Just another webNivaran weblog
Internet
War on Piracy v2.0
0516 days
It seems the bigwigs at RIAA are ready to try out just about anything to stem the piracy biz. First they began by suing people who downloaded music. That meant suing just about every person on planet earth right?
They managed to sue 30,000 accused file sharers in the last five years. Clearly it wasn’t working, so the music industry said “hey wait a minute, since so many people are downloading, viewing and listening to copywrited content, why not try to squeeze some ads in there.” Accordingly, all such content on Myspace and YouTube wasn’t necessarily pulled down. Instead, the original owners could just choose to put ads on it.
Now in its latest installment against piracy, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has announced that it will work with internet service providers to sever abusers’ net connections. Just to clarify, abuser here means you. Yes, you with the 20 GB MP3 collection! Under the new plan, RIAA will send notices to ISPs that identify the IP addresses of suspected file sharers. ISPs will then send warnings to their customers and then cut them off if the users fail to curb their illegal downloads. Details are still being worked out, but most reports said downloaders might lose their net connection after the third notice. The termination could last anywhere from three months to a year.
All about Digital Rights Management (DRM)
2516 days
by webNivaran
in Internet
Digital Rights Management (DRM) refers to any scheme used to protect the copyright of digital content using a system of encryption that often includes remote monitoring and control by the copyright owners. The development of the various forms of DRM has largely been driven by the large media companies as a response, they say, to the effect of large scale copying on their revenues rather than rely on the passive protection of copyright law these companies have gone on the offensive with active digital rights management. DRM encompasses a range of embedded software and hardware measures for all digital media that attempt to physically stop unauthorized use and copying. Since DRM at least appears to be a method of enforcing copyright, any discussion of DRM must include a discussion of copyright itself. The advantages and disadvantages of DRM for the copyright owner and the consumer and the legal, ethical and ideological issues surrounding DRM are by no means clear. In this feature we explore the ins and outs of DRM as they stand today.
What’s wrong with DRM?
If DRM was always completely transparent to the end user, was not intrusive, protected copyright in a fashion that all agreed was fair and did not add cost to media hardware, perhaps no-one would find it objectionable. Various media companies have already applied almost draconian measures A further problem with DRM is that of interoperability, that agreeing on and using a standard form of DRM is not always in the media companies interest.
For example, this is true of Apple iTunes because of Apple’s agreements with the content providers that iTunes downloads should not be easy to copy. Some music download sites use license validation servers which validate a users right to play tracks they have downloaded. There have been several recent examples of music download sites closing down with the result that many users are left with tracks they have paid for but can no longer play because the validation servers are no longer available.
DRM has a negative effect on open source development, particularly on projects that are dedicated to pure open source, because all DRM involves proprietary methods and code. At present, playing protected Blu-ray content on a Linux box requires use of a device or player key, none of which have been issued for open source software players.
Widespread Reports of Phishing Attacks on IndianTax Sites
0516 days
Symantec has reported widespread incidents of phishing scam emails which point to fake Income Tax Department websites, taking obvious advantage of the returns filing season. The emails themselves claim that users have been identified as eligible for tax refunds. These sites, as expected, look identical to the official IT department website, but users are pointed to a form that asks for bank account details and/ or credit card authentication information.
Users are warned to be alert for such kinds of emails, verify the URLs that embedded links point to, and never part with sensitive information unless being absolutely sure of the site.
Microsoft takes steps to shut down Waledac botnet
0516 days
by webNivaran
in Internet
Microsoft has emerged victorious from a sneak legal attack in which it managed to get 277 Internet domains associated with the Waledac botnet shut down, effectively cutting its owners off from their swarm of zombie infected PCs.
According to the company, Waledac was one of the 10 largest botnets in the United States, and had been responsible for over 1.5 billion spam email messages per day, with over 650 million of them directed at Hotmail accounts in the month of December alone. While the PCs still remain infected, they cannot receive commands to send out spam anymore. Security agencies reported that Waledac activity had largely wound down within three days of the domains shutting down.
The stealthy operation was codenamed B49 and took several months to coordinate, according to Microsoft’s official blog post on the matter.
Apple’s lawsuits against HTC could be a swipe at Google
0516 days
Apple, which has sued HTC for 20 counts of patent infringement, might have a tough time ahead of it in court. HTC has said it intends to fight the charges and is confident it can defend itself. HTC manufactures a number of smartphones based on the Android platform, including Google’s own flagship Nexus One device. Several of the patent infringement charges have been made against specific Android models. Relations between Apple and Google have soured considerably in the last few months, judging by the number of public swipes they have taken at each other and the growing number of product categories the two giants compete against each other in despite having enjoyed a close relationship in the past. Both companies now manufacture smartphones, operating systems, web browsers, and mobile application stores, with additional clashes expected in the online office suite and photo management spaces. Google CEO Eric Schmidt was also an Apple board member growing until conflicts of interest compelled him to resign. Android phones initially refrained from using multitouch gestures which Apple pioneered, though these were recently enabled.
