Tech News Weekly: Edition 5-10

[Ehtyar]

The Weekly Tech News

Hi all. Please Read: I'm sorry to say folks that I won't be able to do the weekly news over the coming weeks. Trawling through the news on a daily basis typically happens at work (I have very little free time on weekdays), and my company is currently in the process of being relocated, generating a ton more work than usual. I expect that in the next 2 months or so my free time will pick up again and I'll be able to get back to the regular weekly tech news for you all. In the meantime, I'll be sure to post anything I come across that I think is relevant to the forum and will generate discussion. See you round the forum guys As usual, you can find last week's news here.

1. Facebook’s Project Titan: A Full Featured Webmail Product

Spoiler

http://www.techcrunch.com/2010/02/05/facebooks-project-titan-a-full-featured-webmail-product/
Oh goodie, FB (and Zynga as well no doubt) can watch us in an altogether new way. Joy.

Facebook is completely rewriting their messaging product and is preparing to launch a fully featured webmail product in its place, according to a source with knowledge of the product. Internally it’s known as Project Titan. Or, unofficially and perhaps over-enthusiastically, the Gmail killer.

Facebook messaging has been the bane of users’ existence for years. My first public gripe was in 2008, when I said that urgent changes were needed. The biggest problem is simply deleting old emails. It takes so long that I have thousands of unread and read but not deleted messages in my inbox.

2. Quantum Superclock Will Be Accurate Past End of Life On Earth

Spoiler

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/02/05/new_quantum_superclock/
Probably not terribly necessary, but it's very interesting to read how it's done.

US government boffins say they have built a clock so precise that it will still be accurate to within one second when life on Earth has ceased.

The "quantum logic clock" will neither gain nor lose a second over the next 3.7 billion years, according to its makers at the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). It uses a single aluminium atom to keep time, processing its measurements in the same way as experimental quantum computers do - hence the name.

3. ‘Don’t Be Evil,’ Meet ‘Spy On Everyone’: How the NSA Deal Could Kill Google

Spoiler

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2010/02/from-dont-be-evil-to-spy-on-everyone/
Sensationalist headline as you might expect. In the aftermath of the attack on several top tech companies mentioned last week, Google has turned to the NSA for help securing themselves against such attacks.

The company once known for its “don’t be evil” motto is now in bed with the spy agency known for the mass surveillance of American citizens.

The National Security Agency is widely understood to have the government’s biggest and smartest collection of geeks — the guys that are more skilled at network warfare than just about anyone on the planet. So, in a sense, it’s only natural that Google would turn to the NSA after the company was hit by an ultrasophisticated hack attack. After all, the military has basically done the same thing, putting the NSA in charge of its new “Cyber Command.” The Department of Homeland Security is leaning heavily on the NSA to secure .gov networks.

4. H.264 Video Codec Stays Royalty-free for HTML5 Testers

Spoiler

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/02/04/mpeg_la_h_264_codec_licence/
Interesting timing, given how publicly Mozilla denounced the codec just a few weeks ago. What will happen at the end of that five-year period I wonder...

Freetards stand down - MPEG LA has decided to slash royalties to zero for anyone wishing to use the H.264 codec for free streaming of internet video until the end of 2016.

The MPEG licensing outfit confirmed earlier this week that its AVC patent portfolio licence won’t charge royalties for internet video that is free to end users.

5. Carbon Trade Phish Scam Disrupts Exchanges

Spoiler

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/02/04/carbon_trade_phish_scam/
Having gained  access credentials via a phishing campaign, hackers stole $4m worth of carbon credits from several registries in the EU, then resold them on the legitimate market before an alert was raised. I guess even fabricated currency suffers theft...

Phishing fraudsters have extended their net beyond harvesting e-banking credentials via a scam that resulted in the theft of 250,000 carbon permits worth over €3m.

The outbreak of fraud resulted in the suspension of trading in several EU registries on 2 February. The crooks are thought to have created fake emission registries, promoted via spam emails, before using identity details submitted on these sites to trade rights to blow-off greenhouse gases on the legitimate sites.

6. Wikileaks Finds Cash to Continue

Spoiler

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/02/04/wikileaks_pledge_drive/
Well thank Christ for that.

Whistle-blowing site Wikileaks has secured enough money in donations to resume operations.

The site stopped publishing leaked documents in December in order to concentrate on a pledge drive, aimed at raising a minimum of $200,000 to keep the lights on, and $600,000 if staff were to be paid. Wikileaks also canvassed for technical support and legal help.

7. IiNet Wins! Film Industry's Case Torn to Shreds

Spoiler

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/166348,iinet-wins-film-industrys-case-torn-to-shreds.aspx
Australian ISP iiNet has managed to get safe harbour for all Australian ISPs into legal precedence after winning a lawsuit brought by The Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft who were ordered to pay iiNet's legal fees.

The Federal Court of Australia has dismissed the film industry's case against iiNet, finding that Australia's No.3 internet provider did not authorise copyright infringement on its network.

The Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft representing the film industry, has been ordered to pay iiNet's costs. iiNet chief executive Michael Malone estimated that these costs add up to around $4 million.

8. Crystals in Meteorite Harder Than Diamonds

Spoiler

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35198934/ns/technology_and_science-science/
Right out of a not-terribly-interesting sci-fi, carbon crystals found in a meteorite that struck Finland in 1971 have been found to be even more resilient than diamond.

Researchers using a diamond paste to polish a slice of meteorite stumbled onto something remarkable: crystals in the rock that are harder than diamonds.

A closer look with an array of instruments revealed two totally new kinds of naturally occurring carbon, which are harder than the diamonds formed inside the Earth.

9. Comcast Sees End of IPv4 Tunnel, Beginning IPv6 Trial

Spoiler

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/01/comcast-running-out-of-ipv4-addresses-beginning-ipv6-trial.ars
Following up on the IPv4 exhaustion story from last week, US ISP Comcast is launching an IPv6 trial ahead of a 4-phase rollout on its network. In related news, the YouTube launch of IPv6 support apparently caused a noticable spike in IPv6 traffic across the Internet.

Comcast is asking for volunteers to participate in its upcoming IPv6 trials. The cable ISP has been participating in IPv6 circles for a long time and with its huge subscriber base, it is experiencing the IPv4 address scarcity first-hand. So far, it has been able to get addresses for its customers—but not for those customers' cable modems and set-top-boxes. These also need addresses to function or to be managed. No problem, right? Just use private IPv4 addresses, such as the 10 network, which holds 16.8 million addresses. But with 25 million TV, 15 million ISP, and 6 million Comcast Digital Voice subscribers, 16.8 million private addresses isn't enough for a regular management system in which a management station can directly connect to each managed device. So Comcast needs IPv6 just to run its internal network effectively now.

We're also running out of IPv4 addresses, so at some point in the future, Comcast will be unable to obtain additional addresses to connect new customers. So Comcast also needs to provide IPv6 service to its customers at some point and is looking for willing subjects to give it a try.

10. Oz Banker Caught Porn-surfing On Live TV

Spoiler

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/02/02/sydney_banker/
It has come to light that the employee in question was set up by a friend, but it's still hilarious to watch.

Ehtyar.

[KynloStephen66515]

Cheers for this read, its certainly an interesting one