Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror

Submission + - NIST Investigating Mass Flash Drive Vulnerability (computerworld.com)

Lucas123 writes: A number of leading manufactures of encrypted flash drives have warned their customers of a security flaw uncovered by a German company. The devices in question use the AES 256-bit encryption algorithm and have been certified using the FIPS 140-2, but the flaw appears to circumvent the certification process by uncovering the password authentication code on host systems. The National Institute of Standards and Technology said it's investigating whether it needs to modify its standards to include password authentication software on host systems. Security specialist Bruce Schneier was blunt in his characterization of the flaw: "It's a stupid crypto mistake and they screwed up and they should be rightfully embarrassed for making it."

Submission + - Acer Recalls 22,000 Notebooks Due to Burn Hazard (aviransplace.com)

An anonymous reader writes: The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, in cooperation with Acer, today announced a voluntary recall of 22,000 Notebook computers. Acer has received three reports of computers short circuiting, resulting in slight melting of the external casing. No incidents occurred in the United States. No injuries have been reported.
Transportation

Honda Makes Motorcycle Talk To Oncoming Cars 146

An anonymous reader writes "The system generates warnings to riders and drivers of other vehicles by continuous exchange of positioning data from satellite GPS sources. This is particularly relevant as road users approach intersections, alerting them to other vehicles that are potentially on a collision course, allowing avoidance manoeuvres."
Google

Submission + - Android comes with a kill-switch (theregister.co.uk)

Aviran writes: "The search giant is retaining the right to delete applications from Android handsets on a whim.
Unlike Apple, the company has made no attempt to hide its intentions, and includes the details in the Android Market terms and conditions, as spotted by Computer World:
"Google may discover a product that violates the developer distribution agreement ... in such an instance, Google retains the right to remotely remove those applications from your device at its sole discretion.""

Programming

Submission + - Only 4.13% of the web is standards-compliant (arstechnica.com)

Death Metal writes: "Browser maker Opera has published the early results of an ongoing study that aims to provide insight into the structure of Internet content. To conduct this research project, Opera created the Metadata Analysis and Mining Application (MAMA), a tool that crawls the web and indexes the markup and scripting data from approximately 3.5 million pages."
Government

Submission + - Joe Biden's pro-RIAA, pro-FBI tech voting record

Aviran writes: "By choosing Joe Biden as their vice presidential candidate, the Democrats have selected a politician with a mixed record on technology who has spent most of his Senate career allied with the FBI and copyright holders, who ranks toward the bottom of CNET's Technology Voters' Guide, and whose anti-privacy legislation was actually responsible for the creation of PGP."
The Military

Submission + - Scientists closer to invisibility cloak

Aviran writes: "Scientists say they are a step closer to developing materials that could render people and objects invisible. Researchers have demonstrated for the first time they were able to cloak three-dimensional objects using artificially engineered materials that redirect light around the objects. Previously, they only have been able to cloak very thin two-dimensional objects"
Security

Submission + - Compressed VoIP leaves eavesdropping clues (theregister.co.uk)

Aviran writes: "Eavesdroppers might be able to gain clues about the content of encrypted conversations even without breaking the cryptography.Boffins from John Hopkins University in Baltimore, USA have found that the relative size of packets in a VoIP conversation might be used to detect whether words or phrases of interest appear in encrypted conversations. The result might yield a transcript even more unintelligible than from comedian Norman Collier's faulty microphone routine — which might still be a useful result. Even though the approach is not sophisticated enough to come anywhere near gaining the actual gist of conversations it is be good enough to pick out chosen phrases within encrypted data. By using machine learning techniques the researchers were able to develop systems that "inferred 'hidden' information from encrypted VoIP traffic streams based on observable patterns in packet size and timing of various protocols"."
OS X

Submission + - Java 6 available on OSX thanks to port of OpenJDK (bikemonkey.org)

LarsWestergren writes: Many Mac users have been upset that Apple has not made Java 6 available on the platform. Landon Fuller posts that there is a developer preview release available of Java JDK6 on Mac OSX, Tiger and Leopard. It is based on the BSD port of Sun's Java 6 and is made available under the Java Research License. Charles Nutter posts about impressive JRuby performance gains using Java 6 on his Mac.

Slashdot Top Deals

To downgrade the human mind is bad theology. - C. K. Chesterton

Working...