RFID-Equipped Passports Come to U.S.
Federal officials said Monday that United States passports equipped with RFID tags would soon begin to make their way to consumers, with its Colorado Passport Agency being the first to produce the documents.
Although the federal government insists the passports are safe, security researchers say the data on the tags can be compromised.
Lenovo Debuts SUSE Linux Portables
Lenovo debuted its first Linux-based laptops at LinuxWorld in San Francisco on Tuesday, running SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 provided through a partnership with Novell. The systems are the result of a two-year research effort by the two companies as well as Intel, whose Centrino Duo processors power the portable.
The Thinkpad T60p is an inch thin and weighs 4.7 pounds. Several features of Lenovo's Windows-based notebooks, including Help Center support, the ThinkPad Configuration Utility, Power Manager and Access Connections have been ported to Linux, the company said.
AMD Looks to Quad-Core Opterons
AMD introduced its next-generation Opteron processor on Tuesday, complete with a redesign of the server chip that would allow the chipmaker to natively upgrade it to quad-core capability. Such chips would make an appearance in mid-2007, with the dual-core models available now at top speeds of 2.6 GHz, similar to current Opterons.
Next-Generation Opterons, as they are called, will be available for $873 to $2,649 USD per chip in 1,000-unit quantities and use AMD's new "Socket F" to plug into the motherboard. That socket design is expected to take AMD through the end of the decade, the company said.
Dell Recalls 4.1 Million Laptop Batteries
Under a deal negotiated with the U.S. Government's Consumer Product Safety Commission, Dell disclosed plans late Monday to recall nearly 4.1 million batteries. The recall would be the largest ever electronics recall negotiated by the agency, involving laptop batteries shipped between April 1, 2004 and July 18, 2006.
The batteries, made by Sony, have been the subject of increased scrutiny after media reports caught footage of at least two laptops catching fire due to the batteries overheating. The most notable of these was a laptop in Japan that exploded on video during a conference, prompting the company to launch an investigation into the matter.
802.11n Standard Unlikely Until 2008
A backlog of almost 12,000 comments on the first draft of the proposed 802.11n standard is pushing back the second draft, originally planned for late fall of this year. The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) said late last week that it is likely that the second draft would not appear until January 2007.
The delay means that the final standard may not be approved until 2008, industry insiders say. While approximately half of the comments had to do with editorial changes needed in the document, the remaining 6,000 or so comments may lead to changes that put some of the pre-802.11n hardware in danger of being incompatible with the final standard.
Verizon Offering FiOS Multi-Room DVR
Verizon introduced its first digital video recorder product for its FiOS fiber-optic television service Monday, hoping to take advantage of a quickly expanding market for such services. The multi-room DVR would enable viewing of recorded programming on up to three televisions at the same time, and also allow for dual-tuner operation.
Much like TiVo's broadband services, Verizon has also included software that would permit users of the DVR to access collections of pictures and music stored on networked computers. Copy-protected content is currently not supported, but would be in the future, Verizon said.
Microsoft: Build Your Own Xbox Game
Microsoft plans to open up its Xbox 360 game development platform to the masses with the launch of XNA Game Studio Express, due out during the holiday season. The Redmond company says such an offering would benefit the entire gaming industry by nurturing the ideas of new development talent and providing beneficial experience in game creation.
Anyone with a Windows XP computer would be able to use the software, available for an annual $99 fee. This fee would permit users to build, test and share their games on Xbox 360 consoles, as well as gain access to development resources.
Windows Worm Spreads Over Weekend
Various security firms began warning of a new exploit that takes advantage of a vulnerability in Server Service function of Windows. The exploit involves the same advisory that Homeland Security warned computer users about late last week, and appears to be spreading as a worm like initially feared.
The virus is known by a host of names depending on security vendor: Backdoor.Win32.IRCBot.st through Kaspersky, Backdoor:Win32/Graweg through Microsoft, W32.Wargbot through Symantec, W32/Cuebot through Sophos, and WORM_IRCBOT through TrendMicro.
Apple Receives Stock Delisting Threat
Apple's troubles regarding the issuance of stock option grants and the surrounding fallout came to a head Friday. In a statement issued by the company after the close of the market, Apple disclosed it had requested a hearing with a NASDAQ committee following the receipt of a letter threatening the company with delisting its shares.
NASDAQ's threat came after Apple failed to file on time a Form 10-Q, which is a more detailed version of the company's quarterly earnings, with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company warned that it would miss the deadline during the day Friday, and amended the filing to include notice of the NASDAQ’s actions later in the afternoon.
Automakers to Improve Hybrid Engine
The research teams of three automakers have joined forces to develop a new hybrid technology that the companies hope would trump the current leading implementation offered by Toyota. A team of 500 researchers have been working for a year and a half on the technology, which would appear in cars by the end of next year, Reuters reports.
BMW, DaimlerChrysler and General Motors are currently developing an engine that offers improvements over the current line of thinking on combination combustion and electric motors. One of the enhancements includes a computer that would optimize fuel consumption ben deciding when to use the two motors and when the battery needs to be recharged.
Homeland Security: Patch Windows Now
The Department of Homeland Security took the unusual step earlier this week of urging Windows users to apply a patch to protect themselves from possible worm attacks. The move was the first time that the department had instructed computer users to apply a security patch.
"Attempts to exploit vulnerabilities in operating systems routinely occur within 24 hours of the release of a security patch," it said in a statement. "This vulnerability could impact government systems, private industry and critical infrastructure, as well as individual and home users."
Judicial Panel Merges NSA Spying Suits
A judicial panel ruled Thursday that the 13 class-action lawsuits filed against telephone companies over the NSA spying program would be consolidated into a single suit. Judge Vaughn Walker of the Northern District of California will preside over the newly combined case.
The Northern District of California was selected due to the fact that the first suit was filed there, and "more advanced action is pending." Additionally, Walker has studied the issue thoroughly and understands the issues brought in the case, the panel said.
NYC Borough Hit by Cell Phone Outage
Water damage at a Verizon central office facility cut cellular service to thousands of Sprint Nextel customers in the New York City borough of Queens Thursday, amid the confusion following a foiled terrorist plot in London. Two of the city's airports -- JFK and LaGuardia -- are in Queens.
The outage affected around 75 of the company's towers in the Flushing section of Queens. While the problem cut service for Sprint customers, Verizon said that it was aware of no problems on its own network, or outages on its landline system as a result.
Study: Minors Buying Booze Online
In an attempt to fight the loosening of liquor control laws regarding online sales in nearly two dozen states over the past year, a liquor resellers interest group released a study Thursday that says an alarming number of minors are purchasing alcohol online or know someone who has.
The study, sponsored by the Wine and Spirits Wholsalers of America, claims that two percent of teens aged 14-20 have purchased alcohol online, and 12 percent say they know of a friend who has. One in ten of them have visited a Web site that sells alcohol, and a third of those surveyed are open to the possibility of purchasing alcohol online before their 21st birthday.
Creative Trims Loss, Sales Down 25%
Creative's financial situation is improving as it reported a narrower net loss Thursday for the fiscal fourth quarter, however sales plummeted nearly a quarter over last year as the company continues to struggle against Apple in the digital music market.
Additionally, Creative reported a much wider loss for the year, but said it was positive about future quarters.
Ed's Bio
Ed Oswald is a freelance journalist from the Reading, PA area. Although he has written across a variety of subjects, Ed’s passion and focus has been on technology and gadgets. His work regularly appears on tech news sites BetaNews, PCWorld, and Technologizer, and has been syndicated to eWeek, Time’s Techland blog, VentureBeat and the New York Times.
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