Moving to a new appartment

I am currently moving to a new appartment wich is why it have been such a low activity on the blog the past week.
will get more time for the blog when i am done sometime next week

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Microsoft lets Hotmail users set encryption by default

Hotmail users can set the e-mail service to automatically use https for their sessions.

(Credit: Microsoft)

Microsoft announced today that it is offering Hotmail users the ability to take advantage of encryption when using the free e-mail service.
To enable full-session HTTPS (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure) for Hotmail you can type in "https://hotmail.com" or set it as the default for e-mail, calendar, and contacts at https://account.live.com/ManageSSL. Previously SSL was only used at the time of sign-in, but now it's available from the start until a user logs off, a Microsoft spokeswoman said.
Also starting today, SkyDrive, Photos, Docs, and Devices pages will all automatically use SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) encryption.
Enabling HTTPS means Outlook Hotmail Connector, Windows Live Mail, and the Windows Live application for Windows Mobile (version 6.5 and earlier) and Symbian won't be available, Dick Craddock, group program manager for Windows Live Hotmail, wrote in a blog post.
Google has always offered Gmail users the ability to use HTTPS and made it the default setting in January, and offers it as an option for Google Docs as well.
The Microsoft encryption announcement follows new security features Microsoft added in September that make it harder for e-mail accounts to get hijacked and easier for victims to recover them if that happens.

About fucking time if you ask me!
Read more: http://news.cnet.com

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Security firms blast Microsoft for free antivirus offer

Microsoft Security Essentials is being offered as a free download via the Microsoft Update service.

(Credit: Microsoft)

Two security software makers are complaining about Microsoft using its update service to deliver its free antivirus software to Windows users who don't have such protection on their computers.
No, it's not 1998. And we're talking about allowing customers to choose whether they want the software, rather than bundling a particular browser--say Internet Explorer--on Windows.
Microsoft began making its Security Essentials software available to customers through its Microsoft Update service as an optional download on November 1 for U.S. customers and October 19 for U.K. customers. It offers the download only to customers who do not have an antivirus solution that is detectable by Microsoft's Action Center.
"Despite the broad availability of anti-malware software, we still find that many consumer and small business PCs remain unprotected," the company said in a statement to CNET on Monday. By offering the free antivirus download, "we make it easy for those who want and know they need protection, but for whatever reason have not gotten around to installing it. Now they can download the software when they perform their other system updates without having to search the Web or make a special trip to the store."
Who can argue with a company offering people a free download of security software if they want it? Trend Micro and Panda Security, that's who. Executives from both companies claim the move is anticompetitive because Microsoft is leveraging its update service that downloads software to millions of Windows computers to plant its own antivirus software on systems.
"This will end up in action taken, especially in Europe," Panda Chief Executive Juan Santana told CNET in an interview on Friday afternoon. He stopped short of saying that Panda would lodge an official complaint. "We will monitor the situation," he said.
"Commercializing Windows Update to distribute other software applications raises significant questions about unfair competition," Carol Carpenter, general manager of the consumer and small business group at Trend Micro, told Computerworld late last week. "Windows Update is a de facto extension of Windows, so to begin delivering software tied to updates has us concerned," she said. "Windows Update is not a choice for users, and we believe it should not be used this way."
Reached for comment today, Trend Micro spokesman Alan Wallace told CNET that the company had no further comment beyond what was already reported.

"There is still sensitivity to that issue in Europe even if there isn't in the U.S. If it looks like they're using that solution to bundle in essentially a security program that competes with other players, then there are concerns."

--Gartner analyst John Pescatore

Beyond the anticompetition concerns, Panda Security has other gripes. For instance, Pedro Bustamante, a senior research adviser at Panda, said Microsoft Security Essentials is insufficient protection compared with other free antivirus products that offer multiple layers of security such as Web filtering and behavior blocking. And from a global overall security perspective, Microsoft's plan is flawed because it will only get installed on computers with a valid license to run Windows and will thus leave millions of unlicensed computers unprotected, he wrote in a blog post today.
In addition, the move will create a "monoculture" with millions of computers running the same antivirus software. That means malicious hackers can infect all those machines if they are able to bypass only one antivirus program instead of having to get past multiple programs, Bustamante said.
"In summary, while it's commendable that Microsoft is trying to protect users, offering only 'their' basic MSE antivirus provides neither sufficient protection against today's threats nor does it solve the malware problem of millions upon millions of pirated PCs who will continue spreading viruses. In fact, it can easily achieve the contrary by making it easier for hackers to infect users," Bustamante wrote. "Microsoft should offer the complete portfolio of more advanced and secure alternatives of free antivirus products and time-limited versions of paid security suites, allowing users to choose any of them from the Optional Windows/Microsoft Update."
Several analysts dismissed Bustamante's arguments, as well as the antitrust concerns and said Microsoft's plan was a good thing for Internet security overall and offering any security protection was better than offering none at all.
"I think the vendors are simply complaining because Microsoft is the dominant vendor on PCs in the world," said Don Retallack, research vice president for systems management and security at Directions on Microsoft. "Other security vendors do offer a wider range of tools that go far beyond what Security Essentials provides...so I think there is still a place for other vendors and they're not being squeezed out."
"Microsoft is not bundling (its antivirus software) with the operating system. That's where the line typically is drawn with antitrust issues," said Neil MacDonald, a vice president and fellow at Gartner market research firm. "You could make an argument that it's in the best interest of consumers and the rest of the world to have more people protecting their machines. That's a good thing."
However, a colleague of his had a different take on the matter. Given Microsoft's history fighting antitrust claims, the company would be wise to avoid leveraging its Windows dominance to increase the market share for its other software or avoid even the mere appearance of doing so, said Gartner analyst John Pescatore.
"There is still sensitivity to that issue in Europe even if there isn't in the U.S. If it looks like they're using that solution to bundle in essentially a security program that competes with other players, then there are concerns," he said in an interview. "They still have huge competitive advantage."
Pescatore suggested that Microsoft add other antivirus software to its list of options for its update service. "They would be better off making sure they are helping people install any security software that's out there," he said. "I'm sure Panda and Trend Micro would be happy to participate."
A Microsoft spokeswoman did not immediately have comment to that suggestion or to the antitrust concerns.
Update Nov. 9 at 11:02 a.m. PST: Trend Micro provided an e-mail statement. "In principal, we welcome Microsoft or anyone else entering into the security market to provide more choice for customers--even if it's just baseline protection. As we mentioned previously, our concern is about any mechanism or tactic that may obscure that choice for consumers. While techies may recognize the difference between 'Microsoft Update' and 'Windows Update,' many consumers may not be familiar with this distinction or see any difference between optional and recommended updates from Microsoft."

