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Tuesday the 26th of January 2010

Welcome to the Helpforce Daily Briefing, on Tuesday the 26th of January 2010

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

This is a free service provided by Helpforce.com, to unsubscribe please visit http://www.helpforce.com
For free technical support, visit us at http://www.helpforce.com

1. Latest Virus Alerts From Sophos
---------------------------------------
Mal/EncPk-NI on 26 January 2010 10:14:49 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/malencpkni.html?_log_from=rss
Mal/FakeAV-BV on 26 January 2010 10:14:49 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/malfakeavbv.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/Agent-MGY on 26 January 2010 10:14:49 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojagentmgy.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/Agent-MGZ on 26 January 2010 10:14:49 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojagentmgz.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/Banker-EVY on 26 January 2010 10:14:49 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojbankerevy.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/Buzus-CE on 26 January 2010 10:14:49 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojbuzusce.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/DwnLdr-IAI on 26 January 2010 10:14:49 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojdwnldriai.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/DwnLdr-IAJ on 26 January 2010 10:14:49 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojdwnldriaj.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/DwnLdr-IAK on 26 January 2010 10:14:49 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojdwnldriak.html?_log_from=rss
Troj/FakeAV-ARW on 26 January 2010 10:14:49 Z
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/trojfakeavarw.html?_log_from=rss

