Spam alert on Facebook.
Read it at Pc Clean blog NOW!!!
http://ping.fm/FRIz7
Pc Clean often updates its blog of IT related news that has caught our attention. The blogs are not my thoughts, but of thoughts of people who study the finer sectors of the IT Circle
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Facebook spam warning
Facebook on Friday afternoon was investigating what appeared to be a new spam scheme that results in users getting messages from friends over Facebook chat that have malicious links. The messages say "LOL is this you?" and are accompanied by a link that looks like it leads to a video on Facebook, one victim told CNET. In his case, clicking the link directed to a Web page with a "404-Page Not Found" error message and his account sent the spam out to at least one of his friends, he said.
The spam was also reported on Twitter, but at this point the outbreak seems to be minor.
By Niall Mulrine, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal
www.pcclean.ie
Google to lauch cheap phone calls via GMAIL
Google enables phone calls from Gmail
Google has said users of Gmail will now be able to call telephones directly from their e-mail, putting it in direct competition with Skype as well as more traditional operators.
While Google had already offered computer-to-computer voice and video chat services, it said, starting on Wednesday, it would now allow calls to home phones and mobile phones directly from Gmail for the first time.
Google promised free calls to US and Canadian phones from Gmail for the rest of this year and said it would charge low rates for calls made to other countries.
For example it said calls to the UK, France, Germany, China and Japan would cost two cents per minute.
Analysts said the service would likely be a bigger competitive threat to services like Skype than to traditional phone companies, which have already been cutting their call prices in recent years in response to stiff competition.
"This is a risk to Skype. It's a competitor with a pretty good brand name," said Hudson Square analyst, Todd Rethemeier.
Skype, which is owned by private equity firms and eBay and planning a $100 million initial public offering, has long allowed consumers to make calls from computers to phones. Skype became popular by first offering free computer-to-computer voice and video services.
Like Skype, Rethemeier said the Google service will likely be much more popular among users making international calls, than among people calling friends inside the country.
"Calling is so cheap already that I don't think it will attract a huge amount of domestic calling. It could take some of the international market," he said.
Another analyst, Steve Clement from Pacific Crest, said anybody who is tempted by Internet calling services has likely already disconnected their home phone. "The type of person who would use a service like that isn't the type of customer who still has a landline."
Google said making a call through its service works like a normal phone in that a user could click on the "call phone" option in their chat buddy list in Gmail and type in the number or enter a contact's name.
Calls that cost money will be charged from an online account that users can top up with a credit card, Google said. The service will not be available for making outgoing calls on mobile phones because other Google apps already cater to that market, the company added.
published by techcentral.
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal.
www.pcclean.ie
http://www.facebook.com/pccleancomputers
www.twitter.com/pccleancomputer
It's VoIP, but not as you know it
Google has said users of Gmail will now be able to call telephones directly from their e-mail, putting it in direct competition with Skype as well as more traditional operators.
While Google had already offered computer-to-computer voice and video chat services, it said, starting on Wednesday, it would now allow calls to home phones and mobile phones directly from Gmail for the first time.
Google promised free calls to US and Canadian phones from Gmail for the rest of this year and said it would charge low rates for calls made to other countries.
For example it said calls to the UK, France, Germany, China and Japan would cost two cents per minute.
Analysts said the service would likely be a bigger competitive threat to services like Skype than to traditional phone companies, which have already been cutting their call prices in recent years in response to stiff competition.
"This is a risk to Skype. It's a competitor with a pretty good brand name," said Hudson Square analyst, Todd Rethemeier.
Skype, which is owned by private equity firms and eBay and planning a $100 million initial public offering, has long allowed consumers to make calls from computers to phones. Skype became popular by first offering free computer-to-computer voice and video services.
Like Skype, Rethemeier said the Google service will likely be much more popular among users making international calls, than among people calling friends inside the country.
"Calling is so cheap already that I don't think it will attract a huge amount of domestic calling. It could take some of the international market," he said.
Another analyst, Steve Clement from Pacific Crest, said anybody who is tempted by Internet calling services has likely already disconnected their home phone. "The type of person who would use a service like that isn't the type of customer who still has a landline."
Google said making a call through its service works like a normal phone in that a user could click on the "call phone" option in their chat buddy list in Gmail and type in the number or enter a contact's name.
Calls that cost money will be charged from an online account that users can top up with a credit card, Google said. The service will not be available for making outgoing calls on mobile phones because other Google apps already cater to that market, the company added.
published by techcentral.
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal.
www.pcclean.ie
http://www.facebook.com/pccleancomputers
www.twitter.com/pccleancomputer
Monday, August 30, 2010
Thank you all.I cann
Thank you all.I cannot believe the amount of people who have donated already. Fair play to you all Check out http://htxt.it/hiXG
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Do you regret what you typed in Twitter or Facebook. Can we change our real name??
Read Pc Clean Blog:
http://bit.ly/9KWRR2
Read Pc Clean Blog:
http://bit.ly/9KWRR2
Will you regret your Tweets or Wall Postings later in life???
Tweeted a stupid update? Time for a name change
Kids today post so much embarrassing personal content online that one day they’re going to have to change their names to escape the mess. That’s what Google’s Eric Schmidt believes, anyway.
The Wall Street Journal doesn’t quote Schmidt directly, but reports that: “He predicts, apparently seriously, that every young person one day will be entitled automatically to change his or her name on reaching adulthood in order to disown youthful hijinks stored on their friends’ social media sites.”
Let’s assume he is indeed serious. Most Facebookers and Twitterers have posted impetuous comments only to later delete them in embarrassment, or lived to regret their friends tagging them in a goofy, drunken photo, so it’s no wonder years down the line it may seem time to hit reset.
This isn’t a new phenomenon, hating the stupidity of our younger selves — don’t believe me? I dare you to share a photo of yourself as a teenager, then — but Schmidt is right that our childish ideas, foolish dress sense and drunken silliness have never been so publicly documented.
But will the teens of today go so far as to reboot their lives in mass embarrassment when faced with applying for their first jobs?
No. Instead, what I think will happen — or hope will happen, at least — is that the world will grow up and realise you can’t judge people by a status update posted years ago, that we shouldn’t all live in fear of things we’ve said just because our outbursts and silliness are now archived and searchable.
I can’t put it any better than this swear-filled comic from XKCD (really, let me warn about the naughty words in very large font), which argues we shouldn’t temper our lives to fit a mold, or hold back for fear of shaking things up.
And you know what? We’re already pretty good at forgiving mistakes. The US has elected presidents knowing they’ve smoked joints or battled cocaine addictions. We forgive stupid drunken behaviour and celebrate missteps as at least showing some character.
Decades from now, someone’s who’s had a Twitter account since their teens will stand for PM, and we’ll surely see that feed picked apart. Tabloid headlines will scream the unsuitability of someone who once got drunk and silly, felt it necessary to review the weird new sandwich they had for lunch, or dared to share an unpopular opinion.
Hopefully the rest of us will have the good sense to ignore all that and remember we’ve all done it too, whether or not it’s a matter of public record.
published by pccpro
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
The Wall Street Journal doesn’t quote Schmidt directly, but reports that: “He predicts, apparently seriously, that every young person one day will be entitled automatically to change his or her name on reaching adulthood in order to disown youthful hijinks stored on their friends’ social media sites.”
Let’s assume he is indeed serious. Most Facebookers and Twitterers have posted impetuous comments only to later delete them in embarrassment, or lived to regret their friends tagging them in a goofy, drunken photo, so it’s no wonder years down the line it may seem time to hit reset.
