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Atari Online News, Etc. Volume 13 Issue 29
Volume 13, Issue 29 Atari Online News, Etc. July 22, 2011
Published and Copyright (c) 1999 - 2011
All Rights Reserved
Atari Online News, Etc.
A-ONE Online Magazine
Dana P. Jacobson, Publisher/Managing Editor
Joseph Mirando, Managing Editor
Rob Mahlert, Associate Editor
Atari Online News, Etc. Staff
Dana P. Jacobson -- Editor
Joe Mirando -- "People Are Talking"
Michael Burkley -- "Unabashed Atariophile"
Albert Dayes -- "CC: Classic Chips"
Rob Mahlert -- Web site
Thomas J. Andrews -- "Keeper of the Flame"
With Contributions by:
Fred Horvat
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=~=~=~=
A-ONE #1329 07/22/11
~ Two Hackers Slipped Up ~ People Are Talking! ~ Apple Uncages Lion!
~ FBI Raids Anonymous! ~ PCs Look Like Tablets ~ Facebook Stalker!
~ Ethics Researcher Bust ~ Hacker Social Network! ~ Twins Lose Again!
~ Facebook Ranked Lowest ~ Google Malware Warning ~ Asura's Wrath News!
-* Taliban Network Gets Hacked! *-
-* PlayStation 4 Eco-Concept Gorgeous! *-
-* China's Fake Apple Store Angers Customers! *-
=~=~=~=
->From the Editor's Keyboard "Saying it like it is!"
""""""""""""""""""""""""""
They say it's not the heat, but the humidity. Well, I say that it's
either one or the other, or worse, both! The country is currently in a
weather meltdown; it's in the mid-90's here in the Northeast, with the
heat index (heat and humidity) teetering around 100 degrees and higher.
It's brutal out there. It's been that way all week, progressing to worse
day-by-day.
Heat index means how hot it feels to a human when combining the current
temperature and humidity. I guess the concept makes sense, and it's
something that no one likes to feel. But I do know that people everywhere
are doing whatever they can to stay cool. It's not easy! I'm sitting in
my study with the AC blasting away, and there's not too much relief!
Sure, it's better than no AC, but I'd like to see some relief from this
weather rather than trying to find a way to get around it!
So, while I continue to try to find some relief, as most of you are
likely trying to do, let's move right along and get to this week's issue!
Until next time...
=~=~=~=
->In This Week's Gaming Section - PS 4 'Eco-Concept' Is Gorgeous!
""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" Asura's Wrath to New Heights!
Gears of War 3!
=~=~=~=
->A-ONE's Game Console Industry News - The Latest Gaming News!
""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
Playstation 4 'Eco-Concept' Is Gorgeous
With Nintendo recently announcing the successor to its popular Wii video
game system, all eyes have shifted to Microsoft and Sony for hints of what
the future holds for the the Xbox 360 and Playstation.
Neither has said anything officially, though leaks here and there are
starting to garner press. A DigiTimes report said Sony is prepping a new
console for release in 2012; while a director of operations for chipmaker
AMD claimed that the next Xbox will produce graphics rivaling the scenes
in James Cameron's "Avatar."
It's all hype and a lot of fun, which makes this gorgeously rendered concept
of an imagined Playstation 4 all the more interesting. It comes to us from
designer Joseph Dumary on the site Yanko Design - and is something I'm
hoping Sony draws inspiration from.
The highlights that I'm most appreciative of are the system's embrace of
sustainable manufacturing and energy efficiency. According to Dumary, his
concept would contain 60 percent recycled materials with a smart zero watt
standby mode. Since it was released in 2006, Sony has been revising the
Playstation 3 hardware to be more energy efficient, going from a 380W power
supply in the first generation to a 200W unit in the current "slim" model.
It makes sense that Sony might take energy conservation even further with
its next system. In 2008, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and
consulting firm Ecos recommended in a study that the next generation of
systems "have power-management features built in, a "sleep" button on the
console, and automatic power-down after three hours of inactivity."
According to the study, adding these features would save the U.S. more than
$1 billion in electricity costs.
Dumary's design would seem to align with some of those recommendations.
He's included an "ECO Restart" function that allows a game to be saved,
"the console turned off, and turned back on to resume exactly where the
user left off without the need for a full start up, reducing energy waste
and prolonging the life of the unit."
