November 8, 2002 'Stupidity expert' arrested for Internet solicitation A man who has written two books on stupidity was arrested for allegedly trying to arrange sex with a 15-year-old girl over the Internet. The girl turned out to be an undercover male detective. James F. Welles, the 61-year-old author of The Story of Stupidity and Understanding Stupidity, was taken into custody last week after arranging to meet the girl at a restaurant, investigators said. http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2002-11-08-stupid-expert_x.htm - - - - - - - - Ericsson caught in espionage web Telecom equipment maker Ericsson said Friday it suspended two more employees in relation to an industrial spying case in which three current or former workers have already been detained by police. "At this time the two are not suspected of any crime, but they could have broken Ericsson's internal security or secrecy rules,'' the Swedish company said in a statement. Police said Wednesday they had detained three Swedes on suspicion of passing secret documents to a foreign intelligence service, which they did not identify. A source at Ericsson alleged that a Russian was involved. http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1106-965047.html http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2125611,00.html http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/biztech/11/08/ericsson.spy.reut/index.html http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2002-11-08-ericsson-scandal_x.htm - - - - - - - - E-mail virus alert carries own worm A Russian antivirus company apologized Friday for an e-mailed virus alert that was infected with the very worm the message was supposedly designed to warn against. Kaspersky Labs said the message, sent Thursday to subscribers of the company's "Virus News" e-mail dispatch, had actually been sent by hackers masquerading as the company. The hackers had managed to break into Moscow-based Kaspersky's computer system and steal the mailing list for the newsletter, the company said. http://news.com.com/2100-1001-965130.html http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/56/28017.html - - - - - - - - Cybersecurity bill nears House vote American universities may receive a nearly $1 billion windfall next week, when Congress is expected to approve a massive new spending program for computer security. On Tuesday, the House is scheduled to vote on a bill that would spend approximately $900 million over the next five years to recruit graduate students and faculty members in computer security and create research centers at colleges and universities. http://news.com.com/2100-1023-965164.html http://www.gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/20436-1.html http://207.27.3.29/dailyfed/1102/110802td1.htm - - - - - - - - Congress jumped the gun on biometrics, FBI official says The implementation of biometric technology became a hot topic when Congress passed the Patriot Act and Border Security Act last year after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, but the measures were premature, the FBIs acting deputy CIO said. http://www.gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/20439-1.html - - - - - - - - Standards agency seeks input on computer security The National Institute for Standards is soliciting public comments on two of its draft reports concerning the security of federal technology systems. The agency, which historically has published reference materials and guidance in the computer security, has prepared a draft report called Security Considerations in Federal Information Technology Procurements, which aims to provide broad resources to federal procurement officials to take into consideration when purchasing new equipment. http://207.27.3.29/dailyfed/1102/110802td2.htm - - - - - - - - Mattel loses cybersquatting challenge A federal appeals court has rejected a legal shortcut aimed at slashing the costs of battling trademark infringement on the Net. In a ruling Thursday, the 2nd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in New York found that the Anti-cybersquatting Protection Act (ACPA) does not allow plaintiffs to consolidate in a single venue cases affecting domain names registered with services operating in different states. http://news.com.com/2100-1023-965184.html - - - - - - - - Retrieving incriminating e-mails not difficult Retrieving e-mails - deleted or otherwise - is as simple as opening a door with a key. "It's there to be found," said Jon Berryhill, owner of Berryhill Computer Forensics, a San Francisco-based company that performs computer data retrieval services. http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36~53~966650~,00.html - - - - - - - - IT security training 'inadequate' UK employees lack the appropriate IT security training necessary to combat potential threats to organisations such as network viruses. IT security training is woefully inadequate in the majority of UK companies, according to a survey. Results from a SurfControl/NOP survey shows that 73 percent of organisations from the UK's largest employment sectors do not have proper training programmes in place. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2125615,00.html - - - - - - - - Piracy a factor in Macromedia move Macromedia is set to relocate its Asia Pacific regional office from Melbourne to Singapore. According to Peter OConnor, vice president for Asia Pacific, "the majority of our business today is across Asia. Australia [only represents] around 20-25 percent" and the growth opportunities for the company are significantly greater in Asia than in Australia and New Zealand. ANZ remains the "cornerstone" of Macromedias Asia Pacific business, he said. http://zdnet.com.com/2110-1106-965110.html - - - - - - - - Symantec undeletes mail deletion bug Symantec has issued a fix for a serious bug within Norton Internet Security 2003 which is responsible for the unexplained deletion of emails for some users. Users are advised to run the LiveUpdate automatic updating facility to fix the flaw. Symantec was first notified of the serious bug, which it says only affected a small number of users, on October 14. At first it was unable to replicate the problem, but our story on Monday this week seems to have focused its mind. http://online.securityfocus.com/news/1599 - - - - - - - - Quantum encryption secures high-speed data stream A quantum encryption system developed by two Northwestern University professors can encode entire high-speed data streams and could potentially encrypt data sent at Internet backbones speeds, its inventors said. The approach developed by Prem Kumar and Horace Yuen uses quantum codes to encrypt the signal transmitted down the Internet's optical fiber backbone. http://www.eetimes.com/at/news/OEG20021107S0031 - - - - - - - - All CDs will be protected and you are a filthy pirate One mad consumer relations team might be an isolated incident, two begins to look like a trend. The dismissive response Bertelsmann Music Group's copy protection team recently issued to a consumer's query essentially boiled down to, 'all Cds will be copy protected, it's not our problem that they won't play on some devices, so tough.' But apparently, it's a competition. EMI Germany is taking pretty much the same attitude, and its humorously- tagged Consumer Relations team is calling the customers pirates while it's about it. http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/28009.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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