This isn’t a new phenomenon, hating the stupidity of our younger selves — don’t believe me? I dare you to share a photo of yourself as a teenager, then — but Schmidt is right that our childish ideas, foolish dress sense and drunken silliness have never been so publicly documented.
But will the teens of today go so far as to reboot their lives in mass embarrassment when faced with applying for their first jobs?
No. Instead, what I think will happen — or hope will happen, at least — is that the world will grow up and realise you can’t judge people by a status update posted years ago, that we shouldn’t all live in fear of things we’ve said just because our outbursts and silliness are now archived and searchable.
I can’t put it any better than this swear-filled comic from XKCD (really, let me warn about the naughty words in very large font), which argues we shouldn’t temper our lives to fit a mold, or hold back for fear of shaking things up.
And you know what? We’re already pretty good at forgiving mistakes. The US has elected presidents knowing they’ve smoked joints or battled cocaine addictions. We forgive stupid drunken behaviour and celebrate missteps as at least showing some character.
Decades from now, someone’s who’s had a Twitter account since their teens will stand for PM, and we’ll surely see that feed picked apart. Tabloid headlines will scream the unsuitability of someone who once got drunk and silly, felt it necessary to review the weird new sandwich they had for lunch, or dared to share an unpopular opinion.
Hopefully the rest of us will have the good sense to ignore all that and remember we’ve all done it too, whether or not it’s a matter of public record.
published by pccpro
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
Make your own 3D Film on a budget??
3D TV: in the home, on a budget and… on the news?
This is the final part in a series of blogs based on a seminar by Buzz Hays, chief instructor for the Sony 3D Technology Center in Culver City, California.It’s the most important consideration when it comes to filming in 3D: what types of production does the technology really suit? The huge vistas of Avatar used the 3D effect better than any film we’ve seen so far, but can shots still look good when scaled down to less epic proportions? Buzz Hays believes it may be something far smaller scale than cinema that eventually shows what 3D can achieve.
Filming on a hand-held budget
If we move way down the scale from Avatar towards smaller productions, one technique crops up more and more. The hand-held style – as used in Cloverfield (above) and the Bourne films, and increasingly aped by lower-budget productions - just doesn’t work well in 3D. Buzz calls it “very much a 2D convention”, which goes where the action goes, keeping the wobbles and shakes intact. That supposedly immerses the viewer, but when combined with 3D it ratchets that motion up several notches.“Say you’re riding a bicycle down a very bumpy mountain road. Your bicycle’s going to be juddering up and down, but your eyes stay much flatter, while your visual cortex is making a lot of corrections. We never see the world in that juddering way unless we’re subjected to some very erratic motion. So to then shoot an image like that and stick it into the head of somebody? That’s going to make people sick. We’re happy to help people figure out a way to shoot 3D like that, but it does not work out like they think – it doesn’t give a scene that level of excitement, it just makes people nauseous.”
Buzz gave the example of a US TV show that’s shot on the high seas, where the makers suggested filming in 3D to enhance the excitement. “I’m thinking hang on… if we’re standing on that boat any one of us would be throwing up over the rail after two seconds, and you want to recreate that in my living room? Certain situations are just very much 2D-centric.”
It’s not impossible to create a 3D scene using the hand-held approach, but for a watchable experience the level of motion has to be toned down. As Buzz says, “if you don’t want to change the style of your film then don’t shoot it in 3D. Once you use a Steadicam and smooth it out a bit, it’s no longer the film you were trying to make.”
3D in the home
One common complaint of 3D in cinemas (as made on this very site) is that the glasses make things too dark to fully appreciate the picture. Buzz agreed, but had more to say.“You do need to compensate for the fact that you’re losing at least a full stop of light to each camera. But this is an issue unique to cinema; 3D television has the opposite problem. You have a luminance of 17fL* for a 2D cinema projection, yet we have 35fL in a 3D television, so we typically have to adjust these things for each particular style of display.”
Whether this brighter picture makes home 3D more palatable to a sceptical public remains to be seen, but it’s at least one hurdle cleared. The other is getting different types of content made in 3D, at a time when the blockbuster is the clear king.
“Live action 3D, especially in dramas, is a very new concept to a lot of people, and a lot of studios just haven’t been willing to go there yet – they figure it has to be the big tentpole, the big visual effects, the big action picture. That’s changing, and will change more with 3D television – not everything has to be the big blockbuster event.”
We’ve already seen Sky launch its 3D channel in the UK, initially for pubs and bars with the necessary 3D Ready projectors, but eventually making its way into homes. By now Sky has plenty of practice with sports, but the 3D team has also experimented with programmes intended for Sky Arts and even news. Could it be the more intimate productions that really harness the effect?
“There’s a truth to a 3D image that we will never get from 2D,” explained Buzz, “especially if you look at news photography. When we photograph war in 2D, it’s interpretation; regardless of how the filmmaker’s trying to present the facts, it’s a filter. Once you present the same images in 3D there’s a very visceral response to it, very truthful and honest, to the point where I think there’s a certain responsibility now with filmmaking, that you have to regard the fact that you’re about to show people something very real.”
That may sound surprising to those of us who see 3D purely as a way into fantasy worlds full of blue catpeople, but it’s being taken seriously in some quarters already.
“We had a situation in Beowulf, where the ratings board didn’t want to give the film a final rating until they actually saw certain objectionable scenes in 3D because they thought they might be more graphic.”
The DIY future of 3D
While Bob Zemeckis and James Cameron have been the ones putting the high-profile 3D productions out there for the world to see – and to criticise – Buzz sees the future as more in the hands of people with less money and more creativity.“There’s already the possibility, especially in the CG world, for people to get involved in 3D. There’s a little group who did a film for a Bjork song called Wanderlust, it was shot by a duo called Encyclopedia Pictura in New York. They didn’t know the first thing about 3D. They researched it, they talked to [stereoscopic guru] Lenny Lipton, they talked to a bunch of people, they built their own camera rig, they shot this thing and it’s great. They knew nothing and it cost them almost nothing. If people have the wherewithal to figure it out they’re going to do some amazing stuff.”
People like us? People at home with everyday jobs, no specialist knowledge and nothing but a camera and some imagination?
“It will become more accessible, especially as consumer-grade cameras come out. We already have a couple of still camera systems right now that can shoot 3D, the Sony NEX series can shoot 3D panoramas.” [Panasonic has since announced the HDC-SDT750 3D camcorder, right.]
“Once you put 3D cameras into the hands of general consumers, that’s when we’ll start to see amazing things. I am convinced that the best 3D we’ll see is going to come completely out of leftfield.”
published by pcpro
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Back to school. Will this be the last time you will need to purchase the 'old' style textbooks for your children.
Who said reading about technology was boring??
Read this blog
http://bit.ly/cNweXW
Who said reading about technology was boring??
Read this blog
http://bit.ly/cNweXW
Save money on school books NOW!!
Students have not yet ditched heavy textbooks, but the options for getting course materials digitally are growing. However, shopping-savvy students increasingly are avoiding the queues and the effect of their wallet choosing to rent or purchase used textbooks online. But as a generation heads to school armed with multiple mobile devices, publishers are beginning to offer digital alternatives to traditional course materials.
Proponents of digital textbooks (or e-textbooks) tout their lower cost, instant accessibility, ecological sense, and potential to transform how students interact with course materials. Not to mention the fact that e-textbooks mean the end of backpacks heavier than a sack of bricks.
A complicated format
Nevertheless, while ordinary e-books are catching on like wildfire - Amazon reported that in July Kindle e-books outsold hardcover books - e-textbooks are not yet pervasive at traditional universities.
In a recently released study, the National Association of College Stores found that digital textbooks account for just two to three percent at member stores.
