EarthLink Pink Slips Half Of Workforce
In a continuing effort to cut costs, EarthLInk said it would lay off about 900 employees.
In addition, it would buy back about $200 million of its own stock, according to a statement by CEO Rolla Huff on Tuesday. The news was well received by Wall Street, as EarthLink stock closed up seven percent even in the face of a sharply lower market overall.
Sony USB Drives Pack Rootkit Surprise
Finnish security company F-Secure has reported on new rootkit-like software discovered on USB thumb drives manufactured by Sony. Although the software doesn't appear to cause damage to a user's system, it does create a hidden directory that is inaccessible via the Windows API and some virus scanners.
The product in question is Sony's MicroVault USM-F fingerprint reader software, included with the company's USB drives. Sony was widely derided in 2005 for bundling copy-protection software on its music CDs that utilized rootkit-like functionality. "It is our belief that the MicroVault software hides this folder to somehow protect the fingerprint authentication from tampering and bypass," says F-Secure. "However, we feel that rootkit-like cloaking techniques are not the right way to go here." The company contacted Sony about the issue, but received no response.
Court Rules Sharing Music is Illegal, Even if Nobody Downloads It
In what will undoubtedly be chalked up as a shutout victory for the recording industry, a federal court in Arizona last week granted summary judgment in favor of the RIAA in one of its many anti-piracy lawsuits against ordinary citizens.
The Howell family of Scottsdale, Arizona has been found guilty of copyright infringement after an investigative team hired by recording labels discovered copyrighted material being shared on Mr. Howell's computer through the Kazaa P2P program.
Zango Drops Lawsuit Against PC Tools
Adware company Zango has voluntarily withdrawn its lawsuit against security software company PC Tools, which Zango accused of illegally removing its software from users' PCs without their express permission. The move follows a court's refusal to grant Zango a temporary restraining order.
The company had asked a court to prevent PC Tools' Spyware Doctor software from detecting and classifying Zango as potentially harmful, but a judge ruled it was "unlikely that the Plaintiff will be able to prove that the Defendant's software was unfair or deceptive."
Company Debuts 3D Gaming Monitor
A San Diego, Calif.-based company has released a new monitor for gamers that would allow them to play games in three dimensions.
Built by iZ3D, the 22-inch widescreen monitors would require a special set of polarized glasses to make the effect work. The display is compatible with Windows XP and Vista, and works on the newest graphics accelerators and processors.
Yahoo: We Followed Law in China Dissident Case
Defending its actions in disclosing the identities of Chinese dissidents, Yahoo on Monday said it acted with Chinese law in doing so.
The company has been roundly criticized for its involvement in several jailings, including journalists Wang Xiaoning and Shi Tao. Both were accused of using Yahoo's services to distribute subversive material about the Chinese government.
System Center Configuration Manager for WS2K8 Released
What may eventually be considered one of the most useful and welcome new features for admins has finally been officially released by Microsoft. Today, the company announced that System Center Configuration Manager has officially "released to manufacturing." A 120-day trial evaluation version appeared on Microsoft TechNet this morning.
SCCM is the replacement for Systems Management Server 2003 R2, and its purpose is to enable an administrator from a central location to manage and configure operating systems remotely. This new version makes feasible an innovative method of deployment, which is actually already under way for Windows Vista: You can build your own "distribution image" of an operating system, complete with the applications and settings specific to your organization, and distribute it through your network for remote installation.
Microsoft Responds to Re-discovery of Vista Network Slowdowns
A curious network performance reduction noticed by many Windows Vista users of the 2CPU forum that became the talk of Slashdot last week has been identified as having been caused not by DRM, as Slashdot users expected, but by a curious prioritization "feature" of Vista that's intentionally biased toward Media Player at the expense of network and system resources.
The effects of this feature were first revealed last June, as BetaNews reported, by Microsoft security engineer Mark Russinovich.
TorrentSpy Closes Doors to US Users
Saying it wants to protect user privacy, TorrentSpy said Monday that it will no longer allow visitors from the United States to use the site. The BitTorrent search engine's servers are located in the Netherlands, and it falls under the jurisdiction of the European Union, as do the copyright laws that govern it.
The decision to ban US users from the site was not due to any compulsion from the courts, it assured. "Rather it arises out of an uncertain legal climate in the United States regarding user privacy and the apparent tension between US and European Union Internet privacy laws," the company said.
Last Call for Paper Airline Tickets
A global airline body has placed its last order for paper tickets, meaning that by June 1, 2008 the industry will complete the transition to an electronic system.
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) represents approximately 240 airlines that operate all but 6 percent of the world's international flights. By ending paper ticketing, the airlines save $9 per passenger and 50,000 trees a year.
Intel 'LaGrande' Chipset Ships, First Test of New vPro Trusted Platform
One of the most ambitious new features ever to be built into an x86 motherboard is now publicly available: a hypervisor-based computer that runs both the operating system and its underlying BIOS under the control of a virtual machine monitor.
Underneath these physical and virtual layers is Intel's latest and boldest implementation of the Trusted Computing platform - the highly anticipated, and in some circles dreaded, LaGrande platform, now called Trusted Execution Technology (TXT). It is quite literally a computer that provides the entire universe for another computer, replacing the BIOS with a radically advanced underlying system capable of detecting incursion at the deepest levels.
Microsoft Opens 'Hackers' Web Site
It's no secret that Microsoft employs individuals that attempt to bypass the security restrictions built into its software products in order to make them safer, but the company has rarely publicized this fact. That's changing with a new Web log called hackers @ microsoft.
The Redmond company plans to utilize the blog to introduce its "white hat hackers" and show people what they do for Microsoft, although in keeping with tradition, those mentioned on the blog will likely go by their pseudonyms. "At his or her core, a true hacker is someone who is curious and wants to learn how systems work. This can and of course at Microsoft is done in an ethical, legal manner," techjunkie writes in the first posting on the site.
AllofMP3: 'Service Will Be Resumed'
While some may have left it for dead, the owners of AllofMP3 said Monday that they do plan to resume service. "The service will be resumed in the foreseeable future," a blog post from the company read. "We are doing our best at the moment to ensure that all our users can use their accounts, top up balance and order music."
The announcement of the return of AllofMP3 follows a decision by the Russian courts to throw out a case against the former head of Mediaservices (parent company of the site) Denis Kvasov. Although the record industry has vowed to appeal, they might be fighting an uphill battle as the courts have ruled Kvasov can't be sued under current laws.
Sony Merges HDTV With Blu-ray PC
Sony debuted its first combination HDTV/PC including Blu-ray technology on Monday, although the price tag still remains rather high.
The Vaio LT HD PC/TV is a 22-inch widescreen "all-in-one" display. The system supports CableCARD technology that allows the user to view digital cable channels without the need for a separate cable box.
WGA Outage Over, No Word On Cause
Microsoft said over the weekend that an issue with its Windows Genuine Advantage validation systems -- which were causing verified systems to fail and lose access to features -- had been fixed.
"I'd encourage anyone who received a validation failure since Friday evening to visit this site now; after successfully revalidating, any affected system should be rebooted to ensure that genuine-only features are restored," Windows Vista product manager Nick White said.
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