Ameritrade breach will spark spam deluge

Ameritrade has admitted that its security has been breached and the contact information of 6.3 million of its customers stolen.

Now many of these users of the online brokerage can expect a storm of spam emails, according to the security software company Sophos. Customers of Ameritrade were assured by the outfit that their confidential details, such as social security numbers and bank account numbers were not exposed when the security lapse occurred.

However, it has already apologized for the spam emails that will result. Graham Cluley, a technology consultant at Sophos, said: "Hackers are now in possession of 6.3 million email addresses for people that they know are interested in trading shares.

"This knowledge alone could spur the creation of highly targeted spam emails, such as 'pump and dump' campaigns which offer bogus share tips to artificially boost stock prices." Ameritrade is one of the largest online brokerages in the world.

Apple iPhone hits O2 in the UK on November 9th

by Paul Miller

Ending months of intense, practically insane speculation, Apple just confirmed its first European carrier for the iPhone: O2 is scoring exclusive UK rights to the hotly contested device, and will be launching it on November 9th for £269 including VAT. Unlimited data comes standard with the £35, £45 and £55 voice plans, which include 200, 600 and 1200 minutes, respectively, and 200 SMS for the cheapest plan, but 500 messages for the other two. Just like the rumors (finally) predicted, Carphone Warehouse is being pulled in to beef up retail presence for O2, with 1300 retail locations, each with an "expert" on the iPhone. Naturally, Apple's not doing anything fancy here, and is announcing the same old EDGE phone we know and love here in the States -- shattering the 2007 3G pipe dreams of millions of Europeans -- but has made up for it slightly by scoring free WiFi for O2 iPhone users at the 7,500 hotspots serviced by Cloud in the UK. Those hotspots will certainly come in handy when trapesing through O2's EDGE-deficient network -- only 30% of the country will be covered by launch time. Of course, if you aren't keen on Visual Voicemail or Apple's blessing, there are certainly plenty of unlocked iPhones to be had between now and launch.

FCC: Cable Must Carry Local Analog Signal for Three Years—and HD Forever

Late Tuesday the FCC ordered cable operators to provide HD signals of local broadcasters after the end of analog broadcasts in February 2009.

The unanimous commission also ordered that for three years after the analog shutoff, cable operators with analog subscribers would have to continue to provide analog signals by downconverting broadcasters’ DTV signals.

The commission did not go as far as requiring cablers to pass through every digital bit broadcasters provide.

Both NAB and the National Cable and Telecommunications Association praised the ruling, with NCTA calling the ruling the cable industry’s plan.

But not all NCTA members share that upbeat outlook. Comcast, for example, had told the FCC that forcing cable to carry both digital and analog channels would be “indefensible” and unconstitutional.

But NCTA President and CEO Kyle McSlarrow downplayed the dissent, saying that Comcast was a leader in aggressively asserting legal principles shared by the entire industry. Comcast Senior Director spokeswoman Sena Fitzmaurice declined to comment on the decision or whether Comcast would take it to court, saying only that the NCTA comments spoke for the company.

Small cable operators—those with less than 552 MHz capacity—got sympathy from some commissioners, but all they got in the order was a chance to apply for waivers to the new requirements. Democrat commissioner Jonathan Adelstein said the requirements could inhibit the rollout of other services, such as broadband Internet access, in smaller and rural communities. He also said the smaller systems should have received a blanket waiver instead of having to enlist Washington lawyers and apply for individual exemptions.

The American Cable Association said some of its members could shell out more then $150,000 in equipment to carry the multiple formats. The ruling will slow rural broadband rollout and, and some very small operators could be forced out of business, ACA said in a statement.

The order also calls for more comment on some carriage issues, including the specifics of how cable should handle or convert between 16:9 and 4:3 pictures, and how to further address the concerns of small cable operators.

Also late Tuesday, the commission ruled to extend, for another five years, the ban on exclusive programming contracts between cable operators and programmers with whom they are vertically integrated. The ban is designed to ensure that cable operators have access to programming owned by other cable companies or their owners. The commission gave a five-year extension to the ban in 2002 and will decide again in 2012 whether to let it sunset.

Does VoIP Make It Easier For Scammers?

By, Deb Shinder

If you’re considering switching from the traditional public switched telephone network (PSTN) service to VoIP, you might be wondering whether the change will make you more vulnerable to scammers, help protect you from common scams, or not make much difference at all.

Con games are about as old as human history; there will always be people around who attempt to use deception to persuade others to do something — often, to give them money or something else of value. In today’s electronic world, that something else may be passwords used to access various accounts at financial institutions, etc., or it might be credit card numbers and similar information used to obtain goods and charge them to someone else.

Most jurisdictions have fairly broad laws against fraud that cover both in-person and online scams, and many are now enacting legislation to deal specifically with the types of fraudulent schemes commonly perpehttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.giftrated over the Internet. How much of a threat is VoIP? Let’s take a look. Click here for the entire story.

Internet Privacy Urged By Google

The Internet search engine giant Google has told the UN that it should help guard the privacy of internet users by setting up global regulations.

Google's privacy chief, Peter Fleischer, told the Guardian that unless universal privacy restraints are set up, people will lose faith in the internet and its development will be adversely affected. Mr. Fleischer is due to address a conference of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) in Strasbourg later today. He is to request that Unesco push for internet privacy standards that span the globe.

He told the paper: "Three-quarters of the countries in the world have no privacy regimes at all and among those that do have laws, many of them were largely adopted before the rise of the internet. "It's said that every time you use a credit card, your details are passed through six different countries."

