Blackmoor Vituperative

The US Department of Homeland Security has urged Windows users to install the latest patches from Microsoft as quickly as possible.

In particular it warned about one bug fixed in the latest batch of security updates that, if exploited, could put a PC under the control of an attacker.

Microsoft’s recent update fixed 23 flaws found in Windows software.

Many of these bugs are known to malicious hackers and some are already actively exploited on the net.

(from BBC News, Official warning on Windows bugs)

To date, with its Genuine Advantage anti-piracy programs, Microsoft has targeted consumers. Windows and Office users have been required to validate their products as “genuine” before being able to obtain many downloads and add-ons.

Come this fall, however, the Redmond, Wash., software maker is planning to turn up the Genuine Advantage heat in two ways: by baking more Genuine Advantage checks directly into Windows Vista, and by taking aim at PC makers, system builders, Internet cafes and other sources of potentially pirated software.

(from eWeek, Microsoft to Tighten the Genuine Advantage Screws)

Governor Tarkin: Princess Leia, before your execution, you will join me at a ceremony that will make this battle station operational. No star system will dare oppose the Emperor now.

Princess Leia: The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.

The book is one of Britain’s best-known documents, but a poll commissioned by the National Archives suggests not everyone is sure what it is. While 80 percent of respondents had heard of the Domesday Book, 13 percent thought it was a chapter in the Bible, and 2 percent thought it was a book by Dan Brown, author of the hugely popular “The Da Vinci Code.”

(from MSNBC.com, 11th-century Domesday Book goes online)

After months of issuing warnings, the music industry finally made good on its threat to file suit against peer-to-peer software company LimeWire.

A group of music companies, including Sony BMG, Virgin Records and Warner Bros. Records, have accused LimeWire and the company’s officers of copyright infringement, according to a federal lawsuit filed Friday in U.S. District Court in New York. LimeWire produces software that’s often used to create copies of music recordings and then distribute them over the Web.

The recording industry is asking for compensatory and punitive damages, such as $150,000 for every song distributed without permission.

(from ZDNet, Music industry sues P2P firm LimeWire)

Personally, I use Shareaza.

When the zombies take over, how long till the electricity fails?

Just when Microsoft and Nintendo thought they were safe from the madness that is the United States patent system, a Texas-based company called Anascape comes along and sues both console makers over 12 patents relating to video game controllers.

[…]

Anascape filed suit against Microsoft and Nintendo in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas this past Monday. Anascape has accused the companies of infringing on a dozen different patents that were issued between 1999 and 2005. The patents seem to deal with almost every aspect of today’s modern video game controller, such as analog controls, analog pressure sensors for buttons, vibration and tactile feedback, and more.

(from GameDaily, Microsoft, Nintendo Hit with Controller Patent Lawsuit)

Our patent system is a cruel joke. It will get worse before it gets better.

By the way, don’t lump patents together with unrelated issues like trademarks, or copyright. They are each completely different issues. (I know, I know: I do it, too.)

A Homeland Security plan to require port workers to carry tamper-proof photo ID cards has numerous security problems that threaten to delay it, investigators said yesterday.

In an audit, Homeland Inspector General Richard Skinner said his review of prototype systems at participating U.S. ports identified several vulnerabilities in the Transportation Worker Identification Credential program, known as TWIC.

The weaknesses, some of which were deemed “high risk,” included instances of “false positives” in detecting which workers might pose a security risk, as well as cases in which the system inadvertently disclosed sensitive personal information inappropriately.

(from BaltimoreSun.com, Plan for secure IDs for port staffs flawed)

The e-passport might well become a thing of the present, but it’s still vulnerable to hacking, as proven recently by a German computer security expert.

At a demonstration at the Black Hat security conference in Las Vegas, Lukas Grunwald, a security consultant with a German technology firm, successfully copied data from one e-passport to another, resulting in a maneuver that would fool e-passport readers into thinking that one person was passing through security when, in fact, someone else entirely was there.

(from Mobile Magazine, Cloned e-passport heightens RFID security fears)

The Spanish-American War has been over for more than 100 years, and now so is a portion of the tax imposed in 1898 to help fund it.

As of Tuesday, all phone companies selling long-distance phone service are legally required to eliminate the 3 percent federal excise tax on long-distance service. The last portion of the tax, pertaining only to local telephone service, remains in effect.

Companies can, and do, fall from the top rung all the time.

Microsoft is no different.

Remember when everyone bought IBM PCs? IBM isn’t even selling ThinkPads anymore. Are you too old to recall when everyone bought American-made cars? Today, General Motors and Ford keep shrinking, while Toyota and Honda keep expanding. I can also recall when Pan-American Airways was the American airline for international travel. Pan Am closed up shop in 1991.

No, if Microsoft wants to stay on top, the Evil Empire could stand to take some lessons from its most dangerous competitor — and that’s Linux.

(from Linux-Watch, Top five things Microsoft can learn from Linux)