Previews, Newz and Reviews

Today in Tech History - The LAN

2009-05-23T06:20:00.001-05:00

The first Ethernet LAN data packet was transmitted at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center on May 23, 1973. Bob Metcalf and David Boggs were the inventors of the networking technology that would eventually be used on the vast majority of local area networks in the world. For three years they worked to refine and improve their invention. By 1976, their experimental network was connecting 100 devices.

Today in Tech History: Microsoft Windows 3.0

2009-05-22T10:31:00.002-05:00

Microsoft Windows 3.0 was released on May 22, 1990. Independent software vendors began developing Windows applications with vigor in response to its increased memory addressing and a more powerful user interface. The powerful new applications helped Microsoft sell more than 10 million copies of Windows, making it the best-selling graphical user interface in the history of computing.

March 6 - Michelangelo Virus Anniversary

2009-03-06T08:40:00.002-05:00

The Michelangelo virus was the first computer virus to capture the attention of the mass media. Set to first execute on March 6, 1992 (the birth day of the famous Renaissance artist), the virus was predicted to destroy data on all personal computers on which it resided. The hype lead to many installations of anti-virus software and computer checks. All told, less than 10,000 PCs worldwide were affected as a result of Michelangelo.

The Birth of the BBS or Bulletin Board System

2009-02-16T10:22:00.000-05:00

The first computer bulletin board system (BBS) goes live on February 16, 1978 in Chicago, Illinois. During a winter blizzard, Ward Christensen and Randy Suess piece together a computerized answering machine and message center that allows fellow computer hobbyists to send and receive announcements and meeting notes. They call it the Computerized Bulletin Board System.

Forbes Top Ten Richest Americans List

2008-10-07T12:43:00.002-05:00

Did you know? Tech executives made up half of the Forbes Top Ten Richest Americans List in 2007, but how did they fare in 2008?

2008	2007
Bill Gates - Microsoft Warren Buffett - Berkshire Hathaway Lawrence Ellison - Oracle Jim Walton - WalMart, Chairman Arvest Bank S Robson Walton - WalMart Alice Walton - WalMart Christy Walton and Family - WalMart Michael Bloomberg - Mayor of New York City Charles Koch - Koch Industries David Koch - Koch Industries	Bill Gates - Microsoft Warren Buffett - Berkshire Hathaway Sheldon Adelson - Las Vegas Sands (former Comdex trade shows) Larry Ellison - Oracle Sergey Brin - Google Larry Page - Google Kirk Kerkorian - Tricinda Corporation Michael Dell - Dell Computer Charles Koch - Koch Industries David Koch - Koch Industries

The Waltons, the original family owners of WalMart, Sam's Club and other business entities seem to have taken over the majority of the Forbes list for 2008. Interesting!

Fireproof Sets Box Office -- and Amazon.com -- Ablaze

2008-10-06T09:37:00.004-05:00

Article from ChristiansUnite.com
Samuel Goldwyn Films' FIREPROOF, starring Kirk Cameron, far surpassed industry expectations to place #4 at the box office for the weekend. Produced by Sherwood Pictures in Albany GA, FIREPROOF is the company's third film following FACING THE GIANTS - also released by Goldwyn, which went on to gross more than $10 million.

With an 1,200-person volunteer cast and crew, FIREPROOF opened on 839 screens, grossing $6,804,764. It was the highest opening weekend box office* of the year for films released on 1,000 screens or fewer. In the week before its opening, FIREPROOF pre-sold more than $1 million in tickets - far above the predicted blockbusters.

Directed by Sherwood's Alex Kendrick and co-written with his brother, producer Stephen Kendrick, FIREPROOF stars Cameron and newcomer Erin Bethea in a story about a firefighter who must learn how to rescue his own marriage.

Communities across the U.S. are using the film as a tool to support local firefighters, police, and other first responders' groups with divorce rates up to 90 percent. As first responders and their spouses spend a night at the movies, volunteer babysitting brigades on are the job, freeing up couples to go.

Meyer Gottlieb, president of Samuel Goldwyn Films, said: "Congratulations to Alex and Stephen Kendrick for showing once again that they know how to make a movie both entertaining and substantive. FIREPROOF will make you laugh, cry, and reflect. I'm confident audiences will continue to support it."

"The success of FIREPROOF is an example of the combination of great writing and storytelling, proper setup and marketing execution, all directed at an underserved audience hungry for filmed entertainment that meets their needs in many ways," said Terry A. Hemmings, president & CEO, Provident Music Group.

"Opening weekend turnout is a testament to grassroots marketing," said Provident Executive Vice President Ben Howard. "We spent nine months getting this movie and its message to the right people . . . now it's charging away on its own momentum."

Michael Catt, senior pastor of Sherwood Baptist Church and executive producer, said: "We believe good stories can have a good effect. This film was made by a small army of people who poured into something bigger than themselves - into not just a movie, but a movement to restore and uplift marriages across the country."

Bob Rubin, executive vice president, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, which oversees the Affirm Films label, one of the film's acquisition partners, said: "The faith market is a vast and underserved community with a growing appetite for filmed content that is both inspirational and entertaining. We are delighted to be part of the team that brought FIREPROOF to audiences nationwide."

A book entitled The Love Dare was only a plot device in the film until audiences repeatedly requested copies for themselves. The book also debuted in stores this weekend, having pre-sold 600,000 copies. Written by the Kendrick brothers, The Love Dare finished the weekend at #12 on Amazon.com and currently is in its seventh printing.

In coming weeks, Goldwyn plans to expand film's release to more than 1,000 screens.

SHERWOOD PICTURES
This is the third movie by Sherwood Pictures, its second theatrical release. FLYWHEEL, produced in 2004, has sold 200,000 DVDs. FACING THE GIANTS in 2006, earned $10.1 million at the box office and has sold more than 1.6 million DVDs (in 58 countries and 14 languages).

PROVIDENT FILMS
Provident Films is a division of Provident Music Group, designed to produce and distribute faith-based films. Sony BMG Music Entertainment's Provident Music Group is one of the world's leading Christian music companies. Provident Music Group operates under the umbrella for Sony BMG Nashville.

SAMUEL GOLDWYN FILMS
Samuel Goldwyn Films is a major, independently owned and operated motion-picture company that develops produces and distributes innovative feature films and documentaries. The company is dedicated to working with world renowned and emerging writers and filmmakers and, committed to filmed entertainment that offers original voices in uniquely told stories. This steadfastness is best exemplified by the Oscar-nominated THE SQUID AND THE WHALE, SUPER SIZE ME, AMAZING GRACE and Julie Delpy's hit comedy 2 DAYS IN PARIS. Goldwyn's 2008 slate also includes PRICELESS, a romantic comedy starring Audrey Tautou, Oscar-winner Claude Lelouch's ROMAN DE GARE, FUGITIVE PIECES based on the international bestseller by Anne Michaels, TRUMBO, the acclaimed documentary about Oscar-winner Dalton Trumbo and the critically hailed ELEGY, starring Oscar nominee Penelope Cruz and Oscar winner Ben Kingsley

Facebook Email Spoof Contains Trojan Horse

2008-09-23T09:19:00.002-05:00

Websense® Security Labs(TM) ThreatSeeker(TM) Network has discovered a new malicious social-engineering spam campaign masquerading as official emails sent by the popular Web 2.0 social-networking site, Facebook. The email is spoofed to appear from the domain facebookmail.com, an official domain used by Facebook for their outbound emails when notifying their users of an event.

It is common for Facebook to send an email to notify their users when another Facebook user adds them as a friend on the social network. However, the spammers included a zip attachment that purports to contain a picture in order to entice the recipient to double-click on it. The attached file is actually a Trojan horse.

A login page to Facebook is included in the body of the email. We have previously alerted on our discovery via our HoneyJax system about a viral Facebook phishing campaign, and thus would not be surprised if the login page presented was merely a fake front to a phishing site. However, an examination of the HTML form's source code shows that it was indeed passing the user name/password to Facebook itself. This may be to increase the legitimacy of the email to evade reputation-based spam filters.

To view the details of this alert, click here.

The Personal Computer: IBM PC

2008-08-12T07:49:00.002-05:00

The IBM PC was released 27 years ago today -- on August 12, 1981. Priced at $1,565, the personal computer had a 4.77 MHz Intel 8088 microprocessor and a 160-KB floppy disk drive. There was an optional CGA color monitor. IBM's Disk Operating System was the OS for the "PC".

The development team at IBM developed and announced the IBM PC in 12 months, at that time, faster than any other hardware product in IBM's history.

UFOs and Aliens are REAL, According to Former NASA Astronaut

2008-07-24T14:14:00.003-05:00

Aliens are real and have made contact with us several times according to Dr. Edgar Mitchell as discovered by Nick Margerrison and The Night Before Team. Dr. Mitchell said he was aware of many UFO visits to Earth during his career, but each one was covered up by the government involved. He further stated that certain governments, such as Belgium, have recently acknowledged alien life.

Lest you think Mitchell is some crackpot with an ax to grind, consider this. Edgar Mitchell is a respected scientist, an a former NASA astronaut. Mitchell, is also the 6th man to land on the moon.

He came on air with Nick Margerrison of Kerrang Radio UK and told them that UFOs definitely exist, he has been in on it all, and that they are in contact with our government. Dr. Mitchell, who has a Bachelor of Science degree in aeronautical engineering and a Doctor of Science degree in Aeronautics and Astronautics claimed Roswell was real and similar alien visits continue to be investigated.

The Daily Mail also featured an article regarding the radio interview.

Officials from NASA, however, were quick to play the comments down. In a statement, a spokesman said: "NASA does not track UFOs. ... NASA is not involved in any sort of cover up about alien life on this planet or anywhere in the universe. ... Dr Mitchell is a great American, but we do not share his opinions on this issue.'

Big Fish Games - Whale or Minnow?

2008-07-08T14:30:00.005-05:00

I'm looking for information and reviews of Big Fish Games. Whether it's your favorite games website or a bane to your existence, I want to know. BFG offers entertainment in three categories: Online game, PC game, Mac game.

Send comments via this blog post. I'll accept ALL comments (that don't use vulgar language or ignorant claims one way or the other). If you've never heard of Big Fish Games, check out the following link to their site -- and Game Club:

Here are a few of the titles they offer:

I look forward to reading your opinions and comments.

Technology History: Ethernet LAN

2008-05-23T07:28:00.002-05:00

Six Gas-Saving Myths

2008-05-21T08:30:00.003-05:00

Article provided by CNNMoney.com
Sure you want to save gas, but there's a lot of bad advice on how to do it. Some of it makes no difference, and some of it can wind up costing you. With gasoline prices hitting record levels, it seems everyone has a tip on how to save fuel. Much of the advice is well-intentioned, but in the end, much of it won't lower your gas bill. Here's a look at a few misconceptions:

#1. Fill Your Tank in the Morning
You may have heard that it's best to fill your gas tank in the early morning while the fuel is cold. The theory goes that fluids are more dense at lower temperatures, so a gallon of cold gas actually has more gas molecules than a gallon of warmer gas.

But the temperature of the gasoline as it comes out of the nozzle varies little during the course of the day, according to Consumer Reports, so there's little, if any, benefit, to getting up early to pump gas.

#2. Change Your Air Filter
Maintaining your car is important, but a clean air filter isn't going to save you any gas. Modern engines have computer sensors that automatically adjust the fuel-air mixture as an increasingly clogged air filter chokes off the engine's air supply.

While engine power will decrease slightly as the air filter becomes clogged, a lack of performance or an increase in fuel consumption will be negligible, Consumer Reports says.

#3. Use Premium Fuel
With prices already over $4.00 a gallon, premium gasoline is a hard sell these days. But a lot of drivers think because their owners' manual recommends premium, they'll get better fuel economy if they stick with it. Really, they're paying more money for nothing.

Even cars for which premium is recommended won't suffer with regular fuel. Modern engine technology comes to the rescue again. When sensors detect regular instead of premium fuel, the system automatically adjusts spark plug timing. The result is a slight reduction in peak horsepower - really, you'll never notice - but no reduction in fuel economy.

#4. Pump Up Your Tires
Proper tire inflation is important for a number of reasons. Under-inflated tires are bad for handling and can even cause a crash. Improper tire inflation also causes tires to wear out faster and to heat up more, which could trigger a dangerous high-speed blow-out. According to on-the-road driving tests by both Consumer Reports and auto information site Edmunds.com, underinflated tires reduce fuel economy, so proper inflation is key.

But you should never over-inflate your tires. They'll get you slightly better fuel economy because there will be less tread touching the road, reducing friction. But that means less grip for braking and turning. The added risk of a crash isn't worth the extra mile a gallon you might gain.

#5. To A/C or Not A/C
There's no question air-conditioning makes extra work for the engine, increasing fuel use. But car air conditioners are much more efficient today than they used to be. In around-town driving, using the A/C will drop fuel economy by about a mile a gallon. Meanwhile, driving at higher speeds with the windows down greatly increases aerodynamic drag. As speed increases, drag becomes more of an issue, making A/C use the more efficient choice at high speeds.

At most speeds and in most vehicles, A/C use drains slightly more fuel than driving with the windows down, contends David Champion, head of auto testing for Consumer Reports. "My final take on is that it's very close," says Phil Reed, consumer advice editor for Edmunds.com. "It's hard to measure the difference and every vehicle is different."

#6. Bolt-Ons and Pour-Ins
Before you buy a device that's supposed to make your car more fuel-efficient or pour in an allegedly gas-saving additive, ask yourself this: Don't you think oil and car companies aren't doing everything they can to beat their competitors?

If BP could add something to its gasoline that made cars go farther on a gallon, cars would be lining up at the company's pumps. Sure, people would burn their fuel-saving BP gas more slowly, but then they'd drive right past rivals' gas stations to come back to BP for more. BP stations could even charge more for their gas and still sell tons of the stuff.

So if there really was an additive that made gas burn up more slowly, it wouldn't be sold over the Internet one bottle at a time.

"There are a number of these gas-saving devices that are generally useless," says Champion.

What Does the Average Person Pay For Gas?

2008-05-20T16:20:00.003-05:00

As a follow-up to yesterday's post about gas prices and the financial strain it is placing on our family, I wanted to offer some stats on avg driving costs.

The average vehicle gets 23 mpg combined fuel economy. 1
The average miles driven per week is 200. 2
The avg. unleaded regular gas price, over the past year, in the US, has been ~$3.60/gallon. 3

Therefore, the average cost of driving a personal vehicle in America is ~$31.30 per week. The average monthly cost is ~$134.00.

If gas prices were "normal" and we were not being gouged by the oil companies, the price would probably be around $2.30/gallon. Without being screwed, we would likely pay, on average, around $20.00 per week for regular unleaded gasoline. The monthly average would be ~$86.00.

That's $48.00 per month difference in what the average person pays to what he would pay if not for oil company greed. Folks, those numbers add up quick. The annual total difference is $576.00 -- and that's just for cars getting 23mpg and people who drive only 200 miles per week.

If you drive a 15mpg pick-up or SUV an avg. of 300 miles per week, your total added costs is $112.00 per month, or ~$1342.00 per year.

So, what is the answer?

Higher mpg?
Lower gas prices?
Drilling in ANWAR?
Tax cuts?
Penalties for the oil companies?
Human beings conserving?

Leave a comment with your thoughts!

Sources:
1. http://www.southcarolinagasprices.com/Past_polls.aspx?poll_id=306
2. http://www.southcarolinagasprices.com/Past_polls.aspx?poll_id=351
3. http://www.southcarolinagasprices.com/

Gas Prices are Hurting the Economy of My Family

2008-05-19T17:47:00.000-05:00

Gas prices are hurting the economy of my family. Plain and simple. The greed of the oil companies is causing a financial burden on our family of five. Over the past several months, we have considered several options, as have many others who are in the same situation.

Just so you know how to compare our circumstances to yours, here is a little reposition about us (using good averages from my record keeping). We have two vehicles: a 2004 Pontiac sedan and a 2005 minivan. The '04 gets 25mpg; the '05 van gets 21mpg. Our daily commute to/from work is 55 miles for one of us and 60 for the other. We have two kids who are involved in extra-curricular activities, so there are always added miles at least three days per week. And we attend church on Sunday -- 45 mile round trip at least once; most Sundays, twice. On average, we fill up both vehicles with fuel every five days. Using today's gas price of $3.65/gal in our area, the avg. fill-up costs $60 for the '04 and $65 for the '05. Our total fuel costs per month avg $750-$800 (inclusive of extra driving, etc).

