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Tuesday the 29th of December 2009

Welcome to the Helpforce Daily Briefing, on Tuesday the 29th of December 2009

1. Virus Warnings
2. Daily Technology News
3. Latest Shareware and Freeware
4. FAQ for the day
5. Advice of the day
6. Internet Advice

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1. Latest Virus Alerts From Sophos
---------------------------------------
Troj/BredoZp-S on 29 December 2009 11:03:21 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojbredozps.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/VIDQLG-A on 29 December 2009 11:03:21 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojvidqlga.html?_log_from=rss
W32/Autorun-AXF on 29 December 2009 11:03:21 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/w32autorunaxf.html?_log_from=rss
W32/Autorun-AXG on 29 December 2009 11:03:21 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/w32autorunaxg.html?_log_from=rss
Mal/EncPk-MP on 29 December 2009 06:13:25 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/malencpkmp.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/Agent-MBE on 29 December 2009 06:13:25 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojagentmbe.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/Inject-LI on 29 December 2009 06:13:25 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojinjectli.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/BDoor-AYG on 29 December 2009 02:25:00 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojbdoorayg.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/FakeAV-AME on 28 December 2009 22:41:23 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojfakeavame.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/FakeAV-AMF on 28 December 2009 22:41:23 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojfakeavamf.html?_log_from=rss