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

-- China Will Lead World Scientific Research By 2020
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/hF7HCPfL4eE/China-Will-Lead-World-Scientific-Research-By-2020)
Hugh Pickens writes "An analysis of papers published in 10,500 academic journals across the world shows that, in terms of academic papers published, China is now second only to the US, and will take first place by 2020. Chinese scientists are increasing their output at a far faster rate than counterparts in rival 'emerging' nations such as India, Russia, and Brazil. The number of peer-reviewed papers published by Chinese researchers rose 64-fold over the past 30 years. 'China is out on its own, far ahead of the pack,' says James Wilsdon, of the Royal Society in London. 'If anything, China's recent research performance has exceeded even the high expectations of four or five years ago.' According to Wilsdon, three main factors are driving Chinese research. First is the government's enormous investment, with funding increases far above the rate of inflation, at all levels of the system from schools to postgraduate research. Second is the organized flow of knowledge from basic science to commercial applications. And third is the efficient and flexible way in which China is tapping the expertise of its extensive scientific diaspora in North America and Europe, tempting back mid-career scientists with deals that allow them to spend part of the year working in the West and part in China." Here's the Financial Times's original article.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Game Distribution Platforms Becoming Annoyingly Common
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/zqkQvrPI3uQ/Game-Distribution-Platforms-Becoming-Annoyingly-Common)
The Escapist's Shamus Young recently posted an article complaining about the proliferation of distribution platforms and social networks for video games. None of the companies who make these are "quite sure how games will be sold and played ten years from now," he writes, "but they all know they want to be the ones running the community or selling the titles." Young continues, "Remember how these systems usually work: The program sets itself up to run when Windows starts, and it must be running if you want to play the game. If you follow this scheme to its logical conclusion, you'll see that the system tray of every gaming PC would eventually end up clogged with loaders, patchers, helpers, and monitors. Every publisher would have a program for serving up content, connecting players, managing digital licenses, performing patches, and (most importantly) selling stuff. Some people don't mind having 'just one more' program running in the background. But what happens when you have programs from Valve, Stardock, Activision, 2k Games, Take-Two, Codemasters, Microsoft, Eidos, and Ubisoft? Sure, you could disable them. But then when you fire the thing up to play a game, it will want to spend fifteen minutes patching itself and the game before it will let you in. And imagine how fun it would be juggling accounts for all of them."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Prison Bans D&D For Mimicking Gang Structure
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/WfSqFpAh2xo/Prison-Bans-DampD-For-Mimicking-Gang-Structure)
Trepidity writes "In a case that has been winding its way through the courts for a while now, a Wisconsin prison banned inmates from playing Dungeons & Dragons, using the justification that 'one player is denoted the Dungeon Master... [who] is tasked with giving directions to other players... [which] mimics the organization of a gang.' The prison also cited some sparse evidence that a handful of non-inmate D&D players once committed some crimes that allegedly were related to their D&D playing. On Monday the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the regulation (PDF) against challenges from inmates. The court appeared skeptical of the ban, sarcastically referring to it as the 'war on D&D,' but upheld it nonetheless as having a 'rational basis.' Law professor Ilya Somin suggests that the court may have had no choice, given how deferential rational-basis review usually is."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Interview With the Founder of a Video Game Rehab Clinic
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/CHcH7Kk-3LE/Interview-With-the-Founder-of-a-Video-Game-Rehab-Clinic)
Ten Ton Hammer has posted the transcript from an interview with Dr. Hilarie Cash, co-founder of the "reSTART Internet Addiction Recovery Program," a relatively new clinic that deals with adults who feel that they are addicted to video games. The interview contains some.. interesting nuggets of wisdom. If you want to avoid addiction, you'd better spend less than two hours per day on online entertainment! The good news is that she doesn't recommend beating people. "When people come, they come for 45 days. It is only for adults; patients must be 18 or older. When they first come, they come for a minimum 2 days to be interviewed and to interview us, because we don't want anyone there who doesn't want to be there. So if they decide they want to be there then they stay for 45 days or longer if they choose. During that time they don't have access to the internet. The idea is that it takes at least 30 days for the brain to make some adjustments it needs to make to get over this addiction, so the brain can begin to rewire back to normal. During that time we are helping them look at why they got addicted, what motivated their addiction and we're assessing to see what skills they are lacking so they can be successful in their adult lives. We try to make a good start at helping to build those skills."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Intego's "Year In Mac Security" Report
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/KOx43_Vb_p4/Integos-Year-In-Mac-Security-Report)
david.emery notes the release of Intego's "Year In Mac Security" report (PDF), adding: "Mac OS X and iPhones that haven't been jailbroken fare pretty well (although vulnerabilities exist, there's not been a lot of exploitation). Apple does come in for criticism for 'time to fix' known vulnerabilities. Jailbroken iPhones are a mess. The biggest risk to Macs are Trojan horses, often from pirated software."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- New Super Mario Bros. Wii Tops 10 Million Sales
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/S4QkAxyvW4s/emNew-Super-Mario-Bros-Wiiem-Tops-10-Million-Sales)
According to a report from Japanese publication Nikkei Net, Nintendo's New Super Mario Bros. Wii has now sold 10 million copies worldwide. The game needed only 45 days to pass the already impressive sales numbers of Super Mario Galaxy. Quoting Gamasutra: "NSMB Wii has sold 3 million units in Japan, where it launched on December 3; 3 million copies in Europe, where it launched November 20, and 4.5 million units in North America, where it launched November 15. Super Mario Galaxy has sold 4.1 million units in North America since 2007. The game's design hearkens back to the two-dimensional, side-scrolling style of earlier Mario titles ... The numbers would seem to suggest that these traits successfully generated more mass appeal for NSMB Wii than for the three-dimensional and far less familiar Super Mario Galaxy, which sent the plumber navigating more innovative spherical space environments."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Getting Company Owners To Follow Their Own Rules?
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/wvJT24PTnfI/Getting-Company-Owners-To-Follow-Their-Own-Rules)
techmage writes "Recently we had an issue at our small company that resulted in the loss of a lot of important data. To prevent it from happening again, we created a company-wide policy that all computers would return to IT to have their contents backed up, and the computers would be formatted and reloaded for the next user. Consistently the owners of the company break this and other policies we set up to prevent data loss, theft, etc. How do I get through to the bosses that when they break with the policies, they are potentially shooting the company in the foot?"Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Uranus and Neptune May Have "Oceans of Diamonds"