Of course, this thing is also loaded with the latest tech to make virtual
worlds come to life. Some of the dream specs listed include a 1.5TB HDD,
Full 3D 4K2K compatible, DLNA, DPhdmi (HDMI Connect), 3D Blu-ray, USB 3.0,
and more.
Whatever Sony and Microsoft release next, you can bet that the systems
themselves will be much more energy efficient than their predecessors. If
they can embrace some greener materials (and reduce the toxicity of their
components as well), the real world will be better off as you save that
virtual one from an imminent alien invasion.
Asura's Wrath Takes Game Cinematics to New Heights
Console video games are becoming more like big blockbuster movies all the
time. Seeing this trend, Capcom has decided to jump ahead a few years and
give us Asuras Wrath, an epic hybrid of sorts that blends cinema and
gameplay in ways few developers have yet dared to try. I didnt manage to
play the game at E3 this year, but I did catch up with Capcom at a New York
event not long ago where I played through the PS3 game demo twice. I left
fairly impressed, a little confused, but definitely curious.
Heres the story as I understand it (and I dont really understand it). You
play as Asura, a deity or half-god of sorts. Asura has been betrayed by his
fellow gods and stripped of all his powers, kind of like Thor. Now hes
really angry, out to seek vengeance and save his daughter Mithra from the
Seven Deities (not dwarves) that have her. The angrier Asura gets, the
crazier he looks. His hair goes white; his skin turns to stone; and when
things really heat up, he even sprouts two extra sets of arms.
The portion of Asuras Wrath I played through was made up of probably
90-percent cinematic sequences. Save for one boss battle that was played
more like a traditional third-person action game (it was an odd diversion),
the majority of Asuras Wrath seems to consist of strangely interactive
cinematic scenes with no graphical UI at all. In the demo, when you need to
perform something, a button will often pop up on screen to show you what to
do, but other than that youre on your own as you face a fat boss who keeps
getting larger every time you defeat him.
Capcom and developer CyberConnect2 explain that the game isnt just one
quicktime element after another, though its hard to grasp the level of
control you have until you actually play it. Like an action game, there are
basic controls that follow you throughout the experience. One button jumps,
another shoots missiles, while another lets you catch things and deflect
them. Different abilities come into play during difference sequences. Many
sequences are on rails, sometimes from behind, sometimes from the side or
any other odd angle Capcom can think up. Partway through the demo, you
chase down a 100 foot version of one of the mean deities (he is Shadow of
the Colossus big) and deflect his missiles back at him, while shooting your
own and dodging attacks. During other segments you scale his body and after
you defeat him, you actually grow more arms and hurl his carcass into space.
Dont think its over though. After an extended non-interactive cutscene,
an even bigger god (see the top of this post) shows his face and pokes his
finger at the Earth, hoping to crush Asura like a bug. To stop him, you
perform a sequence of button strikes. Its completely bizzare and in no way
plausible, but oddly entertaining.
Its difficult to separate gameplay from cinema in Asuras Wrath. All the
while you play, the camera angle keeps shifting and the scenario constantly
changes, much like a fast-paced blockbuster movie. Non-interactive
cutscenes seamlessly weave themselves into play as well, some more welcome
than others, but none intruding as much as a long-winded scenes from Metal
Gear Solid 4. The demo we played just kept getting faster, more frantic,
and more outlandish with each passing minute. Its tough to imagine Capcom
creating an entire game filled with this much action and craziness, but
that may be just what its attempting.
Asuras Wrath is an interesting experiment for the industry. Will players
embrace a game that could legitimately be considered more video than game?
Its hard to say. If anything, the scifi/manga/mythical world could prove
too odd for American audiences, who arent used to controlling a hero with
six arms. The closest many of us have come to six arms is defeating Goro in
Mortal Kombat. But hey, in a market where Katamari Damacy can take off,
anything is possible. We look forward to spending a lot more time with
Asuras Wrath when it nears closer to its 2012 release for the Xbox 360 and
PS3.
Gears of War 3 Goes Behind The Scenes To Discuss The End
When Gears of War 3 hits this September, it will mark the end of an era.
The franchise has become one of the most important and recognizable games
of this generation of consoles, and after several years as one of the Xbox
360s flagship exclusive titles, the trilogy comes to a conclusion. There
may or may not still be further GoW games in the future, but the primary
story of Marcus Fenix and his now shattered society will reach its finale.
