Valued at over £0.5m, the project includes migrating Sky’s Broadcast Scheduling System (BSS), as well as several satellite applications, to Microsoft .NET, and is due to complete mid 2013.

The heart of Sky’s broadcasting operation, BSS serves as a repository for programs, promos and play rights, from which media assets are scheduled and transmitted to broadcast playout chains, and published to Sky’s video-on-demand platforms. Sky’s internal development team, which has been developing BSS for over 15 years, will undergo Firefly Migration’s .NET training program and will continue to develop the migrated application.

As part of the evaluation process conducted by Sky, the company’s Tape Library System had been migrated by Firefly Migration and tested by end-users to Sky’s satisfaction, within the predetermined timeframe of four months.

Tim Taylor, Head of Broadcast & Media Sales IT, Sky, commented: “The evaluation period went well – we had good engagement from Firefly Migration and were able to prove their conversion processes. Their tool allows us to automate the conversion of our main BSS application in a cost effective way, while at the same time minimizing the impact on our delivery programme – these were key factors for us when deciding on Firefly Migration.”

Noam Honig, CEO of Firefly Migration, added: “Sky is exactly the kind of customer we were aiming for when we set out to create our migration technology and has a lot to gain from our automated conversion to .NET, both business and technology-wise.”

About Firefly Migration

Firefly Migration provides technology solutions that help organizations convert legacy applications to the latest Microsoft technologies, including Visual Studio and the .NET Framework. The company’s automatic migration solution requires no manual programming and guarantees a short schedule, low cost, and complete preservation of the investment in the original system. Firefly Migration’s customers include: DdD Retail, DataMax, Crown Agents, and Israel Aerospace Industries.

About Sky

Sky entertains and excites more than 10.5 million homes through the most comprehensive multichannel, multi-platform television service in the UK and Ireland. Sky continues to break new ground with its own portfolio of channels: Sky 1 combines its commitment to UK production with the best of the US; Sky Living pushes ahead with fresh and innovative entertainment formats; Sky Arts is the UK’s only dedicated arts channel brand; Sky Atlantic is the home to HBO and other iconic drama and comedy, Sky Sports is still raising the bar in sports broadcasting; Sky News remains a pioneer in television news; and Sky Movies is leading the way in High Definition and on-demand.

Sky also works with dozens of other broadcasters on the satellite platform, as well as online and on mobile through the groundbreaking Sky Go service. Sky has also led the UK into the age of high definition television, launched Europe’s first 3DTV channel, Sky 3D, and offers customer even more flexibility and choice through Sky Anytime+, its internet-delivered video on demand service. Since launching Sky Broadband and Sky Talk in 2006, the company has also been the UK’s fastest-growing home communications provider.

Sky believes in making a wider contribution to the communities in which it operates, not least by increasing participation in, and access to, the arts, supporting grassroots sports, and taking positive action on the environment.

The protest at Daunt Square was organised by 16-year old student Evin Doyle, who believes that the Anti-counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) challenges civil liberties and the right to privacy.

The treaty – which Ireland signed up to last month – has triggered a series of protests in Dublin and across Europe.

It aims to establish an international legal framework for targeting counterfeit goods, generic medicines and copyright infringement on the Internet.

Neil Sutton is a technical person with twenty years of experience in Ireland and abroad. He has a passion for technology and firmly believes that it has the ability to make all our lives better. He has been interested in computers and mobile communications from a very early age. He is an early adopter of new technologies. He prides himself on being deeply knowledgeable in his areas of interest. Explaining technology in an easy to understand way comes naturally to him. He has taught about technology subjects in Ireland, UK and Canada.

Based on the number of questions he answers every day regarding broadband, computers, wireless, smartphones and tablet PC’s, he believes that the demand is there for courses teaching the use of technology to a variety of people, from absolute beginners to regular users who want to get more out of their devices. These ‘gadgets’ are expensive. Why not get value for money out of them. Let the technology work for you.

Contact details: 087 2901808

The Donegal Gathering is a series of cultural and music events taking place throughout the county over the coming year, with the idea of bringing the Donegal Diaspora back hom. One of the main events will be the hosting of this year’s flagship Donegal Live event in Donegal town.

An initiative of Donegal County Council, The Donegal Gathering 2012 “extends a heartfelt welcome to both native emigrants planning a homecoming holiday, and first time explorers embarking on a new adventure,” and during this first event you’ll get a sense of all that Donegal offers.

You can watch it all unfold online at www.livetrad.com. You can also find the Time Conversion to your region on that website.

The entire show will also be available for instant playback any time within the following 24 hours. In other words, if 6pm GMT tonight (Wednesday) doesn’t suit you to tune in, you’ve got the option of watching the entire show at any time between then and 6pm tomorrow.

 With social media constantly-evolving, children are communicating online not just through their PC, but on mobile phones and game consoles.

Understanding the internet and the risks it can pose is the first step to keeping your child safe, says the NSPCC.

Neil Anderson, National Head of Service for NSPCC Northern Ireland, told the ‘Sunday Journal’: “The internet can be a wonderful resource, but it is not without its pitfalls.”

“As young people across the region log on to play games, chat to peers and socialise, I would urge parents to use this opportunity to talk about the possible dangers online. Not only can you never really be sure who you are talking to, but without meaning to do so you can make yourself vulnerable by giving away personal information.

“Parents can play their part by talking openly to their children about their activities on the internet, ensuring they follow advice on internet safety and encouraging them to speak out if they see anything that makes them feel upset or uncomfortable.”

While interactive social media technology continues to grow, the potential for misuse is high. Risks can include cyberbullying, grooming and potential abuse by online predators, identity theft and exposure to inappropriate content.

The NSPCC is offering parents some advice on how to make cyberspace safer for their children:

* Help your children to understand that they should never give out personal details such as their email address, mobile number, school name or arrangements for meeting up with friends.

* Make them aware that they need to think carefully about the information and pictures they post on their profiles. Once published online, anyone can change or share these images.

* If your child receives spam or junk email and texts, remind them never to believe their contents, reply to them or use them.

Devious cybercrooks have developed a Trojan that is capable of redirecting calls your bank has made to verify suspicious transactions – straight into the waiting handsets of professional criminal caller services.

The capability comes bundled in a modified configuration of Ice IX, a Trojan developed using the infamous ZeuS cybercrime toolkit. In addition to stealing bank account data from infected machines, these Ice IX configurations are capturing sensitive information on telephone accounts belonging to the victims who happen to be customers of BT, TalkTalk and Sky. US banking customers have also been targeted by the scam.

Redirecting bank’s post-transaction verification calls to professional criminal caller services gives crooks more chance of abusing stolen card data for longer, maximising their ill-gotten profits in the process.

Security researchers at transaction security firm Trusteer discovered a strain of malware used in the attack that steals a victim’s user ID and password, memorable information/secret question answer, date of birth and account balance from a compromised machine. Victims are then asked to update their phone numbers of record (home, mobile and work) and select the name of their service provider from a drop-down list. Automated dialogue boxes generated by the malware further attempt to trick victims into handing over their telephone account number, private data that is used by phone firms to authorise account modifications such as call forwarding.

Victims are falsely told the sensitive data is required as part of a verification process caused by “a malfunction of the bank’s anti-fraud system with its landline phone service provider”.

In reality that data is used by fraudsters to redirect and fob-off post-transaction verification checks by banks, circumventing an important security check in the process. Victims will find it harder to contest disputed transactions as a result of the ploy, designed to give fraudsters and their accomplices more time to bleed cash from compromised accounts.

Amit Klein, CTO of Trusteer, explained, “Fraudsters are increasingly turning to these post-transaction attack methods to hide fraudulent activity from the victim and block email and phone communication from the bank. This allows attackers to circumvent security mechanisms that look for anomalies once transactions have already been executed by the user.”

A: Consider buying an inexpensive GPS unit after you arrive. You might save a few bucks and it will already be loaded with maps of Ireland. For the most accurate maps, stick with major brands, such as Garmin and TomTom. If you have a GSM smartphone from AT&T or T-Mobile, you can use Google Maps or other international navigation apps to guide you. That way, you won’t have to carry two gadgets.

According to news reports, the letter was submitted on Friday in the Eastern District of Virginia. Although MegaUpload is based in Hong Kong, U.S. authorities claim to have the authority to act because some of the company’s leased servers are located in Virginia.

According to MegaUpload, millions of users store their own data, such as photos and personal documents, on the site.

The site had some 180 million registered users and was getting 50 million daily hits when U.S. prosecutors shut it down on January 19, indicting and arresting the owners for allegedly operating an organisation dedicated to piracy of movies, music and more.

Users who don’t have backup copies haven’t been able to get at their data since the shutdown, but they’ve held out hope that they could get it back. At this point it’s not looking good, even for owners of copyright-kosher data.

According to a report from The Associated Press, MegaUpload pays outside companies to store the data. An attorney for MegaUpload, Ira Rothken, said on Sunday that the government has frozen its money, according to the report.

The letter, filed on Friday, said that storage companies Carpathia Hosting Inc. and Cogent Communications Group Inc. may begin deleting user data on Thursday, given that government investigators have finished executing their search warrants at the storage centres.

MacBride wrote in the letter that the government copied some data but didn’t remove any. Now that the search is over, the government no longer has access to the servers, he said.

Meanwhile, MegaUpload users are howling over the loss of their data. TorrentFreak reported on Friday that Pirate Parties worldwide have begun to compile a list of users affected by the MegaUpload raids, and they are planning to file an official complaint against the FBI.

From the TorrentFreak report, here’s what the Pirate Parties had to say:

The widespread damage caused by the sudden closure of MegaUpload is unjustified and completely disproportionate to the aim intended.

For this reason Pirates of Catalonia, in collaboration with Pirate Parties International and other Pirate Parties, have begun investigating these potential breaches of law and will facilitate submission of complaints against the US authorities in as many countries as possible, to ensure a positive and just result.

This initiative is a starting point for legitimate internet users to help defend themselves from the legal abuses promoted by those wishing to aggressively lock away cultural materials for their own financial gain.

File sharing site TorrentFreak have started compiling a list of names to complain about the loss of non-pirated data.

The sand in the hourglass is running out for that data.

I won’t tell any MegaUpload users that they should have backed up any important data before sending it off into the cloud, because that would just be rubbing salt into what may soon be a gaping wound.

During the past few years, Facebook has been targeted by many nasty viruses and malware with links on its site that take you to websites infected with all kinds of malware programs that can infect a user’s computer.

If you suspect your computer has been infected with a virus or malware (slow or abnormal behavior), there are things you can do.  Try the following instructions below.

NOTE:

Although generally safe, any cleaning operations carry some risk for data loss. Before proceeding, Dee.ie  recommends backing up any important or valuable files on your computer.

Run System Restore.
System Restore saves ‘snapshots’ of your system files and settings. If your computer is acting odd or not functioning correctly, you can use these restore points to return your computer to a previous state without affecting personal files. Dee.ie recommends starting your computer in Safe Mode before using System Restore to avoid possible malware restrictions on your system.

Update your operating system.
It is important to regularly download the latest security updates for your Operating System as soon as they are released.  To download directly, click here: http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com.

Update/Upgrade your virus protection/ security product.
New viruses and malware are released every day.  If your virus protection is out of date, it may not detect a potential problem.

Run a system scan. 
Once your virus protection is up to date, run a complete system scan.  This will potentially take a long time, so it’s a good idea to start the scan at a time when you will not use the system.

If your computer is still exhibiting the suspicious behavior, please contact Dee.ie for additional assistance.

The Dee.ie PC Standard that we adhere to is our own design and ensures all PC’s & laptops are fully diagnosed, health checked and up to date including OS updates, automatic antivirus & malware detection.

Our repair centre offers a professional and independent support facility and can support and repair down to the component level of many devices while ensuring independent advice is directly applied to our clients from various forms of technology.

We have a host of fixed fee repair services to give you peace of mind when allowing Dee.ie to repair your technology.

Someone broke into Symantec’s network in 2006 and stole source code for PCAnywhere, which allows customers to remotely connect to other computers, as well as for Norton AntiVirus Corporate Edition, Norton Internet Security and Norton SystemWorks, the company said last week. Earlier this month, hackers in India affiliated with the Anonymous online activist group said they had taken the code from servers run by Indian military intelligence.

Hackers have threatened to use the pilfered code to attack companies using it and then release the code publicly. The affected products have been updated since 2007 so there is no risk to customers, except for PCAnywhere, Symantec said. Separately, Symantec released a hotfix for several critical vulnerabilities in PCAnywhere on Tuesday, but said it did not know of any publicly available exploits.

“At this time, Symantec recommends disabling the product until Symantec releases a final set of software updates that resolve currently known vulnerability risks,” the company said in a white paper (PDF). Customers who rely on it for business critical purposes should install version 12.5 and apply relevant patches, it added.

For more on this story, see Symantec tells customers to disable PCAnywhere

However, the source of the attack–the IP address for the individual computers attempting to access the site–can easily be traced when LOIC is used, putting participants at risk of prosecution. (Despite that threat, people have been downloading LOIC like mad since Wednesday, including more than 19,000 downloads in the last day, according to a blog post by security firm Imperva.)

So, Anonymous has come up with a way to allow people to participate without risking arrest. In protest of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), as well as yesterday’s government takedown of file-hosting site Megaupload and the indictment of its operators, Anonymous launched DDOS attacks on more than a dozen sites and used a new tactic.

The group distributed Web links yesterday during its attacks on the Department of Justice, FBI, Universal Music and a host of other sites, that made joining the attacks as easy as clicking the mouse. The links led to Web pages with special JavaScript instructions that automatically redirected the visiting computer to a Web site being targeted for attack. The computer continues attempting to access the target site until the Web page is closed.

Another version of the tool, for people willing to participate, would direct computers to a Web page on which a visitor could type in the IP address to target and the page would automatically refresh in the background so the computer would continually try to access the target.

The tool relies on JavaScript being enabled, and given how many Web sites require JavaScript, it’s likely most of the people who clicked the links were unwittingly drawn into the attacks.

It’s likely that the tricky links increased the effectiveness of the attacks, which appeared to have impacted overall Internet traffic patterns, at least for a while, according to areal-time Web monitoring site operated by content delivery company Akamai. The site registered 218 attacks yesterday hours after the attacks started. Attack-related traffic was up 24 percent over normal, while general network traffic was up 14 percent.

The links were distributed on Twitter, IRC, Facebook, Tumblr, and other sites and there was no indication that they were potent. Some of the links led to sites similar to Pastebin, where Anonymous often posts its messages. Other links were obscured using Web address shorteners like Bitly.com.

“From the looks of things, this is on a scale we haven’t seen before,” said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at security company Sophos, who wrote a blog post about the tool. “We saw some Anonymous Twitter accounts gain hundreds of thousands of new fans overnight as word began to spread.”

If you did happen to click one of the links, you aren’t likely to get in trouble. For one, investigators might conclude that all the different IP addresses that hit the site during the attack were part of a botnet of compromised computers. And even if investigators suspected that the blasts from your IP address on the target site were conducted as part of the attack, it’s unlikely that you would be singled out for a visit from the authorities, said Jennifer Granick, an attorney who has represented defendants accused of computer crimes.

“If you are an unwitting participant then technically you’re not liable under the law because all criminal statutes, with some narrow exceptions, require some criminal state of mind,” such as acting “knowingly” or “intentionally,” she said.

“But even being part of a botnet could result in unwanted police attention anyway,” Granick added. “That’s probably unlikely, depending on how many computers are involved in the DDOS attack.”

The situation is another story for the people distributing the attack-enabling links, however.

“If you are a distributor of malware that targets a site, you can be liable for all damage that occurs to that site as a result of the malware functioning,” Granick said. “If you are distributing a program and intending to cause damage and that’s what results, that is a violation under the law.”

In computer crime cases, damage is usually defined broadly and includes resources needed to respond to an attack and return the system to normal, so damages can add up, she said.

Viviane Reding, vice president of the European Commission, said in a speech on Sunday that the new data-protection legislation was needed to protect users and cut red tape for businesses in Europe.

“Only if consumers trust that their data is protected will they entrust companies with it … We need individuals to be in control of their information,” Reding said at the DLD conference of tech industry leaders in Munich.

But Reding also emphasized a need to simplify Europe’s approach to online data protection, arguing that the current system was too cumbersome and costly for business.

“In Europe we have too many rules, conflicting rules,” she said. “The extra cost to business of this fragmentation is 2.3 billion euros ($3 billion) a year.”

Europe’s new data-protection rules are expected to be issued on January 25.

The EU regulation will need to be approved by national governments, some of which, such asFrance and Germany, may resist seeing their oversight on privacy matters shift to Brussels.

The legislative process is likely to take at least two years, so the rules could still change considerably. Internet companies will not be required to comply before 2014 or 2015.

The new rules come amid widespread change in how people use the Internet. Social networks such as Facebook and LinkedIn have attracted nearly a billion users, while so-called cloud computing services, which allow businesses and people to stock data on distant servers and access it anywhere, are going mainstream.

The questions of who owns such data, to what end companies can use it and for how long remain major issues of debate among Internet firms, governments and consumers.

Facebook, the world’s largest social network, has been investigated by U.S. and European regulators for its treatment of user data and privacy policies. In November, it signed a settlement with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission that will subject it to 20 years of independent audits, and it recently signed an accord with Ireland’s privacy regulator on how it treats international users’ data.

There has also been a series of high-profile breaches such as one at Sony Corp’s online videogame network last year in which hackers stole the data of some 77 million users.

NEW POWERS

According to a draft obtained by Reuters, the EU proposals would bolster significantly regulators’ powers on fighting data-protection breaches, requiring companies to notify regulators when data has been stolen or mishandled.

The proposals also give member states new powers to fine companies up to 1 percent of their global revenues for violating EU data rules. The Financial Times reported in December that the rules would allow for fines up to 5 percent of global revenues, so the EU may have reconsidered its approach since then.

The proposals grant broad, new rights to individuals, including a so-called “right to be forgotten” that would allow people to request that their information be erased and not disseminated online.

The rules also create a “right to data portability” to ensure that people can easily transfer their personal information between different companies or services.

Such rules could force social networks to change the way they handle users’ data.

In written comments submitted to the EU last year, Facebook expressed concerns that the EU’s approach in some areas was too proscriptive for the fast-changing world of the Internet and urged caution on proposals for stiffer sanctions.

“There is a risk that an excessively litigious environment would impede the development of innovative services that can bring real benefit to European citizens,” the company wrote.

Participants at the DLD conference were also divided about coming EU changes.

Stefan Gross-Selbeck, CEO of Germany’s professional social network Xing, said his company was still subject to harsher rules than its U.S. counterparts.

“I appreciate the EU commitment to create a level playing field in Europe … But the regulation that Facebook’s founder Mark Zuckerberg is subject to is nothing compared to what I’m subject to.”

Chris Poole, founder of the online community 4chan that is a haven for hackers, welcomed the prospect of even tougher enforcement on companies that mishandle users’ data.

“I would love to see some regulation that would hold Sony responsible,” he said, referring to the PlayStation data breach last year. “They deserve to be punished.”

Over a century ago Thomas Edison got the patent for a device which would “do for the eye what the phonograph does for the ear”. He called it the Kinetoscope. He was not only amongst the first to record video, he was also the first person to own the copyright to a motion picture.

Because of Edison’s patents for the motion pictures it was close to financially impossible to create motion pictures in the North american east coast. The movie studios therefor relocated to California, and founded what we today call Hollywood. The reason was mostly because there was no patent.

There was also no copyright to speak of, so the studios could copy old stories and make movies out of them – like Fantasia, one of Disney’s biggest hits ever.

So, the whole basis of this industry, that today is screaming about losing control over immaterial rights, is that they circumvented immaterial rights. They copied (or put in their terminology: “stole”) other peoples creative works, without paying for it. They did it in order to make a huge profit. Today, they’re all successful and most of the studios are on the Fortune 500 list of the richest companies in the world. Congratulations – it’s all based on being able to re-use other peoples creative works. And today they hold the rights to what other people create.

If you want to get something released, you have to abide to their rules. The ones they created after circumventing other peoples rules.

The reason they are always complainting about “pirates” today is simple. We’ve done what they did. We circumvented the rules they created and created our own. We crushed their monopoly by giving people something more efficient. We allow people to have direct communication between each other, circumventing the profitable middle man, that in some cases take over 107% of the profits (yes, you pay to work for them). It’s all based on the fact that we’re competition.