Here are a few of those considerations, what I've done about them and the results of that action or research:

Drive less
Tune-up vehicles
Buy a motorcycle & park my car
Trade in both vehicles for more fuel efficient models

RESULTS:
1. Drive less: We started doubling up on trips to the grocery store, Wal-Mart and the like two years ago. We never run to any store for anything that costs less than $10.00. It's not a scientific fact, but the closest area with various stores and services is 20 miles round trip from our home in the country. I figured that needing anything less than twice what it costs to drive to the store is not worth going to get.

2. Tune-up vehicles: Both vehicles have new spark plugs, fresh oil, K&N filters and properly inflated tires. The fuel filters are regularly checked, as are the air filters, etc. We figure we're getting 2-3mpg savings by keeping the vehicles tuned -- and using the K&N filters.

3. Buy a motorcycle & park my car: I thought about it. Have you? Just for kicks, I went over to RoadTripAmerica's Fuel Cost Calculator and figured the difference between driving my car and riding a 50mpg motorcycle.
The results were not as satisfying as I had hoped for. On avg, I would save around $4.00 per day in fuel costs. Since I work 5 days each week, that avg's out to $80.00 per month in savings. Does anyone know where you can buy a reliable motorcycle AND insurance for $80/mth? Nope, me neither. That would be the break even point. To actually save money, the cost per month would have to be even less.

4. Trade in both vehicles for more fuel efficient models: We're both a little "upside-down" in car value vs. loan payback -- so we can't effectively trade and purchase more fuel efficient vehicles. BTW, part of the drop in value is likely due to the mpg of both vehicles. People are buying smaller cars now -- so large sedans and minivans are taking a hit in value. In order to recoup the difference, we would have to extend our loans, pay a large down payment or much higher monthly payments. All of those options would effectively negate any savings at the pump.

So what are we doing to stave off the crunch in finances?
We pay the gas prices and cut out other things. XM radio and my subscription to ConsumerReports.org are now gone. I guess the next thing to go will be DirectTV -- then the kids' cell phones. I don't know what else to do. We have to work and therefore, are forced to buy gas -- no matter what it costs.

What are YOU doing? Are gas prices significantly hurting your finances?

Wikipedia Peddles Porn to Kids

2008-05-15T08:41:00.002-05:00

Article from ChristiansUnite.com

It would be a tall order, but parents around the world may want to make every effort to keep their kids away from Wikipedia.com, the enormously popular, user-generated online encyclopedia. While doing homework, research for term papers, or for just plain fun, millions of kids visit Wikipedia every day. That's why parents may be alarmed to learn that, as recently exposed by WorldNetDaily.com, Wikipedia features hundreds, if not thousands, of hardcore pornographic images and online sex videos, making them easily accessible to children.

Matt Barber, Policy Director for Cultural Issues with Concerned Women for America (CWA), said, "Perhaps Wikipedia should change its name to Pornopedia. Providing clinical images that may assist people in research is one thing, but many of the images and videos featured by Wikipedia are gratuitous and obscene. They're entirely unnecessary and amount to hardcore pornography, plain and simple. These actions by Wiki founder Jimmy Wales and other executives with Wikipedia are reprehensible. By disseminating this obscene material, their misbehavior is no better than that of the sleazy smut peddler at the XXX bookstore down the street. They should be ashamed of themselves. In fact, the Department of Justice (DOJ) should look into whether Wikipedia may be in violation of federal obscenity laws."

"For this reason, we're calling on Wikipedia to either pull the pornography from its Web page, or, as do many other porn sites, place a prominent warning on the home page indicating that it features pornography, and requiring visitors to affirm that they are at least 18 years of age or older before entering," said Barber. "People may notice that while searching a term using the Google search engine, a Wikipedia link is often the first to pop up. This makes Wikipedia one of the most visited websites on the Internet. With great power comes great responsibility. To willingly, if not intentionally, make pornography a mouse click away for kids is contemptibly low and represents the height of irresponsibility."

"Unfortunately, the federal government's reticence to prosecute violations of federal obscenity laws has created a climate where disseminating hardcore pornography, even to children, is considered 'no big deal.' Perhaps now, knowing that millions of children are being readily exposed to obscenity on Wikipedia.com, the DOJ will finally step up its efforts," concluded Barber.

Concerned Women for America is the nation's largest public policy women's organization.

Outsourced Tech Support

2008-05-12T08:16:00.007-05:00

These days, when you have a problem with computer hardware or software, you place a call to technical support. Most of the time, your call is outsourced to a call center overseas. Take a look at the pictures below... and then read the "punch line". BTW, this is 100% TRUE!

THIS IS INDIA. This is where your tech support call goes when you need help with electronics, computers or software. Doesn't this make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside?

Dr. Alveda King: Defund Planned Parenthood

2008-05-04T17:15:00.004-05:00

Article from christiansunite.com
Dr. Alveda King, Pastoral Associate of Priests for Life and niece of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., today said that a new study released by Students for Life of America reinforces the call of black leaders to eliminate federal subsidies to Planned Parenthood.

"It's time to let freedom ring for the babies," said Dr. King. "The Students for Life report on Planned Parenthood's targeting of African Americans for abortion spells out why taxpayers should not be forced to contribute to that organization. The government should not be subsidizing racism, but that's exactly what it's doing through Planned Parenthood."

The study examines programs and incidents dating from Planned Parenthood's founding through the most recent scandal of seven Planned Parenthood chapters' willingness to accept donations for the exclusive purpose of aborting black babies. "Defending human life is part of the civil rights struggle and I and my fellow pro-life African American leaders are not going away," added Dr. King. "We are uniting civil rights and moral rights to fulfill the dream of what my uncle called 'the beloved community.' America needs to know that black leaders do support life. We start where life begins, with the babies, and we will march on until abortion, racism, and all society's ills bow to the truth that we are all one race."

Priests for Life is the nation's largest Catholic pro- life organization dedicated to ending abortion and euthanasia.
For more information, visit www.priestsforlife.org.

Rapist / Murderer Cesar Laurean Captured in Mexico

2008-04-11T08:20:00.004-05:00

A Marine wanted in the brutal slaying of a pregnant colleague who had accused him of rape was arrested Thursday night in Mexico after a three-month international manhunt, authorities said. FBI agents and Mexican authorities arrested Marine Cpl. Cesar Laurean around 7 p.m. EDT. He is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Marine Lance Cpl. Maria Lauterbach, whose burned remains were found in January in the backyard of his home near Camp Lejeune.

"You know my name. You know who I am," Laurean told The Associated Press while being held at the Michoacan state Attorney General's Office in Morelia, the state capital. Asked if he wanted to say anything, Laurean simply said, "Proof," but wouldn't explain. Laurean appeared slightly disoriented. Asked what he would do next, he replied: "Do I have a choice? ... I don't know."

Magdalena Guzman, a spokeswoman for the Michoacan, Mexico, state prosecutors office, said police carrying out an anti-kidnapping operation stopped Laurean as he wandered on a street in the rural township of Tacambaro, Michoacan, because they thought he looked suspicious. When they realized he didn't speak Spanish well, they became even more suspicious. After running his name through a computer, they realized Laurean was wanted in the United States to face charges in Lauterbach's death.

Guzman said Laurean told the arresting officers he had only 10 pesos (about US$1) in his pocket, and that he had been surviving by eating avocados and other fruit he found in the fields of the farming community where he was found. The FBI said Laurean, 21, is awaiting extradition to the U.S., although local prosecutors in North Carolina cautioned the process could take a year or more. "Laurean's swift arrest in Mexico was due to the diligence and dedication of the Mexican government and our law enforcement partners," Nathan Gray, the special agent in charge of the FBI's Charlotte office, said in a statement. "This was truly an international effort, and we will do all we can to ensure Laurean is brought back to Onslow County (N.C.) as quickly as possible to answer the charges against him."

Additional information on ABCNews.com

Technology History; Microsoft WORD

2008-04-04T16:17:00.002-05:00

The development of Microsoft Word began in April, 1983. Richard Brodie, Microsoft's 77th employee, developed the program while Microsoft Windows was being developed. WORD was completed in 1985. To market the new word processor, Microsoft distributed 450,000 demo disks in the November, 1985 issue of PC World magazine (which is now a tech collector's item).

Technology History: Apple Computer Company

2008-04-01T07:22:00.003-05:00

The Apple Computer Company was "born" on April 1, 1975. Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs designed the first Apple computer in Jobs' home. Jobs was able to convince a local electronic retailer to order 25 Apple I computers. In order to raise the money to make these machines, Jobs sold his Volkswagen microbus. Wozniak sold his HP scientific calculator, thus enabling them to raise $1,300.
Apple has gone on to become a multi-billion dollar worldwide technology company -- whose most famous product, the iPod, is the standard for MP3 players today.

FCC Auction for 700Mhz Ends

2008-03-18T19:20:00.003-05:00

Excerpt from PhoneScoop.com
The FCC 700 MHz auction came to an end this afternoon, after 38 days, 261 rounds, and $19.6 billion in bids. Of the five large blocks being auctioned off, spectrum licenses in the A, B, C, and E blocks reached their minimum bids. The D block, which was reserved for a nationwide public safety network, failed to reach the minimum bid and is being officially removed from the auction.

The FCC may attempt to sell it off again in a separate auction. The C block, which generated the most interest because it covers large portions of the U.S., reached its minimum bid early in the auction and has remained mostly stagnant since. The FCC will not disclose the names of the winners of the 1,099 licenses that were made available for up to 10 days.

Technology History: The Dot Com Crash

2008-03-03T07:56:00.000-05:00

The Dot Com Crash occured from March to October in 2002 -- when the NASDAQ stock market composite index lost 78% of its value. The bubble began in the mid 1990s with widespread, public availability of the World Wide Web.

The new economy of the Internet set the stage for euphoria where speculators were barely able to control their excitement. The crash was set into motion as a series of losses and failures (such as Netscape) were reported in the first quarter of 2000.

Yahoo's Yang Tell Rice It's Her Job to Get Dissidents Released

2008-02-27T12:19:00.001-05:00

Article from RedmondMag.com, By Peter Varhol
In a response that has irony written all over it, Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang said in a letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that it was the State Department's job to pursue the release of two journalists being held in a Chinese prison for allegedly leaking state secrets and political writings. The irony is that it was information provided to the Chinese government by Yahoo that led to these arrests and imprisonments.

Yang claims that the information Yahoo provided was released against company values, and the company has settled a lawsuit by the families involved and established a human rights fund after the fact. However, after a Yahoo official was caught in the act of misleading Congress about the affair, California Rep. Tom Lantos responded, "While technologically and financially you are giants, morally you are pygmies."

It sounds like a cop-out by Yahoo to me. Does no one there recall the courage and conviction of H. Ross Perot as chronicled in "On Wings of Eagles"? Yang wouldn't do that; it's all about dollars and cents to him.

Nokia Shows Nano Technology in its concept MORPH Mobile Phone

2008-02-26T11:16:00.008-05:00

Article from Nokia.com

Featured in The Museum of Modern Art “Design and The Elastic Mind” exhibition, Nokia's Morph concept device is a bridge between highly advanced technologies and their potential benefits to end-users. This device concept showcases some revolutionary leaps being explored by Nokia Research Center (NRC) in collaboration with the Cambridge Nanoscience Centre (UK) – nanoscale technologies that will potentially create a world of radically different devices that open up an entirely new spectrum of possibilities. Morph concept technologies might create fantastic opportunities for mobile devices:

Newly-enabled flexible and transparent materials blend more seamlessly with the way we live
Devices become self-cleaning and self-preserving
Transparent electronics offering an entirely new aesthetic dimension
Built-in solar absorption might charge a device, whilst batteries become smaller, longer lasting and faster to charge
Integrated sensors might allow us to learn more about the environment around us, empowering us to make better choices

In addition to the advances above, the integrated electronics shown in the Morph concept could cost less and include more functionality in a much smaller space, even as interfaces are simplified and usability is enhanced. All of these new capabilities will unleash new applications and services that will allow us to communicate and interact in unprecedented ways.

Flexible & Changing Design
Nanotechnology enables materials and components that are flexible, stretchable, transparent and remarkably strong. Fibril proteins are woven into a three dimensional mesh that reinforces thin elastic structures. Using the same principle behind spider silk, this elasticity enables the device to literally change shapes and configure itself to adapt to the task at hand. A folded design would fit easily in a pocket and could lend itself ergonomically to being used as a traditional handset. An unfolded larger design could display more detailed information, and incorporate input devices such as keyboards and touch pads. Even integrated electronics, from interconnects to sensors, could share these flexible properties. Further, utilization of biodegradable materials might make production and recycling of devices easier and ecologically friendly.

Technology History: Microsoft Corporation

2008-02-14T15:11:00.005-05:00

Microsoft Corporation's IPO opened on the stock market on February 14, 1986. The asking price of the IPO was $21.00 per share. At that time, Gates, Ballmer and the gang were making much of the company's revenue on Macintosh software, BASIC language interpreters, and the PC operating system MS-DOS.
After the IPO, Microsoft began a tremendous run -- earning large increases in revenue over the next two decades. By 2003 (a mere 13 yrs later), a $2,100 investment at the 1986 IPO offering price was worth $1.5 million. Sadly, while Microsoft has posted excellent dividends over the last 21 years, their share price has fallen by more than half from it's peak around the time of the dot com bubble.

Technology History: The Apple iPod

2008-02-05T11:19:00.001-05:00

Seven years ago... Apple Computer hired Tony Fadell in early 2001 and assigns him a team of designers, programmers and hardware engineers to develop a new music player called the iPod. Fadell's business idea is to take an MP3 player, build a music sale service to complement it, and build a company around it. Apple CEO Steve Jobs was highly involved with the project since its inception and molded the device's shape, feel and design. The rest, as they say... is history.

Excel Flaw Highlights Need for Better App Security

2008-01-29T22:07:00.000-05:00

Experts believe the rising number of exploits targeting Excel gives hackers incentive to continually exploit applications -- rather than operating systems -- for flaws.

Article by Jabulani Leffall

Don Leatham of Lumension Security has a first-step remedy to the ongoing security concerns around Microsoft's Excel application. "IT guys should tell end users right off the bat that if they see an unrecognizable Excel document in their inbox, they should treat it like porn -- it's not something you should be opening up at work." Extreme measures aside, because Excel is one of the most commonly used software applications of the planet, it's also increasingly the most common and frequent target for client-side attacks, security experts say.

In the last 18 months alone there were more than 33 documented vulnerabilities that pertained specifically to the popular spreadsheet program, a number Microsoft would neither confirm nor deny. While this seems like a large number -- an average of almost two every month for that duration -- these are just the documented cases. This prompts IT security mavens to assert that securing Excel -- even above Internet Explorer -- should be Job No. 1 where Windows programs are concerned.

"Out of all the applications sitting on networks and desktops around the globe, Excel lends itself to be the most natural attack target because of its ubiquity in the corporate world," said Leatham, director of solutions strategy for Lumension, which is based in Scottsdale, Ariz. "This is definitely the one program IT pros are really pulling their hair out over because more often than not, Excel documents carry sensitive information such as financial data and the like." In mid-January, Microsoft's security group said there were continual attacks exploiting a flaw in most versions of the popular spreadsheet program.

READ MORE...

BIZ LEADERS ON BIZ CONTINUITY

2008-01-24T10:38:00.000-05:00

Article from RedmondMag.com
Additional info from steeleye.com
SteelEye Technology has released its Technology Business Continuity Index. This annual survey conducted by the data replication and protection software developer polls IT professionals and business executives and looks at adoption levels, best practices and attitudes about business continuity. The bottom line of this year's report is that threats to business continuity are increasing, so business leaders are placing increasing priorities on business continuity. Here are some of the most significant findings of the survey:

More than 50 percent of the CEOs surveyed regarded outages of services such as financial transaction processing or customer service as being "fatal" to their business.

More than 40 percent of all respondents feel the average IT organization is more prepared for business continuity threats than last year.

Less than 28 percent of IT managers feel their CEOs haven't prioritized business continuity assurance.

87 percent of C-level executives feel the average IT organization faces the same threats or even more threats to business continuity than last year.

63 percent of C-level executives feel there are now more potential threats to IT systems that are in turn threats to business continuity.

81 percent of IT managers feel their CEOs consider business continuity a top priority.

66 percent of IT managers feel their CEOs understand the steps and precautions required to ensure business continuity.

