October 29, 2001 Man jailed for software scheme over Internet Software counterfeiter gets two years and $500,000 fine for Internet scam. A 49-year-old Nevada man has been sentenced to two years in prison for the large-scale trafficking in counterfeit Microsoft software over the Internet, federal prosecutors said on Friday. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2098173,00.html http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/51/22514.html - - - - - - - - Warez sites hold illegal XP key Despite Microsoft's promise to tighten up the controversial Product Activation system, a tool lets pirates bypass it and burn copies of Windows XP. Copyright protection software specialist BitArts Labs claims to have discovered code that completely removes the registration process from Microsoft's Windows XP operating system, launched last Thursday, leaving users free to burn pirate copies. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2098196,00.html - - - - - - - - Taliban Web Sites Remain Online While their leaders have been driven underground, the Taliban have maintained a prominent home on the World Wide Web. Despite economic sanctions and retaliatory hacker attacks, two Web sites of Dharb-i-Mumin, an organization recently named by the U.S. on a list of terrorist groups, were still operational today. http://www.newsbytes.com/news/01/171617.html - - - - - - - - High court to weigh laws on pornography The U.S. Supreme Court will consider two cases over the next month that test congressional limits on Internet content, including a San Francisco suit challenging a ban on virtual child pornography. The uneasy relationship between the First Amendment and cyberporn will take center stage over the next month in the U.S. Supreme Court, which will consider two cases that test the limits of congressional efforts to keep children from the Internet's X-rated underbelly. http://www0.mercurycenter.com/premium/local/docs/kidporn29a.htm http://www.siliconvalley.com/docs/news/depth/pornlw102901.htm http://www.newsbytes.com/news/01/171613.html - - - - - - - - DoCoMo Files Spam Injunction NTT DoCoMo said on Monday it clinched a temporary injunction against a company sending massive amounts of unwanted e-mail to users of its "i-mode" Internet- access service. The injunction, filed in the city of Yokohama, is valid for a year from Monday and bars a Web company, Global Networks, from sending randomly generated e-mail to addresses with the suffix "+docomo.ne.jp." http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,47960,00.html - - - - - - - - Public data gets pulled off Web Some critics cite embarrassment, not security Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, a wide range of governmental bodies have removed significant amounts of potentially sensitive information from the Web, marking an abrupt departure from years of effort to make public data available to anyone with a computer. http://www.siliconvalley.com/docs/news/depth/web102801.htm NJ Removes Chemical, Reservoir Data From State Web Sites http://www.newsbytes.com/news/01/171567.html - - - - - - - - Government's anti-terror tools include high-tech gadgets The government's pursuit of terrorists is relying heavily on sophisticated technology, from software that automatically translates foreign communications on the Internet to a device that secretly captures every keystroke a suspect makes on his computer. http://www.siliconvalley.com/docs/news/tech/016857.htm - - - - - - - - Volvo puts brakes on terror joke emails The Swedish car manufacturer has clamped down after workers sent each other inappropriate jokes and pictures of George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden. Fears of bad-taste humour following September's US terrorist attacks have forced Volvo to ban its employees from sending email jokes about Osama bin Laden. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2098208,00.html - - - - - - - - ISPs fight viruses by unplugging users Some Internet service providers (ISPs) are sending this ominous e-mail message to customers: Update your home PC anti-virus software or we'll terminate you. ISPs across the nation, mostly smaller ones, are battling insidious viruses such as Nimda that overload network servers, slowing or disrupting service for subscribers for hours or days. http://www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/2001/10/29/isp-virus.htm - - - - - - - - Gateway Joins U.S.-E.U. Safe Harbor Program Computer maker Gateway Inc. has joined the E.U.