We’ve proven that their existance in their current form is no longer needed. We’re just better than they are.  And the funny part is that our rules are very similar to the founding ideas of the USA. We fight for freedom of speech.

We see all people as equal. We believe that the public, not the elite, should rule the nation. We believe that laws should be created to serve the public, not the rich corporations.

The Pirate Bay is truly an international community. The team is spread all over the globe – but we’ve stayed out of the USA. We have Swedish roots and a Swedish friend said this:

The word SOPA means “trash” in Swedish. The word PIPA means “a pipe” in Swedish. This is of course not a coincidence.

They want to make the internet inte a one way pipe, with them at the top, shoving trash through the pipe down to the rest of us obedient consumers.

The public opinion on this matter is clear. Ask anyone on the street and you’ll learn that noone wants to be fed with trash. Why the US government want the american people to be fed with trash is beyond our imagination but we hope that you will stop them, before we all drown.

SOPA can’t do anything to stop TPB. Worst case we’ll change top level domain from our current .org to one of the hundreds of other names that we already also use. In countries where TPB is blocked, China and Saudi Arabia springs to mind, they block hundreds of our domain names. And did it work? Not really.

To fix the “problem of piracy” one should go to the source of the problem. The entertainment industry say they’re creating “culture” but what they really do is stuff like selling overpriced plushy dolls and making 11 year old girls become anorexic. Either from working in the factories that creates the dolls for basically no salary or by watching movies and tv shows that make them think that they’re fat.

In the great Sid Meiers computer game Civilization you can build Wonders of the world. One of the most powerful ones is Hollywood. With that you control all culture and media in the world. Rupert Murdoch was happy with MySpace and had no problems with their own piracy until it failed. Now he’s complaining that Google is the biggest source of piracy in the world – because he’s jealous. He wants to retain his mind control over people and clearly you’d get a more honest view of things on Wikipedia and Google than on Fox News.

Some facts (years, dates) are probably wrong in this article. The reason is that we can’t access this information when Wikipedia is blacked out. Because of pressure from our failing competitors. We’re sorry for that.

Visitors to Temple Bar’s newly reopened Meeting House Square will be able to connect wirelessly to the internet.

Meeting House Square reopened in December 2011 following the installation of a retractable canopy over the open space, providing an all-weather cover at outdoor events.

To celebrate the new launch Bitbuzz has installed Bitbuzz Freetime, meaning that all visitors to the Square can use the Wi-Fi service free of charge, at any time.

Des Kenny, Bitbuzz Development Manager, said: “Offering complimentary Wi-Fi in an outdoor space as unique as Meeting House Square is a new departure for Bitbuzz. Smartphones and internet tablets have greatly increased the demand for complimentary Wi-Fi in venues across the board in 2011.

“Now that most people have access to the Internet so readily on their phone we expect that levels of usage in Meeting House Square will be exceptional. We hope that Meeting House Square is the first of many such outdoor venues for Bitbuzz.”

The venue will be hosting the Dublin Chinese New Year Festival from today, 20th January until Friday 3rd February.

Dermot McLaughlin, CEO of Temple Bar Cultural Trust said: “We are in the business of bringing culture closer to people, so having complimentary Wi-Fi in a public space like Meeting House Square makes perfect sense. Our online community is growing all the time and we’re sure that complimentary Wi-Fi in the Square will be well used and appreciated.

“We are delighted to work with Bitbuzz – they understand our needs and they have worked with us to make Meeting House Square a place where creative connections can happen.”

The new levy is being considered in a bid to ensure people who view public service broadcasting online will not be able to avoid paying.

Communications Minister Pat Rabbitte, who brought the new proposal before the Dail yesterday, said today that a huge number of people now got their news, not from sitting in front of the 9pm news, but from other services offered by the national broadcaster.

He said that within minutes of speaking in the Dail yesterday he received complaints.

“People were on email in five or ten minutes to tell me what a dreadful idea it was and they had never had a TV in their lives. You can only conclude they are accessing public service content on the RTE website,” he said.

The proposed charge will be imposed on properties regardless of whether there is a TV as there is a perception that there are a growing number of people using computers and mobile devices like iPads and iPhones to watch programmes through the internet.

Mr Rabbitte said that those paying the current €160 annual television licence fee would not be affected as the new levy will simply replace it.

However, he conceded that if the new fee managed to address the €25m currently being lost in evasion, there was a chance the new charge could be lower.

He was looking at how this was being managed in four other countries currently, but it was unlikely this new fee would be introduced by next year, he said.

Asked on RTE’s Morning Ireland programme about the limits of Ireland’s broadband service, Mr Rabbitte said that it was improving al the time and he was devising a road map for the future.

Mr Rabbitte, who first mooted the idea last year, said the Programme for Government committed the Coalition to examining the possible rollout of a broadcasting charge to homes and businesses “regardless of the device used to access content”.

A spokesman for the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources said the plans were at an early stage and there were no moves to introduce it “in the immediate future”.

He said department officials had been tasked by the minister last year to conduct a review on how it could be implemented, but there was no date as to when they must report back.

The current TV licence covers public service content on television, radio and online, but a household is only required to have it if they have a TV.

“The concept of a TV licence fee is within a few years going to be an outdated concept,” the spokesman said.

He said details on exemptions for the charge have not yet been thrashed out, but he stressed it would simply be a replacement for the current licence fee and was not an extra revenue-raising exercise.

Mr Rabbitte said only those trying to dodge the licence fee would be affected. An Post said more than 80 jobs were related to servicing the TV licence contract, across sales, administration and inspection. The contract is worth €12m a year to the semi-state body.

But a spokeswoman said revenue streams were changing and that there “may well be new opportunities within a new arrangement”.

However, An Post has not been in touch with the department concerning the plans. An Post said 1,021,443 licences were sold last year.

Tell Congress not to censor the internet NOW! – fightforthefuture.org/pipa

PROTECT-IP is a bill that has been introduced in the U.S. Senate and the House and is moving quickly through Congress. It gives the government and corporations the ability to censor the net, in the name of protecting “creativity”. The law would let the government or corporations censor entire sites– they just have to convince a judge that the site is “dedicated to copyright infringement.”

The U.S. government has already wrongly shut down sites without any recourse to the site owner. Under this bill, sharing a video with anything copyrighted in it, or what sites like Youtube and Twitter do, would be considered illegal behavior according to this bill.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, this bill would cost us $47 million tax dollars a year — that’s for a fix that won’t work, disrupts the internet, stifles innovation, shuts out diverse voices, and censors the internet. This bill is bad for creativity and does not protect your rights.

In total 4,000 libraries have signed up to a national digital promise that will see free internet access in every library, staff trained to help people get online, the ability to join a library via the web, and access to a virtual library online 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. 

Libraries have helped more than a million people go online for the first time over the past year. The Society of Chief Librarians (SCL) said libraries offered many people their only point of access to the web. And it argued that libraries helping people to get online also helped them gain access to local council services, many of which are becoming digital.

SCL president Nicky Parker said: “With this digital promise we hope to expand and improve the standard of online resources in libraries both now and for the future.”

In further good news for Dublin commuters, WiFi is also due to be introduced on Luas trams this year, while Dublin Bus is planning to carry out a pilot scheme on 10 buses this year before examining the feasibility of making it available on the wider fleet.

Minister for Transport Leo Vardkar confirmed the major expansion of wireless internet on Ireland’s public transport networks in the Dáil.

Bus Éireann is planning to continue its rollout of WiFi but it is subject to funding being made available for the project. 36 Bus Éireann buses currently have WiFi fitted.

The project to install WiFi on the DART and commuter rail fleet in the Greater Dublin Area started last year. Full WiFi on those services is due to be rolled out “by this summer”, a spokesperson for Irish Rail confirmed to TheJournal.ie.

The Railway Procurement Agency is installing WiFi for passengers on Luas trams this year, Minister Varadkar said in response to a parliamentary question from Sinn Féin’s Peader Tóibín.

There are as yet no details on exact dates or information on how the service will work for passengers.

Irish Rail began rolling out WiFi for the first time on its Cork to Dublin route last July.

AccuBook has developed a new suite of products called Pocketbook, which lets accommodation providers use their phone to check details such as when customers are arriving and the price and availability of their rooms.

They can download from a website a combined booking engine, website and channel manager, all of which comes with a unique ‘mobile powered’ management system.

The system is connected via the channel manager to sites such as Booking.com and Hotels.com. For the first time this offers small to medium sized owner-managers the opportunity to compete with the larger hotels on a level playing field and while on the move, according to senior developer Joe Byrne.

“The concept for this product was created together with our distribution partners in Asia, where whole generations have leap-frogged Laptops and PCs and embraced whole-heartedly mobile phone solutions, but even in Europe we have seen users switching to mobile phones to manage their property.

“We suspect that one reason is that developing for mobile phone use forces the creation of simple, intuitive, easy to use applications. In short it’s often simpler to use a mobile phone than it is a PC or Laptop.”

The positive interest shown in the product has resulted in AccuBook looking at markets further afield, including South America, where products will be released in June.

IT’S A constant of the urban landscape: the smartphone user staring into a screen as the world passes by on the street around them. Whether it’s updating Facebook, looking for directions or checking a football score, the Irish have embraced ubiquitous internet connections.

Under a proposal being considered by Dublin City Council to provide free wireless internet coverage in public spaces, the absorbed smartphone user could become an even more common phenomenon on the capital’s streets.

Last week the mobile operator O2 announced that it will provide free internet access in public spaces in the City of Westminster and the London borough of Kensington and Chelsea in time for next summer’s Olympic Games. O2 claims the deal with the councils will create the largest free wireless area in Europe and significantly enhance the experience for the millions expected to flock to London for both the Olympics and the celebrations for Queen Elizabeth’s diamond jubilee.

The current proposal to the Dublin authorities was inspired by a trip to the Spanish city of Bilbao by the Labour councillor Oisín Quinn. Sitting in a park in the Basque city, he noticed signs for a free municipal Wi-Fi service that would allow him to get online with his smartphone without the risk of incurring a huge roaming bill from his mobile operator. Quinn was particularly taken with the ease with which he was able to get online.

“There was no registration,” says Quinn. “You just see the network and when you connect to it an advertisement is displayed.” So taken was Quinn with Bilbao’s example that he tabled a motion to Dublin City Council to create a similar scheme. The proposal, which called on the city manager to consider how to provide free wireless internet access in Dublin’s “public parks and squares”, was passed last Monday night. The city manager is due to report back by the end of the month, leading to speculation that such a scheme could be in place as early as next year.

Quinn believes that tourists would be among the main beneficiaries of free internet. “They are usually very worried about using data due to the roaming charges,” says Quinn. “But people now have so many location apps on their phones which they would use if they had free Wi-Fi.” He believes that if tourists were able to use their phones to find out what attractions are nearby, it could benefit the city’s museums, galleries and restaurants.

“It’s a positive thing for a modern city to have, and while it’s good for tourists, and could generate business, it will also be an amenity for Dubliners.”

The United Nations Human Rights Council recently published a report on whether internet access is a human right. While it failed to draw firm conclusions on the core issue it concluded that blocking access to the internet impinges freedom of expression, something demonstrated during last year’s Arab Spring uprising, when access was cut off to prevent demonstrations being organised.

But is internet access a utility our local government should be providing to us for free? We’ll soon be paying for the water that comes out of the taps in our homes, so why should a public body provide something for free that is already widely available commercially? In 2006 Dublin City Council spent 12 months working on a much more ambitious proposal for the provision of a citywide Wi-Fi service. With internet access far less widely available just a few years ago, the provision of free coverage at a cost of between €12 million and €20 million, was seen as a way of bridging the “digital divide” and bringing the benefits of the internet to socially deprived areas of the city.

The suburbs of Ballymun and Ballyfermot were identified as the initial locations, and the council was close to appointing a commercial partner for the scheme when it was abruptly pulled. An EU ruling in May 2007, which became known as the Prague judgment, found that similar proposals in the Czech capital distorted competition and amounted to unfair state aid. The council scaled back and instead promised to make wireless internet access available in its own properties that are open to the public, such as libraries and City Hall.

But much has changed since 2007. For a start, the latest proposal for Dublin is significantly less ambitious and would cover large public spaces rather than the entire city. Other cities in Europe have also managed to escape EU censure under the Prague judgment by reigning in their ambitions for their schemes.

Possibly the biggest change since the previous proposal for Dublin was the introduction of the Apple iPhone.

“Three or four years ago there was no market for this, as there were not enough smartphones around,” says Shane Deasy, managing director of Bitbuzz, which provides commercial Wi-Fi services in hotels, bars and other venues in the UK and Ireland. “People just didn’t want to [go online] in public on their laptop.” Bitbuzz already has experience in providing free public internet access. As part of the refurbishment of Meeting House Square, in Temple Bar in Dublin, which was completed in December, it now provides free Wi-Fi in the space, which is used for cultural events.

Dermot McLaughlin, chief executive of Temple Bar Cultural Trust, which runs the square, says it makes sense for a “contemporary social space which is privately owned but publicly used” to provide the service.

He says there are social, cultural and business benefits from it, not least the power of recommendations provided through services such as Foursquare and Twitter, which visitors can now use more easily thanks to the availability of Wi-Fi. “People should have a reasonable expectation that free Wi-Fi will be available, particularly in a capital city that wants to be at the cutting edge of the knowledge economy,” says McLaughlin.

Based on the success of the Temple Bar scheme, which McLaughlin says will be expanded to other spaces in the quarter, Bitbuzz has talked to the Office of Public Works and city traders about providing the free service in St Stephen’s Green and on Grafton Street. “If Dublin City Council wants to do something we would be happy to tie in with that,” says Deasey.

This raises the question of whether the city council should be spending money providing a service that the private sector seems to be on the verge of supplying. McLaughlin says that the Cultural Trust has a “very attractive arrangement” with Bitbuzz but points out that his is a private limited company that doesn’t draw down public funds.

Eircom also has a significant number of hot spots in the city that its broadband and mobile customers can access without charge; noncustomers pay €1 a day. Those willing to share their email address with the company can also get 10 minutes’ free access.

The London scheme “will run at no cost to the councils or the taxpayer”, according to O2, whose involvement is not entirely without self-interest. Like those of other operators, O2’s mobile network in the centre of London is getting seriously congested, with the result that customers get slow or nonexistent data connections. “We’ve been quite open about the importance of layering technologies” – or offering Wi-Fi and other alternatives to 3G – “because there are challenges for 3G in densely populated areas,” says Emma Hart, a spokeswoman for O2 in the UK.

In the smaller Irish market, congestion is not an issue yet, but this may change soon, according to Elaine Robinson of Eircom. “We are seeing data usage doubling year on year, so for us Wi-Fi is part of our core strategy of giving customers as good a data connection as possible. By the end of 2013 Eircom plans to have 4,000 hot spots around the country compared to its current 730.”

The simplest solution for citywide coverage may be to encourage businesses and residents to share their Wi-Fi connections. Fon, a Spanish company, has been championing people to do this on a quid-pro-quo basis since 2006. Sign up to Fon to share your Wi-Fi connection – something it provides you with the equipment to do securely – and you can avail of free Wi-Fi from other Fon users around the world.

Fon will soon have five million hot spots in its global network, although coverage in Ireland is spotty at best. Although Fon’s venture was initially a community-driven initiative, the company’s main business is now partnering with mobile operators, according to its vice-president of business development, Alex Puregger.

While welcoming any scheme that encourages Wi-Fi usage, he cautions the Dublin authorities against doing anything that interferes with the existing telecoms business models. “If you give it away for free you are disrupting the business of someone who is investing in these services,” says Puregger.

Quinn’s proposal draws heavily from Dublinbikes, the bicycle-sharing scheme in the capital, which has been one of the most successful public-private partnerships of recent years. More than 30,000 people have subscribed for that scheme, which has generated more than a million bicycle journeys since it was launched, in 2009. The advertising firm JC Decaux pays for the operation of the scheme in exchange for free advertising in public areas.

“The plan would be to start in the centre of the city and work our way out from there,” says Quinn. “Similarly, it was thought the Dublinbikes scheme would primarily interest tourists, but it has been embraced by Dubs as well.” While the free advertising space provided to JC Decaux has proven a successful, if sometimes controversial, source of funding for the provision of bicycles, there is no guarantee that enough revenue would be generated from online advertising to cover the cost of a scheme.

The internet giant Google partnered with the city of San Francisco on a so-called “municipal Wi-Fi” scheme that ultimately failed to take off, largely because of political infighting between the city mayor and councillors. “If anyone understands internet advertising it’s Google, and it hasn’t been able to do it in San Francisco,” says Puregger.

Some councillors in Dublin expressed concern that Quinn’s proposal is not costed. Carlow attracted headlines in 2007 when it announced it was providing Wi-Fi all over the town, though users would have to pay for the service. It is understood the capital investment was less than €300,000, and while it was a technical success it proved a commercial failure. Potential subscribers simply didn’t see the value in paying for another service when they had data plans on their mobiles or broadband in their offices.

Quinn is acutely aware that Dublin city’s finances are under pressure and admits the scheme is unlikely to proceed without a commercial partner. Ultimately, potential commercial partners may deliver his vision without the support of the local authority.

More than 700 work crews will be out over the weekend to restore services.

The highest number of faults were reported in the north and western coastal counties of Donegal, Sligo, Mayo and Galway as well as along the eastern coast in Co Louth, and northeast in counties Cavan and Monaghan.

Customers reporting faults to the Eircom customer service line last night were informed that repair times could exceed four days.

However, Eircom last night said the crews are working “hard to repair all faults as quickly as possible”.

Service, meanwhile, was restored to about 250 ESB customers by noon yesterday after winds of between 70kmh and 120kmh lashed parts of the country overnight on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, 22 ESB crews boarded ferries bound for Scotland yesterday to help restore power to more than 200,000 homes, which have been battered by the same weather system that swept through here over the past few days.

The increase can be attributed to Bitbuzz’s increased presence in the hotel industry with the operator providing services in 100 hotels across the UK and Ireland.

The increased number of hotspots and in hotel usage has resulted in a significant growth in the total number of logins per month for Bitbuzz, which is now just over 250,000. This is a 40% increase in monthly logins compared with the 99,657 logins per month recorded at the end of 2010. Logins per day hit 10,000 in 2011.

Bitbuzz has also recently completed the rollout of Wi-Fi to all of the Costa Coffee stores in Ireland and Northern Ireland. 

Since Bitbuzz’s first Costa site went live in Belfast City Airport, over 90,000 people have connected in Costa stores throughout Ireland with Bitbuzz throughout Ireland and regulars have come to expect Bitbuzz Wi-Fi access within all Costa stores. Now 15 more stores are finishing upgrade to Bitbuzz Wi-Fi completing the Irish estate of 56 Costa stores.

Costa customers throughout Ireland can now enjoy 20 minutes of complimentary Wi-Fi with their purchase, while store employees can utilise easy and reliable connectivity for their tills and stock ordering systems. 

“It is encouraging to know that, despite a very challenging economic environment, we still increased our number of hotspots. This continued growth reflects the increased popularity of smartphones; logins by smartphone users now stands at just under 40% of our total Wi-Fi usage in Ireland and the UK.”

“In terms of 2012, our aim is to continue to develop our presence throughout Ireland and the UK, through the provision of a technically superior, accessible and good value Wi-Fi service,” said Shane Deasy, Managing Director, Bitbuzz.

Connect with caution

A new batch of spam emails are circulating in which the contents have been translated into Irish, confirming the recipient was to receive €450,000 in a Spanish lottery win.

“To make it all seem more credible, they went to the effort of translating it ‘as Gaeilge’ as well. If all .ie domain mails ere targeted then as many as 10 million spam emails could have been pumped out.

“Translating it ‘as Gaelige’ is sure to strike a certain chord of credibility to many Irish users and playing along in this case means sending your private info to the crooks,” said Urban Schrott from ESET, an antrivirus company in Wexford.

Research from the National Consumer Agency found that one in 10 people hand money or personal details over to scam artists.

But to understand how to be prepared, we need to look back at cybercrime in 2011. 

More “Catchy” Viruses

Viruses and malware were the most common types of cybercrime last year.  Viruses are usually transmitted through unsuspecting users who visit or download from corrupt sites and who open emails containing malicious software — or “malware.”   In 2011, 54 percent of online adults experienced a virus or malware attack.

 Many of the most potent viruses this year were transmitted via links to corrupted sites or email attachments, often hitting as a disguised news story.

