Internet | San Diego-Tech

July 4, 2010
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Google Chrome Fixes Security

Category : Computer Repair , Computer Security , Google , Internet , San Diego Computer Repair

The stable version of Google Chrome received multiple security fixes this week, including four rated as “high,” while the developer’s version adopted an interface tweak to create more room for extension icons.

Google Chrome dev 6.0.453.1 for Windows, Mac, and Linux consolidates the former page control menu into the customization menu that’s accessible from the wrench icon. This clears space on the toolbar for an extra extension icon, as well as giving a stronger visual presence to the cut, copy, and paste options, page zoom controls, and the full screen view toggle. Other minor changes to Chrome dev for Windows include showing previews of images when dragging them, and printing vectors instead of pixels for the built-in PDF plug-in.

The changelog for Chrome dev indicates only that Mac developers continue to work on feature parity, while the Linux version of dev received more substantial changes. These include experimental password-storing support for gnome-keyring and kwallet, though Google advises users to read a post on how to safely test the feature. The PDF plug-in is now available to Linux users, though it’s not on by default. It must be activated in about:plugins.

Google Chrome stable 5.0.375.99 for Windows, Mac, and Linux is a security-fixing release, with four memory corruption repairs labeled “high.” There was also one medium-rated fix that addressed sandboxed iFrames, and four repairs ranked “low” that dealt with modal dialog crashes, print dialog annoyances, invalid image crashes, and a WebGL error. The changelog for Chrome stable also details which groups earned rewards for discovering security holes.

June 11, 2010
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Windows XP No Longer Installed on Netbooks

Category : Internet , San Diego Computer Repair

Before Windows 7 launched, there was a lot of consternation about when Microsoft planned to cut off the supply of Windows XP to netbook makers.

This week, Microsoft officials reminded customers and partners of that deadline date – October 22, 2010. As of that date, “OEMs will no longer be able to pre-install Windows XP Home on new netbook PCs,” Microsoft officials said. (Microsoft announced this cutoff date back in 2008, when Microsoft called netbooks ultra-low-cost PCs, or ULPCs)

There are still a number of XP-based netbooks for sale at retail. But the number of Windows 7 netbooks has been picking up since Windows 7 launched in October. According to NPD’s Retail Tracking Service, as of April 2010, 81 percent of netbooks sold at retail in the U.S. came with Windows 7 preinstalled (according to a new post on the Microsoft “Blogging Windows” site).

A year ago, there was considerable worry about the price Microsoft planned to charge PC makers for Windows 7. The company is believed to charge OEMs about $15 per copy for XP. The rumored price per copy of Windows 7 is closer to $50. (Microsoft officials won’t comment on the record about the exact price per copy the company charges OEMs for any version of Windows.) The thinking a year ago was that PC makers would have to pass that higher cost on to consumers. However, netbooks have stayed cheap. OEMs (and Microsoft) have been maintaining higher margins by selling more pricey form factors, like thin and lights. Windows 7 slates (when they come to market) might fall into this higher-margin category as well.

There also were concerns a year ago as to how well Windows 7 would run on netbooks. Would anything but the lowest end SKUs be too cumbersome to run on low-power processors and/or machines with smaller amounts of drive space? The answer has proven to be no to both. A number of users are running Windows 7 Ultimate — and not just Home or Home Premium — on their netbooks.

Meanwhile, one more Windows-related date reminder: July 13, 2010 is the date when Windows XP Service Pack (SP) 2 reaches the end of support. If you still want/need Microsoft support for XP, you should move to XP SP3 before that date. Extended support — which means paid support plus free security hotfixes — for XP SP3 ends in April 2014.

June 4, 2010
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Butt-Out FCC! Wireless Data Control

Category : Computer Security , Internet , San Diego Computer Repair

A big question these days for smartphone users is whether telecommunications providers will continue to offer “all you can eat” data plans or switch to charging by the megabyte. The more important issue–at least from the perspective of the public-policy community–is whether the Federal Communications Commission will have a say in the matter. And recent, seemingly contradictory initiatives by the regulators provide good reasons to believe that the FCC should get out of the way.

In 2007, Comcast, the giant cable company and Internet service provider, faced a marketing problem. A relatively small number of subscribers were hogging huge swaths of bandwidth, as they traded movies and music with others. (Some of the exchange was legal, some of it probably not.) Comcast responded by limiting upload speeds for customers using peer-to-peer networks.

After an investigative reporter from the Associated Press caught the company blocking a transfer of the King James Bible using BitTorrent (leading one blogger to ask, “Why does Comcast hate Jesus?” a couple of advocacy groups, Free Press and Public Knowledge, filed a complaint with the FCC. The agency ordered Comcast to stop.

