Pc News

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Microsoft Finally Reissues Botched IE Patch

Two days later than expected, Microsoft has reissued a critical security update for its Internet Explorer browser.

The reissued patch is important because it "fully resolves" a serious security bug Microsoft introduced with the original update, released August 8.

Microsoft acknowledges that there were problems with its update soon after it was issued. Web sites that used HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol) 1.1 compression to speed up the downloading of images could cause the browser to fail, and users of Web-based applications such as PeopleSoft, Siebel, and Sage CRM had problems with the software.

The issue does not affect users of Microsoft's latest Service Pack 2 version of Windows XP, but users of Internet Explorer 6 Service Pack 1 on Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 and Windows XP Service Pack 1 are affected, Microsoft says.

Coming Through Auto Update
Last week, Microsoft released a "hotfix" download that addressed these problems, but the software vendor also decided to take the unusual step of announcing that it would rerelease the entire update (called MS06-042). This would ensure that subscribers to Microsoft's automatic update services would receive the fixed patch.

That update had been slated for release on August 22, but it was ultimately delayed because of an "issue discovered in final testing," Microsoft says.

Just as Microsoft was announcing this delay, security researchers at eEye Digital Security disclosed the security issue, saying that Microsoft's August 8 update had actually created a new IE bug that attackers could exploit to run unauthorized software on a PC.

Though no attacks exploiting this bug have been reported, eEye believes that the issue is critical.

"The bad guys basically know about this and know that it's an exploitable scenario," eEye's chief hacking officer Marc Maiffret said Tuesday.

Microsoft has published a security advisory on this issue.

While Microsoft's introducing bugs in its security updates is not uncommon, it is unusual for the company to give guidance on when it plans to fix such bugs, says Russ Cooper, senior information security analyst for Cybertrust.

It is also unusual for security firms like eEye to then investigate the bugs for security problems and disclose their existence before Microsoft has patched the problem, he adds. "They should have reported ... this issue to Microsoft first, and only," he says. "And then waited for Microsoft to release a fix."

Microsoft has posted additional details on the newly rereleased MS06-042 security update.

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Logitech's New Mice Offer Speedier Searches

Logitech today announced new mice that it claims will ease Web searches and navigation of content on a PC.

The wireless MX Revolution and VX Revolution laser mice include an automatic Web search button, and a wheel that can navigate down hundreds of pages in seven seconds, according to the company.

After flicking the MicroGear Precision Scroll Wheel, the wheel spins continuously for seven seconds, scrolling down hundreds of pages in a Web page, spreadsheet, or word processing document, said Kate Brinks, a Logitech spokeswoman.

The free-spinning wheel makes it easier for users to navigate through long documents or data lists. "Even in a three-page document, [the mouse] reduces the repetitive motion of scrolling down. I use it a lot in my e-mail inbox," Brinks said. The wheel can switch between the free-spin and the conventional scroll mode.

Web Search Tools
Located under the scroll wheel is the One-Touch Search button, which brings up Web search results for a highlighted word or phrase with just a single click. After highlighting a term in a spreadsheet or document, clicking the search button opens a Web browser with Yahoo, Google, or Yahoo LiveWords search results for the term. Logitech's SetPoint software needs to be installed for this button to work, Brinks said. Users can highlight terms for Web search in any software.

The $100 MX Revolution, targeted at desktop users, also has a thumb wheel that collaborates with the MicroGear Precision Scroll Wheel to zoom into pictures, Logitech said. It also has seven customizable buttons to run program macros.

The smaller $80 Logitech VX Revolution is targeted at laptop users and operates on a single AA battery.

Both come with a USB micro-receiver that wirelessly connects the mice to a PC up to 30 feet away.

The mice work on Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Mac OS X PCs. They will become available on Friday, according to the company.

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Hackers Hunt for Unpatched Windows PCs

Hackers are actively using exploit code to target a flaw in Microsoft's software that generated a special warning from the U.S. government last week.

The problem concerns a networking function called Windows Server services within the Windows OS, used for file sharing and printing.