Part of the difficulty is that "in the higher education market, users' needs are so unique that all the right pieces haven't come into place yet", says Tracey Weber, executive vice president of textbooks and digital education for Barnes and Noble.
"Publishers, teaching staff and students each have a separate set of demands for what an e-textbook should be able to do."
Publishers, for their part, have to contend with the tricky realm of digital rights management (DRM) and strike a delicate balance between protecting copyrights and giving students adequate access for studying effectively. Common restrictions limit the number of devices that the e-textbook can be read on and how much of the text can be printed, shared, and copied/pasted.
Furthermore, though today's students may be tech-centric, they grew up learning from printed materials. Many find it tiring to read on a digital screen for long periods of time, or dislike the limitations of the applications used to read materials.
One well-documented example is Amazon's Kindle DX pilot trial program. Students at seven US universities used the first-generation Kindle DX in place of traditional textbooks and then reported on the classroom effectiveness of the 9.7in e-book reader. The results were underwhelming, as many (though by no means all) students found that the device didn't suit their study habits.
Burgeoning innovation
The benefits of going paperless - and predictions that e-textbooks will comprise 10 to 15 percent of the market in 2012 (and steadily climb upward thereafter) - have prompted a slew of new ventures from giants like Barnes and Noble and from small start-ups. Each such effort attempts to address the rapidly changing needs of students and the array of challenges currently hampering widespread adoption of e-textbooks.Many publishers offer digital titles directly through their own e-bookstores. But because each uses its own format (and because students are unlikely to obtain all of their textbooks from the same place), students must download and use several software applications to read all of the texts. To make e-textbooks as widely available as possible, publishers also offer their titles in a number of different marketplaces.
CourseSmart, a venture founded in 2007 by six higher-education textbook publishers, is one of the market's biggest players, with more than 12,500 titles available by subscription. Book-selling giant Barnes and Noble is making strides in the market with a new software application, Nookstudy, for accessing e-textbooks from its catalogue and for integrating with the popular course management software, Blackboard. Not to be left out, Amazon has made e-textbook titles available on its Kindle e-readers and on PCs, as well as through Kindle applications on mobile devices (iPad, Android, Blackberry, iPhone).
The where-to-buy question remains one of the biggest, given that digital textbooks are tied to a specific platform and format. The marketplace where you purchase the text will determine the hardware and software you can use to access it. If your titles are available in more than one marketplace, the key factors to consider are price, whether you want to own or rent the text, which devices you can access the content from, and which e-reader software application best suits your studying habits. Stay tuned for our upcoming feature focusing on where to buy e-textbooks.
published by pcadvisor
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
A computer car where no accidents will ever happen!!
A vehicle that's so safe, nobody will die in it? New technologies are bringing us ever closer to that goal.
Computers have affected every aspect of our lives, and our cars are no exception.
Over the next 10 to 20 years, car companies will rely increasingly on computer simulations and virtual engineering to build safer cars and help reduce fatalities. With magnesium and carbon-fibre parts in strategic locations, active safety systems that slow the car as it follows curves in the road, and vehicle-to-vehicle communication that warns you about approaching traffic, future cars will be much safer to drive.
Volvo, for instance, has launched a program called Vision 2020, which states: "by 2020, nobody shall be seriously injured or killed in a new Volvo". It includes not just new protective measures in the car, but technology for communicating dangers to and from the car. Other car companies have similar, less formalised programs.
Getting there will require carmakers to develop and strengthen an underlying technological infrastructure that can support intense crash simulations using tens of millions of data points, as well as a robust communications network that sends out safety signals between cars. The result will be the deployment of new active safety methods that can predict a crash and drive you out of a jam - literally.
High-performance computing advancements have enabled GM to move to an interactive design process, according to Bhatti. "We now [simulate] a full vehicle model - that is, bumper to bumper, including interior trim, with [crash test] dummies in it - using as many as four million elements."
Engineers create test scenarios and send the results back to the designers, who use that information to develop the next round of car models for retesting. "We can see what happens to the trunk, the dummies, and we look at the information as you would do in a physical test. And then we look to see if we need to change body structure, airbags, seat belts - or, in a side impact, the interior trim on door, B-pillar, roof rear headers. All of this would be done after several iterations on a computer," Bhatti says.
Only after a car design has passed every virtual crash test is a full physical prototype created.
According to Pradeep Srinivasan, a senior technical specialist at Altair, automakers that use Radioss incorporate millions of data elements - such as tyre pressure, car weight and road conditions - into a single simulation. One Japanese manufacturer he declined to name used 10 million to 12 million data elements in an especially detailed crash simulation, Srinivasan says.
With such detailed simulation and analysis, it's not surprising that processing power is an important factor. For many common computer simulations, such as one vehicle crashing into another, carmakers have the supercomputing power they need in-house. Altair has publicly demonstrated that even a complex simulation of a full crash test with 1 million elements can take just five minutes to render using a cluster of Intel Xeon 5500 processors.
American Honda Motor Co (which includes Honda and Acura cars, as well as Honda motorcycles, motors and power equipment) has more than 3,000 processors dedicated to crash analyses, according to Eric DeHoff, manager and principal engineer for vehicle structure research and computer-aided engineering.
"We use high-power computer clusters - load-balancing computers with many processors that share the computational workload - to process many different standardised regulatory and consumer information crash modes," he says. "We perform structural deformation analyses and occupant injury mode analyses, which require the modelling of restraint system parts like the seat belts, airbags and the actual crash dummies."
Mercedes-Benz performs thorough simulations on new vehicle designs, says Richard Krüger, manager of safety communications. "We run approximately 5,000 crash simulations with complete car models during the whole development phase [for each car]," he says.
Krüger says Mercedes uses LS-Dyna for the simulation solver for crash tests, Medina from T-Systems for car modelling and Animator4 from GNS for crash visualisation to see how the models perform in the rendered environments. "A typical turnaround time for [the complete crash-test simulation] rendering is approximately 15 hours," he adds.
PAGE 3
A vehicle that's so safe, nobody will die in it? New technologies are bringing us ever closer to that goal.
Currently, virtual dummies help measure only displacements, velocities and physical force, Bhatti says. Work is under way - mostly by a group of partners led by the Global Human Body Models Consortium - on building a human model that can measure tissue damage, brain trauma and other accident damage beyond what the typical crash test dummy can show.
David Pulaski, an analyst at market research firm Harris Interactive, related a story about a recent real-world incident for a carmaker he did not name: A thin and light woman was sitting in the back seat of a car involved in an accident, but the car did not deploy an airbag because it was designed to sense a heavier weight and larger size.
If the designers had used more environmental and passenger variables in simulations testing the airbag system, the car could have sensed the woman and deployed the airbag appropriately. This points to a need to expand simulation testing to include more scenarios, which will require even more processing power.
Another major limitation to crash simulations is cost, says Pulaski. Every car company could pour millions of dollars into materials research or virtual human tissue for crash dummies, but consumers would balk at the higher prices car companies would need to charge to offset the costs.
Most of us have accepted the reality that driving cars will sometimes cause fatal injuries. Pulaski says there needs to be another incentive - just as car companies finally started addressing fuel consumption problems when the cost of oil escalated beyond the stratosphere.
Telematics services such as GM's OnStar and Mercedes' mbrace today use CDMA cellular and GPS signals to communicate vehicle status, including automatic collision notification, to a central location and provide other services such as roadside assistance and remote door lock or unlock. It's easy to see how these services could be expanded to allow vehicles to communicate with one another, although neither company has announced specific plans to do so.