• We’re used to getting emails about packages being delivered. This year, hackers exploited that comfort and sent out emails impersonating DHL that launched a virus into the user’s computer.
• A popular “news” scam was a report about Fidel Castro’s death that launched a virus.
• A faked video of the death of Osama bin Laden was another virus circulated this year.
• Lady Gaga’s Twitter account was hacked and attackers sent out a link to a site where users could get a free iPad 2. Users were directed to a corrupted website.

1 A big 12 months for the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland 

Helen Shaw, founder of media production and consultancy company Athena Media

“2012 will see the BAI play a far bigger role in media life and landscape but we should expect to see signals towards a new broadcasting Bill and a potential merger of the BAI and ComReg – the telecommunications and spectrum regulator in the coming years.

“The internet remains outside the scope of the content regulation and all future legislative developments are going to have to address that gap. The RTÉ/Fr Reynolds report will also define the conversation around RTÉ, whatever its determinations.”

2 Mobile commerce will triumph in 2012 

Colm Grealy, chief executive of media app-maker Digital Reach Group

“Next year will see the emergence of mobile commerce, as sub-€50 smartphones will become the norm in the prepaid market. Finger-friendly shopping on mobile stores will replace much of our online shopping activity. Budget-conscious retailers will build stores in the web browser that work across all types of smartphones. NFC (near field communications) will accompany short codes and QR codes as marketers engage in creative ways to connect with customers, and rich media advertising formats delivered to smartphones and tablets will become a key part of most cross-platform advertising campaigns.”

3 A year of ‘doing more with less’ for regional newspapers 

Deirdre O’Shaughnessy, editor of the Cork Independent

“I anticipate the regional market tightening further with a struggle to retain online presences, the abandonment of nascent hyperlocal operations and the exit of some big names from the scene, throughout the country.

“Hyperlocal has been a buzz word for a couple of years but it’s fast becoming clear that the market here is too small to bear it and I don’t see the few recent hyperlocal sites making any real headway. Most of them are run out of bigger operations and will be reintegrated as overworked staff do more with less.”

4 The continued rise of ‘social television’ 

Piaras Kelly, account director at public relations company Edelman and media blogger

“Social TV is an interesting trend to watch in 2012, with Apple rumoured to be developing an interactive TV. This builds upon other developments – such as those at Microsoft.

“The immediate opportunity is the incorporation of social media to increase viewer engagement. The likes of the WWE have begun to try to push hashtags as part of their regular TV show in order to get topics to trend and pull in viewers.

“New services like Zeebox have also sprung up, allowing users to interact with complementary content for whatever show they are watching at the time.”

5 A whirlwind year for digital marketing 

Suzanne McElligott, chief executive of digital advertising trade group IAB Ireland

“There’s been a lot of talk about the pace of acceleration online, particularly in relation to media and I don’t see that abating. With that great excitement and progress comes major challenges. For brands, for advertisers and for people working in the industry, they might wish that the pace wasn’t quite so accelerated.

“There will be a move away from aggregate market and a switch from ‘we’ to ‘me’ marketing. Traditional mass marketing was about standing out from the crowd and shouting out repeated messages.

“We’re looking now at far more individualised messages.”

6 Tough times for print media, but the iPad will be its saviour 

Jack Murray, managing director of digital media agency MediaContact.ie

“By the end of the second quarter, we will see some contraction in print media – maybe not a national newspaper, but at local level.

“On the positive side, I think the iPad is the device that will be the saviour of newspapers, and 2012 will see the conversion of people from smartphones to tablets continue at pace.

“I work in an office of 22- and 23-year-olds and the first thing they do in the morning is look at online media.

“You can decry the fact that young people don’t listen to Morning Ireland or buy a printed newspaper – or you can try and make a product for them.”

7 Big demand for marketers with skills in data analytics 

Sandra Lawler, managing director of marketing recruitment specialist Alternatives

“Companies will be open to take on new people, but they will do it differently than before. They are looking for people who are very commercial and very focused.

“Digital has changed the landscape completely. Brands almost no longer own their brands, their consumers do.

“Marketing is more scientific now as well as creative: data analytics and customer modelling is something that companies are still struggling in and they are looking to bring in people who can do it.

“They want marketers not just with good research skills but with good insight-generation skills.”

8 Advertisers will continue to shift business to the UK 

Pat Stephenson, managing partner of Boys and Girls advertising agency

“My hope is that Robbie Keane will score the winner in Euro 2012, driving the country to a euphoria never before seen and bringing back a massive sense of confidence. But aside from that I think it’s going to be a relatively tough year.

“One of the worrying aspects I think will continue over into 2012 is advertisers moving their business from Dublin to London – big advertisers like Vodafone and O2 are now operating their campaigns out of their UK agencies, and other companies have moved a large proportion of their business. Hopefully, that’s just a cyclical thing.”

This controversial issue has a background story starting in 2009. Back then, the Irish Recorded Music Association had made an agreement with one of the largest Internet service providers of Ireland in order to stop those unauthorized file sharing processes. On this agreement, it was stated that, this Internet service provider would be supervised by some outfit members like Sony, EMI, Universal and Warner. Moreover, these outfit members had to create the “Graduate Response System”, so that they can stop those unauthorized file sharing systems readily available online.

However, Eircom had promised a year ago that, the company will be starting their implementation process of the ‘’three-strikes’’ protocol service that will work to enforce suspension and disconnection procedure of Internet service for those Internet users who intentionally and persistently disobey the terms and regulation of the country’s copyright legislation.

Nevertheless, this Internet service provider had made some mistakes by sending 300 notification letters to some people whose were not guilty at all. Therefore, the country’s Data Protection Commissioner took this issue quite seriously and asked for initiating an investigation of such failures by Eircom. He has also asked to investigate whether this “three-strikes” rule was actually lawful and legal. However, it has been found out that, the company has decided to stop this system from proceeding.

The experts in the industry have stated their views on this controversial issue and expressed that, both the Data Protection Commissioner and the court have definitely started to get an idea about the basic users right on Internet and web based data access without being tracking down by the authorities at every step. Though, this decision can create some negative impacts on the entertainment industry due to the legal issues of using their service. However, there is another recently published report stating that, website blocking can be an effective and alternative solution to that problem. Sean Sherlock, who is the minister of State for Enterprise will be publishing an order about allowing the copyright owners blocking out the access of the Internet users who will violate the terms and regulation of legislation. This news has been stated by the local media and they have also said that, this order will be implemented from early of the next year with the help of Internet service providers. Though, it is still not clear on which basis the websites are going to be enlisted as rule breakers.

The decision is made by the minister of State of Enterprise due to the incoming threats to sue Ireland by EMI if the government fails to make some decision against digital piracy issues. In response, the Department of Enterprise has stated to EMI that, the government will implement the law from January 2012, as a published and applied law against digital piracy.

GPs are to have until 2015 to give all patients full online access to view and edit their records, download their entire medical history and see details of prescriptions and appointments.

But MPs, patient groups and doctors have lined up to warn that the scheme could put records at risk. Senior Tory David Davis said of the decision: ‘How many WikiLeaks lessons does this government need?’

Critics say an online system would be vulnerable to hackers, and sensitive medical information – such as life-threatening illnesses, mental health problems and sexual health issues – could be made public by accident.

The Conservatives pledged before the election to give patients the right to check and edit their NHS records online, and Chancellor George Osborne unveiled the 2015 deadline last month in his autumn statement. Patients will not be able to overwrite notes made by a doctor but will be able to point out mistakes or ask for a second opinion from their GP. The doctor could then change the records accordingly.

Yesterday the NHS Future Forum,  a group of senior doctors who influence government health policy, backed  the scheme.

The Department of Health estimates there will be significant financial benefits, because patients will make fewer visits to their GPs for consultations and for repeat prescriptions that can be obtained over the web.

But last night former Tory home affairs spokesman and leadership contender Mr Davis said the risks of the scheme outweighed the benefits.

He said previous IT failings, such as the  loss by HMRC of the tax details of 20million people on an unencrypted disk and the secret U.S. cables obtained by WikiLeaks, had highlighted the danger of relying on computer systems. ‘This medical records policy is dependent on the security that surrounds it, but it is probably unwise,’ he said.

There could be some benefits but the risk is much greater than the benefits.

‘This information could become available by accident or by the action of malicious hackers. How many WikiLeaks lessons does this government need?

‘If you put these things online, at some point or another people will get access to them. And with medical records, that is very serious – just as serious as the loss of 20million tax records.’

Joyce Robins, of pressure group Patient Concern, said: ‘If this is to be introduced, we would want to see proper consent to ensure that patients were put on the system only if they want to be there. But the talk today is wider and broader.

‘The security is going to have to be very tight and anything that goes online has to have question marks over it.’

Katherine Murphy, chief executive of the Patients Association, said: ‘Patient confidentiality is paramount. Health records are among the most personal and sensitive information kept about patients and they must be protected. There must be a guarantee that all patient data will be protected and that it will not be possible to trace back information to an individual.’

She added: ‘We would not want online records to create a two-tier system whereby those who are less likely to use the internet system face the brunt of the costs.’

At present patients have a right to see their medical records, enshrined in the NHS Constitution.

However, to do so they must make an application to their GP and usually attend a meeting where a case for access has to be made.

The doctor can then decide whether limited access is appropriate. This process is repeated each time that access is sought. In addition, many health centres demand a charge for access to medical records.

Under the new system, patients would be able to access their records, even out of hours. They will be able to view the results of medical tests and discharge notes sent from hospital and obtain repeat prescriptions. Online access to health records could also be used by patients who are overseas on holiday or business, providing foreign doctors with potentially life-saving information.

Before the election, the Tories pledged to hand medical records over to Google and Microsoft to enable patients to access them online. Now they have dropped this idea, instead encouraging GPs to host the online records.

Yesterday a spokesman for the British Medical Association said: ‘While we support the principle of patients having more access to their medical records, we would have to be completely reassured that security was watertight.

‘Patient confidentiality is our number one priority and this should not be compromised. We are also concerned that some groups who do not  have access to the internet, the elderly perhaps, may be at a disadvantage and this  will need to be addressed.’ Giving patients access to their own medical records would potentially give them more trust in their doctors, the chairman of the NHS Future Forum said.

Professor Steve Field told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘There are about 70 or so practices across the country that give free access to the patients whenever they want them.

‘The idea is that the patients feels more in control of their health and knows what people are writing about them.’

Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said: ‘We believe that patients having a direct say in decisions about their care, the principle of “No decision about me without me”, is a very important one in the NHS.

‘But if you’re actually going to share in decisions about your care, you should have full access to your medical record.’

The proposals will form part of a major report from the Forum due out next month. They do not apply to Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland.

Over the past week we’ve had fun looking up what governments, Fortune 500 companies, and even the most dedicated anti-piracy groups download on BitTorrent. All we had to do is put their IP-addresses into the search form on YouHaveDownloaded and hit after hit appeared.

To our surprise, we found out that even IP-addresses registered to the RIAA were showing unauthorized downloads of movies, TV-shows and software.

This curiosity was quickly picked up by other news outlets to whom the RIAA gave a rather interesting explanation. Apparently these file-sharing transactions weren’t carried out by RIAA staffers, but by a third party who’s using the RIAA IP-addresses to share and distribute files online.

“Those partial IP addresses are similar to block addresses assigned to RIAA. However, those addresses are used by a third party vendor to serve up our public Web site,” a spokespersontold CNET, adding, “As I said earlier, they are not used by RIAA staff to access the Internet.”

This is all a bit confusing. First of all, the addresses are not similar, they are simply assigned to the RIAA. Everyone can look that up here, or here.

Secondly, while we are prepared to believe that RIAA staff didn’t download these files, we are left wondering what mysterious third party did. Also, is it even allowed by the official registry to register a range of IP-addresses to your private organization, and then allow others to use these IPs?

Also, just as a bit of friendly advice, it’s generally not a good idea to let others use your organization’s addresses to browse the internet. This time it’s “just” copyrighted material up for debate, but who knows what else they may be sharing online.

Considering the RIAA’s past of suing tens of thousands of file-sharers for copyright infringement, the excuse is perhaps even more embarrassing than taking full responsibility. When some of the 20,000 plus people who were sued by the RIAA over the years used the “someone else did it” excuse this was shrugged off by the music group’s lawyers. Can these people have their money back now? We doubt it.

Whois pirating?

Elsewhere, Henrik Chulu from the Free Culture blog discovered that someone at the infamous Johan Schlüter law firm downloaded the Danish movie ‘Dirch’. But Maria Fredenslund from anti-piracy group RettighedsAliancen had their excuse ready.

“We’re working for right holders, who obviously have given us permission to collect their material online as part of an investigative work,” she told Comon.dk in response.

Notably, Sarkozy is staying quiet and not attempting to justify any infringements carried out in his name. Perhaps a case of least said, soonest mended…

The changes are intended to curb the illegal downloading of music and movies, which is apparently easier to do in Ireland then it is in other countries.

Authorities are looking to plug a loophole in the Republic’s law that allows Irish Internet users to access sites that ‘pirate’ illegal material.

The Minister of State for Enterprise, Sean Sherlock, is to publish an order early in the new year that is expected to allow music publishers, film producers and other parties to go to court to prevent Internet service providers from allowing their customers access to ‘pirate’ websites, reports the Irish Times.

Record label EMI Ireland recently wrote to the Irish Government warning that it would take legal action against the State if the Government did not address the loophole.

The changing of the law could not come at a better time for the music industry (apart from the fact that it’s not being changed before Christmas) as downloading, both legal and illegal content, has cut into CD sales hugely.

The Irish Times reports that CD sales in the Republic fell from €146 million in 2006 to just €56 million last year.

SOPA would also punish firms, including search engines, that link to foreign websites dedicated to online piracy. As written, the bill would effectively break the Internet.  Although the bill expands the ability of U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods, SOPA has caused controversy in its possible unintended consequences regarding content sharing and self-policing. 

One of the unintended consequences is new law pertaining to VPNs, or virtual private networks, which should be of interest to industry leaders across industries like energy, construction, supply chain and hospitality. Many top companies use VPNs, and this law could change how a company, or a vpn provider, would have to do business. The bill is essentially whacking away at the DNS system and that’s a mistake.

It’s a bad way to go about solving the problem.

Under SOPA, it wouldn’t be just websites who would be held accountable for copyright infringement, but developers, distributors, and “enablers” as well. So, a website that hosts copyrighted content is not only in jeopardy, but also those who share copyrighted content without permission and those who try to help those who share or host copyrighted content without permission. This extension of violators means that a VPN could be considered an enabler of copyright infringement. 

The broadband service in Ireland has been criticised as many households were found to run on low-speed broadband connections. This was reported in early November with the release of results from a survey conducted on mobile phone and broadband users in Northern Ireland by the University of Usher. Different areas in Ireland had varied speeds from one town to the other, though, with users in Belfast had higher-speed connections compared to those in Fermanagh or Down counties.

Google has also encouraged Ireland to get more businesses online while calling for improvements to be made in broadband for the region. Google’s head honcho, Eric Schmidt, stated: “Which is not to say that you can’t catch up quickly, but you need to do it. It’s not a tragedy but it’s an issue. The thing the Government can actually do that’s hard is [to] work with the telecommunications providers to get more broadband. It’s very difficult for small businesses to do.”

He added: “There are very few things that are better use of your money than long-term infrastructure in information technology that serves the interests of the citizens of the country.”

Now the European Commission has probably taken notice of the state of Ireland’s broadband as it is looking for 1,500 Irish participants to take part in a survey that will provide broadband performance benchmarks. The information gathered will be used to help in the allocation of the the commission’s €9 billion broadband investment.

The commission’s digital agenda commissioner Neelie Kroes has backed the study. She said: “Everyone in the EU should be able to enjoy the benefits of an open and lawful internet, without hidden restrictions or slower speeds than they have been promised. We need to collect first-hand information from European consumers on the actual quality of their broadband access. With that data, we can easily see which countries have been most successful and which countries are falling behind, enabling us to direct support and investment most appropriately.”

ComReg, Ireland’s telecoms regulator, will be working with the stakeholders to put into place a consumer information initiative on broadband speeds. ComReg spokesman Tom Butler explained: “ComReg believes that the availability of transparent and consumer friendly information about actual speeds experienced by consumers when using broadband is an important issue and would help to inform consumer choice.”

BBC Radio 4 has broadcast a documentary claiming that computer hackers were used by the British press to spy on politicians and the military.

According to the programme, the illicit mining of confidential information was said to be rife at one detective agency, which allegedly bragged of their ability to gain access to private medical records, tax records, pension information and so forth.

“They boasted ‘we could get the Queen’s medical records if we needed it’”.

Undercover investigations

In “The Report”, BBC reporter Jane Dodge spoke to a man who had unusual visibility on the inner workings of a private investigations agency used by national newspapers.

For 10 years, former police officer Joe Poulton (not his real name) went undercover as a ‘chis’ (covert human intelligence source) at a firm called Southern Investigations. His job was to gather information for the police about the firm, and its owner Jonathan Rees.

Poulton wasn’t there to gather evidence about computer hacking – but instead gathering intelligence regarding a possible connection between Rees and the murder of Daniel Morganin 1987. Rees was charged with the murder but the case against him collapsed in March 2011.

What’s of interest to us, of course, are the unrelated claims of computer hacking. Because Joe Poulton told the BBC about the lengths the detective agency were prepared to go to get a story.

Rather than doing background checks for newspapers investigating stories, the firm is said to have discovered that there were rich pickings to be made from taking a story to a newspaper instead.

In Poulton’s opinion, such a relationship works well for newspapers as it allows them to distance themselves themselves from the (possibly illegal) way in which information has been gathered.

Spyware Trojan horses

Poulton told the BBC documentary that Southern Investigations commissioned computer hackers in their thirst for information they might be able to sell to newspapers. Some of the hackers were said to have learnt the tricks of the trade while working for army intelligence.

A typical attack would involve a Trojan horse (dubbed an “eblaster trojan attack”) that could capture keystrokes and allow a remote hacker to see what was happening on a compromised computer. In this way, all emails and attached documents could be easily read.

The Northern Ireland connection

The documentary spoke to some possible victims of just such a Trojan attack: Ian Hurst, a former British army intelligence officer who handled IRA informers in Northern Ireland, and Jane Winter of British-Irish Rights Watch.

Hurst believes that Jonathan Rees hired a hacker to spy on his computer in 2006. According to the former army officer, journalists wanted to discover the new address of a man using the codename “Stakeknife”, an IRA informant who had fled after his name was made public.

Meanwhile, Jane Winter believes that sensitive information accessed on her hacked computer could have potentially put people’s lives at risk.

These alleged hacks took place in 2006 – a tense political time for Northern Ireland.

Recently it has emerged that email accounts belonging to the then government minister for Northern Ireland may also have been hacked.

Peter Hain, who served as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland between 2005-2007, has been told by Scotland Yard’s “Operation Tuleta” team that computers belonging to him, containing sensitive intelligence material, may have been compromised.

Although all of the victims uncovered by the BBC investigation have a Northern Ireland 

connection, it is easy to imagine that the scale of the problem was actually much wider.

Hacking computers – but for who?

The obvious question has to be, if the claims that Southern Investigations hired hackers are true, who was the information being gathered for?

On the BBC documentary, Joe Poulton names former News of the World executive Alex Marunchak as one of the firm’s regular customers.

Marunchak has denied any wrongdoing, saying he had never instructed any third party to gather private information through illegal means.

In addition, Jonathan Rees, the owner of Southern Investigations owner, denies ever selling or providing information obtained through illegal methods.

Ironically, Joe Poulton also believes his own computer was hacked and his communications spied upon – an incident that resulted in him blowing his cover in 2006, and forced him to abandon his role gathering information for the police.

Poulton claims that hackers would have been able to remove intelligence documents from his computer – including debriefs with his handlers.

Did the police know about all this hacking?

According to the BBC, the police have known about the problem of rogue private investigations firms hacking into computers for some time. A confidential report, seen by the BBC, was sent to the Home Office by the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) in 2008, detailing the criminal activities of such firms and the need for proper regulation of the industry.

The report describes the “eblaster Trojan attack” and even gives a price list for hacking different types of device:

Hacking phones/voicemail £7000 per month
Hacking computers £7000 per month

Of course, if the authorities have known about these activities for some years – why has it taken so long for a proper investigation of the hacking allegations to begin?

