The Libyan government has removed an adult-friendly link-shortening service from the web, saying that it fell foul of local laws.
It could have an impact on similar services registered in Libya — via redwolf.newsvine.com
A near-final version of the international Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) released this week won praise from organizations representing copyright holders and some sighs of relief from groups that had opposed proposals in earlier drafts.
Still, concerns about the copyright-enforcement trade pact remain, said some groups critical of language in earlier, leaked versions of ACTA. The proposed trade agreement has been improved, with Internet service providers no longer on the hook for the copyright infringement of their customers, said the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA), a tech trade group — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Spammers have jumped on the little-used soft hyphen (or SHY character) to fool URL filtering devices. According to researchers at Symantec Corp., spammers are larding up URLs for sites they promote with the soft hyphen character, which many browsers ignore — via redwolf.newsvine.com
NSW and Victoria have ruled out following Tasmania’s lead and legislating for all homes to be connected to the National Broadband Network — via redwolf.newsvine.com
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In the face of China wielding menacing control over 97% of the world’s rare earth materials, the US House of Representatives recently passed a bill that would bolster R&D of the key elements and help find substitutions for the materials — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Countries in Eastern Europe and Africa that harbour cyber criminals should be locked out of the global internet until their governments do something to reduce the threats, the former chief technology officer at the US National Security Agency says — via redwolf.newsvine.com
During the last week, French Internet users have been starting to receive letters as part of the graduated warning system built in to the controversial Hadopi anti-piracy legislation. The email warnings are being sent by Hadopi via France’s ISPs. But even at this early stage at least one ISP is refusing to forward them to their customers prompting complaints from rivals that they are seeking to achieve a competitive advantage — via redwolf.newsvine.com
A Montreal man who sent more than four million spam e-mails to Facebook users over a two-month period was ordered to pay the social media giant more than $1 billion in compensation — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Tasmanian homes and businesses will automatically be connected to the National Broadband Network unless they actively refuse — via redwolf.newsvine.com
The online behaviour of millions of Australians is to be tracked and auctioned to advertisers by a new generation of internet businesses setting up shop here.
The world’s largest data exchange
, the Californian company BlueKai, boasts it already has the computer addresses and purchasing intent
of 8 million Australians it knows are in the market for cars, holidays and online shopping.
And a British company, Phorm, which has been investigated by European regulators for alleged privacy breaches, targets customers of consenting internet service providers with ads based on websites they visit and their customer details. It was found to have served up ads to users of British Telecom’s net service without seeking their prior consent — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Anyone who owns a laptop computer can now fight crime from the safety of their home and win cash prizes for catching thieves red-handed, under a new British monitoring scheme that went live this week — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, which has dominated the Web browser market since blowing by Netscape in the late 1990s, last month fell below the 50% market share level for the first time in years.
IE’s share of the worldwide market fell to 49.87% in September, down from 51.3% in August and 58.4% a year ago. It is followed by Firefox, which increased its share slightly from 30.09% to 31.5% and Google Chrome, which grabbed 11.54% share, more than triple its September 2009 share, according to market watcher StatCounter — via redwolf.newsvine.com
BT is seeking a moratorium on legal applications to obtain details of its customers who are alleged to have illegally shared files online — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Verizon Wireless said Sunday it will pay up to $90 million in refunds to 15 million cell phone customers who were wrongly charged for data sessions or Internet use, one of the largest-ever customer refunds by a telecommunications company — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Google sure does capture a ton of interesting stuff when it sends Street View cars around the world. Sometimes its 360-degree cameras pick up a disturbing image or two.
That allegedly is the case after Google announced this week it has added Antartica, Brazil, and Ireland to its Street View library. Shortly after its announcement, Brazilian site G1, allegedly found a corpse in Google’s online mapping service — via redwolf.newsvine.com
The million-plus citizens of Leon, Mexico are set to become the first example of a city secured through the power of biometric identification. Iris and face scanning technologies from Global Rainmakers, Inc. will allow people to use their eyes to prove their identify, withdraw money from an ATM, get help at a hospital, and even ride the bus. GRI’s eye scanning systems aren’t more secure than others on the market, but they are faster. Large archway detectors using infrared imaging can pick out 50 people per minute, even as they hustle by at speeds up to 1.5 meters per second (3.3 mph). The first phase of the Leon iris and face scanning project has already begun. It is estimated to cost around $5 million and focuses on law enforcement agencies’ security check points. Over the next three years commercial uses will be rolled out with banks leading the charge. Check out the videos below to see GRI’s wide range of iris scanning stations in action. Whether you’re jealous or intimidated by Leon’s adoption of widespread eye identification you should pay attention to the project – similar biometric checkpoints are coming to locations near you. Some are already in place — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Researchers in the Midwest are developing microelectronic circuitry to guide the growth of axons in a brain damaged by an exploding bomb, car crash or stroke. The goal is to rewire the brain connectivity and bypass the region damaged by trauma, in order to restore normal behavior and movement — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Open sourcers have seized control of the OpenOffice project and product and declared their independence from database giant Oracle — via redwolf.newsvine.com
In a study that could eventually restore movement to humans’ paralyzed limbs, researchers at California’s Stanford University have used light to induce muscle contractions in mice. A gene derived from algae was inserted into the mice, encoding a light-sensitive protein which adhered to their nerve cell surfaces. Scientists then placed an optical cuff
lined with tiny, inwards-facing LEDs around the mice’s sciatic nerves. By penetrating those nerves with brief, high-intensity bursts of blue light, they were able to produce muscle contractions similar to those that would occur naturally. The technology is called optogenetics
— via redwolf.newsvine.com
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