Mike Shulman, technical leader for advanced engineering at Ford, says his company is moving from passive safety features that protect passengers during a crash to active safety features that can prevent crashes altogether. This means the car will still be made from safe materials and provide airbags and other protections, but it will also actively search for dangers, partly by communicating with other cars and partly by communicating with the road infrastructure, including signs, traffic lights and parking lots.
Pulaski says most automakers have shifted to the active safety approach. For example, just about every car manufacturer now has some form of stabilisation control that checks for uneven tire speed and whether the car is at an angle, and keeps the vehicle level to prevent it from overturning. The next step, Pulaski says, is for this stabilisation state to be communicated to other cars.
To help spur innovation, the Federal Communications Commission in 2002 approved the use of the Dedicated Short Range Communications (DSRC) 5.9-GHz spectrum in the US for both vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure signals. In 2009, the US Department of Transportation launched the IntelliDrive research program, in which auto manufacturers, in cooperation with federal and state government agencies, are developing standards for the wireless signals and figuring out how to use them in cars. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is scheduled to review the program's recommendations in 2013 and decide whether to approve IntelliDrive technology for deployment.
Today, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety - the noted US crash-test rating authority sponsored by the insurance industry - rates crash safety based mainly on car-to-barrier collisions. But Ford's Shulman speculates that the DSRC signals could become part of the IIHS ratings and that future cars could be rated for their ability to communicate with other cars -- a glimmer of that possible 'zero fatality' rating for cars down the road.
At a low level, these signals would send out a safety state - for example, the car's speed, the level of brake pressure the driver has applied and steering - to every other car in the vicinity. According to Shulman, this signal would emanate 10 times per second.
A second level of communication involves more detail - the car could send out its current path prediction according to GPS routing, for example, or warn the driver about unsafe traffic conditions reported from other vehicles. One early sign of this was Dash Navigation's Dash Express GPS system, which debuted in early 2008 and sent traffic information from each Dash owner for other drivers to see. (Research in Motion, which purchased Dash Navigation in 2009, discontinued Dash Express service and support on June 30, 2010, for undisclosed reasons.)
All this could lead to what Shulman calls the smart intersection. Cars would know the status of the next traffic light, the speed of other cars and that, say, there was a semi-trailer truck barrelling down the cross street. Shulman says there are other benefits unrelated to safety: drivers could look up the routes they have taken over several weeks or track their miles per gallon from a computer.
Of course, getting car companies to decide on and conform to an approved standard for car communication may be a challenge. Another challenge is that wireless signals can be unreliable in moving vehicles. For example, Wi-Fi, which is just starting to become available in cars such as the 2011 Ford Edge, requires complex algorithms to make sure it works well in a moving vehicle.
It's too soon to tell whether the DSRC signals on the 5.9GHz spectrum will have reliability problems, but there's no doubt that automakers will need to test and retest the communications systems to ensure uptime and accuracy.
Finally, as AutoPacific's Kim notes, no amount of vehicle-to-vehicle communication will help when drivers make monumental mistakes, such as driving into a tree.
Next up are collision avoidance systems that inspect environmental variables such as road conditions, lane markers and your attention level (by measuring steering wheel movements, time elapsed since you started the car, erratic behaviour and many other variables) and use advanced algorithms to determine how much you should be braking in a given situation.
Already in use in advanced vehicles such as the Acura RL, the Mercedes S550 and the Volvo S60, these systems send out a radar signal and wait for a response to determine the distance and closing speed of cars and other objects in front of the car. If a collision is likely to occur, the car first warns the driver, then automatically applies the brakes partially or fully, depending on the time to impact.
Similarly, the Volvo S60's new pedestrian detection system combines radar (to gauge the distance and trajectory of moving objects) with a camera (to determine whether they're human). If a pedestrian suddenly steps out in front of the car, the system applies the brakes automatically.
The system includes approximately 10,000 stored images of what pedestrians 'look like', according to James Hope, a technical media representative for Volvo.
"The camera compares the stored images to what it's seeing in front, along with looking for human-type movement - the arms swinging, the shoulders and head, the legs moving - to determine if it's really seeing a person or something else. The system wouldn't recognise an animal or a baby stroller, but it would recognise the person pushing the stroller," Hope says.
These collision avoidance systems require a wealth of data about multiple driving conditions, which allows the computer to factor in every possible variable when deciding upon the appropriate response. As with crash tests, computer simulations have proved key in gathering this data. Volvo tested the S60's pedestrian detection system over 500,000 km of simulated driving in a virtual world, according to Thomas Broberg, a senior technical adviser for safety at the Volvo Car Safety Center in Gothenburg, Sweden.
To generate the data required for better simulations, Volvo has launched 100 test cars in Europe that are collecting driving-condition data over three years, equipped with video cameras and eye-tracking sensors that will aid further research and simulation. The project will collect about three million km of live driving data and will help uncover the results of impacts that are less common than front and rear collisions. Broberg says this data is required if Volvo is to reach its zero-fatality goal.
"There will be a combination of protective enhancements and collision avoidance," says Broberg. "This will be a groundbreaker for safety, as soon as you get communication between vehicles and between the vehicle and the infrastructure within the next 10 years, if not sooner."
The ultimate goal? Broberg says cars need to get better at performing actions that rely on human interaction today - anticipating what the driver wants to do (say, by evaluating head movements), reading road signs and adjusting speed based on driving conditions. "The car will know its state, that the road is slippery and [the driver] seems tired - there is something coming up in the road, so the car will act evasively," says Broberg.
Of course, a looming challenge for cars that rely on computers for their safety is that computers are not 100 percent reliable. Car companies address this problem by creating programs that check and recheck the vehicle state many times in a short period. For example, a Mercedes with blind-spot detection sends out multiple signals to verify that it's safe to make a lane change; the car also checks the state of the blind-spot detection system itself and warns the driver if it's not working properly, according to a company representative.
Although we're unlikely to ever see a car that results in absolutely no fatalities from car crashes, it will be an enormous achievement for the auto industry if it even gets close to that goal. According to the US Department of Transportation, 37,000 people are killed annually in crashes on US roadways; if even a fraction of those fatalities could be avoided, we'd be putting technology to its best possible use.
published by pcadvisor
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
Over the next 10 to 20 years, car companies will rely increasingly on computer simulations and virtual engineering to build safer cars and help reduce fatalities. With magnesium and carbon-fibre parts in strategic locations, active safety systems that slow the car as it follows curves in the road, and vehicle-to-vehicle communication that warns you about approaching traffic, future cars will be much safer to drive.
Volvo, for instance, has launched a program called Vision 2020, which states: "by 2020, nobody shall be seriously injured or killed in a new Volvo". It includes not just new protective measures in the car, but technology for communicating dangers to and from the car. Other car companies have similar, less formalised programs.
Interactive
As ambitious as it seems, the zero-fatality goal is achievable, according to Ed Kim, an analyst at automotive research firm AutoPacific. In the next 10 years, there will be a confluence of safety technologies - such as road-sign recognition, pedestrian detection and autonomous car controls - that lead to safer cars, says Kim.Getting there will require carmakers to develop and strengthen an underlying technological infrastructure that can support intense crash simulations using tens of millions of data points, as well as a robust communications network that sends out safety signals between cars. The result will be the deployment of new active safety methods that can predict a crash and drive you out of a jam - literally.
Advanced crash-test simulation
Crash simulation has changed in recent years, says Majeed Bhatti, a car safety engineer at General Motors. In the past, engineers designed physical prototypes and ran them into a barrier, then analysed the results on a computer. Today, the physical prototype is just the last piece of the puzzle. Bhatti says computer simulations are now used as the primary test method.High-performance computing advancements have enabled GM to move to an interactive design process, according to Bhatti. "We now [simulate] a full vehicle model - that is, bumper to bumper, including interior trim, with [crash test] dummies in it - using as many as four million elements."