In the video below, the developers at Epic Games talk a bit about the world
that players will enter when they play GoW3. It is a society that has
already collapsed, and the survivors are simply those that are too stubborn
to die. There is no military, and the governments of the world have fallen.
All that is left is a handful of former COGs that embark on one last,
desperate mission.
=~=~=~=
A-ONE's Headline News
The Latest in Computer Technology News
Compiled by: Dana P. Jacobson
FBI Raids Suspected Anonymous Hackers in New York
Internet "hacktivist" group Anonymous was the target of several early
morning raids conducted at homes in Long Island, Brooklyn, and Baldwin,
New York today. FBI agents used search warrants to obtain computers and
other electronics from the residences and arrested several individuals
with ages ranging from teens to early 20s.
Among its various exploits, Anonymous has performed web-based attacks on
major credit card companies including Mastercard and Visa. Its hacker
cohorts, LulzSec, have taken aim at the CIA, as well as the Arizona Police
Department in an effort to expose alleged racism. Yesterday, LulzSec took
credit for an attack on Rupert Murdoch's U.K. tabloid The Sun. A website
redirect sent readers to a fake Sun page announcing the embattled media
mogul's death from a drug overdose.
It isn't clear whether those arrested in today's raids were confirmed to
be connected to the hacking troupe, though the organization's notorious
secrecy makes obtaining any information on members a difficult task to
begin with. One of Anonymous' main Twitter accounts - which had celebrated
the Murdoch debacle just last night - has not seen an update in roughly 9
hours, though that is far from a concrete confirmation of success by law
enforcement.
How Two LulzSec Hackers Slipped Up
It was pretty astounding to hear that the feds had arrested 16 people
yesterday in connection with Anonymous and LulzSec hacking attacks. Of
them, 14 were indicted for participating in distributed denial of service
attacks as part of Anonymous's Operation Payback, which took down the
Mastercard and Paypal sites because they stopped processing donations to
Wikileaks. But two of the hackers arrested yesterday had very different
charges, well beyond linking their computers to a botnet in a mass DDoS
attack. Both allegedly infiltrated secure organizations and leaked data in
ways that now seem like they almost wanted to get caught.
One man, 21-year-old AT&T customer support contractor named Lance Moore,
allegedly used his company-issued VPN login and password to go into the
AT&T system and gather data that he then leaked as part of LulzSec's
June 25 "50 Days of Lulz" release. The other, 21-year-old University of
Central Florida computer student Scott Matthew Arciszewski, allegedly
hacked into the FBI contractor Infragard in Tampa and uploaded files from
there, which he then tweeted directly to the FBI's own Twitter account.
Court documents outline how both suspects used arguably poor judgment when
allegedly breaching their respective targets.
Moore started working for a company called Convergys in its Las Cruces, New
Mexico office on Aug. 23, 2010, according to the complaint prepared by FBI
Special Agent Jeffrey D. Calandra. In order to do his job as a customer
service representative for AT&T Mobile, he was issued a login for the
company's virtual private network. According to the complaint, the AT&T
security team discovered a large cache of company data - including
"thousands of spreadsheets, Microsoft Word documents, Microsoft PowerPoint
presentations, image files, PDF files, applications and other files,
largely concerning AT&T's plans related to its 4G data network and LTE
(Long Term Evolution) mobile broadband network, among other topics - posted
publicly on the file sharing site Fileape.com on April 16, 2011. The
company valued the information at more than $5,000. The complaint goes on
to describe how AT&T's own investigators caught, and fired, Moore.
AT&T investigators also found Moore had done a bunch of searches for file
sharing and Fileape from his work computer. He was fired on May 19 but the
damage was done. When LulzSec published its 50 Days of Lulz release on
June 25, which contained the information Moore had allegedly leaked, the
FBI started its investigation with the help of the company, which was
likely happy to help nail Moore. Moore now faced data theft charges.