Operation Tuleta has an important job to do – not only in uncovering the truth about computer hacking, but also improving the reputation of a Metropolitan Police shaken by the repercussions of the phone hacking scandal.

At Dee.ie, we have the Dee.ie PC Standard that we adhere to, this is our own design that leaves all PC’s & laptops fully diagnosed, health checked
and to a modern standard including OS updates, automatic antivirus & malware update and detection.  It doesn’t expire and our standard is in a state of constant development and is tested to ensure minimal system resources are being used.

Telecommunications/Communications has snuck in there with IT to form the ICT, however, in Ireland Telecommunication has had its share of bad press when it comes to licensing.

Perhaps IT has performed so well because of the very few barriers to entering the industry, unlike other professions such as Finance, the Legal professions or Health sector. 

The banking sector has had plenty of compliance related issues and now the industry seems over-regulated, where as in the IT sector all you need is a PC, an imagination and plenty of coffee to write an application that could be the next FaceBook.

Off all the areas that funding should not be cut, indeed increased, the IT sector is the place to invest. The government seems to be making the right noises but when cuts start it’s hard to stay focused. It’s like weeding an over-grown garden, the good tends to be thrown out with the bad.

Budget

The Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Richard Bruton TD, announced this week that his Department’s budget will be “broadly maintained” in 2012. Current spending by his department, according to Mr Bruton, is at 366 million euro which he says is “slightly lower” than in 2011.

Over the next two years, Mr Bruton says the the government will commit approximately 1 billion euro in enterprise capital supports.
“This government is determined that, alongside the very painful budgetary decisions we have to make, we must implement our plan for economic recovery and job creation.

“This government, in the context of declining resources, has to make choices. We have made a clear choice to prioritise jobs and enterprise,” said Mr Bruton this week. 

Streamlining of resources has already started in the IT sector. In late November, before the budgetary, it was announced that the Digital Hub Development Agency was to be merged with either Enterprise Ireland or the IDA in 2012. The merger was announced as part of the government’s plans for public sector reform and rationalisation of state agencies.

 The Digital Hub cluster today comprises of 80 companies, employing 700 people in a growth sector – internet / digital media – which is critical to government plans for economic growth.

Echoing remarks made on Thursday by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Internet restrictions in Russia, Syria and China, Kroes said the Arab Spring had been a wake-up call about the relationship between technology and human rights.

The use of social networking websites during this year’s uprisings in the Arab world helped bring down authoritarian governments in Egypt andTunisia and prompted counter attacks by governments against the Internet.

In Russia, prominent anti-corruption blogger Alexei Navalny was jailed this week for 15 days after taking part in anti-government protests over ballot-stuffing and other irregularities in Sunday’s parliamentary elections.

Kroes, responsible for the EU’s digital policy, told a Dutch conference on Internet freedom she had been inspired by meetings with activists fighting for democracy in their countries.

“I am committed to doing whatever I can to support their cause,” Kroes said. “On Monday we will be announcing further details about how we can take this forward.”

Kroes and others voiced concerns the internet and telecommunications technology is used to support human rights, both on and offline, and that it not be used against them.

Kroes is expected to present a “No-Disconnect” strategy on Monday in Brussels, which will outline what is needed to help cyber activists bypass restrictions on their freedom to communicate, including the tools and technology needed to shield them from indiscriminate surveillance, according to Kroes’ spokesman Ryan Heath.

“I want the EU to help develop and distribute these tools,” Kroes told the conference on Friday.

Dutch Foreign Minister Uri Rosenthal, whose government helped sponsor the internet freedom conference, said his government has set up a fund to help provide backup “mesh network” support for online activists when their telecommunications and internet networks go down.

Kroes also urged technology companies to be transparent about equipment they were selling to governments who might use it to repress their citizens.

“If technology is used by certain repressive governments to identify innocent citizens and put their life or freedom in danger, we ought to know,” she said.

“I think it is high time for the industry to decide where they stand, and what they are going to do. If not as a moral issue, then as an issue of corporate reputation. Being known for selling despots the tools of their repression is, to say the least, bad PR.”

Fourteen governments agreed in the Hague to form a global internet freedom coalition to share information online and offline on freedom of expression and support in the exercise of human rights and the internet.

They agreed to work together politically and through project aid to support individuals particularly operating in oppressive environments and to encourage businesses to adopt policies and practices which respect human rights on the internet.

Rosenthal also said the coalition, which includes Austria, Canada, the Czech Republic, France, Estonia, Ghana, the Republic of Ireland, Mexico, Mongolia, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Sweden, will take action including “providing training for internet dissidents and coaching bloggers and civil society on advocacy for internet freedom.”

South Korea’s cyberterrorism police last Friday arrested the aide to a top ruling party politician after finding evidence that he orchestrated an election-day cyber attack on the National Election Commission’s website, thereby flummoxing young voters trying to find their polling places.

News reports have identified the aide as a 27-year-old named Gong who worked as secretary for Rep. Choi Gu-sik of the governing Grand National Party (GNP).

South Korean police are investigating whether Gong (who is identified only by surname) and three accomplices acted independently to take down the website via a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack.

Police are also pursuing the possibility that Gong and his three accomplices – workers at an IT firm – were following orders issued by politicians or “other influential figures,” according to The Korea Times.

Investigators suspect that the DDoS was an effort to suppress voter turnout on the part of the young voters who favor opposition parties. The timing of the cyber attack supports the theory, given that young workers typically vote in the morning before going to work, according to The Korea Times’ Lee Hyo-sik.

The massive cyberattack kicked the knees out from under the National Election Commission’s site, creating “mass confusion” for voters trying to find their way to the polls, according to Lee Hyo-sik.

The scandal is only the latest blow to the ruling GNP and its chances of re-election. The three officials who resigned were on the party’s Supreme Council—the Parliament members who lead the party.

GNP chairman Hong Joon-pyo said at a news conference on Wednesday that he would resist pressure to resign, according to the WSJ.

Instead, he said, he’s pondering a move to dissolve the party and rechristen it with a new name, in hopes of smoothing the troubled waters before parliamentary elections in April.

Here’s more context from the WSJ article:

The conservative party, which controls a sizable majority in the 299-seat National Assembly and includes President Lee Myung-bak, has lost popularity in every election since it took power in 2008, a pattern that is typical in Korean politics.

But over the past year, discontent with the party and Mr. Lee has grown, because they are considered to have been slow to address the nation's uneven recovery from the 2008 global economic crisis. The government handled the crisis mainly by creating favorable conditions for the nation's exporters, while smaller businesses struggled as domestic consumption slumped.

 Use of DDoS attacks to influence elections or suppress political opinions appears to be becoming commonplace.

Just two days ago, Sophos’s Graham Cluley reported on a similar cyber attack on Russian sites that claimed that the vote was being fixed.

As Cluley noted, compromised computers around the world can be put into the service of deluging a website with pings, “effectively clogging it up and bringing the site to its knees.” These DDoSes exploit poorly-defended home PCs, turning them into zombie bots that can then be used to flood a target with requests.

Tracing the trail of a DDoS to find the responsible party or parties is no simple feat.

Will the South Korean attack prove to be the flailings of a foundering political party, orchestrated by its top brass? Or will it prove to be the work of a few lone actors, similar to the 16-year-old who allegedly tried to DDoS the UK’s royal wedding site?

In this case, the attack certainly smells of officialdom.

But regardless of who’s behind the attack, these type of exploits are here to stay, part of our modern election zeitgeist. As long as PCs sit undefended, there will be plenty of zombies to launch at any target that a lone perpetrator or a corrupt government chooses.

The survey found that businesses are spending, on average, only 10pc of their information technology budgets on backup and recovery increasing the risk of security breaches and data loss.

Jason Ward, EMC Ireland’s country manager has warned businesses they are wasting time and money by not backing their data up electronically.

He said: “Business preparedness for routine IT disruption or more significant incidences of advanced cyber crime starts with a next-generation backup approach, not a reliance on traditional back-up tapes which employees in some Irish public and private-sector organisations still take home at night.

“Businesses and public-sector organisations can dramatically cut costs and become leaner by getting rid of tape which is cumbersome and vulnerable to security breaches.

“By moving to a disk-based solution, staff in an office can be released for other duties and third-party tape management costs eliminated.”

The International Data Corporation (IDC) recently said that businesses will have to deal with around 40 times more information each year over the next decade.

“The explosion in the volume of this information – known in the IT world as big data – has consequences for how it is to be captured, stored, managed and analysed,” Ward said.

Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny unveiled the project — which Ireland hopes will help in its ambition in becoming a global hub for cloud computing — on Thursday at Dublin Castle.

“This will give great connectivity around the whole country, which is vitally important for attracting high tech investment in the future,” Irish government spokesman Tom McLoughlin said.

Demand for remote data centers is increasing, boosted by the rising trend of so-called cloud computing, where information is stored and processed at massive remote data centers.

Ireland’s temperate climate suits the centers, which require huge amounts of power to run and to prevent from overheating.

Iceland, located between North America and northern Europe, and recovering from its own economic crisis, hopes the new, larger cable will help it to benefit from its renewable hydro and geothermal energy resources for data centers.

Google Inc is building a data center in Dublin and Microsoft Corp already has one in the city.

The centers would bring much-needed investments and new jobs to the country which fell victim to a severe recession after a property crash and bank sector meltdown.

It has won international plaudits for meeting its goals under an 85 billion euro ($114.4 billion) EU-IMF bailout but needs its domestic economy to start growing again if it is to convince investors that its debt burden is sustainable.

U.S.-based startup Emerald Networks Inc on Thursday joined a race to build the first new transatlantic telecommunication cable since 2003, linking Ireland and Iceland to North America.

Two other transatlantic projects, Hibernian Express and Wasace, are also in the works, but using different routes.

The company has raised the first $5 million from the Welcome Trust and has appointed investment bank Jefferies & Co Inc to complete the $300 million fundraising.

“We are very confident that in the current economy we are going to make it,” Ray Sembler, CEO of Emerald Networks, told Reuters in an interview.

EXISTING CABLES

Emerald seeks to raise $20 million to $25 million of equity this year, which would be enough to start the project, Sembler said, while in the first half of 2012 it aims to raise at first some $100 million more in equity and then $150 million in debt.

It has picked TE SubCom, a unit of U.S. firm TE Connectivity, to supply the cable and install it.

As existing cables in the Atlantic are aging, Emerald is seeking to first grab a share of their data traffic and then focus on growing through serving data centers.

Research firm Telegeography sees demand for transatlantic capacity increasing nearly nine-fold between 2010 and 2017, but it says current capacity is not being fully used.

“Less than 20 percent of potential capacity is in service today … (the) likelihood of exhaustion is a far-off point,” said Alan Mauldin, analyst at Telegeography.

Mauldin says the opportunity for Emerald lies in linking new locations, like Iceland, with a fast connection.

Sembler said a few dozen Forbes 500 companies have already studied setting up a data center in Iceland.

One of the first global players to move there has been Norway’s Opera Software, maker of world’s most-used mobile browser, which opened its Iceland data center last year.

Trygve Jarholt, director of hosting at Opera, said so far the few cables to Iceland have been enough.

“A new cable is always welcome … more capacity means more room for growth,” he said.

Internet groups are trying to use Nordic locations to benefit from natural cooling, with Facebook building a center in Sweden and Google opening a data center in Finland on the site of an old paper mill.

“There are going to be some people who will use Iceland for data centers, but it’s not going to be the only place to benefit from green energy demand,” Telegeography’s Mauldin said.

This is according to Sir Hugh Orde, president of the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO). At the time of the alleged hack, he was chief constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, a position he held until 2009.

The police chief is the latest in a string of senior figures involved in Northern Ireland intelligence who may have been targeted by hacks working for News international.

Police are also investigating leads suggesting the PC of Peter Hain – who was Secretary of State for Northern Ireland between 2005 and 2007 – might have been hacked. Hain wasreportedly asked to confirm that sensitive information obtained by investigators might have originated from his computer.

A former British army intelligence officer tasked with handling informants within the IRA in Northern Ireland told the Leveson Inquiry into media ethics of his suspicions that he had also fallen victim to a malware-driven hack attack. Ian Hurst reckons his computer was compromised sometime during 2006. The possible motives for the alleged hacks, which raise obvious national security concerns, remain unclear.

Computer hacking tactics were also allegedly deployed against targets outside the Northern Ireland intelligence community. Actress Sienna Miller last week told the Leveson Inquiry of her suspicions that her email account had been broken into. Miller said her concerns stemmed from the content of notes made by disgraced private detective Glenn Mulcaire and shown to her by police.

Mulcaire was jailed for six months back in 2007 after he was convicted of hacking into the voicemail messages of royal aides at the behest of the News of the World. ®

* Operation Tuleta is a separate inquiry by the Metropolitan Police into alleged computer hacking by the press. It is running parallel to the more high-profile inquiries into mobile phone voicemail hacking and payments from the media to police. A 52-year-old man from Milton Keynes was arrested and questioned by officers working on Operation Tuleta late last month.

EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding said Monday that social networks must become more open about how they operate. Under her proposals, businesses — including Internet service providers — would have additional responsibilities, such as having to inform users of what data about them is being collected, for what purpose, and how it is stored.

EU regulators have been concerned about how commercial online services use customers’ personal data to attract advertisers, saying they want to make sure that citizens’ Internet privacy rights are respected.

“All social network service providers active in the EU must fully comply with EU data protection laws,” Reding said. “Companies have a specific responsibility when personal data is their main economic asset.”

Existing EU laws date to 1995, long before Facebook and other social networking sites existed. EU officials expect the draft legislation to be ready early next year, and after that, it could take up to 18 months for the bill to become law.

The EU has to iron out differences between its members over privacy issues. Countries like France and Germany favor stronger protections for privacy, while Ireland, Britain and others prefer more market-friendly rules.

A Eurobarometer survey this summer found that 75 percent of Europeans are worried about how companies — including search engines like Google and social networks like Facebook or LinkedIn — use their private information.

The proposed reform also would help businesses by replacing the current patchwork of 27 national regulations, she said.

“They need … to have a ‘one-stop-shop’ when it comes to data protection matters, one law and one single data protection authority,” Reding told the American Chamber of Commerce to the EU. “I want to drastically cut red tape.”

The government has set aside £100m to create high speed internet links in 10 cities across Britain.

Cardiff, Belfast, Edinburgh and London will receive support from the fund, chancellor George Osborne announced in his autumn statement, and a competition will decide which six other cities will join the list.

The money will be spent on providing 80 to 100 megabits per second (Mbps) broadband and city-wide high speed mobile connections, most likely through Wi-Fi. Efforts will focus on areas where companies such as Virgin Media and BT would not have built high-speed links without subsidy.

City councils will bid for a share of the money, identifying which areas are to be connected, with a particular focus on small to medium-sized enterprises and strategic employment zones to support economic growth.

Announcing the fund, Osborne said: “It means creating new superfast digital networks for companies across our country. These do not exist today. See what countries like China or Brazil are building, and you’ll also see why we risk falling behind the rest of the world.

“Our great cities are at the heart of our regional economies. And we will help bring world leading, superfast broadband and Wi-Fi connections to 10 of them – including the capitals of all four nations.”

The “super-connected cities”, one of an array of infrastructure projects announced in the autumn statement, will see £20m allocated in the year to April 2013, £60m spent the following year and the final £20m by April 2015. Companies bidding for a share of the pot will be expected to contribute matching funding.

A BT spokesman said: “This is a positive initiative that will help ensure our major cities have the best available super-fast broadband. BT is already upgrading large parts of these cities under its commercial roll out plan and these funds could help us go further.”

Naomi Climer, vice president at the Institution of Engineering and Technology, Europe’s largest engineers’ body, also welcomed the money: “This announcement is good news for improving UK business productivity and closing the digital divide. It’s a step in the right direction to catch up with the capacity in other countries such as Korea, Singapore and Japan.”

The urban broadband funding is over and above some £830m already allocated in this parliament and the next for rural broadband. The government wants all 25m British homes, however remote, to have access to a minimum speed of 2Mbps by 2015. Some 90% of homes should be able to get up to 24Mbps, enough for several computers to download video simultaneously on a single line.

A further £150m was committed by Osborne at the Tory party conference in October to roll out mobile coverage to 99% of the UK, ensuring six million more people would be able to get a signal. Mobile coverage is currently at 95%, although in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, masts only reach 90% of locations.

Critics said the money would have been better spent boosting rural broadband.

“£100m between 10 cities is about £1.50 per person,” said Andrew Ferguson, editor of news site ThinkBroadband. “If the government had put the money in rural projects it would have boosted rural businesses. Broadband is already available in cities.

Scotland Yard told the Neath MP and former Cabinet minister it is examining evidence that his files, as well as those of senior civil servants and intelligence agents, were targeted by private detectives who may have been working for News International, according to the Guardian.

The Shadow Welsh Secretary had access to classified information during his two year tenure in the role, which ended in June 2007, including highly sensitive details about informers.

Police are to ask Mr Hain to confirm material obtained investigators came from his computer, the newspaper reported.

The investigation is part of Operation Tuleta, which is looking into privacy intrusions outside of the phone-hacking inquiry Operation Weeting.

A spokesman for Peter Hain said: “These are matters of national security and are subject to a police investigation so it would be inappropriate to comment.”

A News International spokeswoman said the company was “co-operating fully with the police” on all investigations.

A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: “We are not providing a running commentary on this investigation.”

Among the extensive plans are the following key strategies:

• A new national cyber security ‘hub’ that will allow the government and businesses to exchange information on threats and responses;

• A cyber crime unit within the National Crime Agency that will build on the Metropolitan Police’s eCrime Unit by expanding the deployment of ‘cyber-specials’, giving police forces across the country the necessary skills and experience to handle cyber crimes;

• A single reporting system to report financially motivated cyber crime through the existing Action Fraud Centre will also be launched;

• Strengthening of the role of the Centre for Protection of the National Infrastructure (CPNI) to increase its reach to organisations that have not previously been considered part of the critical infrastructure;

• Work with ISPs to create a voluntary code of conduct to help people identify if their computers have been compromised and advise them on what action to take.

In October 2010, the government classified cyber security as a ‘tier one’ national security priority and committed £650m over the next four years to bolster its cyber defences.

According to a statement issued with the strategy, this “heralds a new era of unprecedented co-operation between the government and the private sector on cyber security, working hand in hand to make the UK one of the most secure places in the world to do business”.

James Brokenshire MP, parliamentary under-secretary of state for crime and security, said: “We want to ensure that everyone can make the most of the internet and online services while protecting themselves from crime. The new National Crime Agency will share knowledge and expertise across law enforcement agencies, building on the pioneering work done by the Metropolitan Police and SOCA.

“We are also reaching out to industry and the public to get involved. We all have a role to play in keeping ourselves and our families safe while enjoying the huge opportunities and benefits of surfing the web.”

Among security industry spokespeople, the plans were welcomed with acclaim: Frank Coggrave, general manager EMEA at Guidance Software, called the strategy “a positive step in the right direction”; Ross Brewer, vice-president and managing director for international markets at LogRhythm, said it was “great to finally see the UK government starting to take the cyber threat seriously and provide a framework to help organisations protect their assets”; while Kaspersky Lab senior security researcher David Emm said “a joined-up strategy for tackling cyber crime is a must”.

Chris Hardy, regional director of central government, defence and security at McAfee, said: “Ultimately, today’s Cyber Security Strategy announcement is a great way to increase the public’s knowledge of online security, and the reaffirmation of the role that ‘get safe online’ plays shows that it is a crucial tool in continuing to drive public awareness.”

Ilias Chantzos, senior director of legal and public affairs at Symantec, said: “Symantec welcomes the initiative to the continuously evolving threat of cyber attacks. The strategy reaffirms the government’s commitment to tackling this complex issue and highlights a pertinent focus on leadership and international co-operation.

“It is promising that public-private partnerships are a key tenet of the strategy; this is particularly the case for critical infrastructure industries but applicable across all areas. Only by the timely sharing of actionable information can we respond to the evolving threat landscape and ensure better preparedness against attacks. Education and awareness remain key issues that should continue to be absolute priorities in tacking cyber crime.

“Perhaps most importantly, we believe that every national security and defence strategy needs to have a cyber defence element, which is why this strategy is so important and very much welcomed.”

David Harley, senior research fellow at ESET, said: “I welcome the fact that the government seems to be aware that the nation’s security is not restricted to those organisations formally recognised as part of the critical national infrastructure. It’s a good thing, on the whole, that more generalised cyber crime will be getting some attention as well as the more glamorous but very fluffy topic of cyber warfare, as in practice it’s not always easy to separate the two.”