That last one is good news indeed. You won't be barking up the wrong tree when you go to your CEO asking for funding for data protection or secure offline storage.

CIA Confirms Cyber Attack Caused Multi-City Power Outage

2008-01-18T15:22:00.001-05:00

From SANS.org:
On Wednesday, in New Orleans, US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) senior analyst Tom Donohue told a gathering of 300 US, UK, Swedish, and Dutch government officials and engineers and security managers from electric, water, oil & gas and other critical industry asset owners from all across North America, that

"We have information, from multiple regions outside the United States, of cyber intrusions into utilities, followed by extortion demands. We suspect, but cannot confirm, that some of these attackers had the benefit of inside knowledge. We have information that cyber attacks have been used to disrupt power equipment in several regions outside the United States. In at least one case, the disruption caused a power outage affecting multiple cities. We do not know who executed these attacks or why, but all involved intrusions through the Internet."

According to Mr. Donohue, the CIA actively and thoroughly considered the benefits and risks of making this information public, and came down on the side of disclosure.

Westboro Baptist Church to Protest at Camp LeJeune January 26th

2008-01-18T12:23:00.001-05:00

The Westboro Baptist Church (which is nothing more than the vile Fred Phelps and his whack relatives) is planning to picket, outside Camp LeJeune, NC, in favor of the murder of Maria Frances Lauterbach and her unborn child. The protest is set to take place just outside the main gate at Camp LeJeune on Saturday, January 26th -- starting around noon.

These "demons" are using the Holy Bible to say that God hates the American military because they have allowed homosexuality into their ranks -- and that deaths of ALL soldiers are God's work.

This could not be further from the truth. While the Bible is clear that homosexuality is a sin, God does NOT "hate fags". He hates sin, but loves His creation -- and that includes ALL people. God does not kill American soldiers, such as Maria Lauterbach, as some sort of vendetta against mankind.

Our Advice: Don't go to Jacksonville, NC looking for a fight, BUT be prepared to protect those who are there in protest AGAINST the Topeko, KS group. Military personnel have been given standing orders NOT to go near the demonstration. So, it's time for civilians to stand up and support our military -- and shield the world from the vomited hatred of the WBC.

EDITORIAL: I plan to be in Jacksonville -- protesting AGAINST the WBC and it message of hate. There are NO plans for confrontation, but rest assured that I would gladly get arrested for protecting (yes, that means PHYSICAL ACTION) innocent people from the venom Phelps and his ilk spew.

Christina Laurean Knew Maria Lauterbach Was Dead

2008-01-18T10:35:00.001-05:00

Excerpts from WRAL.com and FOXNews.com
Christina Smith Laurean, the wife of the suspected killer of a pregnant Marine, knew Lance Cpl. Maria Lauterbach was dead a day before she went to police, according to affidavits obtained by local TV news stations in North Carolina. The court document states that Cpl. Cesar Armando Laurean and his wife were driving to meet with an attorney on January 10.

Cesar Laurean had asked Christina "if she was with him on this". She replied, "I do not know. Is there anything you have not told me?" At that time, Cesar Laurean confessed that Lauterbach was dead and he had buried her body in a wooded area adjacent to their home, the affidavits show.

Cesar Laurean told his wife that Lauterbach slit her own throat with a knife during an argument on the evening of December 15. He said Lauterbach, who was eight months pregnant, had come to him earlier that day to tell him she was leaving Jacksonville, N.C., and demanded that he give her money. He took her to a bus station and helped her buy a ticket to El Paso, TX., his wife said in the affidavits.

Cesar Laurean's wife of two years told Onslow County sheriff's detective John Dubois that a disoriented and agitated Lauterbach returned to the home later that night and told Laurean that "her plan had failed, that an argument ensued" and that she produced a knife and killed herself by slitting her throat. "He became scared, took her body to a wooded area adjacent to his residence, and buried her. He obtained legal counsel and explained the facts to them. He was told that he was facing the death penalty," Dubois wrote.

Christina Laurean did not go to authorities with that information until January 11, when her husband left home. She has not seen him since (according to statements she has made to investigators). A search warrant has been issued for a cell phone belonging to Cesar Laurean, his wife, his mother and his sister (Blanca Laurean), according to the affidavits.

WRAL-TV obtained copies of the warrant and attached affidavits documenting conversations between 21-year-old Laurean and his wife. Police said they do not believe Lauterbach took her own life. Christina Laurean discovered Lauterbach was pregnant in July, but her husband said he was not the father of the baby, according to court documents. He also told his wife that he had not raped Lauterbach, as she claimed. Christina Laurean has been cooperating in the investigation, police told FOX News.

Onslow County authorities said this morning they do not believe Christina (whose full name is Christina Sue Smith [Laurean])was at her house when the pregnant Marine Lance Corporal was killed. They believe she was at a Christmas party during that time. Sheriff's officials said yesterday that investigators believe Cesar Laurean killed Lauterbach, 20, on December 14. Authorities described Christina Laurean as a cooperating witness and said they have no plans to charge her.

Significant questions that must be answered:
1) Why didn't Christina Laurean contact authorities immediately after finding out her husband disposed of another woman's body -- especially after knowing the situation between the two AND that the dead woman was eight months pregnant?

2) Why does law enforcement insist Maria Lauterbach was killed on December 14 when we also know that someone matching her description purchased a bus ticket on December 15?

2a) What piece of evidence are they holding back, glossing over or refusing to acknowledge? [Something doesn't match up here!]

3) Did Maria Lauterbach have ANY connection with El Paso, TX?

3a) Does Cesar Laurean or Christina Smith Laurean have any connection with El Paso, TX?
[If not, why would Lauterbach purchase a bus ticket to El Paso? After all, Cesar claimed Lauterbach said she "had a plan" to leave the Jacksonville area.]

4) If Maria Lauterbach went back to the Laurean home later the night she was to leave on the bus, how did she get there? Did she drive her Hyundai Sonata? If so, how was her car moved back to the restaurant near the bus station? Did Cesar Laurean take it there? If so, how did he get home? [The person who helped him needs to be questioned thoroughly!]

5) Who was the "white male" who withdrew funds from Maria Lauterbach's bank, using her ATM card, December 24? [The ATM machine used was near the Laurean home.]

6) How could Christina Laurean NOT be involved in the murder and disposal of Maria Lauterbach and her unborn child? Lauterbach was killed inside the Laurean home. A large amount of blood evidence was found inside the home. A large scale clean-up job was undertaken. Someone painted over at least one wall where some of the blood spatter was found. The body of a grown woman, eight months pregnant, was moved from inside the home to the adjacent woods and buried. It was later dug up and moved to the Laurean's backyard. A large pit was dug in the backyard. The bodies of Lauterbach and her unborn child were then burned and covered over by someone. [Does anyone believe ONE 5'9", 160 pound guy did ALL this by himself AND/OR without another person living in the same household knowing?!? VERY DOUBTFUL!]

Marine Lauterbach / Laurean Mystery Continues

2008-01-17T13:06:00.000-05:00

As the hunt for Cesar Laurean drags on, a few mysteries are being solved in the murder of Maria Lauterbach and her unborn child. Police have admitted to obtaining a "piece of evidence" they believe to be the murder weapon in the case. This piece of evidence is thought to be a crowbar handed over, along with the now public note, by Laurean's wife, Christina.

In my opinion, the crowbar is the piece of "tangible evidence" Sheriff Ed Brown spoke over when we first found that Cesar Laurean was the primary suspect late last week. The note is helpful, but not what law enforcement would consider a piece of definitive tangible evidence, from what I know about LE investigations.

Christina Laurean is apparently cooperating with police, but they are still very vague as to her status (witness or co-suspect) and location (when questioned, they always say they don't know exactly where she is at the moment). One more thing we know is that Christina Smith Laurean has told authorities she believes her husband is either in or headed to Mexico. She handed over two letters she received from Cesar Armando Laurean (Ramirez) -- one of which had a Houston, TX. postmark.

Friends and fellow Marines have also said Laurean made statements leading them to believe he would flee to Mexico "if it appeared he would be found guilty of rape" -- a two-count charge Lauterbach made against him in 2007. An Article 32 hearing was scheduled just days after Lance Cpl. Lauterbach disappeared on December 14, 2007.

Police believe she was killed around December 15th. We believe her body was stored somewhere (possibly in the Laurean home) from the time of her death until December 24, when Cesar Laurean lit a large fire in a pit in his backyard. There is also reason to speculate that the body was dismembered before being burned in the pit. OTOH, the baby's body was not disposed of separately, which would make sense in this type of case.

Even though Lauterbach accused Laurean of two counts of rape (one incident in March and one in April), medical examiners say the time of conception was around May 14th. According to military records, the first positive pregnancy test was in June, 2007. Two mysteries surrounding the child are still unsolved questions of whether Laurean is the father AND whether or not the baby was born prior to Maria Lauterbach's death.

Photo from FOXNews.com

THE WORLD'S MOST DANGEROUS IM CLIENT

2008-01-16T14:26:00.000-05:00

Doug Barney of RemondMag.com wrote in the latest issue:

"Talk about a dubious distinction. Microsoft last year gained top honors as the most-hacked instant messaging client of 2007. According to some quick and dirty Internet research (read: this information could be wildly inaccurate!), AOL has by far the most IM market share, with Microsoft coming in second with roughly half the number of users.

If MSN is the most hacked, there are only two reasonable theories. First, it's easier to hack MSN than other clients, or second, it's just more fun to hack a Microsoft product. I'd go with the latter!"

BREAKING NEWS: Laurean's Truck Found Outside Raleigh

2008-01-15T15:26:00.000-05:00

BREAKING NEWS: 3:10pm ET -- Police found Cesar Laurean's truck outside a Morrisville hotel on Airport Blvd. late Tuesday afternoon. Laurean remains missing.

WTVD-11 is providing live video of Cesar Laurean's black Dodge pickup truck. It is sitting behind the Microtel Inn off Airport Blvd. in Morrisville, NC (which is very near the Raleigh/Durham airport).

Police, SBI and FBI are definitely closing in on Laurean. We predict he will be found soon.

Onslow County Sheriff Ed Brown says he believes that friends of Laurean are assisting him in hiding and providing resources for his use. These folks should reconsider their actions as they can and will likely be charged with aiding and abetting a fugitive -- both from federal and military prosecution.

Slain Marine Corporal Maria Lauterbach's military ID card was found at a bus station in Durham, about 150 miles northwest of Jacksonville. Witnesses reported seeing his black four-door pickup truck in the Raleigh and Durham area, Brown said.

More updates to follow...

Murdered Marine: You call this an investigation?

2008-01-15T14:32:00.000-05:00

Randi Kaye of Anderson Cooper 360 makes some EXCELLENT points in her blog post from earlier this morning...
Today, Onslow County Sheriff Ed Brown announced he won't be talking to the media anymore, until Corporal Cesar Laurean is caught. Laurean is the U.S. Marine charged in the brutal murder of fellow Marine Lance Corporal Maria Lauterbach and her unborn child. He's been on the run since last Friday. Police believe they recovered Lauterbach's charred remains in a fire pit behind Laurean's home over the weekend along with those of her baby.

Sheriff Brown has been holding press conferences daily and doing one-on-one interviews with local and national media. Now he says it's time to get back to work and we shouldn't expect a word from him until Laurean is behind bars. I've never heard of holding a press conference to announce you're NOT going to hold press conferences anymore. But nothing in this case has been business as usual.

The Marines knew Maria Lauterbach had accused Cesar Laurean of rape and didn't give the Sheriff his name until January 7th, TWENTY days after she disappeared.

The Marines knew Laurean was forbidden to go near Lauterbach. A military protective order was issued in June 2007. It had expired in September 2007, but the Marines never even told Sheriff Brown about it. He told me he wasn't aware of it until last weekend when his deputies found the paperwork in Lauterbach's car.

Can you imagine?

Turns out there is no protocol in place for the Marines when it comes to sharing information with civil law enforcement. Read on...

EDITORIAL: It seems to me that the Lauterbach family has grounds for a precedent-setting lawsuit against the Marine Corps. There is ZERO EXCUSE for the military police not sharing information with the sheriff's department once Maria Lauterbach went missing. It is INTOLERABLE that they did NOTHING to assist -- and even thwarted law enforcement efforts -- in the missing persons case.

As for the civilian authorities, Sheriff Brown and his deputies need to charge Christina Laurean as an accessory to murder (minimally) or a co-conspirator (more likely) in the deaths of Lauterbach and her unborn child. I can't fathom how Cesar Laurean's wife could not have known a violent murder took place in their home. Come on! He washed and painted the walls without any previous decision on both their parts. What husband does that?!? [Some records indicate Christina Laurean said she assisted Cesar with painting the walls.]

Also, why would Christina S. Laurean not question a fire pit freshly dug in the backyard; a large fire burned Christmas Eve (odd time for a fire) -- and then another fire (neighbors says Christina called it a "bonfire with friends") Christmas night?!? I may be wrongly accusing her of being involved, but I just don't see how the facts could prove otherwise.

Fourth Day of Manhunt for Rapist/Murderer Laurean

2008-01-15T14:02:00.001-05:00

Excerpts from FOXNews.com

Officials positively identified the burned remains Tuesday found in the backyard of a Marine on the run accused of murder as those of a 20-year-old Marine and her unborn child. Lance Cpl. Maria Lauterbach, reported missing on Dec. 19, died from a blunt force trauma to the head, according to an autopsy report.

The manhunt for Cpl. Cesar Armando Laurean, the suspect in Lauterbach's murder, stretches into its fourth day with a $25,000 reward and a national billboard campaign. "He’s probably where he wants to be and can move at a more slower, unattractive pace," Onslow County Sheriff Ed Brown told FOX News Tuesday. "So now it’s probably going to be the results of people in the community where he’s at recognizing he’s a stranger, or different, and comparing his photograph to those that he sees on TV and on the billboards."

Over the weekend, authorities recovered the remains of Lauterbach and her unborn child from a fire pit in Laurean's backyard in Jacksonville, N.C. Dr. Charles Garrett, the Onslow County medical examiner, said Lauterbach died from "traumatic head injury due to blunt force trauma."

Lauterbach's ATM card was found at a bus station in Durham, about 150 miles northwest of Jacksonville. Witnesses reported seeing his black four-door pickup truck in the Raleigh and Durham area, Brown said. Other witnesses said they thought they saw him Saturday night at a bus station in Shreveport, La.

The FBI and United States Marshals are involved in the search for Laurean, who is expected to be charged with murder when he is arrested. The first billboards with Laurean's photo went up in Columbus, Ohio, and others are expected in Tampa, Fla., and Las Vegas. "Laurean will be found", Sheriff Brown said later at a press conference.

Read more...

Wanted By the FBI: Cesar Armando Laurean Ramirez

2008-01-14T21:13:00.000-05:00

UNLAWFUL FLIGHT TO AVOID PROSECUTION - MURDER

CESAR ARMANDO LAUREAN

Aliases:

Cesar Gudino, Cesar Sanchez, Cesar Armando Laurean Ramirez

DESCRIPTION

Date of Birth Used:	November 13, 1986	Hair:	Black
Place of Birth:	Unknown	Eyes:	Brown
Height:	5'9"	Sex:	Male
Weight:	160 pounds	Race:	White (Hispanic)
NCIC:	W653665173	Nationality:	Unknown
Occupation:	United States Marine Corps Corporal
Scars and Marks:	Laurean has a tattoo of a skull on one of his upper arms, and a tattoo of a black widow spider, including an hourglass on the spider's abdomen, on the other upper arm.
Remarks:	Laurean is a United States citizen. He is also a United States Marine Corps Corporal currently assigned to Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. Laurean may be driving a four-door 2004 Dodge Ram truck, black in color, displaying North Carolina license plate TRR1522.

CAUTION

Cesar Armando Laurean is wanted for his alleged involvement in the murder of 20-year-old Maria Lauterbach, who was pregnant at the time of her murder. Lauterbach was a United States Marine Corps Lance Corporal assigned to Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. She had been missing since December 14, 2007. Charred remains have been recovered in a shallow grave in the backyard of Laurean's Jacksonville, North Carolina, residence. The remains are believed to be those of Lauterbach and her unborn infant.

A state arrest warrant was issued on January 12, 2008, in Onslow County, North Carolina, after Laurean was charged with murder. That same day, Laurean was charged federally with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution by the United States District Court, Eastern District of North Carolina, Wilmington, North Carolina, and a federal warrant was issued for his arrest.

