Google has confirmed that it is developing an online payment system, although it says it has no plans to take on eBay’s PayPal service
An Indian researcher has cracked the much-touted impenetrable
Windows Genuine Advantage of Microsoft. According to Microsoft this service would soon require all Windows users to verify their licence before downloading updates
Three lions reportedly rescued a 12-year-old girl from her kidnappers in Bita Genet, Ethiopia. The girl had been held captive for seven days by men who intended to force her into a marriage. Police say the lions scared off the kidnappers and stayed to protect her — via BoingBoing
Phishers and malware writers have started sending e-mails that refer to the high profile data security breach at MasterCard — when information on more than 40 million credit cards was stolen — with an offer to help worried card holders into recovering
their stolen information
Dvorak has an interesting editorial up, where he links the recent stories of alleged security problems
and spyware problems
bittorent has been having with the recent Microsoft announcement of research into a file sharing application called Avalanche
. concluding it’s all part of an orchestrated Microsoft disinformation campaign against BitTorrent
French actress turned animal rights activist Brigitte Bardot has urged the European Union to take legal action against France for authorising the killing of six wolves
Japan has failed in its bid to resume commercial whaling during a vote at the International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting in Uslan, South Korea. Twenty-nine countries voted against, with 23 supporting the plan
Real Simple provides a useful guide to expiration dates and how long dozens of products last — via BoingBoing
A prankster in Sunnyvale, California has been toying with traffic lights across the city for three months. Police say he or she has turned them to face the wrong way, altered the timing, and made them flash red in all directions. There is evidence that whoever is doing it knows what they’re doing,
(city spokesman John) Pilger said. The evidence suggests they’re an electrician or have that background. This isn’t a high school prank
— via BoingBoing
An underground society has emerged among Tokyo’s homeless living beneath the shadows of the capital’s skyscrapers and in its parks. Just recently, there’s been a rapid increase in the number of former yakuza gangsters who’ve become homeless. And they’re really aggressive, flashing their tattoos, scaring passers-by and lording over other homeless as they do whatever they like.
For many Japanese who associate the yakuza with wealth, even if it is the result of ill-gotten gains, the idea of a gangster living on the streets is close to unthinkable. But the number of homeless yakuza inhabiting parks and living under bridges is apparently skyrocketing, especially in central Tokyo — via Warren Ellis
New Zealand’s telecommunications have been crippled by two separate incidents that have closed the country’s stock exchange and affected internet, mobile and landline phone calls around the country. You’d think Telstra were running the show
A technique that confuses clothes moths about their sexuality has made a dramatic difference to the storage of ballet and opera costumes at Covent Garden
Apparently a sudden interest in technology is catching. My mother is in good company with her recent acquisition of an iPod, Her Royal Majesty Queen Elizabeth II is also a devotee of Apple’s iPod. If the thought of the Queen trolling through Apple’s online jukebox, iTunes looking for hits
is a little too much for the frontal lobes, the Sun assures its readers that, like most things, she probably has a footman to do it for her
Little Johnny Coward had been forced to review his barbaric immigration detention policy that has seen families locked up for years without hope of release. These minor changes have only come about since the government got outed for illegally incarcerating and deporting Australia citizens. The changes don’t go far enough, the entire system needs to be dismantled and the facilities turned over to a more suitable use; like locking up useless, rascist, xenophobic, hate-mongering politicians
A Georgia lawyer is taking a case to appeals court to prove that the mere act of viewing a web site does not constitute possession of the materials that were automatically cached on your hard drive
An alleged armed robber has just had the beating of a lifetime, at the hands of nearly 30 women inside a Shreveport beauty school. They all beat him with sticks, table legs and curling irons. Officer Eric Swartout describes what happened, Basically, they’re hitting him with everything that wasn’t nailed down
— via BoingBoing
As the Downing Street memo confirms, they had so little evidence of real threats that they knew from the start that they were going to have manufacture excuses to go to war. What’s more damning still is that they effectively began this war even before the congressional vote
The inherent weirdness of quantum physics may act to prevent the paradoxes which seem possible with the conventional view of time travel
Activity surrounding Kryptos, the cryptographic puzzle at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, continues to surge. Elonka Dunin who runs a comprehensive Kryptos site, told The Guardian that she used to see 500 visitors a day but recently got 30,000 visits in 24 hours. Of course, interest in cracking Kryptos skyrocketed once it was revealed that The Da Vinci Code dustjacket references the puzzle and that it’s part of the plot of Dan Brown’s next bestseller, The Solomon Key — via BoingBoing
Two men were married in the chapel at Nova Scotia’s Greenwood airbase in May, in what’s being called the Canadian military’s first gay wedding. How can you not love Canada? — via HogBlog
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