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/5MfxBPdngug/Uranus-and-Neptune-May-Have-Oceans-of-Diamonds)
Third Position writes "Oceans of liquid diamond topped with solid 'icebergs' of the precious gems could be on Uranus and Neptune. The first-ever detailed research into the melting point of diamond found it behaves like water during melting and freezing — with its solid form floating on the liquid. A large diamond ocean on one or both of the planets could provide an explanation for an oddity they both share: unlike Earth, they do not have magnetic poles that match up with their geographical poles." The article doesn't mention what the pressures might be like in these outer-planets environments, but the researchers found that liquefying diamond requires 40 million times Earth's atmospheric pressure at sea level.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Thomas Edison's Kindle
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/qLKeaXWIXE4/Thomas-Edisons-Kindle)
harrymcc writes "In 1911, Thomas Edison bragged that he could make a 40,000-page book by printing the pages on thin pieces of metal. In the mid-1930s, newspapers experimented with transmitting special editions into homes via early fax machines. In 1956, Chrysler tried to sell Americans on buying 7-inch records that could only be played on a tiny turntable built into its cars' dashboards. Over at Technologizer, I rounded up these and a dozen other fascinating, forgotten gadget ideas that didn't work out — but which foreshadowed products and technologies that eventually became a big deal."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Insecure Plugins Ding IE, Safari, Chrome, Opera
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/_ApLb6wu8Ns/Insecure-Plugins-Ding-IE-Safari-Chrome-Opera)
krebsonsecurity writes "The Web browser wars often focus on which browser is more secure, but the dirty secret is that insecure plugins are a serious threat to all browsers, from the perspectives of both stability and security. Krebsonsecurity.com features an informative look at the administration page for a popular browser exploit kit called Eleonora, which suggests that plugins like Adobe Reader and Java are leading to successful compromises for users surfing not just with Internet Explorer, but also with Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Opera."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- The Cell Phone Has Changed — New Etiquette Needed
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/vjdPU4T3OqM/The-Cell-Phone-Has-Changed-mdash-New-Etiquette-Needed)
CWmike writes to share a recent manners-rant that has some great gems about how not to be "that guy" on a cell phone. What rules of engagement are absolutely necessary and what social penalties should become standard practice for repeat offenders? "It's easy to be rude with a cell phone. A visitor from another planet might conclude that rudeness is a cell phone's main purpose. Random, annoying ring tones go off unexpectedly. People talk too loudly on cell phones in public because of the challenge of holding a conversation in a noisy environment with someone who's not present. Cell phones need their own rules of etiquette, or we'll descend into social barbarism."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- NASA To Propose Commercial Space Initiative
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/CaI2Shzolbk/NASA-To-Propose-Commercial-Space-Initiative)
MarkWhittington writes "The Wall Street Journal is reporting that starting with the FY2011 budget request for NASA, the Obama administration intends to propose a new program to encourage the development of a commercial space flight industry. 'The controversial proposal, expected to be included in the Obama administration's next budget, would open a new chapter in the US space program. The goal is to set up a multi-year, multi-billion-dollar initiative allowing private firms, including some start-ups, to compete to build and operate spacecraft capable of ferrying US astronauts into orbit—and eventually deeper into the solar system. Congress is likely to challenge the concept's safety and may balk at shifting dollars from existing National Aeronautics and Space Administration programs already hurting for funding to the new initiative. The White House's ultimate commitment to the initiative is murky, according to these people, because the budget isn't expected to outline a clear, long-term funding plan.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- SETI Founder Outlines Ambitious Future Plans
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/TBmZgDmLakk/SETI-Founder-Outlines-Ambitious-Future-Plans)
Lanxon writes "'In the universe there is intelligent life, I'm confident about that,' SETI founder Dr Frank Drake (of the Drake Equation) affirmed earlier today during a talk at the Royal Society in London, 50 years after SETI was founded. One of his visions to prove this, and to show that the last five decades were not a waste of time, is to station a radio observatory not in near-Earth orbit, but on the far side of the moon. He also suggests that another craft could later be stationed 500 times further away from the Sun than the Earth, using the Sun itself as a giant magnifying lens to resolve alien worlds."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Researchers Claim "Effectively Perfect" Spam Blocking Discovery
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/mcUgTEcuGNQ/Researchers-Claim-Effectively-Perfect-Spam-Blocking-Discovery)
A team of computer scientists from the International Computer Science Institute in Berkeley, CA are claiming to have found an "effectively perfect" method for blocking spam. The new system deciphers the templates a botnet is using to create spam and then teaches filters what to look for. "The system ... works by exploiting a trick that spammers use to defeat email filters. As spam is churned out, subtle changes are typically incorporated into the messages to confound spam filters. Each message is generated from a template that specifies the message content and how it should be varied. The team reasoned that analyzing such messages could reveal the template that created them. And since the spam template describes the entire range of the emails a bot will send, possessing it might provide a watertight method of blocking spam from that bot."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

-- Bach Launches Updated MP3 Format
(http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/Ks4E-JblryE/Bach-Launches-Updated-MP3-Format)
An anonymous reader writes to tell us that Bach Technology has rolled out an updated MP3 file format in a bid to combat music piracy. Dubbed "MusicDNA," the new format offers embedded "updatable premium content" like lyrics, videos, news updates, and album artwork. "Using the new technology, music labels and bands will be able to send updates to the music files – with tour dates, interviews or updates to social networking pages – while illegally-downloaded files remain static. ... No major labels have signed up to use MusicDNA so far, but British record company Beggars Group and US label Tommy Boy are both on board. However, the files are likely to be more expensive than MP3 files – according to the BBC – and will have to compete with Apple's iTunes LP, which already provides additional content such as bonus tracks, lyrics and video interviews."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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

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

-- How do I turn off auto complete?
(http://www.helpforce.com)

Question: When i type things in say a google search, words that i have already typed come up for me to select. How do i or where do i go to make what i have already typed previously to not pop up?

Answer: right click internet explorer, go to properties,click on the content tab. under personal information, click on auto complete and remove the checks, also clear everything.

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

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