	February
	Newsletter
	Issue 51

Included in this months issue:

Virgin Media admit to Broadband upgrade "confusion"

Net neutrality: Are all bits created equal?

The ability to visit big or small websites equally is coming under attack from critics of "net neutrality" in America.

This principle means all web traffic is treated equally regardless of the type or origin.

The networks delivering large volumes of multimedia content to US homes are feeling the strain, and demanding fundamental changes to the rules underlying the internet.

Internet service providers (ISPs) in America want more control over the pipelines delivering the data to net users.

Taken from BBC Technology News

Microsoft's foiling of botnet gets mixed response

Security experts are split over the effectiveness of Microsoft's efforts to shut down a network of PCs that could send 1.5 billion spam messages a day.

The firm persuaded a US judge to issue a court order to cripple 277 internet domains used by the Waledac botnet.

Botnets are usually armies of hijacked Windows PCs that send spam or malware.

"We aim to be more proactive in going after botnets to help protect the internet," said Richard Boscovich, the head of Microsoft's digital crime unit.

By Maggie Sheils

Go To Top.

Google scores an own goal with Nexus One

Potential internet overlord Google seems to be having a spot of bother with its Nexus One smartphone. Apparently some of the buyers of the gadget want to complain about it or get help and Google's telephone help line is total rubbish.

It is not that the phone is breaking, according to the BBC, but just that Google stupidly thought it could run its Nexus One help operation like it does its web pages. Google is only responding to questions by email and the outfit lacks phone-based support. So of course support forums that Google has set up for the Nexus One are filling up with complaints.

By Nick Farrell

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Tiny ear listens to hidden worlds

A micro-ear could soon help scientists eavesdrop on tiny events just like microscopes make them visible.

Initially, researchers will use it to snoop on cells as they go about their daily business.

It may allow researchers to listen to how a drug disrupts micro-organisms, in the same way as a mechanic might listen to a car's engine to find a fault.

A team from three UK institutions are building the device, which they hope will become standard lab equipment.

Institutions involved include the Universities of Glasgow and Oxford as well as the National Institute of Medical Research at Mill Hill.

QLogic sues over video of chip frying egg

Storage networking outfit QLogic has sued archrival Emulex for posting a web video that shows an egg frying on a QLogic converged network adapter.

As noticed by The Street, QLogic filed suit on Monday in a California Superior Court, claiming the Emulex video is intentionally deceptive.

"Emulex's video purporting to show an egg frying on a QLogic semiconductor chip is misleading and intended to deceive potential customers of QLogic products," the suit reads.

The suit also alleges that during a recent quarterly earnings call, Emulex made "completely and utterly false statements" intended to harm QLogic's business. Among other things, the suit says, Emulex claimed that QLogic's competing converged network adapter lacked a "certified and hardened Ethernet stack to support demanding server requirements."

In the Emulex video - posted to YouTube and an Emulex blog in late January - a company engineer tells viewers he wants to help them avoid an "actual crash and burn in the data center," before claiming that the QLogic QLE8152 converged network adapter has an internal temperature of 190 degrees Fahrenheit, "as much as 70 degrees higher" than the Emulex OCe10102.

The mobile menace: One in 20 drivers admit updating Twitter and Facebook from behind the wheel

One in 20 drivers have read a post on social networking sites, such as Facebook and Twitter, while behind the wheel, a report showed today.

Soaring numbers of motorists have gone beyond phone calls and are now texting and even posting on social-networking sites while on the road, the survey of more than 2,000 car drivers showed.

Tough new laws regarding the use of mobile phone while driving were brought in just three years ago.

Taken from Daily Mail

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Twitter hits fan as scams smite banks, cabinet ministers

The Twitter phishing attacks from earlier this week stepped up a gear on Friday with huge volumes of spam from compromised accounts, some of which belonged to UK cabinet minsters and even a bank.

Pwned micro-blogging accounts include high profile targets such as Ed Miliband MP, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change. His account sent out links to a site selling knock-off male potency pills after Miliband (or more likely his research staff) fell victim to a phishing scam earlier this week, Sophos reports.

By John Leyden

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Mobile phones become smarter in 2010

Despite the name, smartphones are often quite dumb as there are many tasks these devices struggle to do.

The Mobile World Congress in Barcelona saw the launch of software aiming to try and solve some of the bigger issues such as handsets not playing Flash videos.

Despite the majority of video, animation, and many games on the net being Flash based, the system is not yet fully supported on handsets.

David Wadhwani, vice president of Adobe, said: "We'll see over the next 12 months Flash player 10.1, which is the same version of Flash on desktops, running on a variety of smartphones."

The mobile download of Flash 10.1 will be available from this summer on Android and Palm Pre handsets - and with other manufacturers to follow.

Currently 19 out of the top 20 manufacturers have signed up to support the video and animation platform.

The update will not be available on the iPhone because Apple has decided not to support the software.

By Dan Simmons

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Virgin Media admits broadband upgrade 'confusion'

Virgin Media has denied claims from broadband customers that it is cheekily charging them more to upgrade their cable broadband packages than it asks new punters to pay up.

One customer who contacted Reg Hardware told us that punters on Virgin Media's 20Mb/s XL tariff who log on to the account management section of the VM website are currently being told the upgrade to 50Mb/s XXL broadband will cost £52 per month.

However, potential customers checking prices on the main VM website will see that XXL costs £38 pounds per month when similarly ordered without a phone or cable TV package.

Over a year, that's a £168 difference.

By Tony Smith

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iPhone: The OS with big aspirations

Apple is advertising for an Engineering Manager to take the iPhone OS onto new platforms and new hardware, extending the OS, and the Cupertino control that goes with it.

With the iPad not yet out of the door, Apple is already looking at ways to extend the iPhone platform onto other hardware, as the advertisement spotted by Computer Worlddemonstrates:

The Core Platform team within Apple's Core OS organization is looking for a talented and inspired manager to lead a team focused on bring-up of iPhone OS on new platforms.

It should come as no surprise that Apple would like to see the locked-down OS elsewhere - having complete control of the platform is very attractive, as any games-console developer will tell you. Computer World points out that Apple TV would be a good place to start. Connected to the iTunes store it has huge potential, but that would likely be only the beginning of Apple's aspirations for its smallest OS.