Science & Technology Today

If you don’t know it already, Stuxnet is a worm that could take control of industrial equipment. It is widely believed that its target was machinery used to enrich uranium. Stuxnet first came to light in July 2010. Nearly 60% of reported infections were inside Iran. The worm targets industrial control systems, known as programmable logic controllers (PLCs), made by Siemens. While PLCs are used to control a wide variety of automated systems, it is believed that it was those inside Iran's nuclear facilities that were the intended target. Analysts who have examined the Stuxnet code say it could have been used to damage centrifuges which play a crucial role in the process of enriching uranium for both nuclear power and weapons. In a recent report on Stuxnet, the security firm Symantec said that it would have taken a team of between five and 10 developers, six months to create the worm.

Our obsession with texting is prompting more a more online entrants to get into this space. Today I had an opportunity to click Text4FreeOnline Free SMS Text Message 2Way and I found it very cool. I just send an international MMS and within seconds I got back the response. Try it out for free and let me know if it worked for you. Let me tell you that they did ask me to test their service.

Did you notice that resently Facebook took a step towards opening up parts of its site to outsiders by introducing more options for user’s privacy settings. The changes will make it easier for Facebook’s more than 350 million users to limit who sees their musings, videos, photos and other personal information, but will also give them the opportunity to expose a wider swathe of their information to a broader internet audience. The move comes as internet search engines like Google and Microsoft are showing interest in incorporating the growing trove of user-generated content from social media websites into their search results. Schrage, Facebook Vice President of Global Communications and Public Policy said Facebook users will be greeted with a message on Wednesday presenting them with new options to customise privacy settings and directing them to a new, simplified overview page of all their personal privacy settings. You will see that my blogs are short these days and We're qui...

MS Windows 7, the next major release of the world's most popular operating system, goes public in trial form in the next week. A test version of Windows 7 will be available to developers from Thursday, while the public can try it out from 5 May. Microsoft is hoping it can avoid the negative press that surrounded the launch of Vista, the last major Windows release, almost three years ago. Windows 7 has been designed to be compatible with Vista so users do not have to invest in new hardware. A commercial release of Windows 7 is expected in the next nine months. Microsoft is hoping it can avoid the negative press that surrounded the launch of Vista, the last major Windows release, almost three years ago. Windows 7 has been designed to be compatible with Vista so users do not have to invest in new hardware. A commercial release of Windows 7 is expected in the next nine months. Windows 7 promises a major usability improvement on Vista, and a simplification of security measures which cau...

A new startup company Navio Systems based in Apple's home town of Cupertino , California is trying hard to break the hold of Apple in online music domain. Their recently launched music download website gbox is getting lot of attention and record labels like Universal and SonyBMG have started selling music on there website. Customers can buy tunes through gbox at the same price charged by market leader iTunes - 99 cents per track. gbox will also benefit from a special advertising deal with Google. The adverts, which will appear when a user searches for a particular term, such as the name of an artist, will link to the g box site. Navio Systems is hoping to finally open the iPod to other formats with a system that stores the rights associated with a musical piece, game, or movie in the file itself, according to Business Magazine. Navio software that enable its customers to offer copy-protected video content that will play on Apple's iPods . The move will create o...

Omnifone is all set to break Apple's hold on digital music. Its software Musicstation is estimated to run on millions of mobile phones in Europe and Asia. Omnifone has decided to take on Apple's music-playing iPhone , weeks before its launch in the USA. Musicstation software, which has already started being loaded in mobile phones in Europe, is estimated to be in 100 million mobile phones in Europe and Asia in the next 12 months. Big mobile phone operators and all music majors have signed up to Musicstation .All the company wishes to do, is to break Apple's hold on digital music and they believe mobile phones are the way to do it.The advantages of a Musicstation over the iPod and iPhone is that music can be downloaded anywhere, without a computer needed. Musicstation will also work on a range of handsets offered by mobile phone operators.The songs will be stored on a server and not on the phone that can get lost or stolen.So it implies that the songs are rented not ...

All the devices running the Symbian Series 60 platform operating system could be infected by Commwarrior virus that invades a phone either through Bluetooth or Multimedia Messaging Service ( MMS ) and then sends infected SIS files to other phones, which means all Nokia phone could be potential victims. In addition to spreading over Bluetooth , the Commwarrior will also read the user's local address book for phone numbers and start sending MMS messages containing the Commwarrior SIS file. Whether by Bluetooth or MMS , the person receiving a virus would have to choose to install the virus, either by selecting that option from the Bluetooth notification or choosing to download and run the embedded file from the MMS message they receive. The virus cannot be spread to the receiving device unless the user of the device chooses to run the application.So keep on the watch out for text messages with an unknown or unusual subject line. Example of affected messages include: SymbianO...

