Trash Chronicles

1957: The respected BBC news show Panorama announced that thanks to a very mild winter and the virtual elimination of the dreaded spaghetti weevil, Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop. It accompanied this announcement with footage of Swiss peasants pulling strands of spaghetti down from trees. Huge numbers of viewers were taken in. Many called the BBC wanting to know how they could grow their own spaghetti tree. To this the BBC diplomatically replied, "place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best."

1985: Sports Illustrated published a story about a new rookie pitcher who planned to play for the Mets. His name was Sidd Finch, and he could reportedly throw a baseball at 168 mph with pinpoint accuracy. This was 65 mph faster than the previous record. Surprisingly, Sidd Finch had never even played the game before. Instead, he had mastered the "art of the pitch" in a Tibetan monastery under the guidance of the "great poet-saint Lama Milaraspa." Mets fans celebrated their teams' amazing luck at having found such a gifted player, and Sports Illustrated was flooded with requests for more information. In reality this legendary player only existed in the imagination of the author of the article, George Plimpton.

1962: In 1962 there was only one tv channel in Sweden, and it broadcast in black and white. The station's technical expert, Kjell Stensson, appeared on the news to announce that, thanks to a new technology, viewers could convert their existing sets to display color reception. All they had to do was pull a nylon stocking over their tv screen. Stensson proceeded to demonstrate the process. Thousands of people were taken in. Regular color broadcasts only commenced in Sweden on April 1, 1970.

1996: The Taco Bell Corporation announced it had bought the Liberty Bell and was renaming it the Taco Liberty Bell. Hundreds of outraged citizens called the National Historic Park in Philadelphia where the bell was housed to express their anger. Their nerves were only calmed when Taco Bell revealed, a few hours later, that it was all a practical joke. The best line of the day came when White House press secretary Mike McCurry was asked about the sale. Thinking on his feet, he responded that the Lincoln Memorial had also been sold. It would now be known, he said, as the Ford Lincoln Mercury Memorial.

1977: The British newspaper The Guardian published a special seven-page supplement devoted to San Serriffe, a small republic said to consist of several semi-colon-shaped islands located in the Indian Ocean. A series of articles affectionately described the geography and culture of this obscure nation. Its two main islands were named Upper Caisse and Lower Caisse. Its capital was Bodoni, and its leader was General Pica. The Guardian's phones rang all day as readers sought more information about the idyllic holiday spot. Only a few noticed that everything about the island was named after printer's terminology. The success of this hoax is widely credited with launching the enthusiasm for April Foolery that gripped the British tabloids in subsequent decades.

1992: National Public Radio's Talk of the Nation program announced that Richard Nixon, in a surprise move, was running for President again. His new campaign slogan was, "I didn't do anything wrong, and I won't do it again." Accompanying this announcement were audio clips of Nixon delivering his candidacy speech. Listeners responded viscerally to the announcement, flooding the show with calls expressing shock and outrage. Only during the second half of the show did the host John Hockenberry reveal that the announcement was a practical joke. Nixon's voice was impersonated by comedian Rich Little.

1998: The April 1998 issue of the New Mexicans for Science and Reason newsletter contained an article claiming that the Alabama state legislature had voted to change the value of the mathematical constant pi from 3.14159 to the 'Biblical value' of 3.0. Soon the article made its way onto the internet, and then it rapidly spread around the world, forwarded by email. It only became apparent how far the article had spread when the Alabama legislature began receiving hundreds of calls from people protesting the legislation. The original article, which was intended as a parody of legislative attempts to circumscribe the teaching of evolution, was written by physicist Mark Boslough.

8: The Left-Handed Whopper 1998: Burger King published a full page advertisement in USA Today announcing the introduction of a new item to their menu: a "Left-Handed Whopper" specially designed for the 32 million left-handed Americans. According to the advertisement, the new whopper included the same ingredients as the original Whopper (lettuce, tomato, hamburger patty, etc.), but all the condiments were rotated 180 degrees for the benefit of their left-handed customers. The following day Burger King issued a follow-up release revealing that although the Left-Handed Whopper was a hoax, thousands of customers had gone into restaurants to request the new sandwich. Simultaneously, according to the press release, "many others requested their own 'right handed' version."