2. Latest Technology News From Slashdot
-----------------------------------------------

-- China's DIY Aviators Take Flight
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/yZXf-k1GhuI/Chinas-DIY-Aviators-Take-Flight)
ScuttleMonkey writes "China’s emerging aviator class is spreading its wings with a plethora of approaches, from the ramshackle to the sophisticated to the potentially revolutionary. They’re using everything imaginable, from old motorcycle engines to electric motors to even their own legs, like Mao Yiqing and his human-powered airplane. You could easily plot these adventurous innovators on a graph, with the X axis showing their skill and the Y axis their financial means."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Graphic Novelist Calls For Better Game Violence
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/1epo_l2N5Hs/Graphic-Novelist-Calls-For-Better-Game-Violence)
eldavojohn writes "Landry Walker (alternative comics creator of X-Ray Studios) has a brief opinion piece at Elder Geek asserting that all he wants for Christmas is more realistic game violence. While he acknowledges the world probably isn't ready for it, he wishes that getting shot in a video game was a bit more like getting shot in real life. From his piece: '... that's my problem with video game violence. Bullets are something we shrug off. Point blank fire with a machine gun is something that a tiny bit of flexible body armor and 20 seconds sitting on a magic invisibility inducing gargoyle can cure. Time and time again, I've heard people claim that they want to see a greater degree of realism in video games. But that's a lie. We don't want realism. We want fantasy. We want unlimited ammo and we want rapid respawns. We want to jump out of second story windows without a scratch. We want to dodge bullets and shake off mortal wounds without pause.' What say you, reader? Would this bring a new level of impossibility to video games or would there be a way to balance this out?"Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- UK Consumers To Pay For Online Piracy
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/cdVUQTRSy-M/UK-Consumers-To-Pay-For-Online-Piracy)
Wowsers writes "An article in The Times states that UK consumers will be hit with an estimated £500m ($800m US) bill to tackle online piracy. The record and film industries have managed to convince the government to get consumers to pay for their perceived losses. Meanwhile they have refused to move with the times, and change their business models. Other businesses have adapted and been successful, but the film and record industries refuse to do so. Surely they should not add another stealth tax to all consumers."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- The Need For Search Neutrality
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/W3mBZIFdeVY/The-Need-For-Search-Neutrality)
wilsone8 writes "The New York Times includes an op-ed today arguing for Search Neutrality: 'Today, search engines like Google, Yahoo and Microsoft's new Bing have become the Internet's gatekeepers, and the crucial role they play in directing users to Web sites means they are now as essential a component of its infrastructure as the physical network itself. The F.C.C. needs to look beyond network neutrality and include search neutrality: the principle that search engines should have no editorial policies other than that their results be comprehensive, impartial and based solely on relevance.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- GSM Decryption Published
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/xwkL08XqhUM/GSM-Decryption-Published)
Hugh Pickens writes "The NY Times reports that German encryption expert Karsten Nohl says that he has deciphered and published the 21-year-old GSM algorithm, the secret code used to encrypt most of the world's digital mobile phone calls, in what he called an attempt to expose weaknesses in the security system used by about 3.5 billion of the 4.3 billion wireless connections across the globe. Others have cracked the A5/1 encryption technology used in GSM before, but their results have remained secret. 'This shows that existing GSM security is inadequate,' Nohl told about 600 people attending the Chaos Communication Congress. 'We are trying to push operators to adopt better security measures for mobile phone calls.' The GSM Association, the industry group based in London that devised the algorithm and represents wireless operators, called Mr. Nohl's efforts illegal and said they overstated the security threat to wireless calls. 'This is theoretically possible but practically unlikely,' says Claire Cranton, a GSM spokeswoman, noting that no one else had broken the code since its adoption. 'What he is doing would be illegal in Britain and the United States. To do this while supposedly being concerned about privacy is beyond me.' Simon Bransfield-Garth, the chief executive of Cellcrypt, says Nohl's efforts could put sophisticated mobile interception technology — limited to governments and intelligence agencies — within the reach of any reasonable well-funded criminal organization. 'This will reduce the time to break a GSM call from weeks to hours,' Bransfield-Garth says. 'We expect as this further develops it will be reduced to minutes.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- North Magnetic Pole Moving East Due To Core Flux
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/cflF3LDY_Ms/North-Magnetic-Pole-Moving-East-Due-To-Core-Flux)
National Geographic is reporting that the migration of Earth's magnetic pole has accelerated again and is now racing in Russia's direction at a blazing 40 miles per year. This movement began in earnest around 1904 at about 9 miles per year and has been accelerating since. "Geologists think Earth has a magnetic field because the core is made up of a solid iron center surrounded by rapidly spinning liquid rock. This creates a 'dynamo' that drives our magnetic field. Scientists had long suspected that, since the molten core is constantly moving, changes in its magnetism might be affecting the surface location of magnetic north. Although the new research seems to back up this idea, Chulliat is not ready to say whether magnetic north will eventually cross into Russia. 'It's too difficult to forecast,' Chulliat said. Also, nobody knows when another change in the core might pop up elsewhere, sending magnetic north wandering in a new direction."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Escaped Convict Continues To Update Facebook
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/26vG_YnVq3A/Escaped-Convict-Continues-To-Update-Facebook)
Craig "Lazie" Lynch has been on the run from a U.K. prison since September. However, he continues to taunt police by updating his Facebook status. Now he is threatening to quit. From the article: "It seems, though, that late Sunday, Lynch began experiencing a little emotional pain. In what must have been an almost teary update, he posted: 'right I'm coming off this page as I have better things to do.' Who might have imagined that, in his mysterious hideaway, Lynch had something better to do than continue his run as a Facebook attraction?"Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Man Challenges 250,000 Strong Botnet and Succeeds
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/r4NEfRDd6Y4/Man-Challenges-250000-Strong-Botnet-and-Succeeds)
nandemoari writes "When security officials decide to 'go after' computer malware, most conduct their actions from a defensive standpoint. For most of us, finding a way to rid a computer of the malware suffices — but for one computer researcher, however, the change from a defensive to an offensive mentality is what ended the two year chase of a sinister botnet once and for all. For two years, Atif Mushtaq had been keeping the notorious Mega-D bot malware from infecting computer networks. As of this past November, he suddenly switched from defense to offense. Mega-D had forced more than 250,000 PCs to do its bidding via botnet control."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Extinct Ibex Resurrected By Cloning
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/xmMF1omX4bM/Extinct-Ibex-Resurrected-By-Cloning)
The Telegraph is reporting that for the first time an extinct animal has been brought back via cloning. The Pyrenean ibex, a type of mountain goat, was declared officially extinct in 2000, but thanks to preserved skin samples scientists were able to insert that DNA into eggs from domestic goats to clone a female Pyrenean ibex. While the goat didn't survive long due to lung defects this gives scientists hopes that it will be possible to resurrect extinct species from frozen tissue. "Using techniques similar to those used to clone Dolly the sheep, known as nuclear transfer, the researchers were able to transplant DNA from the tissue into eggs taken from domestic goats to create 439 embryos, of which 57 were implanted into surrogate females. Just seven of the embryos resulted in pregnancies and only one of the goats finally gave birth to a female bucardo, which died seven minutes later due to breathing difficulties, perhaps due to flaws in the DNA used to create the clone."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- China Debuts the World's Fastest Train
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/8dUkK3EGye4/China-Debuts-the-Worlds-Fastest-Train)
An anonymous reader writes "China unveiled their new high speed train that clocks in at an average of 217 mph. China's new rail service travels through 20 cities along its route, connecting central China and less developed regions to the larger and more industrial Pearl River Delhi. Seimens, Bombardier and Alstom worked together to design and build this feat of modern transportation, which topped out at a whopping 245mph (394km/h) during trial runs earlier in December."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Ruby In Practice
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/G5BUKH6yUn8/Ruby-In-Practice)
littleidea writes "Ruby In Practice is like a sampler platter that picks up where The Ruby Way leaves off. Depending on your tastes each of the different offerings are delicious, but sometimes leave you wishing you had a whole order of just that. Then again, if you eat the whole thing, chances are you won't be hungry." Keep reading for the rest of Andrew's review.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- The Speculative Pre-History of the iPhone
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/7fOH3790UnA/The-Speculative-Pre-History-of-the-iPhone)
harrymcc writes "The blogosphere is abuzz with rumors about 'iSlate,' Apple's supposed upcoming tablet. It's constructive to look back at coverage of the first iPhone in the months before it was announced. A high percentage of what was reported turned out to be hooey — as I remembered as I reviewed stories that said the iPhone would have a click wheel, a slide-out keyboard, and two batteries, and would run on an Apple-branded wireless network. I'm guessing that much of what we 'know' about iSlate is similarly off-base."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Happy Birthday, Linus
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/8Bzj3KGQ_Bo/Happy-Birthday-Linus)
Glyn Moody writes "Today is the birthday of Linus. Just under 19 years ago, on the first day the shops in Helsinki were open after the holidays, Linus rushed out and spent all his Christmas and birthday money on his first PC: a DX33 80386, with 4 Megs of RAM, no co-processor, and a 40 Megabyte hard disc. Today, the kernel he wrote on that system powers 90% of the fastest supercomputers, and is starting to find its way into more and more smartphones — not to mention everything in between. What would the world look like had he spent his money on something else?"Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- HDD Manufacturers Moving To 4096-Byte Sectors
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/d4xunwNV3l8/HDD-Manufacturers-Moving-To-4096-Byte-Sectors)
Luminous Coward writes "As previously discussed on Slashdot, according to AnandTech and The Tech Report, hard disk drive manufacturers are now ready to bump the size of the disk sector from 512 to 4096 bytes, in order to minimize storage lost to ECC and sync. This may not be a smooth transition, because some OSes do not align partitions on 4K boundaries."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Anti-Technology Themes in James Cameron's Avatar
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/s88lOlzbuis/Anti-Technology-Themes-in-James-Camerons-emAvatarem)
ThousandStars writes "'The anti-technological aspect [in James Cameron's Avatar] is strange because the movie is among most technically sophisticated ever: it uses a crazy 2D and 3D camera, harnesses the most advanced computer animation techniques imaginable, and has apparently improved the state-of-the-art when it comes to cinema. But Avatar’s story argues that technology is bad. Humans destroyed their home world through environmental disaster and use military might to annihilate the locals and steal their resources.' The question is two-fold: why have a technically sophisticated, anti-technical movie, and why are we drawn to it? Part of the answer lies in Neal Stephenson's Turn On, Tune In, Veg Out."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

