Trend Micro has come up with an interesting solution. Titanium Internet Security. Anti Virus in the cloud. Specifically designed for low powered Netbooks it can be used on any Windows PC using XP Pro, Vista Family or Windows 7 Home,Premium and Starter. They say it will run on an XP machine with a 300MHz processor.

It’s $39.95 with a free trial

“There are, of course, complications, which leave the geolocation- and local-services start-up community with plenty of questions about how much of their data they will have to share with Facebook if they tap into the new APIs. And additionally, Facebook’s tendency to garner bad press with regard to privacy may make some of them wary of getting involved.”

Facebook needs to understand that it’s users are increasingly concerned about privacy on the web, and what Facebook does with their personal information.

As is Adobe’s practice, it revealed only the scantiest of details about the half-dozen bugs in the accompanying security advisory. Five of the six were labeled as ‘memory corruption’ vulnerabilities, while the sixth could potentially be used in a ‘click-jacking’ attack.

Adobe said it was unaware of any in-the-wild exploitation of the vulnerabilities.

One of the patches is a second try for Adobe.

The company tried to patch the CVE-2010-2188 flaw two months ago when it last updated Flash. However, about two weeks after that June 10 update, Adobe admitted its fix had failed. “

There is also a security update for Adobe Reader pending. Look out for that next week.

Over a few weeks, the BBC put together a crude game for a smartphone that also spied on the owner of the handset.

The application was built using standard parts from the software toolkits that developers use to create programs for handsets.”

Generally speaking apps from the official distribution channels should be safe. Be careful if you habitually go for pirated versions, the bad guys can easily modify someone else’s code to sniff out your personal data.
Jailbreakers should be similarly careful.

Reposted from Spalding Computers

It is still standing and every time I look at it, from inside or out, I’m reminded of how easy it is to simply throw money away on useless things. It currently houses an old sofa, bursting stuffing at the seams but so supremely comfortable it would be a sin to even think of throwing it away, a hideous IKEA uplighter too ugly to put anywhere else in the house, the Dyson, a pine box full of old VHS cassettes and a clothes airer.

The builders, for want of a better word, used copious quantities of mastic to glue various bits of the non stressed plastic structure together. Surprisingly this works quite well and as I say it’s not actually falling apart. However one fairly large bit of plastic architrave, forming the frame round the inside of the door, did fall off. About 3 years ago.
It’s been on my todo list since then but there is always something more interesting to do.

However I have to report, it’s fixed.
Browsing round one of the local cheapo cheapo shops where everything costs a pound or less, or a little bit more, I came across Hard as Nails. A chunky tube of super glue guaranteed to stick your granny to the sky, forever.
Well it actually promises to do away with those pesky nails when reattaching things like skirting boards to the wall and stuff like that, but you get the picture.

I can report the job is done. Beads of glue on the plastic architrave, press onto the wooden frame round the door, temporarily hold in place with some carefully positioned Gaffa tape and 24 hours later if you tried to pull it off you’d probably have the whole conservatory down on your head.

And it cost a quid. Recommended for people like me who just don’t get on with hammers, nails and screws.

Basically it describes the tussles within Microsoft between the developers of Internet Explorer 8 and other MS executives more interested in what the proposed new privacy settings within IE8 would do to Microsofts advertising revenues. Not to mention the fact they would seriously upset a lot of the online advertisers and tracking companies.
The result is you the user is shafted in favour of Microsoft’s bottom line.

Of special interest to users of IE8 are these 3 paragraphs. Particularly the second one.

“When Microsoft released the browser in its final form in March 2009, the privacy features were a lot different from what its planners had envisioned. Internet Explorer required the consumer to turn on the feature that blocks tracking by websites, called InPrivate Filtering. It wasn’t activated automatically.

What’s more, even if consumers turn the feature on, Microsoft designed the browser so InPrivate Filtering doesn’t stay on permanently. Users must activate the privacy setting every time they start up the browser.

Microsoft dropped another proposed feature, known as InPrivate Subscriptions, that would have let users further conceal their online browsing habits, by automatically blocking Web addresses suspected of consumer tracking if those addresses appeared on “black lists” compiled by privacy groups.”

The Wall Street Journal.

“The BMJ’s report said that the greatest reduction in deaths and injuries was in young children.”

Better education would be more useful. Running into the road in front of moving traffic can best be described as bloody stupid.

When I were a lad it was drummed into us from primary school onwards, look right, look left, look right again and if the road is clear WALK across.

