TeKSaurus

They should make this guys story into a movie= The Cisco Kid

2011-07-23T09:41:00.001-07:00

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/07/a-pound-of-flesh-how-ciscos-unmitigated-gall-derailed-one-mans-life.ars

a cautionary tale of corporate fascism...and horror...

High-tech entrepreneur Peter Adekeye's yearlong nightmare began after he dropped his wife off at the Vancouver International airport and headed downtown to The Wedgewood, a posh boutique hotel. Inside a tasteful boardroom adorned with gilt-framed mirrors, the US District Court for Northern California, San Jose division, had convened a special sitting to hear Adekeye's deposition as part of a massive antitrust action he had launched against his former employer, the computer giant Cisco Systems. An official court video camera recorded the proceedings on May 20, 2010—Adekeye affably answering questions in an elegant black suit accented with a pale blue shirt and a coral tie.

At 5:15pm, however, two plainclothes women—the shorter one brandishing a badge—and two uniformed police officers entered the room. Adekeye was confused, as were his two Wall Street lawyers and the special judicial master conducting the hearing. But the four lawyers for Cisco knew exactly what was going on.

"I'm from the RCMP," the taller woman said, "I'm sorry I have to interrupt your meeting here."

"Hello," Adekeye said.

"I'm looking for—are you a Mr. Peter Alfred-Adekeye?"

"Yes."

"How do you say your name?"

"Add-a-kay."

"Add-a-kay," she repeated.

The lawyers interjected—"this is off the record," "on the record."

"I just want to speak with you," the officer continued. "Mr. Adekeye, the reason I'm here..."

"Wait, we're conducting a deposition here," the special master said as decorum collapsed and the video was shut off.

The recording resumed at 5:40pm, the camera focused on an empty chair with the special master speaking. "The interruption makes it impossible to continue the deposition today and, in my opinion, tomorrow," he said. "So I think that this deposition will be suspended until further notice."

Meanwhile, Adekeye was being perp-walked through the swanky hotel lobby, paraded past its well-heeled and powerful patrons and into a waiting paddy wagon. With that, the former Cisco executive, a British citizen with a blemish-free record and a sterling resume, dropped down an Alice-in-Wonderland rabbit hole that would tie up a year of his life.

The judge who freed Adekeye a year later said the public would "blanche at the audacity" of the conduct of Cisco and US prosecutors, both of whom turned out to be involved in Adekeye's jailing and persecution.

Simple Injection

2011-07-21T09:15:00.000-07:00

Anonymous Releases Restricted NATO Document

By Jeremy Kirk, IDG News Jul 21, 2011 7:30 am

The hacking collective Anonymous released a document on Thursday marked "restricted" from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
The 36-page document, which is dated Aug. 27, 2007, appears to be budget and equipment outlays for what was termed a new "HQ ISAF JOINT CIS CONTROL CENTRE." NATO's press office could not be immediately reached.

Anonymous claimed on its "AnonymousIRC" Twitter handle that it has 1GB of material from NATO but said that most would not be published because it would be "irresponsible."
In another Tweet, Anonymous said that the data was harvested via "simple injection," which usually refers to inputting malformed data in Web-based forms and seeing if the back-end database responds with information.

The group prefaced its release of the NATO document with an earlier comment on Twitter about its alleged trove of e-mail from the British tabloid The Sun, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. media group that is under investigation for voicemail interception and paying police officers for information.

"We think actually we may not release emails from The Sun, simply because it may compromise the court case," according to a Twitter post from Anonymous.
LulzSec, known as LulzSecurity, claimed credit on Twitter on Monday for that attack, but the two groups are somewhat aligned. Although LulzSec said it was going dormant after a string of highly successful attacks against the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, PBS.org and Fox.com, among others, it appears to be back in action. LulzSec hit The Sun's website on Monday, posting a fake news story that Murdoch had died.

The two groups also posted a statement on Pastebin directed at Steven Chabinsky, a deputy assistant director in the U.S Federal Bureau of Investigation's cyberdivision.
"Your threats to arrest us are meaningless to us as you cannot arrest an idea," the statement said. "Any attempt to do so will make your citizens more angry until they will roar in one gigantic choir."

Still, law enforcement isn't doing too bad. The FBI said on Wednesday it had arrested 14 people suspected of conducting distributed denial-of-service attacks against PayPal in December 2010. PayPal, along with Visa, MasterCard, Western Union and Bank of America, came under attack by Anonymous following their severing of payment links that funneled donations to the whistle-blowing site WikiLeaks.

Repost from the Dumb Little Man...

2011-07-08T19:13:00.000-07:00

Lack of Vision
The number one thing that holds most people back is lack of vision. You have to get a clear image in your mind's eye about what success means to you. I'm not talking about having tons of money, five cars, and a huge house somewhere expensive.

I'm talking about the life that you truly want to live. Think about how you would feel if you already had all that.

In the end all we want is to feel good now.

Negative Expectations
We've been conditioned to talk negatively to ourselves all day long. Some people don't believe in affirmations, but they go around telling themselves that they aren't good enough, that they can't accomplish anything, and that nothing is worth doing.

Try saying those things to yourself right now and see how you feel. Positive expectations will make good things happen.

Blame
There's no one to blame. You alone are responsible for not only the business success you have, but also how much you enjoy life right now. Even if someone did something wrong to you in the past, it doesn't mean that you have to be mad at them for the rest of your life.

The only one suffering from you blaming others is you.

Negative Beliefs
Everyone has their own set of negative beliefs. Figure out what yours are and start letting them go. There are a lot of ways out there that you can use to let go your negative beliefs.

Many of them work. I personally help people do just this with NLP and sometimes EFT and the results are powerful, but the change starts with you making the decision.

The problem is that most people like their negative beliefs, because they have benefits and feel familiar. They haven't realized that by letting go of these negative beliefs, you can feel even better and become even more successful.

Familiarity
Familiarity holds everyone back, because feeling like you're safe and comfortable is nice, but it ultimately keeps you stuck. And it's nowhere near as nice as when you take action, face your fears, and build a life that you truly desire.

Feeling uncomfortable when you do something new is a part of the game. It's just a sign that you're changing and making progress.

No Trust
It's essential that you trust the process. You don't have to know exactly how you're going to earn more and become more successful.

Your heart already knows where to go. Listen to your heart and follow your highest excitement.

Trust yourself, because you are the only one who knows what's right for you.

Lack of Focus
Another big stumbling block that may hold you back from outrageous success is the lack of focus. You have to have smart goals.

If you begin a new project or start a new business, you have to put on the blinders and focus on nothing else.

I’ve found that the more I focus, the better I do. It's easy to get distracted and sidetracked, I get that, but if you want success, you have to have laser-sharp focus.

Wrong View of Happiness
Happiness doesn't come from the outside, it comes from the inside.

Think about what you truly want when it comes to business success, and ask yourself what that will give you that you wouldn't otherwise have.

Keep asking that question until you reach the end, which is usually peace of mind, happiness, joy, or something like fulfillment.

The truth of the matter is that we all want to feel good, and we can feel good right away. You don't have to get stuff or accomplish things to do so.

Settling for Mediocrity
This goes hand in hand with familiarity. It's easy to settle for mediocrity, because you may have felt that you weren't good enough up until now.

You can change that whenever you want. Success isn’t what you thought it was. It can be fun and enjoyable.

Everything we believe is just a map of reality, and the map is never the territory.

Passion Procrastination
The most successful people are those who are passionate about what they do. Now, there are people out there that don't love what they do and are widely successful. The only problem with them is that they kind of hate life.

Being successful is not about making a lot of money, it's about doing what you love, and feeling fulfilled.

The funny thing is that when you do something you love and get really good at it, the money tends to follow.

You can become an outrageous success. All you have to do is make the decision today.

Written on 7/08/2011 by Henri Junttila. Henri writes at Wake Up Cloud, where he shares his personal tips on how you can live the life you know you deserve. When you feel ready to take action, get his free course: Find Your Passion in 5 Days or Less. And if you liked this article, you will enjoy one of his top articles: 77 Great Quotes That Will Change Your Life.

Anonymous hackers crimewave

2011-07-07T20:38:00.000-07:00

Anonymous vows revenge after 15 arrested; AntiSec hacks continue

By Peter Bright | Published about 3 hours ago

After 32 raids across Italy (and one in Switzerland), 15 alleged members of Anonymous have been arrested. The detainees, aged between 15 and 28 with five under 18, have been accused of performing denial of service attacks on Italian Web sites belonging to the government, and on both state and private broadcasters.
The Italian authorities are describing one of the suspects, a 26-year-old Swiss-Italian going by the monkier "Phre," as a "leader" of the hacking group. A further 30 suspects are still being sought.

As was the case with the Anonymous arrests in Spain and Turkey, the AnonOps faction within Anonymous has been swift to both promise revenge and dismiss claims that there are "leaders" of the group.
The AnonOps response ends with a call to arms for other Italian Anons, imploring them to "Let [the government] have it, stronger than ever." In Italy, as with Spain before it, further denial of service attacks are likely to be the chosen response.
In spite of the arrests, hacking under the Anonymous banner continues unabated. The "Anti-Security" movement, promoted by breakaway Anonymous faction Lulz Security, and subsequently picked up by Anonymous after LulzSec returned to the fold, has resulted in the compromise of numerous poorly secured Web servers around the world. Over the past few days, AntiSec hacks have included huge numbers of defacements of Turkish websites—a few dozen government sites here, a thousand here, and another few hundred here, database dumps from 20 Italian universities, and futher attacks on the Arizona Department of Public Safety.
Just how these attacks further the notional purpose of AntiSec—attacking security and government installations to uncover corruption and oppression—is less than clear. Though many of the targets are government websites, it's rare for a site to include the kind of sensitive information that might actually be instrumental in furthering such an agenda. Denial of service and defacement may provoke some amount of media coverage, but little more.
Some attacks are a little more focused. IM and VoIP provider Nimbuzz has been targeted, with the account of an administrator apparently compromised. What has Nimbuzz done wrong? According to a document taken from the company, Nimbuzz is willing to cooperate with local governments and block access to its VoIP services. Sometimes, the company even pro-actively blocks access without being demanded to do so. That's not acceptable, according to Anonymous; the group says that it doesn't tolerate censorship.