REWARD

The FBI is offering a reward of up to $25,000 for information leading to the location and arrest of Cesar Armando Laurean.

SHOULD BE CONSIDERED ARMED AND DANGEROUS

IF YOU HAVE ANY INFORMATION CONCERNING THIS PERSON, PLEASE CONTACT YOUR LOCAL FBI OFFICE OR THE NEAREST AMERICAN EMBASSY OR CONSULATE.

ROBERT S. MUELLER, III
DIRECTOR
FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20535
TELEPHONE: (202) 324-3000

Laurean Spotted in Louisiana; Headed Towards Texas

2008-01-13T20:21:00.001-05:00

Well, it looks like we were right on target Friday afternoon. Laurean has been seen in Alabama -- headed towards Texas.

The NY Daily News reports: Marine Cpl. Cesar Armando Laurean, lead suspect in the slaying of a 20-year-old pregnant marine, is on the run in Louisiana, say authorities. The nationwide manhunt for a Marine wanted in the brutal slaying of a 20-year-old pregnant colleague who had accused him of rape focused Sunday on Louisiana and Texas, after he was spotted at a bus station.

Marine Cpl. Cesar Armando Laurean was seen at a Shreveport, La., station Saturday night, Onslow County Sheriff Ed Brown said. The bus Laurean was riding was headed to Texas, but police don’t know if he continued on that route, he said. "It will be a short trip — a short vacation — for Mr. Laurean," Brown said. "His vacation may be short, his travel may be long, but I hope we’ll be there to help him return."

On Saturday, authorities said they recovered what they believe to be the burned remains of Marine Lance Cpl. Maria Lauterbach and her unborn child from a fire pit in Laurean’s backyard, where they suspect he burned and buried her body. Those remains have been sent to the state medical examiner’s office in Chapel Hill for a formal identification. That same day, state authorities issued an arrest warrant on murder charges for Laurean, 21, of the Las Vegas area. They believe he fled Jacksonville before dawn Friday after leaving behind a note in which he admitted burying her body but claimed Lauterbach cut her own throat in a suicide.

Brown has challenged Laurean’s assertion that Lauterbach killed herself, citing what he described as evidence of a violent confrontation inside Laurean’s home — blood spatters on the ceiling and a massive amount of blood on the wall. Brown said Sunday that evidence in the case "leads us to believe that he would be a dangerous and violent person if put in a corner."

"What I’ve seen and what we’ve discovered indicates he does have a real heinous behavior about him," he said. Brown has said Lauterbach purchased a bus ticket to El Paso, Texas, around the time of her disappearance, but said Sunday authorities are not in possession of the ticket. Shreveport is roughly 950 miles southwest of Jacksonville, and is about two dozen miles from the Texas state line and more than 800 miles east of El Paso.

Read more...

Burnt Human Remains Found in Laurean's Backyard

2008-01-11T20:54:00.000-05:00

Onslow County Sheriff Ed Brown just finished a news conference with reporters. He stated that the charred remains of what is believed to be the body of Maria Lauterbach (and her unborn baby) were found in the backyard of Cesar Armando and Christina Smith Laurean.
Sheriff Brown also stated that there are positive luminol results in at least two areas of the Laurean home. IMO, that points to the murder taking place in the house. Apparently, Cesar Laurean burned and buried the bodies of Maria Mauterbach and her baby. By several statements the sheriff made, it can probably also be safely assumed that Lauterbach's body was dismembered. For what other reason would investigators want to comb through the dirt in the "cavity" where the burned remains were located?

One more thing -- police need to press Christina Laurean VERY hard for information. She may be 100% innocent of wrong doing. Then again, she may be part of the murder and subsequent disposal of Lauterbach and child. If Christina is innocent of involvement, she may know more than she is aware of -- like places Cesar may be headed. Where are any friends who may be willing to help him? Where is his family? Does he know anyone who could help him get out of the country? What did he take with him (that he doesn't normally travel with)? What didn't he take that he normally has with him when he travels? There could be a lot of information garnered from police pressing Christina Laurean.

One last thought -- It's pretty safe to say that Christina Laurean gave Sheriff Brown the "tangible evidence" proving Maria is dead. Could she have made a plea bargain deal with law enforcement to give them info in exchange for not being prosecuted? Where is she now? Where is there baby daughter?

Suspicious Cavity Found Behind Laurean's Home

2008-01-11T19:55:00.000-05:00

FOXNews.com says, The suspect investigators are pursuing is Cpl. Cesar Armando Laurean, 21; the "suspicious cavity" was discovered on the property behind his house. "It is believed the house and the contents of that cavity may eliminate the need to look any further for the body of missing Marine Maria F. Lauterbach," said the sheriff's office in a statement. Detectives were combing through Laurean's home Friday night and planned to inspect the contents of the ditch Saturday morning, according to the sheriff.

I found this on a Facebook group supporting Maria Lauterbach:

::: SPECULATION :::
Christina knew about the rape charges, but didn't initially know about the murder. Cesar took off around 4:00am this morning. She woke up or found a note and called the police. She was not at home when Maria was buried, so she didn't know about it. Although Maria was killed more than two weeks ago, she was not buried in the yard until the last 48 hours (at most).

The police never searched a random area around Gum Branch, but solely the backyard of the Laurean home. Christina provided something substantial from Maria's murder.

The reason the cavity is not being opened tonight is that Maria's body is not completely intact. They need light and time to search through the cavity in order to find, photograph and inventory all of the evidence.
::: CLOSING SPECULATION :::

I happen to agree with this guy, by the way. That's almost exactly what I was thinking!

Who Is Cesar Armando Laurean? Where Is He?

2008-01-11T16:38:00.000-05:00

The blogosphere is already developing a picture of who Cesar Armando Laurean is. Here is what we have gathered thus far. [This information will be updated as we obtain more data on Corporal Laurean -- in hopes someone will put everything together and offer investigators a substantial lead in the case.]

Name: Cesar Armando Laurean (earlier reported as Lauren or Lauran)
Age: 21
Occupation: Personnel Clerk
Employer: US Marines; Stationed at Camp LeJeune, NC
Address: 103 Meadow Trail, Jacksonville, NC
Physical Appearance: Hispanic male
Height: 5'9"
Weight: ~165 lbs
Previous Address: Clark County, NV
Education: Graduated from Palo Verde High School in Las Vegas, NV in 2004
Marital Status: Unknown; Was married to Christina Sue Smith in 2005 (Marriage license# 2005-00001647)
[Laurean listed himself on MySpace as "Single". However property records in Onslow County show a Cesar and Christina S. Laurean as homeowners -- with a resident near the area where police are searching for Maria Lauterbach's body.]
Children: 1 known - Female - Abrianna Sue; Born 2006

We are still betting that Cpl. Laurean is heading towards El Paso, TX. I doubt he would try to make it to Las Vegas as that would take days and days of driving. My guess is that he either forced Maria Lauterbach to purchase a bus ticket to El Paso or persuaded her to run away with him. Then, either something went wrong or he deliberately killed her. We should know within the next 48-72 hours -- as he will be caught or Lauterbach's body will be found. I am quite confident of that.

Cesar Armando Laurean Sought in Double Murder of Lauterbach and Unborn Child

2008-01-11T15:08:00.001-05:00

UPDATED: 5:27pm ET
UPDATED: 3:58pm ET

Marine Corporal Cesar Armando Laurean, (misspelled as Lauren in earlier reports) stationed at Camp LeJeune, is currently being sought for the murders of Maria Lauterbach, 20, and her unborn child. Previews, Newz and Reviews has found a picture of Cpl. Laurean, whose local address is 103 Meadow Trail, Jacksonville, NC.

We have obtained a picture of the 2004 black Dodge Ram quad cab pickup truck Laurean used to flee the Jacksonville area earlier today. The truck is registered in North Carolina with tag number TRR-1522 on the plate.

[We would bet on Laurean heading towards El Paso, TX. State police are likely patrolling I-95 South, and I-20 West in North and South Carolina, looking for Cpl. Laurean. If he follows normal driving, the cops should be able to pick him up somewhere around Birmingham, Alabama. If he sleeps a few hours during the day, my next guess would be Jackson, MS or possibly even Shreveport, LA. Now that he is being hunted, he will likely want to travel at night.]

An ABP was put out for Laurean's arrest as the primary suspect in the Lauterbach case after a local female, who is a former Marine, offered Sheriff Ed Brown "tangible evidence" that Lance Cpl. Lauterbach was dead. Currently, law enforcement officials have not located Lauterbach's body. They are scouring an area off Gum Branch Road and North Bryan Road, in Jacksonville, for a shallow grave.

If you see Cesar Laurean or his truck, you are urged to contact the Onslow County Sheriff's Department at (910) 455-3113 or the NC State Bureau of Investigation.

Photo courtesy of Onslow County Sheriff's Dept

Maria Lauterbach Dead - Cpl. Cesar Laurean is Prime Suspect

2008-01-11T12:51:00.000-05:00

A nine-month pregnant Marine missing for nearly a month is dead, and investigators were seeking another Marine whom she had accused of sexually assaulting her, Onslow County Sheriff Ed Brown said Friday midday.
[To make sure everyone gets the story straight, Lauterbach originally stated that a senior officer has raped her. Later, it was determined that a fellow enlisted Marine was the perpetrator.]

Authorities had not recovered the body of 20-year-old Lance Cpl. Maria Frances Lauterbach, but believe she was buried in a shallow grave off Gum Branch Road (near North Bryan and Meadow Trail in Jacksonville, NC), Sheriff Brown said. Police are also likely checking a nearby creek.

Brown and an NCIS officer both stated that a witness (identified only as a female) came forward early this morning with tangible evidence that led them to believe Lance Cpl. Lauterbach and her unborn child are dead. Law enforcement spokesmen said the mother & child were killed on or shortly after December 20, 2007.

Maria Lauterbach had originally claimed a superior officer sexually assaulted her, and she was worried that the investigation was going nowhere, according to court documents. She vanished last month before she was to testify during an Article 32 proceeding. Brown said the Marine, now identified as Corporal Cesar Armando Laurean had declined to meet with investigators, who no longer knew his whereabouts. "They don't know where he is," Brown said of the suspect. "He's gone." According to Brown, Cesar Laurean left Jacksonville this morning in a black Dodge pickup truck (NC tag has 1522 in it).

Brown said Lauterbach may have been due to give birth January 8. The police reports, however, said she was due on February 14 and did not show up for a prenatal medical appointment December 28.

Lauterbach's cell phone was found on a roadside near Camp Lejeune on December 20. Her car (a 2006 Hyundai Sonata) was found Monday in the parking lot of a fast-food restaurant (near the bus station), Brown said, and apparently had been there since December 15.

The court papers said the anticipated birth of the baby "might provide evidentiary credence to charges she lodged with military authorities that she was sexually assaulted by a military person."

Sources: Facebook.com, AP.org, CNN.com and WRAL.com

Technology History: 1982

2007-12-31T09:25:00.000-05:00

Time magazine named the Computer “Man of the Year” in 1982. The magazine wrote, "Computers were once regarded as distant, ominous abstractions, like Big Brother. In 1982, they truly became personalized, brought down to scale, so that people could hold, prod and play with them."

Record Industry Goes After Personal Use

2007-12-30T11:58:00.001-05:00

Excerpt from WashingtonPost.com

Despite more than 20,000 lawsuits filed against music fans in the years since they started finding free tunes online rather than buying CDs from record companies, the recording industry has utterly failed to halt the decline of the record album or the rise of digital music sharing. Still, hardly a month goes by without a news release from the industry's lobby, the Recording Industry Association of America, touting a new wave of letters to college students and others demanding a settlement payment and threatening a legal battle.

Now, in an unusual case in which an Arizona recipient of an RIAA letter has fought back in court rather than write a check to avoid hefty legal fees, the industry is taking its argument against music sharing one step further: In legal documents in its federal case against Jeffrey Howell, a Scottsdale, Ariz., man who kept a collection of about 2,000 music recordings on his personal computer, the industry maintains that it is illegal for someone who has legally purchased a CD to transfer that music into his computer. The industry's lawyer in the case, Ira Schwartz, argues in a brief filed earlier this month that the MP3 files Howell made on his computer from legally bought CDs are "unauthorized copies" of copyrighted recordings.

"I couldn't believe it when I read that," says Ray Beckerman, a New York lawyer who represents six clients who have been sued by the RIAA. "The basic principle in the law is that you have to distribute actual physical copies to be guilty of violating copyright. But recently, the industry has been going around saying that even a personal copy on your computer is a violation."

RIAA's hard-line position seems clear. Its Web site says: "If you make unauthorized copies of copyrighted music recordings, you're stealing. You're breaking the law and you could be held legally liable for thousands of dollars in damages."

2007-12-29T22:05:00.000-05:00

Some information from PerezHilton.com
Rosie O'Donnell is bothered by the fact that according to a new poll, almost 50% of Americans named her the most annoying person of 2007 - followed by Paris Hilton (24%), coming in a distant second. Ann Coulter (16%), Heather Mills McCartney (12%) and Perez Hilton (4%) round out the Top Five Most Annoying for 2007.

The former talk show host is so upset about her dubious distinction, that she's made this video about being dubbed most annoying.

Here's an excerpt of what she says: "I apparently am the most annoying celebrity, according to Parade magazine. And, frankly, most celebrities are annoying. So, I agree. Celebrities are annoying and the fact that I am one is annoying. And I suppose I am the most annoying. But whatever. Why? Cuz I'm loud. Some people don't like me. Barbra Streisand likes me!"

Perez Hilton (who is also very annoying) says: "Uhmmm, Barbra Streisand is annoying! It might help to name someone that likes you who is not annoying."

Benazir Bhutto Has Been Assassinated!

2007-12-27T09:58:00.000-05:00

Excerpt from FOXNews.com
Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated Thursday, shot in the neck and chest before a homicide bomber blew himself up at a campaign rally. Twenty others also died. The assassin struck just minutes after Bhutto addressed a rally of thousands of supporters in the garrison city of Rawalpindi.

She was shot as she was entering her car. Her attacker then set off his bomb. Bhutto was rushed to the hospital and taken into emergency surgery. "At 6:16 p.m. she expired," said Wasif Ali Khan, a member of Bhutto's party who was at Rawalpindi General Hospital.

U.S. officials said they were looking into reports of Bhutto's death. "Certainly, we condemn the attack on this rally. It demonstrates that there are still those in Pakistan who want to subvert reconciliation and efforts to advance democracy," said deputy State Department spokesman Tom Casey.

Bhutto's death threw the campaign for the Jan. 8 election into chaos and created fears of mass protests and an eruption of violence across the volatile south Asian nation. The United States has for months been encouraging Musharraf to reach some kind of political accommodation with the opposition, particular Bhutto, who is seen as having a wide base of support here.

Bhutto served twice as Pakistan's prime minister between 1988 and 1996. She had returned to Pakistan from an eight-year exile on Oct. 18. Her homecoming parade in Karachi was also targeted by a suicide attacker, killing more than 140 people. On that occasion she narrowly escaped injury. [TIME.com released an excellent overview of Benazir Bhutto after the assassination today.]

The scene of the bombing Thursday was awash in blood. An Associated Press reporter could see body parts and flesh scattered at the back gate of the Liaquat Bagh Park where Bhutto had spoken. He counted about 20 bodies, including police, and could see many other wounded people. Party supporter Chaudry Mohammed Nazir said two gunshots rang out when Bhutto's vehicle pulled into the main street and then there was a huge blast next to her car.

ADDED LINK 16:36 ET: Getty Images Photog, John Moore, took last known photos of opposition leader before death.

New Exploit Targets Internet Explorer

2007-12-06T09:39:00.000-05:00

Article by Jabulani Leffall

One week before the last Patch Tuesday of 2007 and two weeks after a researcher in New Zealand discovered holes in Microsoft's Web Proxy Automatic Discovery (WPAD) program, Redmond this week issued its latest in a long line of security advisories. Tim Rains of Microsoft's Security Response Center wrote in a blog post on Monday that Windows XP SP2, Windows Server 2003 SPs 1 and 2 and Windows Vista are all vulnerable to WPAD server manipulation.

This vulnerability also affects all supported versions of Internet Explorer, a browser which most commonly uses the WPAD function to locate an automatically configured proxy file to determine settings on offsite servers and by extension affecting Internet traffic flow through server indentification and authentication.

