Techno-News Blog Ray Schroeder, editor, OTEL - University of Illinois at Springfield |
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Technology News for Higher Education 
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Saturday, August 02, 2003
Software Vulnerabilities Fade But Never Disappear - Gregg Keizer, TechWeb News
Security flaws have a half-life, just like radioactive materials, according to new research unveiled Wednesday at the Black Hat security meetings being held in Las Vegas. Rather than disappear entirely, security vulnerabilities only degrade in danger over time, said Gerhard Eschelbeck, the chief technology officer of Qualys, a vulnerability assessment and management firm in a presentation at the Black Hat Briefings, a conference of software and security experts that's currently convened. Based on analysis of 1.24 million vulnerabilities scanned over an 18-month period, Eschelbeck's research laid out what he called the "Laws of Vulnerabilities," a group of observations about security flaws' behavior and longevity.
Nanotechnology Now
This Web site provides an outstanding introduction to the world of nanotechnology. Many standpoints of the topic are discussed, from current and future applications to the "ethics of nanotechnology." Scattered throughout the site are historic, visionary quotes and excerpts from notable journals and publications. Transcripts of interviews with prominent researchers give readers an idea of the diversity of views on the subject within the scientific community. Several essays and links to off-site articles are also given. From The Scout Report, Copyright Internet Scout Project 1994-2003. http://scout.wisc.edu/
Downloaders Disregard Legal, Copyright Issues - Robyn Greenspan, CyberAtlas
Coming on the heels of Jupiter Research's (a unit of this site's corporate parent) re-assessment of the online music industry are insights from The Pew Internet Project about American downloaders and file-sharers. Jupiter projects online music will grow from less than $1 billion in 2003 to $3.3 billion in 2008, when the Internet will account for 26 percent of U.S. music spending.... According to the data from both Jupiter and Pew, Internet users hold little regard for the legal and copyright issues surrounding file-sharing. Jupiter's survey shows that only 17 percent of online adults say that they've cut back on their file-sharing due to fear of legal consequences, and the 2003 Pew survey found that 67 percent of downloaders and 65 percent of file-sharers say they do not care if the music is copyrighted. Friday, August 01, 2003
Net phone service worries FBI - Paul Davidson, USA TODAY
With the spread of Internet phone calling, the FBI worries that federal plans to deregulate broadband will hamper its ability to track criminals and terrorists. The concern stems from: the increasingly blurry line between data and voice traffic, the Federal Communications Commission's desire to keep broadband free of regulation and the wording of a federal law. That law, the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA), requires "telecommunications" carriers' networks to be easily wiretapped by authorities. But it exempts "information services."
Spam emails hide key logger virus - Robert Jaques, Vnunet
A dangerous strain of 'virus spam' is tricking computer users into allowing serious infections into home and business computer systems, IT experts have warned. According to industry body The Corporate IT Forum (Tif) virus spam, or 'v-spam', dodges antivirus and firewall systems by tempting users to click on a website link contained in an email which then sends them a virus. Tif said that incidents of v-spam are increasing at the same rate as spam, which has doubled over the past year. While any virus can be delivered in this way, Tif believes that the key logger virus, which silently sits in computers recording key strokes and bank and credit card details, could be one of the most dangerous.
Feds warn of broad Internet attack - ASSOCIATED PRESS
Government and industry experts consider brewing hacker activity a precursor to a broad Internet attack that would target enormous numbers of computers vulnerable from a flaw in Windows software from Microsoft Corp. Experts described an unusual confluence of conditions that heighten prospects for a serious disruption soon. They cite the high numbers of potential victims and increasingly sophisticated attack tools already tested successfully by hackers in recent days. An alert distributed Thursday among U.S. government agencies warned of “widespread scanning and exploitation” of victim computers by hackers who were developing “improved and automated exploit tools.” Thursday, July 31, 2003
Study: Bad security flaws don't die - Robert Lemos, CNET News.com
A study of Internet security flaws showed that for serious issues, half of vulnerable systems remain unfixed after 30 days. The data--released Wednesday at the Black Hat Briefings security Conference here--also showed that some flaws don't completely die out over time but actually make a comeback. The vulnerabilities exploited by the Code Red and SQL Slammer worms, for example, are allowing those threats to reassert themselves on the Internet, said Gerhard Eschelbeck, chief technology officer for vulnerability-assessment company Qualys.