1995: Discover Magazine reported that the highly respected wildlife biologist Dr. Aprile Pazzo had found a new species in Antarctica: the hotheaded naked ice borer. These fascinating creatures had bony plates on their heads that, fed by numerous blood vessels, could become burning hot, allowing the animals to bore through ice at high speeds. They used this ability to hunt penguins, melting the ice beneath the penguins and causing them to sink downwards into the resulting slush where the hotheads consumed them. After much research, Dr. Pazzo theorized that the hotheads might have been responsible for the mysterious disappearance of noted Antarctic explorer Philippe Poisson in 1837. "To the ice borers, he would have looked like a penguin," the article quoted her as saying. Discover received more mail in response to this article than they had received for any other article in their history.

1976: The British astronomer Patrick Moore announced on BBC Radio 2 that at 9:47 AM a once-in-a-lifetime astronomical event was going to occur that listeners could experience in their very own homes. The planet Pluto would pass behind Jupiter, temporarily causing a gravitational alignment that would counteract and lessen the Earth's own gravity. Moore told his listeners that if they jumped in the air at the exact moment that this planetary alignment occurred, they would experience a strange floating sensation. When 9:47 AM arrived, BBC2 began to receive hundreds of phone calls from listeners claiming to have felt the sensation. One woman even reported that she and her eleven friends had risen from their chairs and floated around the room.

March 29, 2009 (IDG News Service) A 10-month cyberespionage investigation has found that 1,295 computers in 103 countries and belonging to international institutions have been spied on, with some circumstantial evidence suggesting China may be to blame.

The 53-page report, released on Sunday, provides some of the most compelling evidence of the efforts of politically motivated hackers while raising questions about their ties with government-sanctioned cyberspying operations.

It describes a network that researchers have called GhostNet, which primarily uses a malicious software program called gh0st RAT (Remote Access Tool) to steal sensitive documents, control Web cams and control infected computers.

"GhostNet represents a network of compromised computers resident in high-value political, economic and media locations spread across numerous countries worldwide," said the report, written by analysts with the Information Warfare Monitor, a research project of the SecDev Group, a think tank, and the Munk Center for International Studies at the University of Toronto. "At the time of writing, these organizations are almost certainly oblivious to the compromised situation in which they find themselves."

The analysts did say, however, they have no confirmation if the information obtained has ended up being valuable to the hackers or whether it has been commercially sold or passed on as intelligence.

The operation probably started around 2004, the time security researchers noticed that many of these institutions were being sent bogus e-mail messages with executable files attached to them, according to Mikko Hypponen, director of antivirus research at F-Secure. Hypponen, who has been tracking the attacks for years, said that GhostNet's tactics have evolved considerably from those early days. "For the past three-and-a-half years or so it's been fairly advanced and fairly technical."

"It's really good to see a spotlight on this while thing right now, because it's been going on for so long and nobody's been paying attention," he added.

Although evidence shows that servers in China were collecting some of the sensitive data, the analysts were cautious about linking the spying to the Chinese government. Rather, China has a fifth of the world's Internet users, which may include hackers who have goals aligning with official Chinese political positions.

"Attributing all Chinese malware to deliberate or targeted intelligence gathering operations by the Chinese state is wrong and misleading," the report said.

However, China has made a concerted effort since the 1990s to use cyberspace for military advantage "The Chinese focus on cyber capabilities as part of its strategy of national asymmetric warfare involves deliberately developing capabilities that circumvent U.S. superiority in command-and-control warfare," it said.

A second report, written by University of Cambridge researchers and published in conjunction with the University of Toronto paper, was less circumspect, saying that the attacks against the computer systems of the office of the Dalai Lama were launched by "agents of the Chinese government." The Cambridge team titled their report, "The Snooping Dragon."

Google Docs users shouldn't lose sleep over the security concerns a security analyst has raised about the hosted suite of office productivity applications, Google said late Friday.

In an official blog posting, Jonathan Rochelle, Google Docs' product manager, details why the company has determined that the issues included in the analyst's report are far from critical.

Google's conclusions aren't a surprise. Hours after Ade Barkah published his report on Thursday, Google responded with a preliminary statement saying it was investigating the matter but that it didn't believe there were significant security issues with Docs.

Nonetheless, Google evidently sees some merit in Barkah's report. Google has added information regarding Barkah's observations to its Docs "help" pages about creating drawings and about adding viewers and collaborators to documents.

In addition, Google may make changes to Docs as a result of Barkah's report. "We are also exploring alternative design options that might further address the concerns. We'd like to thank the researcher for sharing his concerns with us," Rochelle wrote.

Asked for comment about Rochelle's blog post, Barkah indicated that he's not done with his security analysis of Google Docs. "At this time, new details and test scenarios are still emerging. I appreciate the excellent feedback I'm receiving from Google Security. I am continuing to share my most recent findings with them, and will be able to comment further once our analysis is complete," he said via e-mail.