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EU wants stronger online privacy rules

The European Union wants stronger rules that would give people more control over how their personal information is used by online companies like Google and Facebook.

The EU has directed its European Commission arm to draft proposals for new rules governing online data, looking to address a variety of questions: What happens to your personal data when you board a plane, open a bank account, or share photos online? How is this data used and by whom? How do you permanently delete profile information on social-networking Web sites? Can you transfer your contacts and photos to another service?
The new rules could require online companies to clearly explain to their users what personal information is collected, what happens to that information, and how people can modify or delete that information.
Both Google and Facebook have found themselves once again in hot water over privacy issues. Google admitted last month that it grabbed e-mails and passwords while taking photos for its Street View service. Facebook recently revealed that some of its app developers had been selling user information to a data broker.
Beyond addressing key questions and concerns about online data, the EC is also looking to set up a common set of rules that all 27 members of the EU would follow. The goal is to cut down on the current red tape and confusion that exists among businesses and law enforcement officials over online data collection.
Released yesterday, the EC's proposals (PDF) are expected to drive further discussion and debate on the topic of online data. These proposals will be the basis for the new rules that will be proposed next year to revise and modernize the EC's 1995 Data Protection Directive, which laid out regulations for protecting personal data and allowing the free flow of that data.
European citizens and other stakeholders have until January 15 of next year to comment on the new proposals.
"The protection of personal data is a fundamental right," EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding said in a statement. "To guarantee this right, we need clear and consistent data protection rules. We also need to bring our laws up to date with the challenges raised by new technologies and globalisation. The Commission will put forward legislation next year to strengthen individuals' rights while also removing red tape to ensure the free flow of data within the EU's Single Market."


Read more: http://news.cnet.com

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The sorry state of antivirus software

I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve come across an ‘expert’ telling some poor soul who’s had their PC trashed by malware that it was all their fault and that the problem could have been easily prevented by installing an antivirus package, and keeping that package up-to-date.
If only life were that simple …
My blogging buddy Ed Bott recently discovered a few malicious files lurking on his system despite having antivirus installed. Now Ed’s a clever guy, so if he can have nasties lurking on his system, that should act as a warning to us all.

Note: Let’s not turn this debate into a Windows vs. Mac vs Linux argument. I’m talking here specifically about security of the Windows platform.

Now, I don’t have any specifics on Ed’s setup, but I think that his story serves to demonstrate the sorry state of antivirus software. Let’s break it down:

I’ve had Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) installed on my main working PC for most of the past year. Mostly, I use it for real-time protection. I typically disable the scheduled virus scans on my PCs and instead occasionally do a manual scan just to confirm that nothing out of the ordinary has snuck through. Last month I decided to perform a scan using the Full option. Because I have 2.5 terabytes of hard disk space, with roughly 40% of it in use, I knew the scan would take a long time. So I scheduled it to run while I was out running errands.

First problem - scheduled virus scans take too long and hammer the system too heavily. Most antivirus solutions are designed with a “megabyte” mindset while many of us live in a “gigabyte” or even “terabyte” world. Part of the problem here is thinking of a system scan as a discrete thing that you run daily, weekly, monthly or whatever. This seems counter-intuitive to me and a better solution would be to have scanning done piecemeal during “screensaver” time. Priority could be given to certain file types but the goal would be to sweep the entire system on a regular basis.
I’ll come back to why this is important later.
But is relying on one antivirus solution good enough? No, it isn’t.

Only 17 of 43 antivirus products detected this as a threat. The full results page showed the identification, if any, for each product on the list. Microsoft, Symantec, Avast, and F-Secure were among the engines that flagged the file. But the majority didn’t.

Now, you can run multiple antivirus solutions on a system, but it’s not recommended because you can run into all sorts of issues. Antivirus software embeds itself pretty deep into a system, so you can end up with two programs fighting it out. Another problem is the system resources consumed by multiple security applications.
So what’s the solution? Well, we live in hard times and I’m pretty cheap, but what I’d like to see is a situation where the antivirus signatures are separate to the application itself so I could run a generic scanner and choose to subscribe to multiple signature services (a bit like how Virustotal.com works, only real-time). This way I could pick and choose the signatures used to scan my system. I like this idea of greater redundancy for two reasons:

• First, greater protection. Effectively I’d have more eyes looking at my files for nasties.
• Secondly, greater redundancy. Having multiple signatures scanning files would lower the risk of false-positives, or at least give me the option of investigating files that are picked up by only one set of signatures further.
   
  Let me go back to my first point again, and the need for regular system scans of ALL files. Let’s examine the chronology of Ed’s story:
  

  I’ve had Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) installed on my main working PC for most of the past year.
  …
  … occasionally do a manual scan just to confirm that nothing out of the ordinary has snuck through.
  …
  Last month I decided to perform a scan using the Full option.
  …
  According to the scan results, this threat was first identified in definition 1.85.1774.0, which was released by Microsoft on July 9, 2010.