Arciszewski allegedly used his UFC dorm room's Internet connection to hack
into FBI contractor Infragard on June 21, then broadcast the files he
uploaded and instructions on how to breach the security. The breach was
done in the name of LulzSec's Anti-Security movement, but not as part of
an "official" LulzSec release. He allegedly posted the files on the website
kobrascorner.com, which was registered under the name Voodookobra. FBI
Special Agent Adam R. Malone wrote in his criminal complaint that he
searched for Voodookobra on Google and found a Wikipedia entry from 2009
that named Arciszewski as its owner. UFC also helped Malone with his
investigation by confirming the IP address that breached Infragard was the
same one assigned to Arciszewski's dorm room. Malone found a post
Arciszerski had allegedly made to hackforums.net under an account on which
he used his own photo as an avatar, and he also found Arciszerski's
Facebook page. But the kicker is that after Arciszerski breached and
uploaded the files, he tweeted the news to both LulzSec and the FBI itself,
the affidavit says:
The account @voodooKobra is still active. This is the most recent tweet,
from yesterday:
I have had a very bad day. I am stressed to the max.less than a minute ago
via web Favorite Retweet ReplyvoodooKobra
voodooKobra
In his chatroom comments to The Atlantic Wire yesterday, LulzSec frontman
Topiary suggested those who were arrested were "volunteer/supporter DDoS
Anons who accidentally (or just foolishly) used LOIC from their home IPs."
He said newer or less serious members of the group were frequently lax
about security out of recklessness, laziness, or "nessnessness." These
accounts seem like examples of all three.
Taliban Network Hacked, Group Blames U.S. for "Technical Larceny"
The Taliban saw its information network disrupted today as email accounts,
websites, and mobile phones connected to the organization began spreading
false reports that its leader, Mullah Omar, had been killed. The militant
Islamist group, which remains in the spotlight for harboring suspected
al-Qaeda terrorists after 9/11, was quick to blame the United States
military for the cyber attack, calling it "technical larceny."
Despite being notoriously secretive, the Afghanistan-based militant troupe
has made its presence known in cyberspace, even going so far as to set up
its own Twitter account. The terrorist group is particularly sensitive to
modern technology and its ability to give away location data. Taliban
documents have been discovered in the past that warn members of the
dangers of carrying things like mobile phones.
Today's virtual attack on the Taliban's web and phone communication has
led the group to threaten its regional phone service providers for
cooperating with Western forces. One NATO spokesperson claimed to have no
knowledge of the incident, while another refused to comment on the
terrorists' allegations. Whatever the case, it's clear that the face of the
war on terror is changing, and the internet is quickly becoming another
front line.
Threatened by iPad, PCs Start To Look Like Tablets
The response by computer makers to the iPad stealing sales from them:
Make their PCs more like iPads.
The "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" strategy" is prompting a wave of
experimentation with the design of the laptop, which has been largely
unchanged for two decades. Touch-sensitive screens and the use of Google's
Android system for mobile devices are two ways the PC industry is
adapting.
About 50 million tablets are expected to be sold this year, and that could
double to as many as 100 million next year. PC shipments worldwide grew
just over 2 percent in the second quarter, short of what research firms
IDC and Gartner had expected. The popularity of tablet computers was one
of the main reasons.
One way PC makers are countering the threat is with iPad-style tablets
running Android, but these haven't seen wide success so far. And in trying
to emulate the iPad, they're competing with not just Apple, but also with
phone makers such as Motorola Inc., which are launching their own tablets.
So PC makers are offering hybrids that try to offer the best of both
worlds. Some are tablet-like devices that come with keyboards, which the
iPad doesn't have. Others are PC-like, combining the tablet's signature
touch-screen with the ability to run heavy-duty Windows programs for photo
editing and design.
Witness the Acer Iconia, a Windows laptop that looks like any other when
the lid is down. When you open it, you'll find two touch-sensitive screens
and no keyboard, similar to a tablet computer. To type, you bring up a
virtual keyboard on the lower screen. If you're not using the keyboard, Web
pages can flow from the top screen to the bottom one.
Another iPad-like laptop is the Dell Inspiron Duo. Its screen can be
flipped around to face outward when the lid is closed. When folded that
way, it works like a tablet.
Lenovo Group also sells a Windows laptop with a screen that can be detached
from the keyboard to function as an Android tablet.
"We should learn some things from tablets," such as the iPad's
user-friendly interface and the ease of installing software from outside
parties, said Yang Yuanquing, the CEO of Lenovo, the world's fourth-largest
maker of PCs.