Microsoft issued a patch, MS06-040, for the problem on August 8, which affected several Microsoft operating systems. Security experts warned then that exploit code had been detected and could be used more widely.

However, the latest exploit code only affects users running Windows 2000 who have not applied the patch, Microsoft said. The impact so far from the malware, which the company calls "Win32/Graweg," has been low, the company said.

"We are not currently aware of widespread customer impact," Microsoft said Sunday.

The SANS Institute reported on Sunday other names given to the malware by security vendors. Symantec calls it "W32.Wargbot" while TrendMicro has named it "Worm****CBOT.JK and JL." McAfee goes by "IRC.Mocbot" and F-Secure refers to the malware as "IRCBOT-ST."

Remote Control
The malware is a "bot," a class of malicious code that allows a hacker to take remote control over a computer. The malware appears to be a version of one called "Mocbot," which first appeared in late 2005, according to Lurhq, a security company. Both SANS and Lurhq said two similar versions of the bot are circulating.

Once on an infected machine, the bot contacts remote servers in China over IRC, Lurhq said.

"Historically Chinese ISPs and government entities have been less-than-cooperative in taking action against malware hosted and controlled from within their networks," Lurhq said in an advisory.

The bot is capable of several malicious functions, Lurhq said. It can send messages through a user's AOL Instant Messenger account, an activity that could be used to trick other users into downloading the bot. It's also possible to use the bot to launch a distributed denial-of-service attack, Lurhq said.

The bot could also spread itself to other computers on a network, giving it worm-like characteristics. Microsoft, however, said the exploit code does not appear to be self-replicating at this point.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security highlighted the MS06-040 vulnerability a day after Microsoft issued a patch, saying it "could impact government systems, private industry, and critical infrastructure, as well as individual and home users."

Microsoft issued a total of 12 fixes this month on what's known as "Patch Tuesday."

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Windows Live Spaces Launch Beset With Problems

Microsoft's highly anticipated upgrade of its MSN Spaces blogging and social networking service has run into significant and unforeseen performance problems.

Microsoft began rolling out the "next generation" version of the service, dubbed Windows Live Spaces, on Tuesday night, but things got quite bumpy along the way.

For more than 12 hours, pages loaded extremely slowly at best, and at worst they didn't render properly at all, according to a message posted late Wednesday by Microsoft on the official MSN Spaces blog.

"We know we disappointed a bunch of you with the issues we had in our rollout last night," the message reads. "We planned long and hard for this release and unfortunately it was one of those gotchas that only showed up once we were in production."

User Complaints
Microsoft has been working hard to fix the problems and has solved some of them, according to the posting. Still, in angry comments to the posting, exasperated users continue to report a variety of design and performance problems. A common request from them is for Microsoft to roll back the upgrade until all the problems are taken care of.

Microsoft didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

MSN Spaces is one of the most successful online services launched by Microsoft in recent years, and its popularity has been a great source of pride for the company, which is otherwise fighting a losing battle against Google in the search engine market.

About 40 million people have set up MSN Spaces blogs, and the network receives about 120 million unique users per month, Karin Muskopf, an MSN product manager, said in June.

The Windows Live Spaces upgrade gives the service an extended social-networking functionality that is a clear attempt to provide features made popular by MySpace. The upgrade is also designed to make it easier for people to customize their blogs through support for Microsoft Gadgets. These are lightweight applications that can extend the functionality of larger desktop and Web-based applications.

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First Tests: Fast 32GB Flash Hard Drive

Are you ready for laptop storage with no moving parts to spin up, break, drain your battery, add weight, or make noise? That's what you get with Samsung's new 32GB SSD (Solid State Drive). Built using NAND flash memory, the SSD is the first consumer unit with enough capacity to compete against standard notebook drives; 32GB may not satisfy multimedia addicts, but it's plenty for average business users.

We looked at a preproduction model to see how it fared against 5400-rpm Seagate drives using the latest perpendicular recording technology or traditional longitudinal recording. The SSD found files more than twice as fast, and accelerated boot-up. Its cumulative speed advantage over the other two drives was an impressive 25 percent, though it was slower on two tests that involved accessing the drive many times rather than performing longer sequential reads and writes.