Google Docs is a free, standalone product, as well as a component in the broader collaboration and communication suite Google Apps, which comes in free and fee-based versions and is designed for workplace use.

Barkah, founder of BlueWax, an enterprise application consultancy based in Toronto, highlighted what he considered three flaws in the way files are shared in Docs, which lets people invite others to view and edit their word processing documents, spreadsheets and presentations.

First, Barkah noted that images inserted into a document are assigned their own URL, so that someone who has been given access to the document can continue to call up the image even if the document is deleted or if the document owner removes their access rights. "If you embed an image into a protected document, you'd expect the image to be protected too. The end result is a potential privacy leak," Barkah wrote.

Rochelle countered that images are kept independently of the documents in which they appear for fear that deleting them would break references to them in other documents and external blogs. "In addition, image URLs are known only to users who have at some point had access to the document the image is embedded in, and could therefore have saved the image anyway -- which is fully expected," Rochelle wrote.

Ultimately, document owners can request that images be purged from their account by sending an e-mail to Google's support team at docsimagedelete@google.com.

The second observation Barkah made concerned the ability of someone with whom a document is shared to view all versions of any diagram contained in it by modifying the image's URL.

In his response, Rochelle points out that allowing collaborators to view a document's revision history is a Docs feature, and that the only people who could see past revisions of a drawing are those who have been given access to the document.

"We may consider explicitly preventing viewers from accessing drawing revisions," Rochelle wrote. "For now, if document owners decide they don't want viewers to have access to their revisions, they can simply make a new copy of the document -- from the File menu -- and share that new version. The revision history of both the document and all embedded drawings is removed in copies of documents."

Barkah didn't detail his final concern in his report to give Google time to troubleshoot it, but said that it allowed, in some cases, contributors whose access to a document has been removed to get back into it without the owner's knowledge and permission.

Rochelle explained that the scenario involves the use of a Docs feature that allows invitations to access documents to be forwarded to more than one person. Google added this feature in response to requests from users who wanted to forward invitations and share documents with e-mail lists.

"Invitations sent using this feature contain a special key on the document link. This feature can be disabled at any time to expire previously distributed invitations which contain that special key. To do this, simply disable this feature by unchecking it -- in documents and presentations, it's called 'invitations may be used by anyone' and in spreadsheets it's 'editors can share this item,'" Rochelle wrote.

Privacy and security controls in Google's hosted applications have been in the news recently. Last week, the Electronic Privacy Information Center filed a complaint asking the U.S. Federal Trade Commission to stop Google from offering hosted services that collect data until privacy controls can be verified.

Earlier this month, Google acknowledged that a glitch in Docs caused some documents to be exposed to users without proper permission. The problem occurred among users who had previously shared documents. The company said it affected fewer than 0.5 percent of documents.

The final version of Microsoft Corp.'s Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) does contain the vulnerability used to hack a preview of the browser at last week's Pwn2Own, the contest's sponsor confirmed today.

But the exploit used by the computer science student to break the release candidate of IE8 -- and walk away with a Sony laptop and $5,000 in cash -- won't work on the final version of IE8 as long as it's running in Windows Vista Service Pack 1 or Windows 7, said Terri Forslof, manager of security response at 3Com Corp.'s TippingPoint unit.

Questions had arisen about the exploitability of IE8 almost immediately after the Pwn2Own hack because Nils, the German student who gave only his first name, hacked IE8 Release Candidate 1 (RC1), while Microsoft released the final code less than 24 hours later.

Today, Forslof put the chatter to rest by confirming that IE8's RTW, or "release to Web" portions, were immune from Nils' hack. "His exploit did, in fact, employ the technique found by Sotirov and Dowd," said Forslof, referring to work by Alex Sotirov and Mark Dowd, two researchers who announced last summer that they were able to bypass two of Vista's biggest security defenses, ASLR (address space layout randomization) and DEP (data execution prevention).

Microsoft made changes to IE8 between RC1 and the final code that blocked Dowd's and Sotirov's circumvention technique, thereby making Nils' exploit moot -- but only in some situations, said Forslof today.

"Nils' exploit is only broken when IE8 is running in Windows Vista SP1 or Windows 7," she said. "The vulnerability is absolutely there, so for IE8 on Windows XP, which lacks ASLR and DEP, it can be exploited using commonly known techniques."

