Strange but interesting.
eBay: Phishing likely to blame for members' data theft
eBay's security experts have determined that the 'fraudster' who posted personal data for 1,200 users acquired it through phishing and not hacking
By Juan Carlos Perez, IDG News Service September 27, 2007
eBay's security experts have determined that it's highly likely that whoever posted confidential information about its members in a company discussion forum this week stole the data via an e-mail phishing scam, an eBay spokeswoman said Thursday.
The perpetrator of the data disclosure on about 1,200 eBay members didn't hack into eBay systems, spokeswoman Nichola Sharpe said in an e-mail interview, reiterating an assurance eBay made when the incident happened on Tuesday.
eBay is working with law enforcement to take action against the fraudster, she said, while declining to answer whether the person has been identified or caught. Because the situation is delicate, eBay can't fully disclose the information it has gathered, she said.
Sharpe also defended eBay's reaction to the incident, in which a malicious user posted members' information like names, addresses, user IDs and, apparently, credit card numbers on the company's Trust & Safety discussion forum.
In a discussion forum thread, some eBay members have criticized the vendor for, in their view, taking too long in shutting down the forum used by the fraudster.
eBay took the Trust & Safety forum offline about an hour after the fraudster began posting the confidential data.
Regarding the credit card numbers, eBay now knows they didn't belong to the affected members and is fairly certain that the numbers weren't valid at all. "We have reason to believe this data was falsified to cause public concern," Sharpe said.
eBay hasn't been able to determine when the phishing scam may have taken place, she said, while declining to comment on whether the data theft may involve more than the 1,200 members whose information was listed.
Sharpe declined to answer whether eBay can or plans to implement changes to its discussion forums so that potentially malicious postings or suspicious activities can be automatically flagged and alerts triggered.
... More information about safety measures on eBay can be found on this Web site.
Gee, there must be a market for surveillance...
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/27/1857244&from=rss
Sony Developing Gigapixel Satellite Imaging
Posted by Zonk on Thursday September 27, @04:04PM from the hello-up-there dept. Privacy Science
holy_calamity writes "Sony and the University of Alabama are working on a gigapixel resolution camera for improved satellite surveillance. It can see 10-km-square from an altitude of 7.5 kilometres with a resolution better than 50 centimetres per pixel. As well as removing annoying artefacts created by tiling images in Google Earth and similar, it should allow CCTV surveillance of entire cities with one camera. 'The trick is to build an array of light sensitive chips that each record small parts of a larger image and place them at the focal plane of a large multiple-lens system. The camera would have gigapixel resolution, and able to record images at a rate of 4 frames per second. The team suggests that such a camera mounted on an aircraft could provide images of a large city by itself. This would even allow individual vehicles to be monitored without any danger of losing them as they move from one ground level CCTV system to another.'"
Cute
http://digg.com/offbeat_news/A_Brief_History_of_Surveillance_PIC
A Brief History of Surveillance (PIC)
A timeline of technological and policy innovations in the art of commercial and state surveillance
http://www.aclu.org/images/privacy/milestones.gif
Somehow, I doubt this...
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/27/2157230&from=rss
Internet Uses 9.4% of Electricity In the US
Posted by Zonk on Thursday September 27, @06:03PM from the that's-it dept. Power The Internet
ribuck writes "Equipment powering the internet accounts for 9.4% of electricity demand in the U.S., and 5.3% of global demand, according to research by David Sarokin at online pay-for-answers service Uclue. Worldwide, that's 868 billion kilowatt-hours per year. The total includes the energy used by desktop computers and monitors (which makes up two-thirds of the total), plus other energy sinks including modems, routers, data processing equipment and cooling equipment."
I wonder what their contract says... “Don't mess with us or we'll turn your iPhone into a $600 'Pet Rock'”
http://www.news.com/8301-13579_3-9786644-37.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5
September 27, 2007 3:11 PM PDT
Owners of unlocked iPhones hosed by software update
Posted by Tom Krazit
Well, you can't say they didn't warn you.
Apple released an update for the iPhone on Thursday that brings the Wi-Fi Music Store to the device, as well as several security fixes and enhanced features. But, as expected, it also turns iPhones that were unlocked to run on cellular networks other than AT&T's into little more than emergency call boxes.
Macworld reported two iPhones in its office with SIM (subscriber identity module) hacks did not work after the update was installed. A message prompted the phone's owner to install "an unlocked and valid SIM card" before the phone could be completely activated. It's almost like the phone was in the same pre-activation limbo stage that frustrated many iPhone users waiting for activation the first weekend the device went on sale.
Related or “something completely different?”
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/27/1852202&from=rss
Microsoft Should Abandon Vista?
Posted by Zonk on Thursday September 27, @03:21PM from the seems-a-bit-harsh dept. Microsoft Windows
mr_mischief writes "An editorial written by Don Reisinger over at CNet's News.com takes Microsoft to task for the outright failure of Vista. He suggests that Vista may be the downfall of the company as, despite years in development, Vista was delivered to market too early. His suggestion? Support those who are running it, but otherwise ditch Vista and move on. 'Never before have I seen such an abysmal start to an operating system release. For almost a year, people have been adopting Vista and becoming incensed by how poorly it operates. Not only does it cost too much, it requires more to run than XP, there is still poor driver support ... With Mac OS X hot on its tail, Vista is simply not capable of competing at an OS level with some of the best software around. If Microsoft continues down this path, it will be Vista that will bring the software giant to its knees--not Bill Gates' departure.'"
For those idle moments...
http://digg.com/movies/Top_10_Streaming_Movie_TV_Websites_of_2007
Top 10 Streaming Movie & TV Websites of 2007
We've searched far and wide, through every nook and cranny of the deepest recesses of the internet with one goal in mind -- To find the absolute best websites that offer Streaming Video Entertainment for movies, television series, cartoons, anime, bollywood flicks and beyond. So, with no further ado, here is the result of our journey.
http://www.kazoop.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=4&Itemid=24
I'm disappointed they haven't yet connected this to either Osama or copyright piracy...
http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/14214576/detail.html
Suspects Arraigned In Pop Can Smuggling Ring
Authorities: Smuggling Rings Defrauded Mich. Bottle Deposit Fund
POSTED: 10:31 pm EDT September 26, 2007 UPDATED: 7:58 pm EDT September 27, 2007
DETROIT -- Authorities said they arrested 10 people and seized more than $500,000 in cash after breaking up a smuggling ring that collected millions of beverage containers in other states and cashed them in for 10 cents apiece in Michigan.
The 10 people were arraigned on charges ranging from false pretense, a possible 5-year felony to running a criminal enterprise, a possible 20-year sentence.
A total of 15 people were named in a 67-count warrant issued as part of Operation Can Scam, Attorney General Mike Cox said Wednesday. Some suspects were members of two smuggling rings based in Ohio and others were Michigan merchants who took part in the scheme, he said.
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