Impending Conficker virus can be detected from a distance

Dan Kaminsky, who along with other safety experts, revealed a serious vulnerability of the DNS infrastructure last year, today reported on finding a procedure, which allows identifying Conficker worm-infected computer even from afar.

Conficker, according to experts’ findings, changes the implementation of Windows Server providing files and printers’ sharing services. It is possible to detect changes by communication with a PC so it can be unambiguously spotted whether the PC is infected with Conficker worm or not.

However, a scanner in Python language is already available, seeking all worm-infected PCs in the scope of provided IP addresses. It is of course only possible to scan those IP addresses, to which the scanner can send packets to port 445. Scanner can be downloaded from the Kaminski site. It shall also be installed into standard scanning tools of nmap, ncircle, Nessus, Foundstone and Qualys within the coming days.

The sale of Notebook batteries with 3-times the lifetime has been launched

HP Company, as the first manufacturer of notebooks, currently introduced new Li-Ion batteries from Boston-Power, which have up to three times longer lifetime than the current Li-Ion batteries, onto the market.
Boston-Power states on their websites that the maximum capacity of its batteries is reduced to 80% of their capacity only after more than 800 charging cycles. In normal Li-Ion batteries this happens after approximately 300 cycles. And at the same time, the batteries from Boston-Power should be charged to 80% of their actual capacity in 30 minutes.
Batteries designated as HP Enviro are in sale since Monday for $ 150. They are compatible with laptop models Pavilion dv4, dv5, dv6, HDX 16, G50, G60, G61, G70, G71, Compaq Presario CQ40, CQ45, CQ50, CQ60, CQ61, CQ70 and CQ71.

Mac clones manufacturer Psystar came with the a smaller model

Company Psystar which sells personal computers with preinstalled Mac OS X currently presented, despite the ongoing litigation with Apple Company, a new model of Open (3).

Compact desktop, in a base configuration, comes with a 2.8 GHz Core 2 Duo E7400, 2 GB DDR2 800 memory, 500 GB 7200 RPM disk, GeForce 8400 GS graphics and 20x speed DVD burner. Its price is $ 600, including Mac OS X, which Apple sells for $ 129.

Preinstalled Mac OS X has been purchased by Psystar Apple, but its license conditions do not allow it to be installed on other computers than those made by Apple.

Apple sued Psystar in July last year, accusing it of breaching the terms of the license, copyright infringement on Mac OS X software and helping copyright infringement to the Mac OS X by Psystar customers, Trademark infringement and unfair competition. It did not take long for the answer to come. In September, Psystar sued Apple and accused it of unfair competition, illegal tying of products and other breaches of the Antimonopoly Law.


The court has decided that the Mac OS X computers' market is not a separate market, and thus Apple has no monopoly. The law process is not yet complete and so Psystar has been selling computers with Mac OS X for almost a year.

Finally, the OpenOffice 3.1 uses anti-aliasing

The upcoming new version 3.1 of open source office package, OpenOffice.org will use, unlike its previous versions, anti-aliasing for rendering graphics. Anti-aliasing brings significant benefits, especially in the graphs, rendering of which shall be significantly improved and usable.

As stated by the developers of this office package, it was necessary to adjust 500 thousand lines of code to support anti-aliasing. http://blogs.sun.com/GullFOSS/entry/finally_anti_aliasing_is_done

Graphics processing in the original OpenOffice did not store image data with sufficient accuracy in order to allow high-quality anti-aliasing. Implementation of anti-aliasing took a total of five years.

Microsoft releases final version of Internet Explorer 8

Microsoft Corp is set to publicly launch Internet Explorer 8 early on Thursday, the latest version of its Web browser.

The application can be downloaded from Microsoft's website from 9 a.m. : http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer

IE8 will run with Windows Vista, and also Windows XP SP2+, Windows Server 2003 SP2+ and Windows Server 2008.
IE8's new features include the ability to right-click on an address to go straight to a map or put into a blog or other Website, which Microsoft calls an "accelerator".
Microsoft has already announced that users of Windows 7 wil be able to turn Internet Explorer off.

Google has released Chrome 2.0 Beta

Google Company released the first beta version of its upcoming Chrome browser 2.0 on Tuesday. Chrome 2.0 testing versions have already been available since the beginning of January, starting by the build 2.0.156.1.
It was possible to obtain them by selecting a distribution channel with development versions, according to this guide : http://dev.chromium.org/getting-involved/dev-channel

The first build, which the company issued as a beta version is build 2.0.170.0. Compared to its earlier versions, it in particular, corrects numerous errors. Compared to version 1.0 several features have been added, like full-screen display support, form filling, and a new simple method of placing multiple windows side by side.



The essential change is accelerated implementation of JavaScript, which opposed to the final version of Chrome 1.0, is accelerated by 25% according to V8 benchmark and according to Sunspider benchmark even by 35%.
Chrome Beta version 2.0 can be downloaded from http://www.google.com/intl/en/landing/chrome/beta/index.html

Virtual Identity funerals services to be found on Internet

Arrivals of various new social webs also mean that the term “virtual identity” is becoming more and more of an issue. It is not just internet games but also the identity that we are creating on the net together with other parallel identities for years.
Legacy Locker Company has come with an interesting offer. It is trying to be the “funeral service” of internet Web identity.
Whatever your lawyer does for you in case of your heritage, and funeral service company in case of a funeral; this company intends to do regarding your online identity.

The Company shall post a virtual “death announcement” on Facebook or send e-mails prepared in advance with the information about your death to your friends. At the same time, they will also deliver your inheritor access passwords to all services that you had specified.
We will see how will contacting the funeral services Web identity company be dealt with in the event of death in real life.

New Improved 3D Baseball Cards

Topps Company, the biggest American baseball card producer, will start selling baseball cards with 3D improved reality support.

After placing such card in front of a web camera, a 3D picture of the player detected on the card will appear on the card producer’s web-site, when a special web application is used.

This application also allows playing simple games with the player, like throwing, catching and hitting the ball.

Card technology is similar to older technology, previously used by Australian software company Boffswana.

Total Immersion Company is the technology supplier for the producer. It is necessary to select a player manually in the web application, as the technology does not recognize the card automatically.

It is possible to check the 3D improved reality baseball card video clip on the technology supplier’s web-site:

http://www.t-immersion.com/

More can be found in The New York Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/09/technology/09topps.html?_r=1

The companies wish to be updated and try new technologies, which should restore interest in playing cards. Only time will say, whether they are not way behind, anyway. I personally think these technologies should have been implemented long time ago and companies with such turnovers should be bringing their own original technologies, into which they shall invest themselves.