  So, unless I’m missing something, Ed has had MSE installed on the system for “most of the past year.” He admits to running occasional scans, and since the threat identified was added to MSE on July 9, 2010, I assume that Ed must have acquired this nasty before this date and has not run a full scan since. Moral of the story - just because something gets past your antivirus scanner today, don’t assume that it’s clean.
  Now, given the information that Ed has supplied, it’s pretty clear that his system was immune to the malware on his system because, being a smart guy, Ed updates his system. But it goes to show how malware can creep onto a system and lurk despite having security software installed.
  Bottom line, antivirus software as a whole is in a sorry state and it’s failing to provide even experienced customers with the sort of security they need (and deserve). The widespread availability of free antivirus software might help reinvigorate the security industry and make them rethink how security should be done, rather than put more effort into generating hype.
  
  was originaly posted on http://www.zdnet.com
   

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Microsoft vs. McAfee: How free antivirus outperformed paid

How effective is free antivirus software? I had a chance to see a real, in-the-wild example just this month, and the results were, to put it mildly, unexpected. The bottom line? Microsoft’s free antivirus solution found and removed a threat that two well-known paid products missed. Here are the details. [Update: After I publlished this post, a second example appeared, courtesy of a rogue commenter in the Talkback section. See the results at the end of this post.]
I’ve had Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) installed on my main working PC for most of the past year. Mostly, I use it for real-time protection. I typically disable the scheduled virus scans on my PCs and instead occasionally do a manual scan just to confirm that nothing out of the ordinary has snuck through. Last month I decided to perform a scan using the Full option. Because I have 2.5 terabytes of hard disk space, with roughly 40% of it in use, I knew the scan would take a long time. So I scheduled it to run while I was out running errands.
When I came back, here’s a snippet of what I found:

MSE had detected several files files that it considered malicious. One was a rigged PDF file (not shown here). The other was a single file in the Java cache folder on this system that contained three separate exploits. Using the information in the MSE history pane, I found the file and uploaded it to Virustotal.com, which is a free service that allows you to scan a suspicious file using 43 separate antivirus engines. The file, identified by a unique hash, had already been analyzed, so I got the results immediately:

Only 17 of 43 antivirus products detected this as a threat. The full results page showed the identification, if any, for each product on the list. Microsoft, Symantec, Avast, and F-Secure were among the engines that flagged the file. But the majority didn’t. That means one of two things. Either the file was a false positive, and I was about to delete something harmless and perhaps even necessary. Or it was real, and most AV programs were missing it.
To get to the bottom of the issue, I sent e-mail messages to contacts at three companies. I asked Microsoft to reanalyze the file and confirm that it was indeed malicious. I also asked McAfee and Sunbelt to look at the file; both of them had reported the file as clean, according to VirusTotal.
Microsoft had two analysts review the file. Here’s a portion of their response:

We have confirmed that the threat detection you received from Microsoft Security Essentials is indeed valid. There were more than 3.5 million reported CVE-2008-5353 attacks in Q3 2010, and Java vulnerability exploitations like these, while once a rare occurrence, have spiked this year. … [T]his exact file is something we have seen in the wild more than 40,000 times in the past six months.
This October 18 post by Holly Stewart on the Microsoft Malware Protection Center blog provides useful additional detail on why these types of attacks can be challenging for IDS/IPS vendors, as well as the steps customers should take to ensure that they are protected.

According to the scan results, this threat was first identified in definition 1.85.1774.0, which was released by Microsoft on July 9, 2010.
McAfee responded quickly to my e-mail as well. A spokesperson sent this reply:

Our Labs team took a look at the file you referenced and it is malicious. We are in the process of developing new heuristics to combat the effects from a stream of recent malicious JAR files more proactively, the file corresponding with the hash you mentioned is in the queue.

Sunbelt’s Malware Response Manager, Dodi Glenn, reported that this file was in the company’s repository and submitted it for detailed analysis. Here are the results:

This file contains a malicious java.class … that exploits the CVE-2008-5353 vulnerability. … We are currently testing our updated detection for this exploit and expect to release it shortly.

The good news is that my system wasn’t compromised in any way. The exploit in question was blocked by a Java update that I had installed last year. Likewise, the booby-trapped PDF file (which all of the antivirus programs detected) relied on the user having a very outdated version of Adobe Reader installed, and mine was fully up-to-date.
Last week, when I wrote about Microsoft’s decision to expand its distribution of Microsoft Security Essentials via Microsoft Update, McAfee complained that free software simply isn’t as good as its paid protection. Here’s what a spokesperson told me:

McAfee wants consumers to be safe online. Options that provide an elementary level of security are free products including Microsoft Security Essentials, however these mostly rely on traditional protection mechanisms.  McAfee products offer not only more features but most importantly, McAfee products offer real-time protection using cloud-based Global Threat Intelligence to combat even the most sophisticated threats thus ensuring complete protection and peace of mind.

In this case, at least, that protection wasn’t as complete as the free Microsoft product it was comparing itself to.
As an aside, it’s worth noting that criticizing Microsoft Security Essentials because it’s free misses an important point. MSE uses the same scanning engine and definitions as its enterprise-grade Forefront product, which is most assuredly not free.
One certainly shouldn’t draw definitive conclusions from a single anecdotal example, but as this case shows, the gap between antivirus products isn’t as simple as free versus paid, and even the best and brightest researchers can miss a threat.
Update 15-Nov 7:00AM PST: Another real world example just dropped into my lap. A commenter in the Talkback section of this thread posted a link to a news website claiming to offer a video of the full Sunbelt report. (The malicious comment and link were deleted almost immediately.) Visiting that page (which is hosted on a legitimate website that has clearly been compromised) displayed a video window with the message “Sorry, this video cannot be played. Problem: plugin is not found.” It then helpfully included a “Download plugin” link. Here’s what the browser displayed:

Of course, this is one of the oldest tricks in the malware book. The link leads to an executable file, which I downloaded (but did not execute) on a system that was not running any antivirus software and submitted to Virustotal.com. The result? 15/43 scanning engines detected it as malware. Microsoft Security Essentials was one of them. It identified the file as TrojanDownloader:Win32/Waledac.C, which was originally included in definition file 1.63.2017.0, released on August 27, 2009. The McAfee Gateway edition identified it as a suspicious file (and thus would have blocked it). McAfee’s consumer product line did not detect the threat at all.