Three years later, in Comcast v. FCC (PDF), a federal appellate court reversed the FCC’s order. But the court simply ruled that the FCC had overstepped its jurisdiction; it never addressed the legality of Comcast’s behavior.
The irony, of course, is that Comcast ran afoul of the FCC, in part, for failing to use tiered pricing to ration bandwidth.

Comcast, it’s worth noting, could have dealt with its peer-to-peer problem by switching to a pricing model that charged according to use. But the company feared that customers were wed to salad-bar-style pricing and would bolt at the change. Thus, apparently for competitive reasons, Comcast chose instead to block the offending traffic.

Now we can see why. Verizon, which is about to roll out its version of 4G high-speed wireless-data service, says it is planning to charge according to use. Verizon is worried that 4G will make it so convenient to move huge video files over wireless links that it would face a Comcast-like problem, if it didn’t charge by the bucket of data.

Meanwhile, AT&T has beaten Verizon to the punch, announcing that new iPhone customers will pay by the megabyte. (Existing customers with all-you-can-eat plans will be allowed to keep them.)

Verizon’s admission immediately brought forth criticism from the blogosphere. And the FCC wasn’t far behind: it is already preparing new regulations to prevent “bill shock”–you know, when dad finds out that little Jennifer has downloaded every episode of “True Blood” and “The Vampire Diaries,” and stuck him with a $400 cell phone bill.

The irony, of course, is that Comcast ran afoul of the FCC, in part, for failing to use tiered pricing to ration bandwidth. Now, apparently, Verizon has caught the FCC’s attention by deciding to charge according to usage.

The FCC may do no more than require carriers to notify customers when they’ve exceed their allotted megabytes–something AT&T is apparently planning to do, even without a nudge from Washington. Still, we’d much prefer that the FCC stay out of data-service-pricing decisions altogether, letting the carriers adjust to changing technology and market conditions.

Telecommunications markets don’t always get it right. But we doubt that the regulators could do better.

May 30, 2010
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Human RFID Data Mining

Tags : Data Mining RFID

Category : Computer Security , Internet

Every other year, 2600: The Hacker Quarterly throws its Hackers on Planet Earth bash in NYC, and every year, they have elaborate, hackable badges. Lately, these have been OpenAMD RFID badges, whose in-built RFID tags can be hacked, tracked, monitored, spindled, folded and mutilated.

This year’s badge sports its own API, for your hacking pleasure:

PopoutConference attendees will see first hand where human tracking by commercial and government interests may be headed when they are offered an active RFID conference badge.

Participation in RFID tracking is completely voluntary. If you wish, you can request an electronics-free “unpopulated” badge at registration, or simply remove the battery from your “populated” RFID badge at any time. There will be a limited number of the full-featured badges, so register early to be guaranteed to receive one.

May 29, 2010
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Child Starves to Death while parents raised a Virtual child

Category : Internet , San Diego Computer Repair

Seoul, South Korea — A couple whose baby starved to death while they raised a virtual child in an online fantasy game was sentenced Friday, their defense attorney said.

Prosecutors at Suwon District Court had sought a five-year sentence for negligent homicide, but the court handed out a two-year sentence.

Sentence was suspended for the female defendant, Kim Yun-jeong, 25, who is expecting the couple’s daughter in August. Her partner, Kim Jae-beom, 41, will serve two years.

The unmarried couple’s defense attorney said he was satisfied with the sentence.

“This is the first legal case regarding Internet addiction in Korea,” said Kim Dong-young, a lawyer with the Korean Legal Aid Corp. “I am pleased that the female defendant’s Internet addiction was taken into consideration, and she was bailed.”

Three-month-old Kim Sa-rang died of malnutrition in September while her parents were engaged in 12-hour sessions of Prius Online. In the 3-D fantasy game, players nurture an online girl who gains magical powers as she grows.

Kim’s mother is a former factory worker while her father is a taxi and truck driver.

During their trial, the court heard that the toddler weighed 6.4 pounds (2.9 kgs) when she was born, but was only 5.5 pounds (2.5 kgs) at the time of her death.

The trial was in March, but sentencing was delayed after the court requested a psychological examination of the mother. Both defendants appeared contrite during the trial, with the mother frequently breaking down in tears.

Internet gaming is hugely popular in South Korea, with some 21,500 ‘PC Bangs’ — or Internet cafes — offering ultra-high speed Internet connections nationwide.

The case has highlighted the dark side of the nation’s Internet, an industry touted by South Korean officials as cutting edge. A public debate is under way in the nation over online privacy and regulating Internet rumors.

There is particular concern about gaming addiction and its effects on teenagers and those estranged from mainstream society. “Consequently, it comes as no surprise to me that two people who were disconnected from society in general found a common psychological space that kept them physically and socially divorced from reality,” said Tom Coyner, Seoul-based author of “Mastering Business in Korea.”

