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You paid for your antivirus software? Why? Good free options have been available for years, mainly from no-name companies. Nervous consumers figure they’re better off buying major brands, like Norton security software from Symantec Corp. Well, here’s a major brand for you: Microsoft Corp.

"...In other words, after you've blithely downloaded a plug-in that shares your computer's Internet connection and processing power with other, unknown computers, Octoshape might choose to alter just what it's doing, how it's doing it, or the extent to which it is using your computer, remotely updating the software on your machine to change it, and /they're not going to tell you/. Oh, they'll make a revision to the license agreement available on their website, sure – but when was the last time you actually read all of the details of any software agreement, much less reviewed revisions to the...

"EU funding 'Orwellian' artificial intelligence plan to monitor public for "abnormal behaviour" The European Union is spending millions of pounds developing "Orwellian" technologies designed to scour the internet and CCTV images for "abnormal behaviour"." SNIPPET: "A five-year research programme, called Project Indect, aims to develop computer programmes which act as "agents" to monitor and process information from web sites, discussion forums, file servers, peer-to-peer networks and even individual computers. Its main objectives include the "automatic detection of threats and abnormal behaviour or violence"." SNIPPET: "Project Indect, which received nearly £10 million in funding from the European Union, involves the Police...

“MI5 hiring Asian teenagers to fight cyber terror” London, September 21, 2009 First Published: 00:09 IST(21/9/2009) Last Updated: 02:44 IST(21/9/2009) SNIPPET: “MI5 head Jonathan Evans has told his staff that the recruits were essential to combat cyber terrorism which has been traced to China, Russia and Pakistan — the hackers have also intercepted messages from terrorists in Belmarsh maximum security prison, the newspaper said. In a report to Lord West, the Security Minister, Evans has revealed that during the summer over 1,000 hits were made on computers in Whitehall. Other targets have been air traffic control, power stations and the...

BULLETIN -- NEW YORK POLICE AND FBI RAID HOMES IN QUEENS IN TERRORISM INVESTIGATION.6 minutes ago from BNO Headquarters

Note: See comments after the blog entry. Chinese researchers show how the PRC “owns” the U.S. Power Grid I had a head-slapping “What the F” moment when I read the New Scientist story “How to Short-Circuit the U.S. Power Grid“. Let’s start with the fact that the military strategy of the PRC ever since the U.S. speedily won the first Iraq war has been to find ways to mitigate our technological superiority by attacking its most vulnerable point - the network. That includes, as the Wall Street Journal so sensationally reminded us, the U.S. power grid. How fast do you...

I am trying to create recovery disks for a Sony Vaio. After getting to help and support windows, and clicking on a link for "recovery disks," I reach a window that explains what recovery disks are and what they do. The last line in this window says, "to create recovery disks, click next." However, this window has no link labeled "next" and no clickable button labeled "next." Furthermore, the window cannot be maximized (there is no maximize icon), or does it have horizontal or vertical scrolling. In other words, there's nothing to click. Has anyone run into this issue? How...

Device captures everything you type and sends it via your ethernet card to the Dept. of Homeland Security without your knowledge, consent or a search warrant - every time you log on to the internet! I was opening up my almost brand new laptop, to replace a broken PCMCIA slot riser on the motherboard. As soon as I got the keyboard off, I noticed a small cable running from the keyboard connection underneath a piece of metal protecting the motherboard. -------------------------------------------------- This was sent to me, not confirmed.

Sorry to clog the board with a vanity but I have a problem. It is an extra older machine running Windows 2000 Professional. Our office had power problems and I did not have it on a power backup and it lost power.

Hope this is the right area to post this geek thing. I'm trying to locate a program to protect my laptop in case it's stolen. I have passwords on it but I would like to have a USB flash drive as a key/lock. If the flash drive is not installed then the laptop can't be booted or accessed in any way. The USB flash drive has to be inserted into the laptop before it's turned on and the laptop needs to access a program on it before it would boot. Any ideas?