Hewlett-Packard Co., the world's largest maker of personal computers, is
giving its PCs the ability to run applications written for its webOS
software, which runs on smartphones and a tablet, the TouchPad.
In their experimentation, PC makers are reviving designs haven't been very
successful in their previous incarnations. The laptop with a screen that
detaches to become a tablet is an idea that dates to 2002, when a flurry
of tablet computers debuted along with Microsoft Corp.'s Windows Tablet
Edition.
This earlier generation of tablet PCs didn't catch on because they were
expensive and too heavy for comfortable use in tablet mode. "Windows Tablet
Edition" wasn't much different from regular Windows, and it wasn't fully
adapted for tablet use. Microsoft added more touch-oriented features when
it released Windows 7 in 2009.
Even with the improvements in Windows, however, the PC faces hurdles in
mimicking the tablet's design.
Windows isn't a very friendly operating system for tablets, partly because
it needs Intel-style processors to run on. These chips drain batteries
much faster than the cellphone-style chips used in the iPad, with a core
designed by ARM Holdings PLC. ARM chips can save power by turning off
parts of themselves when they're not in use, among other tricks.
"A lot of what makes the iPad an iPad is the long battery life,"
technology analyst Rob Enderle said.
Windows-based PCs and tablet computers that use Intel chips need bigger
batteries, which make the devices heavier. Even then, the batteries don't
last as long as the iPad's. The Dell Inspiron Duo weighs 3.4 pounds, or
two and a half times the weight of the iPad. It has four hours of battery
life, compared with 10 on the iPad.
Microsoft is hard at work developing a version of Windows that will run on
ARM chips, and it's expected to be ready next year. That means the next
generation of laptops could match the iPad for weight and battery life.
But while waiting for the new software, PC makers are in an uncomfortable
situation. The new software might be what they need, but in the meantime,
they have to try other means to distract consumers from the iPad, such as
borrowing tablet features. These experiments with laptop-tablet hybrids are
unlikely to be as important as the advent of the new system, currently
dubbed Windows 8. But something might stick, providing a model for the
future of PCs.
"Right now the PC industry is fighting kind of a holding action," Enderle
said.
Apple Unleashes Lion, Updates MacBook Air
Apple on Wednesday unleashed its new Lion operating system, running it on
updated, more powerful versions of its MacBook Air ultra-thin laptop.
A slew of Apple product releases came as the California company's stock
rose on the back of record high net profit and revenue in the quarter
ending June 25.
Lion is the latest version of the Macintosh computer operating system and
boasts more than 250 added features including handling multi-touch
controls.
Sales of Macintosh computers dramatically outpaced the overall market in
the recently-ended quarter and Lion is expected to further ramp up
interest in Apple products.
Lion will be pre-installed on new Macintosh computers and is available for
download as an update from the Mac App Store for $30.
"Lion is the best version of OS X yet, and we're thrilled that users
around the world can download it starting today," said Apple senior vice
president of Worldwide Product Marketing Philip Schiller.
Updated MacBook Air laptops feature speedier Intel processors, backlit
keyboards, and quicker data ports.
MacBook Air models range in price from $999 to $1,599 depending on
processor speeds, memory and other features.
Apple also introduced a Thunderbolt Display that serves as a docking station
and a high-quality desktop screen for a Mac notebook computer. Thunderbolt
Display will be priced at $999 when it hits the market some time in the
coming two months, according to Apple.
Customers Angry, Staff Defiant at China's Fake Apple Store
Customers at an apparent Apple Store in the Chinese city of Kunming
berated staff and demanded refunds on Friday after the shop was revealed
to be an elaborate fake, sparking a media and Internet frenzy.
Long a target of counterfeiters and unauthorized resellers, Apple Inc was
alerted to the near flawless fake shop by an American blogger living in
the southwestern city, more than 1,000 miles from the nearest genuine
Apple stores in Beijing and Shanghai.
"When I heard the news I rushed here immediately to get the receipt, I am
so upset," a customer surnamed Wang told Reuters, near tears. "With a
store this big, it looks so believable who would have thought it was fake?"
Wang, a petite, 23-year-old office worker who would not give her first
name, spent 14,000 yuan ($2,170) last month buying a Macbook Pro 13-inch
and a 3G iPhone from the Kunming store. She wasn't issued a receipt at the
time, with staff telling her to come back later.