Suwon, the satellite town south of Seoul where the tragedy occurred, was named “Intelligent City of the Year” this month by a New York-based think-tank Intelligent Community Forum.

The honor was awarded because of the town’s investment in broadband infrastructure and its push to increase connection speeds to 1 gigabyte per second, according to reports.

May 28, 2010
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Apple Passes Microsoft in Worlds Largest Tech Company

Category : Google , Internet

What a long, strange trip it’s been.

Apple’s market capitalization officially passed Microsoft’s Wednesday afternoon, making the Cupertino, California, company — for the first time — the largest technology company in the world.

With a market cap of $241.5 billion versus Microsoft’s $239.5 billion, Apple also became the second-largest company on the S&P 500, according to Standard & Poor’s analyst Howard Silverblatt. At the moment, only Exxon Mobil is bigger.

Market cap is a measure of the total value of all the outstanding shares of a company, and it’s a proxy for what investors think the company is worth, taking into account future earnings and future growth. As such, it’s a measure of expectations, not reality: Apple’s annual revenue was $42.9 billion in the most recent fiscal year, versus Microsoft’s $58.4 billion. Both look puny next to Exxon Mobil’s $301.5 billion in annual revenue.

Market cap is also a fickle mistress, and fluctuates wildly depending on stock price, so Apple’s position as the king of the hill may be short lived.

But it’s a significant milestone for a company that looked like a has-been just one decade ago.

Ten years ago, Apple was all but written off by most expert commentators. An also-ran computer company that once dominated geeks’ hearts and minds with the Apple II and the Macintosh, Apple made serious missteps in the 1990s that relegated it to a tiny niche of the overall computer market, with market share in the low single digits. It was all but certain that its share would continue dwindling until the company faded away entirely, like Commodore, Atari, Tandy and dozens of other computer makers before it.

What the commentators didn’t count on was the string of hits Apple would deliver over the next 10 years. Founder Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1996 and removed then-CEO Gil Amelio in 1997, making himself interim CEO (and then eventually dropping the interim title).

Jobs then instituted what can now clearly been seen as a far-reaching strategy to consolidate and simplify Apple’s product line, while gradually leveraging the company’s strengths (ease of use, consumer-friendly branding, attractive design, and high margins) to expand into new areas of consumer technology.

Jobs also carefully created a new company culture, one that’s centered on innovation, control and secrecy. That approach has alienated many people — and runs counter to Silicon Valley received wisdom about the value of openness and sharing — but the proof is in the pudding. With a CEO of Jobs’ caliber, at least, that kind of top-down control works.

May 28, 2010
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Human Computer Virus!

Tags : anti virus Security

Category : Computer Security , Internet

The machines are going to take over.

And so a British scientist says he is the first man in the world to become infected with a computer virus. Dr. Mark Gasson from the University of Reading, who sadly does not have wild white hair, contaminated a computer chip which was then inserted under the skin in his hand.

The gizmo, which enables him to pass through security doors and activate his mobile phone, is a version of the ID chips used to tag your pet dog.

In trials, Dr. Gasson showed that the chip was able to pass on the computer virus to other control systems, though, hopefully, not including his nervous system. The doc thinks this has important implications for a future where medical devices such as pacemakers become more sophisticated and risk being contaminated by other human implants.

Gasson also predicts that implanted technology will spread: “This type of technology has been commercialized in the United States as a type of medical alert bracelet, so that if you’re found unconscious you can be scanned and your medical history brought up.”

We give it three weeks before Gasson begins to morph into a cyborg. Watch the video of the man looking human while you still can.

Watch the Human Computer Virus Video

May 4, 2010
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Stephen Hawking: “Time travel possible”

Tags : computer repair escondido Laptop Repair time travel

Category : Computer Security , Internet , San Diego Computer Repair

In his new documentary, Stephen Hawking offers the view that humans will be able to travel millions of years ahead of their own time.

May 4, 2010
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Internet Explorer Finally Fades Away!

Tags : Firefox Internet Explorer

Category : Computer Security , Downloads , Internet

Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser market share has dipped to a historic all-time-low in April, at under 60 percent, according the latest NetApplications statistics. Internet Explorer’s losses are at the expense of Mozilla’s Firefox and Google’s Chrome browser which continue to grow more popular.

For the first time since Internet Explorer 4 won over Netscape over 10 years ago, Microsoft’s browser has dropped in usage to 59.95 per cent market share in April this year. Internet Explorer had an 80 percent market share less than two years ago.

NetApplications browser market share statistics for April 2010.