Shipping now, the 32GB and 16GB drives will initially be sold to equipment makers only. Given flash memory costs (approximately $63 per 4GB chip module at press time), it will be a while before an SSD matches the cost per gigabyte of a standard notebook drive, which is typically less than $2 per GB. Samsung already includes the drive in its Japan-only Q30 subnotebook; the company is in discussions with U.S. vendors to bring SSD laptops and portable devices here.

Though the SSD's price is high, its silent operation, light weight, incredible shock resistance, and low level of power consumption bolster its appeal. Our unit weighed just 1.6 ounces, compared to 3.5 ounces for a typical 2.5-inch drive; 1.8-inch SSDs weigh even less. Its shock rating is a whopping 1500G--it can withstand most shocks short of being fired out of a howitzer--far higher than a standard drive's 200G to 300G rating. And it draws a tiny 0.5 watt of power while active and 0.1 watt at idle, far less than common drives.

But don't expect huge battery-life savings. On our system-level test, we saw a boost of about 9 percent in battery life for the test unit when configured with the SSD as opposed to with the Seagate Momentus 5400.3 (4 hours, 25 minutes versus 4 hours, 3 minutes).

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Social Atlas Sites Let You Map Your Life

No plain-vanilla mapping site knows your favorite haunts as well as you do. New online services tap that information by enabling you to share your knowledge and memories of your most beloved locales--in your hometown or on the other side of the globe--with the rest of the world. I looked at five of these services: Flagr, 43 Places, Platial, Plazes, and Wayfaring.

Built on conventional mapping data from services such as Google Maps, these sites let you add digital pushpins that link to personal descriptions of the locations. While any visitor can peruse the contributions of others on these sites, typically you must register in order to add content. But don't worry about having to provide credit card info: All five sites are free, requiring only that you submit a valid e\0x2011mail address. (Note, however, that Plazes is still in beta form, and that 43 Places may eventually charge a fee.)

Looking for New York City's best street art? Want to follow the virtual footsteps of Jack Bauer, protagonist of the TV show 24? Wayfaring Media's Wayfaring has directions for both. Users can also post comments on other users' maps.

Though most contributors offer a lighthearted look at their locations, some at Platial tell dark tales, such as those tied to locations of recent shark attacks. The site, which calls itself "The People's Atlas," recently added a feature that links its maps to RSS feeds, so you can receive alerts about new annotations for places that interest you, or by other users whom you specify--giving the site a timeliness that the others I looked at lacked. Several of the sites I visited allow you to add images to your text posts, but Platial is the only one that supports video uploads.

Traveler Wish Lists
Anyone who has ever used Yahoo's popular Flickr photo-sharing service recognizes how tags work: Users assign keywords to categorize images. The same approach is taken by the Robot Co-op's 43 Places, which--despite its name--has descriptions of thousands of locales around the world. Along with the usual place names, you'll find tags such as "Hogwarts" and "Pirates of the Caribbean," illustrating that travel is sometimes a state of mind. The site even posts user-assigned "wanderlust ratings" for each mapped location, though it's difficult to find any spot with a rating under 80 percent (100 percent is the highest possible mark).

Plazes ties user-supplied data to network router locations (called Plazes), as automatically identified by free, downloadable desktop software that also lets people (all users or, at your discretion, invited friends) see where you are. You can use the service without the downloaded app to find other Plazes and users--but unless you use the software, you can't add a Plaze to the service's database, and others won't be able to see your precise location.

The least developed of the five services is Flagr, self-described as a "Sharewhere" site. It has relatively few annotated locations, and the descriptions I checked lacked detail. Flagr demonstrates that, like all sites that rely on community-created content, personal-mapping services depend on attracting a critical mass of participants.

Privacy Issues
One key caveat: These and other personal-mapping sites have built-in privacy risks. Though all five of the services I tested offer some ability to control who can see your data, you are entrusting personal information to a Web server. In general, it's a bad idea to post any data you wouldn't feel comfortable writing on a postcard sent via U.S. mail.

