Technology

HTTPS Everywhere is a Firefox extension produced as a collaboration between The Tor Project and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. It encrypts your communications with a number of major websites.

John Graham-Cumming wrote an article today complaining about how a computer system he was working with described his last name as having invalid characters. It of course does not, because anything someone tells you is their name is?—?by definition?—?an appropriate identifier for them. John was understandably vexed about this situation, and he has every right to be, because names are central to our identities, virtually by definition.

Years ago we suggested sticking a borked hard drive in your freezer for a chance at recovering your data before the drive goes completely kaput. Developer site Server Zone highlights the same tip, with more detailed instructions for saving your freezer drive.

My search for a program comparable to the Windows’ application DVD Decrypter is finally complete. If you’ve ever wanted to create an ISO of a DVD — in order to keep all of the menus, special features, language options, etc. of an encrypted DVD intact — I’ve got a straightforward solution — via Mac OS X Hints

Spam is an apparently unavoidable fact of life in email, but it’s still a shock to get an unsolicited marketing message to your mobile number. If you’ve experienced mobile spam, Australian communications regulator ACMA has set up a dedicated service to let you report it — via Lifehacker Australia

Twitter is testing a feature intended to make it more convenient and secure for end users to include shortened Web addresses, or URLs, in messages they post via the popular microblogging service and via its third-party applications. Expected to be rolled out broadly this summer, the URL shortening feature is now in limited testing and is designed to reduce the length of any Web page address, but particularly long ones

Olympus Japan has issued a warning to customers who have bought its Stylus Tough 6010 digital compact camera that it comes with an unexpected extra — a virus on its internal memory card. The first thing to point out is that the camera itself is not at risk — the autorun worm being carried on its internal memory can not activate on the Stylus Tough camera, but can attempt to infect your Windows PC. In other words, users are at risk of infecting their Windows computers with the autorun worm when they plug the device into their USB drive, a method of transmission effectively identical to the infected Samsung Wave smartphones

Google has launched one of the biggest revamps of its search engine in history, which it said would provide search results that are 70 per cent fresher than the current algorithm. The company later revised this to say it would be 50 per cent better than before. The new indexing system, dubbed Caffeine, will provide the largest selection of web content ever offered on Google. It’s faster — processing hundreds of thousands of pages in parallel every second — and takes up nearly 100 million gigabytes of storage in one database

Taking a page from the Australian broadband playbook, New Zealand has decided not to sit around while incumbent DSL operators milk the withered dugs of their cash cow until it keels over from old age. Instead, the Kiwis have established a government-owned corporation to invest NZ$1.5 billion for open-access fibre to the home. By 2020, 75 percent of residents should have, at a bare minimum, 100Mbps down/50 Mbps up with a choice of providers

When the phrase oil spill is typed on Google or Yahoo, the immediate result guides one to BP’s Gulf of Mexico response, its official page dedicated to giving information about its attempt to curtail the spill. Search engines — especially Google and Yahoo, are the first point of contact for anyone looking for related information in a crisis situation. Thus BP’s PR strategy is pretty straight forward. While a host of companies resort to this strategy in crisis situation, BP has received flak from many critics who condemned the move as unethical

The next version of the iPhone will hit Australia in July as part of the second wave of countries to receive the handset, Apple chief executive Steve Jobs revealed this morning after demonstrating the new device. The phone will be available in the US, France, Germany, the UK and Japan from 24 June, but Australia will have to wait until July

Google has denied suggestions by Communications Minister Stephen Conroy that its Street Viewcars inadvertently captured people’s personal banking details. Senator Conroy yesterday suggested that Google could have gathered financial information when its cars accessed private data through unsecured wireless networks. The data collection occurred while the cars were out gathering information for Google’s mapping service. But Google Australia said no banking data was collected because it could not read information transmitted over secure networks like a financial website. A Google spokeswoman explained that Street View cars did not keep encrypted data

The Federal Government, alongside the Internet Industry Association (IIA), yesterday launched a code of practice that aims to reduce the amount of zombie-infected computers on the internet. Zombie-infected computers are PCs connected to the internet that are infected with malware. Drafted in September 2009, the IIA released the code of practice to internet service providers (ISPs), outlining ways they could protect and inform their users about being infected with malware. One suggestion within the code is to put users into a walled garden if their computer becomes infected, which limits internet access to prevent further security problems until the PC is quarantined. Another option is to throttle infected users’ speed down

HP is set to unveil a line of printers with their own email addresses, allow people to print from devices such as smartphones and the iPad

The Australian police have been ordered to investigate Google for possible breach of privacy while taking pictures for its Street View service. Australia’s attorney general said he had asked police to probe the internet giant following complaints that Google had gathered personal data from some unencrypted wi-fi services. Google has admitted doing so, but apologised, saying it was in error. The company has recently criticised the government’s plan for internet filters

Facebook could have a local police point of presence within months, according to Australian Federal Police High Tech Crime Centre assistant commissioner Neil Gaughan. The move would eliminate a sticking point in a high-profile slanging match between the two organisations, after the AFP questioned Facebook’s willingness to co-operate with local police investigations

Tinfoil hatters around the world are abuzz that UVB-76, the Russian shortwave radio station that has been broadcasting its monotonous tone almost uninterrupted since 1982, has suddenly gone offline. Of course no one knows what the significance of this is, but best brush up on your drills just in case — via Slashdot

Ben-Gurion University of the Negev students have developed an innovative optical radar system that helps blind people manoeuvre around obstacles. The radar system incorporates a computer, two video cameras and a scanning light source to warn the blind of obstacles with audible alerts. The system detects obstacles — even those overhead — by scanning the depth of its surroundings, taken from two different angles

There are a few simple rules that will stand you in good stead in the markets: buy on the dips. Don’t trade too often. And never bet against Rupert Murdoch. The Australian-born media tycoon, 79, has railed against the conventional wisdom in a career that has lasted many decades. He has taken plenty of rulebooks, ripped them up and come out a winner. This month he will make his most ambitious gamble yet. He will try to redesign the way the internet and the media work by putting up a paywall around two British newspapers, The Times and The Sunday Times. And this time he is doomed to fail. It’s too late to start charging for newspapers online. The content isn’t good enough, and newspapers themselves are a product of technologies that simply don’t work in a digital economy. All Murdoch is going to achieve with this move is to kill off one of the most famous media brands in the world

Millions of documents stored at the World War II code-breaking centre, Bletchley Park, are set to be digitised and made available online. Electronics company Hewlett-Packard has donated a number of scanners to the centre in Milton Keynes so volunteers can begin the ground-breaking task. Many of the records at the once-secret centre have not been touched for years. During the war, it was home to more than 10,000 men and women who decoded encrypted German messages. The centre hopes that once the work starts, previously untold stories about the role Bletchley Park played in the war, will be revealed