3. Latest Shareware from Planet-Shareware
-----------------------------------------------

4. FAQ of the day from Helpforce
-----------------------------------------------

-- I am having problems with large and middle sized windows
(http://www.helpforce.com)

Question: gt; Problem: When I open email (READ & WRITE & ADDRESS BOOK) and 95% of my websites come in small. Don't let me confuse you, I know that there are 3 sizewindows but I'm having a problem with the middle size and the large sizewindows. I'm running AOL 8.0 and AOL 7.0. I just installed the 8.0 to see ifit did the same thing the 7.0 did. They both are the same. I have 256RAM and30GIG hard drive with about 14GIGs free.> OK let see if I can explain this right. When I open a web page it comes inthe middle size. That's not to bad but on the right side and the bottom arescroll bars. The page that opens slides under the right scroll bar and hidesthe X Square & the expand square. I have to move the page to the left to getat these squares. If I resize the page and click remember window size andposition or remember window size only it will remember but only once. If Iexpand the window as big as it will go the scroll bars go bye bye. I'llclick the remember size and position or remember size only but if I closethe page and then go back its small again. I AOL, GATEWAY & MICROSOFTcouldn't help. What they were trying to tell me was its the nature of thebeast and we don't know how to fix it.> If someone out there tries to help keep in mind I tried a lot of things sofar so don't be surprised if I keep saying "BEEN THERE DONE THAT,"> Thanks for any help you might have.> Most of the web pages come in small. I can expand them myself window by window but that's a drag. I know there are 3 size windows its the middle size and the large size. How cane I get all my web pages as well as my email pages (READ, WRITE & ADDRESS BOOK) to open large all the time and let me be the one to resize them if I want to.

Answer: Dear Ed,I hate to agree with AOL, Gateway and Microsoft but it appears that the information they gave you is correct, it is the nature of Windows to work this way.When a window is in maximised mode (e.g. it's largest size) you can not manually change the size of the window, that is the fixed large size. Scroll bars will appear if needed for the page (email, letter, etc) to allow you to see the rest of the document.In medium size (normal mode) a window is free to be moved and re-sized. Scroll bars will appear if you make the window too small and the entire document can no longer be seen.If the entire document can be seen, scroll bars will dissapear until needed again.These are the only two ways you can have a window.If you are saying you want to have every window automaticly maximise (largest) when you open it, all you have to do is click 'maximise' on one of the windows and it should remember this setting for every window that follows.If you are having troubles with the size of your screen and the amount of viewing space you have, I would suggest changing your screen reseloution which will allow you to fix more text on one screen.You can do this by right clicking on the desktop, selecting Properties, going to the settings tab and then adjusting the screen resleloution slider to a setting appropriate for you. Reply Posted on 5/1/2003 yeah i think you need to up your resolution, goto display propeties in control panel, choose settings, then move the slider right 1 notch only.Chris

5. Advice of the Day from ask-leo
-----------------------------------------------

6. Internet Advice
-----------------------------------------------

-- What Exactly Is 'VoIP'?(http://netforbeginners.about.com/b/a/257850.htm)

You see the local advertisements offering VoIP phone service for $20 a month. Long distance calls are almost free, and you're curious enough to research it more. So what exactly...

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