To its credit, Sunbelt successfully identified this threat. On the list of companies that missed it? Symantec, Avast, and TrendMicro.

Blog was posted on http://www.zdnet.com/blog

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apologies : real life

i have to apologise but i have to much stuff going on in my life right now so i have not been able to produce any new content on the blog for the past days, i hope i get more time over the weekend

Beezie

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Update your programms

Just a little reminder for the normal Pc user
Take the time tonight and update your software on your computer, Ativirus programs and windows are the most important ones, just used the whole day myself to update what i had. It takes time but its something you NEED TO DO at least once a week

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Study: 92% of U.S. 2-year-olds have online record

There has been a lot of concern about young people posting too much information about themselves online, but a study commissioned by security company AVG found that 92 percent of U.S. children have some type of online presence by the time they are 2 years old. A third of U.S. mothers posted pictures of newborns, and 34 percent of U.S. moms said they had posted sonograms of their as-yet unborn child.
The study, conducted by Research Now, surveyed 2,200 mothers with young children in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan during the week of September 27. American parents, according to the study, are more likely to share baby pictures and information online than parents from other countries in the survey. Seventy-three percent of parents in the United Kingdom, Spain, France, Germany, and Italy said they were willing to share images of their infants.
According to the study, the average "digital birth" of children worldwide happens at about six months, with a third of children having photos of them posted online within two weeks of birth.
AVG Chief Executive J.R. Smith acknowledged that "it's completely understandable why proud parents would want to upload and share images of very young children with friends and families," but he urged parents to remember that they are "creating a digital history for a human being that will follow him or her for the rest of their life."
Smith makes a good point. I don't worry about putting a child in danger simply by sharing his or her photos online, but I do think that it's important for parents to consider that their babies will someday turn into preteens and teens who might have some issues with their baby pictures floating around the Web. (See Lance Whitney's Q&A with Smith.) Also, be careful about what types of pictures you post. Photos that may be appropriate for family viewing could be inappropriate, if shared with the general public.
AVG's research also reinforces the need for parents to think about the privacy settings on their social-networking profiles, including not just Facebook but other sites, such as Flickr, Picasa, and YouTube. All of these sites have privacy settings that can limit who can see what. Facebook allows members to control who has access to photos and other shared media on a post-by-post basis.
Having said that, there is always the possibility that someone with access can copy, store, or forward anything you post.

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Study: 359 Android code flaws pose security risks Read more

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Coverity tallied various flaws in Android 2.2 that can lead to security vulnerabilities.

(Credit: Coverity)

Coverity, a company with tools to check for programming problems that pose security risks, has found 359 of them in a scan of the Android source code.
There are 88 high-risk problems and 271 medium-risk problems in the source code underlying the Android kernel used in HTC's Incredible phone, the company said Tuesday. Android uses the Linux kernel, but the Android-specific components have a higher defect rate than mainstream Linux, Coverity said.
Some good news for Google, though, is that the defect rate is still lower than the industry average of one defect per 1,000 lines of code. Specifically, Android's kernel was less than half of that--0.47 defects per 1,000 lines, Coverity said.
Some bad news is that the Android-specific code had more problems.
"We found that the Android-specific files had a higher defect density (0.78 defects/kloc) than any other component in the system (the other components consist mostly of files unmodified from a Linux kernel). In addition, the Android-specific files had more high-risk defects than any other component," Coverity said in the report.

The number and proportion of defects are higher in Android-specific areas of the Linux kernel, according to Coverity.

(Credit: Coverity)

One issue with Android, along with many other open-source projects with dispersed participation, is pinning down just whose job it is to fix a problem.
"Accountability for Android software integrity is fragmented," Coverity said in its report. "The problem is no different with Android than what we see across open source. Android is based on Linux, which has thousands of contributors. Compound that with the Android developers from Google, the contributors to Android from the larger development community, and OEMs [original equipment manufacturers such as phone makers] that supply components for specific configurations of Android to support different types of devices and the lines of accountability are quickly blurred."

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Controlling where Facebook Places puts you

Users can disable the ability of friends to check them into places.

(Credit: Facebook)

In designing its new Places geolocation service, Facebook seems to have learned from its past privacy blunders. The new service has multiple layers of privacy control, but as with other aspects of Facebook privacy, users need to put some thought about whether and how they want to disclose their location. Facebook has also created an extra level of privacy for its under-18 users, prohibiting them from displaying their location to anyone other than their friends.
The first thing to know about Places is that it's not fully automatic. You have to "check in" or be tagged at a location for Facebook to display where you are. Because location is a particularly sensitive issue, Facebook, by default, shows only your location to people designated as friends, even if you have more open privacy settings for posts or other types of information.
Check-in vs. tagging
The difference between being checked-in and being tagged can be confusing. If you're checked-in by yourself or by a friend, your presence at the location is visible to anyone that either you or your friend allows, based on your friend's and your privacy settings. Your name will show up on the location's Places page, if there is one, so everyone at the location can see that you're there. If you are tagged by a friend, your presence at the location is seen by your friends or whoever they allow to see their posts, subject to their (not your) privacy settings.
You can be outed, if you don't disable friends' ability to check you in
It's also important to know that once you've used the service and agreed to its terms, any Facebook friend of yours can check you in to a location that displays that you are there, just as if you had checked yourself in.
Even if you don't agree to those terms, and even if you've never used Places or don't even own a mobile phone, any Facebook friend can tag you as being at the location, and who sees that information is subject to that person's privacy settings, not your privacy settings.
Facebook representatives are quick to point out that this is the same as with any form of tagging, such as in status messages and photos. It has long been possible for a Facebook friend to type "@LarryMagid is with me at Anotnio's Nut House." The difference with Places is that it makes it a lot easier, and you no longer have to type in the location because Places knows where you are.

You can opt out of being checked in or tagged
Although the privacy settings don't say this, I was told by a Facebook employee that if you disable the ability of friends to check you into Places, that also disables the ability for anyone to use Places to tag you as being at a location. Even if someone does tag you, you can always untag yourself, but between the time you're tagged and the time you untag yourself, people may be aware that you are at the location.
For a friend to tag you, that person must be checked into the same location, so it's not possible to "out" someone for being in a place that you're not checked into as well. You get a push notification, if someone has checked you in or tagged you, but if you're in a noisy bar and don't check your cell phone, you might not know it right away.

