

Note: input through system memory.

It’s this last type of vulnerability (though not exclusively), which drives my need to logon to my banking site via a self-booting Linux Live CD – in this case – Puppy Linux. Since Puppy is read-only media, the environment (running entirely in RAM), will be much more secure than Windows.

Yes, I admit that it’s a pain (occasionally) to shut down and reboot just to complete an online financial transaction but, I’d rather be safe than sorry – I’m into an ounce of prevention.

Since the majority of malware is Windows specific, banking online through a Linux Live CD is my ounce of prevention. It should be yours as well.

Minimum Hardware Requirements for Puppy Linux 4.2.1:

500MHZ processor
128MB RAM
512MB free hard drive space to create an optional save file
No hard drive required to boot a Live Disc.
CD-ROM any speed

Download at: Puppy Linux

More information is available on the publisher’s site.

Tech Thoughts Daily Net News – July 9, 2012

The 10 Commandments of Social Media Etiquette – Are you a social media sinner? If you regularly violate any of these commandments, the answer is probably yes.

Google Expands Indoor Maps Selection – Google is launching indoor maps for Android devices in the U.K., to enable smartphone users to easily find their way around train stations, sporting venues, art galleries, shopping centres and department stores.

Get Angry Birds Seasons free for iOS – Until next Thursday, Apple is giving away this level-packed game for both iPhone and iPad. Let the bird-flinging begin!

Better Explorer – Better Explorer (aka BExplorer) looks and behaves the way Windows Explorer will in Windows 8–except that it runs in Windows 7.

Why the new Droid Incredible isn’t – HTC’s Droid Incredible 4G LTE is compact and costs less than Verizon’s other smartphones, but it still adds up to a raw deal.

Tactile iPhone Keyboard Seeks Kickstart – Spike designers give the Apple smartphone a tactile keyboard, then flip it out of the way when not needed.

How to Eliminate Eyestrain From Your Big, Beautiful PC – Building an amazing desktop computer is easy, but even after you stuff your new system with the latest hardware, hook up your cabling, and make room for your giant monitor, you’re not quite done. Make it easy on the eyes with this handy guide.

Now your car can report you for cellphone driving – As governments around the world struggle to dissuade people from using cellphones while driving, Indian researchers have cut the Gordian knot.

How to Install Desktop Memory – It takes just seconds to upgrade the RAM in your PC–or get a jump-start on a new build. Installing memory might be the easiest DIY upgrade you can do, but it’s still worth knowing how to do it right. We walk you through it step by step.

Beyond the Realm of Tolkien Ripoffs: Different MMORPGs – Each of these ten MMOs offers something different, whether in setting or in gameplay. Most are free to play, and all are free to try.

Security:

Microsoft’s Tuesday Patch Douses Flame Malware – When Patch Tuesday rolls around next week, Microsoft will address three critical security issues using an improved version of Windows Update that closes a loophole exploited by Flame malware. The fix is important because it addresses the flaw that allowed Flame’s authors to certify that malware they were sending to victim machines was authenticated by Microsoft, making the malware as trusted as an actual Windows security update.

Password Protection 101: Lessons From the eHarmony Data Breach – The passwords used by the eHarmony site visitors shows that names of sports teams, dogs, states and masculine and feminine names formed the foundation of many of the passwords.

Software can ‘identify online predators’ – Researchers have developed a free software app that they say can help detect pedophiles and criminals online. The Social Privacy Protector (SPP), created by students at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU), is claimed to detect fake profiles through an analysis of a user’s friend list and the number of mutual links. The free software is available as a Facebook app for all browsers, and as an add-on for Firefox.

Smart TVs new Web threat frontier – Lack of security measures such as antivirus and intrusion detection system means Internet-connected TVs susceptible to online scams and bot campaigns too, security watchers warn.

Company News:

Ex-Nokia employees to launch Meego smartphone – Finnish startup will use the operating system, which Nokia developed but abandoned for Microsoft’s Windows Phone platform.

Apple Fights for Snow Leopard Trademark in China – A Chinese company accuses Apple of infringing its trademark of the name Snow Leopard, in the wake of a multimillion-dollar settlement over the name iPad.

Microsoft readies Bing Fund angel investment incubator – Software giant is poised to launch a new startup/accelerator incubation effort designed to bring innovation to the company’s Online Services Division.

Samsung plans Windows RT tablet: A ‘cover all bases’ land grab? – Samsung is said to be planning a Windows RT tablet, according to reports, but is the move a bid to ‘hands in all pots’ to take on its arch-rival in the table space?

