Security threats shift to applications

As people heed warnings to install the latest security updates for Microsoft's Windows operating systems and Internet Explorer browsers, researchers say hackers have been shifting their focus to applications that are harder to protect.

The Associated Press reports in The new York Times (22 November) that the SANS Institute's annual list of top internet security threats includes a separate category for ''cross-platform applications'' for the first time.

Data-backup programs, media players and anti-virus software were added to the list, joining instant messaging and file-sharing applications before listed under Windows threats.

AP says in the NYT report that most of these programs lack auto-updating mechanisms now available to automatically take care of the Microsoft threats, setting the state of security back five or six years, said Alan Paller, director of research as SANS, a security training and research organization.

Backup programs are of particular concern because they are used by businesses to duplicate the most sensitive data, such as financial and hospital records, Paller said.

{mospagebreaktitle=Search usurping email as top internet activity}Search usurping email as top internet activity

Search is catching up to email as the internet's number-one activity, according to a new poll.

The Register reports (23 November) that 41 per cent of US adults who surfed the internet on a "typical day" in September 2005 used a search engine, up from 30 per cent in June 2004, according to the latest Pew Internet & American Life survey of consumer behavior.

The publication says, however, that email continues its online reign. Fifty two per cent of Americans online sent or received email on a typical day in September 2005 - up from 45 per cent in June 2004.

According to The Register, the results come as IT giants and start-ups spawn in the search market, with dreams of becoming the "next Google" or the "next Yahoo!". Microsoft has set itself on a collision course with Google by trying to fuse search with advertising, while Silicon Valley start-ups rush to provide search services and engines that attract advertisers by serving niche markets.

The Register says, however, that search doesn't have it easy, though. Internet users spent more than 24 minutes on email compared to just 3.5 minutes on search engines, according to comScore data, meaning search companies must work hard to ensure they become desireable online destinations for consumers

{mospagebreaktitle=RSS 'extensions' published by Microsoft}RSS 'extensions' published by Microsoft

Microsoft has released details of a set of proposed extensions to Really Simple Syndication (RSS), billed as making it easier to receive and share data.

The Register reports (22 November) that a draft (https://msdn.microsoft.com/xml/rss/sse/) of Simple Sharing Extensions (SSE) version 0.9 for RSS 2.0, and Outline Processor Markup Language (OPML), has been published under the Creative Commons license by Microsoft.

The publication says that SSE has been primarily devised as a way to improve the way data, like calendar or contacts information, is delivered to different devices, and shared or replicated. Microsoft said SSE could be used to replicate RSS-enabled calendar entries among groups or to enter new appointments when users are not online.

According to The Register, if this sounds familiar to those using IBM's Lotus Notes, it should. SSE was conceived after Microsoft's recently recruited chief technology officer Ray Ozzie brainstormed with members of the Exchange, Outlook, MSN, Windows Mobile and Messenger Communicator product teams shortly after he joined.

The publicaton says that Ozzie is the father of Lotus Notes, groupware and collaboration technology that pioneered the concepts of pushing and replicating data to different devices and distributed users. Microsoft spent the latter half of the 1990s trying to unseat Notes in businesses, launching Exchange Sever as its groupware alternative.

The Register says that news Microsoft was tinkering with RSS first emerged in August, with plans to re-name RSS as "web feeds" in the next version of Internet Explorer (IE), for use with Windows Vista and Windows XP.

Any attempt to "extend" RSS will be greeted with concern that Microsoft is trying to interfere with a popular standard or technology rather than throw its full corporate backing behind the existing industry standard, says The Register, adding that past examples of such behaviour include Microsoft's "optimisation" of Sun Microsystems' Java and "extensions" added to the Kerberos security standard that was implemented by Microsoft in Windows 2000.

In its defense, Microsoft said (https://msdn.microsoft.com/xml/rss/ssefaq/) SSE defines the "minimum" extensions necessarily for loosely coupled applications that use RSS to share information.

{mospagebreaktitle=BitTorrent agrees to help curb access to movies}BitTorrent agrees to help curb access to movies

The creator of software used by millions of computer owners to download movies has agreed on to prevent his web site from linking to illegally available movies online, the latest result of a bid by Hollywood to gain control of a growing piracy problem.

The New York Times reports (23 November) that Bram Cohen, the 30-year-old founder and chief executive of BitTorrent, held a news conference with Dan Glickman, chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America and chief lobbyist for the movie industry, to announce the agreement, which is aimed at choking off illegal movie traffic exchanged on peer-to-peer networks.