Photo by liryon

PanAm...Ipad Ap must have

2011-07-07T10:36:00.000-07:00

apps

Photojournalism Goes Down a New Path With the Vía PanAm App

Kat Hannaford — Trekking from Chile to Alaska, the photojournalist Kadir van Lohuizen chose the perfect tool for informing fans of his work—a $4 iPad app, Vía PanAm. Everything he sees is being documented as blog posts, videos or, naturally photos.
Having launched an app with the promise of frequent updates, he's bound by the rigid schedule of editing photos and uploading thoughts instantly—all in the same quality people would normally expect of the Dutch photojournalist. When yesteryears' journeys would've been tracked in the monthly National Geographic, it's interesting to see photojournalists such as van Lohuizen take matters into their own hands, becoming masters of their own work. The app costs $4, and is available on iPad now. [iTunes via NY Times]

My Intro to Computer Programming

2011-06-29T20:38:00.001-07:00

Zilog Z80

One of the first Z80 microprocessors manufactured; the date stamp is from June 1976.

A CMOS Z80 in a QFP package.

The Zilog Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor designed by Zilog and sold from July 1976 onwards. It was widely used both in desktop and embedded computer designs as well as for military purposes. The Z80 and its derivatives and clones make up one of the most commonly used CPU families of all time, and, along with the MOS Technology 6502 family, dominated the 8-bit microcomputer market from the late 1970s to the mid-1980s.
Zilog licensed the Z80 design to several vendors, though many East European and Russian manufacturers made unlicensed copies. This enabled a small company's product to gain acceptance in the world market since second sources from far larger companies such as Toshiba started to manufacture the device. Consequently, Zilog has made less than 50% of the Z80s since its conception. In recent decades Zilog has refocused on the ever-growing market for embedded systems (for which the original Z80 and the Z180 were designed) and the most recent Z80-compatible microcontroller family, the fully pipelined 24-bit eZ80 with a linear 16 MB address range, has been successfully introduced alongside the simpler Z180 and Z80 products.
Although Zilog made early attempts with advanced mini-computer-like versions of the Z80-architecture (Z800 and Z280), these chips never caught on. The company was also trying hard in the workstation market with its Z8000 and 32-bit Z80000, both unrelated to the 8-bit Z80.

Brief history and overview

A May 1976 advertisement for the Zilog Z-80 8-bit microprocessor.

The Z80's original DIL40 chip package pinout.

The Z80 came about when Federico Faggin, after working on the 8080, left Intel at the end of 1974 to found Zilog with Ralph Ungermann, and by July 1976 they had the Z80 on the market.^[1] It was designed to be binary compatible with the Intel 8080^[2]^[3] so that most 8080 code, notably the CP/M operating system, would run unmodified on it. Masatoshi Shima, co-designer of the 4004 and the 8080, also contributed to the development of the Z80.^[4]^[5]
The Z80 offered many real improvements over the 8080:^[3]

An enhanced instruction set^[6] including bit manipulation, block move, block I/O, and byte search instructions^[7]
New IX and IY index registers with instructions for direct base+offset addressing
A better interrupt system
- A more automatic and general vectorized interrupt system, mode 2, as well as a fixed vector interrupt system, mode 1, for simple systems with minimal hardware (mode 0 being the 8080-compatible mode).^[8]
- A non maskable interrupt (NMI) which can be used to respond to power down situations and/or other high priority events (and allowing a minimalistic Z80 system to easily implement a two-level interrupt scheme in mode 1).
- Two separate register files, which could be quickly switched, to speed up response to interrupts
Less hardware required for power supply, clock generation and interface to memory and I/O
- Single 5 Volt power supply (the 8080 needed -5V/+5V/+12V)
- Single-phase 5 V clock (the 8080 needed a two-phase high-amplitude clock generator)
- A built-in DRAM refresh mechanism that would otherwise have to be provided by external circuitry
- Non-multiplexed buses (the 8080 had state-signals multiplexed onto the data bus)

The Z80 took over from the 8080 and its offspring, the 8085, in the processor market,^[9] and became one of the most popular 8-bit CPUs.^[10]^[11] Perhaps a key to the initial success of the Z80 was the built-in DRAM refresh, and other features which allowed systems to be built with fewer support chips (later on, most Z80 systems have been embedded systems, which typically uses static RAM and hence does not need this refresh).
For the original NMOS design, the specified upper clock frequency limit increased successively from the introductory 2.5 MHz, via the well known 4 MHz (Z80A), up to 6 (Z80B) and 8 MHz (Z80H).^[12]^[13] A CMOS version was also developed with specified frequency limits^[14] ranging from 4 MHz up to 20 MHz for the version sold today. The CMOS version also allowed a low-power sleep with internal state retained (having no lower frequency limit).^[15] The fully compatible derivatives HD64180/Z180^[16]^[17] and eZ80 are currently specified for up to 33 and 50 MHz respectively.

Technical description

Programming model and register set

The programming model and register set are conventional and similar to the related x86 family. The 8080 compatible registers AF, BC, DE, HL are duplicated as two separate banks in the Z80,^[18] where the processor can quickly switch from one bank to the other;^[19] a feature useful for speeding up responses to single-level, high-priority interrupts. This feature was present in the Datapoint 2200 but was not implemented by Intel in the 8008. The dual-register set makes sense as the Z80 (like most microprocessors at the time) was really intended for embedded use, not for personal computers, or the yet-to-be invented home computers.^[20] It also turned out to be quite useful for heavily optimized manual assembly coding. Some software, especially games for the MSX, Sinclair ZX Spectrum and other Z80 based computers took Z80 assembly optimization to rather extreme levels, employing the duplicated registers among other things.

The Z80 architecture.

Registers^[21]

Like on the 8080, 8-bit registers are typically coupled to provide 16-bit versions. The 8080 compatible registers are:

AF - 8-bit accumulator (A) and flag bits (F) carry, zero, minus, parity/overflow, half-carry (used for BCD), and an Add/Subtract flag (usually called N) also for BCD
BC - 16-bit data/address register or two 8-bit registers
DE - 16-bit data/address register or two 8-bit registers
HL - 16-bit accumulator/address register or two 8-bit registers
SP - stack pointer, 16 bits
PC - program counter, 16 bits

The new registers introduced with the Z80 are:

IX - 16-bit index or base register for 8-bit immediate offsets
IY - 16-bit index or base register for 8-bit immediate offsets
I - interrupt vector base register, 8 bits
R - DRAM refresh counter, 8 bits (msb does not count)
AF' - alternate (or shadow) accumulator and flags (toggled in and out with EX AF,AF' )
BC', DE', and HL' - alternate (or shadow) registers (toggled in and out with EXX)
Four bits of interrupt status and interrupt mode status

There is no direct access to the alternate registers; instead, two special instructions, EX AF,AF' and EXX,^[21] each toggles one of two multiplexer flip-flops; this enables fast context switches for interrupt service routines: EX AF, AF' may be used alone (for really simple and fast interrupt routines) or together with EXX to swap the whole AF, BC, DE, HL set; still much faster than pushing the same registers on the stack (slower, lower priority, or multi level interrupts normally use the stack to store registers).
The refresh register, R, increments^[22] each time the CPU fetches an opcode (or opcode prefix) and has therefore no simple relationship with program execution. This has sometimes been used to generate pseudorandom numbers in games, and also in software protection schemes. It has also been employed as a "hardware" counter in some designs; a famous example of this is the ZX81, which lets it keep track of character positions on the TV screen by triggering an interrupt at wrap around (by connecting INT to A6).
The interrupt vector register, I, is used for the Z80 specific mode 2 interrupts (selected by the IM 2 instruction). It supplies the high byte of the base address for a 128-entry table of service routine addresses which are selected via a pointer sent to the CPU during an interrupt acknowledge cycle; the low byte of the base address is fixed at zero.^[8] The pointer identifies a particular peripheral chip and/or peripheral function or event, where the chips are normally connected in a so called daisy chain for priority resolution. Like the refresh register, this register has also sometimes been used creatively; in interrupt modes 0 and 1 it can be used as simply another 8-bit data register.

The Z80 assembly language

Background - the Datapoint 2200 and Intel 8008

The first Intel 8008 assembly language was based on a very simple (but systematic) syntax inherited from the Datapoint 2200 design. This original syntax was later transformed into a new, somewhat more traditional, assembly language form for this same original 8008 chip. At about the same time, the new assembly language was also extended to accommodate the added addressing possibilities in the more advanced Intel 8080 chip (the 8008 and 8080 shared a language subset without being binary compatible; the 8008 actually was binary compatible with the Datapoint 2200 however).
In this process, the mnemonic L, for LOAD, was replaced by various abbreviations of the words LOAD, STORE and MOVE, intermixed with other symbolic letters. The mnemonic letter M, for memory (referenced by HL), was lifted out from within the instruction mnemonic to become a syntactically freestanding operand, while registers and combinations of registers became very inconsistently denoted; either by abbreviated operands (MVI D, LXI H etc.), within the instruction mnemonic itself (LDA, LHLD etc.), or both at the same time (LDAX B, STAX D etc.).

Datapoint 2200 & i8008	i8080	Z80	i8086/i8088
ca -1973	ca 1974	1976	1978
LBC	MOV B,C	LD B,C	MOV BL,CL
--	LDAX B	LD A,(BC)	MOV AL,[BX]
LAM	MOV A,M	LD A,(HL)	MOV AL,[BP]
LBM	MOV B,M	LD B,(HL)	MOV BL,[BP]
--	STAX D	LD (DE),A	--
LMA	MOV M,A	LD (HL),A	MOV [BP],AL
LMC	MOV M,C	LD (HL),C	MOV [BP],CL
LDI 56	MVI D,56	LD D,56	MOV DL,56
LMI 56	MVI M,56	LD (HL),56	MOV byte ptr [BP],56
--	LDA 1234	LD A,(1234)	MOV AL,[1234]
--	STA 1234	LD (1234),A	MOV [1234],AL
--	--	LD B,(IX+56)	MOV BL,[SI+56]
--	--	LD (IX+56),C	MOV [SI+56],CL
--	--	LD (IY+56),78	MOV byte ptr [DI+56],78
--	LXI B,1234	LD BC,1234	MOV BX,1234
--	LXI H,1234	LD HL,1234	MOV BP,1234
--	SHLD 1234	LD (1234),HL	MOV [1234],BP
--	LHLD 1234	LD HL,(1234)	MOV BP,[1234]
--	--	LD BC,(1234)	MOV BX,[1234]
--	--	LD IX,(1234)	MOV SI,[1234]

Illustration of four syntaxes, using samples of equivalent, or (for 8086) very similar, load and store instructions.^[23]

The new syntax

Intel had claimed copyright on their assembly mnemonics. Yet another assembly syntax was therefore developed, but this time with a more systematic approach:

All registers and register pairs are explicitly denoted by their full names
Parentheses are consistently used to indicate "memory contents at" (indirection, or pointer dereferencing) with the exception of some jump instructions.^[24]
All load and store instructions use the same mnemonic name, LD, for LOAD (a return to the simplistic Datapoint 2200 vocabulary); other common instructions, such as ADD, INC etc., use the same mnemonic regardless of addressing mode or operand size. This is possible because the operands themselves carry enough information.