Time will tell whether any of these ambitious services will ever become the mapping equivalent of such community powerhouses as MySpace or YouTube. But if you're going to check out just one, head to Platial, which seems to have more--and more-detailed--posts than its competitors.

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Employers Crack Down on Personal Net Use

Tasha Newitt was aware her employer, the Washington State Department of Labor and Industries, had a policy restricting personal use of work computers, but she believed it focused on Web surfing, not e-mail. Nonetheless, she was careful to use her work e-mail primarily for professional matters. So she was stunned when the agency fired her after finding 418 personal e-mail messages received over a period of five months (or about 5 per workday) on her PC.

Newitt isn't alone: Increasingly, managers are cracking down on employee Internet activity by drafting strict usage policies--and enforcing them through use of software that monitors surfing, examines e-mail, and restricts the sites an employee can browse to.

Newitt, an eight-year agency veteran, says that she received great performance reviews as well as certificates for providing outstanding customer service in her position as a workers' compensation claims manager. Most of the personal e-mail messages were innocuous notes regarding birthday greetings and lunch plans with coworkers, she says. But none of this mattered to Newitt's employer examined her office's e-mail after a co-worker filed a sexual-harassment complaint against a supervisor. The department ultimately fired 8 employees (including Newitt) and disciplined 16 others for their improper use of agency equipment.

Photograph: Katherine LambertWill Vehrs, who works at the Virginia Department of Business Assistance, received a ten-day unpaid suspension for excessive casual use of the Internet while at work. Vehrs' employer knew he blogged, often about state issues, at the Commonwealth Conservative's Virginia politics blog. In fact, Virginia's governor read and sometimes reused his posts; but he was punished after composing humorous captions for photographs as part of a local newspaper's contest. His captions poked fun at a Virginia county and annoyed a local politician.

Whether streaming video is eating into a company's network bandwidth or employees' viewing of adult content is exposing the firm to sexual harassment charges, companies have some legitimate reasons to limit their workers' access to and activity on the Internet.

A 2005 survey of 526 businesses and organizations by the ePolicy Institute and the American Management Association found that 76 percent of them monitor the sites that their employees visit, and 65 percent block certain sites. At least 55 percent of them review and retain employees' e\0x2011mail, and 36 percent track the content on workers' PCs, their keystrokes, and the time that they spend at the keyboard. Lost productivity is a major concern: Last spring, some companies blocked streaming video during the NCAA men's college basketball tournament. Even so, more than 14 million fans accessed video from the NCAA March Madness on Demand Web site during the first three rounds of the tournament, according to CBS SportsLine; and considering the starting times of the games, many of them likely did so from work

Massachusetts-based Networks Unlimited audits the Internet activity of its clients' employees and sells equipment for auditing and blocking workers' Internet use. It says that many executives are surprised at what their employees do online. The company installs a monitoring box on its customers' networks for a week and then extrapolates longer-term patterns of usage from that data to estimate how many hours a year employees spend browsing Web sites.

For example, Networks Unlimited found that fewer than 100 employees at Balls Food--a supermarket and pharmacy chain based in Kansas City--had Net access at work, but that they spent a total of 686 hours in one year using Web-based e-mail such as Hotmail and Yahoo. By contrast, 120 employees at a New York\0x2013based software company spent an estimated 7700 hours in one year accessing Web-based e-mail, 2400 hours at shopping and sports-related sites, and 250 hours visiting pornographic sites. In total, the employees spent more than 17,000 hours in one year on recreational surfing (roughly 3 hours per employee per week), which translates into an estimated loss in worker productivity of $867,000, according to Networks Unlimited.

Fear of viruses, spyware, and other security breaches due to non-work-related Web use is another impetus for employers to limit their workers' Internet activity. Such attacks can disrupt company networks and lead to loss of confidential information. But Nancy Flynn, director of the ePolicy Institute and author of Blog Rules and other books on workplace tech policies, says that concern about potential litigation is the main reason organizations manage their employees' Internet use.