Unfortunately some meddling bureaucrat decided that was a waste of time.

As a driver I see people wandering about in the road every day, and not just children, apparently either oblivious to the danger or in the misguided belief they own the bloody road. They don’t, I do as a road fund licence holder.
Oh wait, that’s not true, I probably own a bit of Afghanistan now, but you get the point.

Of course an accident at low speed is likely to be less fatal, but it would be totally un-fatal if the stupid pedestrians stayed on the pavement until the road was clear.

And pity the poor residents of 20mph streets having to put up with the increased CO2 emissions from all the vehicles grinding past in low gear, using up even more petrol and diesel.

And traffic lights controlled pedestrian crossings? What a complete waste of money, what’s wrong with a good old zebra crossing and Belisha beacons? I’ll tell you, we’re all complete morons who can’t be trusted not to hurt ourselves.

And don’t get me started on cyclists.

What Car

Press Association.

The crazyness of the traffic jams on Sheik Zaeed Road, a multi lane super highway that runs the length of Dubai from the old city up to and beyond the Marina complex to the site of the new, under construction, airport. It’s actually one of the few roads in Dubai that has a name.
The Burj Dubai, the worlds tallest building. Why bother?
The Atlantis Hotel sitting out on a man made sandbank which, according to some reports, is already sinking, and so expensive to even walk into for a cup of coffee. What were they thinking?
The taxi drivers who generally speaking don’t speak much English and have no idea where you want to go anyway if it’s not a famous landmark.
And the sewage system. Well actually more the lack of a proper sewage system for all the new buildings that have shot up in last few years.
Dubai trucks it’s sewage out of the city to the one and only sewage farm on the outskirts of town in a huge fleet of tankers.
When we were there last year there was a huge stink over the tanker drivers, fed up with up 15 hours queuing in the boiling desert heat to dump their loads, driving out to a deserted beach and off loading it there. Beaches were closed as a result.

These are just a few of the examples of why in my opinion they got it all arse about face.
The banking system is a farce even against western standards, the telephone system is creaking at the seams and very expensive. The internet is ADSL, very expensive and slow even by UK standards. Mobile coverage is all there but overloaded. Calls generally drop within a few seconds.
And all this in a place that has expectations of becoming not only the major tourist destination in the Middle East, but also the economic and business hub of the region.

There is much work to do if they wish to achieve this.

When you see it in the flesh it’s like a cross between Las Vegas and Disneyland, but both those places are built better and actually work.

On the plus side the food is good and relatively cheap.

So what’s all this got to do with us? Quite a lot actually. Dubai has no real money of its own, most of what you see there is financed by debt, much of it from Abu Dhabi.
Both of these Emirates own considerable portfolios of property overseas. Abu Dhabi owns a considerable amount of Jolly Old England for a start.
The worry is that in order to save Dubai they will have “bring the money home” by offloading these investments.

What that will do to an already depressed world market is what makes these ‘Interesting Times’.

I’m not paying that put it back together and I’ll think about it. To
their credit there was no charge for the inspection.

Slightly bothered by this I contacted my usual garage, although short on
time I made the effort to drive over to Moulton Chapel so they could have a look.

Yes the discs and pads all need replacing but the car is safe to drive,
which is good news as I need it this week.

OK how much.
£350.00.
Booked in for the job later this month.

I’m not suggesting KwikFit are ripoff merchants, I think he just made a
mistake. But mistakes like that don’t inspire confidence, do they.

Here’s a quote from a “security consultant”

“This should be a wake-up call to Google and Microsoft to educate their users”
Carole Theriault, Security consultant

I’m sorry but it’s quite clear from this incident that the users in question are blithering idiots and further education isn’t going to change that any time soon.

It’s not only Google and Microsoft either, what about the banks, the social networks, any number of other secure websites. All are being targeted on a daily basis by cyber criminals after users login details. And despite persistent warnings in all the media, both traditional and digital, stupid people still fall for it.

A wake up call to Google and Microsoft?
No. It’s the somnambulistic users who need a damn good shaking.

And if you are one of them, wake up, change your passwords, and please do not fall for this blindingly obvious scam again. None of these services will ever ask you for your login name and password by email.

If you get an email that looks genuine and contains a link to a website that looks genuine and asks for your password and user name, leave. And then go to the website through the usual url or your bookmarks, not the link in the email, to be sure you are actually on the genuine site. And then see if they still want your details for any other reason than to log in to your account.