Potential vulnerabilities first came to light around Thanksgiving weekend when Redmond's software engineers responded to the results of a presentation made by Beau Butler, a New Zealander and self-described "ethical" hacker. Butler's work revealed that a hacker can use WPAD files to intercept and manipulate all Internet traffic on a given network. Butler said 160,000 computers in New Zealand alone could be seized with just one attack.

Media reports have claimed that U.S. computers are not vulnerable to the attack. However, it appears Microsoft isn't taking any chances, as the software giant said it released the security advisory as it investigates "new public reports of a vulnerability in the way Windows resolves hostnames that do not include a fully-qualified domain name." Thus an issue that was supposed to have been resolved in 2005 has become a 2007 fix as the minute technical overhaul made back then only addressed the ".com" domain name, and not other suffixes such as ".org," ".tv," and non-U.S. country tags -- in the case of the hacker's findings, "nz."

This week, Microsoft added a new specification to the vulnerability profile stating that "Customers whose domain name begins in a third-level or deeper domain, such as "contoso.co.us," are at risk. Conversely, among those not at risk are IT shops where a manually specified proxy server is in place for IE. Additionally, those who have disabled the "Automatically Detect Settings" command in IE can also work around the issue.

Jabulani Leffall is an award-winning journalist whose work has appeared in the Financial Times of London, Investor's Business Daily, The Economist and CFO Magazine, among others.

Junk Science: Hey Al Gore, We Want a Refund!

2007-10-19T14:06:00.003-05:00

By Steven Milloy

A British judge ruled on the eve of Al Gore co-winning the Nobel Peace Prize that students forced to watch "An Inconvenient Truth" must be warned of the film’s factual errors. But would there be any science at all left in Gore’s "truth" if these errors and their progeny were excised?
Minutes of non-science filler dominate the opening sequence — images of the Gore farm, Earth from space, Gore giving his slideshow and the 2000 election controversy. Gore then links Hurricane Katrina with global warming. But the judge ruled that was erroneous, so the Katrina scenes would wind up on the cutting-room floor. Another 12 minutes of filler go by — images of Gore in his limo, more Earth photos, a Mark Twain quote, and Gore memories — until about the 16:30 minute mark, when, according to the judge, Al Gore erroneously links receding glaciers — specifically Mt. Kilimanjaro — with global warming. The Mt. Kilimanjaro error commences an almost 10-minute stretch of problematic footage, the bulk of which contains Gore’s presentation of the crucial issue in the global warming controversy — whether increasing levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide drive global temperatures higher. As the judge ruled that the Antarctic ice core data presented in the film "do not establish what Mr. Gore asserts," this inconvenient untruth also needs to go.
[Note to readers: A video debate between Al Gore and climatologists on this point produced by me can be viewed by clicking here.]
After Gore lectures viewers on how global warming is a "moral issue" and how he came to realize this as a result of his son’s 1989 car accident, the next five or so minutes of film would seem to violate the judge’s concern about the film linking specific weather events with global warming. During this clip, Gore again spotlights Hurricane Katrina and other discrete weather events, including how 2005 was the hottest year on record (more on that later).
After still more filler footage about Winston Churchill, the 2000 election, and rising insurance claims from natural disasters, Gore spends about 35 seconds on how the drying of Lake Chad is due to global warming. The judge ruled that this claim wasn’t supported by the scientific evidence.
More filler leads to a 30-second clip about how global warming is causing polar bears to drown because they have to swim greater distances to find sea ice on which to rest. The judge ruled however, that the polar bears in question had actually drowned because of a particularly violent storm. On the heels of that error, Gore launches into a 3-minute "explanation" of how global warming will shut down the Gulf Stream and send Europe into an ice age. The judge ruled that this was an impossibility.
Two minutes of ominous footage — casting Presidents Reagan and George H.W. Bush, and Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) in a creepy light and expressing Gore’s frustration with getting his alarmist message out — precede a more-than-9-minute stretch that would need to be cut. In this lengthy footage, Gore again tries to link global warming with discrete events including coral reef bleaching, the melting of Greenland, catastrophic sea level rise, Antarctic melting and more. But like Hurricane Katrina, these events also shouldn’t be linked with global warming.
Based on the judge’s ruling, the footage that ought to be excised adds up to about 25 minutes or so out of the 98-minute film. What’s left is largely Gore personal drama and cinematic fluff that has nothing to do with the science of climate change. It should also be pointed out that Gore makes other notable factual misstatements in the film that don’t help his or his film’s credibility. He says in the film that polio has been "cured," implying that we can cure "global warming." While a preventative polio vaccine does exist, there is no "cure" for polio.
Gore attempts to smear his critics by likening them to the tobacco industry. In spotlighting a magazine advertisement proclaiming that "more doctors smoke Camel than any other brand," he states that the ad was published after the Surgeon General’s 1964 report on smoking and lung cancer. But the ad is actually from 1947 — 17 years before the report. Gore also says in the film that 2005 is the hottest year on record. But NASA data actually show that 1934 was the hottest year on record in the U.S. — 2005 is not even in the top 10.
Perhaps worse than the film’s errors is their origin. The BBC reported that Gore knew the film presented incorrect information but took no corrective steps because he didn’t want to spotlight any uncertainties in the scientific data that may fuel opponents of global warming alarmism.
"An Inconvenient Truth" grossed about $50 million at the box office and millions more in DVD and book sales. Gore charges as much as $175,000 for an in-person presentation of his slide show that forms the basis for the film. Considering that a key 25 percent of "An Inconvenient Truth" is not true — and perhaps intentionally so — it seems only fair that Gore offer a refund to moviegoers, DVD/book purchasers and speaking sponsors. Where are the class action lawyers when you need them?

Steven Milloy publishes JunkScience.com and DemandDebate.com. He is a junk science expert and advocate of free enterprise and an adjunct scholar at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

How to Put an End to Microsoft's Sneaky "Silent Updates"

2007-09-28T08:19:00.002-05:00

The following is an excerpt from Scott Dunn's informative September 20th article in Windows Secrets Newsletter on how to keep Microsoft from installing silent updates without your permission...

If you're an individual or a small business using Windows Update (or its enhanced sibling, Microsoft Update), you may be concerned about Microsoft installing patches before you've had a chance to research their reliability. In that case, you can completely turn off the Automatic Updates Agent, thereby preventing updates or even notifications from occurring. If you take this step, you'll become solely responsible for learning about new Microsoft patches yourself. I'll explain below how to adapt to this situation. In the meantime, here's how to turn off Automatic Updates and prevent stealth installs:

In Windows XP, take these steps:
Step 1. Open Control Panel and launch Automatic Updates (in the Security Center
Step 2. Select Turn off Automatic Updates. Click OK.

In Windows Vista, take these steps:
Step 1. Open Control Panel and launch Windows Update (in the System and Maintenance category).
Step 2. In the left pane, click Change settings.
Step 3. Click Never check for updates (not recommended). Click OK.
Step 4. Click Continue, if prompted by User Account Control. category).

With Automatic Updates turned off, Windows Update will still update itself (and notify you of patches), but only when you manually launch Windows Update and give your consent.

What to do about repeated boot-up warnings:
Turning off Automatic Updates can cause Windows Security Alert pop-up balloons to appear in the taskbar tray every time you log on. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1. Turning off Automatic Updates causes scary
error balloons featuring a red shield.

If this bothers you, Windows XP allows you to suppress any warnings that relate to Automatic Updates. You can also do this in Vista but, unfortunately, the newer OS forces you to turn off all security alerts just to suppress the Automatic Updates warnings.

To eliminate the warning balloons about Automatic Updates in both XP and Vista, take these steps:
Step 1. Double-click the red shield icon in the taskbar, or open the Control Panel and launch the Security Center.
Step 2. In the left pane or box, click Change the way Security Center alerts me.
Step 3-XP. In XP, uncheck Automatic Updates and click OK.
Step 3-Vista. In Vista, select the second or third option.

Use Secunia's Software Inspector to check for updates:
With the Windows Update Agent turned off, how will you know if you have the latest security patches and updates you need?
First, read the Windows Secrets Newsletter that comes out two days after Patch Tuesday. Look in their paid section for descriptions of any patches that are reported to have negative side-effects, and use their recommended workarounds if any problems might affect you. Then, to check for needed updates to Windows and dozens of other programs, use the Secunia Software Inspector. This is a free service.

Once you know what updates you need, you can visit the Microsoft Update Web site, which offers updates for both Windows and Microsoft Office. The Secunia report includes a link to Microsoft's site and other update sites so you don't even have to bookmark them. Download and install the necessary patches. Reboot your PC and you should be good to go -- without the sneaky, underhanded, stealth "updates" Microsoft is trying to force on computer users.

STEALTH UPDATES CONTINUE TO PLAGUE MICROSOFT

2007-09-27T11:59:00.000-05:00

Microsoft continues to get itself into trouble with "stealth" or silent updates. The first round of silent updates was reported September 13th. This time, the issue is over a silent update the company broadly distributed in July and August that's apparently restraining Windows XP's repair feature from fully carrying out its task.
According to this week's Windows Secrets Newsletter, since the silent download of new support files for Windows Update, the Windows XP repair function is unable to install the last 80 patches from Microsoft.

Apparently, the trouble surfaces when users reinstall Windows XP's system files using the repair capability contained on the XP CD. At this point, the repair option, which is mostly used when XP becomes unbootable, rolls "many aspects" of XP back to a pristine state. In the process, it blows away many updates and patches and kicks Internet Explorer back to the version that originally shipped with the OS.

Typically, users who repair XP can simply download and install the latest updates, using either Automatic Updates control panel or going to Microsoft's Windows Update site. But once you run the repair option from the CD, Automatic Updates defaults to "on" and the new 7.0.600.381 executables are automatically downloaded and installed. According to the report, these new executables will not register themselves with the OS, thereby preventing Windows Update from working. This then prevents the 80 updates from being installed.

While everyday users rarely attempt a repair install, the flaw figures to be a constant irritant to a lot of admins who frequently have to repair Windows. However, the report states that if Windows Update refuses to install patches, admins can register the missing DLLs by manually entering the necessary commands at the command prompt.

Pentagon Amateur Radio Club to Host Special Event Station Commemorating 9/11

2007-09-09T11:01:00.000-05:00

From the ARRL website - On Sunday, September 9, the Pentagon Amateur Radio Club (PARC) will operate a Special Event station commemorating the 6th anniversary of the attacks that occurred on the Pentagon, the World Trade Center and over Pennsylvania in 2001.

They will be operating on 10, 15, 20, 40 and 80 meters, both phone and CW where and when possible, with plans to operate on a 12 hour basis (1200-2400 UTC). There will be a special QSL card available for stations that work K4AF.

For more information, please contact Claude Hennessey, KG4TVN. QSL via
PARC
PO Box 2322
Arlington, VA 22202

In addition, club members will operate from the station on Tuesday, September 11 as part of the commemoration. -- Thanks Jeffery W. Wilson, AI4IO

Motorola Begins Selling RAZR 2

2007-09-05T20:48:00.000-05:00

By BetaNews Staff, BetaNews
While the now $399 Apple iPhone will dominate the news Thursday, Motorola has chimed in to remind everyone that its RAZR2 is now available through wireless carriers across the United States. But its $299 to $349 price tag won't likely bring out long lines.

The is offered by AT&T while the CDMA V9m is sold by Verizon, Sprint and Alltel. T-Mobile will likely sell the Motorola RAZR2 V9m, but the phone is not yet listed on the carrier's website. Motorola is hoping to bring back the glory days of the original RAZR by adding features such as Windows Media Player, 2GB of on-board memory and a full-HTML browser. But the company faces stiff competition from LG, Samsung and now Apple.

EDITORIAL: Manufacturers need to remember that phones need to be PHONES first. While MP3, cameras, etc. are nice, we need to be able to receive and make calls as the first order of business. Otherwise, we DO NOT need their phones! After all, Apple makes a better MP3 player. Nikon & Canon make better cameras. Most everyone has TiVO, DVR or some way of watching videos on demand. BUT, we need a phone to make calls -- and that is the bottom line. Moto, Samsung, LG and the like need to work on xmt/rec and call quality, NOT all this other junk.

Rock 'N' Roll: Sex, Drugs and an Early Exit

2007-09-04T11:07:00.000-05:00

Article from HealthDay News

From Elvis Presley to Jimi Hendrix, from Janis Joplin to Kurt Cobain, rock and pop stars are more than twice as likely to die early compared with the general population, British researchers report. What's more, pop stars often die within a few years of achieving fame, often due to drug and alcohol abuse. But it's their role as icons that worries the researchers behind the report that appears in the September issue of the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.

"People should understand the type of lifestyle that many of these performers live," said study author Mark Bellis, director of the Centre for Public Health at Liverpool John Moores University. "In addition, the music industry should consider not just the short-term health of popular rock stars, but also the longer term health even as they disappear later into obscurity." Part of the problem is living with the stress of fame, Bellis said. "Also, living in an environment of money and fame, which protects people from some of the consequences, which would make members of the general public give up drugs," he said. "Generally," he added, "affluence enhances people's lifestyles and prolongs life, whereas in this particular case the exposure to fame and what comes with it is associated with a mortality which is higher than that in the general population."

Read more...

Don't Trust Experts Forecasts, Studys Says

2007-08-30T07:48:00.000-05:00

Article from Science Daily

A study about predicting the outcome of actual conflicts found that the forecasts of experts who use their unaided judgment are little better than those of novices, according to a new study in a publication of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences.

When presented with actual crises, such as a disguised version of a 1970s border dispute between Iraq and Syria and an unfolding dispute between football players and management, experts were able to forecast the decisions the parties made in only 32% of the cases, little better than the 29% scored by undergraduate students. Chance guesses at the outcomes would be right 28% of the time. The research can have serious consequences for foreign policy and business. Green says, “Political leaders in the West are pondering how best to deal with the threat of the Iranian government’s nuclear ambitions. Forecasting problems such as this are the stuff of not only international relations but also of takeover battles, commercial competition, and labor-management disputes. In most cases, experts use their judgment to predict what will happen."

How good are their forecasts? “The short answer is that they are of little value in terms of accuracy. In addition, they lead people into false confidence.”

Amateur Radio: Upcoming Meteor Shower Can Be Boon for VHFers

2007-08-29T07:35:00.000-05:00

VHFers, particularly those interested in meteor scatter, should be on the alert Saturday morning, September 1, for what could be a rare opportunity of excellent propagation. At 1137 UTC (4:37 PDT), the Earth's orbit will cross through the dust trail of long-period comet C/1911 N1 (Kiess), which is expected to provide a short but active two hour outburst of bright (-2 to +3 magnitude) meteors radiating from the constellation Auriga. Predicted rates for this particular Aurigids vary from around 100 meteors per hour to up to 1000. If high rates are achieved, the meteors could provide "open-band" conditions during the peak times. It might certainly be worth a look on 2 meters (or higher) during the hour leading up to the peak and through the peak time period. The meteor radiant is ideally placed for North Americans, so the more stations that are active, the more people can take advantage of what might possibly happen in the sky on Saturday morning. If conditions turn out to be excellent, the best mode for information exchange will be on SSB, keeping calls and transmissions very short and exchanging minimal information, such as signal reports or grids. As usual, the best frequency on 2 meters will likely be 144.200 MHz, with stations spreading out from there if conditions warrant.

More information on this rare event can be found here (photo above borrowed from this link).
Reprinted information provided by Steve McDonald, VE7SL

Technology History: The World's First MP3 Player

2007-08-27T20:55:00.000-05:00

The world's first MP3 player wasn't introduced to the public by Apple (nope, not the iPod). It wasn't offered by Creative Labs (not the Zen either). The first MP3 player wasn't even a Diamond Corporation product (can anyone say Rio?). The world premiere of the MP3 was from a now defunct company named Eiger Labs.
Eiger Labs brought the world's first MP3 player to the masses during the summer of 1998 -- for a mere $165. The 32Mb portable held up to 32 minutes of near CD-quality audio or approximately 64 minutes of FM stereo-quality audio.
The player, dubbed the MPMan F10, was very basic and not user expandable, though owners could upgrade the memory to 64Mb by sending the player back to Eiger Labs. One article described the Eiger MPMan player as: "It’s probably easiest to describe it as the next generation of Sony Walkman. It’s probably just as Revolutionary as the very first Walkman if not more, because it represents the beginning of a new era in Digital Audio." [random capitalization copyright the original author]

MCPMag POLL: Upgrade to Microsoft Vista or wait for "Windows 7"?

2007-08-07T08:01:00.000-05:00

The Question: Will you upgrade to Microsoft Vista or wait for "Windows 7"?

