OK, I found this interesting. Homeland Security is apparently testing a pilot program to track financial information. This program is supposed to track some possible 250,000 individuals that may have links to terrorism, drug trafficing, money laundering, etc.

Well, for face value, it seems quite interesting and a good project, but, sceptic in me just takes over.

I doubt that the quarter of a millin individuals were just typed into a database and searched by some admin at Homeland Security, so, what are the priorities that put someone on this list? How is the data mined?

I'm growing more concerned by such measures every day. Especially since none of these measures would have prevented what happened on 9/11.

Big Brother is watching.....
The link to this article from the New York Times with more info can be found on the New york times website

Weethet.nl has an interestong tutorial on how to mod Tivo Series 2 digal video recorders (DVR). The mod reportedly allows you to transfer the shows Tivo Records to your home computer. It also enables various other features including USB, wifi, home networking support, and allows you to telnet and ftp into your tivo box from your home network.

For full instructions see www.weethet.nl

OK, you know the basic drill. You download a file off of Kazaa, Bearshare and the like (or even an ordinary website - remember them?).

According to M$ DRM protocol, you can play a file 3 times (example) before you have to decide to keep it or not - kind of like a web browser asking you a simple question. The problem is, that Yes or No you click on could be malicious code. M$ knows the problem exists. According to David Caulton, group product manager for Microsoft's Windows Digital Media Division. "We wouldn't want to endorse anything that involved delivery of content that appears to be one thing, and then something else is delivered."

He also further states ""It's possible that someone could modify [an existing audio] file after it's created to point back to their http server."

Hmmm..... next time you click on any dialogue box, this should make you wonder. For more information on this topic, and other examples - check out the PCWorld article

Imagine this.....

You work for a large fortune 250 pharmaceutical company. You come across a memo clearly stating that the company knows something is wrong with their product. You go public with the story as a whistleblower. Now, for the obvious, you want to protect your anonymity.

You contact a reporter, drop a copy of the memo and all is well..... until......

The Feds come knocking at your door, you lose your job etc. This is the way of the future, George Orwell was only off by a few years.

This story made headway in November, but has received little press. It seems that new printers, mostly color, but some plain old laser printers, embed a serial number in the prints, barely perceivable to the human eye. The example above is only one detremental effect on this technology. Of course, we're supposed to believe that it is to protect us from counterfeit rings - you know, like we are running fiber paper embedded with wire through our printers anyway!

This is a scary step in the privacy that we once thought was a right. To view the entire story from the Sunday Herald Online, click below:

http://www.sundayherald.com/46335

Yep, it seems that eBay has started a new year with a little bit of a focus on security. OK, for those that know me, I'm not into Micro$oft all that much - but hey, they are the richest and most dangerous techno monopoly on the 3rd rock from the sun! But, it just doesn't stop at Passport - .net isn't alone either.

According to their press release:

In late January, we will no longer support the ability for members to sign in to eBay through Microsoft Passport.

As part of this change, we will also discontinue sending eBay Notifications through Microsoft .NET alerts.

The press release in it's entirety

Gaim, the instant messanging client has always been an important part of the graphic internet utilities included with varous distributions of Linux but recently I was supprised to find that it was long ago ported to Windows.Growing weary of Trillians bloated XML interface, AIM's included spyware, and the over populaton of advertisments in Yahoo I decided to try gaim for windows. Select read more to see my review.

SYMPTOMS
After you set up Microsoft Windows Firewall in Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2), you may discover that your computer can be accessed by anyone on the Internet when you use a dial-up connection to connect to the Internet.

CAUSE
This problem occurs because of the way that Windows Firewall interprets local subnets when the “My network (subnet) only” option is used. Windows Firewall is included with Windows XP SP2.
Because of the way that some dialing software configures routing tables, Windows Firewall in Windows XP SP2 can sometimes interpret the whole Internet to be a local subnet. This can let anyone on the Internet access the Windows Firewall exceptions. When the "My network (subnet) only" option is enabled, it is automatically selected for file and print sharing. Therefore, your shared drives can be unexpectedly revealed on the Internet when you use a dial-up connection.

The patch and more info about the patch from Microsoft

Today, Tony Smith of TheRegister reported that seagate has intruduced the worlds largest capacity serial ATA drive for the PC (400GB). The drive Smith reports that the drive utilizes native command queing which accelerates the drive past the performance points of 10,000 RPM drives while only spinning at 7,200.8 RPM's.
To see more visit seagates press release area.

Note that a quick search revieled that hitachi has been offering 400GB SATA drives for some time now.... see newegg.com

So the time here, firefox 1.0 is released and the world rejoices or err huh? The below is a review which may not express the feelings of all but it definatly exresses the feelings of me:

With powerful new version of Trojans and Viruses becoming major concerns for companies and home users Norton Antivirus has a problem. The problem some may say has only to do with there product which Symantec admits has "tiny security issues". What's more troubling (and an underlying issue) is the fact that Symantec spreads misinformation to try and cover up the truth.

"Symantec would like to reiterate that the situation described is one of access rather than threat. The VBS scripts described can only be successfully run on the target system with administrator rights"

Is this a joke? Does Symantec really not care about there customers? In reality 99% of all people running windows HAVE to run there there application logged into there systems as an administrator, most applications don’t work any other way. So while Symantec spreads misinformation customers get infected. I wonder how many people will wonder: "Hmm, How’d this get past my Antivirus, did I get duped?"

For more information see Zdnet article