These principles made it straightforward to find names and forms for all new Z80 instructions, as well as orthogonalizations of old ones, such as LD BC,(1234) above.
It is interesting to see the resemblance between Z80 and 8086 syntax, as illustrated by the table. Apart from naming differences, and despite a certain discrepancy in basic register structure, the two are virtually isomorphous for a large portion of instructions. Whether this is due to some common influence on both design teams (above 8080, such as PDP-11), the competitive nature of the relation between the two designs, or maybe just a matter of taste, is, so far, uncertain.

Instruction set and encoding

The Z80 uses 252 out of the available 256 codes as single byte opcodes ("root instruction"); the four remaining codes are used extensively as opcode prefixes:^[26] CB and ED enable extra instructions and DD or FD selects IX+d or IY+d respectively (in some cases without displacement d) in place of HL. This scheme gives the Z80 a large number of permutations of instructions and registers; ZiLOG categorizes these into 158 different "instruction types", 78 of which are the same as those of the Intel 8080^[26] (allowing operation of 8080 programs on a Z80). The ZiLOG documentation further groups instructions into the following categories:

8-bit arithmetic and logic operations
16-bit arithmetic
8-bit load
16-bit load
Bit set, reset, and test
Call, return, and restart
Exchange, block transfer, and search
General purpose arithmetic and CPU control
Input and output
Jump
Rotate and shift

No multiply instruction is available in the original Z80.^[27] Different sizes and variants of additions, shifts, and rotates have somewhat differing effects on flags because the flag-influencing properties of the 8080 were copied. Load instructions do not affect the flags (except for the special purpose I and R register loads). The index register instructions are useful for reducing code size, and, while some of them are not much faster than "equivalent" sequences of simpler operations, they also save execution time indirectly by reducing the need to save and restore registers.^[28] Similarly, instructions for 16-bit additions are not particularly fast (11 clocks) in the original Z80; nonetheless, they are about twice as fast as performing the same calculations using 8-bit operations, and equally important, they reduce register usage.

Undocumented instructions

The index registers, IX and IY, were intended as flexible 16 bit pointers, enhancing the ability to manipulate memory, stack frames and data structures. Officially, they were treated as 16-bit only. In reality, they were implemented as a pair of 8-bit pair registers,^[29] in the same fashion as the HL register, which is accessible either as 16 bits or separately as the High and Low registers. Even the binary opcodes (machine language) were identical, but preceded by a new opcode prefix.^[30] ZiLOG published the opcodes and related mnemonics for the intended functions, but did not document the fact that every opcode that allowed manipulation of the H and L registers was equally valid for the 8 bit portions of the IX and IY registers. As an example, the opcode 26h followed by an immediate byte value (LD H,n) will load that value into the H register. Preceding this two-byte instruction with the IX register's opcode prefix DD, would instead result in the most significant 8 bits of the IX register being loaded with that same value. A notable exception to this would be instructions similar to LD H,(IX+d) which make use of both the HL and IX or IY registers in the same instruction;^[30] in this case the DD prefix is only applied to the (IX+d) portion of the instruction.
There are several other undocumented instructions as well.^[31]

Instruction execution

Each instruction is executed in steps that are usually termed machine cycles (M-cycles), each of which can take between three and six clock periods (T-cycles).^[32] Each M-cycle corresponds roughly to one memory access and/or internal operation. Many instructions actually end during the M1 of the next instruction which is known as a fetch/execute overlap.
Examples of typical instructions (R=read, W=write)

Total M-cycles	instruction	M1	M2	M3	M4	M5	M6
1^[33]	INC BC	opcode
2^[34]	ADD A,n	opcode	n
3^[35]	ADD HL,DE	opcode	internal	internal
4^[36]	SET b,(HL)	prefix	opcode	R(HL), set	W(HL)
5^[37]	LD (IX+d),n	prefix	opcode	d	n,add	W(IX+d)
6^[38]	INC (IY+d)	prefix	opcode	d	add	R(IY+d),inc	W(IY+d)

The Z80 machine cycles are sequenced by an internal state machine which builds each M-cycle out of 3, 4, 5 or 6 T-cycles depending on context. This avoids cumbersome asynchronous logic and makes the control signals behave consistently at a wide range of clock frequencies. Naturally, it also means that a higher frequency crystal must be used than without this subdivision of machine cycles (approximately 2–3 times higher). It does not imply tighter requirements on memory access times, however, as a high resolution clock allows more precise control of memory timings and memory therefore can be active in parallel with the CPU to a greater extent (i.e. sitting less idle), allowing more efficient use of available memory performance. For instruction execution, the Z80 combines two full clock cycles into a long memory access period (the M1-signal) which would typically last only a fraction of a (longer) clock cycle in a more asynchronous design (such as the 6800, or similar).
Memory, especially EPROM, but also Flash, were generally slow as compared to the state machine sub-cycles (clock cycles) used in contemporary microprocessors. The shortest machine cycle that could safely be used in embedded designs has therefore often been limited by memory access times, not by the maximum CPU frequency (especially so during the home computer era). However, this relation has slowly changed during the last decades, particularly regarding SRAM; cacheless, single-cycle designs such as the eZ80 have therefore become much more meaningful recently.

Compatible peripherals

Zilog introduced a number of peripheral parts for the Z80, which all supported the Z80's interrupt handling system and I/O address space. These included the CTC (Counter-Timer-Circuit), the SIO (Serial Input Output), the DMA (Direct Memory Access), the PIO (Parallel Input-Output) and the DART (Dual Asynchronous Receiver Transmitter). As the product line developed, low-power, high-speed and CMOS versions of these chips were produced.
Like the 8080, 8085 and 8086 processors, but unlike processors such as the Motorola 6800 and MOS Technology 6502, the Z80 and 8080 had a separate control line and address space for I/O instructions. While some Z80-based computers used "Motorola-style" memory mapped input/output devices, usually the I/O space was used to address one of the many Zilog peripheral chips compatible with the Z80. Zilog I/O chips supported the Z80's new mode 2 interrupts (see description above) which simplified interrupt handling for large numbers of peripherals.

'Undocumented' 16 bit I/O-addressing

The Z80 was officially described as supporting 16-bit (64 KB) memory addressing, and 8-bit (256 ports) I/O-addressing. Looking carefully at the hardware reference manual, it can be seen that all I/O instructions actually assert the entire 16-bit address bus. OUT (C),reg and IN reg,(C) places the contents of the entire 16 bit BC register on the address bus;^[39] OUT (n),A and IN A,(n) places the contents of the A register on b8-b15 of the address bus and n on b0-b7 of the address bus. A designer could choose to decode the entire 16 bit address bus on I/O operations in order to take advantage of this feature, or use the high half of the address bus to select subfeatures of the I/O device. This feature has also been used to minimise decoding hardware requirements, such as in the Amstrad CPC and ZX81.

NEC's μPD780C Z80 clone.

Sharp's LH0080A Z80 clone

The T34BM1, a Russian Z80 clone.

Toshiba TMPZ84C015; a standard Z80 with several Z80-family peripherals on chip in a QFP package.

The Z80 compatible Hitachi HD64180.

Z180 in a PLCC package.

The Z80 compatible R800 in QFP.

The Z280 in a PLCC package

Mostek MK3880 and SGS-Thomson Z8400 (now STMicroelectronics) were both second-sources for the Z80. Sharp and NEC developed clones in NMOS, the LH0080 and µPD780C respectively. Toshiba made a CMOS-version, the TMPZ84C00, which is believed^{[by whom?]} (but not verified) to be the same design also used by Zilog for its own CMOS Z84C00. There were also Z80-chips made by GoldStar (alias LG) and the BU18400 series of Z80-clones (including DMA, PIO, CTC, DART and SIO) in NMOS and CMOS made by ROHM Electronics.
In East Germany, an unlicensed clone of the Z80, known as the U880, was manufactured. It was very popular and was used in Robotron's and VEB Mikroelektronik Mühlhausen's computer systems (e.g. the KC85-series) and also in many self-made computer systems (ex. COMP JU+TER). In Romania another unlicensed clone could be found, named MMN80CPU and produced by Microelectronica, used in home computers like TIM-S, HC, COBRA.
Also, several clones of Z80 were created in the Soviet Union, notable ones being the T34BM1, also called КP1858ВМ1 (parallelling the Russian 8080-clone KR580VM80A) The first marking was used in pre-production series, while the second had to be used for a larger production. Though, due to the collapse of Soviet microelectronics in late 80s, there are many more T34BM1s than КP1858ВМ1s.

Derivatives

Compatible with the original Z80

Hitachi developed the HD64180, a microcoded and partially dynamic Z80 in CMOS, with on chip peripherals and a simple MMU giving a 1 MB address space. It was later second sourced by Zilog, initially as the Z64180, and then in the form of the slightly modified Z180^[40] which has bus protocol and timings better adapted to Z80 peripheral chips. Z180 has been maintained and further developed under Zilog's name, the newest versions being based on the fully static S180/L180 core with very low power draw and EMI (noise).
Toshiba developed the 84 pin Z84013 / Z84C13 and the 100 pin Z84015 / Z84C15 series of "intelligent peripheral controllers", basically ordinary NMOS and CMOS Z80 cores with Z80 peripherals, watch dog timer, power on reset, and wait state generator on the same chip. Manufactured by Sharp as well as Toshiba. These products are today second sourced by Zilog.^[41]
The 32-bit Z80 compatible Zilog Z380, introduced 1994, has survived but never gained real momentum; it is used mainly in telecom equipment.
Zilog's fully pipelined Z80 compatible eZ80^[42] with an 8/16/24-bit word length and a linear 16 MB address space was introduced in 2001. It exists in versions with on chip SRAM and/or flash memory, as well as with integrated peripherals. One variant has on chip MAC (media access controller), and available software include a TCP/IP stack. In contrast with the Z800 and Z280, there are only a few added instructions (primarily LEAs, PEAs, and variable-address 16/24-bit loads), but instructions are instead executed between 2 and 11 times as clock cycle efficient as on the original Z80 (with a mean value around 3-5 times). It is currently specified for clock frequencies up to 50 MHz.
Kawasaki developed the binary compatible KL5C8400 which is approximately 1.2-1.3 times as clock cycle efficient as the original Z80 and can be clocked at up to 33 MHz. Kawasaki also produces the KL5C80A1x family, which has peripherals as well as a small RAM on chip; it is approximately as clock cycle efficient as the eZ80 and can be clocked at up to 10 MHz (2006).^[43]
The Chinese Actions Semiconductor's audio processor family of chips (ATJ2085 and others) contains a Z80-compatible MCU together with a 24-bit dedicated DSP processor.^[44] These chips are used in many MP3 and media player products.