Webopedia Daily:

Amazon Simple Storage Service – Amazon S3 – Amazon’s Simple Storage Service, or Amazon S3 for short, is a personal cloud storage service from Amazon.com. Amazon S3 debuted in 2006 as a cost-effective Web services solution for developers to store and retrieve data at any point in time from anywhere Web access is available. Amazon S3 customers receive up to 5 GB of online data storage for free, with commercial tiered plans available for those with additional storage or more intensive data transfer needs.

Off Topic (Sort of):

World’s fastest camera detects elusive cancer cells – UCLA researchers say their optical microscope can detect rare cells with sensitivity of one part per million — in real time.

5 Things You Won’t Believe Aren’t In the Bible – As a predominantly Christian people, Westerners think they know the Bible pretty well. But not everybody realizes that many of the most iconic features of Christianity were never mentioned by the holy book or the church, but were actually pulled from the ass of some poet or artist years after God turned in his final draft of the Bible. Things like …

The 9 Most Badass Bible Verses – If the Bible had been written by King Leonidas and the rest of the Spartans from 300, it would probably read pretty much the same as it does now. It turns out, the Bible is already chock full of ass kicking. Here are the verses that make us want to take to the streets and put some unbelievers to the sword.

Google to governments: Legalize gay marriage – In an effort to make gay marriage the norm, Google announces “Legalize Love,” a campaign that pressures governments to do the right thing.

NBC, Google Running ‘War Games’ to Prep Olympics Streaming – The companies are hoping that they’ve worked out all possible pitfalls in advance of what’s expected to be the largest streaming of a sporting event ever.

Def Leppard covers own songs to get digital revenues – After a long-running dispute with Universal Music, the English rock band takes advantage of a law that protects cover versions, by covering its own songs.

A Look at Why the iPhone Matters – A mobile industry analyst says the iPhone has had such a rapid effect on the market that theories that usually take decades of research to validate are shown in near real time.

Today’s Quote:

“With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.”

–      Steven Weinberg

Today’s Free Downloads:

Stress My PC 1.21 – “Stress My PC” is stress testing software, to do a pc testing e.g. computer stress test. Let’s see! How long can your laptop battery hold a charge? Or let your PC sweat like a….

Scanner Radio for Android 3.7.1 – Listen to police and fire departments from around the world on your phone. Listen to live audio from over 2,900 police and fire scanners, weather radios, and amateur radio repeaters from around the world (with more being added daily).

Tech Thoughts Daily Net News – July 8, 2012

How to Listen to Free Music Online – For those of us with jobs that require sitting in front of a computer, the days of listening to the radio as accompaniment may be long over. (We know there are some holdouts.) Now, we can get all the free music play we want right from our PC, over the Internet. And with the advent of those little handheld computers called smartphones, all of this free music can travel with us. Here’s a quick look at the leading services that will get free music buzzing in your ears no matter where you go.

ACLU app lets Android users secretly tape the police – The free app records video and audio, hides when requested and lets users send backup copies of recordings to the ACLU for safekeeping. “This app provides an essential tool for police accountability,” ACLU-NJ Executive Director Deborah Jacobs said in a statement. An iOS version of Police Tape is expected later this summer.

Australian bank to offer payment services on Facebook – Australia’s Commonwealth Bank (CBA) is set to offer banking via Facebook by the end of this year, in which people can pay each other and receive money electronically. The bank has demonstrated the Facebook banking application that will allow customers to do all their banking transactions, including paying others and collecting money without leaving the social network. The bank’s Chief Marketing and Online Officer Andy Lark said the institution wasn’t seeking to reinvent banking, but rather “help people manage their money and their lives” in ways that suited them. (recommended by Mal C. who’s perspective on this is – “Has this world gone fu*** crazy? Banking on Facebook?)

Like Open Source? For Collaboration, Try Group-Office 4.0 – Available in a free, open community version as well as a paid one with support, this newly upgraded software offers a fresh groupware alternative.

File Sharers Easily Skirt European Efforts To Blockade Pirate Bay – Oh, those silly governments. Internet censorship won’t withstand the onslaught of web-savvy geeks! Nevertheless, the British and Dutch governments recently ordered ISPs to bar users from accessing The Pirate Bay whatsoever. Despite claims from anti-piracy groups that the blockade is being effective, new reports show that simply isn’t true, and one website even explains how you can bypass the ban using only a web browser.

DNSChanger Doomsday – The FBI is pulling the plug on rogue DNS servers on Monday, meaning those who haven’t cleaned up their computers could be stranded without Internet. Which begs the question, should they even be allowed Internet access?