Engineers create test scenarios and send the results back to the designers, who use that information to develop the next round of car models for retesting. "We can see what happens to the trunk, the dummies, and we look at the information as you would do in a physical test. And then we look to see if we need to change body structure, airbags, seat belts - or, in a side impact, the interior trim on door, B-pillar, roof rear headers. All of this would be done after several iterations on a computer," Bhatti says.
Only after a car design has passed every virtual crash test is a full physical prototype created.
Tools of the trade
Two of the leading software tools for simulating complex crash environments are Altair's Radioss and ESI Group's PAM-Crash. GM currently uses LS-Dyna from Livermore Software Technology, originally developed at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.According to Pradeep Srinivasan, a senior technical specialist at Altair, automakers that use Radioss incorporate millions of data elements - such as tyre pressure, car weight and road conditions - into a single simulation. One Japanese manufacturer he declined to name used 10 million to 12 million data elements in an especially detailed crash simulation, Srinivasan says.
American Honda Motor Co (which includes Honda and Acura cars, as well as Honda motorcycles, motors and power equipment) has more than 3,000 processors dedicated to crash analyses, according to Eric DeHoff, manager and principal engineer for vehicle structure research and computer-aided engineering.
"We use high-power computer clusters - load-balancing computers with many processors that share the computational workload - to process many different standardised regulatory and consumer information crash modes," he says. "We perform structural deformation analyses and occupant injury mode analyses, which require the modelling of restraint system parts like the seat belts, airbags and the actual crash dummies."
Mercedes-Benz performs thorough simulations on new vehicle designs, says Richard Krüger, manager of safety communications. "We run approximately 5,000 crash simulations with complete car models during the whole development phase [for each car]," he says.
Krüger says Mercedes uses LS-Dyna for the simulation solver for crash tests, Medina from T-Systems for car modelling and Animator4 from GNS for crash visualisation to see how the models perform in the rendered environments. "A typical turnaround time for [the complete crash-test simulation] rendering is approximately 15 hours," he adds.
PAGE 3
Simulation limitations
Despite today's sophisticated testing capabilities, Bhatti says one of the roadblocks to the zero-fatality car is researchers' understanding of human anatomy and physiology - for example, they don't know enough about how the brain responds to a head injury to simulate a model that can distinguish between light and severe injuries.Currently, virtual dummies help measure only displacements, velocities and physical force, Bhatti says. Work is under way - mostly by a group of partners led by the Global Human Body Models Consortium - on building a human model that can measure tissue damage, brain trauma and other accident damage beyond what the typical crash test dummy can show.
David Pulaski, an analyst at market research firm Harris Interactive, related a story about a recent real-world incident for a carmaker he did not name: A thin and light woman was sitting in the back seat of a car involved in an accident, but the car did not deploy an airbag because it was designed to sense a heavier weight and larger size.
If the designers had used more environmental and passenger variables in simulations testing the airbag system, the car could have sensed the woman and deployed the airbag appropriately. This points to a need to expand simulation testing to include more scenarios, which will require even more processing power.
Another major limitation to crash simulations is cost, says Pulaski. Every car company could pour millions of dollars into materials research or virtual human tissue for crash dummies, but consumers would balk at the higher prices car companies would need to charge to offset the costs.
Most of us have accepted the reality that driving cars will sometimes cause fatal injuries. Pulaski says there needs to be another incentive - just as car companies finally started addressing fuel consumption problems when the cost of oil escalated beyond the stratosphere.
Vehicle communication networks
Vehicle-to-vehicle communication is another important step on the road to the zero-fatality car. The more a vehicle knows about other cars (and the roadway), the better it can react and avoid a danger.Telematics services such as GM's OnStar and Mercedes' mbrace today use CDMA cellular and GPS signals to communicate vehicle status, including automatic collision notification, to a central location and provide other services such as roadside assistance and remote door lock or unlock. It's easy to see how these services could be expanded to allow vehicles to communicate with one another, although neither company has announced specific plans to do so.
Mike Shulman, technical leader for advanced engineering at Ford, says his company is moving from passive safety features that protect passengers during a crash to active safety features that can prevent crashes altogether. This means the car will still be made from safe materials and provide airbags and other protections, but it will also actively search for dangers, partly by communicating with other cars and partly by communicating with the road infrastructure, including signs, traffic lights and parking lots.
Pulaski says most automakers have shifted to the active safety approach. For example, just about every car manufacturer now has some form of stabilisation control that checks for uneven tire speed and whether the car is at an angle, and keeps the vehicle level to prevent it from overturning. The next step, Pulaski says, is for this stabilisation state to be communicated to other cars.
To help spur innovation, the Federal Communications Commission in 2002 approved the use of the Dedicated Short Range Communications (DSRC) 5.9-GHz spectrum in the US for both vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure signals. In 2009, the US Department of Transportation launched the IntelliDrive research program, in which auto manufacturers, in cooperation with federal and state government agencies, are developing standards for the wireless signals and figuring out how to use them in cars. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is scheduled to review the program's recommendations in 2013 and decide whether to approve IntelliDrive technology for deployment.
Today, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety - the noted US crash-test rating authority sponsored by the insurance industry - rates crash safety based mainly on car-to-barrier collisions. But Ford's Shulman speculates that the DSRC signals could become part of the IIHS ratings and that future cars could be rated for their ability to communicate with other cars -- a glimmer of that possible 'zero fatality' rating for cars down the road.
A second level of communication involves more detail - the car could send out its current path prediction according to GPS routing, for example, or warn the driver about unsafe traffic conditions reported from other vehicles. One early sign of this was Dash Navigation's Dash Express GPS system, which debuted in early 2008 and sent traffic information from each Dash owner for other drivers to see. (Research in Motion, which purchased Dash Navigation in 2009, discontinued Dash Express service and support on June 30, 2010, for undisclosed reasons.)
All this could lead to what Shulman calls the smart intersection. Cars would know the status of the next traffic light, the speed of other cars and that, say, there was a semi-trailer truck barrelling down the cross street. Shulman says there are other benefits unrelated to safety: drivers could look up the routes they have taken over several weeks or track their miles per gallon from a computer.
It's too soon to tell whether the DSRC signals on the 5.9GHz spectrum will have reliability problems, but there's no doubt that automakers will need to test and retest the communications systems to ensure uptime and accuracy.
Finally, as AutoPacific's Kim notes, no amount of vehicle-to-vehicle communication will help when drivers make monumental mistakes, such as driving into a tree.
Collision avoidance systems
To help reduce fatalities, cars' computers will help drivers avoid crashes in the first place. Adaptive cruise control, which adjusts car speed automatically as you approach another car on the highway; blind-spot warning systems, which use cameras or sensors to detect cars moving up beside you; and lane-departure warning systems, which alert you when you drift out of your lane, are already fairly common.Next up are collision avoidance systems that inspect environmental variables such as road conditions, lane markers and your attention level (by measuring steering wheel movements, time elapsed since you started the car, erratic behaviour and many other variables) and use advanced algorithms to determine how much you should be braking in a given situation.
Already in use in advanced vehicles such as the Acura RL, the Mercedes S550 and the Volvo S60, these systems send out a radar signal and wait for a response to determine the distance and closing speed of cars and other objects in front of the car. If a collision is likely to occur, the car first warns the driver, then automatically applies the brakes partially or fully, depending on the time to impact.