A new approach to security is evolving with the development of what is called as Content-Centric Security- CCS . CCS is a self-authenticating content utilized, proprietary means to embed data and logical content within content that securely binds files with embedded crypto elements. Thus CCS is a new way to solve most of the problems associated with conventional network-centric security. As we know all networks face the difficult problem of authenticating participants, trust levels, devices, applications, and content. Existing state-of-art authentication procedures are based on centralized authorities and are very poorly suited to end-node and cross domain exchange. CCS substantially simplifies existing authentication methodologies through a novel solution to cope with growing privacy concerns, amounts and types of digital content, the number of people and assigned trust levels of those participating, and the variety of devices required to support “Security to the Edge” strategies,...

Customer Care is the latest marketing tool, which nobody can ignore in today's market place and using customer relationship management -CRM software is a essential part of it. Use of customer relationship management products for large and medium business for sales, services,marketing and contact-center operations is very common and we have some big names like Oracle and Siebel in this business. So far small business have not been using these solutions even if they know the importance of CRM for growth and sustenance for their business.We have some of the affordable customer relationship management packages are available now that small business can take advantage of . For example AIMpromote CRM package is available with no setup fees and a $33 per user licence fee and their software package is feature rich and takes care of all aspects of CRM. Please Note:-This is a sponsored and paid post for AIMpromote

If you do not have any protection on your PC and it is behaving erratically; you are most likely to be infected with vicious software called Malware . According statistics collected by InfectedOrNot .com, more than half the computers scanned by them were infected with some kind of malware . Almost 70% of the non protected computers and almost 50% of the protected computers are infected by some form of malware . Panda Software who are behind website the InfectedOrNot .com,claims that their goal is to raise awareness about these widespread infections (besides the promotion of their new tools, of course). The website allows you to use their Panda Nano Scan and Panda Total Scan tools for free and, more importantly, it displays the collected stats from all the scans performed at the website in the past 24 hours. Now many of these so called malware detection and removal websites, are in fact responsible for installing their own malware , so beware of these impostors.I am not sure if this I...

A major technological breakthrough has arrived in computing world--- Quantum Computing is a reality. Recently a Canadian company D-wave demonstrated a viable quantum computer in Silicon Valley. Quantum computing get is name because it uses quantum mechanics rather than the conventional physics associated with digital processing, to drive the computation. The quantum chip which is at the heart of quantum computing was designed by D-wave and built by NASA. Quantum chip is a processor built from the superconducting materials aluminum and niobium, chilled in a tank of helium. It achieves supercomputing speeds because its basic data units-called qubits , can hold both values “0” and “1” at the same time and also share those values with other qubits . The demonstration had a chip capable of running at 16 qubits and by end 2008 they are planning to reach 1024 qubits . Quantum computers are not just faster than conventional computers. They change what computer scientists call the computationa...

Continuing on my earlier post on advances in VOIP recently concluded VoiceCon Spring 2007 saw VOIP vendors trying to get into the corporate and mobile subscriber areas as well. One the most impressive product announcements was Unified Communication Manager Version 6.0 by Cisco - with new mobility and collaboration features as well as a VOIP server package for small and midsize companies. Unified Communication Manager Version 6.0 will support up to 10,000 users on its servers. Right now, the application is going to run only on Linux operating system and Windows based application will come in the next twelve months or so. They also introduced Unified Mobile Communicator client software for cell phones and smart phones, which lets these devices tie into Cisco based VOIP infrastructure. This software supports devices with operating systems like Windows Mobile, Symbian and Blackberries.

Many of us have been working from home these days. Some of us seem to love it but a recent survey shows that if you have chosen this mode of working, it may not help in your career ambitions as folks working form home are least likely to be promoted. Even if you decide you start going to office again you may still be using IP Virtual Private Network (VPN), the enabling technology for working from home. Today, I am going to write about different ways of implementing IP VPN. Three basic IP VPN technologies are used today to create network architectures: Multi Protocol Label Switching (MPLS), IP Security (IPSec), and Secure Socket Layer ( (SSL ). They may be used as stand alone or in combination. Each of them is used for a specific purpose and you may be using one or more of these technologies. MPLS is a site - to-site connectivity based on mesh network topology which allows multiple network services. When you are connected through a MPLS network each packet that traverses through it...

Mobile gaming will be go mobile in a literal sense with the upcoming launch of GPS enabled and location based games. Even though I had read analyst saying that mobile gaming is going to rack up billions very soon, I was skeptic about it, till I saw some of my colleagues playing mobile games during launch time. And now with the advent of GPS enabled games , mobile gaming is going to reach a new level and users. Your World Games Ltd, will soon be launching ' The Shroud' which allow players to enter “quests” by physically moving into randomly determined hotspots in the vicinity. Earlier attempts by KnowledgeWhere Corp. at this were not so successful but may be it was not the right time a year back. Just to give you idea what is hot in mobile gaming, look at the enclosed snapshot of popular games. Top Mobile Game Categories by Revenue Share (U.S) Category Revenue Share 1. Puzzle/Strategy 33.8% 2. Card/Casino 18.3% 3. Sports/Racing ...