According to the NetApplications statistics, Mozilla’s Firefox browser now has nearly 25 percent market share, and has been stationery for the last two months at around a quarter of the market. Firefox is still the largest threat to Internet Explorer‘s dominance.

Lower down in the NetApplication rankings was Google’s Chrome (6.7 percent), leading the WebKit-powered browsers, ahead of Apple’s Safari (4.7 percent). Chrome’s surge in use is impressive, considering it had zero percent share prior to 2009.

Opera, which has been recently in the news with their new Opera Mini browser for iPhone, commands only 2.3 percent of the market in the NetApplications statistics.

NetApplciation’s numbers are not too far off from StatCounter data either, which says that Internet Explorer has 56.5 percent of the market share, followed by Firefox with 31.3 per cent, then by Chrome and Safari with 5.3 and 3.6 percent respectively. StatCounter measures Opera at 2.2 percent.

Nielsen data on the other hand, via a BBC report, suggest that Internet Explorer has not lost much ground against its fellow rival browsers, and still commands 70 per cent of the market, while Mozilla has only 18 percent.

April 22, 2010
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How to fix your McAfee crippled computer

Tags : McAfee

Category : Computer Repair , Computer Security , Featured Posts , Google , Internet , Laptop Repair , Remote Support , San Diego Computer Repair

McAfee pushed out a malformed security patch early on Wednesday that wound up crippling computers running Windows XP, but there is a fix available. Users should note that it’s labor-intensive and must be applied manually to each computer. If you’re running Windows Vista or Windows 7, your computer shouldn’t be affected by the bad update.

As of 3 p.m. PDT, McAfee had yet to link on its front door to a fix for a false positive update with disastrous consequences that went out Wednesday morning.

If your computer is shutting down automatically, you must address that before you can fix anything else.

Step 1: Open a command prompt: Start menu, Run, then type cmd and hit Enter

Step 2: Type shutdown -a, which will prevent the shutdown from occurringMcAfee has revealed two fixes for the problem. Each one requires multiple steps, and can be confusing. If you’re not comfortable with advanced computer fixes, you should get help with this.For the first fix, go to the McAfee interface through the Start menu, and disable Access Protection and On-Access Scanner.

Step 1: Click Start, Programs, McAfee, and then VirusScan Console

Step 2: Right-click “Access Protection”

Step 3: Select “Disable”If you have Internet access, download the EXTRA.ZIP file provided by McAfee and unzip the EXTRA.DAT within. (Note that Nai.com is a safe site maintained by McAfee, for those who were wondering.) Once EXTRA.DAT has been extracted:

Step 1: Click Start, Run, then type services.msc and click “OK”

Step 2: Right-click the McAfee McShield service and select “Stop”

Step 3: Copy EXTRA.DAT to “Program FilesCommon FilesMcAfeeEngine”

Step 4: Then restart the McAfee McShield service by right-clicking on it and choosing “Start” from the context menu

Step 5: Re-enable access protection by going back to the VirusScan Console

Step 6: Right-click “Access Protection”

Step 7: Select “Enable”

Step 8: In the VirusScan Console, go to the Quarantine Manager Policy

Step 9: Click the Manager tab

Step 10: Right-click on each file in the Quarantine and choose “Restore”There is, of course, one massive hang-up with this McAfee-recommended solution: More likely than not, you don’t have Internet access on your McAfee-borked computer. In fact, it’s highly unlikely that you have access to much of anything, since deleting SVCHOST.EXE prevents key Windows 32-bit sub-system processes from functioning at all. To get the EXTRA.DAT on your computer, you’ll probably have to download it on an unaffected computer, then copy it to either a USB drive or a CD-ROM and use the command prompt to copy it over to your C: drive.The second workaround requires that you apply the EXTRA.DAT fix as detailed above before beginning and that you have access to a second, unaffected Windows XP computer. On that computer, go to C:WINDOWSsystem32 and copy SVCHOST.EXE to a network location or a removable media device such as a USB stick. Then copy the SVCHOST.EXE from the unaffected computer to the affected computer, and restart the McAfee-afflicted computer. There are details on applying the EXTRA.DAT via ePolicy Orchestrator at McAfee’s fix on Nai.com.Severe problems caused by buggy or false positive security updates are rare, but not unheard of. Recent instances include an update from Avast that marked hundreds of legitimate files as threats in December 2009, Computer Associates flagging a Windows system file as a virus in July 2009, and AVG marking ZoneAlarm as malware in October 2008.

McAfee did not immediately responded to a request for comment.

Updated at 5 p.m. PDT with additional information.

McAfee Executive Vice President of Technical Support and Customer Service Brian MacPherson has written a blog post and a follow-up commenting on the situation, although neither addresses how the bad update made it past quality-control testing in the first place.

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