Articles by date
10 May 2013
US government orders removal of Defcad 3D-gun designs (BBC News)
The US government has demanded designs for a 3D-printed gun be taken offline.
In Hours, Thieves Took $45 Million in A.T.M. Scheme (New York Times)
It was a brazen bank heist, but a 21st-century version in which the criminals never wore ski masks, threatened a teller or set foot in a vault.
No 'Sharks With Lasers on Their Heads': What Protects the Internet in the Ocean? (The Atlantic)
If you've been following the events in Syria over the past few days, you know the country's Internet is now back from the dead after a 19-hour outage that the government blamed on "terrorist" sabotage--an explanation bought by approximately zero people.
Youtube Rolls Out Paid Subscription Channels (CIO)
Not everything on YouTube is free any more. The video-sharing website will now charge users a monthly fee to view certain content offered through subscription channels, the Google-owned site announced Thursday.
Mobiles 'to outnumber people next year', says UN agency (BBC News)
There will be more mobile subscriptions than people in the world by the end of next year, according to a UN agency report.
The Common Enemy: Spam was born in 1971, when an MIT engineer used his system-administrator privileges to send an antiwar message to his colleagues (Wall Street Journal)
"There is no way to peace. Peace is the way." The first spam message, sent in 1971, was very much of its time. It was born when Peter Bos, an engineer at MIT, used his privileges as a system administrator to urge a thousand fellow engineers -- including some at the Pentagon -- to oppose the Vietnam War.
Individuals can be identified despite IP address sharing, BT says (Out-Law)
The use of Internet Protocol (IP) address sharing technology will not prevent individuals from being identified as the perpetrators of illegal online activity, BT has claimed.
09 May 2013
BitTorrent reveals Bundle file to package media content (BBC News)
The developers of the BitTorrent file-sharing protocol have unveiled what they describe as a new "multimedia format" called a Bundle.
Syrian internet back after 19-hour blackout (BBC News)
The internet in Syria appears to have returned after a nationwide blackout knocked the country offline for more than 19 hours.
Internet in Syria goes dark, leaving questions and uncertainty (Electronic Frontier Foundation)
Earlier today, we learned that Internet traffic between Syria and Western online services had plummeted drastically, indicated that the country's connection to the wider Internet had been shut down. Reports from Renesys and Google confirmed the routes into Syria had been withdrawn, implying either a massive infrastructure cut, or a deliberate silencing of online communication.
Why Did Syria Shut Down the Internet? (New Yorker)
The World Wide Web became a little less worldwide on Tuesday afternoon. Suddenly, Syria disappeared, at least from the perspectives of Google and Akamai. Nineteen hours later, it appears to have come back on. How was it turned off? Four fibre-optic lines carry Internet traffic in and out of the country. Perhaps, as the government says, the rebels cut them all. Or perhaps four scavengers simultaneously digging for copper wrenched their spades in at the same time. But most likely, President Bashar al-Assad did the deed. The government also flipped the kill switch last fall, and security firms report that the shutdown comes from sophisticated engineering, not coördinated slicing or accidental shovelling.
Queen's speech revives UK 'snooper's charter' legislation (The Guardian)
The government appears to have left open the door to the resurrection of the controversial "snooper's charter" bill to track everyone's email, internet and mobile text use.
08 May 2013
DNS What? Celebrating 30 Years of a Technology That You Use Every Day and Don't Know It by Paul Mockapetris (Huffington Post)
When the domain name system (DNS) was developed in 1983 it was viewed as a way of "making it possible for people to create and use domain names for the things they wanted to access instead of numerical addresses," writes Paul Mockapetris, Chief Scientist and Chairman, Board at Nominum.
Google under pressure to cut $5bn valuation of smartphone patents (The Guardian)
Google could face pressure to write down the $5bn (£3.2bn) value of the patents in its Motorola subsidiary, as the mobile arm faces fines from Europe's antitrust commissioner for trying to use them to block sales of Apple's iPhone in Germany.
China calls U.S. the "real hacking empire" after Pentagon report (Reuters)
China on Wednesday accused the United States of sowing discord between China and its neighbours after the Pentagon said Beijing is using espionage to fuel its military modernisation, branding Washington the "real hacking empire".
US Senators propose law to go after foreign cybercriminals (CNET)
After a slew of U.S. companies' Web sites were hacked, a group of bi-partisan senators is looking at getting a new law passed that combats cyber-theft by foreign governments and hackers.
Apple ordered by German court to change its privacy rules (CNET)
The iPhone maker can no longer ask for "global consent" to use customer information or tap in to location-based data. But the court ruling applies only to Germany.
French, German politicians to pressure Google on tax (Reuters)
Politicians in Germany and France say they will press for Google Inc to be quizzed on corporate income tax after a Reuters report highlighted how the company employs sales staff in the UK while telling the tax authorities that sales are made from Ireland.
U.S. Is Weighing Wide Overhaul of Wiretap Laws (New York Times)
The Obama administration, resolving years of internal debate, is on the verge of backing a Federal Bureau of Investigation plan for a sweeping overhaul of surveillance laws that would make it easier to wiretap people who communicate using the Internet rather than by traditional phone services, according to officials familiar with the deliberations.
Syria cut off from global Internet as civil war rages (Reuters)
Internet connections between Syria and the outside world were cut off on Tuesday, according to data from Google Inc and other global Internet companies.
07 May 2013
Online Pornography's Effects, and a New Way to Fight Them (Wall Street Journal)
It was suspiciously warm, the reception given to a study published a week ago in the Journal of Sexual Medicine. A survey of 4,600 young people in the Netherlands, aged 15 to 25, found the behavioral impact of pornography -- most of it online now -- to be surprisingly small. Reaction to the news? People didn't whoop exactly. But you know they wanted to.
China's Changing Internet Landscape (New York Times)
China was on vacation much of last week for the May 1 Worker's Day holiday, but executives at two of China's most important online companies were busy completing a deal that could reshape the country's Internet.
YouTube Is Said to Plan a Subscription Option (New York Times)
Newspapers have digital subscriptions. Record labels have iTunes and Spotify. And YouTube is about to have special programming for paying customers.
E.U. Rules Against Patent Move by Google's Motorola Unit (New York Times)
The European Commission on Monday made a preliminary antitrust finding against Google's mobile communications unit, Motorola Mobility, for seeking and enforcing an injunction against Apple in Germany over patents essential to smartphones and tablets.
U.S. Says China's Government, Military Used Cyberespionage (Wall Street Journal)
The Chinese government has targeted U.S. government computer systems for intrusion, the Pentagon said Monday in a more direct accusation of cyberespionage than the U.S. has made in the past.