Non-compatible

The Toshiba TLCS 900 series of high volume (mostly OTP) microcontrollers are based on the Z80; they share the same basic BC,DE,HL,IX,IY register structure, and largely the same instructions, but are not binary compatible, while the previous TLCS 90 is Z80-compatible.^[45]
The NEC 78K series microcontrollers are based on the Z80; they share the same basic BC,DE,HL register structure, and has similar (but differently named) instructions; not binary compatible.

Partly compatible

Rabbit Semiconductor's Rabbit 2000/3000/4000 microprocessors/microcontrollers^[46] are based on the HD64180/Z180 architecture, although they are not fully binary compatible.^[47]

No longer produced:

The ASCII Corporation R800 was a fast 16-bit processor used in MSX TurboR computers; it was software, but not hardware compatible with the Z80 (signal timing, pinout & function of pins differ from the Z80).
Zilog's ill-fated NMOS Z800 and CMOS Z280 were quite fast Z80-implementations (before the HD64180 / Z180) with a 16 MB paged MMU address space; they added many orthogonalizations and addressing modes to the Z80 instruction set, but were too complex and mini-computer inspired to be a natural choice for most embedded applications.^[48] In contrast, the plain CMOS Z80 has remained popular, alongside the compatible Z180 and eZ80 families.

FPGA and ASIC versions

A commercial, functionally equivalent, CPU core is the Evatronix CZ80CPU,^[49] available as synthesizable VHDL or Verilog source code, for high-volume ASICs, or as post-synthesis EDIF netlists, for low-volume FPGAs from Actel, Altera, Lattice or Xilinx.
Free versions are the T80 and TV80, available as VHDL and Verilog sources under a BSD style license.^[50]^[51]^[52] The VHDL version, once synthesized, can be clocked up to 35 MHz on a Xilinx Spartan II FPGA. For large production series, it is much cheaper to use a traditional solution (or ASIC) than an FPGA, however.

Software emulation

Software emulation of the Z80 instruction set on modern PCs runs faster than the original Z80 CPU ran and is used for home computer simulators (such as Amstrad CPC, MSX and Sinclair ZX Spectrum) and also for video game emulators such as MAME, which executes arcade video games. SIMH emulates MITS Altair 8800 computer with Intel 8080, Zilog Z80 or Intel 8086 processors.

In desktop computers

For a comprehensive overview, see the List of home computers using the Z80.
During the late 1970s and early 1980s, the Z80 was used in a great number of fairly anonymous business-oriented machines with the CP/M operating system, a combination that dominated the market at the time.^[53]^[54]
Two well-known examples of Z80+CP/M business computers are the portable Osborne 1 and the Kaypro series. Research Machines manufactured the 380Z and 480Z microcomputers which were networked with a thin Ethernet type LAN and CP/NET in 1981. Other manufacturers of such systems included Televideo, Xerox (820 range) and a number of more obscure firms. Some systems used multi-tasking operating system software to share the one processor between several concurrent users.
The Radio Shack TRS-80, introduced in 1977, used the Z80, as did the follow on Models II,III,IV and proposed Model V. In the United Kingdom, Sinclair Research used the Z80 and Z80A in its ZX80, ZX81 and ZX Spectrum home computers, and Amstrad used them in their Amstrad CPC line.
The Commodore 128 featured a Z80 processor alongside its MOS Technology 8502 processor for CP/M compatibility.^[55] Other 6502 architecture computers on the market at the time, such as the BBC Micro, Apple II^[56] and the 6510 based Commodore 64,^[57] could make use of the Z80 with an external unit, a plug-in card, or an expansion cartridge. The Microsoft Z-80 SoftCard for the Apple II was a particularly successful add-on card and one of Microsoft's few hardware products of the era.
The Acer company, formerly Multitech, introduced the Microprofessor I, in 1981. It was designed as a simple and inexpensive training system for the Z80 microprocessor. Currently, it is still being manufactured and sold by Flite Electronics International Limited in Southampton, England

In embedded systems and consumer electronics

Z80 based PABX. The Z80 is to the right of the chip which has a label stuck on.

The Zilog Z80 has long been a popular microprocessor in embedded systems and microcontroller cores,^[21] where it remains in widespread use today.^[10]^[58] The following list provides examples of such applications of the Z80, including uses in consumer electronics products.

Industrial/professional

Office equipment such as matrix printers, fax machines, answering machines, and photocopiers are known examples.
Industrial programmable logic controllers (PLCs) use the Z80 in CPU modules, for auxiliary functions such as analog I/O, or in communication modules.
It has also been employed in robots, for example for speech recognition^[59] and low level tasks such as servo processors in pick and place machines.
RS232 multiplexers connecting large numbers of old style "terminals" to minicomputers or mainframes used arrays of Z80 CPU/SIO boards.
Applications such as TV broadcast vision mixers have used the Z80 for embedded real time subtasks.^[60]^[61]
It has also been used in Seagate Technology's and other manufacturers' hard disks.
Credit card consoles controlling fuel pumps used Z80 CPU and PIOs (US patents 4930665, 4962462 and 5602745).
Several PC expansion cards, such as Adaptecs SCSI boards, have been using the Z80/Z180 and peripheral chips.
Z80/Z180/Z380 have been used in telecommunication equipment such as telephone switches, various kinds of modems etc.
The Stofor message switch, used extensively by banks and brokers in the UK was Z80 based.
Cash registers and store management systems
Home automation, wireless sprinkler control and wireless mesh using the N8VEM open source homebrew system.
Breathalyzer equipment used by law enforcement agencies.^[62]

Consumer electronics

Various scientific and graphing calculators use the Z80, including the Texas Instruments TI-73, TI-81, TI-82, TI-83, TI-84, TI-85 and TI-86 series.^[63]
All the S1 MP3 Player type digital audio players use the Z80 instruction set.^[64]
Z80 was often used in coin-operated arcade games,^[10] and was commonly used as the main CPU, sound or video coprocessors. Pac-Man arcade games feature a single Z80 as the main CPU.^[65]^[66] Galaxian and arcade games such as King & Balloon and Check Man that use the Namco Galaxian boardset also use a Z80 as the main CPU.^[67] Other Namco licensed arcade games such as Galaga and other games that use the Namco Galaga boardset such as Bosconian, Dig Dug, Xevious, and Super Xevious use three Z80 microprocessors running in parallel for the main CPU, graphics, and sound.^[68]
It was also found in home video game consoles such as the ColecoVision,^[69] Sega Master System^[70] and Sega Game Gear video game consoles, as an audio co-processor in the Sega Mega Drive and as an audio controller and co-processor to the Motorola 68000 in the SNK Neo-Geo.
Nintendo's Game Boy and Game Boy Color handheld game systems used a Z80-derived processor ^[71] with a slightly different instruction set (the index registers and alternate register set are missing, but auto-increment/decrement addressing modes have been added), manufactured by Sharp Corporation. Game Boy Color is notable for its ability to selectively double the CPU clock speed when running Game Boy Color software. The Game Boy Advance series of products originally included this same modified Z80 for backward compatibility. However, this changed with the release of the Game Boy Micro.
In Russia, Z80 and its clones were widely used in multi-functional land line phones with Caller ID

Musical instruments, etc.

MIDI sequencers such as E-mu 4060 Polyphonic Keyboard and Sequencer, Zyklus MPS, and Roland MSQ700 were built around the Z80,
MIDI controllers and switches such as Waldorf Midi-Bay MB-15 and others.
Several polyphonic analog synthesizers used it for keyboard-scanning (also wheels, knobs, displays...) and D/A or PWM control of analog levels; in newer designs, sometimes sequencing and/or MIDI-communication. The Z80 was also often involved in the sound generation itself; implementing LFOs, envelope generators etc. Known examples include:
- Sequential Circuits Prophet 5, Prophet 10,^[72] Prophet 600, Six-Trak, Multitrak, MAX, and Split-8
- MemoryMoog six-voice synthesizer^[73]
- Oberheim OB-8 eight-voice synthesizer with MIDI
- Roland Jupiter-8 eight-voice synthesizer
Digital sampling synthesizers such as the Emulator I, Emulator II, and Akai S700 12-bit Sampler,
as well as drum machines like the E-mu SP-12, E-mu SP-1200, E-mu Drumulator, and the Sequential Circuits Drumtraks, used Z80 processors.
Many Lexicon reverberators (PCM70, LXP15, LXP1, MPX100) used one or more Z80s for user interface and LFO generation where dedicated hardware provided DSP functions.
The ADA MP-1. A MIDI controlled, vacuum tube, guitar pre-amplifier.

Blame it on the Haarps

2011-06-27T21:04:00.000-07:00

http://www.haarp.alaska.edu/

The High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) is an ionospheric research program jointly funded by the US Air Force, the US Navy, the University of Alaska and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).^[1] Its purpose is to analyze the ionosphere and investigate the potential for developing ionospheric enhancement technology for radio communications and surveillance purposes.^[2] The HAARP program operates a major Arctic facility, known as the HAARP Research Station, on an Air Force owned site near Gakona, Alaska.

The HAARP project directs a 3.6 MW signal, in the 2.8–10 MHz region of the HF [High Frequency] band, into the ionosphere. The signal may be pulsed or continuous. Then, effects of the transmission and any recovery period can be examined using associated instrumentation, including VHF and UHF radars, HF receivers, and optical cameras. According to the HAARP team, this will advance the study of basic natural processes that occur in the ionosphere under the natural but much stronger influence of solar interaction, as well as how the natural ionosphere affects radio signals.

Game Changer for the Internet Domain Names - dot coms are now .*.

2011-06-20T15:07:00.000-07:00

Existing Generic TLDs

.com : companies, now broader
.edu : educational institutions
.gov : government institutions
.int : international organisations, e.g. Interpol
.mil : military organisations
.net : networking technologies, now broader
.org : non-profit organisations
.arpa : first ever domain, now technical use
.aero : air travel industry
.biz : business alternative to .com
.coop : co-operatives
.info : information, but open for general use
.museum : museums
.name : personal names - johnsmith.name
.pro : professionals, e.g. doctors
.asia: Asian websites
.cat : Catalan language
.jobs : employment websites
.mobi : mobile phones
.post : postal services
.tel : telecoms
.travel : travel

Source: Icann

Applications will start on 12 January.

Save the Fish with a better better Fishnet!

2011-06-20T11:03:00.000-07:00

http://inhabitat.com/

Susbscribe to Inhabitat.com, you will never regret it...their motto,

green design will save the world...

and I'm beginning to believe them...