I'll stick with XP as long as I can. (50.5%)
I've already upgraded to Vista. (21.3%)
I'll eventually upgrade to Vista. (16.0%)
Skipping Vista and going straight to Windows 7. (6.9%)
I've already moved on to a non-MS OS. (4.8%)
Not even considering Windows 7. (0.5%)

The total number of votes was just shy of 200, but the outcome was a little surprising. According to Microsoft PR (propaganda reports), Vista is selling like hotcakes. The telling part of this poll is that the majority of MCP Mag readers are Microsoft Certified Professionals. Hmm, even those certified in MS technologies and software are not clamoring for Vista. The majority are holding on to Microsoft Windows XP Professional"as long as they can". This makes me wonder about the truth in Microsoft claims of more than one million copies of Vista being sold.

As an MCP (and CompTIA A+) certified tech myself, I tend to agree with the majority of poll respondents. I am holding out for Vista's Service Pack 1 release before considering an upgrade. Along with SP1, the price will need to drop a bit before Vista will become part of my budget. BTW, the only choice worth making (IMO) regarding Windows Vista is Premium Edition. All the others are lesser versions.

Technology History: Intel Corporation

2007-07-18T07:59:00.000-05:00

Intel was founded on July 18, 1968 by former Fairchild Semiconductor Company engineers Bob Noyce and Gordon Moore. The name Intel is a shortened version of "Integrated Electronics." The company's first money making product was the 3101 Schottky bipolar 64-bit static random access memory (SRAM) chip.

Spammers Automatically Creating Hotmail And Yahoo Accounts

2007-07-10T07:32:00.000-05:00

BitDefender researchers found that spammers are easily bypassing the captcha system, to automatically set up new e-mail accounts to use to send out waves of spam.

By Sharon Gaudin, InformationWeek

Spammers have a new trick up their sleeves. According to researchers at BitDefender Labs, spammers are automatically creating Yahoo and Hotmail accounts, and using a Trojan to help them send waves of spam. The spammers, according to the security company, have figured out how to outwit the "captcha" security system. That's the one which won't allow a new e-mail account to be created until the creator correctly types in the twisted letters depicted in an image.
A piece of malware, Trojan.Spammer.HotLan.A, actually has been set up to access the e-mail accounts, pull down encrypted e-mails from another site, unencrypt them, and then send them to e-mail addresses stored in yet another Web site. "They've found a way to bypass the captcha system by using optical character recognition," said Vitor Souza, a manager at BitDefender, in an interview. "The software reads the images and transforms it into text. Once it bypasses the captcha system, it enables them to automatically creates the e-mail accounts." Souza said the automatic system creates accounts extremely quickly. "It's beyond what we've ever seen before," he said, adding that it can create 500 new e-mail accounts every hour and up to 15,000 a day.
"With this kind of speed, they can send spam from thousands of different accounts and that's a lot more resources for them," he added. "[Companies] have to look at this new threat," said Souza. "The captcha system has become a norm in the industry for setting up e-mails and different kinds of accounts. Responsible companies, like Yahoo and Hotmail, will have to find a way to fight this through more sophisticated security systems or they're going to have to find a new system all together." The spam is set up to currently lure unsuspecting users to a site that advertises pharmacy products, BitDefender researchers said.

Locking Down Laptops Before It's Too Late

2007-06-20T08:19:00.000-05:00

Article by Bill Watkins / CNet News

Confidential, invaluable business and personal data are at risk when laptop computers are misplaced or stolen. Companies large and small, public and private, are all at risk.

Within the past year, the Veterans Administration lost a laptop holding information on 26.5 million individuals, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) lost or misplaced 500 laptops, and Boeing reported the theft of a laptop with files that contained Social Security numbers for more than 300,000 of its past and present employees. Unfortunately these incidents are far from unusual. During 2005, 20 percent of all banks, 18 percent of credit card companies, 13 percent of government organizations and 9 percent of health care companies reported data breaches--and that number is growing.

The real and associated costs of data breaches are staggering: In 2006, corporations that experienced a data breach spent an average of $5 million trying to recover data. Customer relationships suffer, too; among consumers that discovered their data had been lost, 20 percent terminated their relationships with the company, another 40 percent considered terminating their relationships, and 5 percent considered legal action. Clearly, something must be done before one of these breaches bankrupts a company or threatens national security.

The government has begun to address the issue with recently enacted legislation. Federal laws such as the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) make the security of critical digital content--including the secure disposal of electronic files to end the data lifecycle--a fundamental requirement. On a state by state basis, 29 states thus far have enacted data protection legislation and 28 of these laws have provisions calling for the encryption of digital content. The flaw with current legislation is that it does not specify how to encrypt data--and that's critical. If agencies and companies encrypt their data using software, it's like locking individual car engine components–-time-consuming, expensive and fraught with failure points.

By contrast, hard drive full disc encryption is similar to a car key: it protects everything from the engine to the dashboard with a single mechanism and point of entry. Hard drive full disc encryption is straightforward; it automatically protects every bit of computer data without any human intervention. It makes any data stored on a stolen or lost notebook unreadable and unusable forever. It can also automatically "repurpose" existing laptops or deny access to data when computers reach the end of their useful life. No need to smash a drive with a hammer or use special software to wipe it clean. By simply changing the encryption key on the disc, all stored data is instantaneously rendered unreadable and unusable forever--saving both time and money.

The advantages of hard drive full disc encryption are clear; the dangers of stolen and misplaced laptops are overwhelming. To thoroughly protect sensitive information, government and business organizations must mandate hard drive full disc encryption--especially for mobile workers--to help keep data from falling into the wrong hands. The time to lock laptops down is now.

Technology History: The FCC

2007-06-19T07:29:00.000-05:00

The United States Federal Communications Commission was created by an act of Congress on June 19, 1934. A month later, seven commissioners and 233 federal employees began the task of merging rules and procedures from the Federal Radio Commission, the Interstate Commerce Commission and the Postmaster General into one agency. Today, the agency employs approximately 1,900 people and has extensive oversight responsibilities in new communications technologies such as satellite, microwave, and private radio communications.

Encyclopedia Of DNA: New Findings Challenge Established Views On Human Genome

2007-06-16T09:30:00.000-05:00

Article from ScienceDaily.com

An international research consortium just published a set of papers that promise to reshape our understanding of how the human genome functions. The findings challenge the traditional view of our genetic blueprint as a tidy collection of independent genes, pointing instead to a complex network in which genes, along with regulatory elements and other types of DNA sequences that do not code for proteins, interact in overlapping ways not yet fully understood.

DNA double helix. (Credit: National Human Genome Research Institute)

In a group paper published in the June 14 issue of Nature and in 28 companion papers published in the June issue of Genome Research, the ENCyclopedia Of DNA Elements (ENCODE) consortium, which is organized by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), reported results of its exhaustive, four-year effort to build a parts list of all biologically functional elements in 1 percent of the human genome. Carried out by 35 groups from 80 organizations around the world, the research served as a pilot to test the feasibility of a full-scale initiative to produce a comprehensive catalog of all components of the human genome crucial for biological function.

"This impressive effort has uncovered many exciting surprises and blazed the way for future efforts to explore the functional landscape of the entire human genome," said NHGRI Director Francis S. Collins, M.D., Ph.D. "Because of the hard work and keen insights of the ENCODE consortium, the scientific community will need to rethink some long-held views about what genes are and what they do, as well as how the genome's functional elements have evolved. This could have significant implications for efforts to identify the DNA sequences involved in many human diseases."

The completion of the Human Genome Project in April 2003 was a major achievement, but the sequencing of the genome marked just the first step toward the goal of using such information to diagnose, treat and prevent disease. Having the human genome sequence is similar to having all the pages of an instruction manual needed to make the human body. Researchers still must learn how to read the manual's language so they can identify every part and understand how the parts work together to contribute to health and disease.

In recent years, researchers have made major strides in using DNA sequence data to identify genes, which are traditionally defined as the parts of the genome that code for proteins. The protein-coding component of these genes makes up just a small fraction of the human genome -- 1.5 percent to 2 percent. Evidence exists that other parts of the genome also have important functions.

However, until now, most studies have concentrated on functional elements associated with specific genes and have not provided insights about functional elements throughout the genome. The ENCODE project represents the first systematic effort to determine where all types of functional elements are located and how they are organized.

In the pilot phase, ENCODE researchers devised and tested high-throughput approaches for identifying functional elements in the genome. Those elements included genes that code for proteins; genes that do not code for proteins; regulatory elements that control the transcription of genes; and elements that maintain the structure of chromosomes and mediate the dynamics of their replication.

Fed's 'Operation Bot Roast' Reveals 1 Million Victims

2007-06-14T07:35:00.000-05:00

As the FBI and the DOJ investigated botnet operators, they began amassing a list of the alleged botnet victims -- with most of them here in the U.S.

Article by Sharon Gaudin, InformationWeek

In the Department of Justice and the FBI's attack on 'botherders', the government has identified more than one million botnet victims. The agencies announced Wednesday the results of an ongoing cybercrime initiative to disrupt and dismantle botherders, a term used for the people creating and operating an increasing number of botnets around the world. The FBI reported in an online advisory that its agents are working with the U.S.-CERT Coordination Center at Carnegie Mellon University to notify the owners of the compromised computers.

Government investigators tracked down the million victims while working on five different cybercrime cases, according to Richard Kolko, a special agent with the FBI. Charges already have been handed down in three of those cases. James C. Brewer of Arlington, Texas, is charged with operating a botnet that infected Chicago area hospitals. His botnet allegedly infected tens of thousands of computers worldwide. The government charged Jason Michael Downey of Covington, Kentucky, with using botnets to launch denial-of-service attacks. Robert Alan Soloway of Seattle was also charged this month with using a large botnet network to spam tens of millions of messages to advertise his Web site.

Kolko told InformationWeek that as agents delved into these three cases, along with two others that are under investigation, they uncovered the botnet victims. "There are hundreds of cybercrime cases at any given time but we put the botnet cases together for this initiative," he said. "We're trying to get people to take care of their computers. They're unaware participants in this criminal activity. We need them to take the proper precautions so we can put a dent in this crime." He also said most of the one million victims they found are in the United States. The government, he added, will continue to try to find more victims so they can notify them and get the compromised machines cleaned up.

Hackers and malware writers conspire to infect computers around the world with viruses and Trojans that allow them to remotely control the victim machines. Then, they amass thousands or hundreds of thousands of these zombie computers, creating great armies -- or botnets -- of them. In recent months, botnets have been increasing in number and in size, as they launch massive waves of spam, malware and even denial-of-service attacks. Most of the owners of the zombie machines don't even know they have been infected or that their machine is being controlled by someone else.

According to the FBI's advisory, because of their widely distributed capabilities, the government considers botnets a growing threat to national security, the national information infrastructure, and the economy. "They were a problem and they're emerging as a greater problem as people use them to get around security measures and cause greater damages," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Erez Liebermann, chief of the computer hacking and intellectual property unit in New Jersey. "The fact that they can do so much damage with the press of a button is a huge problem." A large number of the botnets are controlled by hackers and botherders outside of the U.S., with a growing number being set up in China. Dealing with cybercriminals outside the country's borders has been an issue -- but it's one the U.S. government is working on.

"Generally speaking, international aspects of these cases do have extra hurdles, but more and more countries are cooperating," said Liebermann. "There are efforts to get [cooperation] from China, and they're paying off." In recent months, rival online gangs have even begun a virtual turf war for bragging rights to the largest botnets. Two or three online criminal gangs have been waging an all-out battle for control of the largest botnets, sending out waves of malware aimed at stealing zombie computers from rival gangs to build up their own army. Each online gang is trying to build up the biggest botnet because the bigger the army of infected computers they control, the more money spammers and hackers will pay to use them, said Shane Coursen, a senior technical consultant forKaspersky Lab, in a previous interview.

Infanticide, Abortion Responsible for 60 Million Girls Missing in Asia

2007-06-13T12:09:00.000-05:00

Article by Sherry Karabin

There is a little-known battle for survival going in some parts of the world. Those at risk are baby girls, and the casualties are in the millions each year. The weapons being used against them are prenatal sex selection, abortion and female infanticide — the systematic killing of girls soon after they are born.
According to a recent United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) State of the World Population Report, these practices, combined with neglect, have resulted in at least 60 million "missing" girls in Asia, creating gender imbalances and other serious problems that experts say will have far reaching consequences for years to come. "Twenty-five million men in China currently can’t find brides because there is a shortage of women," said Steven Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute in Washington, D.C. "The young men emigrate overseas to find brides."
The imbalances are also giving rise to a commercial sex trade; the 2005 report states that up to 800,000 people being trafficked across borders each year, and as many as 80 percent are women and girls, most of whom are exploited. "Women are trafficked from North Korea, Burma and Vietnam and sold into sexual slavery or to the highest bidder," Mosher said.

State-Sanctioned Infanticide?
Mosher, the first American social scientist allowed into China, puts much of the blame on Beijing's one-child policy, which took effect in 1979. The policy encourages late marrying and late childbearing, and it limits the majority of urban couples to having one child and most of those living in rural areas to two. Female infanticide was the result, he said. "Historically infanticide was something that was practiced in poor places in China," Mosher said. "But when the one-child policy came into effect we began to see in the wealthy areas of China, what had never been done before in history — the killing of little girls."

In recent years, female infanticide has taken a back seat to sex-selective abortion or female feticide, due to the advent of amniocentesis and ultrasound technology as well as other prenatal sex selection techniques, many of which are now readily available in clinics and doctors’ offices. "We feel it's a serious problem that everybody should be concerned about and aware of," said Wanda Franz, president of the National Right to Life Committee. "This is a form of abortion that, from our point of view is especially egregious. Abortion is claimed to help women; obviously in these cases, females are the direct victims, because women in these cultures are not valued. In our family we adopted a Chinese baby," she continued. "There have been thousands and thousands of them adopted since China’s one-child policy created this overabundance of baby girls in orphanages."

How bad are the imbalances between males and females in Asia? Generally, the normal sex ratio at birth (SRB) is between 103 and 105 males per 100 females, and in rare cases 106 or a bit more than that. Countries that are known to have or have had higher sex ratio at birth numbers include South Korea, which peaked at 115 in 1994, Singapore where the SRB registered 109 in 1984 and China, which has seen the numbers increase over the past two decades. Published reports in China show the gender ratio for newborns in 2005 was 118 boys for every 100 girls, and in some southern regions like Guangdong and Hainan, the number has reached 130 boys for every 100 girls. The 2000 Chinese census put the average sex ratio at 117, with Tibet having the lowest number at 103 and Hainan registering the highest at 136.

Nicholas Eberstadt, a researcher at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research in Washington, D.C., attributes the large sex-ratio imbalances in places like China to a combination of factors: an enormous and enduring preference for boys reinforced by the low socioeconomic status accorded to women; the use of rapidly spreading prenatal sex determination technology for gender-based abortion; and the rapid drop in fertility in different populations, making the outcome of each birth even more important. "The one-child policy intensifies this problem, but if that policy stops and fertility levels stay at one or two, the problem won’t entirely go away," Eberstadt said. "When the average number is down to one or two, there is an incentive for parents to meddle with the outcome. In places where fertility levels are high, there are few signs of sex selection." In his presentation before the World Youth Alliance in New York City last April, Eberstadt warned that "The Global War Against Baby Girls" is expanding. "There are gender imbalances in almost every East Asian country, but Japan," said Eberstadt, who has also noted alarming irregularities in Western Asia in places like Cyprus, Qatar and Pakistan, as well as in some countries on the African continent, including Egypt, Libya and Tunisia.

Indian Girls Bear Dowry Burden
In India, where the child sex ratio is calculated as the number of girls per 1,000 boys in the 0-6 years age group, the problem is severe. The 2001 Census shows there are only 927 girls per 1,000 boys, representing a sharp decline from 1961 when that number was 976. In certain parts of the country there are now fewer than 800 girls for every 1,000 boys. "India is a very mixed bag," Eberstadt said. "In some parts there are no signs of any unnatural imbalances; in other parts the numbers are grotesque." For instance, 2001 census reports show that Punjab and Haryana reported fewer than 900 girls per 1,000 boys. "The problem is more prevalent in the northern and western states, where prosperity, rapid fertility decline and patriarchal (male heads the family) mindsets combine to put girls at risk," said Ena Singh, the assistant representative at UNFPA.