SimCity Social Launches on Facebook – The world’s largest social network just got a little more social. As promised, Facebook on Thursday opened its doors to SimCity Social, integrating the fan favorite features of the computer game into a city-building simulation for the Farmville-wary.

Torque turns BitTorrent into a Web app – BitTorrent introduces Torque, a JavaScript-powered Web app for managing torrents, accompanied by a framework for experimentation by developers.

Does Apple Really Need a 7-inch iPad? – Pundits, fans, and Apple-watchers of all stripes are chatting about the rumored 7-inch iPad and drawing wildly different conclusions.

How a Group of Businesses Conspired to Get Better Yelp Ratings – Yelp recently busted what it calls a “review-swapping ring,” in which partners in a business network posted top ratings and glowingly positive reviews of each other’s services.

Block Your Stolen AT&T Phone Starting July 10 – AT&T will launch a new service to let its customers report and block stolen devices. As first reported by The Verge, AT&T will launch the service on Tuesday, allowing customers to prevent individuals from accessing voice, data, and SMS messages on a stolen device, while keeping their overall account intact.

Security:

7 Ways to Spot a Fake Facebook Friend – The fake factor: Facebook is full of bogus accounts. Here’s how to shake the counterfeits and take them down.

Find, Remove DNSChanger From Your Router – Most routers are set to automatically trickle down network settings to any machine on a home network that connects to them through the use of DHCP. DNS settings on the router get assigned to all computers and devices that connect to that router. And yes, the DNSChanger threat can infect a router. Here’s how to tell if your router is infected and what to do.

Olympics Facing Threat From Cyberattacks, Says UK Official – A Home Office official has warned once again that with the Olympic Games only weeks away the country faces an unprecedented threat from cyber-attacks during the event.

Company News:

Mozilla calling it quits on Thunderbird, report says – The Internet company plans to let go of its open-source e-mail software, with hopes that other people will keep the T-bird alive, according to a leaked letter obtained by TechCrunch.

Yahoo and Facebook Settle Patent Dispute, Join Advertising Alliance – Facebook and Yahoo have agreed to settle a patent dispute. This averts a potentially bitter battle over the technology running two of the Internet’s most popular destinations.

Amazon Collecting Patents as Part of Smartphone Strategy – At a time when Apple has been successful in suing competing products right off of store shelves for allegedly copying the look and feel of the iPhone, Amazon fully understands what’s at stake as it looks to enter the smartphone market.

Apple bows out of program for environment-minded products – The company’s design direction is no longer in keeping with the requirements of a major program devoted to the fostering of environmentally responsible electronics, according to a report.

Webopedia Daily:

Facebook Connect – A type of data portability technology that enables users of the social networking site (SNS) Facebook to connect their Facebook account with any partner Web site using a trusted authentication method. Using Facebook Connect, members will be able to use their Facebook identity across the Web, including profile photos, name, friends, groups, events, and more. Facebook Connect also uses what the company calls “dynamic security” which ensures the privacy setting you use will also be used on the third-party Web sites.

Off Topic (Sort of):

Quantum Computing at Room Temperature — Now a Reality – Harvard researchers claim to have created quantum bits that can store data for nearly two seconds at room temperature — how’d they do it?

Road Rules – Guidelines adopted by director Chuck Jones in making Warner Bros.’ Road Runner-Wile E. Coyote cartoons, from Jones’ 1999 memoir Chuck Amuck. A very good read! (recommended by Michael F.)

Burning The Cathars – Scholarly review of medieval historian RI Moore’s groundbreaking title The War On Heresy, a book that calls for a complete re-evaluation of the heresy campaigns of 12th century Europe. Interesting throughout.

Now that we’ve got the Higgs, what’s next? – Don’t let anyone tell you that “Physics is over now that we’ve found the Higgs.” On the contrary, it’s only the physics that we had every right to expect was correct that’s over. Now is where the fun begins. (recommended by Michael F.)

How Nevada became America’s Nuclear Age ground zero – road trip For more than 40 years, the U.S. government tested nuclear weapons deep in the Nevada desert. Now the site is a reminder of what a scary world that was.

Hotel replacing guest phones with iPhones – Vancouver hotel hopes guests will appreciate making calls with no roaming fees on hotel-provided iPhones instead of those things called landlines.

Today’s Quote:

(Something a little different today – thanks Mike)

Today’s Free Downloads:

WinPatrol 25.0.2012 – WinPatrol takes snapshot of your critical system resources and alerts you to any changes that may occur without your knowledge. WinPatrol was the pioneer in using a heuristic behavioral approach to detecting attacks and violations of your computing environment.