"The camera compares the stored images to what it's seeing in front, along with looking for human-type movement - the arms swinging, the shoulders and head, the legs moving - to determine if it's really seeing a person or something else. The system wouldn't recognise an animal or a baby stroller, but it would recognise the person pushing the stroller," Hope says.
These collision avoidance systems require a wealth of data about multiple driving conditions, which allows the computer to factor in every possible variable when deciding upon the appropriate response. As with crash tests, computer simulations have proved key in gathering this data. Volvo tested the S60's pedestrian detection system over 500,000 km of simulated driving in a virtual world, according to Thomas Broberg, a senior technical adviser for safety at the Volvo Car Safety Center in Gothenburg, Sweden.
To generate the data required for better simulations, Volvo has launched 100 test cars in Europe that are collecting driving-condition data over three years, equipped with video cameras and eye-tracking sensors that will aid further research and simulation. The project will collect about three million km of live driving data and will help uncover the results of impacts that are less common than front and rear collisions. Broberg says this data is required if Volvo is to reach its zero-fatality goal.
"There will be a combination of protective enhancements and collision avoidance," says Broberg. "This will be a groundbreaker for safety, as soon as you get communication between vehicles and between the vehicle and the infrastructure within the next 10 years, if not sooner."
The ultimate goal? Broberg says cars need to get better at performing actions that rely on human interaction today - anticipating what the driver wants to do (say, by evaluating head movements), reading road signs and adjusting speed based on driving conditions. "The car will know its state, that the road is slippery and [the driver] seems tired - there is something coming up in the road, so the car will act evasively," says Broberg.
Of course, a looming challenge for cars that rely on computers for their safety is that computers are not 100 percent reliable. Car companies address this problem by creating programs that check and recheck the vehicle state many times in a short period. For example, a Mercedes with blind-spot detection sends out multiple signals to verify that it's safe to make a lane change; the car also checks the state of the blind-spot detection system itself and warns the driver if it's not working properly, according to a company representative.
Although we're unlikely to ever see a car that results in absolutely no fatalities from car crashes, it will be an enormous achievement for the auto industry if it even gets close to that goal. According to the US Department of Transportation, 37,000 people are killed annually in crashes on US roadways; if even a fraction of those fatalities could be avoided, we'd be putting technology to its best possible use.
published by pcadvisor
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
No access to Hotmail!! Read this for help
Microsoft says download Windows Live Mail to fix issue
Users have hit back at Microsoft over errors in the new Hotmail webmail service that locked them out of their accounts, blocked them from viewing mail or kept them from accessing contacts.But since late July, complaints spiked dramatically on the free service's support forum.
Some of the threads on Microsoft's support forum have also been heavily redacted, with numerous messages now labelled only with "This post was deleted by a moderator". Other threads have been locked down, and will accept no new messages.
"I'm now going on week 2 and still can not read/write emails," said self-described "Angry_user" in a message on a support thread last week. "I guess this is another way of Microsoft telling their subscribers that if the new upgrade does not work, well, you are SOL and it's time for you to get a new email service from someone else."
Several follow-up messages from Angry_user were deleted by Microsoft moderators.
The number of complaints is difficult to gauge, since they are spread across a number of threads, some that have been archived for what Microsoft has called "technical difficulties".
But users believe the count is significant. "Since July 28, Microsoft has received thousands of complaints in these forums from customers who are having trouble with Wave4 Hotmail," charged "langware" in a thread that kicked off yesterday. "What has Microsoft done with respect to these complaints?"
In that same thread, Angry_user popped up on with another status update on Tuesday: "We are now on week 3 and I still can not read/send email."
Bugs range from the most basic - an inability to access email or contacts or both - to the bizarre.
"I open my SENT folder, select a message, and then move it to some other folder... [and] the sender's name (for the message that was just moved) changes to my name!!" reported langware on Aug. 3.
Much of the advice Microsoft or its forum representatives have given users was to tell them to try a different browser. In a message on Tuesday, Microsoft again listed the supported browsers, which include Internet Explorer (IE) 6 and later, Firefox 3 and later, Safari 4 and later, and the newest version of Chrome on Windows.
"[The] Hotmail product group is using [user-supplied] information to create hotfixes for the issues reported by customers," Microsoft said in the same message. "We will be making broad updates to this thread as we have new workarounds or fixes related to the issues."
Microsoft declined to answer questions about why it's deleted large numbers of user posts and how the bugs were missed during beta testing.
The company is working on a fix for a problem related to accessing Hotmail over a mobile broadband connection, however, and said it will update the service as necessary. "The Hotmail team will continue to make periodic updates based on customer feedback," a Microsoft spokeswoman said. She did not reveal a timetable for such updates, however, or whether they would be publicly disclosed.
As a workaround, Microsoft suggested that users download the Windows Live Mail desktop client to access their Hotmail accounts. Windows Live Mail, a part of the Windows Live Essentials bundle, is a free download. Numerous users on the support forums reported that they were able to finally access Hotmail using the desktop client.
Microsoft also recommended running Chrome, saying users had reported that they were able to reach their Hotmail accounts with Google 's browser after rivals had failed them.
published by pcadvisor
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Thursday, August 12, 2010
DANGER!!
Do you see smudges on your touch screen phone?
Read this if you want to keep it secure!!!
http://bit.ly/9swmw7
Do you see smudges on your touch screen phone?
Read this if you want to keep it secure!!!
http://bit.ly/9swmw7
Security issues with Touchscreen phones!!!
Touchscreens open to smudge attacks
Greasy fingerprints can take the shine off a new touchscreen handset, and the smudges they leave behind could also leave it open to hacking, according to researchers.
0diggsdigg
When touchscreen devices are held up to the face, they pick up oil from the skin, explained researchers from the University of Pennsylvania at the Usenix security conference. The next time the password is entered, the pattern can be traced – and photographed – in the resulting smudges. Top five stories on PC Pro
1. Inside the online sweatshops2. Toshiba unveils auto-wipe hard drives
3. The film techniques that make great 3D
4. Data disasters more likely to strike in summer
5. Kindle newspapers: slower than print
The researchers tested Android handsets because the Google OS uses a graphical password, with users tracing a pattern on the phone to unlock the device. In ideal lighting conditions, the researchers managed to decipher the phone’s password 92% of the time by taking photos of the screen and bumping up the contrast.
Slipping a phone into a pocket isn’t enough to clean the password trail from the screen, the researchers found, so anyone wary of such an attack should take care to wipe their phone down frequently.
While smudge attacks might sound trivial, the researchers said the threat was genuine because it was so easy to analyse the patterns with just a computer and camera.
Although the experiment focused on Android handsets, the resarchers said smudge attacks could be used against other touchscreen devices, including bank machines, voting devices, and PIN entry systems.
“We believe smudge attacks based on reflective properties of oily residues are but one possible attack vector on touch screens,” the report added. “In future work, we intend to investigate other devices that may be susceptible, and varied smudge attack styles, such as heat trails caused by the heat transfer of a finger touching a screen.
"The practice of entering sensitive information via touchscreens needs careful analysis in light of our results."
The researchers said the Android password pattern needed to be strengthened, but noted that Android 2.2 will also include the option to use an alphanumeric password.
published by pcpro
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 086-2377033
Toshiba unveils autowipe hard drives
Toshiba unveils auto-wipe hard drives
Nervous administrators worried about data leakage have a new tool in their arsenal following the launch of Toshiba's Wipe technology.
Wipe instantly clears the data from drives by invalidating the security key when the power supply is turned off or the HDD is removed from the system.
Lost or stolen notebooks are not the only security risk that IT departments must addressSuch a feature could be used to prevent data from being stolen off of printer or copier drives or from returned leased systems, Toshiba said.