-U.S. Safe Harbor program, becoming the latest high-tech heavyweight to endorse an agreement designed to protect European users' online privacy. In ratifying the agreement earlier this month, Gateway joined the ranks of other major computer manufacturers already enrolled in the program, including Intel and Hewlett-Packard. http://www.newsbytes.com/news/01/171601.html - - - - - - - - Song-swappers stay in tune The downing of the popular Internet music site Napster has curbed Europe's song-swapping appetite, Jupiter Media Metrix reported on Monday. According to the report, Jupiter said that the level of Internet file-sharing activity has dropped by 50 percent in Europe since February, the point at which the popular song-swapping service Napster hit its peak. http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2820881,00.html Napster court case throttles file sharing http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2098212,00.html http://www.cnn.com/2001/TECH/internet/10/29/napster.relaunch.reut/index.html Study: Online song-swapping on decline in Europe http://www.siliconvalley.com/docs/news/reuters_wire/1608987l.htm - - - - - - - - Military Shows Off Smart ID Card Top U.S. military officials on Monday unveiled a new generation of "smart" identity cards, but were still weighing whether to add medical data and other information to the chip-based ID cards. The Defense Department said it expected to issue the chip-based "common access cards" to 4.3 million military personnel -- including active military, selected reserves, civilian employees and some contractors -- within the next 15 months. http://www.wired.com/news/conflict/0,2100,47971,00.html Pentagon unveils smart identification cards with tiny computer The nation's increasingly high-tech soldiers are getting another computer in their arsenal -- this one wallet-sized. The Pentagon began arming four million troops and civilians on Monday with ``smart'' ID cards that will allow them to open secure doors, get cash, buy food -- and soon check out weapons and other military hardware. http://www.siliconvalley.com/docs/news/tech/047469.htm - - - - - - - - Electronic financial networks: How safe are they? Tens of billions of dollars were bottled up at the Bank of New York for 3 days after World Trade Center telephone systems collapsed on Sept. 11. The bank, a linchpin on Wall Street, electronically transfers money and stock and bond trades among investment firms and more than 7,000 banks worldwide over high speed telephone lines. After those lines were cut, it was hours before some Bank of New York customers could determine the status of their accounts. http://www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/tech/2001/10/29/financial-networks-safety.htm Hacker's story shows financial system's weak spots http://www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/tech/2001/10/29/financial-networks-russian-hacker.htm - - - - - - - - Cybernarks - Who's hunting the Hackers? Steven Lynch was first introduced to the joys of hunting down hackers in MIT in 1989. While working in the University's IT department he came across Australia's very own Leftist and Urvile, as they took control of the institutions servers and used them to poke holes in systems on the other side of the world. Phoenix and Electron were eventually tracked down to a flat in Melbourne, but not before Lynch spent countless hours following their clandestine progress through unsuspecting networks. http://www.zdnet.com.au/newstech/security/story/0,2000024985,20261485,00.htm - - - - - - - - Culprits in rising cyber-attacks unknown With most of the civilized world still anxious from the recent terrorist attacks and even more recent anthrax poisonings, do we also need to worry about cyber-attacks? Yes. Is there any connection between burgeoning computer hacking and virus activity and Sept. 11 and its aftermath? The answer to this is not so clear. http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/10/29/business/COMP29.htm - - - - - - - - When did the term 'computer virus' arise? Four different experts respond: Rob Rosenberger is a computer consultant who maintains the Computer Virus Myths Homepage. He replies: The roots of the modern computer virus go back to 1949, when computer pioneer John von Neumann presented a paper on the "Theory and Organization of Complicated Automata," in which he postulated that a computer program could reproduce. http://www.scientificamerican.com/askexpert/computers/computers15/ - - - - - - - - DoS Attacks Go For the Throat We all yearn for the more innocent time when the acronym DOS stood for your Disk Operating System, or even the Dept. of State for the better traveled. Today, however, it is a term that brings a chill to many technologists -- Denial of Service. Initially, this was largely the realm of minor miscreants, who wanted no more than to target specific Web sites they thought would be cool to disrupt. But now a greater chill has begun to set in as a result of the selective targeting of routers. http://networking.earthweb.com/netsecur/article/0,,12084_911371,00.html - - - - - - - - Don't make cyberspace into a police state America's next civil war will be fought on the Internet, and the fundamental values in question will be the right to privacy versus the need for national security. Right now, that assertion might seem far-fetched. This is a time of flag waving and patriotic fervor that ranges from genuine statesmanship to banal jingoism. http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/comment/0,5859,2820861,00.html *********************************************************** Search the NewsBits.net Archive at: http://www.newsbits.net/search.html *********************************************************** The source material may be copyrighted and all rights are retained by the original author/publisher. The information is provided to you for non-profit research and educational purposes. 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