A TSG investigation unmasks the leader of Pranknet and the miscreants behind a year-long wave of phone call criminality AUGUST 4--At 4:15 AM on a recent Tuesday, on a quiet, darkened street in Windsor, Ontario, a man was wrapping up another long day tormenting and terrorizing strangers on the telephone. Working from a sparsely furnished two-bedroom apartment in a ramshackle building a block from the Detroit River, the man, nicknamed "Dex", heads a network of so-called pranksters who have spent more than a year engaged in an orgy of criminal activity--vandalism, threats, harassment, impersonation, hacking, and other assorted felonies and...

A Briton wanted in the United States for breaking into NASA and Pentagon networks in "the biggest military hack of all time" lost an appeal against his extradition Friday, making a U.S. trial more likely. Gary McKinnon, 43, has fought a three-year battle to avoid extradition, including going to the European Court of Human Rights, but he appeared to have run out of options as Britain's High Court ruled against his latest appeal Friday. The court rejected arguments by McKinnon's lawyers that extraditing McKinnon, who was recently diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, a form of autism, would have disastrous consequences for...

New Version Reflects Lowered Price on Mac Notebook NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Following a complaint from Apple, Microsoft has quietly tweaked at least one of the ads in its "Laptop Hunters" campaign to reflect its rival's lower pricing on its Mac notebooks. In the new version of the ad, Lauren doesn't talk about how much the Mac costs, but she does say: 'It seems like you're paying a lot for the brand.' 'Greatest single phone call' Just last week Microsoft Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner was ecstatic about a phone call from Apple lawyers, who demanded that Microsoft stop showing...

I came in nn it appears a harddrive was failing. Jumped in the car to take it to the computer guy. I should have a solid backup to restore plus I had a new 80 gig HD in a box.

Note: The following text is a quote: Federal Grand Jury Returns Indictment on Internet Bomb Threats Hammond, IN—The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Indiana announced that a three-count indictment was returned against Ashton Lundeby for his role in Internet bomb and related threats directed to Purdue University, Indiana University/Purdue University at Fort Wayne, Ind., and numerous other educational institutions throughout the country. Lundeby, 16, of Oxford, N.C., was arrested by the FBI at his home in Oxford on March 6, 2009. A federal search warrant was also executed at that time. Lundeby was arrested pursuant to a...

The doctrine of karma states that one's state in this life is a result of actions (both physical and mental) in past incarnations, and action in this life can determine one's destiny in future incarnations. Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce the Karmic Koala, the newest member of our alliterative menagerie. Mark Shuttleworth introduces Ubuntu 9.10-Karmic Koala! A good Koala knows how to see the wood for the trees, even when her head is in the clouds. Ubuntu aims to keep free software at the forefront of cloud computing by embracing the API’s of Amazon EC2, and making it...

"Cybersecurity Plan to Involve NSA, Telecoms DHS Officials Debating The Privacy Implications" SNIPPET: "The Obama administration will proceed with a Bush-era plan to use National Security Agency assistance in screening government computer traffic on private-sector networks, with AT&T as the likely test site, according to three current and former government officials. President Obama said in May that government efforts to protect computer systems from attack would not involve "monitoring private-sector networks or Internet traffic," and Department of Homeland Security officials say the new program will scrutinize only data going to or from government systems."

Officials accused Aleynikov of stealing codes that are used for sophisticated automated stock and commodities trading.

Microsoft on Monday warned of a vulnerability in its Video ActiveX Control that could allow an attacker to take control of a PC if the user visits a malicious Web site. There have been limited attacks exploiting the hole, which affects Windows XP and Windows Server 2003, Microsoft said on its Security Response Center blog. This is the second DirectShow security hole Microsoft has announced in the past few months. The company has yet to provide a security update for a vulnerability announced in May that involves the way DirectX handles QuickTime files. Since there are no by-design uses for...

15 Must-Have Web Apps for Students June 28, 2009 in Tips and Tools Welcome! If this is your first time here, you may want to subscribe to get updates in your RSS feed reader. Thanks for visiting! This is a guest post from Karen Schweitzer. For more from Karen, check out her blog about Online College Courses, or follow her on Twitter. College students are increasingly reliant on computers – and, for many of us, that means spending tons of money software that we’d rather not use anyway. The reality, though, is that there are a ton of great, free...