The SafetyNet Could Save 7 Million Pounds of Fish Every Year

by Brit Liggett, 06/20/11

filed under: environmental destruction, Water Issues

A new type of net called the SafetyNet could help save millions of fish around the world every year. The innovative new fishing net is designed with reinforced holes that will allow small fish to escape the certain demise they face with conventional fishing nets. 40% of the world’s population is dependent on a fish based diet and since industrial fishing started in the 1950′s we’ve already depleted 90% of the Earth’s supply of large fish. Much of that depletion is caused by the accidental capture of young fish, which are too small for fisherman to keep and sell — or unwanted species getting caught in nets, being killed and then being thrown back into the ocean. The SafetyNet promises to help solve this problem by allowing the little guys to escape and continue their lives as healthy members of the ocean’s fish population. Watch a video about the new net after the jump.

The Les Paul Google Doodle...

2011-06-18T18:54:00.000-07:00

ow Much Did the Les Paul Doodle Cost Google, and the World?

By Sebastian Anthony on June 13, 2011 at 11:25 am
4 Comments

Google Doodles have become something of an institution. Google has always received more than its fair share of attention from social networks and the media, but when a new doodle appears on the home page, a huge portion of the web stops by the home page to take a look. A doodle is usually just a pretty picture that celebrates a birthday of some kind, but on special occasions Google rolls out the big guns. Last year we had Pac Man and Buckyballs, both of which cost millions of man hours and megawatts of power, but last week’s playable Les Paul guitar has just broken all the records.

As of June 2011, Google has somewhere in the region of 740 million visitors per day. During the two days that the Les Paul doodle was online, those 740 million visitors, according to analytics from RescueTime, spent 26 seconds more on the Google home page than normal. 740 million times 26 seconds is 5,344,444 hours — and over two days, that’s a total of almost 10.7 million man hours spent playing with the Les Paul Google Doodle. Assuming the average Google user earns $25/hour, the doodle cost companies around the world $268 million in lost productivity.

But that’s not all! The doodle cost Google money to produce and serve, too! While the guitar is mostly lightweight HTML5 and JavaScript, it relied on a big Flash file for sound playback. The Les Paul wasn’t quite as big as the Pac-Man game (which also used a big Flash file for sound), but it still clocks in at 180 kilobytes. 740 million visits, times 180 kilobytes, is 124 terabytes, or 248TB over two days. If those 248TB were served from a content distribution network like Akamai, Google would’ve spent no less than $9,920 on serving the static files needed for the Les Paul doodle. In reality, though, thanks to peering agreements, Google probably paid almost nothing to serve the guitar doodle.
We should remember that animated Google Doodles require CPU cycles — and CPU cycles cost money!

The Buckyballs doodle was estimated to use between 15 and 20 watts — but that due to a extensive use of JavaScript. It’s impossible to predict exactly how many kilowatt hours were used by the Les Paul guitar, but if we posit that the doodle draws 5 watts, and the average visitor spent 26 seconds playing with the doodle, then each visit used 0.000035 kilowatt hours (kWh). Over two days, with 1,480 million visitors, that’s 51,800 kWh. At 10 cents per kWh, that’s a grand total of $5,180.

Finally, Google will have paid a developer to create the Les Paul guitar — but we’re only talking about a few hundred dollars. In conclusion, then, the Les Paul doodle cost the world $268 million — but it cost Google just $15,000. http://www.extremetech.com/

Okay, we all know Japan wants to turn out robots...but do we have to make them wear uniforms?

2011-06-18T18:25:00.000-07:00

http://www.redferret.net

The Actroid-F android from Japan has just been introduced to the world, and what an introduction. The only thing I could think while watching the video (below) was “wow, just imagine what will happen when Apple gets into robotics”. Designed to be used in hospitals, the eerily lifelike robot can mimic a host of human expressions and movements, and at times is uncannily humanoid.

…designed to be used in hospitals and other locations involving natural human-to-human communication, and can move its eyes, open and close its mouth, tilt its head, nod, smile, replicate breathing, and bow; and is 1.4 meters tall when seated…a teleoperating station equipped with a camera was showcased, enable the android to replicate the head and facial movements of the operator, as well as following manually-inputted commands.

2011-06-14T20:37:00.000-07:00

See Thru Plane!

The Software called Hidden

2011-06-01T19:22:00.000-07:00

By SUDHIN THANAWALA, Associated Press –

SAN FRANCISCO – The images began arriving in Joshua Kaufman's inbox. The grainy photos are low-lit and intimate: a man curled up on a couch, sound asleep; the same man propped up against pillows on a bed, shirtless.

Who was this stranger sitting with Kaufman's stolen laptop?

Kaufman collected the images and took them to police, who did not help him. So he went online, publishing the pictures on Twitter and in a blog titled "This Guy Has My MacBook."

"People who followed me on Twitter retweeted it. It got picked up by social media and the press. It went super viral," he said. On the same day that he posted his website on Twitter, police came calling.

Police on Tuesday arrested a 27-year-old cab driver, Muthanna Aldebashi. On Wednesday, Kaufman picked up his laptop from the police.

Kaufman said he was "surprised and amazed" when he began receiving images of the man using his laptop.

Kaufman's case is the latest example of people, not police, using technological tools to help find their own stolen property such as cars, cell phones and digital cameras.

Kaufman had just moved to a new apartment in Oakland when a burglar broke in, taking the laptop, a bag, an electronic book reader, and a bottle of gin on March 21. He activated theft-tracking software he had installed, which began sending photos taken by the computer's built-in camera of the unauthorized user three days later.

"I wasn't sure if it would work because I never tested it before," he said. Most of the images "were honestly really boring photos — people staring into the screen. But some were definitely more humorous."

Among them was a screenshot of the man logging onto his Gmail account, which showed an email that appeared to include the name of a business, Kaufman said. A quick Internet search revealed it was a cab company in nearby Berkeley, which Kaufman assumed was the man's workplace.

Kaufman submitted the information to police, but said they were unwilling to help and didn't respond to numerous follow-up emails.

"I know a stolen computer is small in the larger scheme but it would be nice to feel like you actually cared," he tweeted three days after the break-in.

Kaufman said he turned to the Internet because he became "frustrated and thought I should try and get some attention from the media." He posted some of the photos, including captions such as "I really don't want to know what this guy is doing with my MacBook" for the image of the shirtless man in bed.

Kaufman said he received a call from Oakland police spokeswoman Holly Joshi on the day he included a link to his blog. Joshi said she first heard about the case after receiving calls from media outlets Tuesday.

"From that point on, they seemed to be on my side completely," he said of police. "They were apologetic, and they continually told me that they would be doing something about it immediately."

Joshi blamed the large volume of theft reports Oakland police receive — about 2,400 a month for three theft investigators — and human oversight for the department's failure to follow up on Kaufman's leads.

"It was filed away," Joshi said. "It had leads, so it shouldn't have been filed away."

Police arranged a cab ride from Aldebashi and nabbed him when they recognized his face, according to Kaufman. Aldebashi was being held in an Oakland jail on $20,000 bail, according to the Alameda County sheriff's office.

The laptop's return was the culmination of a one-man crusade of online sleuthing, social networking and moments of voyeuristic creepiness aided by the software called Hidden.

The software — part LoJack, part nanny cam — is equipped with location positioning software.

A representative for the product's London-based developer, Flipcode Ltd., did not immediately respond to emails from The Associated Press on Wednesday.

Many portable electronics, including some digital cameras, are now equipped with wireless Internet capability and automatic geographic tagging on any photo taken — a helpful tool when trying to see where a thief has been hanging out. It's a step beyond the LoJack system invented two decades earlier that emitted a signal from a stolen vehicle.

Joshi said investigators did not know whether Aldebashi burglarized Kaufman's apartment, noting that stolen merchandise often changes hands. Aldebashi was scheduled to be arraigned Friday.

> "If you shut down our power grid, maybe we will put a missile down one of your smokestacks"

2011-05-31T11:27:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON—The Pentagon has concluded that computer sabotage coming from another country can constitute an act of war, a finding that for the first time opens the door for the U.S. to respond using traditional military force.

WSJ's Siobhan Gorman has the exclusive
story of the Pentagon classifying cyber attacks by foreign nations
as acts of war. Photo: THOMAS KIENZLE/AFP/Getty Images

The Pentagon's first formal cyber strategy, unclassified portions of which are expected to become public next month, represents an early attempt to grapple with a changing world in which a hacker could pose as significant a threat to U.S. nuclear reactors, subways or pipelines as a hostile country's military.

In part, the Pentagon intends its plan as a warning to potential adversaries of the consequences of attacking the U.S. in this way. "If you shut down our power grid, maybe we will put a missile down one of your smokestacks," said a military official.

Recent attacks on the Pentagon's own systems—as well as the sabotaging of Iran's nuclear program via the Stuxnet computer worm—have given new urgency to U.S. efforts to develop a more formalized approach to cyber attacks. A key moment occurred in 2008, when at least one U.S. military computer system was penetrated. This weekend Lockheed Martin, a major military contractor, acknowledged that it had been the victim of an infiltration, while playing down its impact.

The report will also spark a debate over a range of sensitive issues the Pentagon left unaddressed, including whether the U.S. can ever be certain about an attack's origin, and how to define when computer sabotage is serious enough to constitute an act of war. These questions have already been a topic of dispute within the military.

One idea gaining momentum at the Pentagon is the notion of "equivalence." If a cyber attack produces the death, damage, destruction or high-level disruption that a traditional military attack would cause, then it would be a candidate for a "use of force" consideration, which could merit retaliation.

The War on Cyber Attacks

Attacks of varying severity have rattled nations in recent years.
June 2009: First version of Stuxnet virus starts spreading, eventually sabotaging Iran's nuclear program. Some experts suspect it was an Israeli attempt, possibly with American help.
November 2008: A computer virus believed to have originated in Russia succeeds in penetrating at least one classified U.S. military computer network.
August 2008: Online attack on websites of Georgian government agencies and financial institutions at start of brief war between Russia and Georgia.
May 2007: Attack on Estonian banking and government websites occurs that is similar to the later one in Georgia but has greater impact because Estonia is more dependent on online banking.

The Pentagon's document runs about 30 pages in its classified version and 12 pages in the unclassified one. It concludes that the Laws of Armed Conflict—derived from various treaties and customs that, over the years, have come to guide the conduct of war and proportionality of response—apply in cyberspace as in traditional warfare, according to three defense officials who have read the document. The document goes on to describe the Defense Department's dependence on information technology and why it must forge partnerships with other nations and private industry to protect infrastructure.