Facebook's privacy settings enable users to customize who sees where you are.

(Credit: Facebook)

Options on who can see where you are
Adults have the option to share their location with a wider group of people, including "friends of friends" or "everyone," but you can also further restrict who can see your location. However, if you allow Facebook to include you in Places' "Here Now" display, your presence at a location might show up on that establishment's Places page.
A Facebook representative said "seeing the people checked in to a location is consistent with the experience of seeing people there in real life." You can, however, opt out of participating in "Here Now" via your privacy settings.
Special provisions for "minors" (under 18)
If a Facebook user is registered as under 18, the following restrictions are in place:

• Only friends will see that the minor is checked in. There isn't even an option to extend that beyond Friends
• If someone tags a minor at a location, the minor's name will only be shown to the minor's friends
• A minor's name will not be seen on a place's "Here Now" page by anyone other than the minor's friends.

How to configure settings
Facebook members should consider configuring privacy settings in advance to prevent any unwanted disclosure of your location. To control who can see the places you've checked in, click on Account in the upper-right corner, and then on Privacy Settings. Then select "Customize settings."
To the right of where it says "Places I check in," it probably has the default setting of Friends Only. You can change that by selecting another option, including Customize, which lets you further limit who can see your location to specific people, lists of people, or even "just me." You can also opt out of "Here now" by unchecking "Enable."
Below the "Things I share" section is a section called "Things others share," and this is where you can disable "Friend can check me into places."
Location-sharing tips:
Know who can see your location: You may have Facebook "friends" who aren't really close friends, but even if they are, you might not want them to know where you are.
Think about disabling the ability for others to "check you in": If you don't want to give others the ability to check you in, now is a good time to disable that option.
Even if you don't use Places, remember that you can be tagged, unless you opt out. If you are concerned about your friends' ability to use Places to reveal your presence at a location, configure your privacy settings to disable "Friends can check me into places." That also disables their ability to use Places to tag you.
Consider using lists to limit who can see your location: You don't have to stick with Facebook's default that allows all your friends to see where you are when you check in to a location. Consider creating a "list" of friends with whom you wish to share your location. You might have different lists, depending on location. For example, you could have "drinking buddies" who get to know which bars you're in and "work friends" who can see if you're visiting certain business-appropriate locations.
Ask before you tag: It's a good idea to talk with your friends before you tag them at a location. Being comfortable about your friends knowing that you're there doesn't necessarily mean that your friends feel the same way.
Revisit your settings: If you are allowing people to check you into places, consider changing those settings, if you are about to go to a place that you don't want others to know about. You can always change your settings temporarily and then change them back.
Talk with your kids about location services: Parents should discuss with their kids how they might use or avoid location-sharing services. Kids need to be reminded that "checking in" reveals their location to everyone on their friends list, including people they might not wish to share their location with.
Disclosure: Facebook provides financial support to ConnectSafely.org, a nonprofit Internet safety organization where I serve as co-director. ConnectSafely also serves on Facebook's Safety Advisory Board, which was briefed on Places in advance of the announcement and advised the company on safety features for minors.
ConnectSafely co-director Anne Collier posted more Places safety advice for parents.

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Supreme Court weighs law on violent video games

Over the last decade or two, the U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly extended the First Amendment's formidable legal shield to the Web.
In 1997, the justices tossed out the Communications Decency Act, saying Congress could not outlaw making "indecent" material available on the Internet. Last year, the law's benighted successor met the same fate, as did a law targeting animal cruelty videos that the court rejected in April.
Today the Supreme Court is scheduled to discuss during oral arguments whether to grant video games the same favored kind of laissez-faire treatment.
Unlike those other cases, the law in question is a California statute, not one enacted by Congress. But it's received a flurry of attention from all around the country, with everyone from conservative advocacy groups and pediatric associations saying that the law is constitutional to Microsoft, Activision Blizzard, the Motion Picture Association, and payment-processor Vindicia arguing it is not.
Sean Bersell, vice president of public policy for the Entertainment Merchants Association, which sued to overturn the California law, told CNET that upholding the California law would "open the floodgates to a whole host of pernicious legislation" around the country.
"We hope the justices will again reaffirm their commitment to the First Amendment," Bersell said.
In April, the justices agreed to review a California law that a federal appeals court struck down in February 2009, saying at the time that even children and teenagers enjoy free speech rights that are protected by the First Amendment.
California is one of a string of states that have enacted similar laws restricting minors' rights to buy violent video games--legislation that so far has been uniformly rejected by the courts. Laws in Illinois and Michigan were blocked by federal judges on First Amendment grounds in 2005, and earlier laws in Indianapolis and Missouri's St. Louis County were also shot down.

A screenshot from Postal 2 for PCs.

 

 

The California law slaps anyone who sells or rents a "violent video game" to a minor with a $1,000 fine. That's defined as a game in which the player has the option of "killing, maiming, dismembering, or sexually assaulting an image of a human being" in offensive ways. Parents or guardians are still permitted to buy those games for minors.
The U.S. Supreme Court has not squarely addressed this topic, but it has said in other cases that even minors have some free-expression rights.
James Steyer, president of Common Sense Media, which helped to draft the California law, called it "a very fair and First Amendment-friendly effort to try to limit the sales of ultraviolent video games to minors."
"From the standpoint of balancing the best interests of kids with the best interests of the First Amendment, this is a reasonable case," he said.
California-based Activision Blizzard, whose portfolio includes the Call of Duty series and Guitar Hero, has told the court that the existing Entertainment Software Rating Board rating is sufficient to give parents enough information about the content of video games. The rating symbols include E (suitable for early childhood) to T (ages 13 and over), M (17 and over), and A (adults only).
The political fault lines exposed by this case have been difficult to predict in advance. Washington state, Georgia, Utah, South Carolina, and six other states filed a brief saying "quick fixes such as the California statute cause more practical and constitutional problems, in expanding unneeded regulatory activity and hindering law enforcement, than they solve."
But 11 states, including Texas and Michigan, separately argued that governments "may--consistent with the First Amendment and this court's longstanding precedents--prevent minors from buying or renting without parental approval" certain types of violent video games. (The conservative Eagle Forum, founded by Phyllis Schlafly, goes even further and says that video games "do not constitute free speech" at all.)
Although California's law doesn't target a specific game by name, lawyers for the state have singled out Postal 2, which allows players to go on murderous rampages, by name. (The Federal Trade Commission has separately targeted the makers of "Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas" for including sexually explicit content.)
The pro-regulation states also cite Postal 2, saying that the game encourages players to "burn people alive with gasoline or napalm," "decapitate people with shovels and have dogs fetch their severed heads," and "kill bald, unshaven men wearing pink dresses."