Mr. Cohen created BitTorrent a year ago. So far it has a minimal revenue stream, but he is hoping to make deals with Hollywood studios to license their movies and television shows and allow users to download them legally, for a fee.

The newspaper says that Mr Cohen said he was in negotiations with several studios; the company announced last month that it had raised US$8.75 million in venture capital to create a business of online media distribution.

The BitTorrent protocol, available free online, makes large video files, including movies, available online by assembling them from data downloaded by users across the internet. The software is popular with college students and other computer aficionados, who can use it to download movies without the agreement of the studios that own them.

Mr. Cohen said that nternet tracking research indicated that more than one-third of internet traffic was using the BitTorrent protocol, much of that for video, reports the NYT.

{mospagebreaktitle=S. Korea watchdog eyes Samsung - Apple deal}S. Korea watchdog eyes Samsung - Apple deal

South Korea's Fair Trade Commission has said it is looking into whether Samsung Electronics may have engaged in unfair practices when it supplied NAND flash memory chips to Apple Computers.

The Associated Press reports in The New York Times (22 Novembe) that after it was revealed last month that a possible joint investment project between Apple and Samsung collapsed after Apple heard that the FTC may be investigating Samsung.

According to local media reports, a South Korean lawmaker also urged the FTC to conduct an investigation, saying that Samsung's supply of NAND chips at ''below market prices'' was hurting smaller Korean rivals, says AP.

Samsung, the world's larget producer of flash memory chips, has denied violating the law.

AP says that Samsung began supplying NAND flash memory chips -- widely used in music players and digital cameras -- to Apple in the third quarter of this year for use in its hot-selling new iPod Nano music player, which stores data using a flash memory chip instead of a hard disk drive.

On Monday, Samsung extended its agreement with Apple by entering into a long-term contract to supply the chips through 2010. Apple has agreed to prepay Samsung US$500 million.

{mospagebreaktitle=Video game master wins US$150,000}Video game master wins US$150,000

A video game master from Kansas City in the US has won a $150,000 prize on Tuesday by besting a rival in the Cyberathlete Professional League World Tour Grand Finals.

Johnathan Wendel, 24, who goes by the name ''Fatal1ty'' in the world of multiplayer games, beat Sander Kaasjager, a player from the Netherlands known as ''fnatic.Vo0,'' for the competition's top prize.

Wendel has been playing video games since around the age of 5, when his father gave him a Nintendo system and he first played Ikari Warriors. At 15, he started taking home prizes from local competitions. At 18, he entered his first professional tournament in Dallas, reports AP.

{mospagebreaktitle=Sony to make digital films for Christie / AIX}Sony to make digital films for Christie / AIX

Digital cinema venture Christie/AIX has said Sony Pictures Entertainment has agreed to release upcoming movies in digital form, adding to the number of major studios supplying titles for Christie/AIX.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (22 November) that Christie/AIX was formed earlier this year as a venture of privately held projector maker Christie and Access Integrated Technologies, or AccessIT, to provide equipment, service and a funding vehicle for installing digital projection and distribution systems in theatres.

For the venture to succeed, it needs movies to show in digital format, as opposed to old-fashioned celluloid, says Reuters.

Reuters says in the NYT report that Christie/AIX previously signed pacts with Universal Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox and Walt Disney Studios. Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros. are two major studios still outside its system.

Digital cinema promises audiences sharper pictures and new forms of entertainment, like updated three-dimensional movies or satellite telecasts of music concerts.

Reuters says that, for their part, the studios stand to save hundreds of millions of dollars in distribution costs because they would beam movies into theaters via satellites or high-speed Internet versus shipping thousands of film canisters around the world.

{mospagebreaktitle=Personal computers enlisted in AIDS research}Personal computers enlisted in AIDS research

A new project in the fight against AIDS will tap into the unused power of individual and business computers to help research and identify drugs used to combat the HIV virus.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (22 November) that an Internet-based initiative, called FightAIDSatHome, aims to enlist about 100,000 computer users to donate the use of their machines when they would otherwise be idle.

Participants' machines can request data from a central server, process it and send back the results.

Reuters says in the NYT report that the organisers hope to develop new chemical strategies to treat HIV-infected individuals, according to the San-Diego based Scripps Research Institute, which is behind the effort.processing power, researchers will be able to approach problems more aggressively and quickly, Scripps said.

It is the second research project using the network of computers, called the World Community grid, which is funded by IBM.