Meanwhile, Google has announced that it is to sponsor the Lunar X prize, which will award £30 million for landing unmanned machines on the moon and making them carry out specific tasks.

New worm hits Skype

A new worm has hit the internet and is being delivered in the form of an instant message on the popular internet phone service Skype.

The worm accesses the host PC by utilizing Skype's application programming interface and then deactivates any security software before proceeding to mail itself to people on the victim's Skype list. It then starts accessing any passwords or personal information on the infected computer.

The instant-message chat invitation the worm is concealed in, reads: "Hey, where I put ur photo ;-) now u populr. oops sorry please dont look there. look what crazy photo Tiffany sent me, looks cool." Finnish security software company F-Secure has dubbed the worm W32/Skipi.A. Symantec meanwhile is calling it W32.Pykspa.D.

The company claims that the worm is one of a new family called Pykspa which have been surfacing recently in various forms on the internet. On August 16th this year the Skype network went down for the first time, due to millions of users rebooting their PCs at the same time following a Microsoft security update.

MySpace plans TV show over the web

The popular social networking site MySpace is to broadcast a TV show over the internet, it has been announced.

My So-Called Life creators Ed Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz have been signed up for the show, which is to be called Quarterlife. Episodes of the show will be broadcast on the site MySpaceTV. Quarterlife will feature a group of people in their mid-20s.

Chris DeWolfe, chief executive of MySpace, said: "When Emmy award-winning producers come to MySpaceTV - you know this is reaching a whole new level.
"We're proud to offer the creative community a blank canvas and open platform to express their vision." The first episode of Quarterlife is to be shown on November 11th. Mr Berman continued by saying that the creative duo behind the show, Mr Zwick and Mr Herskovitz, were "delighted". Mr Zwick and Mr Herskovitz were also behind blockbusters like The Last Samurai and Blood Diamond.

Today's Hottest Musical Talent Perform Exclusively for 5,000 Volunteers

Boost Mobile RockCorps, the national youth volunteerism movement that since 2005 has motivated more than 25,000 young people in over 13 cities across the country to get
involved and help their community, will execute approximately 60 volunteer projects in New York from now until October 6. The unprecedented program gives local youth an opportunity to earn tickets to an exclusive concert event in exchange for volunteering four hours of community service.

This year, 5,000 community-conscious youth across New York and surrounding areas will earn tickets to a signature BMRC show at Radio City Music Hall which will feature some of the hottest names in hip-hop, R&B and rock. Grammy Award winning artist Ludacris, Busta Rhymes and The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus will be part of the stellar line-up of today's top-selling musical talent to take the stage at the New York show on October 6.

RockCorps, an organization harnessing the power of music to inspire volunteerism, and Boost Mobile, a wireless telecommunications brand dedicated to boosting the lives of today's youth, have partnered to continue the youth movement for social change. Combining the power of music, community and volunteerism, Boost Mobile RockCorps will offer entrance to this summer's most popular concerts for which the only way in is to earn tickets by contributing four hours of volunteer service.

This year's volunteers will work on a range of service projects, in partnership with local non-profit organizations, including school and playground renovations, environmental initiatives, food distribution and much more. New York City will mark the conclusion of the 2007 BMRC U.S. Tour -- which also visited Los Angeles, Oakland, Miami, Atlanta, Baltimore, New Orleans, Houston, Chicago, Portland, and Philadelphia. By the end of the 2007 tour, BMRC volunteers will have contributed more than 100,000
hours of community service and transformed hundreds of project sites in cities across the country.

People interested in participating at upcoming BMRC events are encouraged to log onto http://www.boostmobilerockcorps.com and to register for membership. Boost Mobile RockCorps members will be notified of opportunities in their area to volunteer and asked to commit four hours to a specific event or ongoing cause.

Iceman Put On Ice

A cyber criminal who went by the moniker Iceman has been indicted by a grand jury in Pittsburgh on wire fraud and transferring stolen information.

San Francisco-based Mark Ray Butler, 35, was a prolific identity thief and specialized in stolen credit card numbers, according to the authorities. Now he faces as long as 40 years in prison and fine of $1.5 million. It took a 16-month investigation by the US Secret Service to gather enough evidence against Butler.

Margaret Philbin, spokeswoman for US Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan of Pittsburgh, told the Associated Press that the identity thief was transported to Pittsburgh to be tried as he had sold over 100 credit card numbers to a resident of Pennsylvania. The man cooperated with law enforcement on the case which is why Butler was indicted in a Pittsburgh court. Another witness said that Butler used to routinely hack into institutions like the Pentagon Federal Credit Union and Citibank.

Butler also used to use the aliases of Darkest, Digits and Aphex.

Microsoft to release four patches

In its monthly security update, Microsoft is to release four patches later today, the company has announced.

Only one of the patches has been labeled "critical", the highest security rating for a Microsoft patch. Three other patches have been deemed "important" by Microsoft. One of these is designed to remedy a privilege escalation bug for Unix applications.

The other two patches are for Visual Studio and MSN Messenger, to fix weaknesses that could possibly allow remote code execution. Microsoft has not been specific about what the fourth, critical patch pertains to, though it is a part of Windows 2000 SP 4. Neither Windows or Vista are affected however, Microsoft has claimed. The company was to have released five patches today, but will now only release four.

Eric Schultze, a security architect at Shavlik, told SCMagazineUS.com: "[The revision] means it hasn't passed their testing. There is a beta patch test group that will do all of the testing of the security patches about five weeks before they're to be released." September's release will contain the fewest patches of those in the last several months.