California attorney general and gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown, a Democrat, has said the state should be able to place "reasonable restrictions on the distribution of extremely violent material to children."
The Entertainment Software Association, a Washington, D.C.-based trade group that filed many of the lawsuits and has posted many of the legal documents online, says it thinks the justices will agree with the lower courts.
"We're hopeful that the court will uphold the lower court's ruling," said ESA spokesman Dan Hewitt. It's important for video game players to sign up for the Video Game Voters Network, he added. (The VGVN is currently organizing a mail-in protest against state Sen. Leland Yee, a Democrat who represents part of San Francisco and sponsored the California law.)
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the law in October 2005, but a federal judge blocked (PDF) it from taking effect a few months later. The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that decision.
One reason why the case has attracted an unusual amount of attention is that the Supreme Court's recent rulings, including the Citizens United decision, have been generally pro-free speech. Unless the court wanted to nudge First Amendment law in a more restrictive direction, the thinking goes, there would be no reason for it to accept the case in the first place.
Another reason is the precedent set by this case, Schwarzenegger v. Entertainment Merchants Association, could have repercussions far beyond video game producers, gamers, and retailers.
Which is why groups as diverse as the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund and the Future of Music Coalition are siding with the video game industry. The coalition warns that if the California law is upheld, it "would lead inexorably to the enactment of new statutes prohibiting violent depictions or descriptions in other artistic media" as well.
Update 10:45 a.m. PT: Here's a report from SCOTUSblog saying that, based on the oral arguments, "the court appeared poised to nullify" California's law. The Wall Street Journal reported that "several justices suggested the law violated free-speech protections of the First Amendment." But CNN.com believes it's a closer call, with the justices appearing "genuinely torn as they heard oral arguments." (Unfortunately, I'm at a privacy conference in Canada today and couldn't be at the Supreme Court.)
Update 11:30 a.m. PT: The transcript (PDF) of the oral argument is online. It doesn't clearly show either side as prevailing, but it does seem like the justices reserved their sharper questions for Zackery Morazzini, a California deputy attorney general, and interrupted him more often. Justice Stephen Breyer seemed to be most inclined to view the law as constitutional, saying if asked whether a legislature could reasonably view video games as harmful, "the answer is yes." Morazzini did say that he believed Postal 2 to be covered by California's law, and Mortal Combat is "a candidate." And it was Justice Sonia Sotomayor who seemed to be the most conversant with video games, asking whether a video game showing a Vulcan "being maimed and tortured" would be covered by the act (answer: no) and whether an "android computer simulated person" would be covered by the act (answer: no). Justice Antonin Scalia was sharply critical of the law, but on more traditional grounds: saying that "it has never been understood that the freedom of speech did not include portrayals of violence."

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Man bites dog? Google sues the government

Google and the U.S. government are headed for a legal showdown, but on different sides of the courtroom than one might expect.
Eric Goldman, a law professor with Santa Clara University who closely follows the tech industry, spotted a lawsuit filed by Google against the federal government claiming that the U.S. Department of the Interior did not properly evaluate Google Apps when choosing a new Web-based document system. Google alleges that because the Interior Department specified that the system needed to be part of Microsoft's Business Productivity Online Suite, Google Apps never had a chance despite repeated attempts by Google to explain the product.
"Significantly, the SOW (statement of work) and even certain terminology were closely aligned with Microsoft's product literature for its Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, and Office Communications Online applications. This was because the DOI had defined its needs and requirements around the Microsoft products," Google wrote in its complaint.
Government agencies generally have to follow a complicated process to purchase products or services from technology companies, and Google has increasingly sought to position itself as an alternative to Microsoft's office software in companies and governments.
And, of course, the federal government and Google are no strangers when it comes to legal maneuverings. The most current dispute involves Google's proposed acquisition of ITA Software, but the list stretches back several years.
Updated 4:25 p.m. PDT: Google issued the following statement on its lawsuit:
"Google is a proponent of open competition on the Internet and in the technology sector in general. Here, a fair and open process could save US taxpayers tens of millions of dollars and result in better services. We're asking the Department of Interior to allow for a true competition when selecting its technology providers."
A copy of the complaint follows below:
Google v US Complaint

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Porn maker sues 7,098 alleged film pirates

n a move sure to outrage both file-traders on BitTorrent networks and legal watchdogs, a well-known pornographer has filed a federal copyright suit against 7,098 individuals.

(Credit: Axel Braun)

Axel Braun Productions filed the complaint Friday in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia, alleging that the defendants illegally shared the adult film "Batman XXX: A Porn Parody." The film was written and directed by Axel Braun and distributed by Vivid Entertainment, one of the country's best known porn studios.
In an interview about the suit with Xbiz Newswire, a publication that follows the adult-film industry, Braun made it clear he's prepared to take on the file-sharing crowd.
"F--- 'em all," Braun told Xbiz. "People don't realize that when you pirate a movie it hurts all of the people who work very hard to get it produced--from the cast to the production assistants to the makeup artists...So we are going after every one of them who pirates our content."
All the tough talk notwithstanding, the number of defendants named in a single lawsuit is likely to be condemned by leaders at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an advocacy group for Web users and tech companies. EFF leaders have taken a stand against grouping thousands of separate defendants in a single complaint. In an interview two weeks ago, Cindy Cohn, EFF's legal director, told CNET: "If you lump a bunch of people together, it's harder for each individual to have their case heard and evaluated on the merits."
The law firm of Dunlap, Grubb & Weaver resurrected the practice of suing individuals for copyright violations. The firm began filing complaints earlier this year on behalf of independent film studios, including Voltage Pictures, the production company that made the Academy Award winning film "The Hurt Locker."