Internet Liabilities
Sexually offensive material read or viewed on computers in the workplace can lead to sexual harassment charges or, in extreme cases, bring law-enforcement agencies knocking at the door. a county public Works Department office in Nevada attracted embarrassing attention when an employee was arrested after downloading more than 400 images of child pornography to his work computer. The agency discovered the stash only by tracing a virus that crashed the county's network to one of the images.

The content of e-mail and instant messages can be especially dangerous. In the most recent ePolicy survey results, 24 percent of surveyed companies acknowledged that they had received at least one subpoena for employee e-mail.

"When companies get embroiled in e-mail litigation, it can become very expensive and very embarrassing," says Flynn, who runs seminars on how to establish policies and train employees in proper technology use. The issue can be especially problematic in highly regulated industries, such as health care, where workers are required to adhere to laws that protect the privacy of patient information and records. During an audit of one medical center's computers, Networks Unlimited found that spyware was surreptitiously sending information from the center's network to Gator, a spyware/adware firm, up to 2000 times a day. The audit also uncovered a keystroke-logging Trojan horse on one of the center's workstations.

The Web Off-Limits
Segal says that blocking Internet activity can become "somewhat of a political football" if workers feel that Big Brother is watching. "Sometimes you have senior management at one extreme [having] the attitude of blocking it all," he says, "and then you have the other extreme that says 'I don't want to tread there.'"

Balls Foods is an example of a company that starts by blocking all Internet access, and then doles out access to individual workers, case-by-case. The company's network systems manager, Lance Fisher, says that employees haven't complained about the restrictions because they never had unfettered access in the first place. "From the minute that employees have had Internet access, it's always been restricted access," he says. "So they can't miss what they never had." He concedes that it might be harder for a company that's never blocked access to suddenly institute a restrictive Internet policy. Bob Edwards, executive director of Boston law firm Wolf Greenberg, says that his company recognized this possibility when it audited its network and established a new policy. The firm now prohibits use of instant messaging and blocks access to hacker sites, as well as to gambling and gaming sites.

And since the firm specializes in intellectual property cases, it also blocks peer-to-peer networks. Edwards says that the last thing the company wanted was a scandal involving its own employees downloading copyrighted music or videos. "The [potential] headlines of something like that were definitely enough to make us really want to make sure that we had the thing nailed," Edward says.

Web sites with adult content are also blocked "to make sure that we weren't saying one thing with our sexual harassment policy and then...allowing free access to adult Web sites that might be offensive to others," Edwards says.

Wolf Greenberg was careful not to offend employees with its new policy, however. The firm's audit looked at Internet use in the office as a whole, rather than targeting individuals, and the data it gathered was anonymized to protect employees' privacy. "We wanted to let them know that we really had no intention to look at every site that everyone went to and that we wanted to manage this with their cooperation," Edwards says.

The law firm also carefully designed a policy that balanced its needs with those of its employees. For example, it decided not to block eBay and other shopping sites. "We want to be reasonable," Edwards says. "[The Internet is] there for them to use, and we expect that they will need to use it on occasion, but [we also want them] to be sensitive to the level of use."

Flynn of ePolicy insists that companies must take care to explain their Internet policy clearly to employees and be consistent about enforcing it. "I've seen cases where organizations...have disciplinary rules in place, including saying they will terminate violators, and then they don't terminate anyone," she says. "And there are companies that pick and choose who they terminate. That just confuses employees," says Flynn.

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Disarm Net Threats

A growing number of security tools are taking a new approach to fighting malicious software. Rather than blocking each virus, they aim to limit malware's power to cause harm even if it gets in.

We looked at five apps that adopt this preventive strategy. Amust's 1-Defender and DropMyRights, two free programs, restrict the ability of software (and malware) to make major changes to your computer, such as in non-user-controlled parts of the Windows Registry. Though basic, these utilities are very effective--especially DropMyRights, which works with any program.

