Apple to embed ads in OS

Now, when you boot your Apple notebook, an advertisement is likely to pop up on your screen. The advertisement could be an audio or a plain visual one. Regardless, it may offer you some product or could even offer the operating system (OS), which enables you to start or boot your computer free or at a lower cost.

If Apple Computer has its way, this is precisely what you may get in some years to come. Steve Jobs, CEO and Co-Founder of the company, has aptly titled the patent application as 'advertisement in an OS'. He has listed himself as an 'inventor' of the application (U.S. Patent Application 20090265214).

Jobs is credited with 133 patents, unusual for a CEO of a large company who may have other important issues to handle, of the 1,250-odd patents that Apple has been granted till date.

The current application became available for public inspection on October 22. It was just a day after software giant and rival Microsoft launched the much-touted Windows 7 OS globally. It was also the same day when Nokia filed a complaint against Apple with the Federal District Court in Delaware, alleging that the iPhone infringed some Nokia patents.

Apple's current patent application drafted and filed by the attorneys at Fish and Richardson in Minneapolis explains that 'the OS can disable some aspect of its operation to prompt the operator to pay attention to the advertisement'.

The advertisements may include, a rectangular banner advertisement, an audio advertisement, a video clip, an image file, executable code, embedded information, any other media, content or interactive advertisement.

The application does not appear to be restricted to computer OS. The patent application mentions that in some implementations where the computer device is a cellular phone or music player, the user may be prompted to press a certain button in order to confirm that he is paying attention.

Apple is known for building a mystique around its products like the Mac, iPod and iPhone. The question, of course is, why would the company want to embed advertisements, which irritate most users, in OS? The patent application, of course, does not answer this question.

The Palo Alto-based company is no stranger to patents. A month back, Apple filed a patent application which could tell Apple whether your iPod or iPhone has been subjected to moisture. The new system also covers heat, shock, and tampering.

Google to launch Chrome OS to challenge Microsoft

To compete with the entrenched Windows platform, Google is ready to launch a new computer operating system (OS). Initially, the Chrome OS, designed initially for low-cost netbooks, will offer its program code to developers across the globe and create another 'open source' competition for Microsoft.

Regarding threat to Microsoft, Country Head of products in India, Google said, "Windows XP takes 'forever' to boot up. I can go down, have my cup of tea and come back, it will be ready as it takes four minutes for it to start. Our OS is not about features. We never said that Chrome will have these five features that the others (Windows, Safari) don't have. If you look at the way computing has evolved and look at today's OS, all the popular ones pre-date the Web. People spend 99 percent of their time on browsers, then why is that we are still beholding OS that are 15 years old that were formed with desktop operations in mind? We should move to an application-based system, where it does not matter how many applications are there, boot-up time should be at its minimal. It should be like a TV where you switch it on and voila your programmes start right away. This is really the promise of Google's OS, Chrome."

Since the birth of internet in 1969, it has come long way, and today it has become part and parcel of everyone's life. Goe said, "Today, browsers have become very powerful. For example, look at Google maps and the kind of things you can do with it. It really behaves like a desktop application, although it is fully browser based. And now, we are moving into the next generation which uses the technology of HTML 5 making the browser even more powerful. So, for things that you needed a desktop application like spreadsheets, word documents, modifying photos, etc, you don't need them anymore. It is all browser based. It can all be enabled within the browser. The HTML 5 technology will support any browser and OS and this will be true for Google's Chrome as well. We are trying to make an OS that is fine tuned to the browser and supports whatever it needs. A lot of the OS is built on open source software of Linux, we are trying to marry other stuff to give to the user."

Google is also addressing the local market for search and email in terms of vernacular languages. "We provide search in various Indian languages like Hindi, Telugu, Bengali, etc. However, not all search results are in these languages but are mostly in English. This is based on transliterating where you type the word based on the phonetics and it is converted into the language of the user's choice. The same with e-mail services," said Goe.

iPhone can now be charged wirelessly

The iPhone can now be charged wirelessly. GEAR4 has announced the world's first wireless iPhone charger, the PowerPad. The users can now charge their iPhones wirelessly from any corner of the room without connecting it to the main power.