Like China, there is a strong son preference for various socio-economic reasons, such as the son being responsible for carrying on the family name and support in old age. Furthermore, in some sections of India it is believed that only sons can perform the last rites for parents. In addition to sharing a strong son preference, both India and China lack a national social-security system. As it is assumed that a daughter will become a part of her husband’s family, parents must rely on their sons to take care of them. Since the 1970s, India’s government has promoted a two-child family as "ideal." While no formal laws exist, the general fertility decline in the country has led to smaller families, with couples still preferring to have at least one son. But the government has done more than just suggest this number. "In India it has been done state by state, village by village," Mosher said. "There have sterilization campaigns and there is enormous pressure. Villages that won’t comply have been denied fertilizer, access to irrigation water, etc."

Complicating matters even further in India is the dowry system, where families pay large sums in order to marry off their daughters. Although prohibited in 1961, newspaper reports illustrate the continuing phenomenon. This can be very expensive for families, adding to the perception that girls can be a financial burden. Abortion is legal in India under certain conditions, but sex-selective abortions or female feticide is a crime. In 1994, the government enacted the Preconception and Prenatal Diagnostic Techniques Act (PC & PNDT), which prohibited those conducting such tests from telling or otherwise communicating to the woman or her family the sex of the fetus. The law was amended in 2003 to prohibit sex selection before or after conception. "In recent years, prenatal sex selection and female feticide in India has increased," Singh said. "Though it is against the law for ultrasound technologies to be used to detect the sex of the child, it is still done illegally." In 2006 a doctor and his assistant in the northern state of Haryana were sentenced to two years in jail and fined for revealing the sex of a female fetus and agreeing to abort it. It was the first time medical professionals were sentenced to jail time under the (PC & PNDT) Act. Three years earlier, a doctor in Punjab received a fine. Singh estimates that hundreds more cases are being investigated across the country and taken to court.

Experts who have analyzed the National Family Health Survey 2 (NFHS2) estimate that about 300,000 girls go "missing" in India each year. Other studies have put the number between 150,000 and 500,000. While many people see this as a problem of the poor, analysts say it is more prevalent among those in the wealthier and educated segments of society. Men in parts of India are also beginning to have difficulties finding brides, causing some to leave the country to do so. "Hindu girls are being smuggled and purchased from poor countries like Nepal and Bhutan to be brides for Indian men," said Bernard Dickens, professor emeritus of health law and policy at the University of Toronto Law School.

Combating the Problem
In recent years various Indian state governments and media houses have launched initiatives to address the gender imbalances, including "Save the Girl Child" campaigns. Last February, the Indian government announced its "cradle scheme," whereby orphanages would be set up to raise unwanted baby girls. Other incentives include tax rebates on ownership of properties and reserving seats for female candidates in villages, districts and at municipal levels. Community groups, corporations and individuals have also started various efforts to enhance the status of the girl child. In March 2007, politician Sonia Gandhi, chairwoman of the United Progressive Alliance, spoke out against female feticide and the need for gender equality at the at the International Women’s Day celebrations in New Delhi. Lara Dutta, UNFPA’s goodwill ambassador, a popular actress and Miss Universe 2000, has also been working extensively with young people to raise awareness about the issue.

China too has enacted laws in an effort to meet its goal of lowering the sex ratio at birth to normal levels by 2010. In 1994, the Mother and Child Health Law of the Peoples Republic of China outlawed the practice of sex identification of the fetus and sex-selective abortions without medical requirements. This was reaffirmed in the 2002 Population and Family Planning Law. Officials also started the "Care for Girls" campaign to promote equality for men and women and economic support is being offered to girl-only families in the countryside. "Raising awareness is important," said William Ryan, a Asia and Pacific regional information advisor for the United Nations Population Fund. "I think the effort to emphasize equality of the sexes and the value of women in society will help reduce the problem in the long run."

China Holds On to One Child
However, China has pledged to keep its one-child policy in place until the year 2050, a policy which it admits is "related" to the large sex imbalances in the country. "The implications are potentially disastrous," Mosher said. "The answer is economic development, not restricting the number of people." This year, the United States sponsored a resolution at the U.N.’s Commission on the Status of Women that called for eliminating infanticide and gender selection. The resolution was withdrawn due to opposition from several countries, including China and India; however, the issue of prenatal sex selection was included in the final conference document. Interestingly South Korea was one of the countries to support the resolution. Like China and India, it too has had its own problems with sex imbalances; however, progress is being made. If the imbalances continue, Adam Jones, executive director of Gendercide Watch, sees another possible outcome. "Because of the disparity, surviving women have greater market value," he said. "As a result, it may become more economically viable for families to have girl children, thus reducing rates of female infanticide and sex selection."

As China and India work toward solving their problems, Eberstadt points out that three large European countries are also showing disturbing signs. "Greece, Macedonia and Yugoslavia betray some hints of prejudicial death rates for little girls in the post-war period," he said. While the numbers are very small, he notes they are "nonetheless curious and unusual. "In the western hemisphere, Venezuela and El Salvador both have unnatural death rates for little girls and now also display unnatural sex ratios at birth," he continued. Published reports point to problems among some immigrant groups in Canada as well. And even in the United States, Eberstadt said, some Asian-American populations have begun to "exhibit sex ratios at birth that could be considered biologically impossible."
"Since the mid-1990s, the issue of female infanticide and sex selection has been highlighted in several conferences and in several U.N. documents," said Samantha Singson, chief U.N. liaison for the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute. "Unfortunately the issue isn’t getting as much attention as we feel it deserves."

Poll Says American Car Makers Need More MPG

2007-06-08T08:56:00.000-05:00

A poll, sponsored by GasBuddy.com, shows that US car makers need to accomplish two tasks in order for Americans to purchase their vehicles:
First, they need to increase fuel economy. Second, the big three marks need to improve quality and reliability in their vehicles. An overwhelming 78% (13493) chose one of those two answers as the way to get American dollars back into their coffers.

The unscientific poll is ongoing and being sponsored exclusively by GasBuddy.com.

What do you think is the most important thing American car companies need to do to get people to buy more American cars? (Discuss)
Increase their cars' fuel efficiency		40%
Improve their cars' quality/reliability		38%
Lower their cars' prices		16%
Something else		3%
No opinion		1%
Total votes: 17298

Is MySpace A Piece In The Kelsey Smith Murder Puzzle?

2007-06-07T07:34:00.001-05:00

Did Edwin R. Hall actually know Kelsey Smith? Or, did he find her through MySpace? Or, was she a random victim? It seems that Edwin has a MySpace account (corrected link)-- stating he lives in Overland Park (although his address at the time of arrest was officially Olathe, KS.). His profile has been deleted, so we can't learn anything else from it. Other bloggers have said that Hall's wife, Aletha, was linked to his MySpace page. There is also information saying the Halls have a four year old son. I sure hope the link to the MySpace page is bogus.

Kelsey Smith also had a MySpace page -- stating she lived in Overland Park. Could Edwin have been stalking Kelsey via MySpace? It is a possibility. One thing that is kinda creepy is that Hall's MySpace account shows he logged in sometime yesterday -- shortly before he was arrested for aggravated kidnapping and first-degree murder. FWIW, Kelsey did not have Edwin Hall listed as a "friend" on MySpace. I'm not trying to make a connection where one is not present, BUT the question of MySpace is one the needs to be answered.

I'm sure we'll learn more in the coming hours and days, but questions are large and beg to be answered. The biggest question looming in my mind is WHY? Why abduct and murder a vibrant young lady who just graduated high school and was about to set off for college and adult life? Why?!? Weren't your video games enough? Weren't movies like Hostel and Saw and Hannibal enough? Didn't the Internet satisfy your bloodlust?

Now, some defense attorney will set out to go far beyond the mandate of lawyers to make sure their clients get a fair trial. That attorney will try to wiggle and squirm and circumvent his way around the facts in an attempt to get Mr. Hall acquitted. ARGH! It makes me furious just to think about the whole ordeal -- especially for Greg and Missy Smith.

See the video of Edwin Hall's arraignment here, courtesy of scaredmonkeys.com.

My prayers go out to them, along with Stevie, Cody, Zack and Kelsey's boyfriend John Biersmith. They will all live the tragedy of Kelsey kidnapping and murder many times over.

Police Find Missing Kansas Teen's Body, Suspect Arrested

2007-06-07T07:16:00.000-05:00

Sources: KCTV, MSN & SalemNews.com
Picture of Ed Hall from his MySpace page (corrected link)
A suspect was arrested [as I predicted] Wednesday evening in the slaying of a teenage Kansas girl believed abducted from the parking lot of an Overland Park Target store. Edwin R. Hall, 26, of Olathe, Kansas, is expected to be charged this morning with premeditated first-degree murder and aggravated kidnapping, Overland Park Police Chief John Douglass said. Johnson County prosecutor Phill Kline said his office would file formal charges early Thursday or, at the latest, Friday morning. "Tomorrow morning [Thursday] the Johnson County district attorney's office will file premeditated first-degree murder and aggravated kidnapping* charges against Edwin Hall, 26 years of age, with the disappearance and death of Kelsey Smith," Kline said Wednesday. "This community has lost a vibrant and promising life and a family has suffered unimaginable tragedy." Kline said it was premeditated murder and is requesting a $5 million bond for Hall.

Kelsey Smith, 18, had been missing since Saturday night, when she went to a Target store to buy a gift for her boyfriend. Surveillance video showed her being forced into her car, and the car drove off. It was found in a nearby mall parking lot about two hours later. Douglass said Hall matched the description of a man seen on surveillance video walking into the store soon after Smith entered. Police also found a vehicle that matched the description of a dark mid-1970s Chevrolet pickup that was seen entering the Target parking lot shortly after Smith's car, he said. The truck was in Edwin Hall's possession.

A man who lives near the area where Smith's body was found told KMBC that he saw a vehicle in the park at about 9 p.m. Saturday, which matches the police time line. The man, who didn't want his name used, said he doesn't know what type of vehicle it was, but he remembers seeing headlights behind a locked gate on the road.

Douglass said Hall was interviewed mid-afternoon Wednesday after police acted on a tip that matched Hall and a vehicle to surveillance video from the Target store parking lot in suburban Kansas City where Smith was abducted Saturday evening. He said he had no information why Smith was targeted, or if Hall was believed to have acted alone. Police said Hall's vehicle matched the description of a dark mid-1970s Chevrolet pickup that was seen entering the Target parking lot shortly after Smith's car. Police found Smith's body in a wooded area near Grandview, Mo., about 20 miles east of the Target store. Authorities did not say how she died.

According to Chief Douglass, "Mr. Hall faces 25 years to life minimum sentence on the premeditated murder charge, 147 months minimum sentence on the aggravated kidnapping charge. There is a distinct possibility of an amendment for more severe charges in the future."

* = Aggravated kidnapping charge is defined as kidnapping with "great bodily harm". As I commented on yesterday, Kelsey was likely rendered unconscious or even dead at the time of her was kidnapping (in the Target parking lot or car as they left the store) -- not later on. If that is the case, it would account for the surprise that Kelsey did not fight back (as her father and sister said she would have done).
The aggravated kidnapping charge likely came from the visible effects of damage to Kelsey's body -- which may have accounted for the delay in identifying her body when she found yesterday around 1:30pm.

Search For A Killer!?!

2007-06-06T21:04:00.001-05:00

Steph Watts, of On the Record from FNC, has confirmed that the police DO have a suspect in the Kelsey Smith murder case. They are looking for him now. Watts also reports that no information on a motive or cause of death.

BTW, one reason the FBI is active in the investigation is that Kelsey was transported from Kansas into Missouri. Unfortunately, the federal presence didn't make any difference in the outcome of Kelsey's abduction.

SPECULATION: When the guy attacked Kelsey in the Target parking lot, she may have been rendered unconscious. Therefore, her attacker had to leave her in the car and vacate the area. If he killed her when he forced her into the car, he may have panicked and took her straight to the Longview Lake Park to discard the body.
Kelsey's body was dumped under a bridge, in a shallow creek. Her murderer may have intended to go back and bury Kelsey's body... but the police found her before he could act on the remainder of his plan. We don't yet know the condition of Kelsey's body, but I suspect she may have been damaged in the head or face area. The water of the creek or attacker may have caused the damage -- I'm not sure.

Who Killed Kelsey Smith?

2007-06-06T20:00:00.000-05:00

Photo from FOX25 in Kansas City
As the story of young Kelsey Smith's abduction and murder unfolds, Overland Park Police Chief John Douglass has told the public that a "person of interest" is now a suspect. This person, who remains unnamed, reportedly lives approx. two miles from where Kelsey Smith's body was found. He also has what police call "an extensive criminal record". So, who is this person / suspect?

Sources in Kansas City tells me that someone with the surname of Beach or Beech is being sought by law enforcement. I have heard the first names of Timothy, Jeremiah and/or John. I must emphasize that the name is speculation, but does come from the local area -- and local area information is normally better than what we are told on the evening news. I learned that in the cases of Immette St. Guillen's murder and the Virginia Tech slayings.

These things seem fairly apparent:
1) The guy seen in the Target store video entered the store shortly after Kelsey entered.
2) The same guy was seen on surveillance cameras within Target. He was near Kelsey on at least three occasions.
3) This same person is thought to be the driver of the 1970s Chevrolet pickup that police are seeking.
4) The Target store guy is seen leaving within seconds of Kelsey exiting the store.
5) The person who ran up to Kelsey in the parking - and apparently pushed her into her car - looks to be the same person (a 20-ish year old white male with a goatie; wearing dark shorts, white t-shirt, low-top Converse sneakers).
6) From video not publicly shown, but referenced by police, the pickup truck was left in the parking lot of Target until around 9:00pm Saturday night.
7) Kelsey's car was seen leaving the parking lot around 7:08pm. It was found across the street in the Macy's parking lot (at Overland Mall) around 9:00pm that night.
8) Police believe the kidnapping and murder was a one-man operation -- which fits with the car being used to drive away; the truck being left at Target; and Kelsey's Buick showing up about the same time as the truck leaves the Target lot.
9) Police have narrowed down their suspect list (although not official publicly) down to either a few select persons of interest or this one suspect.
10) Since no details of the state of Kelsey's body were offered, and no immediate identification was made, AND police told the clergy before they told the family, law enforcement officials have at least inferred that Kelsey's body was somehow damaged in a way that made it at least a bit difficult to ID her. [Pure conjecture on my part, but I've done a lot of research on cases like this.]
11) Kelsey was not likely killed in her car.
12) She was not likely in the pickup truck at any time. Nonetheless, the truck could be a key piece for evidence collection.
13) Kelsey was likely murdered within the first 60-90 minutes after her abduction.
14) Kelsey's boyfriend (John Biersmith) is not now, nor has he been a suspect (as some folks have suggested). He was actually at the Smith home awaiting Kelsey's arrival when she was abducted from the Target store parking lot.
15) IF, and I repeat, IF the guy in the surveillance video is her killer, he is not a very bright individual. Along with the dumb moves he made to stalk, follow and kidnap her, he will likely brag to some friends about his "adventure". If he hasn't committed suicide somewhere in the woods, he will be caught rather quickly -- I can almost guarantee it.
16) Lastly, law enforcement officials are NOT telling us everything they know. That fact is more than obvious. I respect them for keeping certain aspects of the case private -- out of respect for the Smith family and/or for the future court case.

Our prayers go out to Greg, Missy, Stevie, Lindsay, Cody and Zack Smith -- along with John Biersmith (Kelsey's boyfriend) and his family.

BTW, I just googled the name "kelsey smith" and beach or timothy and beech. My blog is the ONLY one reporting this information. That makes me a bit nervous as I don't want anyone to decide someone they know in the Kansas City area is guilty of the heinous crimes against Kelsey. Offering a potential name is merely a way to try and learn more about who the suspect really is -- and hopefully assist with his capture and prosecution.

More Details on Kelsey Smith's Abduction & Murder

2007-06-06T15:59:00.000-05:00

INITIAL POST: 5:06pm
LAST UPDATE: 5:42pm

As pastors meet with the Greg Smith family in Overland Park (near Kansas City), we now know the body of their daughter, Kelsey Smith, was found south of Longview Lake Park. The police spokesman, Chief John Douglass, is taking questions at a press conference, as I type.

The suspect has not been arrested. The chief says they are talking to "several people at this point". The police say they do not have the name of the person in the Target store video, but all of the POIs look like the person seen leaving the store just behind Kelsey Smith. Other news sources say the person law enforcement believes is THE suspect is a 20-ish white male who lives within two miles of the spot where Kelsey's body was found. Furthermore, these sources are saying that the suspect has an extensive criminal record. At this time, they have not said the suspect is the owner or driver of the pickup truck shown several times on news broadcasts.