"Where's my receipt, you promised me my receipt last month!" Wang shouted
at employees, before being whisked away to an upstairs room.
Staff were also angry at the unwanted attention after more than 1,000 media
outlets picked up the story and pictures of the store from the BirdAbroad
blog.
"The media is painting us to be a fake store but we don't sell fakes, all
our products are real, you can check it yourself," said one employee, who
didn't want to give his name.
"There is no Chinese law that says I can't decorate my shop the way I want
to decorate it."
While upset at the coverage and unwilling to be fully identified, staff
were cooperative when Reuters visited the store, answering questions and
allowing the shop to be filmed.
Another employee, surnamed Yang, said business had been affected, with
customers demanding they prove the authenticity of their products.
Apple has declined to comment on the fake store or others like it dotted
around China. The Cupertino, California-based firm has just four genuine
Apple Stores in Beijing and Shanghai and none in Kunming.
With about 3.2 million inhabitants, Kunming, the capital of the mountainous
southwestern province of Yunnan, is small by Chinese standards and not well
known in the West.
Located not far the borders of Laos, Vietnam and Myanmar, the city's
fast-growing industrial and manufacturing base is emblematic of China's
ascent on the world stage.
The fake Apple Store is situated along a crowded pedestrian-only shopping
street, its black Apple logo gleaming. Inside, with its Apple posters on
the walls and iPads and Macbook computers displayed on wooden tables, the
store looks every bit like Apple Stores found all over the world but for
some slightly shoddy workmanship and one or two errant details.
Not all customers were bothered by the revelations that the store was not
the genuine article.
"As long as their products are real it's okay - after all, you enter a store
not to look at anything except their products," said Hu Junkai, 18. "If the
products you buy are real why do you care whether the store is a copy?"
Wang was not convinced.
"The biggest thing I'm upset about is that I spent so much money at this
store and I don't even know whether it is real or not," she said.
"What can I do? They aren't going to give me a refund."
California Man Gets 4 Years for Stalking on Facebook
A California man who trolled women's Facebook pages searching for clues
that allowed him to take over their email accounts was sentenced Friday
to more than four years in state prison after a judge rejected a plea
for a lighter sentence and likened the man to a peeping Tom.
Once he took over women's email accounts, George Bronk searched their
folders for nude or semi-nude photographs or videos sent to their husbands
or boyfriends and distributed the images to their contact list,
prosecutors said.
The emails went to families, friends and coworkers. Women in 17 states,
the District of Columbia and England were victimized.
"This case serves as a stark example of what occurs in so-called
cyberspace. It has very real consequences," Sacramento County Superior
Court Judge Lawrence Brown said. "The intrusion of one's profile is no
different than intruding one's home."
Bronk, 23, pleaded guilty in January to charges that included computer
intrusion, false impersonation and possession of child pornography.
Brown sentenced him to four years in state prison for the charges related
to the Facebook and email offenses, and added eight more months for
charges related to child pornography.
Bronk's attorney, Monica Lynch, said her client took responsibility for
his actions and showed remorse. She had sought a sentence of one year in
local jail with probation afterward, or two years in state prison with no
probation.
Brown based his decision on a sentencing recommendation by the California
Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
Bronk was living in the Sacramento suburb of Citrus Heights with his
parents in December 2009 when he began scanning Facebook with the intent
of taking over email accounts. The practice continued until last September.
He looked for email accounts on Facebook pages then gleaned enough
personal information from postings to answer basic Internet security
questions, such as the name of an elementary school or favorite color.
After he changed passwords and took over accounts, Bronk would search
folders for compromising photos and distribute them publicly, prosecutors
said.
He even taunted some of the women in online exchanges and coerced at least
one into sending him more explicit photographs by threatening to
distribute the pictures he already had.
Danielle Piscak, 22, of Parkland, Wash., told The Associated Press earlier
this year that she was able to contact the person who had hacked into her
email account and ask why he was doing it. She said Bronk's reply was,
"Because it's funny."
There was no current phone listing for Piscak, and a Facebook message
seeking reaction to the sentence was not immediately returned.
The case illustrates the vulnerability of all Internet users, said
prosecuting attorney Robert Morgester of the state attorney general's
office.