The strategy will also state the importance of synchronizing U.S. cyber-war doctrine with that of its allies, and will set out principles for new security policies. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization took an initial step last year when it decided that, in the event of a cyber attack on an ally, it would convene a group to "consult together" on the attacks, but they wouldn't be required to help each other respond. The group hasn't yet met to confer on a cyber incident.

Pentagon officials believe the most-sophisticated computer attacks require the resources of a government. For instance, the weapons used in a major technological assault, such as taking down a power grid, would likely have been developed with state support, Pentagon officials say.

The move to formalize the Pentagon's thinking was borne of the military's realization the U.S. has been slow to build up defenses against these kinds of attacks, even as civilian and military infrastructure has grown more dependent on the Internet. The military established a new command last year, headed by the director of the National Security Agency, to consolidate military network security and attack efforts.

The Pentagon itself was rattled by the 2008 attack, a breach significant enough that the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs briefed then-President George W. Bush. At the time, Pentagon officials said they believed the attack originated in Russia, although didn't say whether they believed the attacks were connected to the government. Russia has denied involvement.

The Rules of Armed Conflict that guide traditional wars are derived from a series of international treaties, such as the Geneva Conventions, as well as practices that the U.S. and other nations consider customary international law. But cyber warfare isn't covered by existing treaties. So military officials say they want to seek a consensus among allies about how to proceed.

"Act of war" is a political phrase, not a legal term, said Charles Dunlap, a retired Air Force Major General and professor at Duke University law school. Gen. Dunlap argues cyber attacks that have a violent effect are the legal equivalent of armed attacks, or what the military calls a "use of force."

"A cyber attack is governed by basically the same rules as any other kind of attack if the effects of it are essentially the same," Gen. Dunlap said Monday. The U.S. would need to show that the cyber weapon used had an effect that was the equivalent of a conventional attack.

James Lewis, a computer-security specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who has advised the Obama administration, said Pentagon officials are currently figuring out what kind of cyber attack would constitute a use of force. Many military planners believe the trigger for retaliation should be the amount of damage—actual or attempted—caused by the attack.

For instance, if computer sabotage shut down as much commerce as would a naval blockade, it could be considered an act of war that justifies retaliation, Mr. Lewis said. Gauges would include "death, damage, destruction or a high level of disruption" he said.

Culpability, military planners argue in internal Pentagon debates, depends on the degree to which the attack, or the weapons themselves, can be linked to a foreign government. That's a tricky prospect at the best of times.

The brief 2008 war between Russia and Georgia included a cyber attack that disrupted the websites of Georgian government agencies and financial institutions. The damage wasn't permanent but did disrupt communication early in the war.

A subsequent NATO study said it was too hard to apply the laws of armed conflict to that cyber attack because both the perpetrator and impact were unclear. At the time, Georgia blamed its neighbor, Russia, which denied any involvement.

Much also remains unknown about one of the best-known cyber weapons, the Stuxnet computer virus that sabotaged some of Iran's nuclear centrifuges. While some experts suspect it was an Israeli attack, because of coding characteristics, possibly with American assistance, that hasn't been proven. Iran was the location of only 60% of the infections, according to a study by the computer security firm Symantec. Other locations included Indonesia, India, Pakistan and the U.S.

Officials from Israel and the U.S. have declined to comment on the allegations.

Defense officials refuse to discuss potential cyber adversaries, although military and intelligence officials say they have identified previous attacks originating in Russia and China. A 2009 government-sponsored report from the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission said that China's People's Liberation Army has its own computer warriors, the equivalent of the American National Security Agency.

That's why military planners believe the best way to deter major attacks is to hold countries that build cyber weapons responsible for their use. A parallel, outside experts say, is the George W. Bush administration's policy of holding foreign governments accountable for harboring terrorist organizations, a policy that led to the U.S. military campaign to oust the Taliban from power in Afghanistan.

Write to Siobhan Gorman at siobhan.gorman@wsj.com

Meet My cousin IN LAW

2011-05-31T08:48:00.000-07:00

Reposted from
/www.research-live.com

Opinionaided?

Dan Kurani is sitting on a potential goldmine. While research agencies struggle to convince people to take part in surveys, resorting to offers of points, prize draws and charity donations as incentives, Kurani has built a mobile phone app whose sole purpose is to facilitate the exchange of opinions, consumer to consumer, where taking part is its own reward.

The app, Opinionaided, is proving popular with users and has already built up a sizeable community, Kurani says – though we won’t know how popular it is until he releases data about downloads, user numbers and engagement levels. But the few stats he has shared – 500,000 questions asked, 40m responses, an average of 80 answers per question – are not to be scoffed at.

Kurani hit on the idea for the app after seeing a relative email other family members for advice on a piece of jewellery they wanted to buy but getting little in the way of response. “I thought there was a really interesting opportunity within mobile to send somebody a question about a product and get a real-time opinion to help them make a purchase decision,” Kurani says. From there it grew. “We thought we were just solving a shopping problem, but we ended up solving a problem that is much broader, that involves people asking for opinion and advice,” he says.

“We have the opportunity to build a taste profile around a user and take demographic slices of different user types and look at how they think about brands”

Logging on to the app for the first time, users are asked to give basic profile information – name, sex and date of birth. With permission, the app then searches your phone contacts, Facebook friends and Twitter followers in a bid to link you with other Opinionaided users. From there you move on into the vote stream, where you can specify which age groups and which topics you want to see questions on. Answers can be given as a yes/no, thumbs up/thumbs down, and there’s also a free text box to offer further comment and opinion and to begin conversations with other users. Asking a question is a straightforward process of writing it out, uploading a picture, defining the topic category and choosing whether to ask all users or just those on your friend list.

Kurani has won backing for the app worth $1.2m, and among his investors is former Greenfield Online and Harris Interactive CEO Al Angrisani. That money is earmarked for further development of the user experience and to port the app over to mobile operating systems other than Apple’s iOS – with Google’s Android a top priority.

After that comes monetisation – and it’s little surprise, given Angrisani’s involvement, that market research is top of the list. Kurani has previously floated the idea of allowing marketers to place paid-for questions within the app, but many user-generated questions are already focused on brands or products. “We are gathering a high volume of answers and responses per user,” says Kurani. “We have the opportunity to build a taste profile around a user and take demographic slices of different user types and look at how they think about brands.”

A second potential monetisation strategy is the creation of an ‘insight portal’. “A company would be able to log in and look at their trending insights in real-time: what questions people are asking about the brand and how they are responding, from hour to hour, day to day, to look at what impact something like press coverage is having on their brand,” Kurani says.

There are already plenty of companies out there with tools that scrape sentiment and opinion from the social web, but Kurani believes Opinionaided has an in-built advantage because the app and its community is built around sharing opinion and sentiment. “That’s our core value proposition,” he says. “That’s what people come to us to do, so essentially the data we have is a lot cleaner.” Scraping the social web, he argues, draws in a lot of unwanted noise.

Kurani and his team are also looking at opportunities for leveraging the app and its community in the “commodity” survey business, either as a standalone source of sample or as a tool to be used by panel owners to survey their own panelists and keep them engaged.

Some might struggle to decide which strategy to pursue with so many options in front of them. Kurani should be all right, though. He knows plenty of people more than willing to share their opinions.

What the Web does not do...

2011-05-11T16:59:00.000-07:00

Usability Makes the Web Click

By: Katharine MieszkowskiSeptember 30, 1998

Jakob Nielsen helped Sun Microsystems work the Web. Now he's on a mission to make the Web work for everybody.      

Jakob Nielsen has spent the past 15 years pioneering the art and the science - but mainly the science - of user interfaces. Exhibit A: the Web. Yet if you ask him to name the most user-friendly sites, he protests: "Most sites don't work from a user standpoint. The design is confusing. It takes too long to move from page to page. Most companies don't understand Web business - or the Web itself."

Nielsen is making it his business to change all that. In 1994, after a stint at IBM's User Interface Institute, he joined the usability lab at Sun Microsystems, where he served as a "distinguished engineer" until this past summer. In August, he joined forces with Don Norman, former head of research at Apple Computer, to create a consulting firm aimed at helping companies "enhance the user experience."

Nielsen's Web-reform movement covers many fronts. This year alone, his eminently usable site (www.useit.com) has attracted more than 5 million page views. He's also a popular speaker at conferences, and he's written a series of books, including Designing Excellent Web Sites: Secrets of an Information Architect (forthcoming from New Riders Publishing, November 1998). His core message: "In the 'attention economy,' anyone trying to connect with an audience must treat the user's time as the ultimate resource. Most Web sites squander time shamelessly."

In an interview, Nielsen offered Fast Company some easy-to-implement ideas for improving Web design.

What's wrong with Web design?

Too many Web designers substitute a marketing agenda for a focus on what customers want. Users want speed, utility, and credibility - not portals, banners, or even community. And speed is the overriding criterion: Minimalist design rules.

One phrase sums up the dominant mentality of the Web user: "I'm driving." People don't spend lots of time on any one page, because in order to feel that they're accomplishing something, they have to keep moving. The best kind of site shows users what each page is about and then quickly gets them to the next page.

Why don't more sites work that way?

Most developers fail to treat the Web as a new medium with new rules. The dominant metaphor is TV - think "channel," "show," and "eyeballs." But the Web is an interactive, one-to-one medium in which everyone can be a producer or a publisher.

It isn't like newspapers or magazines either. At IBM and at Sun, we studied how people read on the Web. What we discovered is - they don't! They scan. Only 16% of Web users actually read word by word. So, on any given topic, people should write about half as many words for the Web as they would for the printed page.

Are we all Web writers now?

The ability to communicate online will be one of the most important job skills of the 21st century. At Sun, almost every project has its own Web site. So almost everyone at the company is a writer for the Web. By 2001, there will be about 200 million people throughout the world designing intranet pages. The ability to produce 'microcontent' will be a highly prized talent. Such microcontent could be a good Web page - or even a good subject line for an email message. A good subject line, like a good Web site, answers the question "Why should I pay attention to this?"

What about the Web do you like?

The best Web sites are better than reality. Too much Web design falls into the trap of emulating the physical world in order to make users feel at home. The real promise of the Web is to give users what they can't get in the physical world.

Take Amazon.com. The site asks authors to complete an electronic "self-interview template." That way, it can interview thousands of authors at once - something that you can't do in the physical world.

There are lots of ways to be better than reality. You can be nonlinear: Thanks to links and short pages, Web users control their experience. You can be asynchronous: Users can resume a 'conversation' without having to reestablish context. You can be unconstrained by geography: Users can access a site from their home, office, or car, or from anywhere in the world. Finally, you can be anonymous - and if users don't have to reveal who they are, they may be more willing to do certain things.

