Tuesday, July 30, 2013

TechEye

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Sony and Panasonic plan next optical disk standard

Posted: 30 Jul 2013 03:24 AM PDT

While home users can't really find a use for optical disks, it appears that Sony and Panasonic have not given up on the technology.

The pair have signed a basic agreement with the objective of jointly developing a next-generation standard for professional-use optical disks, with the objective of expanding their archive business for long-term digital data storage.

Both companies aim to improve their development efficiency based on the technologies held by each respective company, and will target the development of an optical disk with recording capacity of at least 300GB by the end of 2015.

Sony and Panasonic said they will talk about specifications and other items relating to the development of this new standard.

While they are no longer used in PCs, optical disks have uses in long term storage as they can be protected against the environment, such as with dust-resistance and water-resistance, and can also withstand changes in temperature and humidity when stored.

They also allow inter-generational compatibility between different formats, ensuring that data can continue to be read even as formats evolve.

Both companies have previously developed products based on Blu-ray but both Sony and Panasonic say that new optical disks will need to accommodate much larger volumes of storage in years to come, given the expected future growth in the archive market. 

Hackers take control of a yacht

Posted: 30 Jul 2013 03:14 AM PDT

A team of hackers has shown how it is possible to pirate an expensive yacht using GPS spoofing.

According to SC magazine, the team of university students have demonstrated that it is possible to subvert global positioning system navigation signals to pilot a superyacht without tripping alarms.

With the permission of the owners, the hackers took control of the White Rose, a 65-metre super yacht worth $80 million, that sailed from Monaco to the island of Rhodes in the Mediterranean.

The experiment took place some 50 kilometres off the coast of Italy in international waters.

Faint GPS signals were broadcast by the students from a spoofing device the size of a briefcase, aimed at the positioning system aerials of the ship.

The real GPS signals were slowly overpowered by those transmitted from the spoofing device, after which the students had gained control over the yacht's navigational system.

They set the ship onto a new course, three degrees off. Although the electronic chart on the bridge of the White Rose showed that the ship was progressing along a straight line, crew and the students could see the ship had turned.

The flaw also applies to aircraft which are operated by autopilot. The team are now working out a way that this sort of spoofing can be detected or countered. 

Apple Store staff frisked each meal break

Posted: 30 Jul 2013 02:59 AM PDT

Apple is in hot water with its own staff for wasting their time with airport security style searches.

According to former Apple employees, the nutty outfit forces its workers to stand around without pay for up to 30 minutes a day while waiting for managers to search their bags for stolen merchandise.

The former employees at Apple stores in New York and Los Angeles have filed a class action suit. They said that they had to stand in line for up to 30 minutes every shift and wait for a manager to search their bags.

According to Gigaom, the court case claims that having to waste time while Apple plays out its compulsive disorder cost each of them $1,500 a year in unpaid wages.

Court documents claim employees are required to wait in line and be searched for merchandise taken without permission as well as being searched for other contraband.

If a large number of specialists and managers leave for lunch at the same time or end their shift at the same time, this creates lengthy lines, the court will hear.

The lawsuit is the brainchild of Amanda Frlekin who worked at Apple's Century City store in Los Angeles and Dean Pelle who was employed at the company's Soho, New York location.

Apple's "personal package and bag search" policy results in staff being forced to stand around for five to 15 minutes every time they clock out for a meal break or leave work at the end of their shift.

In other words, while they might not mind being searched, they are hacked off that they have to do it on their dime, and not Apple's.

Of course Apple refused to comment, but then it never does unless it's busy shifting paradigms or changing games. 

UK losing internet crime battle

Posted: 30 Jul 2013 02:33 AM PDT

While UK Prime Minister David "tough on masturbation, tough on the causes of masturbation" Cameron is trying to rustle up support for his internet porn filter, it appears that cyber crime levels are going through the roof.

Cameron wants people's attention to focus on purging the internet from anything he does not like, while at the same time ignoring a very real cyber threat.

The Home Affairs Committee, which scrutinises the government's domestic policy, called for the government to set up a "state-of-the-art espionage response team" to encourage companies, banks and institutions to report hacking attempts to uncover the full extent of online crime.

According to Reuters, the Committee said it was concerned that there appears to be a 'black hole' where low-level e-crime is committed with impunity.

Cyber crime policing needed to be merged into a new unified structure as part of a shakeup of the country's policing structure, but the report added this was just the first stage to tackle a very real problem.

Cameron's answer is to tighten up online pornography laws and demanded that internet firms block access to child abuse images. Of course that is not going to stop cyber crime but will help some tabloids gloat about their campaign victories.

The Committee said the government is still too complacent about cybercrime, ranging from identity fraud and data theft to the spreading of illegal images and extremist material.

Opposition MP Keith Vaz, chairman of the bipartisan committee, said that it's clear the UK isn't winning the war on online criminal activity.

He said that you can steal more on the internet than you can by robbing a bank and online criminals in 25 countries have chosen the UK as their number one target.

Part of the problem is Cameron's other obsession with isolating itself from EU-wide justice measures designed to tackle the problem. However, EU members were also slammed for not doing enough to stop attacks too. 

Aussies pay 68 percent more for Microsoft

Posted: 29 Jul 2013 08:19 AM PDT

The Australian government has been looking into unfair electronics pricing in the country for a year now, and the results are in - Aussies really are getting a raw deal.

Corporate giants like Apple, Microsoft, and Adobe were not very keen on the inquiry. This could be because, as it turns out, Australians pay on average 66 percent more for Microsoft products and 42 percent more for Adobe products than the rest of the world.

Games cost a staggering 84 percent more, while music is up 52 percent and hardware costs 46 percent more than in the USA.

The traditional line has been that inflated prices were just part of an added cost of business to trade in the region. But that doesn't really hold up to scrutiny when you consider digital downloads.

In the report, the investigating committee also notes it has not received any evidence at all about why it is "almost invariably cheaper" for Aussie games to buy and ship physical media from the UK to Australia than getting a digital copy of the same game.

"Given the evidence presented to the Committee of very large price differentials, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that these practices amount to international price discrimination to the clear disadvantage of Australian consumers and businesses," the report reads.

The committee, News.com.AU points out, recommended the Australian Buraeu of Statistics work on a program that will monitor the price of IT products, hardware and software in Australia and worldwide.

Universities were encouraged to look into the needs and costs for education, and the committee also suggested putting a federally mandated IT procurement policy in place.

Interestingly, Australians could get a "right of resale" law that would - for digital content - allow them to sell on old music and ebooks, which in some cases are locked to individual user accounts not just in Oz, but everywhere. 
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