Rik Ferguson, director of security research and communication EMEA at Trend Micro, said: “The government have clearly worked hard with a wide variety of stakeholders to come up with a wide ranging and actionable strategy that contains several real and measurable goals, which is to be highly commended. If the UK manages to deliver on all the promises of this report it will put us in a leading position in Europe and globally to prevent online crime in the first instance and take action where it does arise.

“The conclusions of the report were only reached after extensive consultation with industry, law enforcement and internet bodies. The strategy presents relatively short term goals and I look forward to seeing them fulfilled over the next four years.”

In terms of building better bridges between the public and private sector, Paul Davis, director of Europe at FireEye, said: “The exchange of information, leading to greater visibility, is the first step in seriously tackling this growing threat to the UK. Yet it is the lack of real understanding of the threat landscape, how quickly it’s evolving and the growing threat to UK plc, coupled with actionable data, which is the biggest hurdle in progressing this initiative.

“There are a number of security professionals and companies both here in the UK and abroad that could make a significant contribution to this initiative. I trust the recognition of this ‘new’ threat brings with it a new approach in engaging with the industry. A cyber security hub centred on government but encompassing critical national infrastructure and potentially extending across key industries should be, and can be with the right political support, developed quickly.

“As welcome as today’s announcement is, concrete steps need to be taken now. Initiatives coming into being in 2013 are too far in the future. The threat is real, it’s happening now and it’s well recognised by the agencies mentioned. We’re ready to contribute; we want to get on board.”

While there was a welcome for the strategy, not all were completely satisfied with its content or delivery.

Nigel Hawthorn, V-P of marketing EMEA at Blue Coat Systems, said while it appreciates what the government is trying to achieve with the strategy, it failed to see how it would resonate with commercial organisations, despite bodies such as SOCA and UK Trade and Investment being featured prominently.

“If we’re all going to work together, the government needs to take into account many more factors, including reaching out to the private sector and enterprise organisations to understand their concerns and what needs to be achieved,” he said.

Mike Maddison, head of UK cyber security at Deloitte, said the launch of the strategy was an encouraging step, but it will take international collaboration and a change in mindset for it to truly work.

He said: “Tackling cyber crime requires both national and international effort and collaboration, as opposed to countries working in isolation from one another. Nations will need to establish strong relationships globally to share threat information, and then define and agree norms for acceptable cyber behaviour.”

Harley said he was concerned that if the view of the threat landscape is dominated by cyber warfare/GCHQ, the private sector and home users could be left out.

Coggrave said: “The fact that the scheme has taken so long to develop gives us pause for thought. Can we fully rely on the efficacy of a strategy when its public unveiling has been delayed twice?

“The government maintains that it is vital to take a collaborative approach and work together to combat cyber crime, which is still an important issue. However, the sensitive commercial implications of knowledge sharing and this suggestion of an ‘open internet’ need to be carefully thought out. Many organisations simply do not want to share their secrets, so as not to compromise competitive advantage.

“Another concern is whether the strategy is too ‘political’ to be effective; if the cause becomes too bureaucratic, it doesn’t necessarily have the rapid response approach needed to deal with the full gamut of cyber threats. Only time will tell if it will hit the mark and resonate with the audiences that truly need high levels of guidance to cope with the advanced threat landscape.”

Ash Patel, country manager for UK & Ireland at Stonesoft, said the strategy was “encouraging”, but he was disappointed not to see any commitment to research to better understand current threats.

“Today’s hackers have more sophisticated attack methods than ever before, and in order to generate the outlook that UK plc in cyberspace is secure, which is obviously something the government is trying to achieve, they need to be working to either slow hackers down or to build solutions that can protect companies against these advanced threats. If we don’t spend any time researching cyber crime, the cyber criminals will always be one step ahead,” he said.

It is a fact of life that you are not going to please all of the people all of the time, but the criticism of the cyber security strategy is outweighed by its praise. What this does propose is very reassuring; its implementation will need to be timely, and trust will be its biggest hurdle.

We all know that if we don’t agree to these terms, policies or agreements, we simply cannot use the social media site, search engine, or cell service. So we all just along with the unread deals offered to us.

No Surprise Here

Reports that Apple tracked user locations and stored location data on iPhones and iPads created an uproar that included Sen. Al Franken, D-MInn., writing a letter to Apple. His letter contained the following questions:

Why does Apple collect and compile this location data?

How is this data generated (GPS, cell tower triangulation, WiFi triangulation, etc.)?

Why is this data not encrypted?

Does Apple believe that this conduct is permissible under the terms of its privacy policy?

In response, Apple admitted that they made mistakes with iPhone and iPad location data; however, the user agreements between Apple and its customers specifically gave the company the right to track this information.

When Apple confessed that they made mistakes, Apple also announced that it would change the operating systems on its devices and thereby change its practice.

Ironically, some security experts believed that Apple collected the iPhone/iPad location data not to track users, but rather to pinpoint locations of devices more quickly to save battery life and bandwidth,The New York Times reported.

Nonetheless, the users contractually permitted Apple to collect this information.

Google Does It Too

No one was surprised to learn that Google  was also tracking the GPS data in Android phones, but the information was accessed with user consent under a Click Wrap agreement and anonymously recorded.

Google relies on GPS tracking information to tell Google Maps users what traffic conditions may exist and which roadways are moving or are stopped. Google Maps relies on tracking the movement of the cellphone GPS traffic on the streets to provide this service.

Street View Sees You

In May 2007, Google Street View appeared for the first time serving five U.S. cities: New York, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Miami and Denver. Since then, Google has taken pictures around the world for the Street View project.

However, to the surprise of many, Google confirmed that since 2006, its Street View Cars captured WiFi network information in addition to Street View Photos.

Google uses this WiFi network information to improve location-based services like search and maps. Specifically, Google admitted 0 that the WiFi information was collected, but claimed that it was not the only enterprise to collect unprotected WiFi information:

WiFi networks broadcast information that identifies the network and how that network operates. That includes SSID data (i.e. the network name) and MAC address (a unique number given to a device like a WiFi router). Networks also send information to other computers that are using the network, called payload data, but Google does not collect or store payload data.

It is not surprising that Google claimed its collection and use of WiFi data was legal, and no different than data collection by other companies, including Skyhook, and such organizations as the German Fraunhofer Institute.

Around the world, a number of privacy groups have been unhappy about Google Street View Photos, and there are now new privacy concerns abound regarding Google’s collection of WiFi network data.

Even though Google claimed its activities were completely legal, it apparently acquiesced to the Irish Data Protection Authority’s request on May 14, 2010, to delete its WiFi network data collected in Ireland. On May 16, 2010, the destruction of this WiFi network data was confirmed by a third-party consultant.

The Push for Privacy

News of Apple’s and Google’s collection of user location data has led the EU to explore new rules regarding location information.

France, Germany, and Italy are currently examining Apple’s possible violation of EU laws. EU residents are very concerned about protecting their privacy and expect Apple and Google to comply with EU laws. Sony’s  recent admission that hackers had pulled off data thefts involving more than 77 million account holders is clearly a matter that the EU is studying as well.

What About the Children?

By the time many children in the U.S. reach 13 years of age, they set up Facebook accounts and start downloading apps to iPhones, but protecting their privacy is rarely a question.

In the U.S., the Federal Trade Commission is responsible for protecting children under the age of 13 under the Children’s Online Protection Act, which was enacted by Congress in 1998. However, this is easier said than done.

Of course, children 13 or younger don’t bother reading Terms of Service, Privacy Policies, or Click Wrap Agreements any more than adults do. So is it any wonder that children lose their privacy on the Internet?

A favorite New Yorker cartoon from 1993 has a drawing of two dogs, one sitting in front of a computer saying to the other “On the Internet nobody knows you’re a dog.”

Unfortunately, no matter what businesses say on their websites about who may use the site and what messages are directed, no one really know who’s on the other end. As a result, there is no guarantee that a website has effectively screened for age just because an Internet user claims to be over 13.

When somebody can ever figure out how to force people to read Terms of Service, Privacy Policies, and Click Wrap Agreements and encourage negotiation of unacceptable terms, then maybe we will be able to actually protect privacy on the Internet. Clearly, with today’s Internet model, it’s really impossible to protect our privacy.

Photonic chips, which use lightbeams to do computing rather than electrons, have advanced a lot in recent years. Now researchers at MIT have taken a step closer toward puting these photonic chips on silicon material, the building block of today’s personal computer electronics. “When today’s data arrives at a destination, it is converted to electronic form, processed through electronic circuits and then converted back to light using a laser. The new device could eliminate those extra electronic-conversion steps.”

What’s the Big Idea?

The new technology could boost the speed of data transmission for two reasons. First, light simply travels faster than electrons. “Second, while wires can only carry a single electronic data stream, optical computing enables multiple beams of light, carrying separate streams of data, to pass through a single optical fiber or circuit without interference.” Caroline Ross, the Toyota Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at MIT for communications systems, says: “This may be the next generation in terms of speed.”

(Black Friday is the name given to the Friday after US Thanksgiving, when frenzied seasonal shopping typically starts.)

The research team from German email security provider eleven wrote on Mondayabout a wave of emails allegedly containing vouchers to the iTunes Store.

The spoofed email is purportedly from the iTunes Store, the subject line reads iTunes Gift Certificate, and the message includes an attachment that supposedly contains a certificate code:

The attachment is a ZIP file containing malware. (Sophos detects this file as Mal/BredoZp-B.)

As the holidays ramp up, so do scams like this. It’s understandable that cash-strapped holiday shoppers might be click-happy enough to try to lighten their holiday with $50 worth of free music, video and games.

Avoiding click-candy like this phony iTunes certificate is one way to keep cyber-safe over the holidays.

Here are some other things to watch out for, adapted from a list posted by USA Today:

* Beware bogus forms. Beware emails and pop-up messages that ask you to type your account username and password, credit card number or personal information such as Social Security number and date of birth. Legitimate organizations don’t solicit sensitive information via email.

* Don’t blindly believe urgent, personalized warnings. Phishers often claim that you need to take urgent action with official organisations such as IRS (taxation), Social Security or the Department of Motor Vehicles.

* Don’t fall for that cute-baby photo. Even if you recognise the sender’s name, don’t open attachments. Distrust all email until and unless you’ve verified that the sender actually intended you to get the message and can vouch for its content.

It is hoped the even will engage and inspire over 40,000 visitors with exciting innovations that will transform our cities from the ground up.

The even is just one of many projects planned in Science Gallery’s 2012 programme, revealed on Thursday, to celebrate Dublin’s role as City of Science and host of the EuroScience Open Forum (ESOF) event in July. 

During 2012, Science Gallery hopes to attract over 250,000 visitors in total and welcome its millionth visitor since opening in February 2008 by the end of the year.

Commenting at the announcement of Science Gallery’s 2012 programme, Minister of the Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht Jimmy Deenihan said: “The Science Gallery’s mission to involve, inspire and engage curious minds through science and creating a space where ideas meet has never been more important as we strive to reinvent ourselves and stimulate entrepreneurship in Ireland. 

“This Gallery represents a unique approach to bridging the university and the city with a view to bringing science into dialogue with the arts and culture. The fundamental themes being explored, from food to happiness, should be of concern to all of us, and will provide a year-round celebration of science and its role in our culture.”

Science Gallery Director Dr Michael John Gorman added that: “Ireland needs to cultivate and inspire a generation of flexible, agile, collaborative young people who are able to move between art and science, between technology and design – similar to Leonardo da Vinci – and Science Gallery has proven its ability to be a magnet for young “Leonardos” and bring our scientists and engineers into new kinds of creative conversations, whether with artists and designers or entrepreneurs and potential investors.”

The Science Gallery will play a key role in Dublin’s tenure as City of Science and the 2012 programme. 

For further information or to take part in any of the events planned throughout 2012 go to www.sciencegallery.com.

As the Irish reporting and information security service (IRISSCERT) conference takes place in Dublin today, the service released statistics for 2011, revealing that from 1 January until 31 October, IRISSCERT had 441 security incidents reported to it, 92 per cent of which related to Irish websites being broken into by criminals to host phishing sites to target unsuspecting users. Just under all (96 per cent) were suspected of being sponsored by organised crime gangs.

IRISSCERT also revealed that there were three major issues which targeted three specific and separate Irish organisations, in which it co-ordinated the response and alerted the potential victims so they could take the most appropriate action to manage the threat.

Spokesperson Brian Honan, said: “The volume and type of incidents we deal with on a daily basis are a clear indication to Irish businesses that cyber crime is a real threat to our systems, our businesses and the economy.

“We can no longer afford to treat information security as an afterthought and need to ensure we take the appropriate steps to secure our systems. Criminals are sharing information and working together so they can exploit our systems and steal our money. Businesses need to better share information with the community so we all can learn; IRISSCERT provides this facility.”

This year’s IRISSCERT cyber crime conference takes place today (23 November) at the D4 Berkley Hotel in Dublin, and includes speakers from Sourcefire, Trustwave SpiderLabs, the IEDR, Trend Micro and Realex Payment Systems. Also speaking is Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer at F-Secure, and former SC Magazine Information Security Person of the Year Stephen Bonner, now a partner at KPMG.

In parallel to the conference, IRISSCERT will host HackEire, the Irish cyber security challenge. The challenge will see a network configured similar to that of an Irish company operating on the internet, and up to ten teams will compete against each other to breach the defences of that network.

The meeting at City Hall on 1 December will be the first to be streamed on thecouncil website.

The project will cost just under £20,000 a year and the council hopes it will help improve interaction with Belfast’s ratepayers.

A number of views of the chamber will be available during the streaming of the monthly meetings.

The decision to broadcast the council meetings online was initially taken in 2010 but had to be tested and reviewed before going live.

It’s understood a dry run during the 1 November meeting was a success.

The decision was taken to increase the council’s presence online and to offer people in Belfast, and further afield, a better opportunity to see what happens at City Hall.

A council spokesperson said: “This enables the council to be open and transparent to ratepayers.

“It increases awareness of the work and responsibility of the council and improves interaction with ratepayers – giving them an opportunity to comment on decisions through our social networking sites.”

The attackers were repeatedly turning a pump on and off until it caused the pump to fail, raising an alert to the operators.

Upon investigation they determined that attackers may have infiltrated the system starting in September 2011, although the attack wasn’t discovered until November 8th, 2011.

The notice about the attack noted that it was similar to an attack against the Massachusetts Institute of Technology earlier this year which exploited bugs in the open source software phpMyAdmin.

Reading about this my spidey-sense was tingling… What? They have SCADA control systems hooked up to the public internet? And they are running phpMyAdmin!?!?

I run a reasonably low profile, small website for myself and some friends and at one point had installed phpMyAdmin to assist them with daily SQL management chores.

I removed it four years ago after a never ending stream of severe vulnerabilities made it too risky for my *play* site.

According the the National Vulnerability Database phpMyAdmin has at least105 reported security vulnerabilities.

It would appear it is common practice these days to connect these sensitive critical infrastructure systems to the public internet and use COTS (Common Off The Shelf) software to manage them.

Convenience and price are always desirable to those responsible for managing these systems, but this is bordering on criminally negligent when you are responsible for our water, power, gas and other sensitive utilities.

The Department of Homeland Security needs to do a top-down audit of these systems and mandate that these insecure practices come to an end.

Within hours of the news breaking on this story a hacker known as pr0f posted images of internal SCADA control systems from the City of South Houston, Nevada.

He insists he hasn’t interfered with their operations and is just releasing the information to draw attention to the problem.

Of course that doesn’t change the fact that accessing these systems is still a criminal act under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

We may already be at a crisis point with regards to our infrastructure security, but perhaps these stories will be a wake up call for those managing similar systems around the world.

What’s the Big Idea?

Computer engineers have worried that the growth of computer power is limited by the increasing amounts of electricity needed to transmit ever-larger amounts of data. When too much electricity is used, chips simply overheat and shut down. But Princeton’s new LED-powered microchips are 2,000 times as efficient as other devices currently in use, says Jelena Vuckovic, who led the research team. By using very little electricity, the development may help sustain Moore’s Law, which has predicted the exponential growth of computer power.

A team at Stanford’s School of Engineering has demonstrated an ultrafast nanoscale light-emitting diode (LED) that is orders of magnitude lower in power consumption than today’s laser-based systems and is able to transmit data at the very rapid rate of 10 billion bits per second. The researchers say it is a major step forward in providing a practical ultrafast, low-power light source for on-chip data transmission.

Stanford’s Jelena Vuckovic, an associate professor of electrical engineering, and Gary Shambat, a doctoral candidate in electrical engineering, announced their device in a research paper in the journalNature Communications.

Vuckovic had earlier this year produced a nanoscale laser that was similarly efficient and fast, but that device operated only at temperatures below 150 degrees Kelvin, about minus-190 degrees Fahrenheit, making it impractical for commercial use. The new device operates at room temperature and could, therefore, represent an important step toward next-generation computer chips.

“Low-power, electrically controlled light sources are vital for next-generation optical systems to meet the growing energy demands of the computer industry,” said Vuckovic. “This moves us in that direction significantly.”

Single-mode light

The LED in question is a “single-mode LED,” a special type of diode that emits light more or less at a single wavelength, similarly to a laser.

“Traditionally, engineers have thought only lasers can communicate at high data rates and ultralow power,” said Shambat. “Our nanophotonic, single-mode LED can perform all the same tasks as lasers, but at much lower power.”

Nanophotonics is key to the technology. In the heart of their device, the engineers have inserted little islands of the light-emitting material indium arsenide, which, when pulsed with electricity, produce light. These “quantum dots” are surrounded by photonic crystal — an array of tiny holes etched in a semiconductor. The photonic crystal serves as a mirror that bounces the light toward the center of the device, confining it inside the LED and forcing it to resonate at a single frequency.

“In other words, it becomes single-mode,” said Shambat.

“Without these nanophotonic ingredients — the quantum dots and the photonic crystal — it is impossible to make an LED efficient, single-mode and fast all at the same time,” said Vuckovic.

Engineering ingenuity

The new device includes a bit of engineering ingenuity, too. Existing devices are actually two devices, a laser coupled with an external modulator. Both devices require electricity. Vuckovic’s diode combines light transmission and modulation functions into one device, drastically reducing energy consumption.

In tech-speak, the new LED device transmits data, on average, at 0.25 femto-joules per bit of data. By comparison, today’s typical “low” power laser device requires about 500 femto-joules to transmit the same bit.

“Our device is some 2,000 times more energy efficient than best devices in use today,” said Vuckovic.

Stanford Professor James S. Harris, former PhD student Bryan Ellis and doctoral candidates Arka Majumdar, Jan Petykiewicz and Tomas Sarmiento also contributed to this research.

Carrier IQ is used to understand what problems customers are having with our network or devices so we can take action to improve service quality. 

It collects enough information to understand the customer experience with devices on our network and how to devise solutions to use and connection problems. We do not and cannot look at the contents of messages, photos, videos, etc., using this tool

However, in digging into the details of the software, Eckhart realized that it can easily track all sorts of info, including what websites people are visiting and what keypresses they make. The software can also surreptitiously report where the phone is located. He further notes that the software is purposely hidden on a bunch of devices, and on many it appears that you simply can’t turn it off. 

Now, I don’t think anyone is suggesting anything nefarious here. There are reasons why operators like to collect this kind of data and, in the aggregate, it seems useful. But, as Eckhart looked in more detail at training materials for the software, he realized it could easily be used to track at a much more granular level, down to individuals. The potential for abuse seems pretty high. Again, it’s obvious why this software is installed, but it raises questions about what carriers are doing to make sure the software isn’t being abused. It’s also somewhat troubling that the carriers aren’t all that straightforward about how this software is monitoring their users…

The internet Systems Consortium (ISC) have described the problem as follows:

An as-yet unidentified network event caused BIND 9 resolvers to cache an invalid record, subsequent queries for which could crash the resolvers with an assertion failure...

Affected servers crashed after logging an error in query.c with the following message: "INSIST(! dns_rdataset_isassociated(sigrdataset))

More details are available in their advisory.

The cause of the crash is still under investigation but the ISC have reacted swiftly with a set of temporary patches that will prevent servers from crashing. There is no known workaround for the problem and BIND users are encouraged to upgrade.

The Domain Name System (DNS) is a critical part of the internet’s infrastructure and most of the DNS servers on the Internet run BIND 9.