Also at risk, said Forslof, are users running IE8 on the browser's Intranet security zone, no matter what operating system is on the machine. "If an organization is compromised, the flaw could still be exploited from the internal network on machines running Windows Vista and IE8," she said.

Forslof declined to confirm whether the bug also exists in older versions of IE, such as IE7. "We're not going to comment on that because we're still confirming the vulnerability on the previous versions ourselves," she said. "So we'll let Microsoft handle that [announcement]."

But Forslof suspects that IE7 is vulnerable. "My guess would be yes," she said. "A lot of times, researchers look at the current software, in this case IE7, find a bug, then they test on the beta of the next. If they find it there [in IE8], they wait and see whether it's fixed in the final."

Microsoft has said little about the IE8 vulnerability, although during an online Q&A on Wednesday, the browser team noted that Nils' exploit wouldn't work on the RTW edition. "We can say that the attack as demonstrated in Pwn2Own at CanSecWest will not succeed on the RTW build released on March 19 because of changes that can block the ASLR+DEP .Net bypass demonstrated by Dowd and Sotirov," said Kymberlee Price, a program manager for IE8 security.

Mozilla Corp., whose Firefox browser was also hacked by Nils last week, plans to patch that flaw, as well as another that just went public, next week. However, Microsoft has not spelled out a timetable for an IE fix.

EARTH HOUR - Tips to save energy

• When you go away for more than a day switch off the main power switch.
• Use candles instead of your incandescent lights for dinner.
• Configure your computer to “energy saving” mode in which it will automatically change to the state of low consumption.
• Switching off the screen can save even more than just letting the screen saver run.
• Turning your computer off at night instead of leaving it on will save on average 25% of its annual energy bill.
• A television in standby mode can use up to as much as half the electricity as when it is switched on.
• Make sure that your refrigerator door is tightly fit.
• Don’t put warm or hot food straight into the freezer.
• The toaster is more energy efficient than the grill for toasting bread.
• When using a percolator to make tea or coffee, boil only the amount of water required.
• Install patio covers, awnings and solar window screens to shade your home from the sun.
• Replace air conditioner filters.
• Turn off appliances, lights andequipment when not in use.
• Do not use the remote to switch off your appliances, since they will still be consuming electricity on stand by.
• Use solar powered lights for your garden.
• Keep the refrigerator away from direct sunlight or the oven.
• Fill your electric jug with only the amount of water you need to boil.
• Using a warm machine wash setting in your washing machine rather than a hot wash will cut consumption by half.
• Look for an energy rating when shopping for appliances.
• Only heat or cool the rooms you are using
• Use a ceiling fan whenever you can.
• Don’t leave the water running while brushing your teeth.
• At home, separate cans, bottles, plastic, and newspaper and take it to a recycling center.
• When you go grocery shopping, take a permanent carrying bag instead of using their plastic bags.
• Use rechargeable batteries instead of regular throw away batteries as much as you can.
• Keep your fridge and freezer closed as much as possible.
• Don’t locate your fridge and freezer in direct sunlight or next to the stove or dishwasher.
• Don’t use your dryer, if you can help it.
• Check the seal on your refrigerator door.
• Drive slow, the faster you drive the more fuel you consume.

• If your intended destination is not too far away, consider walking than driving your car.

• Use a sponge instead of a paper towel around the kitchen.

• Encourage recycling, buy recycled products and support your local recycling agency.

• Don’t buy single-use, throw-away products such as plastic utensils, razors and paper plates.

• Don’t throw but recycle your old phones.

• Use containers again - buy food, drinks and toiletries in returnable containers and ask local shops to stock them.

• Repair your old electronic gadgets instead of constantly shopping for new ones.

• Rearrange your plumbing so that rainwater or wastewater from your shower and tub is used to flush your toilet.

• Refrain from purchasing overpackaged products.

• Educate your children on the importance of climate change.

Asian internet neighborhoods dominated McAfee’s list of the “most dangerous” on the web with HongKong’s “.hk” and China’s “.cn” domains, and the Philippines’ “.ph” topping the list.

In its second annual McAfee “Mapping the Mal Web” report, the security technology firm McAfee found that 19.2% of all Web sites ending in the “.hk” domain pose a security threat1 to Web users. China (.cn) is second this year with over 11%.

Romania (.ro) and Russia (.ru) are still in the top five most dangerous domains.

The report also noted that the Philippines (.ph) experienced a 270% increase in overall riskiness, from being ranked 19 last year to No. 4 this year.