I Think, Therefore I Communicate - Lakshmi Sandhana, Wired
Moving chess pieces by thought alone might have been in the realm of science fiction once. Not anymore. For Jessica Bayliss, a researcher who has been working on brain-computer interfaces, or BCIs, at the University of Rochester, it's simply the next challenge on her list. For the past 15 years, researchers have been trying to develop BCIs to tap into the brain waves of individuals who are unable to communicate with the outside world. The goal of all BCI research is to create a direct link between computers and the electrical signals in the brain of these so-called "locked in" individuals so they can operate devices like wheelchairs or use simple word processing programs to express their wishes.
Storing e-text for centuries - The Economist
For all its woes, nowhere beats Silicon Valley for finding the next big thing in information technology. Unfortunately, the region's entrepreneurs and engineers often fail to take into account how well their inventions mesh with social institutions. Vicky Reich and David Rosenthal, respectively a librarian and a researcher at Stanford University, are exceptions. Rather than invent a better mousetrap, they are using existing technology to imitate an important function of libraries. They want to ensure that readers will still be able to access electronic academic journals even centuries after they have been published. Their project, called LOCKSS (short for “lots of copies keep stuff safe”), addresses a vexing problem that librarians face everywhere. Increasingly, academic journals are published online; many are not even available in print. As a result, libraries are losing the option of maintaining local collections—but are leery of discontinuing paper subscriptions. Wednesday, July 30, 2003
Will Web users ever pay for content? - Stefanie Olsen, CNET News.com
...Louis Borders is a co-founder of Borders Group, the $3.4 billion company that today is the nation's second-largest bookseller. He also happens to be the man behind Webvan, the billion-dollar online grocer that famously failed in 2001 and became synonymous with both the magnificent dreams and the hubris of the dot-com era. Now this self-professed serial entrepreneur is taking another stab at building a brand from scratch. On Monday, Borders launched a subscription-based digital newsstand called KeepMedia. But he also faces the challenge of convincing Web surfers to pay to access archived online content. Despite the Web's transformation into a major publishing platform, relatively few Web users have warmed to the idea that they also should pay for content.
Hackers pounce on latest Microsoft flaw - Iain Thomson, Vnunet
Hackers have moved quickly to exploit the critical flaw in Microsoft's Distributed Component Object Model (DCOM) Remote Procedure Call (RPC) interface. Workable exploit code is now in circulation on hacking mailing lists. Earlier versions were ineffective but the latest code seems to be working. Microsoft released a patch for the critical flaw on 16 July. The vulnerability involves the RPC protocol, which deals with inter-computer communications. Microsoft warned that, under certain circumstances, the RPC might not properly check messages sent to the PC.
The Future of Human Knowledge: The Semantic Web - Gene J. Koprowski, TechNewsWorld
Some serious computer scientists, although cautious about the promise of the Semantic Web, are ultimately optimistic that it will be everything developers are hoping for -- an online source for all of the knowledge humanity has created in science, business and the arts. Under an interdisciplinary project collectively known as the Semantic Web, computer scientists around the world are working on ways to revolutionize the Internet. The researchers -- from Europe, Asia and the United States -- are developing standards, protocols and technologies that will advance the development of a more meaning-oriented Web. Tuesday, July 29, 2003
Techies by Necessity, Not by Choice - KATIE HAFNER, NY Times
Joshua Marcuse didn't plan things this way. Mr. Marcuse, a 21-year-old who is about to start his senior year at Dartmouth College, had no desire to follow the example of his many peers who pursued technical fields. His academic studies are in international relations and moral philosophy. "I would not describe myself as technically inclined," he said. "I almost have a neo-Luddite attitude to technology." Yet Mr. Marcuse devotes several hours a week to the care and feeding of his computer, printers and other electronic devices. With no formal training, he has grown proficient at rummaging through his laptop's settings and changing them to suit any number of connection options.