We will keep you updated as we discover more information.

The tale of a YouView, the much-delayed UK internet-connected TV service, unfolded the next stage of its plot this week as broadband provider TalkTalk said it would commence an in-house trial in early 2012.

By bringing video-on-demand to Freeview, the nine-year old British DTT service, YouView is one of a number of platforms that has the potential to transform how television is consumed and force marketers to rethink how they try to connect with consumers. YouView is one to watch, because its set-top box promises to combine a number of developments that have taken place in the world of internet on the television, and television on the internet.

A joint venture between the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, BT, TalkTalk and Arqiva, it merges existing DTT services with video-on-demand (VOD). Online catch-up services such as the BBC’s iPlayer will be accessible via the same box as hundreds of content providers, including Sky TV, Amazon’s DVD rental and streaming service LoveFilm (a rival to Netflix) and Guardian News Media. Alongside apps delivering VOD and other media, viewers will find old-school linear television with its electronic programme guide (EPG).

EPGs are undergoing their own evolution, encompassing search and recommendation technology gleaned online, and becoming even better at capturing the eyeballs of TV viewers who are flickers at heart.

YouView will feature what’s known as a “backwards EPG”. Thrillingly, this allows viewers to trawl through the EPG for the previous day, and backwards for up to a week. Diehard linear TV watchers who hit the pub on a Friday night could, say, eliminate Monday morning dread by reliving Friday’s television on a Sunday evening, switching between channels with the usual mix of curiosity and impatience – as if VOD didn’t exist.

A backwards EPG is available in the UK on Virgin’s TiVo platform, while BSkyB has Sky Anytime +, which offers a VOD library to Sky Broadband customers. Other potential competitors come in the shape of smart TVs made by LG and Samsung. Both are believed to be set to launch second-generation Google TV in 2012.

While the BBC is likely to sign up to Google TV, commercial British broadcasters may not play ball if it threatens to dilute the return on their investment in YouView. Major US networks ABC, CBS and NBS blocked their websites from Android-based Google TV devices last year, seeking a better deal on revenues.

“Is television going to disappear? I don’t think so. At the moment, people are still ingrained in linear television. But there will be more mixing and matching by consumers in terms of how they access content,” says Bartley O’Connor, head of advisory consulting with PricewaterhouseCoopers.

“I would be somewhat sceptical about the smart TV opportunity, because to date viewers have been somewhat restricted in what they can see, and there’s restricted online access,” he says.

Apart from the possibility that set-top box services will have a greater choice of traditional TV content, consumers may also be swayed by the ability to upgrade their set-top box without having to upgrade their TV monitors. In an age of dual-screening, the very definition of “set-top box” is set to change – O’Connor says he is working on a “very exciting” project with a client that would see a tablet computer act as the set-top box. This is the direction that would make sense for Apple.

In any case, it’s “too early to tell”, says O’Connor, whether the set-top box services or the smart TVs will “win” the hardware market, or if indeed there will be a definitive winner. But all of this frenzied market activity – the race to lock in eyeballs – is being keenly tracked by advertisers, who have stepped up their volume of online video advertising.

Figures from IAB Ireland, the representative body for online advertisers, suggest there has been what chief executive Suzanne McElligott calls “dramatic” growth in online video advertising over the last six months, with advertisers attracted by its similarity and overlap with TV advertising. However, the tipping point is likely to be still around the corner – McElligott describes the current innovation in the online television market as “a golden egg opportunity”.

It’s a case of broadcasters beware: a new advertising powerplay could soon be at work. Manufacturers could reserve a cut of home screen ad revenues, cable providers could take a slice of EPG ad revenues, the online world could take its slice.

While the UK industry reaches the trial stage for YouView, the Irish one is figuring out how Saorview, the Irish DTT equivalent of Freeview, is going to look after analogue switch-off in 2012. Some would-be owners of channels on Saorview could well be deterred by the high carriage costs associated with DTT and choose alternative, online routes.

“The meeting of TV and online is genuinely happening,” says Philippe Brodeur, a former TV3 executive and director of AerTV.ie, an online television streaming service launched by Magnet Networks and one of those possible alternatives.

“TV is worth upwards of $400 billion a year in advertising, and lots of internet companies are saying ‘I’ll have a little bit of that’. It’s for TV to win or lose,” he says. A cross-industry collaboration such as YouView requires a “really vibrant industry” with good working relationships between the broadcasters, he notes. “In Ireland, we have had 40 years of RTÉ and 10 years of RTÉ and TV3,” he says. “It’s a market size thing. It is what it is. But the web will make it more diverse.”

Facebook said yesterday evening it had seen an increase in reports of material that violated its terms of use and it was taking steps to investigate and address the issue. Some Irish users said they had seen a dramatic increase in recent days in the level of pornographic content appearing on their news feeds when they log into the site.

One user from Dublin described the increased level of such material as “unbelievable”. She said it was “not so much on my page, but other eejits liking or commenting on it so it comes up on the news feed”. Another said he had noticed “lots of porn and dating ads disguised as normal products until you click on them and then find strange apps on your Facebook page”.

The increased level of spam appearing on Facebook has been linked to the online hacker group Anonymous, which had previously made threats to target the site over concerns about the manner in which the site distributes and holds personal information and its plans to make money from users.

However, industry sources have cast doubt on whether the group is behind the increased spam as it does not fit with its modus operandi. Spammers have apparently been taking advantage of the new photo-enhanced layout of the site – which means that when “friends” post comments on photographs, the picture is automatically posted on to the news feeds of friends.

The technology site ZDnet said the material was being spread via a “linkspam virus” which tempts members to click on a seemingly innocuous story link.

“It isn’t presently clear precisely how the offending content has been spread – whether users are falling for a clickjacking scheme, are being tagged in content without their knowledge, have poorly chosen privacy settings, have been tricked into installing malicious code, or have fallen victim to another vulnerability inside Facebook itself,” Sophos security expert Graham Cluley said on his blog.

“What’s clear, however, is that mischief-makers are upsetting many Facebook users and making the social networking site far from a family-friendly place.”

Facebook said, “Protecting the people who use Facebook from spam and malicious content is a top priority for us and we are always working to improve our systems to isolate and remove material that violates our terms.”

 

 

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif., Nov. 14, 2011 /PRNewswire/ – Netflix, Inc. (Nasdaq: NFLX) and Lionsgate UK, a subsidiary of Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. (NYSE: LGF) today announced a new multi-year licensing agreement that will make Netflix the exclusive subscription streaming service in the UK and Ireland for first-run feature films from the studio.

Lionsgate UK titles will be available for Netflix members in the UK and Ireland to watch instantly in the pay TV window on their televisions, tablets, game consoles, computers and mobile phones, for a low monthly price. Netflix announced last month that it would launch its service in the UK and Ireland early in 2012.

Appearing exclusively on Netflix within one year of their theatrical release will be such films as “The Hunger Games,” the highly-anticipated film based on Suzanne Collins’ best-selling teen novel and starring Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson and Liam Hemsworth; “The Expendables 2,” the sequel to the blockbuster hit starring Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Bruce Willisand Jet Li and the recently-announced remake of  the beloved 1987 classic “Dirty Dancing.”

Among recent Lionsgate UK hits available to watch instantly in the UK and Ireland are “The Mechanic,” “Saw 3D” and the original “The Expendables” as well as great catalogue titles including “Reservoir Dogs,” “Blair Witch Project,” “3:10 to Yuma,” and “Good Night and Good Luck.”

“Lionsgate is an important and successful supplier of television series and movies to us in all of our territories,” said Ted Sarandos, Netflix Chief Content Officer. “We are proud to be the exclusive Pay TV home for Lionsgate theatrically-released films in the UK and Ireland.”

“Netflix is the leading worldwide brand in steaming movies and they have an incredible service in North America. We are very excited to be working with them as they launch their service and bring our movies to audiences in the UK and Ireland,” addedZygi Kamasa, Lionsgate UK CEO.

“On November 3, 2011, the adidas Group found out that it was the target of a sophisticated, criminal cyber-attack. Our preliminary investigation has found no evidence that any consumer data is impacted,” the company said in a statement on its news stream site. “But, while we continue our thorough forensic review, we have taken down affected sites, including adidas.com, reebok.com, miCoach.com, adidas-group.com and various local eCommerce shops, in order to protect visitors to our sites.”

The company has put in place additional security measures, the statement added, without going into details. The company also did not say what happened

As of this afternoon, adidas.com and miCoach.com were still inaccessible. “Due to technical difficulties our website is currently not available,” the Adidas site said.

“We are working to restore the site as soon as possible. As the site was also scheduled for a number of exciting updates, we will use the current down time to make those changes,” the miCoach.com site said. “This way the site will launch again with the latest and greatest developments already in place.”

The message on the miCoach site said the company was aiming to have the site back up by the end of day on Tuesday.

Significant investment by the Department of Investment, Trade and Investment and operators means Northern Ireland now has some of the best internet infrastructure in the United Kingdom, with more than 90 per cent of households now having access to superfast broadband.

However, the region is less well served for the mobile phone equivalent of superfast broadband – 3G. According to the communications regulator Ofcom, one in ten premises (13 per cent) in Northern Ireland can’t get a 3G signal while around half can’t get a signal from all five 3G operators.

Ofcom has added some handy maps to its website so that people can see whether they live in one of these “3G notspots”.

The app aims to bring networking into the digital age by using location-based technology to help professionals quickly connect with the right people in real-time during conferences and meetups. 

Hundreds of millions of people attend conferences and meetups to network and make the crucial connections that can transform their business or career. 

The Shhmooze app is said to allow delegates to use their mobile devices to ‘check into’ a business event, make themselves known, advertise their skills, and find the people they need or the people who need them quickly and easily. 

To date Shhmooze has partnered with over 100 events including Learning Without Frontiers, Dublin Web Summit, and Mobile Monday and has helped delegates to quickly discover and connect with other professional in order to create valuable relationships.

Having enjoyed success in the iPhone market, Shhmooze won ‘Best Irish App of the Year’ at the 2010 Belfast App Circus and was selected as one of the world’s ’20 Best Mobile Apps of the Year’ at the 2011 Mobile Premier Awards in Barcelona at this year’s Mobile World Congress. 

Shhmooze is a finalist for Best Mobile Startup in Europe at Techcrunch’s The Europas. 

The company has also beaten more than 600 other startups worldwide to become semi-finalist at LeWeb’11 Start-up Competition, Europe’s premier tech event. 

Cofounder of Shhmooze, Michelle Gallen said: “Our research has shown that networking is the top reason why people attend conferences but it’s also what delegates find hardest to do. 

“Shhmooze solves this problem and turns networking from an exhausting and gruelling process into a simple and effective experience. 

“The Shhmooze app makes it really quick and easy to identify the persons you should really be talking. Our real-time messaging system makes arranging a face-to-face chat a breeze. 

“The initial contact is also made a lot easier, as you already know from the information in the app, not only who you’re talking to but also what their interests and experience are. 

“Now that the app has launched on Android devices, the world’s most popular smartphone platform, even more delegates can use Shhmooze to network. We’re really excited at the opportunities that this opens for attendees and conference organisers alike.”

The NISP Director of Corporate Real Estate and Facilities, Mervyn Watley said: “The Science Park is developing as real hub of social media activity with tenants taking advantage of the first-rate connectivity to launch and develop their businesses in the online industry. 

“More and more hi-tech companies are relocating to the Science Park to take advantage of this fibre network which helps to keep local businesses at the cutting edge of new global technological opportunity.”

The west coast of Ireland boasts one of the largest concentrations of wave energy in the world, and consequently, Ireland has been pursuing the development of wave energy as a sustainable/renewable energy alternative. Wave energy conversion devices, such as the one pictured here, are being developed and tested by a number of companies.

Specifically, IBM is contributing sensors, a communications infrastructure and real-time data analytics capabilities that are hosted and processed in the cloud.

The data analysis solution will be applied to the problem of exploring how much underwater noise wave energy generators (such as the Wavebob technology pictured to the right) actually create. That noise will be assessed for its impact on fish, plants and the marine ecosystem at large.

The first test site is in the Galway Bay at a project site that is already being monitored by IBM Research and the Marine Institute Ireland for wave conditions, acoustics, marine life and pollution.

The project was commissioned by the Sustainable Energy Authority Ireland.

Said European Union Commissioner for Research, Inovation and Science Maire Geoghegan-Quinn: ”Underwater noise is a global environmental issues that has to be addressed if we are to take advantage of the huge potential of ocean energy.”

Ireland imported almost 86 percent of its energy during 2010, and it is working toward a goal of switching almost 16 percent of its energy consumption to sources generated by renewable technologies by 2020.

Duqu, or “son of Stuxnet” as some call it, is worrisome because it installs a keystroke logger and then can replicate itself, even across secure networks, using the passwords obtained. It communicates with other servers across the Internet, giving hackers access. The malware will remove itself after 30 days.

In its Security Advisory, Microsoft confirmed that it is seeing attacks in the wild, but downplayed the impact. The Advisory said, “Microsoft is investigating a vulnerability in a Microsoft Windows component, the Win32k TrueType font parsing engine. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could run arbitrary code in kernel mode. The attacker could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights. We are aware of targeted attacks that try to use the reported vulnerability; overall, we see low customer impact at this time. This vulnerability is related to the Duqu malware.”

Nevertheless, Microsoft did release a “Fix-it” tool that allows IT professionals to manually disable the code with the hole in their systems. It does have some drawbacks in that, “Applications that rely on embedded font technology will fail to display properly,” Microsoft warns. Additionally, IT professionals can also manually perform the fix by entering in a series of commands at an administrative prompt. The Fix-It is for all versions of Windows. Here is a link to it. The manual commands are available via Microsoft’s Security Advisory, under “Workarounds.”

Microsoft is still investigating if it will also release a patch. If so, this patch is not currently scheduled to be part of Tuesday’s batch.

This illegal marketplace has been used in the past to advertise information stolen from websites belonging to the U.S. Army, the U.S. Department of Defense, the South Carolina National Guard and other institutions. Its owner, a hacker calling himself Srblche, also offered services that included compromising the particular servers his customers wanted.

According to Rob Rachwald, director of security strategy at security firm Imperva, Srblche is believed to be Kuwaiti. “We tracked his Facebook profile,” Rachwald said Thursday.

Members of the hacking community accused Srblche in the past of stealing other people’s tools from underground forums and trying to profit from them, which might explain why d33ds targeted him.

“Anyone willing to pay for this service must be as stupid as he is,” d33ds wrote in its announcement of Srblche’s online catalogue being hacked. The group published information about the server, the password hashes of his customers and even the hacker’s administrative access code in plain text.

It’s not sure how the compromise occurred, but Imperva’s researchers believe that the group might have broken in through some other application hosted on the same server.

“D33ds is the same group that hacked RankMyHack.com. [...] This is how Rankmyhack was breached,” they said in a blog post. RankMyHack is a website that awards points for Web compromises depending on how big or important the target was. Hackers compete for a higher position on the leaderboard.

Imperva is not aware of any case where stolen information sold by Srblche was actually used in an attack against an organization. However, it would be hard to determine if this happened because attackers don’t publicly boast about it, said Rachwald.

When a hacker gets hacked, there is a high chance of sensitive data stolen from companies being made public.

In “Operation Darknet,” Anonymous exposed the account details of more than 1,500 suspected pedophile users sharing images of child sexual abuses.

Anonymous claims to have stumbled across the offending Website while browsing a “hidden wiki” on the Darknet. The activist group took action against the host server, named “Freedom Hosting,” by publishing details of its users, after it failed to act on takedown warnings the group had issued.

This latest Anonymous action has exposed some of the murkier uses of the Darknet.

This supposedly secret place, out of reach of search engines, began life as a legitimate means to carry out anonymous communications, and for many it remains true to its original purpose.

To explain in a little more depth: There are, in fact, two uses of the term “Darknet.” First, the Darknet exposed by Anonymous consists of a network of virtual tunnels used to defend against surveillance and traffic analysis for those wishing to share files or communications securely or anonymously.

Darknet also is the name given to a network telescope, a tool used to monitor traffic through the unallocated IP address space of the network. Packet activity here can arouse suspicion, since there is no reason a host would be using this space. Monitoring can give evidence of activities such as DDoS, port scanning, worms, etc., and provide us Internet security guys with a useful tool to pick up malware, attack forensics, and analysis.

In a positive sense, the anonymity and secure networking technology of the Darknet, typified by network telescope technology, has enabled dissidents in repressive regimes to remain in touch with the “outside” world. It has protected whistleblowers, radicals, and journalists, and it has provided a means for users to chat about sensitive or private subjects.

The best known Darknet resource is the Onion Router (TOR), developed in 2002, used by the Navy, supported by the Electronic Frontier Foundation , and later developed into The Tor Project, an open-source and free software tool available to anyone requiring a legitimate means of anonymous communication.

But as the other meaning of the term indicates, the Darknet also can be a secret network that protects users from the prying eyes of law enforcement or intelligence services. This Darknet has provided the perfect spawning ground for illicit activity and has delivered a place of refuge for those of criminal intent. It has provided a home for spammers, data thieves, phishers, scammers, terrorists, file sharers, and pedophiles as data can be stored, swapped, sold, or discussed anonymously and freely.

The specific abuses disclosed by Anonymous were found via Tor’s Hidden Service, which has been highlighted recently for its hosting of pirated movie and music sites and for recent takedowns for copyright infringement.

But Tor isn’t by any means the only service operating under the protection of the Darknet. In continuous development since 2000, Freenet proudly advertises its 2 million downloads, as well as its Darknet association. Going back even further (1988) is Internet Relay Chat (IRC), available over hundreds of networks with, at times, millions of users.

As desire for anonymity increases, partly due to the suspicion that many Tor nodes and communication points are actually under the direct control of governmental agencies, so the pool of Darknet resources diversifies and multiplies. First we have Jabber increasingly being used as the communication route of choice for cybercriminals in preference to the more widely known IRC. The I2P (Invisible Internet Project) network is popular too for its secure end-to-end encrypted applications, including EepSites, Websites that are hosted anonymously.

But even the Darknet can reveal its secrets, and as with any network, its vulnerabilities are open to exploitation. And you can be sure that is something many a law enforcement agency, vigilante group, or repressive regime is not too hesitant about using to its own advantage.

— Jart Armin, Editor of RBNexploit.com, a watch blog on the infamous RBN (Russian Business Network), and HostExploit.com.

The internet search giant says it intends to apply to Dublin City Council for permission to build the pool and gym in the Montevetro building on Barrow Street, which it bought for just under €100 million.

The 15-storey block was built by Treasury Holdings, but sold by the National Asset Management Agency for €99.9 million after it acquired responsibility for bank loans held by the Dublin development company.

At 67m (220ft), the Montevetro is the tallest office building in the city and was intended to serve as a dramatic landmark at one of the entrances to Dublin’s docklands. Construction of the building started in March 2008 and was completed last January, but finance for the project had been controlled by Nama since April last year.

The building was constructed with three basement levels, which included parking for up 80 cars. While details of the application for planning permission for the pool, likely to be made to the council by the end of this week, are not yet available it is understood that it would occupy some of this space.

Google, which employs more than 2,000 people in the docklands area, has been operating from Ireland since 2003.

An onsite swimming pool, if approved by Dublin City Council planners, would be the latest leisure facility on offer to staff, who already have access to a gym and several pool tables, table tennis, table football, Scalextric and video-game consoles. Employees may also avail of a weekly relaxation massage.

While the company has no active policy against unions it is understood that most of its Dublin workers are not members of a union.

The company had been renting its two office buildings, also on Barrow Street, but bought them last March just two weeks after the Montevetro sale went through. It paid just over €100 million for the office blocks, Gordon House and Gasworks House, adjoining buildings on Barrow Street which were developed by Liam Carroll. His business subsequently collapsed, leaving him owing the banks some €1.2 billion.

Some Google staff have already moved into the Montevetro property, which is on the opposite side of the road to Gordon House and Gasworks House. The company says it is still planning the final “fit-out”, which it will use to support future growth in Dublin.

“We are working diligently to address this issue and will release a security update for customers,” Microsoft said on Tuesday in a short statement.

News of Duqu surfaced in October when security software maker Symantec Corp said it had found a mysterious computer virus that contained code similar to Stuxnet, a piece of malicious software believed to have wreaked havoc on Iran’s nuclear program.

