I received an interesting email from our Yahoo friends in Australia. It appears that, as a result of a Hack Day project, they’ve created a customized search engine that allows you to select your own content options and offers a nifty interface.
It’s currently pulling results from Yahoo!7 (their Australian unit) and the customization is a little limited, but it has the potential to be Yahoo’s answer to Google Co-op.
We already suspected Google might enter the 411 arena, when they were granted a voice recognition patent last year. With Microsoft’s recent acquisition of Tellme, it seemed even more likely that Google would one day launch a mobile voice search service. That day is now here, with Google launching Google Voice Local Search.
As part of our ongoing effort to make the world’s information universally accessible, we’re testing a free service called Google Voice Local Search. Using this service, you get fast access to the same local information you’d find on Google Maps. But you don’t need a computer, you don’t need an Internet connection, and you don’t even need to use your cell-phone keypad. It’s voice-activated, and you can access it from any phone (mobile or landline), in any location, at any time.
To use the service simply dial 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411) from any phone.
According to Google, the new service lets you:
The service is free, but Google warns that, as part of Google Labs, the service may be erratic.
R.I.P. paid 411 services.
Microsoft’s video site, Soapbox, launched in September, has temporarily closed to new users. This comes in response to the (inevitable) video piracy on the site.
As a part of the NBC/News Corp/AOL deal in the works, Microsoft is trying to ensure that videos they’ll be paid to distribute won’t simultaneously be pirated on their video site. Think that ever happens on YouTube?
Or maybe the move has something to do with a certain $1 billion lawsuit.
My question is: how does not letting new pirates sign up help deter present piracy? Part of the answer, though certainly not all of it, is a partnership with Audible Magic, the same company charged with detering piracy on Google and MySpace.
There’s still talk that Google could become the next Microsoft. The U.K.’s Guardian looks at the similarities between the two companies and how Google’s explosive growth is as much of a drain, as it is a boost.
Apart from the many law suits, there’s the new competition and Wall Street’s concern that Google is starting to overreach…
…shares reached $500 in 2006, but have fallen 13 per cent since January, reflecting worries about its diversification into new markets…Google is no longer the hottest thing on Wall Street and has underperformed the wider market index in recent months. Investors fear that retaliation from competitors could choke off growth that had already showed signs of slowing when it reported its latest quarterly figures. And anxiety persists about the court case with Viacom, which could cost Google untold millions in damages if lost.
I don’t think Google needs to worry about becoming the next Microsoft for the foreseeable future, but then again, I’m sure Microsoft didn’t worry about becoming Microsoft either.
New York, Boston, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Chicago, Atlanta and more... Google Maps now displays live traffic data for about 60 US cities. This functionality has been available on Google Maps for Mobile since July, but it’s now available in many languages on the standard version.
The official Google Blog explains what the colors mean, although the Google Operating System blog seems to be more accurate:
When you’re viewing an area on Google Maps where traffic information is available, a traffic light is displayed. And there’s also a new button labeled “Traffic”.
Google’s not the first to add live traffic to its maps; Yahoo! and Microsoft have already been doing that for a while now.
Microsoft added a range of new features to Live Search Maps, including Firefox support for Virtual Earth 3D. Some of the new capabilities are live right now, and some are going live later today. Below is a list of the new tools and features and their descriptions from the distributed press materials.
Firefox support: Previously, 3D functionality for Live Search Maps was only available on IE. With this update, customers in the US who use Firefox as their web browsers will be able to enjoy the immersive 3D mapping experience available with Live Search Maps.
Updated 3D cities: With this update, 16 additional cities will be available with 3D buildings including San Diego, CA and Portland, OR. The 3D functionality is also now available in five cities in the UK including Plymouth, Cardiff, Bristol, Gloucester, and Wolverhampton.
Ratings and Reviews for Business listings: Live Search Maps customers now have the ability to view ratings and reviews of hundreds of thousands of businesses in the US, provided by third party sites and Live Search Maps customers.
RSS collections feeds: Customers are now able to subscribe to a Live Search Maps collection and their RSS reader will automatically receive any updates that are made to that collection.
Traffic conditions: Our real time traffic feature is automatically presented as an overlay when directions are displayed, providing our customers with relevant information they can act on without the need for an extra step.
Instant Answers Maps feature: For Live Search queries with “local intent”, customers will now be presented with the picture of a map, embedded into their traditional search results. For example, if you type in Las Vegas in the Live Search bar, a map of Las Vegas will be included at the top of your Live Search results.
RKR is pretty simple to use. Fire it up (no installation required), click "Scan," and it will iterate through the Registry and the file system to try and find anything that's attempting to conceal itself from the operating system. The program does turn up a few false-alarm readings by default, mostly in the Security section of the Registry, but these are well-documented and easily ignored.
 | ||
 |
| |
| | |
The results are displayed in an exportable report, but it's not possible to take action against any of the detected items in the program itself — you can't, for instance, right-click on a suspected file and mark it for deletion. Any action you take, you have to do so entirely on your own, which can be a little difficult if you're dealing with a cloaked file or process.
RKR's documentation indicates that it's not designed to detect rootkits that cloak themselves in memory only, such as Fu (which it didn't detect at all). It checks specifically to see if something is attempting to conceal itself in the file system or Registry, so in that respect it's limited.
It did detect signs of the other two rootkits, though, so as a quick-and-dirty first line of defense it's not bad. But for more comprehensive scanning and the ability to take more definitive action against a rootkit, there are definitely better tools available.
RootkitRevealer 1.71 Winternals Software LP/ Microsoft Corp. www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/utilities/RootkitRevealer.mspx Price: Free Summary: Summary: One of the first rootkit detectors, it's now overshadowed a bit by some of the other programs here but can still do some decent work. |
: However, this virus is able replicate only on iPods that are running the iPod Linux operating system. It does not work on normal iPods that are running the default iPod operating system.
iPod Linux is a uCLinux-based software distribution targeted specifically to run on Apple iPods. It enables the iPod to run a variety of third party software, such as games.
So it's a proof-of-concept virus for a rare operating system, and it's not going to become a real-world problem. However, it does show that the computer underground is actively studying new platforms such as portable devices.
And it really is theoretical. After we got the sample, we installed iPod Linux to some iPods we had at hand, but we couldn't get the malware to operate correctly no matter what we tried. However, our friends at Kaspersky did get it working.