Eleven teams fanned out across the Longview Lake Park area early this morning. One of those teams found Kelsey's body in a shallow creek, near Highgrove and Raytown roads around 2:00pm CT. They were "lead" to the specific area by Kelsey's cell phone "pinging" a local cell tower. Police took her cell account's LUDs and analyzed them. The results came back Tuesday morning -- and police immediately started their search.
The cell phone analysis showed that the phone passed through certain telephone cells located on I-35 to I-435, then east to south 71 highway, and from there to an area in the vicinity of Longview Lake Park.
Photos from WPBF FOX25 and FOX4

Kelsey Smith's Body has Been Found

2007-06-06T14:12:00.002-05:00

INITIAL POST: 3:15pm EDT
LAST UPDATE: 4:57pm (Updating every few minutes, so refresh the page often...)

Kelsey Smith's body has been found. It's 3:12pm and the body was found south of Longview Lake, in SE Grandview, MO. The body was found in a shallow creek. A tarp covers the area as I type...

Kelsey Smith was apparently kidnapped from the Target store parking lot in Overland Park (suburb of Kansas City) at 7:07pm Saturday night. A 20-ish looking white male is seen running up behind Kelsey and forcing her into her 1987 Buick Regal. The car is seen backing out of the parking space and leaving the lot.
A little over two hours later, Kelsey's car was found in the Macy's parking -- across the street at the Overland Mall. Police have been searching for the 18 year old high school graduate since that time.

Just a few minutes ago, the story broke on FOX4 in KC --
"Police have located the body of a young girl, police and the independent search company on the scene told a FOX News Channel producer for 'On the Record' with Greta that it was the body of Kelsey."

A half-mile radius was being deeply searched after Kelsey's cell phone pinged a local tower in the southeast Jackson County area. Tire tracks were found -- leaving the road and going into the woods. A search team went into the area -- and found Kelsey Smith's body within a few minutes by the Equi-Search team.

Update: 4:07pm -- The search has been called off. The medical examiner has arrived on the scene. Although not officially confirmed, these are definitive inferences that the body is Kelsey Smith. The local enforcement will have a live press conference at 5:00pm EDT.

Also, the person of interest whom police were trying to locate, lives near the area, according to Steph Watts, a FOXNews On The Record producer.

FWIW, and it may be worth NOTHING -- I am hearing the names Timothy Beach (or Beech) or... Jerimiah John Beach (or Beech) as a potential suspect. Someone also says that the suspected perp (the "person of interest") lives within two miles of where Kelsey's body was found. Police are trying to track him down -- with even more interest now. A rather slumy apartment complex is located near 71 highway and 155th St. -- not far from Longview Lake Park. I've heard someone with the last name of Beach / Beech lives near there... and MAY be a suspect.

As for the truck, I am hearing "live" that a mid-1970s Chevy pickup truck has been found -- and police think it is the one seen in the Target parking lot Saturday just before Kelsey was abducted.

Photos from FOX4 and Kelsey's MySpace page

A press conference is scheduled for 3 minutes from now. I'll post more during and after the press conference.

Online Tunes Are More Risky Than Web Porn - When It Comes to Malware

2007-06-04T09:26:00.000-05:00

About 9% of adult sites produce spyware, adware or spam, compared with 19% of digital music sites found in a study by McAfee.

By Joseph Menn / Times Staff Writer

Whatever threat online pornography might pose to society's morals, online music might pose a bigger threat to society's computers. A study scheduled to be released today found that about 9% of adult sites that turned up high in search-engine rankings had such PC-damaging problems or annoyances as spyware, adware and spam associated with them. Yet searching for digital music was twice as risky — more than 19% of the sites produced by such queries were risky for computer users, according to the study by McAfee Inc., a Santa Clara, California-based company that makes computer-security software.

Other risky searches included those for electronic gadgets and for background "wallpaper" to decorate computer screens. Researchers have one idea why looking for porn appears to be safer: The business side of that industry works even without the extra hustling. Since it's harder to make a living selling digital music, those hawking such items are far more likely to attach programs that spew unwanted ads or worse. "The tier-one adult sites are doing phenomenally well as businesses, and because of that they very much have their house in order," said McAfee Senior Product Manager Mark Maxwell.

The digital music searches studied include those for such file-sharing programs as BearShare, which often include intrusive advertising programs. BearShare took the honors as the single riskiest search term, returning unsafe sites at a 46% rate. Other findings from McAfee's database were not included in the study, including the news that Britney Spears is slightly more dangerous to search for than Lindsay Lohan. The former couple of Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston, meanwhile, are a 36% more hazardous combination than the current pair of Pitt and Angelina Jolie.

The study is the third of its kind from McAfee, which owns a popular free service called SiteAdvisor. It rates millions of websites as red for risky, yellow for somewhat risky and green for safe, warning Web surfers before they click through. The latest paper also found that sponsored search results, which are paid for by advertisers, are twice as likely to be risky as regular search results. It also compared the five most popular search engines, finding that Yahoo Inc. had the safest unpaid results and the riskiest paid results.

For thousands of popular searches, the top 500 unpaid listings were about as safe at one search engine as they were at another. Yahoo came out best with 2.7% that were red or yellow, and IAC/InterActiveCorp's Ask.com was the worst at 3.3%. The range was larger when it came to advertised results: from a low of 4.1% problematic results at Ask to 9% at Yahoo. Google Inc. has toughened its checks on advertisers and made its paid results safer in the last year, McAfee said, while Yahoo has gotten worse.

Yahoo declined an interview request. In a statement Saturday, Vice President of Marketplace Quality Reggie Davis wrote that the unpaid search results "represent the vast majority of clicked links." "We will continue to improve our performance in this area by investing in technology," Davis said. An Ask.com spokeswoman pointed to the company's sharp improvement in paid results, which boosted its overall safety performance from worst to the middle of the pack.

Many of the advertised sites that McAfee flagged are obvious scams pointed out by SiteAdvisor users, including those that make impossible claims about obtaining green cards for immigrants and repairing damaged credit. "We are struck by search engines' failure to block even the most notorious and widespread of scam ads — a decision we suspect arises out of search engines' business objectives," the study's authors wrote.

In better news, the number of the very worst sites — those that use known vulnerabilities in software to automatically install keystroke loggers and other malicious programs — remained quite small. McAfee turned up less than one in a thousand among the top search engine results. Google has begun to warn users before they go to one of those sites, and a spokeswoman said that the effort would remain the priority over fighting such lesser threats as adware and spam. "Google concentrates on Web pages that pose real danger to our users, and we are confident that we are protecting searchers from these threats," company spokeswoman Katie Watson said.

Popular add-ons to Firefox are the latest criminal attack vector

2007-06-01T14:41:00.000-05:00

Article posted by Robert Vamosi on News.com.com
Mozilla enjoys a large development community to build add-ons for its Firefox browser. Now it seems all that development might not be a good thing. A security researcher in Indiana has found that the process used to update some of these add-ons automatically appears to be flawed, allowing criminal hackers to intercept the browser's call to the developer to see if there's a new version available. Worse, the most vulnerable add-ons aren't from vendors you've never heard of; they include brand-name sites like Google, Yahoo, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Extensions for Firefox contain hard coded Internet addresses for updates. Mozilla provides free hosting for update at addons.mozilla.org, however, many developers choose for various reasons to serve the updates themselves from servers under their control. The servers at Mozilla all use the secure https:// protocol, but since encryption requires more resources, many developers opt to use the less secure, less resource intensive http:// instead. That's where the problem lies.

Researcher Christopher Soghoian's blog describes a scenario where a wireless user in an Internet café starts up the Firefox browser. Home users who have not changed the default password on their wireless routers are also affected. Firefox routinely checks with the extension's update servers to see if there are any updates pending and generally notifies the user. Add-ons using the secure https:// protocol are not affected; a criminal could not intercept that encrypted transmission. However, add-ons using the less secure http:// protocol are open to what's called a man-in-the-middle attack where a criminal hacker can intercept the transmission and substitute a maliciously coded update instead.
While Firefox prompts the user to install any updates, not all updates trigger the prompt. For example, Google Toolbar updates will install automatically. Soghoian says "The problem stems from design flaws, false assumptions, and a lack of solid developer documentation instructing extension authors on the best way to secure their code." He urges Firefox users to uninstall extensions not downloaded from Mozilla.

Among these, Google Toolbar, Google Browser Sync, Yahoo Toolbar, Del.icio.us Extension, Facebook Toolbar, AOL Toolbar, Ask.com Toolbar, LinkedIn Browser Toolbar, Netcraft Anti-Phishing Toolbar, and PhishTank SiteChecker.
Add-ons not vulnerable to this type of attack include NoScript, Greasemonkey, and AdBlock Plus.

Secure add-ons can be downloaded from the official Firefox Add-ons website. Soghoian says he contacted Google and other developers and told Mozilla and specific about this vulnerability on April 16, 2007. Many vendors ignored him. Mozilla did work with some vendors, such as eBay, to fix the problem and has updated its developer site to include safe coding practices to guard against this attack. Abiding by the CERT vulnerability disclosure policy, Shogoian went public 45 days after notifying CERT and the vendors affected. Soghoian is no stranger to controversy. In October, Soghoian printed his own airline tickets much to the dismay of the FAA and Department of Homeland Security. No charges were ever filed.

Apple Hides Account Info in DRM-free Music, Too!

2007-05-30T14:35:00.000-05:00

FOLLOW-UP TO EARLIER STORY...

With great power comes great responsibility, and apparently with DRM-free music comes files embedded with identifying information. Such is the situation with Apple's new DRM-free music: songs sold without DRM still have a user's full name and account e-mail embedded in them, which means that dropping that new DRM-free song on your favorite P2P network could come back to bite you.

Ken Fisher and others at arstechnica.com started examining the files this morning and noticed their names and e-mail addresses in the files, and they found corroboration of the find at TUAW, as well. But there's more to the story: Apple embeds your account information in all songs sold on the store, not just DRM-free songs. Previously it wasn't much of a big deal, since no one could imagine users sharing encrypted, DRMed content. But now that DRM-free music from Apple is on the loose, the hidden data is more significant since it could theoretically be used to trace shared tunes back to the original owner.

Read more...

Apple Debuts Unprotected Songs Online

2007-05-30T12:34:00.000-05:00

Excerpts from chron.com
Apple Inc.'s iTunes Store started selling thousands of songs without copy protection Wednesday, marking the trendsetting company's latest coup and a model for what analysts say will likely become a pattern for online music sales.
Launching initially with songs from music company EMI Group PLC, iTunes Plus features tracks that are free of digital rights management, or DRM, technology _ copy-protection software that limits where songs or movies can be played and distributed. The unrestricted content means some songs purchased from iTunes will work for the first time directly on portable players other than Apple's iPod, including Microsoft Corp.'s Zune.
The inaugural batch of iTunes Plus songs includes music from Coldplay, The Rolling Stones, Norah Jones, Frank Sinatra, Pink Floyd and more than a dozen of Paul McCartney's classic albums. The DRM-free tracks feature a higher sound quality and cost $1.29 apiece _ 30 cents more than the usual 99-cent price of other, copy-protected songs at the market-leading online music store. If available, users could upgrade existing purchases to DRM-free versions for 30 cents a song or $3 for most albums, Apple said.
London-based EMI, the world's third-largest music company by sales, and Cupertino-based Apple announced their partnership in April to deliver the industry's first major offering of DRM-free songs, sharing a vision of what both companies say their consumers want: flexibility and CD-audio quality. Earlier this year, Apple CEO Steve Jobs called on the world's four major record companies to start selling songs online without copy-protection software. "We definitely think it's the right thing to do," Eddy Cue, Apple's vice president of iTunes, said Wednesday. "In this case, EMI's a leader and we think others will follow."

In a statement Wednesday, Jobs reiterated Apple expects that more than half of the 5 million songs on iTunes will feature a DRM-free version by the end of the year. In the meantime, Apple's iTunes Store will continue to offer songs in the same copy-protected format as today at 99-cents-per-download and encoded at 128 kilobits per second. The iTunes Plus versions are encoded at 256 kbps, which Apple says makes the audio quality on par with original recordings. Apple also will continue to encode its songs _ including EMI's DRM-free content _ in the AAC audio format, which could force some users to go through an extra step of converting tunes into a version that would be compatible with their players.

Amazon.com, by comparison, said it plans to sell songs online later this year in the DRM-free MP3 format _ the popular unrestricted audio standard that is supported by virtually any device, including Apple's best-selling iPod.

Benzene in Soft Drinks? More Information...

2007-05-28T08:26:00.000-05:00

EDITORIAL: I have to admit that I drink my share of diet colas -- mostly Caffeine Free Diet Pepsi and Diet Dr. Pepper. Therefore, I decided to do a little more research on this topic. There are THOUSANDS of hits for keywords related to the topic. Two articles, in particular, caught my eye (but others are quite pertinent as well). One (previously linked) deserves further discussion.

The other, provides a 2006 statement from the American Beverage Association saying it will address the benzene problem with soft drink makers. But, don't think the ABA is a champion for the American consumer. Their website now clearly sides with the soft drink makers by claiming benzene levels in soft drinks is not a hazard. It looks like the ABA and soft drink makers are trying CYA tactics due to lawsuits being filed against them. BTW, smaller makers are already paying out on such suits.
There have even been questions raised by an ex-official from the FDA. The source told BeverageDaily.com (11/2006) it was "embarrassing" the Food and Drug Administration had failed to eradicate benzene residues from all drinks.

"Big companies are very powerful. If you're a regulator with a tight budget, it could have been one of those closets with skeletons in that you don't want to open," the ex-FDA enforcement official said.

The FDA agreed in 1991 for firms to "get the word out and reformulate" privately, without an official guide or limit drawn up. But isolated drinks samples continued to show elevated benzene levels in later FDA Total Diet Surveys. There is little health risk linked to the levels of benzene found in drinks, according to both the FDA and soft drinks industry. "There is a difference here between a small and unavoidable risk, and a small but avoidable risk," the ex-agency source said.

"The FDA seems to think the risk is quite low here. On the other hand, it's in a [non-essential] product nobody needs, and it doesn't have to be there. They claim they can reformulate." That's right -- sodium benzoate or its equally harmful cousin, potassium benzoate, are NOT necessary to the production of soft drinks. They are needed only for the cold-bottling process, which is what the big three (Coca-Cola, Cadbury Schweppes and PepsiCo) use to produce their products. Heat pasteurization would preserve the taste and freshness without the risk of cancer.

So, why don't the soft drink makers use it? MONEY, plain and simple. They cold-bottle drinks now. If the total effects of benzene were widely known, soft drink makers would be forced to remove the substance from their formulas -- causing them to retool for heat pasteurization. Technically, it would be a large and expensive task. So, they continue to feed us carcinogens in order to save their bottom line. Gives you a warm fuzzy, doesn't it?

Report: Soft Drinks May Seriously Harm Your Health

2007-05-27T20:24:00.000-05:00

Article from FOXNews.com

You may want to put that soda can down. A common preservative found in drinks such as Coca-Cola, Sprite, Dr. Pepper, Fanta and Diet Pepsi and may cause serious cell damage, according to a report in Britain's The Independent. Sodium benzoate has the ability to switch off vital parts of a person's DNA, according to research from a British university. The problem is usually associated with aging and alcohol abuse, but new findings show that drinking soda with the preservative can eventually lead to cirrhosis of the liver and degenerative diseases such as Parkinson's.

"The mitochondria consumes the oxygen to give you energy and if you damage it - as happens in a number if diseased states - then the cell starts to malfunction very seriously. And there is a whole array of diseases that are now being tied to damage to this DNA - Parkinson's and quite a lot of neuro-degenerative diseases, but above all the whole process of ageing."

Sodium benzoate, which derives from benzoic acid, has been used for years by the carbonated drinks industry to prevent mold from developing in soft drinks. The ingredient has been the subject of concern on cancer, because when mixed with Vitamin C, it turns into a carcinogenic substance called benzene, The Independent reported. Last year, a Food Standards Agency survey of benzene in drinks found high levels in four brands that were removed from store shelves. "These chemicals have the ability to cause severe damage to DNA in the mitochondria to the point that they totally inactivate it: they knock it out altogether," said Peter Piper, a professor of molecular biology and biotechnology.