Government and private investigators around the world are racing to unlock the secret of Duqu, with early analysis suggesting that it was developed by sophisticated hackers to help lay the groundwork for attacks on critical infrastructure such as power plants, oil refineries and pipelines.

Details on how Duqu got onto infected machines emerged for the first time on Tuesday as Microsoft disclosed its link to the infection.

Separately, Symantec researchers said they believe hackers sent the virus to targeted victims via emails with tainted Microsoft Word documents attached.

If a recipient opened the Word document and infected the PC, the attacker could take control of the machine and reach into an organization’s network to propagate itself and hunt for data, Symantec researcher Kevin Haley told Reuters.

He said some of the source code used in Duqu was also used in Stuxnet, a cyber weapon believed to have crippled centrifuges that Iran uses to enrich uranium.

That suggests that the attackers behind Stuxnet either gave that code to the developers of Duqu, allowed it to be stolen, or are the same people who built Duqu, Haley said.

“We believe it is the latter,” he said.

The University of Ulster is investigating whether the huge investment in the nation’s telecommunications market has paid off in terms of the service that customers receive.

It noted that regional government, the European Commission and telecommunications bodies have all chipped in over recent years to improve infrastructure in the country.

This could have made it the ideal place for companies to invest in VoIP solutions in order to drive efficiency.

Professor of telecommunications engineering Gerard Parr said: “We want to get direct observations and feedback on the quality of the broadband … service consumers are receiving and the impact this is having on their work.”

Londonderry in Northern Ireland was recently named by BT as the place with the fastest business broadband speeds in the UK.

The video demands the release of an Anonymous member allegedly kidnapped by Zeta members during a protest.

‘You have made a great mistake by taking one of us. Free him,’ the video says. 

The video – in English and Spanish versions – warns that unless the kidnapped activist is freed, the group will post photos and identities of police officers, journalists, taxi drivers and police working with the Zetas online this week. 

‘We cannot defend ourselves with weapons, but we can with their cars, houses, bars,’ the message adds, referring to properties owned by gang affiliates. 

‘It’s not difficult. We know who they are and where they are.’

Global intelligence think tank Stratfor, in its analysis of the video, said anyone exposed by Anonymous as a Zetas collaborator – accurately or not – would be targeted by rival gangs.

It also warned that the Zetas could respond by attacking Internet activists even if they are not affiliated with Anonymous. The gang has attacked individuals for posting information

The video, posted on YouTube, shows a suited man in the familiar Guy Fawkes mask often used by the group, and uses the ‘credits’ often seen on previous Anonymous videos. 

Mexican officials say, however, that its not possible to confirm whether the video is authentic.

The new message is presented by someone wearing a mask and speaking for Anonymous in ‘Veracruz, Mexico, and the world.’ 

It was  uploaded to websites early this month, but there is no way to authenticate its origin. It was first reported Friday on the website of the global intelligence think tank Stratfor.

This is at least the second example of high-profile online resistance to the Zetas, who have been blamed for a dramatic upsurge in violence along Mexico’s Gulf coast.

In July, a group of men dressed in paramilitary gear and heavily armed posted a video calling themselves the ‘Zeta Killers.’ They later claimed responsibility for the murder of Zetas members, but authorities have insisted the group is simply a rival cartel.

Revealed last week at a conference in Jinan, China and profiled in The New York Times, the Sunway BlueLight MPP supercomputer doesn’t use microprocessors from Intel or AMD. It uses a chip designed by the Chinese themselves — and it’s not the Chinese microprocessor the supercomputing community was expecting. In other words, the Chinese are developing two microprocessors that could shift not only bragging rights in the worldwide supercomputer game, but the general market for server silicon.

“It shows that there’s a significant effort underway in China to build multicore processors that can be put into the world’s fastest computers,” Jack Dongarra, the University of Tennessee professor who oversees the annual list of the Top 500 supercomputers, tells Wired. “And you have to wonder what their strategy is in terms of pushing these chips outside of their borders.”

Before the Sunway was uncloaked, Dongarra was expecting China to reveal a computing cluster based on an eight-core chip its engineers were developing under the “Loongson” or “Godson” name. Instead, the Sunway uses a previously unknown chip dubbed the “ShenWei SW-3.” Harnessing 8,700 of these chips, the cluster can, in theory, handle more than 1,000 trillion calculations a second — aka a petaflop.

That will likely put the Sunway among the top 20 fastest supercomputers when Dongarra and crew unveil their official list next month. For the University of Tennessee computer scientist, this shows that China is gaining ground on the big American chip-makers faster than expected. “China hasn’t done much in the way of microprocessor development over the past 20 years,” he says. “But it won’t take them 20 years to catch up. It’s going to take them a very short time.”

Intel and AMD did not respond to a request for comment. Nor did the unnamed Chinese representative who emailed the Sunway’s benchmark numbers to Dongarra last week. Dr. David K. Kahaner, the president and founding director of the Asian Technology Information Program, tells us that the Chinese briefed him on the Sunway in April and that they claimed it would achieve 75% efficiency on the Linpack benchmark, which means its average performance would be about 75% percent of its peak one-petaflop speed. This is similar to what the Chinese claimed last week.

According to reports from Jinan, the ShenWei microprocessor was designed at a supercomputing institute in China and manufactured in Shanghai, and it uses a new instruction set — not the venerable x86 instruction set used by Intel and AMD. The chip runs at about 1GHz, which is well under the speed of the latest Intel and AMD chips, but a lower clock also means it consumes less power.

Last fall, a separate Chinese operation unveiled the Tianhe-1A, based on Intel’s Xeon processors, which was then the fastest supercomputing on earth. It was soon topped by a Japanese cluster known as the K Computer, and the Japanese will likely retain their crown when the list of the Top 500 supercomputers is officially revealed. But in many ways, the Sunway has already stolen its thunder.

In revealing the Sunway — which was apparently installed in Jinan in September — the Chinese also unveiled a list of the country’s top 100 supercomputers. Eighty-five still use Intel and fourteen used AMD, but the plan is to move to the lot towards homegrown hardware. The supercomputing game isn’t a huge part of Intel’s or AMD’s business, but there’s a certain amount of prestige wrapped up in these massive machines, and the same chips can be used in ordinary servers.

“Don’t think of this in terms of supercomputing,” says Dongarra. “There’s a low-end that where these chips can work. You can imagine these chips replacing all the Intel chips in the China.”

Professor of Telecommunications Engineering Gerard Parr (pictured)  and Professor of Mathematics Sally McClean are conducting a comprehensive independent online survey to establish what people living in Northern Ireland really think of their mobile phone and Internet service.

Professors Parr and McClean, who are both internationally acknowledged as leaders in their areas of expertise, will look at two distinct aspects of Northern Ireland’s telecommunications service: broadband access and mobile phone signal strength and geographical coverage.

Northern Ireland has one of the most advanced telecommunications infrastructures in Europe with an ever growing range of products and services on offer for home and business use.  However, despite significant investment by the telecommunications industry, European Commission and regional government, Professor Parr says there is a lot of anecdotal evidence to suggest that not everyone in Northern Ireland is happy with the service they are receiving

Urging people to complete the survey, Professor Parr said the direct feedback and evidence gathered from consumers would be used to identify ‘blackspot’ areas and put pressure on providers to improve their service.

“An analysis of the data gathered will be published and used to inform the telecommunications industry and stakeholders in government about gaps in services and to suggest improvements to the telecommunications infrastructure. Any inequities or inconsistencies in the availability of telecommunications services to any area of Northern Ireland will be brought to the attention of the appropriate agencies.”

Professor Parr says they plan to repeat the survey every six months  to assess what improvements, if any, have been made to the service.

“We want to get direct observations and feedback on the quality of the broadband or mobile service consumers are receiving and the impact this is having on their work or family life. For example how it affects their leisure and entertainment, children’s education, their workload, or ability to access new markets and customers.

“People living in border areas or along the coastline know how frustrating it can be not to get a consistently strong mobile signal.  A lot depends on your exact location, the type of handset you are using as much as the operator and the location of their base stations.  Poor mobile coverag can have much more serious and far reaching consequences, for example in a life or death situation when someone is trying to get in touch with the emergency services in a remote rural area.

 “The provision of broadband access and access to 3G+, WiFi and other wireless services in Northern Ireland have all improved but against this backdrop of significant investment, there are still areas within Northern Ireland where equity and speed of access to the Internet over fixed or wireless infrastructure is not on a par with other areas of the province or the UK.

Professor Parr continues: “A quarter of broadband customers in Northern Ireland get internet speeds of less than 2 M/bits / sec (Ofcom Communications Infrastructure Report- August 2011). The same report revealed that Belfast Internet users can expect a much faster broadband speed (8.9Mbits/sec) than customers in Fermanagh (4.3 Mbits/sec).

“Also, mobile users here generally suffer from poorer coverage when compared to the rest of the UK with just 54% of mobile phone users in Northern Ireland enjoying 3G coverage. The average across the UK is 95%” (Ofcom Communications Market Report – August 2011).

Furthermore, he says the issue of broadband performance has been compounded since the September 2011 ruling of the Advertising  Standards Authority which allows companies to advertise ‘up-to’ speeds if at least 10% of their customers can receive such services.

“This isn’t much good though if you’re part of the remaining 90% and it makes it very confusing for consumers on tight budgets who are trying to work out how to get the best available deal in the current economic climate.

To complete the survey go to https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/NI-Telecomms-Survey 

Notes to Editors

Northern Ireland has high availability of Superfast Broadband Services (that runs above 24Mbits/sec) but 23% of consumers in Northern Ireland are on average receiving less than 2Mbits/sec over their broadband connections

Average maximum speed available around Belfast is 8.9Mbits/sec compared to 5.7Mbits/sec in Coleraine, 4.3 Mbits/sec in Fermanagh, and 5.4 Mbits/sec in parts of County Down district.  (Ofcom Communications Infrastructure Report- August 2011″).

Mobile coverage in Northern Ireland remains lower than the rest of the UK.  87% of the population of Northern Ireland live in a postcode district with at least 90% 2G coverage; however the figure for 3G coverage is much lower at 54%. This is well below the UK average of 95%.” (Ofcom Communications Market Report – August 2011).

Survey Link:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/NI-Telecomms-Survey

Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) director Iain Lobban said on Monday that there was a “disturbing” volume of e-crime and attacks on government and industry systems, according to Reuters.

“I can attest to attempts to steal British ideas and designs — in the IT, technology, defence, engineering and energy sectors as well as other industries — to gain commercial advantage or to profit from secret knowledge of contractual arrangements,” Lobban wrote in a piece for The Times.

“We are also aware of similar techniques being employed to try to acquire sensitive information from British government computer systems, including one significant (but unsuccessful) attempt on the Foreign Office and other government departments this summer,” Lobban added.

Attacks on UK government systems are not new. A cyberattack in December last year succeeded in penetrating systems. Chancellor George Osborne said in May that hundreds of hacking attempts had been made on the Treasury between 2010 and 2011. In June, the defence secretary at the time, Liam Fox, added the MoD had blocked more than 1,000 potentially serious cyberattacks during 2010.

However, some have questioned how serious the majority of such attacks really are. In January, the London School of Economics’s Peter Sommer highlighted Lobban’s speech a year ago, in which the spy chief also said UK governmental websites were under persistent attack, and pointed out that GCHQ did not indicate a ratio of crude versus sophisticated attacks.

IBM and the Sustainable Energy Authority Ireland (SEAI) are working together to understand and minimise the environmental impact of converting wave energy into electricity.  

The project is claimed to be the first to utilise real-time streaming analytics for monitoring underwater noise generated by wave energy conversion devices and is a possible step towards ensuring the environmental sustainability of using this renewable energy resource.

The environmental impact of collecting renewable energy generated in the ocean is not fully understood. While underwater noise limits have been established by the European Union’s (EU’s) marine environmental policy, there are no established global standards for the noise impact of wave energy collection devices on the marine ecosystem and noise emissions from these devices have not been assessed.  

In an effort to get 4G in place quickly old 2G spectrum bands will be auctioned off in conjunction with the spectrum bands freed-up as the analogue TV system ends next October.  The auction is estimated to raise as much as €230 million, which coupled with the €9million Connecting Europe budget allocated to Ireland, is certainly a commitment that telecoms firms can’t ignore.  However, most say they will not guarantee their interest in investment until the auction of the wireless cables begins.

Other European countries like Germany, Spain and Italy have already begun the process of upgrading to 4G by holding spectrum auctions of their own.  Ireland hopes to hold the auctions by Easter 2012 and begin offering LTE services across the country by 2015. The upgrade will unite wireless users across the globe as Europe, the Americas and Asia are all using the LTE model.  Moreover in the past, with 3G, there were different standards and a lack of consistency which prevented it from taking hold.

What does this shift mean for Ireland?  It means that households and businesses alike will be able to access better internet regardless of their location or their provider.  The availability of 4G also means that Ireland’s reputation at the Internet Capital of Europe will grow as internet-based companies know they will be able to find consistently strong and reliable wireless speeds when they set up headquarters here.  There are a wealth of opportunities available to those who seek them in the near future and with LTE 4G networks in Ireland the possibilities are endless.

Northern Ireland broadband service criticised

By Mike McKimm BBC NI Environment & Science Correspondent

Northern Ireland has some of the lowest broadband speeds in the UK and also has the highest percentage of households running low-speed broadband.

It has also been revealed that Belfast internet users can expect a much faster broadband speed than a consumer in counties Fermanagh or Down.

Mobile phone users in NI suffer from a poorer coverage compared to the rest of the UK. Just 54% of mobile phone users here enjoy 3G coverage.

In the rest of the UK it is 95%.

The University of Ulster is urging broadband and mobile phone users in Northern Ireland to reveal how good their service really is and if they are happy with it.

Ofcom say Northern Ireland has the highest availability of super-fast broadband services (running above 24Mbits/sec) but the same report reveals that a quarter of consumers cannot even get a tenth of that speed.

The average speed in Belfast is 8.9Mbits/sec but it is just 4.3Mbits/sec in Fermanagh.

“The purpose of this survey is to identify the areas that are losing out, by gathering direct feedback and evidence from consumers through an internet-based survey,” said Gerard Parr, professor of telecommunications engineering at the university.

“We want to determine the broadband access rates and mobile phone signal coverage situation across the Province.

“We want to capture observations and feedback on the quality of the broadband or mobile service consumers are receiving and the impact this is having on their quality of life, for example: leisure, entertainment, daily work, job creation, accessing new markets, rural support or children’s education.”

JOHN COLLINS

Sat, Oct 29, 2011

IRELAND IS one of the best countries in the world to set up a technology company, according to Niklas Zennström, the Swedish businessman who founded internet phone service Skype.

There is no reason why Irish technology companies should relocate to another country to attract investment or grow their business, said Mr Zennström, who is considered Europe’s most successful internet entrepreneur.

In 2005, Skype was sold to eBay for $3.1 billion (€2.19 billion) and Mr Zennström was part of a consortium that subsequently bought the company back before selling it to Microsoft for $8.5 billion in cash earlier this year.

“There is no reason to leave Ireland,” said Mr Zennström, citing business-friendly laws and the availability of skilled workers as two of the reasons why so many international technology firms choose to locate their European headquarters here.

Mr Zennström made his remarks at the closing of the two-day Dublin Web Summit in the RDS yesterday, which was attended by more than 1,200 people.

The presentations yesterday focused on the new crop of technology startups in Europe and addressed issues such as the future of money and newspapers, the lack of women in senior positions in the technology industry and how charities are adapting to the digital world.

The biggest cheer was reserved for Fred Destin from US venture capital firm Atlas Ventures, when he said he was “on a mission to kill banks” with his investments.

Redeem Get, a Dublin startup, won the ESB Electric Ireland Spark of Genius competition.

The firm, which helps its customers manage deal-of-the-day offers through services like Groupon, won cash and services of €40,000 and will be offered a €100,000 investment from ACT.

About 30 of the speakers at the summit are attending the exclusive Founders conference at Dublin’s Mansion House. The group of 150 company founders, which includes the creative minds behind web giants such as YouTube, LinkedIn, Angry Birds and PayPal, was addressed by Taoiseach Enda Kenny yesterday.

Mr Kenny asked them to “consider Ireland when you are making decisions about locating new startups or growing existing ventures”. “In return, I’ll fill my iPad with your apps,” he joked.

© 2011 The Irish Times

“The usable optical fibre bandwidth available to the telecommunications network operators is becoming scarce and in order to meet the bandwidth demand, network operators must either lay new fibres, which are prohibitively expensive, or employ novel techniques to transmit more information in the available bandwidth,” explains Dr Frank Smith, chief technology officer of Pilot Photonics, which has patented a new technology that can do just this.

The company is a recent spin-out from Dublin City University and the Tyndall National Institute in Cork and its technology will allow major network operators, such as Cisco and Alcatel, to dramatically increase their throughput while reducing costs. These operators typically sell their services to organisations such as Eircom and BT.

“Our transceivers can squeeze over 10 times more information into an optical fibre than the transceivers deployed in the network today,” Smyth says. “Our approach, known as multicarrier optical communication, is unique and offers significant benefits over competitive products currently on the market. Rather than sending a single high-speed signal in each channel, it breaks the signal down into a number of slower signals which can then be overlapped and packed much more densely thereby minimising wasted bandwidth. Slower signals also suffer less from transmission impairments so our technique offers optimum performance over a wider range of operating conditions and avoids the cost explosion associated with compensating for transmission impairments.”

Pilot Photonics was incorporated in August last and expects to employ around 12 people when it is fully up and running. The company has received a €500,000 investment from Enterprise Ireland to help it develop its multicarrier transceiver technology and is now looking to raise €1 million to allow it to assemble a team of world-class experts to take the technology from the research lab to market.

© 2011 The Irish Times

The Smarter Cities Technology Centre at the IBM Technology Campus in Dublin represents an IDA Ireland-supported investment of up to €66m.

Think of how IBM has evolved, from when it first invented the meat cleaver, to the supercomputer, to how it challenged the US TV show Jeopardy this year. IBM won on the latter, of course, donating the proceeds to charity.

Via smart tech, specifically green tech, IBM is aiming to change the way we predict everything, from future natural disasters, to how we choose the ideal place to live to suit our personal needs – be it childcare, away from high-crime levels, to the towns with the best ethnic restaurants.
Smart tech by IBM

It has been a truly awful week for Ireland, one in which more rain fell on Monday in the north Leinster region (encompassing Dublin, parts of Kildare and Wicklow) than the average rainfall in October, and in which two people lost their lives due to the floods.

The smart tech IBM is pioneering, as part of its Smarter Cities portfolio, seems destined to help us predict natural disasters, such as extreme weather conditions, and help us prepare accordingly.

So, yesterday, Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Richard Bruton, TD, visited the new IBM R&D centre, which was formerly a manufacturing building, but which has been converted into a smart-tech hub, deploying lots of green-building features, such as natural light harvesting and smart tech to control room temperatures and ambient lighting.

It seemed to be a special day for Bruton, as he was the Minister for Industry and Commerce back in 1996 when IBM first announced the site in the Mulhuddart campus, just off the N3 and poised near Dunboyne.

Speaking yesterday to a packed auditorium filled with a selection of the brightest IBM minds, some of whom had travelled from places such as Germany, New York and North Carolina for a two-day Science of Cities conference, you could just sense the special affiliation Bruton has with IBM.

Incidentally, the Smarter Cities conference is looking at areas such as energy, water, transport, health, crime and education systems, and how to make cities better, and ultimately safer places to live, by being open and sharing knowledge capital.

Earlier, Bruton had walked around the room, admiring the smart technologies IBM is pioneering.

He started off by saying: “I was actually here when you first announced the site for Ireland.” Then he directed his attention to Dr John Kelly III, head of Research at IBM globally, who was sitting in the audience.

“John says he has the best job in the world … and he’s not far off!” Bruton then spoke about how IBM is really known for constantly reinventing itself.

He said that for Ireland, winning the IBM R&D Lab was a real coup, especially as Ireland is the first country in the European Union to get such an IBM lab.

Bruton then spoke about the way IBM has, over the years, played an instrumental role in transforming our lives, pointing to the “power” of its technologies.

He reflected on the tragedies that happened earlier this week due to the flooding, and said that he had evaluated how we now need to look at how we respond to such disasters, so as to prevent deaths and people losing their homes.

“How can we optimise the development of water, energy, power and transport?” asked Bruton.

He also said that R&D is all well and good but there has to be projects that can be commercialised so that people will experience the benefits.