Windows Tweaker – Windows Tweaker is a free Windows tweaking utility using which you can tweak your Windows 8/7/Vista/XP both x86 and x64 systems are supported. It contains several tweaks grouped into 11 main categories, and access to 38 Windows tools (Device Manager, Registry Editor, DirectX Troubleshooter, Advanced Disk Cleanup, etc) all in a single place.

Free Replicator – Automatically Backup Files, Folders, Even Entire Drives

Regular reader Chris A., was looking for a solution to a long standing problem. Chris had a need to “create a daily backup of an Access database and, to keep adding daily copies instead of overwriting the existing copy each time” – automatically, and in the background.

As it turns out, Chris and I were in the same boat. I have a need to copy/backup several selected files/folders (including Blog posts and drafts) to a secondary drive on a daily basis. Up to now, I’ve simply done a simple manual “copy to” – when I remember to do so, that is.

“When I remember to do so” is more than a little haphazard and, I’ve occasionally paid the price through one system misadventure or another. Always a major bummer, that.

As in all things tech, there is a free solution. A solution Chris has recommended to me (thanks Chris) – Karen’s Replicator – which, if you have a similar need to copy/backup selected files/folders on a manual or scheduled basis, might be a perfect fit for you.

I’m into simple solutions – and, Karen’s Replicator is just that – easy and straightforward. Copying or backing up a folder, including subfolders, scheduled or manual – or a bushel of files/folders if you like, is driven by a fairly simple GUI.

Launching the applications brings up the following window allowing you to enable or disable jobs, manually run a job, view the Replicator’s log file, or change the program’s settings.

Since I’m most interested in scheduling the task of auto copying my Weblog Posts, in this test I set the application to start at 1:00 AM on July 8. I subsequently changed the time to 9:15 AM on July 7, and added an additional save location (not shown in this screen capture).

Both jobs were completed successfully in 63 ms.

A quick check to ensure that the relevant files have in fact been copied over.

And, a further test to ensure that the copied files can be opened in Windows Live Writer.

Scheduling a job, or series of jobs, can easily be accomplished from within the schedule window – illustrated below.

You can easily adjust customized job and application settings from the “Edit Settings” window.

In a short review, it’s rarely possible to cover all of the benefits of a particular application – and, this short review is no different. Karen’s Replicator has additional functionality other than the features I’ve highlighted here – which, you will no doubt discover should you add this super freebie to your utility toolbox.

System requirements: Windows XP, Vista, Win 7 (tested on Win 8).

Download at: http://www.karenware.com/powertools/ptreplicator.asp

Karen’s Power Tools web site has a wealth of additional free utilities that you might find useful.

Tech Thoughts Daily Net News – July 7, 2012

Lock down USB drives in Windows with USB Disk Manager – USB drives can act as delivery systems for malware. USB Disk Manager can help you lock down USB drives to prevent them from spreading malware.

How to Analyze Your Website’s Performance – Building a website–whether you’re selling products or creating a blog or another information-based site–has always presented a challenge. You have complete control over your content, but virtually no control over who’s consuming it. Analytics tools have been part of the Web world for years, but many site owners haven’t fully explored them out of fear that they’re too difficult to use.

Three Alternatives to Your iGoogle Home Page – Google is shutting down its Web portal in just 16 short months. Here are three worthwhile replacements to consider.

British Airways Criticized Over Plan to Google Passengers – A new British Airways program aimed at creating more personalized experience for customers has the airline in hot water with privacy advocates.

From Tech to Toilet Paper, Berliner Tries to Live Completely Open Source for One Year – Open source computer, open source mobile phone, open source toothbrush, open source jeans, open source video codec, open source camera, open source beer and even open source toilet paper: these are just a few things you need if you decide to make every aspect of your life open source for a year. A 28-year-old filmmaker from New Zealand living in Berlin is going to try just that.

There Is No Excuse for Still Being Infected with DNSChanger – People have had months of warnings and a plethora of free utilities that take five seconds to verify if their PC has DNSChanger. If they lose access to the Web on Monday, they deserve it.

Spam Emails: Android Botnet or Not? – Reports emerged this week about a spam-producing Android botnet, but is this really an Android problem?

Better troubleshooting with the Windows 8 Task Manager Performance tab – The Windows 8 Task Manager Performance tab has many new features and provides users with more detailed information than ever.

Say Goodbye to Windows Home Server – The cloud edges out traditional on-site storage for home users, as Microsoft discontinues its nerve center for a PC-centric home.

MegaUpload Founder Seeks Compensation for Illegal Search – Kim Dotcom’s lawyers are seeking relief and reparation from the government over what has been deemed an illegal search and seizure of Dotcom’s property.