Stronger protection comes from two apps that wall off Internet programs in a "sandbox." Software running in the sandbox is blocked from making system-level changes and from accessing personal files, like bank documents in your personal finance app. GreenBorder Pro works only with Internet Explorer, though a Firefox version is planned; for $30 (the promotional rate at press time), you get a one-user license plus a one-year subscription that covers product updates. Fortres Grand's $50 Virtual Sandbox works with any program and must greenlight any process that wants to run on your computer; but its frequent alerts can grow irksome, and its setup is somewhat more complicated than GreenBorder Pro's.

For even more protection, consider the free VMWare Player and Browser Appliance. This hefty download supplies a Firefox browser that runs in a fully virtualized environment; it's much like using a separate PC just for the Web. There are some gotchas, but the player is fairly easy to install, and it offers a great deal of safety for systems with the resources to run it.

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Toshiba Will Build Microsoft Zune Players

Microsoft confirmed today that Toshiba will manufacture its Zune music player, a product intended by the company to take on Apple Computer's successful iPod.

The confirmation follows reports of a regulatory filing Toshiba made to the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that mentions the device and its features. "Toshiba is manufacturing the device and the [FCC] report is legitimate," a spokesperson for Microsoft's public relations firm said.

She declined to say if other hardware makers also would be building Zune players, adding that Microsoft will reveal further details about Zune in the next few weeks.

More Details
In addition to the name "Zune," the device also is referred to as "Pyxis" in Toshiba's filing. A collaborative service for Zune users, something akin to Apple's iTunes software and service, is called "Argo."

The FCC filing contains photos of what Toshiba's Zune player will look like. Here is a PDF of a document that shows photos of the front and back of the device, which looks similar to Apple's original iPod, but bigger.

According to the Zune "user's manual" included in the filing, the Zune device will include 30 gigabytes of storage, wireless capabilities, and an FM radio tuner.

The wireless capabilities will allow users to search for other Zune devices within range and share music, photos, playlists, and other media content with those devices.

After months of speculation, Microsoft confirmed in July that it was developing a music player and service to rival Apple's iPod and iTunes. If other attempts to unseat the iPod are any indication, Microsoft will have a tough road ahead. Earlier this week, Dell stopped selling its DJ Ditty music player on its Web site and ended development of its own line of music players.

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Apple Recalls 1.8 Million Laptop Batteries

Apple has announced a voluntary recall of 1.8 million lithium-ion batteries, the latest casualty of the Sony battery fiasco.

The affected notebooks include certain models of the iBook G4 series as well as the PowerBook G4 series, the company said. About 1.1 million laptops sold within the U.S. are affected, with an additional 700,000 units sold abroad or online. The laptops containing the recalled batteries were sold in October 2003 through August 2006, Apple said.

Apple's decision follows a similar recall by Dell, which had shipped Sony battery cells inside of its own laptops. Dell recalled 4.1 million batteries on August 14, the largest consumer product recall in U.S. history.

Apple said it had received nine reports of batteries overheating, including two reports of minor burns from handling overheated computers. No major injuries were reported. Apple also recalled 128,000 lithium-ion batteries in an unrelated recall in May 2005.


The affected notebooks include the 12-inch iBook G4, the 12-inch PowerBook G4, and the 15-inch PowerBook G4. The model number of the iBook is A1061, with battery serial numbers including ZZ338 through ZZ427, 3K429 through 3K611, and 6C510 through 6C626. For the 12-inch PowerBook G4, the model number is A1079, with the affected battery numbers listed as ZZ411 through ZZ427 and 3K428 through 3K611. For the 15-inch PowerBook G4, the affected models are the A1078 and the A1148l, with the battery numbers listed as 3K425 through 3K601, 6N530 through 6N551, and 6N601.

The recall, made through Apple as well as the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, names Sony as the manufacturer of the affected cells. In a statement, Sony said the recalls by Dell and Apple would cost it approximately between 20 billion yen and 30 billion yen, or between approximately $172 million and $258 million. Apple said the recall would not materially affect its earnings.

"The recall arises because, on rare occasions, microscopic metal particles in the recalled battery cells may come into contact with other parts of the battery cell, leading to a short circuit within the cell," Sony said in a statement. "Typically, a battery pack will simply power off when a cell short circuit occurs. However, under certain rare conditions, an internal short circuit may lead to cell overheating and potentially flames. The potential for this to occur can be affected by variations in the system configurations found in different notebook computers."