My recent posts on Windows Vista and digital rights management (DRM) did not mention that Vista operating system has an integrated DRM system and this is very important for anyone using Vista. This integration of DRM enables it to downgrading video and audio quality if required by the policy associated with the content being played. Beside all other issues associated with DRM, handling this 'Vista's Content Protection systems' put extra demands on the computer's CPU and will slow it down.I think Microsoft has gone too far by adopting this consumer-unfriendly technology. As mentioned in my previous post on DRM, while more and more artists and content providers are looking at new ways to implement DRM, Microsoft wants to police on behalf of content providers and use consumer money and resources to do this. Mr. Bill Gates in the past had expressed his dissatisfaction on the present implementation of DRM seems to have looked the other way when it came to Microsoft. Contrary...

Soon all of us will be talking about JOOST --- which is a new web based TV, being launched by the same guys who were behind free online telephone service Skype . After make cool $2.5 billion in 2005 by heaving off Skype , they are ready to conquer new territories. JOOST is billing itself as the first free global TV distribution platform, uniting advertisers, content owners and viewers in a piracy-free interactive service. They are trying hard to make it as TV-like with programmes, channels and adverts. You can download the Beta version at JOOST , but they are selective with the beta tester, I am still waiting for my password. The enclosed screenshot from their web site is just great. I will update you as soon as I take a peep at it myself, till then you may try to get you own JOOST .

In my earlier post on Back-up and Storage, you read about my views on the importance of optimizing storage resources. I have a similar feeling about Virtualization and it is finally getting some attention from enterprise IT. Virtualization refers to the ability within the network to consolidate computing resources or servers by allowing virtual machines (VMs) to migrate freely between servers. Virtualization has been around for a longtime but some recent developments in Virtualization software are making it a better proposition. Virtualization is implemented by running a layer of software called virtual machine monitor (VMM) directly on the server hardware which allows the “guest” operating systems a complete interface on the virtual machines (VMs). As it involves the management of the hardware resources, it requires active participation of chip manufactures like Intel and AMD. The latest development in virtual machine monitor (VMM) is advent of open source technologies. This serve...

The recording industry has seized the opportunity to distribute their content, mostly audio files through wireless phones carriers and Internet. Nearly all the content provided by wireless phone carriers and online music distribution services comes with embedded anti-piracy software or digital rights management ( DRM ) and with that you end up buying music specific to a particular device or carrier. This is just not right, once you have paid for a particular audio file or content you should be able to play it on any of the players, home network or devices. Wireless phone carriers like Verizon, Cingular Wireless, have all adopted for proprietary DRM solutions for there full track download services and again this is not good for the consumer. DRM has to go or change to a standard form of implementation, whereby it is consumer friendly. We are already seeing some action from artists like Jessica Simpson, Norah Jones etc., by release of DRM -free content for online distribution and I ...

Windows Vista launch is just 20 days away and there is a lot of anticipation in the market. At first look the GUI is fantastic; the Aero visual interface provides cool effects such as translucent windows borders and a way to scroll through a 3-D stack of open windows to find what you want. Search windows integrated into every explorer window and Sidebar-which contains “gadgets” such as headlines, weather update are great. Many of these features seem to mimic Apple’s OS X Tiger operating system with some enhancements. Like myself most of the people using beta version now, seem to like these features. Just to make sure everybody knows that Windows Vista has enhanced performance over Windows XP,Microsoft has coined some new terms or features like Sleep, SuperFetch, Windows ReadyBoost™, and Ready Drive. Sleep is the new name for going into Standby or Hibernate state. Superfetch new name for the memory managements system in Windows Vista. ReadyBoost refers to the use of external Flash ...

We seem to be obsessed with taking multiple copies of data these days. For our personal data we take a copy on CD drive, USB jump drive, and an external HD drive and of course we have multiple copies on our computer as well. But when it comes to storing our business data, we are even more cautious and plenty of SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) /RAID (Redundant Array of Independent or Inexpensive Disks), disk drives and storage array across the network come handy. So we take backups everywhere. We make sure to leave a copy of our work on every folder and server. I have a gut feeling that every piece of data exists on at least twenty places on the network. I do not want to undermine the need to have backups and disaster recovery for a large organization but I think we are doing too much on this. Of course storage has become very cheap but filling up racks with these drives in our data centers is unnecessary. There are already some storage optimization software in market to remove...