"The victims we went to said I had very robust passwords. But it didn't
matter how robust the password was if the recovery question is easy," he
said. "Lost your password? What's your favorite color or what high school
did you go to? Or what's your dog's name? And he was able to glean that
information from social media."
Investigators used information from Bronk's confiscated computer to email
questionnaires to 3,200 of his Internet contacts, asking if they had been
victimized. Forty-six women said they had.
Investigators also said they found 172 email files with explicit
photographs on Bronk's computer.
Lynch has said her client was immature, unemployed and bored while he
cared for his ailing parents.
His parents declined comment after the sentencing.
At a hearing earlier this year, his mother, Joyce Bronk, said her son told
them he needed help for a drinking problem then began attending Alcoholics
Anonymous and taking classes to be trained as an emergency medical
technician.
"This was an Internet persona he created when he was a drunk," she said at
the time as a way to explain his actions.
Authorities began the investigation after one victim called Connecticut
State Police, which referred the complaint to the California Highway
Patrol.
Victims turned up in Alabama, Arizona, California, Georgia, Illinois,
Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New
York, Ohio, Oregon, Texas, Virginia and Washington.
Bronk was arrest in October.
He had hoped to become a paramedic but will not be able to because he will
have to register as a sex offender as a result of his crimes, his attorney
said.
Federal Government Indicts Former Demand Progress Executive
Director For Downloading Too Many Journal Articles
Moments ago, Aaron Swartz, former executive director and founder of Demand
Progress, was indicted by the US government. As best as we can tell, he is
being charged with allegedly downloading too many scholarly journal
articles from the Web. The government contends that downloading said
articles is actually felony computer hacking and should be punished with
time in prison.
"This makes no sense," said Demand Progress Executive Director David Segal;
"its like trying to put someone in jail for allegedly checking too many
books out of the library."
"Its even more strange because JSTOR has settled any claims against Aaron,
explained theyve suffered no loss or damage, and asked the government not
to prosecute," Segal added.
James Jacobs, the Government Documents Librarian at Stanford University,
also denounced the arrest: "Aarons prosecution undermines academic
inquiry and democratic principles," Jacobs said. "Its incredible that the
government would try to lock someone up for allegedly looking up articles
at a library."
Demand Progress is collecting statements of support for Aaron on its
website: http://act.demandprogress.org/sign/support_aaron/
"Aarons career has focused on serving the public interest by promoting
ethics, open government, and democratic politics," Segal said. "We hope to
soon see him cleared of these bizarre charges."
Demand Progress is a 500,000-member online activism group that advocates
for civil liberties, civil rights, and other progressive causes.
Facebook Wins Dismissal of Second Winklevoss Case
Facebook Inc won a dismissal of a second lawsuit by the Olympic rowing
twins Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss seeking to boost their $65 million
settlement with the company and its founder, Mark Zuckerberg.
U.S. District Judge Douglas Woodlock in Boston dismissed litigation over
the accord, three months after a federal appeals court in San Francisco
turned aside a related lawsuit.
The 2008 settlement was intended to resolve claims that Zuckerberg stole
the twins' idea for what became the world's most popular social networking
website.
Zuckerberg created Facebook in 2004 in his Harvard University dormitory
room. His feud with the Winklevosses, who competed in the 2008 Beijing
Olympics and also attended Harvard, was dramatized in the 2010 film "The
Social Network."
On June 22, the Winklevosses decided not to appeal the California decision
to the Supreme Court.
Instead, they and business partner Divya Narendra pursued the Boston
lawsuit, raising a different argument, namely that Facebook had
"intentionally or inadvertently suppressed evidence" during settlement
talks, including communications at the time of its founding.
But in his Friday ruling, Woodlock accepted Facebook's argument that the
Winklevosses' substantive claims had already been rejected by the courts.
Both lawsuits were brought by ConnectU Inc, a company that the
Winklevosses and Narendra had set up.
"We expected that the court would enter a judgment," said Michael Schrag,
a lawyer for the twins, in an interview. "The next step is a post-judgment
motion under Rule 60(b)," a federal rule letting courts grant relief from
final judgments.
Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes declined to comment.
The Palo Alto, California-based company said it has more than 500 million
members, and analysts have said it could be worth $70 billion or more if it
goes public, perhaps in 2012.