Helping Machines Think Different - Noah Shachtman, Wired
To Pentagon researchers, capturing and categorizing every aspect of a person's life is only the beginning. LifeLog -- the controversial Defense Department initiative to track everything about an individual -- is just one step in a larger effort, according to a top Pentagon research director. Personalized digital assistants that can guess our desires should come first. And then, just maybe, we'll see computers that can think for themselves.
Roxio to Bundle Napster with CD-Burning Tools - Ryan Naraine
Digital media software firm Roxio plans to bundle the reborn Napster 2.0 service with its popular CD/DVD burning tools and roll out what it calls the first online music play offering unlimited a la carte downloads alongside a subscription option. Roxio chief executive Chris Gorog used the spotlight of the Jupiter Plug.IN Conference & Expo here to release details of Napster 2.0, which is expected to go live in time for the Christmas holiday with about 500,000 tracks for sale via individual downloads, by monthly subscription, via Internet radio, or in any combination Monday, July 28, 2003
Seven deadly sins of web writing - Gerry McGovern
What's the single most important thing that could improve the Web? It's not broadband. It's better writing. The general quality of writing on the Web is poor. The way you write has a major impact on what people think of you. Avoid these common mistakes and you will achieve more with your website.
A Conversation with Jef Raskin - Ubiquity
Jef Raskin created the Macintosh computer project (naming the computer for his favorite variety of apple) and is the author of "The Humane Interface" (Addison-Wesley, 2000). He is also, among a great many other things, musician, mathematician, professor, and ... well, read the interview.
More colleges and universities see open-source software as an alternative to commercial products - FLORENCE OLSEN, the Chronicle
While open-source-code projects like Linux have long been in the public eye, colleges and universities are now beginning to consider collaboration on similar efforts as a relatively cheap, effective way to meet their specialized software and computing needs. Linux and the Apache Web-server software, another open-source example, are both well established, well supported, and frequently used in higher education. Linux and Apache are kept up to date by a loose network of programmers worldwide who communicate through e-mail lists, fix bugs, and write new code. Sunday, July 27, 2003
Can Spam Be Stopped? - MIT Technology Review Special Report
Close to half of all e-mail is junk—a tsunami of tacky marketing that is imperiling a vital communications medium. New anti-spam weapons are helping. But spammers are a willful, wily bunch, and an online arms race is spiraling out of control.
WiFi Is Open, Free and Vulnerable to Hackers - Jonathan Krim, Washington Post
Here's how Army Lt. Col. Clifton H. Poole, who teaches classes on wireless security at the National Defense University, gets his kicks on I-66: Several times a month, Poole turns on a laptop computer in his car as he commutes between his Reston home and the university campus at Fort McNair in Southwest Washington. As he drives, a software program records the number of "hot spots," areas where wireless transmitters allow Internet access over the air. After nearly two years of monitoring the same 23-mile route, Poole has watched the number of hot spots boom, as the technology known as WiFi has become the latest Big Internet Thing. Setting up a home or business wireless network gives people freedom to jump onto the Internet without their computers being tethered to cables.
Group posts exploit for newest Windows flaw - HELEN JUNG, AP
A group in China released a program Friday that lets hackers exploit a flaw in Microsoft software and take over a victim's computer over the Internet. The program, released nine days after Microsoft Corp. announced the flaw, has turned an embarrassment for the company and inconvenience for customers into a near-emergency. The program, posted on the group's Web site, takes advantage of a vulnerability in nearly all versions of Microsoft's Windows operating system, including Windows Server 2003, touted as Microsoft's safest ever. Fair Use |