Computer-virus infections don't cause your machine to crash anymore.

Nowadays, the criminals behind the infections usually want your computer operating in top form so you don't know something's wrong. That way, they can log your keystrokes and steal any passwords or credit-card numbers you enter at Web sites, or they can link your infected computer with others to send out spam.

Here are some signs your computer is infected, tapped to serve as part of "botnet" armies run by criminals:

• You experience new, prolonged slowdowns. This can be a sign that a malicious program is running in the background.

• You continually get pop-up ads that you can't make go away. This is a sure sign you have "adware," and possibly more, on your machine.

• You're being directed to sites you didn't intend to visit, or your search results are coming back funky. This is another sign that hackers have gotten to your machine.

So what do you do?

• Having anti-virus software here is hugely helpful. For one, it can identify known malicious programs and disable them. If the virus that has infected your machine isn't detected, many anti-virus vendors offer a service in which they can remotely take over your computer and delete the malware for a fee.

• Some anti-virus vendors also offer free, online virus-scanning services.

• You may have to reinstall your operating system if your computer is still experiencing problems. It's a good idea even if you believe you've cleaned up the mess because malware can still be hidden on your machine. You will need to back up your files before you do this.

How do I know what information has been taken?

• It's very hard to tell what's been taken. Not every infection steals your data. Some just serve unwanted ads. Others poison your search result or steer you to Web sites you don't want to see. Others log your every keystroke. The anti-virus vendors have extensive databases about what the known infections do and don't do. Comparing the results from your virus scans to those entries will give you a good idea about what criminals may have snatched up.

From Yahoo.com

I just watch A film titled ‘Antitrust(also titled also titled Conspiracy.com^[4] and Startup)’, Which was release on 2001. It is a story which promotes open source of knowledge (software).
Here is the Plot

Working with his three friends at their new software development company "Skullbocks", Milo Hoffman (Phillippe) is contacted by CEO Gary Winston (Robbins) of NURV (Never Underestimate Radical Vision) for a programming position few would refuse: a fat paycheck, an almost-unrestrained working environment, and extensive creative control over his work. Accepting Winston's offer, Hoffman and his girlfriend, Alice Poulson (Forlani), move to their new home.

The environment of NURV seems as advertised: a friendly, family-oriented company that places great value on individual creativity. NERF footballs fly around the office, the atmosphere is relaxed, and Winston personally shows Milo to his workstation and introduces him to his co-workers. Despite development of the flagship product ("Synapse", a worldwide media distribution network) being well on schedule, Hoffman soon becomes suspicious of the excellent source code Winston personally provides to him, seemingly when needed most, while refusing to divulge the code's origin.

After his best friend, Teddy Chin (Tso), is murdered, Hoffman's world is turned upside down when he uncovers that NURV is stealing the code they need from programmers around the world—including Chin—and then killing them to cover their tracks. Hoffman learns that not only does NURV employ an extensive surveillance system to observe and steal code, they have their fingers in both the United States Department of Justice and most of the mainstream media. Even his girlfriend is a plant, an ex-con hired by the company to manipulate him.

While searching through a secret NURV database containing surveillance dossiers on employees, he finds that the company has information of a very personal nature about a friend and co-worker, Lisa Calighan (Cook). When he reveals to her that the company has this information, she agrees to help him expose NURV's crimes to the world. Coordinating with one of Hoffman's friends (Dushku) from his old startup, they plan to use a local cable access station to hijack Synapse and broadcast their charges against NURV to the world. However, Calighan turns out to be a double agent, foils Hoffman's plan, and turns him over to Winston.

His paranoia paying off, Hoffman had already confronted his "girlfriend", Poulson, and convinced her to side with him against Winston and NURV. When it became clear that Hoffman had not succeeded, a backup plan was put into motion by Poulson, the third member of Skullbocks (Runyan), and the incorruptible internal security firm hired by NURV. While Hoffman is mocked by Winston, the second team successfully usurps one of NURV's own work centers and transmits the incriminating evidence as well as the Synapse code.

Parting ways with the redeemed Poulson, Hoffman re-joins Skullbocks in the garage where it all started, and while the media beats a path to their driveway, Winston and his entourage are publicly arrested for their crimes.

________________________________________________________________

We can find ample amount of open-source knowledge treasures of various kinds, including computer software and various other knowledge and information sources on internet. Many of us have been immensely benefited from these open-source treasures. One of the great features of such extremely precious knowledge sources is they provide users with interactive forums and they are open for questions, answers and for more clarifications.