The Japanese government also on Thursday said that there had been two incidents where laptops containing Sony batteries caught fire in Japan, although no injuries were reported.

Sony said it did not anticipate any further recalls. But analysts said that was still an open question.

"These two recalls from Dell and Apple -- these are two high-quality, high-profile manufacturers so this raises the concern on whether or not we'll see similar recalls from other manufacturers," said Richard Shim, a notebook analyst with IDC. "A lot of them have said that they're not having problems, but this certainly raises the possibility."

Notebooks have become one of the driving forces within the PC industry, showing steady growth over the past few years. According to Shim, consumer confidence in the segment could be jeopardized by the dual recalls.

"We have to find out what the dollar figure is going to be," Shim said. "It says something that these folks are proactively coming out. These are voluntary recalls, so from a perception standpoint, there obviously will be some that are upset. But there will be some that see it as the companies being responsible."

Other analysts were equally skeptical of Sony's claims. The question now, some argued, was what smaller OEMs would be affected.

"I had heard that that was going to happen," said Roger Kay, an analyst with Endpoint Technologies. "It looks like, wow, this is another huge problem. Interesting, [on a] smaller scale but this is a big deal.

"Well, this may not be the last one," Kay added. "I have talked to the other OEMs and some of them are asserting that they use a different charging methodology. One of the problems is that there have been so few failures, such that the people in the labs have trouble replicating these failures. So what Dell and Apple have decided is if there are any failures at all, we need to recall them. You don't know why they're happening, but you still need to err on the side of safety, because a burning or exploding notebook could cause such a big problem."

Consumers who suspect that they have a recalled battery should stop using the laptop, and then visit Apple's battery recall web site or call the company at (800) 275-2273 between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. CT Monday through Sunday to request a replacement battery, Apple said. At press time, the link to Apple's battery recall site was not working.

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Microsoft Preps Answer to Google Pack

Microsoft's latest Windows Live offering is for the most part not a new service at all, but rather a one-time download that includes a subset of the available Live applications, much like the Google Pack.
Called Windows Live Essentials, the program also features a new application called Windows Live Dashboard.

The Dashboard would show the user what Live programs are installed and what is available for download, rather than requiring the user to visit the Windows Live Ideas Web site.

Although it was not detailed, the new application seems to be optimized at this time for Windows XP SP2 using Internet Explorer 6.x.

At least two programs are slated to come with the download, Windows Live Messenger and Live Mail Desktop beta, although it is likely that other applications would be included as well.

Novice computer users seem to be the target of this latest service

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مقامات شركت آي بيام از خريد سيستم حفاظتي براي نرم افزارهاي توليده شده خود خبر دادند.

به نوشته سايت ايتاليايي ،KATAWEBاين شركت ۱/۳ميليارد دلار براي خريد و تهيه اين سيستم حفاظتي و ۲۸دلار براي نصب آن بر روي سايت خود هزينه كرده است.

اين دستگاه حفاظتي داراي سيستمي است كه از نرم افزارها و توليدات اين شركت در مقابله با تهديدات و ويروسهاي اينترنتي خطرناك محافظت ميكند.

مقامات شركت آي بيام نام اين سيستم حفاظتي و اطلاعاتي را ISSاعلام كردند كه نقش يك آنتي ويروس را براي نرم افزارهاي توليد شده توسط اين شركت بازي ميكند.

سيستم حفاظتي ISSنصب شده در شركت آي بيام از سرورهاي مربوط به شبكه اينترنتي اين شركت نيز حمايت و پشتيباني ميكند.

همچنين اين سيستم حفاظتي از خدمات ارايه شده در وب سايت اين شركت پشتيباني و حفاظت ميكند.

اين سيستم حفاظتي با نشان دادن آسيبهاي وارده به نرم افزارهاي توليدي شركت آي بيام از بروز خطرات و آسيبهاي خطرناك تر در اين نرم افزارها جلوگيري ميكند.