You can reach Jakob Nielsen by email (jakob@useit.com). Visit his new company, Nielsen Norman group, on the Web (www.nngroup.com).

fastcompany.com/usability.html

Its the End of the Internet as we know it...

2011-05-10T20:33:00.000-07:00

Repost from Ars Technica...

arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/05/

Surprise! After months in the oven, the soon-to-be-released new version of a major US Internet censorship bill didn't shrink in scope—it got much broader. Under the new proposal, search engines, Internet providers, credit card companies, and ad networks would all have cut off access to foreign "rogue sites"—and such court orders would not be limited to the government. Private rightsholders could go to court and target foreign domains, too.

As for sites which simply change their domain name slightly after being targeted, the new bill will let the government and private parties bring quick action against each new variation.

Get ready for the "PROTECT IP Act."

Targeting Google

A source in Washington provided Ars with a detailed summary of the PROTECT IP Act, which takes its acronym from "Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property." This beats the old acronym, COICA; who can be against protection? The actual legislation should be introduced shortly.

The bill is an attempt to deal with foreign sites which can be difficult for US enforcement to reach, even when those sites explicitly target US citizens.

The PROTECT IP Act makes a few major changes to last year's COICA legislation. First, it does provide a more limited definition of sites “dedicated to infringing activities.” The previous definition was criticized as being unworkably vague, and it could have put many legitimate sites at risk.

But what the PROTECT IP Act gives with one hand, it takes away with the other. While the definition of targeted sites is tighter, the remedies against such sites get broader. COICA would have forced credit card companies like MasterCard and Visa to stop doing business with targeted sites, and it would have prevented ad networks from working with such sites. It also suggested a system of DNS blocking to make site nominally more difficult to access.

The PROTECT IP Act adds one more entity to this list: search engines. Last week, when the Department of Homeland Security leaned on Mozilla to remove a Firefox add-on making it simple to bypass domain name seizures, we wondered at the request. After all, the add-on only made it easier to do a simple Google search, and we wondered "what the next logical step in this progression will be: requiring search engines to stop returning results for seized domain names?"

Turns out that's exactly what's being contemplated. According to the detailed summary of the PROTECT IP Act, this addition "responds to concerns raised that search engines are part of the ecosystem that directs Internet user traffic and therefore should be part of the solution."

Rightsholders also score a major victory with the new legislation, which grants them a private right of action—something Google publicly trashed as a terrible idea earlier this year. Copyright and trademark holders don't have to badger the government into targeting sites under the new bill; they are allowed to seek court orders directly, though these orders would only apply to payment processors and advertising networks (not two ISPs or search engines).

Help us out, please

The emphasis here is on forcing intermediaries to get involved in policing such sites. Rightsholders have had difficulty suing the millions of end users engaged in infringement, and they have had difficulty suing the sites themselves when they are based abroad. But MasterCard and Google? Those are easy, US-based targets who will comply will any law Congress passes.

The PROTECT IP Act goes even further than forcing these intermediaries to take action after a court order; it actively encourages them to take unilateral action without any sort of court order at all. The bill summary makes clear that ad networks and payment processors will be protected if they “voluntarily cease doing business with infringing websites, outside of any court ordered action.” If a search engine decides that the next YouTube is a copyright infringer—and rightsholders have often sued sites like Veoh and YouTube in the past—it can simply cut off advertising for that reason and be immunized under the law. So can Visa.

The bill also encourages everyone—domain name registries, search engines, payment processors, and ad networks—to cut off access to infringing sites that "endanger the public health." That is, online pharmacies (which are often hotbeds of counterfeiting).

Given the strong opinions elicited by the earlier COICA, the expansion of powers here is a bit surprising, but the continued presence of the legislation is not. That's because, no matter how much power and money Congress devotes to intellectual property, rightsholders are back every couple of years for more—as the NET Act, DMCA, Sonny Bono Term Extension Act, PRO-IP Act, and Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) remind us. Each is "essential"—but somehow never quite enough.

New Video Game from Sony...

2011-04-30T16:37:00.000-07:00

Repost from Extreme Tech = Playstation Outtage

2011-04-28T23:12:00.001-07:00

After 7 days of speculation-ridden downtime, Sony has finally announced that the PlayStation Network (PSN) outage was due to a massive hack that exposed the names, birthdays, email addresses, passwords, security questions, and maybe credit card details, of all PSN users.
At first, the most likely explanation for the PSN's downtime was a continuation of Anonymous's DDoS reprisal for Sony's persecution of PlayStation 3 jailbreaker, George Hotz (geohot). Then, as the outage extended past a few days, and Sony announced that it was "rebuilding" its network due to an "external intrusion," it became apparent that this was much more than a simple, brute force denial of service attack. Today's announcement by Sony confirms that the PlayStation Network's security mechanisms were fully circumvented, and that at least one of its most sensitive databases was breached and accessed sometime between April 17 and 19.
How was the PlayStation Network hacked, though? Ironically, for security reasons, and because Sony is historically very tight-lipped on such matters, we will probably never know the exact attack vector -- but we can certainly make some well-educated guesses about how the PlayStation Network was hacked. First, given its proximity to Anonymous's recent attacks, it's likely that the database breach is somehow related. It's safe to assume that Anonymous could have learned about a weakness in the PSN's security mechanisms, and then passed that data on to another group of hackers -- and from there, if the hole was big enough, the attackers might have been able to simply step right in with an SQL injection attack.
The other alternative is the recent release of a custom PlayStation 3 firmware build called Rebug, which effectively turns a PS3 into a developer unit and activates a slew of features that consumers can not normally access. Most significantly, though, the Rebug firmware gives your console trusted access to Sony's internal developer network. There are reports that once you're on the internal, trusted network, a whole range of new hacks became available, including the use of faked credit card details on the PlayStation Network.
With the custom firmware installed, it's possible that customer details database -- the one that was breached -- became easily accessible. It's possible that Sony's security mechanisms simply didn't account for an internal attack from a trusted network -- and indeed, you can't create a functional network without having some trusted agents.
Beyond the hack itself, the other shocking piece of news is that PlayStation Network passwords were exposed. Judging by how long it took the PS3 to be jailbroken -- it lasted much longer than its contemporaries, the Xbox and Wii -- we have to assume that Sony knows a thing or two about security, but why then were PSN passwords apparently stored in plain, human-readable text? Heck, why were email addresses, personal details, and credit card details also stored in unencrypted form? While it might be impossible to fully prevent unauthorized access to a system, it's very simple to encrypt data in a way that both secures user privacy, and makes it almost valueless to any would-be hackers.
Moving forward, there's no indication of when the PlayStation Network will return. Sony has warned its users to look out for mail or telephone scams, and to lodge a "fraud alert" with credit bureaus like Experian and and Equifax, which should prevent your credit card from being used by the hackers. If you're a PlayStation Network user, check the PlayStation Blog for more information.
As we move towards a lifestyle that is dominated by cloud-based services like Gmail, Steam, Xbox Live, and Netflix, these attacks will become more and more commonplace. It's infinitely convenient to have your data all in one place and accessible from any net-connected computer -- but likewise, these services represent the juiciest imaginable hacking target. A large database of email addresses is worth millions if sold to a spam baron!
If Sony can be hacked -- if one of the largest technology companies in the world can be breached -- we can only hope that other companies are watching and learning from its mistakes.

Woman Falls Into Fountain at Mall While Texting and Walking

2011-04-24T09:39:00.000-07:00

I People

2011-04-23T17:21:00.000-07:00

http://questvisual.com/

I'm beginning to detest "I" People...

The Putz with the Iphone, the Ipad, the I Have IT And You Don't People...

Crass commercialism, (Apple sold 8.75 million iPhones in the last three months), Techno lemmings and luddites aside, have you seen where they make Iphones...

worker-dies-despite-new-safety-nets-in-place

But LOOK What it can do!!!!!!! What? Check out the GPS feature!

Look-where-the-workers-who-made-your-iphone-sleep-at-night

LOOK! LOOK! This camera shows all the streets and stuff....

Chinese I BOT jumps-to-their-death-today

The camera? The Surf the Internet thing? They love to show it to you, although, the screen is so microscopic, all you see is the glare from the sun....

and now the Iphone with its Big Brother feature...

Apple is facing some serious questions about how and why its mobile products collect users’ location data. But it’s not the first time the company has dealt with interrogation by lawmakers over its practices related to that sort of information.

On April 21, U.S. Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Senator Al Franken (D-Minn.) fired off letters to Apple CEO Steve Jobs, asking for clarification on news that the iPhone and 3G-enabled iPad running iOS 4 have been saving location data to a hidden database file.

I got one and you don't...
(and I'm not being micro-chipped by a corporation, either)

Woohoo! Look what I can do with my Iphone....

I can translate instantaneously, you can't...

I can run your credit card

I can....leap tall buildings in a single bound with my iphone

and fall into a fountain and become a YouTube sensation

and, and....

And, then there's the Made in the USA question since we all love making the People's Republic RICHER than hell, so they can achieve worldwide domination with their human rights policies...

To which we say:

"They r made by penguins in the north pole and they were deliverd by sexy elfs..."

All I see are automatons walking around with headphones, staring into their smartphones, not paying attention where they are going...

Worker Bots

Botnet arrest eminent - Wired.com

2011-04-13T16:54:00.000-07:00

U.S. Wins Court Order to Seize Control of ‘Coreflood’ Botnet, Send Kill Signal

By Kim Zetter
April 13, 2011 |
6:17 pm |
Categories: Crime, Hacks and Cracks

In an extraordinary intervention, the Justice Department has sought and won permission from a federal judge to seize control of a massive criminal botnet comprised of millions of private computers, and deliver a command to those computers to disable the malicious software.

The request, filed Tuesday under seal in the U.S. District Court in Connecticut, sought a temporary restraining order to allow the non-profit Internet Systems Consortium to swap out command-and-control servers that were communicating with machines infected with Coreflood — malicious software used by computer criminals to loot victims’ bank accounts.

According to the filing, ISC, under law enforcement supervision, planned to replace the servers with servers that it controlled, then collect the IP addresses of all infected machines communicating with the criminal servers, and send a remote “stop” command to infected machines to disable the Coreflood malware operating on them.

A Justice Department spokeswoman confirmed that the takeover occurred Tuesday evening, and the shutdown command was sent to infected computers based in the U.S.

“Under the authority granted by the court in the TRO, we have responded to requests from infected computers in the United States with a command that temporarily stops the malware from running on the infected computers,” wrote spokeswoman Laura Sweeney in an e-mail.