"Lost or stolen notebooks are not the only security risk that IT departments must address," the company said.
"Today, most office copier and printing systems use HDDs and many organisations are now realising the critical importance of maintaining the security of document image data stored within copier and printer systems."
Set to be rolled out in the company's self-encrypting hard drives, Toshiba said Wipe would first arrive in its upcoming 2.5" 7200rpm SED HDD model, and should address a growing need for IT departments to comply with privacy and data protection law.
However, it is unclear at this stage how any facility for recovering data mistakenly locked might work
published by pcpro
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 086-2377033
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
1st SMS Trojan to appear on Android Mobiles
SMS Trojan Alerts on Android mobile devices
Security experts warned on Tuesday about what is believed to be the first Trojan targeting Android-based mobile devices that racks up charges by sending text messages to premium-rate numbers.
The Trojan-SMS malware, dubbed "Trojan-SMS.AndroidOS.FakePlayer.a," is being distributed via an unknown malicious Web site, said Denis Maslennikov, senior malware researcher at Kaspersky Lab.
Users are prompted to install a "media player application" that is a little bigger than 13 kilobytes, but which is hiding the Trojan inside, according to Kaspersky and mobile-phone security company Lookout, which analyzed the threat.
Like all Android apps, the program asks for permission to do certain things upon install. In this case it asks for permission to send SMS messages, with a prompt that identifies it as a "service that costs you money," as well as to read or delete data and collect data about the phone and the phone ID, Kaspersky and Lookout said.
Once installed, the Trojan starts sending SMS messages behind the scenes that cost several dollars per message, without the device owner knowing it.
It appears to be affecting Android smartphone users in Russia and to only work on Russian networks, Lookout said. "As far as we know, there is no indication that this app is in the Android Market," Lookout said in a blog post. It was also reported on a Russian smartphone news site.
A Google spokesman provided this statement when asked for comment: "Our application permissions model protects against this type of threat. When installing an application, users see a screen that explains clearly what information and system resources the application has permission to access, such as a user's phone number or sending an SMS. Users must explicitly approve this access in order to continue with the installation, and they may uninstall applications at any time. We consistently advise users to only install apps they trust. In particular, users should exercise caution when installing applications outside of Android Market."
Android users must change a default setting to accept apps from outside the Android marketplace.
To tell if you are affected, review your bills for any premium SMS messages. Lookout also suggests that if you have recently downloaded a media player, check the permission to make sure the app is not sending SMS messages.
The company recommends that smartphone users only download apps from trusted sources, and avoid downloading media player files that request permission to access your text messages, particularly if they want to send messages from the phone.
published by Cnet
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
Security experts warned on Tuesday about what is believed to be the first Trojan targeting Android-based mobile devices that racks up charges by sending text messages to premium-rate numbers.
The Trojan-SMS malware, dubbed "Trojan-SMS.AndroidOS.FakePlayer.a," is being distributed via an unknown malicious Web site, said Denis Maslennikov, senior malware researcher at Kaspersky Lab.
Users are prompted to install a "media player application" that is a little bigger than 13 kilobytes, but which is hiding the Trojan inside, according to Kaspersky and mobile-phone security company Lookout, which analyzed the threat.
Like all Android apps, the program asks for permission to do certain things upon install. In this case it asks for permission to send SMS messages, with a prompt that identifies it as a "service that costs you money," as well as to read or delete data and collect data about the phone and the phone ID, Kaspersky and Lookout said.
Once installed, the Trojan starts sending SMS messages behind the scenes that cost several dollars per message, without the device owner knowing it.
It appears to be affecting Android smartphone users in Russia and to only work on Russian networks, Lookout said. "As far as we know, there is no indication that this app is in the Android Market," Lookout said in a blog post. It was also reported on a Russian smartphone news site.
A Google spokesman provided this statement when asked for comment: "Our application permissions model protects against this type of threat. When installing an application, users see a screen that explains clearly what information and system resources the application has permission to access, such as a user's phone number or sending an SMS. Users must explicitly approve this access in order to continue with the installation, and they may uninstall applications at any time. We consistently advise users to only install apps they trust. In particular, users should exercise caution when installing applications outside of Android Market."
Android users must change a default setting to accept apps from outside the Android marketplace.
To tell if you are affected, review your bills for any premium SMS messages. Lookout also suggests that if you have recently downloaded a media player, check the permission to make sure the app is not sending SMS messages.
The company recommends that smartphone users only download apps from trusted sources, and avoid downloading media player files that request permission to access your text messages, particularly if they want to send messages from the phone.
published by Cnet
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
More iPhone security risks:
Do you know what happens your iPhone when sync with iTunes
http://bit.ly/a2H87o
Do you know what happens your iPhone when sync with iTunes
http://bit.ly/a2H87o
Do you know what happens your iPhone when sync with iTunes
Apple software stores iPhone details on PC
It started out with a friend’s request for help. His iPhone is at the bottom of one of Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes. He doesn’t have MobileMe or his contacts backed up to any type of address book. To make matters worse, he does not want another iPhone.
That’s why he called me, asking if I could retrieve his list of contacts. I know iTunes saves it, I just didn’t know where. After some searching, I found what I was looking for:
C:\Documents and Settings\”username”\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup
I looked in that folder. Wow, that’s a lot of files. Next step is to figure out how to open them, at least the ones with contact information. The following slide is small portion of what I found:
Side note: Mac users please forgive me. My friend is an adamant PC user, hence the focus of this article. This link describes where the databases can be found on Mac computers.
The next step was to see if I could find a way to read the .mddata files. Fortunately, I found SQLite Database Browser. Now I’m all set, except where to start. There are over 1000 files, so back to the Internet. I found an article by the Hampton Roads Geek community that listed exactly what I wanted.
Contact List: 31bb7ba8914766d4ba40d6dfb6113c8b614be442.mddata
SMS Log: 3d0d7e5fb2ce288813306e4d4636395e047a3d28.mddata
Call Log: ff1324e6b949111b2fb449ecddb50c89c3699a78.mddata
Notes database: 740b7eaf93d6ea5d305e88bb349c8e9643f48c3b.mddata
Before I moved the folder, I decided to sync my iPhone. Talk about being embarrassed. There it was, right in the options on the Summary tab. A checkbox titled “Encrypt iPhone backup” with an option to change the password.
The Apple iPhone OS Enterprise Deployment Guide states:
“Device backups can be stored in encrypted format by selecting the Encrypt iPhone Backup option in the device summary pane of iTunes. Files are encrypted using AES128 with a 256-bit key. The key is stored securely in the iPhone keychain.”
Sounds good to me, I checked the box and initiated a backup. After the sync was completed, I decided to see what the encrypted files looked like. The first example below is of a .mdinfo file before being encrypted:
bplist00ÕXMetadata^StorageVersionWVersion[AuthVersion[IsEncryptedO'bplist00ÔTPathWVersionXGreylistVDomain]iTunesArtworkS3.0_%AppDomain-com.basevelocity.RadarScope.<@A iS1.0S3.0+3?Kàäè
The next example was the same file after being encrypted:
bplist00Õ^StorageVersionXMetadataWVersion[AuthVersion[IsEncryptedS1.0Oä%P¸0¹TMwî7ÄIPi¢Þbýªh(g|Ò¢@ÞP...cݯ$µn'zÍ2‹Ón}I»ùK‹¡ïW=ݸwî³oqWz,C<à«]ÔtH¸YÛð›ëaÓŸH¼u‰’Ófñ¢§o$Èèâ`R„‹co‘ö&J¼ªsô¨zmî^´·!q‚7XUb§ojÄ¿&ö§¤
Not encrypted
Out of curiosity, I checked to see if info.plist was encrypted as well. It wasn’t. I wanted to make sure I mentioned this as you will have to decide how much of a risk that is.