KPN Closes Portal After Two-thirds of Corporate Customers Found Using Default Password – KPN closed a self-service portal for corporate ADSL customers on Tuesday after it discovered that 120,000 of its 180,000 business clients were still using default passwords, all variants of “welkom01,” a company spokesman said Friday. By continuing to use default passwords such as “welkom01,” “welkom1” or “welkom001”, customers risked unauthorized persons gaining access to their accounts, KPN said.

Security:

Fake Amex warning leads to exploit kit – A fake American Express email trying to lure users into following a malicious link by making them think that someone has reset their password for their online account has recently been spotted by NSS Labs researchers. Unfortunately for many users, only a little more than half of the AV solutions used by VirusTotal detect the malware – a downloader Trojan that once safely ensconced within the machine proceeds to download password stealers and additional backdoors, some of which have a very low detection rate.

McAfee Releases DNSChanger Fix; Industry First – McAfee has just released a free tool to help consumers who may be infected by the ‘DNSChanger’ Trojan stay connected after servers are shut down by the FBI on July 9th. The new McAfee tool, available on the McAfee website, helps users easily identify whether they have been affected by the malware and offers a free solution if they have been infected.

Cybercrooks preying on small businesses – Small businesses might think they are little enough to escape cybercrooks’ attention, but they’re increasingly wrong.

Seemingly Insignificant SQL Injections Lead To Rooted Routers – Black Hat researcher to show how vulnerable databases with temporary router information can lead to root-level access of Netgear routers

Traveling Safe, Traveling Smart – Keep your guard up when traveling. Bad Actors never take vacations

Company News:

Time Warner Cable expands broadband data caps – Time Warner Cable is expanding its tests of tiered broadband data service.

VMware Acquires DynamicOps for Cloud Automation – VMware has acquired DynamicOps, a software company that automates the provisioning and management of IT services across multicloud, multiplatform and multivender environments.

Best Buy to cut 650 Geek Squad employees – The company says that the employees’ last day will be August 1, if they can’t find another position by then.

AMD downgraded as PC market slows – Financial analysts at Sterne Agee have downgraded AMD to a neutral rating with an $8.50 price target as the PC market slows.

Intel May Cut Core i3 Price to Reduce Ultrabook Costs – According to an analyst report, Intel officials are seeing greater pressure from such rivals as AMD and Apple, and need to cut the price of Ultrabooks.

HTC Is On the Ropes – Can HTC pull off a comeback, or is this the beginning of the end for the company’s rising star?

Webopedia Daily:

Chief River – A codename for Intel Ivy Bridge processors developed specifically for tablet, ultrabook and Mac laptop computers. Chief River processors are designed to succeed the “Huron River” Sandy Bridge processors used in earlier ultrabook models, and offer native support for USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt. Additional requirements for Chief River ultrabooks include a minimum battery life of 5 hours, at least 16GB of SSD storage and the ability to “wake up” in less than seven seconds. Recommendations beyond the specified requirements include touch screen support, WiDi, GPS, an accelerometer, and an ambient light sensor (ALS) and proximity sensor.

Off Topic (Sort of):

This is what online harassment looks like – Obscene images, hate sites and a game where people are invited to beat you up have been inflicted on Anita Sarkeesian. (recommended by Michael F.)

Brain Time – Fascinating essay. “The days of thinking of time as a river—evenly flowing, always advancing—are over. Time perception, just like vision, is a construction of the brain and is shockingly easy to manipulate experimentally”

Colour Photographs – American Store Fronts 1940s

Maglev lightbulb floats in mid-air – An Australian student has created a levitating lightbulb that powers itself wirelessly.

The Rotten Heart Of Finance – The Libor scandal that began in London with Barclays is about to go global. “This is the banking industry’s tobacco moment,” says the chief executive of a multinational bank. “It’s that big.” As many as 20 firms are now in the frame.

Today’s Quote:

“You’ve gotta dance like there’s nobody watching,

Love like you’ll never be hurt,

Sing like there’s nobody listening,

And live like it’s heaven on earth.”

–      William W. Purkey

Today’s Free Downloads:

Comodo BackUp 4.1.3.51 – Comodo BackUp is the straightforward and powerful utility that allows users to quickly and easily create backup copies of critical data. Protect yourself against ever losing those critical files that took hours to create. Schedule backups to run automatically at a time that suits you.

WinX DVD Ripper 5.5.6 – Free DVD ripping software helps you backup DVD to hard drive. It is able to free rip DVD to MP4, rip DVD to WMV, rip DVD to AVI, FLV, MOV, MPEG, H.264, and easily convert DVD to iPhone, iPod, Apple TV, Android phone, PSP, etc. with customized profile settings.