In an interesting twist, he then spoke warmly about the late Dr Garret FitzGerald, a former Taoiseach, who Bruton said was so thorough in evaluating bus time tables, etc, being a statitician. He said FitzGerald would have gotten a measuring tape out to measure the turning point of the Luas to see if the axis was too tight … A lovely anecdote.
Role of IDA Ireland

IDA Ireland was also present at the event. The agency is working hard to attract FDI into Ireland, with companies such as Google, for instance, recently choosing to locate its new data centre in west Dublin. Twitter is also relocating its European headquarters in Dublin.

Bruton said he wanted to assure companies such as IBM (which first came to Ireland in 1954) how Ireland, and its new Government, really understands how we need to be at the forefront of technology and that the Government is committed to helping companies, such as IBM.

“It is sending a message to companies both here and abroad, that research and innovation are fundamental to our economic plan. If businesses have an innovative project that will build on our research strengths and create jobs, we’ll make it happen in Ireland.

“We want to be part of the re-invention that will take place at IBM over the next 100 years,” he said to applause.

Then Peter O’Neill, IBM in Ireland country manager, introduced us to Dr John Kelly III, who had travelled from the US specifically to visit the R&D lab during the Science of Cities Conference that concludes today.

Firstly, O’Neill said it was a long-held aspiration of the local IBM team in Ireland to establish such a centre in Dublin. And the global IBM team had listened to the Irish team …

He spoke about how Science Foundation Ireland, IDA Ireland and the universities are all helping to put Ireland to the forefront in terms of IT and knowledge capital.

O’Neill spoke about the Irish diaspora who were at the recent Global Irish Economic Forum, held in Dublin Castle, when thinkers pooled their minds to try come up with faster ways of pulling this country out of the recession faster via FDI and research, development and innovation (RDI).
‘The only R&D combined centre in the EU’

Kelly then took to the podium. As well as being head of Research at IBM, Kelly is senior vice-president and director of IBM Research.

“We’re opening a very special IBM centre,” he said. “It’s the only R&D combined centre in the EU. It’s very special.”

So why did IBM pick Dublin for this centre?

Kelly said it boils down to a couple of key factors:

1. Ireland has the very best in IT/tech talent

2. The City of Dublin management system is really opening up, with a desire to move the ball forward for smarter cities.

He also said IBM had, in November 2010, signed a five-year contract with Bank of Ireland to come up with new tech for the bank’s information of the future.

Kelly pointed to how IBM had acquired Q1 Labs, which has its analytics/intelligent development lab in Dublin.

“We are now acquiring companies that have a presence in Ireland.”

But, his most striking sentence had to be – “The world is now our lab.”

He elaborated: “We must collaborate and get out into the real cities of the world with problems. No single entity can solve these problems.”

Kelly spoke about how IBM is also advancing a new supercomputer that will be on the shelves by the end of this decade.

We need such computing power to predict these challenges (such as flooding).
100 years of IBM

Finally, he said IBM is unique as a tech company for having survived 100 years in business. “We carry out innovation and R&D. We reach out around the world. We find the best people and the best locations.”

The Smarter Cities Technology Centre has been operational since March 2010 and is continuing to recruit some of the top Irish and international research and development talent.

It has established world-class research programmes in transportation, sustainable energy, water management, and urban information management. The centre is playing a major role in the design and development of IBM’s first Smarter Cities Solutions product line.

“At IBM, R&D investment plays a critical role in the company’s strategy for growth,” said Kelly. ”Our new Ireland lab exemplifies IBM Research’s strategy of making the world our lab by focusing its mission on smarter cities and high-performance computing, working closely with leading scientists and engineers from academia, government, and commercial entities, and accelerating impact through the combination of research and development.”

Carmel Doyle

As with most quality Technology Consultancy’s, very rarely do you get easy projects and most of the time you’re fixing someone else’s botched job or at the least issuing a report about it.

Today’s issue is the Geovision Text Inserter, aka, GV-Data Capture V3e vs 3rd Party / 4th Party installed text inserter.

What is a Text Inserter?

Its a device that is used to display the information that is running inside a device like a Till or EPOS system and overlay it on the video.  This means you can see in real time what is going on in a video.  We have experience with text inserters and bank machines, tills, epos and waste management systems dating back a decade and sometimes referred to as;

• Cash Register Interface
• Video Overlay Device
• POS Inserter
• Text Inserter
• Data Capture Device

History

At some point a CCTV installation company install these 3rd Party text inserters inside a large night club, mainly due to suspected theft. They never fully worked after several attempts to remedy the problem by the CCTV installation company. We were tasked, being independent, to review and properly remedy this issue with the correct solution. Bottom line the client just wanted the system to work.

After assessment, we quickly realised these 3rd party text inserters were up to the task but not by the way they were installed but by incorrect cabling and over expectation of technology was the main cause.

We re-engineered the layout and presto all tests were successful.

We recommended as the recording systems were Geovision Systems and the POS/Tills were a mix of older and newer sharp systems that a better choice of technology would have been the GV-Data Capture V3e due to the sheer size of the night club and the demand on the current technology.

They will inevitably move to newer EPOS Systems and we don’t think the chosen 3rd Party text inserters will be up to the challenge, but we are sure we will find out. However having to replace them for a second time due to EPOS upgrades will certainly not be a cheap exercise and could have been avoided if the right technology was adapted for the application this is a failure we see time and time again. We call this type of technology JAW’s (just about work’s).

Being tasked by a client with a country to country server move isnt anything special for us sometime it can be a weekly occurrence so is nothing new for the Dee.ie team.

Dealing in Linux/PHP and Windows/.Net server technology for company applications & transfers, how hard could a Classic ASP move be? hummmmm

It’s in the detail, not to step on the “I hate Microsoft” bandwagon and start unloading our six shooter for Bill and crew doing nothing more than what we expect so let’s look at the issue at hand.

Current Server Details

• One server based in London running 2K3, iis6 and sql2008 on 32 bit, an archaic application service base.
• One Classic ASP application that just about works (JAW) linked to several 3rd party applications & incomplete coding and documentation.

Current Issues

• Speed plus server load going through the roof
• Timeouts galore, zero redundancy, zero backup, zero tolerance
• Company wide complains, productivity at all time low

New Server Details

Modern Server standard gigabit technology based on lossless connectivity running W28, iis 7.5, MsSql 2008 R2 running true 64 bit technology.

Now before you say anything (chill nerds) we already know!!!! OMG

Good news, is the move is now complete, tested and working, zero data loss and only a tiny itty bitty amount of down time like hardly measureable.

What we failed to mention is the web application is mission critical and the whole company depends on it to operate so any possible downtime had to be in non-essential times and have addressed failure & recovery points had to be readied at all times.

As with most things in life, including technical issues, you never stop learning, everyday is a school day. We had a badly created application on a badly setup server going against us from the start, our teams skillset really was tested on this move.

Our advice, if anyone out there is planning similar move, is to not do it. We will in future require any Classic ASP & MsSql application to be fully working before a move should take place. If we do this kind of move again we do it in a three phase step move in order to avoid the issues that cropped up on this server move.

Some issue we found;

• Classic ASP has been forgotten about by Microsoft it is only supported by charity
• Classic ASP and iis 7.5 just don’t want to play in the sandbox together, and when they do Classic ASP should be in tip top condition
• Permissions just aren’t the same from Windows NT days
• Check 3rd party applications are still being updated to 64 bit technology pre move
• Licensing Licensing Licensing!!!

Priceless Windows Resources

• iis.net
• technet.com
• msdn.com

Today a client reported to us that they received a call from a company that said they were from “Microsoft Error Reporting Division”

They said “we see you have sent numerous reports over the last few months and would like to ask you a few questions about them”.

The client obliged and they continued to ask one of the clients employees to open task manager on his PC and then open the “Performance Tab” were they go on to explain the reasons for the error reports being submitted saying its other software on your PC that isn’t working correctly and has broken security protocols within the windows environment.

Next this alleged Microsoft employee explained that he has to go to a website, to which point our clients employee refused and the caller explained of dire consequence for their whole network and PC’s if he didn’t. Continually refusing to follow any further instructions and explaining that they must contact their IT Support Administrator (www.dee.ie) and explain any issues to them were they will be able to do anything you ask.

The caller didn’t like this explained that he would have to put him on hold to get his supervisor. At which point the call was taken over by another man reiterating the first caller’s dire consequences. The employee explain to us that they simply wouldn’t take no for an answer. He continually cited us as the IT Support Administrator and soon the caller hung up.

Beware this is just a new variation to an old scam, don’t fall for it. Sales calls, Support calls, Emergency Services calls we have heard them all non-the-less follow the same common sense approach as you would when someone asks for bank account details.

Remember if your business is on our proactive support contacts we will know about any issue way before anyone else, and if you have any doubts what so ever ask them to contact us directly to which that will be the end of the conversation, we are here for you with everything technical.

We are more than happy to help protect our clients and will certainly act as a technical interpreter if there does happen to be a legitimate call, however we are still waiting on that legit call after all these years.

Bit more reading if you like
Mircosoft Development Network Security Tip

Today, we had a Sage Account Production dataset issue that was reported to us. We investigated and found that due to heavy showers there was a few power outages, the client had been working on the dataset at the time.

The dataset errored both on opening and reindexing of the dataset, its error logs were complaining about a database file having a corrupt header and missing index. The database file was adb.dbf there was no indexing issues on the drive so this was most probably just a power failure on write issue.

We tried to automagically repair the dataset but to no avail, so we decided that it’s best to bring in Sage Support at www.sage.co.uk/support as time was against us, this was a time sensitive support fix.

The Sage Account Productions Support operative was simlarly stuck as this issue wasn’t noted or supported in the sage archive so had to be exculated. We walked through the common support fixes (restart your computer) that we already tried and finally they requested that we send them the dataset, after getting all the NDA stuff sorted we emailed them the dataset to work on.

While they were working on the dataset from a Database Repair point of view, we decided to keep our own fixes moving forward by extracting a temporary shadow copy of the dataset from the networked PC ripping the header off and replacing it on the broken database file manually within the server. This work around worked perfectly, we then updated to the latest 2011 UK company master dataset and hay presto the magic of support was complete.

The client was able to finish the accounts without having to repost any data or even go to a loss of any data, downtime 1 hour and 45 minutes including callout.

Sage finally came back to us later in the day and said they too have a solution which might work and would forward us a backup of their repaired dataset the following day. Our arguement continues about information being open, support isn’t a black magic stunt it’s common sense and experience, if sage had made the required information openly available to us we wouldn’t have needed to involve them at all.

Yes apple and the Iphone, Yes Apple and the Ipod, Yes Apple and the Ipad all of which are subjective inventions steeped and controversy but what is often dismissed is the way in which Apple made things desirable. What can not be forgotten nor dismissed or overlooked is Apple and the mouse can someone scale how desirable of a product that became, is it at all possible?

Personally our thoughts are the genius was in the understanding what people needed and the magic of the legendary Apple was making people want it.

Anyhow no point in going over the same old ground hearing the same old wish wash, talking the points to death for now lets not only congratulate the successes of Steve Jobs but pay homage to his family whom lost a man that no doubt touched nearly everyone, how many people in history can say that?

To the Jobs Family sorry for your loss

Independent Information Technology consultants, or simply independent IT consultants, are in high demand around the world and Ireland is no different. Why should you consider the services of an Independent IT consultant and what can they do for your business?

First, though, a question: do you need an IT consultant? If you operate a business and run any sort of computer network, business application or critical system, the answer is yes because eventually you will need to expand or repair or support your business system, seek independent advice and a good consultant can help you achieve these goals.

An independent IT consultant performs a wide variety of jobs, ranging from regulatory compliance to auditing security procedures, overseeing technical specifications, expert reviews and analysis. Independent IT consultants will be able to tell you what needs to be done with your network to make it perform in the manner that you wish and they will be able to tell you what needs to be done to put the changes into effect.

Using the services of an IT consultant is in nearly every case a wise investment because they will not only be able to identify critical deficiencies which would be less costly to repair prior to an incident than after. They will also be able to help you operate your network in a more efficient manner, plan for future growth or cost cutting, saving you money in terms of labour costs and operating costs and total cost of ownership.

As a result of the duties an independent IT consultant is expected to perform they must be quite well educated and experienced in both Information Technology and Computer Sciences. When choosing an IT consultant, ensure that you query them as to their educational background and modern experience. By doing this, you can retain an IT consultant who not only has practical indepth experience but also the educational background necessary to perform their duties beyond expectation.

It is important to understand that sometimes IT consultancy projects fail, not always owing to the consultant. Sometimes, projects fail because the client doesn’t understand the costs involved or for other reasons. Consider the case of the State of Washington, in America. In 1997, they spent $40 million on an IT project intended to carry out drivers’ license and vehicle registration transactions. The project had to be terminated because they, by their own admission, got caught up in the allure of technology instead of practicality. Independent IT consultants should at all times remain focused on being independent and suited to the projects at hand in a fully independent manor.

American retailer Kmart Corp. was forced to write off $130 million after a failed attempt to merge its various systems at the store level, all in an effort to compete with Wal-Mart. Four months after abandoning the project, Kmart filed for bankruptcy.

Don’t let the failed IT projects scare you, but do let them serve as a warning. When retaining an IT consultant and embarking on a project, ensure that you have the money and the ability to follow through. An IT consultant should be able to assist with this during the initial consultation phase, show you viability in the planning stages and negotiate, not only the best prices and terms possible but work closely with legal to ensure correct protective procedures are in place to protect their clients position so that if you will be unable to finish the project, you’ll know prior to investing copious amounts of money.

An IT consultant is invaluable, and researching potential consultants will serve you well in the end. Do your due diligence and check references. By doing this, you’ll be matched with a consultant who will help you meet your IT goals.

The investment will go into new equipment, research and development, infrastructure and IT systems that should enable the factory to cement its position as a leader in the production of read-write heads for hard drives.

“This investment will allow our Springtown factory to remain at the forefront of the technology and efficiency battle that is waged in the disc drive industry,” said John Spangler, vice president at Springtown.

The Northern Ireland factory started production in 1994 and employs about 1,300 people from across Europe.

Seagate announced in April that it had shipped its billionth disc drive. “It took Seagate 29 years to ship its first billion drives but we expect to ship our second billion within the next five years,” said Spangler.

“There is a massive amount of digital content being created in the home, in the office and in many other markets today and most of this content is stored on hard drives. This proliferation will continue to fuel hard drive demand into the future.”

However, the growing take up of solid state hard drives has led some to question Seagate’s focus on read-write heads, which are used exclusively in traditional hard drives.

Ian O’Leary, corporate communications director at Seagate, told vnunet.com that, although solid state drives are gaining momentum, “even the analysts predict they will only be a relatively small part of the market for years to come”.

“We see spinning drives as the biggest segment of the storage market for years to come, but we will provide whatever suits our customers, be it spinning discs, solid state or a hybrid of the two,” he said.

www.3v.co.uk

The Expert Group on Future Skills Needs (EGFSN) published its annual review of employment trends in Ireland on Wednesday.

It showed that, despite rising unemployment and diminished job opportunities in most segments of the Irish labour market, skills shortages continue to exist in IT, healthcare and engineering.

“It is critical that we maintain our focus on ensuring that our labour force is equipped with the skills for current and future jobs,” said Ireland’s minister for training and skills, Ciarán Cannon.

Meanwhile, EGFSN chairwoman Una Halligan said that education and training providers need to continuously align their programmes with the future skills needs of the enterprise.

Halligan added that Ireland needs more initiatives like ‘Springboard’, which provides opportunities for people who are currently unemployed to gain skills in areas such as IT where there are current or future job opportunities.

The EGFSN said that the IT professionals in greatest demand are senior software developers, network engineers and project managers.

Many IT workers continue to be sourced from abroad, although the number of new employment permits issued to those not from the European Economic Area has been declining since 2007, the report found.

The skills shortage is a problem for the growing number of IT companies setting up bases in cities such as Cork and Dublin.

Google recently admitted to difficulties in finding graduates with enough maths and science skills to work at its European headquarters in Dublin.

The problem was raised by Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt at a meeting with the Irish cabinet last week, at which he reportedly said that Ireland needs to ease visa restrictions to allow more foreigners to take up positions at the firm.

Google has since refused to give V3.co.uk more details on the skills shortages Schmidt reportedly highlighted.

IBM, which has multiple bases in Ireland, also declined to comment.

However, EMC Ireland country manager Jason Ward said that he has noted a shortage of maths and science skills among graduates.

“There are not enough computer engineer and computer science graduates coming through the university system,” he told V3.co.uk.

“Even in primary school there has not been enough focus on maths and science subjects, although this is now starting to change as schools can no longer ignore Ireland’s transition to a high-tech economy.”

He added that the country’s new government has also recognised the skills shortage and is working closely with various industry players.

“Since EMC is one company that is based in Ireland for the long haul, we have a key interest in ensuring there are the right skills in Ireland,” said Ward.

He pointed to how EMC has partnered with the Cork Institute of Technology (CIT) to create a cloud computing degree for IT graduates.

Michael Loftus, head of the Faculty of Engineering and Science at CIT, said that the drop in IT graduates had occurred in the dot-com bust in 2001, but believes Ireland is now on the path to recovery.

“There have been challenges, but Ireland is in a good place to meet those challenges,” he said. “This is because of the nature of the education sector.”

Ireland has seven universities running Computer Science degrees and 14 Institutes of Technology focused on providing IT graduates with more niche skills, such as cloud computing or software development.

www.v3.co.uk

We thought we would discuss a modern web development question. Which is best, the new Google + or the old Facebook likes.

Social networking is a big deal. Facebook proved this when it ascended to the second most viewed site on the Internet in a mere seven years. In light of Facebook’s success, it’s hardly surprising that the most important player on the Internet, i.e., Google, has decided to venture into the social networking market by launching Google+. This isn’t the first time that Google has attempted this feat: its social network “Orkut” was launched in 2004, but the network never really gained a foothold among users in Europe. Based on the initial reception of Google+, however, it appears that Google has a good chance of succeeding this time around.

Let’s begin by considering the similarities between these two systems. First, in terms of their technical abilities, both are fully capable of operating as robust mediums for social networking. If your only reason for joining a social networking site is to connect with your friends and family, you will probably be equally happy with either system. Second, in terms of usability, both are reasonably intuitive. Granted, there are some minor differences—for example, Google+ uses a drag and drop system for grouping friends, whereas Facebook uses check boxes. Nevertheless, I think that even non-technical users will find either system easy to navigate. Third, both platforms are modern and aesthetically pleasing. In sum, both Facebook and Google+ fulfill the basic needs of social network users.

However, despite the many similarities, let’s be honest: social networking is not the only thing that we have come to expect from social networking sites. We also care about applications. The Facebook game “FarmVille,” for example, has over 80 million users. Google+ currently lacks the thousands of popular applications supported by Facebook. FarmVille players will be disappointed to learn that their game has not yet invaded Google+. (On the other hand, non-players may be happy to learn that they will not be invaded by dozens of FarmVille invitations). Users expect applications. Until Google is able to better fill this need, users may be hesitant to leave Facebook.

With that said, it is important to note Google offers many other services to its users. For example, although I do not personally sign into Facebook every day, I do log into my Gmail account on a daily basis. As Google+ is directly integrated with my email service, I am probably more likely to see Google+ notifications than Facebook updates. Similarly, although I do not visit my Facebook profile every day, I do check the performance of my portfolio on Google Finance on a daily basis. If I see a Google+ notification while I’m checking my portfolio, I will probably be tempted to visit Google+. Google offers dozens of other services, as well: Google Scholar, Google Reader, Google Maps, Google Earth, Google Analytics, etc. If Google+ notifications appear in each of these services, I will find it pretty difficult to resist checking on my social network.

Social networking will undoubtedly continue to expand. Will Google+ be able to supplant Facebook’s reign? In my opinion, we believe that social networking as with most sites do change and if site owners/director don’t keep their beady eye on the ball, the virtual dust bin awaits them. Will Google+ prove more successful than Orkut? I’m optimistic. Google+ has many obstacles to overcome, not the least of which is that most people are already using Facebook. Nevertheless, its integrating of a lot of important Google services may eventually allow it to become a viable contender in the social networking market. Don’t close your Facebook accounts just yet, but don’t be surprised if someone asks you in the near future, “Why can’t I find you on google plus.”

Article by www.dee.ie, a Derry-based IT Support, Web Development, and Technology Consultancy company.