Final thoughts
I mentioned what I learned to an IT colleague. She said it wasn’t that big of a deal. Someone would need physical and security access to the computer in question. That’s true, but entirely possible. Also, there could be malware specifically developed to steal the critical .mddata files.
Either way, my friend is now happy and I am encrypting my backups. I also wanted to share my new-found know
published by techrepublic
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
It started out with a friend’s request for help. His iPhone is at the bottom of one of Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes. He doesn’t have MobileMe or his contacts backed up to any type of address book. To make matters worse, he does not want another iPhone.
That’s why he called me, asking if I could retrieve his list of contacts. I know iTunes saves it, I just didn’t know where. After some searching, I found what I was looking for:
C:\Documents and Settings\”username”\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup
I looked in that folder. Wow, that’s a lot of files. Next step is to figure out how to open them, at least the ones with contact information. The following slide is small portion of what I found:
Side note: Mac users please forgive me. My friend is an adamant PC user, hence the focus of this article. This link describes where the databases can be found on Mac computers.
Info.plist
Since there were only three .plist files, I thought I would look at them first. I remember reading that .plist files are written using XML and can be opened with a web browser or text editor. I opened the .plist files with Notepad to see what I could find. Info.plist was the only one of interest because it contained the following information:- ICC-ID: Integrated Circuit Card ID or serial number of installed SIM card
- IMEI: International Mobile Equipment Identity or the serial number of the baseband processor
- Phone number
- Serial number of the iPhone
- Product version and product type
SQLite
That meant trying to figure out what the files were with the same name, but different extensions. After a bit of searching, I came across an Apple Examiner article that explained everything. Evidently, the file name is a SHA1 hash of the file’s full path on the iPhone. The article also mentions that the files are SQLite databases. The .mdinfo file contains metadata information about what is contained in the .mddata file.The next step was to see if I could find a way to read the .mddata files. Fortunately, I found SQLite Database Browser. Now I’m all set, except where to start. There are over 1000 files, so back to the Internet. I found an article by the Hampton Roads Geek community that listed exactly what I wanted.
What I found
The blog saved me a lot of guess work as it pointed out the following pertinent .mddata files:Contact List: 31bb7ba8914766d4ba40d6dfb6113c8b614be442.mddata
- This was the file that saved my friend. It has an abundance of information. Contact names, email addresses, and phone numbers are the most important ones.
SMS Log: 3d0d7e5fb2ce288813306e4d4636395e047a3d28.mddata
- As you can see below, the SMS log records every text message and the phone number. The date may seem a bit odd. It’s in Unix time or the number of seconds since January 1, 1970. The flag field allows you to determine if the message was sent or received. The number two indicates a received message and the number three a sent message.
Call Log: ff1324e6b949111b2fb449ecddb50c89c3699a78.mddata
- The call log lists the phone number, date, duration, and whether the call was incoming or outgoing.
Notes database: 740b7eaf93d6ea5d305e88bb349c8e9643f48c3b.mddata
- I really did not expect much from the Notes database. I changed my mind when I opened the file. My friend had several entries including passwords and personal information. As you can see, he even referenced his next oil change.
Thinking about my iPhone security
I personally do not keep any data on my computers. It’s all stored on encrypted flash drives. I now realize that’s not the case. Due to my iPhone, I have sensitive information stored in Documents and Settings. My initial solution was to move the backup folder to my encrypted flash drive. But it’s not a good solution, as I have to remember to move the folder after every sync.Before I moved the folder, I decided to sync my iPhone. Talk about being embarrassed. There it was, right in the options on the Summary tab. A checkbox titled “Encrypt iPhone backup” with an option to change the password.
The Apple iPhone OS Enterprise Deployment Guide states:
“Device backups can be stored in encrypted format by selecting the Encrypt iPhone Backup option in the device summary pane of iTunes. Files are encrypted using AES128 with a 256-bit key. The key is stored securely in the iPhone keychain.”
Sounds good to me, I checked the box and initiated a backup. After the sync was completed, I decided to see what the encrypted files looked like. The first example below is of a .mdinfo file before being encrypted:
bplist00ÕXMetadata^StorageVersionWVersion[AuthVersion[IsEncryptedO'bplist00ÔTPathWVersionXGreylistVDomain]iTunesArtworkS3.0_%AppDomain-com.basevelocity.RadarScope.<@A iS1.0S3.0+3?Kàäè
The next example was the same file after being encrypted:
bplist00Õ^StorageVersionXMetadataWVersion[AuthVersion[IsEncryptedS1.0Oä%P¸0¹TMwî7ÄIPi¢Þbýªh(g|Ò¢@ÞP...cݯ$µn'zÍ2‹Ón}I»ùK‹¡ïW=ݸwî³oqWz,C<à«]ÔtH¸YÛð›ëaÓŸH¼u‰’Ófñ¢§o$Èèâ`R„‹co‘ö&J¼ªsô¨zmî^´·!q‚7XUb§ojÄ¿&ö§¤
Not encrypted
Out of curiosity, I checked to see if info.plist was encrypted as well. It wasn’t. I wanted to make sure I mentioned this as you will have to decide how much of a risk that is.
Final thoughts
I mentioned what I learned to an IT colleague. She said it wasn’t that big of a deal. Someone would need physical and security access to the computer in question. That’s true, but entirely possible. Also, there could be malware specifically developed to steal the critical .mddata files.
Either way, my friend is now happy and I am encrypting my backups. I also wanted to share my new-found know
published by techrepublic
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie 086-2377033
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Apple users beware!!!! Danger do not open certain files until you read this
Apple has advised users of all its mobile devices that run on iOS to avoid opening PDFs until a fix is released for a newly discovered flaw.
Successful exploits of the flaw would enable attackers to take control of targeted iPhones, iPads or iPod Touch devices, security researchers have found.
The flaw is the way the Apple iOS 4 deals with PDF files and can be exploited if a user can be tricked into visiting a website containing a malicious PDF.
Paul Vlissidis, technical director at IT assurance firm NCC Group, said this type of vulnerability is consistent with what has been seen with new technologies.
"There is always a delay from when they are introduced until new vulnerabilities emerge," he said.
Given the speed with which vulnerabilities are picked up by criminals, it is important for suppliers to issue patches or workarounds quickly, said Vlissidis
Users also need to take responsibility for their own security settings and respond to security alerts from suppliers, he said.
"As smartphones become increasingly popular in the market place, more vulnerabilities such as this will come to light, as hacking capabilities become progressively more sophisticated," Vlissidis said.
Published by Computer Weekly
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine PC Clean Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal
Successful exploits of the flaw would enable attackers to take control of targeted iPhones, iPads or iPod Touch devices, security researchers have found.
The flaw is the way the Apple iOS 4 deals with PDF files and can be exploited if a user can be tricked into visiting a website containing a malicious PDF.
Paul Vlissidis, technical director at IT assurance firm NCC Group, said this type of vulnerability is consistent with what has been seen with new technologies.
"There is always a delay from when they are introduced until new vulnerabilities emerge," he said.
Users also need to take responsibility for their own security settings and respond to security alerts from suppliers, he said.
"As smartphones become increasingly popular in the market place, more vulnerabilities such as this will come to light, as hacking capabilities become progressively more sophisticated," Vlissidis said.
Published by Computer Weekly
Uploaded by Niall Mulrine PC Clean Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Aussie Lad receives
Aussie Lad receives $150,000 in his bank account by mistake?? He now wonders should he give it back or keep it? What would you do?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)