The music industry undertook a similar campaign from 2003 to 2008.
Several lawyers, including Ken Ford, who represents Braun in the "Batman" case, have adopted a similar strategy to Dunlap's and have filed suits on behalf of adult-filmmakers such as Third World Media and Larry Flynt, the founder of Hustler.
Up to now, attorneys replicating the Dunlap method start the process by gathering Internet Protocol addresses belonging to people who allegedly shared the movie files. The attorneys then file a complaint in federal court naming the defendants "John Does." A request is made of the court to issue subpoenas to each of the Doe's Internet service providers to obtain the accused persons' names and other information. The attorneys then offer those accused a chance to settle out of court.
If a person refuses to settle, then conceivably the attorneys representing the copyright owners will sue, although that has yet to happen. Cohn and other critics of this approach say they doubt the attorneys will want to spend the money on potentially drawn-out litigation. Ford told CNET last month that he isn't bluffing and will sue.

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The unvarnished truth about unsecured Wi-Fi

Chances are you don't leave your front door unlocked. And you shouldn't leave your Wi-Fi network unsecured either.
Many of you may have heard this before, but many still seem to not be doing anything about it. You should. Here's why. With a US$50 wireless antenna and the right software a criminal hacker located outside your building as far as a mile away can capture passwords, e-mail messages, and any other data being transmitted over your network, and even decrypt data that is supposedly protected.
Someone could also join the network and launch attacks on your computer and any other devices using the network at that time. If file sharing has been left on or the personal firewall is misconfigured it's relatively easy to access the computer via an open Wi-Fi network. Someone could upload an executable program to a file on your hard drive that steals data or just leaves a back door for future access. And if you are using the network to connect to a corporate network through a VPN (virtual private network) an attacker can get into the corporate system too.
"The most dangerous thing is a direct attack," Don Bailey, a security consultant at iSec Partners who is also an expert on telecommunications snooping, told CNET. "The threat is not only that your traffic can be sniffed, but that an attacker can get access to all your data and connections on your computer, even those supposedly secured by SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) and TLS (Transport Layer Security) encryption."
Unsecured Wi-Fi networks can be attractive for scammers to launch spam and virus attacks because the attack would be tracked back to the Wi-Fi network but not to the computer of the criminal who exploited the open network.
"Someone could be using your wireless network, whether it's a neighbor or a customer, and you are taking on the liability of that person's action," Bailey said. "If they do something illegal, like break into computers, those actions are going to come back to your hot spot and the federal authorities are going to hassle you."
Even though many Wi-Fi routers come with WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) enabled by default, a lot of people don't want to be bothered with setting up a password, despite the fact that you don't have to type it in every time you log on. The Wigle.net (Wireless Geographic Logging Engine) site shows that of 26.8 million Wi-Fi networks logged by volunteers who were "war driving"--driving around in cars and using laptops or PDAs to find wireless networks--49 percent were listed as secured with encryption and nearly 28 percent were shown to be not using encryption. (On the remaining 23 percent the security level was unknown.)
There is also an interactive map on Wigle.net where you can zoom in to see individual Wi-Fi networks and even the SSID (Service Set Identifier) numbers associated with individual wireless local area networks.
Not only should you not host an unsecured wireless network, but you should definitely be extra careful when using other people's open networks.
There is no good way to tell whether a hot spot is legitimate, like a Starbucks Wi-Fi network, or if it was set up by someone for malicious purposes. Even if you are on what appears to be a Starbucks network, there could be someone on the network who is spying on other users.
There are also instances of inadvertent fake hot spots. Some older Windows machines running XP create ad hoc networks called "Free Public WiFi," which do not connect you to the Internet but to the computer broadcasting that service. The hole that enables this has been patched, but affected computers that haven't had an operating system update are still vulnerable.
Whether you choose to trust hot spots, configure your device--laptop and smartphone--to connect to open Wi-Fi networks only with your approval and not automatically. Wi-Fi-enabled devices may automatically open themselves to sharing and connecting with other devices, so be sure to turn file sharing off when using Wi-Fi.
"The best thing to do is to stay off hot spots all together," Bailey said. "If you are going to use them, make sure you have a firewall and VPN technology."
This article was first posted as a blog post on CNET News.

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Facebook app developers sold user info

Facebook has revealed that a data broker has been buying identifying Facebook user information from app developers and as a result has placed some developers on a six-month suspension.
The announcement, which Facebook made last Friday afternoon on its developers blog, comes on the heels of the revelation that many popular Facebook apps were transmitting user IDs--which can be used to look up a users' names and, in some cases, the names of the app user's friends--to at least 25 advertising and data firms.
According to Facebook's developers blog:

As we examined the circumstances of inadvertent UID transfers, we discovered some instances where a data broker was paying developers for UIDs. While we determined that no private user data was sold and confirmed that transfer of these UIDs did not give access to any private data, this violation of our policy is something we take seriously. As such, we are taking action against these developers by instituting a 6-month full moratorium on their access to Facebook communication channels, and we will require these developers to submit their data practices to an audit in the future to confirm that they are in compliance with our policies. This impacts fewer than a dozen, mostly small developers, none of which are in the top 10 applications on Facebook Platform.

