Facebook Implements New Anti-Pornography Software
Microsoft and Facebook announced a new partnership that makes the social networking site the first group to use a program called PhotoDNA, which can identify child pornography images even when they're cropped or altered, reports The New York Times' Gadgetwise.
The program searches for "known images of sexual exploitation of pre-pubescent children to avoid trampling on the privacy and free-speech rights of consumers of adult pornography," Read more...
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.1 Offers Upgrades, New Features
Upgrades include a technology preview of Enterprise Identity (IPA) services, based on the open-source FreeIPA project.
Enterprise Linux 6.1 also delivers patches and security updates, while maintaining application compatibility and OEM/ISV certifications.
In addition to performance improvements, Enterprise Linux 6.1 provides technology updates, including additional configuration options for advanced storage configurations with improvements in FCoE; Datacenter Bridging and iSCSI offload; enhancements in virtualization, file systems, scheduler, resource management and high availability; Read more...
Microsoft gives students free Xbox with PC purchase
We normally like to round up the latest and greatest tech deals in one daily post, but we couldn't resist sharing this particular one right away: Microsoft is offering a free Xbox 360 to any student who purchases a Windows PC priced at over $699. Read more...
Converting currency on Google can lead to malware
The way for you to pick up malware. Today's scary corner of the Internet? Currency conversion searches on Google.
Malicious links appeared within the top five results in several currency conversion attempts on Google.
The folks from Sophos Labs report that there appear to be a great deal of malicious links among the results for currency conversion-themed searches on Google. Read more...
Which kind of cloud database is right for you?
Find the keys
Not-so-relational databases do not store data in tables – at least, not the sort of tables we associate with relational databases. Unfortunately, Google has chosen to call its underlying storage mechanism BigTable and Microsoft offers Table Storage as an option in Windows Azure.
Joseph Feltz, an architect at the Microsoft Technology Centre in Dallas, says: “When thinking about Windows Azure table storage, I suggest you think of it as object storage.”
The first thing to understand about key/value stores is that they store all related information about a single item, or object, as a single entity, as opposed to having multiple tables in a relational database linked by primary/foreign key relationships. Read more...
Mac App Store’s slow updates expose users to security risks
Apple's Mac App Store puts users at risk because it's slow to update vulnerable software, a security researcher said Wednesday.
Security blogger Joshua Long raised the issue yesterday when he pointed out that the Norwegian-made Opera browser has not been updated on the Mac App Store since March 1, 2011.
Since then, however, Opera has released two updates to add features, fix crash bugs and patch vulnerabilities in the browser. Yesterday, Opera updated to version 11.11, which closed a critical hole that could be exploited by attackers to infect a Mac with malicious code. Read more...
Exchange Online having downtime problems again
Exchange Online, the hosted version of Microsoft's e-mail system, ran into technical problems again on Thursday, the latest in a series of downtime and performance hiccups.
Thursday's problems apparently began at around noon Eastern Time, affecting users in North America, and at close to 5 p.m. seemed still unresolved, prompting frustrated IT administrators to post complaints on various discussion forums.
A Microsoft official posted the following message to some of the discussion threads: "As of this morning, we are investigating reports of intermittent mail flow issues affecting Exchange Online users served from the Americas data center." Read more...
Amazon: E-books now outsell print books
It had to happen eventually: Amazon.com announced Thursday that it is selling more Kindle e-books than printed hardcover or paperback books.
Amazon said that since April 1, it has been selling 105 Kindle e-books for every 100 print books. Free Kindle books are excluded from that count; if free books were included, the number would be even higher.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said the e-book threshold arrived sooner than expected. "Customers are now choosing Kindle books more often than print books," he said. "We had high hopes that this would happen eventually, but we never imagined it would happen this quickly." Amazon has sold printed books for 15 years and Kindle books for less than four. Read more...
Google, Apple not unassailable in smartphone race
Microsoft and some smaller software vendors still have a shot in the fast-changing smartphone race even though Google and Apple are pulling rapidly ahead, industry executives said.
Helped by interest from manufacturers, operators and consumers, Google's Android platform has become the leading mobile operating system, with Google and Apple together controlling more than half of the market in the first quarter, according to research firm Canalys.
"Those are the two horses that are out in front today," Neil Rimer, co-founder of Index Ventures, said at the Reuters Global Technology Summit in Paris this week. Read more...
Plantronics Celebrates 50 Years with New Products, Software
Communications giant Plantronics is celebrating its 50th anniversary with a host of new product offerings and a software plug-in designed to integrate with IBM's UC² software, Sametime, and Sametime Unified Telephony.
The new Savi 700 Series is a headset system with capabilities that include managing calls coming in from a PC, desk phone, or mobile phone and switching between all three. The headset is a lightweight DECT headset with a 350-foot roaming range. It can auto-answer when picked up from its cradle and has a hot-swappable battery. The headset can be worn over the ear, over the head, or behind the neck. The Savi 700 is priced from $379.95-$399.95 and will be available in June. Read more...
LiveChat Livens Up Its Features
LiveChat this week announced two new features for its real-time software and Web analytics tool for e-commerce sales and support teams, Intelligent Triggers and Conversion Meter.
With Intelligent Triggers, the LiveChat system identifies the best prospects visiting a Web site based on data gathered from the purchasing decisions of 65 million buyers. It initiates a chat invitation with a personalized, custom message. Triggers can also be set based on keywords, referring Web site, and location and can contain any combination of conditions as needed to reach the desired set of customers. LiveChat inviations are customizable. Read more...
Apple fans’ brains react in a way similar to religious people
Apple devotees are notorious for their steadfast dedication to the computer and gadget manufacturer, standing in line for hours and sometimes days just to be the first to try out a new piece of hardware. According to a new study, the areas of the brain which produce that tenacity in Apple fans are the same spots that fuel religious fervor. Read more...