The PowerPad is basically a flat pad that uses inductive charging to power the iPhone's battery. The users can put the iPhone anywhere on the pad for it to charge up. The phone needs to be sporting a protective rubber case.

GEAR4 is claiming that the wireless system will consume the same amount of time the wired chargers take.
The PowerPad has been carefully designed to provide the ultimate solution in convenient power management, as it fits perfectly into the home or office environment and simply plugs into the mains to transmit charge to the iPhone via the patented receiver case. The case acts as a protective cover when the batteries are out and the iPhone is placed on the charge pad to power it up wirelessly.

The company will take the pre-orders from November 15, and the PowerPad is available for $130.

Google will not integrate Chrome in Windows 7

Google has called off its plans to fully integrate the Chrome web browser with Microsoft's new Windows 7 operating system. The news has come after an announcement by the Mozilla Foundation that Firefox 3.6, the next version of the open source browser, would integrate with Windows 7 features such as taskbar thumbnail previews and jump lists, reports IDG.

According to reports in The Register, Google's internal issue tracking system signals that work on the features has been pushed back to version 5 of the browser. Chrome is currently on the 3.0 release, while version 4 is presently under development.

The work seems to be on progress regarding Google's Chrome OS. An early developer build of the operating system has been leaked on Google.

Phishing..Now from IT dept.

Look this new mail i got...

from India Tax Departament reply-to qzitgo@aol.com to date Fri, Oct 16, 2009 at 4:31 AM subject Tax refund (5416533) 820.50 Rs

hide details 4:31 AM (5 hours ago)

Dear Income Tax Department of India customer,

After the last annual calculation of your fiscal activity we have determined that you are going to receive a tax refund of $820.50 Rupees.
Please submit the tax refund form and allow 3-5 days in order to approve it.

A refund can be delayed for a variety of reasons.For example submitting invalid records or sending the form after the deadline.

To complete the form please Click Here.

NOTE!
For security reasons your ip may be recorded.

Thank you,
Income Tax Department of India Online Department.

Kottation fest....

Phishing..new Techniques..!!

In my previous post i told you about the dangers in the internet banking. Now look at two mails i got this week..

from Bank of India reply-to jgvrdh@yahoo.com to date Sun, Oct 4, 2009 at 3:34 AM subject Your Bank of India Account May Have Been Accessed From an Unauthorized Computer

hide details Oct 4 (1 day ago)

Dear Bank of India customer, We recently reviewed your account, and we are suspecting that your Internet Banking account may have been accessed from an unauthorized computer. This may be due to changes in your IP address or location. Protecting the security of your account and of the Bank of India network is our primary concern. We are asking you to immediately login and report any unauthorized withdrawals, and check your account profile to make sure no changes have been made. To protect your account please follow the instructions below: * DO NOT SHARE YOUR PASSWORD WITH OTHER USERS * LOG OFF AFTER USING YOUR ONLINE ACCOUNT Please click on the following link, to verify your account activity: http://www.bankofindia.com/web/internetbank.aspx We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause, and appreciate your support in helping us maintaining the integrity of the entire Bank of India system. Please login as soon as possible. Thank you, Bank of India Customer Service. This is a false link..if you click in this it will lead you to a hoax site and ask you to enter your account information. Now look this one.. from PUNJAB NATIONAL BANK ALERT! reply-to no-reply@punjabnationalbank.co.in to date Sun, Oct 4, 2009 at 4:03 PM subject YOUR NETBANKING ACCOUNT STATUS. hide details 4:03 PM (18 hours ago) Account Status Notification Dear Valued Customer, We regret to inform you that some of your internet banking services has been limited. This is due to the Obsolate security protocol still in existence in your account settings in our central database. In accordance with Punjab National Bank User Agreement, all accounts within the suspected range of possible security compromise have been placed on limit. This is to enable us protect your account against unauthorized access. Protecting the security of your Punjab National Bank account is our primary concern, and we apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. To continue, follow the reference below to log into your account : Click here Thank you for using Punjab National Bank This is also a false link..if you enter any of your bank information here, then your account & money will be stolen!!! Actually the mail form site address www.punjabnationalbank.co.in is wrong. The correct site is www.pnbindia.com. Now look the latest one.... from IDBI Security Team reply-to bqsboe@aol.com to date Thu, Oct 8, 2009 at 4:18 AM subject Your IDBI Account May Have Been Accessed From an Unauthorized Computer Dear IDBI Bank customer, We recently have determined that different computers have logged on to your IDBI NetBanking account, and multiple password failures were present before the logons. We now need you to re-confirm your account information to us. If this is not completed by October 9, 2009, we will be forced to suspend your account indefinitely, as it may have been used for fraudulent purposes. We thank you for your cooperation in this manner. To confirm your NetBanking records click on the following link: https://inet.idbibank.co.in/login/SignonBankId Thank you for your patience, IDBI Bank Customer Service. Please do not reply to this e-mail as this is only a notification. Mail sent to this address cannot be answered. Š 2009 IDBI Bank. All rights reserved. So please take care in your internet banking.