Facebook did not identify the data broker that was purchasing user information but did say it had reached an agreement with Rapleaf, a San Francisco-based data aggregation company that was previously identified as receiving some user information. Facebook said that Rapleaf has agreed to delete all user ID information in its possession and agreed not to conduct any further activities on the social network. The blog post did not indicate whether Rapleaf was the broker involved in the sale of user information, and Rapleaf representatives did not immediately return a request for comment.
In announcing the suspensions, Facebook said it "never sold and will never sell user information" and has a "zero tolerance for data brokers because they undermine the value that users have come to expect from Facebook".
The social networking giant has blamed the issue on "referrer URLs", which tell sites which Web sites directed Internet users to sites, and proposed a technical solution to prevent future transfers. Facebook also announced it had modified its policy to require developers to use the anonymous identifiers when working with ad networks.
This article was first published as a blog post on CNET News.

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Nurses and the profession they represent: A chase that concern`s us all

Heya
you did read probably the title and wonder what it has to do with computers, the truth is that it does not have that this is one of the few times I will deviate from the main theme for the rest of the blog,
Today I have visited Norway `s largest Internet newspaper, and at the bottom of the page was a link to a post made by a nurse, Where she talks briefly about her profession, it is a subject that affects us all at some point in our life.
You can wake up one day that work just like everyone else, but it may soon prove to be one of your worst days for many reasons, But what many take for granted are the people who are there for you that day you end up in health care, The Angles in White, which you can call them is often a forgotten profession for most of us. You can see them mostly on the news to help an old lady walking chair but is often forgotten how low their salaries are, and how much they have to do during the day and how many hours they work in a week.

They are there for you the day you really need them, and they will be there the day you leave them, the Angels in White's job to make sure you have it as good as you can at the moment, they give you medication or they give you food, job dealing with all aspects of life as a whole, they do not have a high salary or normal business hours and often work overtime. Everything to ensure you are doing well, The original post is Norwegian, but I'll translate it here so you all can read it
The original link is here


Care is not appreciated 
When you read in various media, there is little doubt that the need for trained manpower in the health sector will only get bigger and bigger. For years we heard about an "old wave" that allegedly were to hit us like a tsunami. The last I heard was that this wave would now change its name to "old flower". I personally am not so concerned with what we call it, but is rather concerned with the facts. The facts are that the need for trained personnel in the sector will increase in future years.

I work as a nurse at a suitably large hospitals. I'm happy in my job and I am glad that I have taken this training.

The problem is when I talk with people who do not know what to get. When they ask what I like to think that they are considering to start nursing. Based on that I enjoy the job, and I am glad that I have the education I have, so would the answer to such questions is simple. But now they are not. I consistently advise people to start on nursing education ..

Many think this alone is related to the "low" wages we have as nurses, but it's not here you can find my justification. Of course I could have liked more money into the account on 12 of each month, but I think that if you are interested in wealth as has never considered this profession anyway. It makes me so strongly discourages the profession is that in this case is left with a "bachelor" in the low staffing, high time pressure and responsibility be able to imagine ....

When we nurses are at work there is a varying number of patients who trust hundred percent for us. They add just the lives in our hands. We have a responsibility to ensure they get the medicines they need, we care for them, we make sure that all measurements are acceptable and we must be alert to detect changes and developments in the clinical picture. No doctor who stands by the bed when my patients are poor. It is I, the nurse, who stands there. Of course I told the doctor, and it is of course the doctor has the ultimate responsibility, but you could try to stand and hold a very sick patient in his hand while we should think that "oh, it's certainly not my responsibility that this is going well. " This is not one of Norway's nurses screwed together.

We have been seen as a group that always cries out our lament, but is it really so strange? If you ask patients who are important people for them, during such a crisis as an illness is, so is the doctor and nurse they refer. It is almost not a day that one or more patients a nurse refers to the group as "angels in white". When the patient in pain is what we coming with pain killers and when they need someone to talk to it is we who pops up.

For this job, appreciate the state's low funding.

Of course, our purse should be bigger, but the important thing for nurses, I think that they want more jobs and a slightly quieter life. Yes we are certainly lazy, but I'd like to have time to eat my lunch, not to mention to go to the bathroom when I pee penetrated. It happens every so often that I or my colleagues simply do not have time to go to the toilet. We are extremely concerned about what comes out of our patients, but we have not even able to squeeze out the precious drops.

 I'd like and set the economist or the engineer who found that they did not go to the toilet ..

A bit of the reason I'm so skeptical of the profession is because I'm not sure what happens the day I accidentally make a great and fatal mistake. I have often been at work for six hours and I've gotten into my food or drink. Maybe I'm completely in a daze because I am so pee penetrated. I went home from work the night before at 22 and I got up at 06 to reach jobs just this day. Maybe "chunks" and I give wrong medicine to the wrong patient. Maybe I do not see the signs that day that the patient is on my way into the pulmonary edema.

 

What happens then?

 

If the employer would be quickly on hand and say: 

 

"Like this, we just expect us because we are manning the way we do. We think it's okay that some human lives are lost every year because we save money ".

 Then it would be okay. Or had it? No one with Norwegian authorization Nurse will think that this is okay. But then, at least the responsibility is placed where it belongs. As it is today I'm afraid the full responsibility will remain on the poor nurse

Some will obviously say that we must be better to just bring us the breaks we are entitled to, but I want to tell them that when there are people talking about this is not so easy. The same as throwing such comments to me would probably not have been very happy if it was their relatives who remained a half-hour in excruciating pain waiting for the painkillers because the nurse is entitled to a half-hour lunch break. I understand that it is possible to grant himself all sorts of breaks when working with numbers or other cold thing, but did not come and tell me that this is possible when to deal with a face, a name, perhaps a grandmother or perhaps a child .

No more hands in the elderly is needed. It is not me advocating for the profession, but perhaps the state has some good ideas. I'll do my for my patients and colleagues are doing well, but it will be up to Anne Grethe to address health policy (she earns after all, probably five times as much as me).


Now Please take a moment and think about The Angels in White


this was translated with http://translate.reference.com/ 

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long day

Heya it have been a very long day with lots of stuff to do for me so i will hold the updates to tomorrow since i don`t have an opportunity to do it tonight, have a good evening and take care, come back tomorrow !

Beezie

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