In upholding the $65 million settlement, the San Francisco appeals court
called the accord "quite favorable" for the twins. Chief Judge Alex Kozinski
wrote that the time for the litigation to end "has now been reached."
The case is ConnectU Inc et al v. Facebook Inc et al, U.S. District Court,
District of Massachusetts, No. 07-10593.
Hacker Group Launches Online Social Network
Infamous hacker group Anonymous launched Monday its own social network
after being rejected by Google's freshly-launched online community.
"Today we welcome you to begin anew," the hacker alliance said at the
website anonplus.com, which it described as a platform to distribute
information.
"Welcome to the Revolution - a new social network where there is no fear...
of censorship...of blackout...nor of holding back."
The drive to build a social network came after the Anonymous account was
suspended at the Google+ online community, which was launched last month by
the Internet giant as a challenge to Facebook.
A message on the anonplus.com website promised that the Anonymous social
network would be for everyone and listed online monikers of developers
taking part in the project.
Anonymous, which rose to infamy last year with cyber attacks in support of
controversial whistle-blower website WikiLeaks, posted the suspension
notice from Google on its blog at Tumblr.
The group has been linked to attacks on Visa, Mastercard and Paypal, which
blocked donations to WikiLeaks after it published thousands of US
diplomatic cables.
Early this year, Anonymous took credit for breaking into the website of
HBGary Federal because the firm was working with federal agents to expose
the hackers' identities.
Anonymous last week released a trove of military email addresses and
passwords it claimed to have plundered from the network of US defense
consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton.
In recent months, police in Spain, Turkey and Italy have arrested suspected
members of Anonymous, which is believed to have branches in several
countries.
Consumers Not Satisfied with Facebook
The American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) released on July 19 a
report on consumer satisfaction with the internet, including social media.
The report found that Facebook was the lowest ranked site of its kind.
The 2011 American Customer Satisfaction Index E-Business report, the 12th
of its kind, was produced in collaboration with analytics firm ForeSee
Results. The report uses data from over 70,000 customers and measures
satisfaction on a scale on 1-100.
This year in the category Internet Social Media the report scored three
websites - Wikipedia, Facebook, and YouTube (Google) - plus "All Others";
MySpace was not included in this year's report.
Of the sites measured, Wikipedia scored highest with 78, YouTube (Google)
came in second place with 74, followed by social media websites under the
category of All Others with a score of 67; social networking giant
Facebook, meanwhile, came last with a score of 66.
An outline of the report is available on the website of the ACSI.
Whether customer dissatisfaction with Facebook will lead customers to switch
to Google's new social network Google+ remains to be seen; however, it does
appear that customers are moving away from Facebook. This trend away from
Facebook was indicated in a separate report released June 12 by Facebook
monitoring site Inside Facebook, which found the amount of active monthly
users on the social networking site to be declining throughout the North
America and parts of Northern Europe.
Google Warns of Malware Infection on Windows Users' Computers
Google is harnessing the power of the web to alert Windows users of possible
malware infections on their machine.
The malware alert was developed after the company noticed "some unusual
search traffic" during routine maintenance on their data centers.
"After collaborating with security engineers at several companies that were
sending this modified traffic, we determined that the computers exhibiting
this behavior were infected with a particular strain of malicious software,
or 'malware,'" said Google security engineer Damian Menscher in a July 19
post on the Google Security Blog. "As a result of this discovery, today
some people will see a prominent notification at the top of their Google
web search results."
The yellow "Your computer appears to be infected" warning will appear at
the top of Google's web search results if the company finds a computer is
housing a specific type of malware, along with a link that shows how to fix
the issue and remove the infections.
"We hope to use the knowledge we've gathered to assist as many people as
possible," said Menscher, but comments left on Google's Security Blog
suggested that the warning could be more detrimental to non-savvy computer
users in the future than no official warning at all.
"It's too bad that the malware folks in the world already use 'your
computer appears to be infected' messages to trick people into installing
malicious software," commented a user by the name of Mecandes. "Tomorrow,
the bad guys will copy the format and appearance of Google's version of the
message, to leverage the trust people have in Google. Perhaps Google needs
something akin to the Yahoo personalized 'sign-in seal' for moments like
this?"
According to a January Security Threat Report by security company Sophos,
the USA is home to the most infected webpages in the world. France,
Russia, Germany and China follow in second to fifth places.
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