A separate court filing Tuesday afternoon (.pdf) indicated that the FBI’s New Haven office is behind the operation. In that filing, authorities informed the court that a new variant of Coreflood had been released by criminals Tuesday morning, but that the FBI had tested the kill command against that variant and it had worked successfully.

According to the filing, Coreflood is designed to run whenever an infected computer is rebooted. Therefore the intervention software designed to disable Coreflood has to resend the disable command after every reboot, until the victim removes the malware from his system. The government assured the court, however, that this would cause no harm to computers.

“Based upon technical evaluation and testing, the Government assesses that the command sent to the Coreflood software to stop running will not cause any damage to the victim computers on which the Coreflood software is present, nor will it allow the Government to examine or copy the contents of the victim computers in any fashion,” the government wrote in its request.

The government also insisted in the request that neither the replacement servers nor the trap-and-trace device it would use to collect the IP addresses of infected machines would “acquire the content of any communications” on infected machines.

“Should the Government inadvertently acquire the content of any communication, it will destroy such communication upon recognition,” the government asserted.

In her decision granting the restraining order U.S. District Judge Vanessa Byrant wrote that, “Allowing Coreflood to continue running on the infected computers will cause a continuing and substantial injury to the owners and users of the infected computers, exposing them to a loss of privacy and an increased risk of further computer intrusions.”

In conjunction with the move, the government planned to provide the IP addresses of infected computers to ISPs around the country to notify customers that they’re infected, and Microsoft planned to release an update to its free Malicious Software Removal Tool on Tuesday to remove Coreflood from infected computers.

According to the government, this is the first case in the U.S. in which authorities have swapped out criminal servers for government servers in order to intercept communications between infected systems and the servers controlling them. The court filing notes that Dutch law enforcement used the same approach last year in order to disable the Bredolab botnet. In that case, Dutch authorities remotely installed and executed a program on infected machines to notify users that their systems were infected.

“These actions to mitigate the threat posed by the Coreflood botnet are the first of their kind in the United States and reflect our commitment to being creative and proactive in making the internet more secure,” said Shawn Henry, executive assistant director of the FBI’s Criminal, Cyber, Response and Services Branch, in a press release.

Coreflood has been around for nearly a decade infecting machines and is designed to log keystrokes to harvest usernames and passwords as well as financial information in order steal funds.

According to the government, between March 2009 and January 2010, one Coreflood command and control server held about 190 gigabytes of data stolen from more than 400,000 victim computers. The server controlled more than 2 million machines.

The botnet allowed criminals to loot $115,000 from the account of a real estate company in Michigan, according to the filing, as well as $78,000 from a South Carolina law firm.

Read the Government's TemporaryRestrainingOrder

News and Features Edition

2011-04-05T08:52:00.000-07:00

"Apple today released its first television commercial
for the iPad 2,taking a philosophical approach to focus
on the experience of using the device rather highlighting
its technical capabilities or specific features.
This is what we believe. Technology alone is not enough.
Faster, thinner, lighter...those are all good things.

But when technology gets out of the way, everything 
becomes more delightful...
even magical. That's when you leap forward. 
That's when you end up with something like this."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyEpaPEbjzI

and,

this just in from

Anonymous

Hackers have taken down Sony and PlayStation.com which has consequently taken the PlayStation Network offline.
Speaking on an IRC chat a group of hackers, who are known as Anonymous, have successfully taken down several Sony-owned websites. One of which is PlayStation.com as well as Sony.com (although the site is slowly coming back). The attack is caused via a DDoS attack which is a distributed denial-of-service attack.
Also, the PlayStation Network is experiencing connection issues for PS3 owners. Sony tweeted:

PSN currently undergoing sporadic maintenance. Access to the PSN may be interrupted throughout the day. We apologize for any inconvenience.

The hackers stated that the attacks won’t stop until “sony do a press release”.
The hacker’s actions are due to a war on Sony they declared yesterday. The hackers said:

Congratulations, Sony. You now have now received the undivided attention of Anonymous. Your recent legal action against our follow hackers, Geohot and Graf_Chokolo, has not only alarmed us, it has been deemed wholly unforgivable.”
You have now abused the judicial system in an attempt to censor information on how your products work. You have victimised your own customers merely for possessing and sharing information, and continue to target every person who seeks this information. In doing so you have violated the privacy of thousands. This is the information they were willing to teach the world for free. The very same information you wish to suppress for sake of corporate greed and complete control of the users.
Now you will experience the wrath of Anonymous. You saw a hornets nest, and stuck your p*nises in it. You must face the consequences of your actions, Anonymous style.
Knowledge is Free. We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not Forgive. We do not forget. Expect us.

Techno Manifesto

2011-04-03T19:21:00.000-07:00

 Original Neil Postman: Five Things We Need to Know About Technological Change

 First, that we always pay a price for technology; the greater the technology,

the greater the price

 Second, that there are always winners and losers, and that the winners

 always try to persuade the losers that they are really winners

 Third, that there is embedded in every great technology an epistemological,

political or social prejudice. Sometimes that bias is greatly to our advantage.

Sometimes it is not.

The printing press annihilated the oral tradition;

telegraphy annihilated space; television has humiliated the word;

the computer, perhaps, will degrade community life. And so on.


Fourth, technological change is not additive; it is ecological, which means,

it changes everything and is, therefore, too important to be left entirely in the hands of

Bill Gates.

And fifth, technology tends to become mythic; that is,

perceived as part of the natural order of things, and therefore tends to control more

 of our lives than is good for us. ....

When a technology becomes mythic, it is always dangerous because it is then accepted

 as it is, and is therefore not easily susceptible to modification or control.

Twitter in China via Radical Ai WeiWei

2011-04-01T22:00:00.000-07:00

Digital Activism in China: A Discussion Between Ai Weiwei, Jack Dorsey and Richard MacManus

Written by Frederic Lardinois / March 15, 2010 5:43 PM / 9

Earlier tonight, the Paley Center hosted a discussion about social media and digital activism with celebrated artist, architectural designer, activist and blogger Ai Weiwei, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey and ReadWriteWeb's editor and founder Richard MacManus. The discussion touched upon a large variety of topics related to social media and digital activism in China, including translating Twitter into Chinese and Google's exit from the Chinese market.

Jack Dorsey joined the conversation via satellite from San Francisco. The conversation was moderated by Emily Parker, the Arthur Ross Fellow at the Asia Society's Center on U.S.-China Relations, who is currently working on a book about China and the Internet.

To start out the discussion, MacManus pointed out that it was the read/write aspect of the Internet that spawned the growth of social networks like Facebook and Twitter over the last few years. In the Western world, this development allowed users to connect and express their thoughts freely. In China, however, even though the same tools are available as in the West, a lot of them are currently blocked and censored. In addition to this, Ai Weiwei noted that sites like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, as well as TV channels like CNN, are currently blocked in China.

Even though there are a number of Facebook and Twitter clones in China, Ai Weiwei argued that those companies work within the framework that the Chinese government has set for them with regards to what users can say on these services. Ai Weiwei's name, for example, can never be used on these sites without getting censored. Indeed, said Ai Weiwei, using Twitter in China is "very physical and dangerous."

Translating Twitter

Asked about the reason for Twitter's popularity among netizens, Ai Weiwei noted that services like Twitter and blogs are easy to use, but once he got too popular, his blog was quickly shut down. Even though Twitter has a 140-character limit, Twitter's users in China can easily express in-depth thoughts because the Chinese language allows Twitter users to express 140 words on Twitter and not just 140 characters.

With regards to how Twitter is being used in China, Ai Weiwei noted that the most active Twitter users in China often use the service for political and philosophical discussions.

Jack Dorsey, after recapping the basic history of Twitter and his fascination with maps, and open, public databases, noted that messages on Twitter, even though they are often trivial, do show that "we are human" and remind us that we are all the same. Twitter, which he called a utility, was extended by the user and the developer ecosystem that grew up around it. Internet users across the world can now use it to communicate, talk to their governments, build a business and create political movements.

Ai Weiwei told Dorsey that the "Chinese people think you are some kind of God" because Twitter allows people to express themselves without worrying about censorship.

A lot of the discussion with Jack Dorsey focused on had to do with what Twitter can do to to help its users in China. Ai Weiwei directly asked Dorsey why Twitter doesn't provide its users a Chinese-language version of Twitter. According to Dorsey, it is just a question of time and mostly a technological issue. Given Twitter's problems with scaling the service, making it work for every character set creates some issues for Twitter because of the legacy framework that Twitter established in its early days. Currently, the company doesn't really have the resources to devote to this. Doresey did, however, argue that users already know how the service is meant to work and understand the setup of the Twitter page.

Dorsey also noted that Twitter isn't sure that it really wants to move into the Chinese market, but would like to offer a Chinese translation of its service at some point. Indeed, Dorsey noted that he wasn't even aware that Twitter was blocked in China until just a few weeks ago.

Censorship and Twitter

MacManus then asked Ai Weiwei if the Chinese government couldn't just censor Twitter or force Twitter to censor its service. Ai Weiwei, however, pointed out that Twitter could easily translate Twitter's registration page to help Chinese users. He noted that he isn't asking Twitter to set up an operation in China - he just wants Twitter to make the service easier to use for Chinese users and to translate large parts of the service. The Internet companies in China, as MacManus noted, tend to "self-discipline" themselves and censor their own content. MacManus wondered what would happen to a Chinese language version of Twitter, and if it wouldn't just get blocked and censored just like other international services.

Ai Weiwei noted that a lot of international companies that would like to enter the Chinese market have a responsibility to not give up on basic human rights. While the discussion didn't go into depth with regards to the issues surrounding Google's exit from China, MacManus noted that Google was one of the few Western services that entered the Chinese market, even though it faced a strong Chinese competitor. According to MacManus, leaving the Chinese market was a "brave move" by Google that sends a strong message that these companies are willing to stand up to the Chinese government.

Twitter's Moral Responsibility

Twitter and other technology companies have, said Dorsey, a responsibility to follow basic moral guidelines, and in his view, many technology companies have helped to push the messages of the U.S. government (and other governments) forward with regards to acknowledging human rights violations in China.

Asked specifically if companies do have a moral responsibility, Dorsey said that Twitter - as a company - is focused on opening information as completely as possible and wants to ensure that everybody can participate in the conversations on the service. Twitter, which according to Dorsey was founded around the principles of immediacy and transparency, allows users to create a shared experience among users around the world and create more empathy.

Towards the end of the discussion, Dorsey said that Twitter is just a tool and that it can't change any governments itself, but that it is the users who can use it to change governments.

As MacManus noted during the discussion, it is people like Ai Weiwei that are using these tools effectively. One day, Ai Weiwei noted towards the end of the discussion, we won't need tools like Twitter to change our governments anymore.