Indian spacecraft finds water on the moon

In a sensational scientific discovery, India's maiden lunar mission Chandrayaan-1 has found evidence of water on the moon.

"The moon has distinct signatures of water," top American scientist Carle Pieters confirmed Thursday.

"The evidence of water molecules on the surface of the moon was found by the moon mineralogy mapper (M3) of the US-based National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) on board Chandrayaan-1," M3 principal investigator Carle Pieters said in a paper published in the journal Science.

M3 was one of the 11 scientific instruments on board the lunar spacecraft that was launched Oct 22, 2008 by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). The mission was aborted Aug 30 after Chandrayaan-1 lost radio contact with Earth.

Crediting ISRO for its role in the findings, Pieters said: "If it were not for them (ISRO), we would not have been able to make this discovery."

ISRO chairman G. Madhavan Nair had told the media Wednesday that he could not yet confirm the presence of water on the moon, but "before the end of this week, we will let you know".

However, confirming the finding and terming it a major discovery, Pieters said the discovery of water on the lunar surface would reinvigorate studies of the moon and potentially change thinking on how it originated.

"Hydroxyl, a molecule consisting of one oxygen atom and one hydrogen atom, were discovered across the entire surface of the Earth's nearest celestial neighbour," claimed Pieters, a planetary geologist at Brown University in Rhode Island.

Though the abundance of the hydroxyl molecules are not precisely known, about 1,000 parts per million could be in the lunar soil, the paper noted.

"Harvesting one ton of the top layer of the moon's surface will yield as much as 32 ounces (907 grams) of water," scientists involved in the discovery said.

As lead author of the M3 findings, Pieters said more evidence of water was found in the moon's high latitudes.

"It greatly expands current thinking about where water in any form was presumed to be located," she pointed out.

The findings give rise to interesting new questions about where the water molecules come from and where they may be going.

Scientists have speculated that water molecules may migrate from non-polar regions of the moon to the poles, where they are stored as ice in ultra-frigid pockets of craters that never receive sunlight.

"If the water molecules are as mobile as we think they are -- even a fraction of them -- they provide a mechanism for getting water to those permanently shadowed craters. This opens a whole new avenue (of lunar research), but we have to understand the physics of it to utilise it," Pieters noted.

The NASA payload found water molecules and hydroxyl at diverse areas of the sunlit region of the moon's surface, but the water signature appeared stronger at the moon's higher latitudes.

Internet has never been more dangerous

There seems to be no end to the proliferation of malware online. Last week i received two mails one from bank of India & another from Punjab national bank saying that due to some server error my account has been disabled. In order to reactivate my account i have to click on the bank website link provided with that mail. The link was valid (www.pnbindia.com & www.bankofindia.co.in) but when you click it, it goes to a phishing site and my browser google chrome automatically blocked the site displaying a warning message. If the browser you are using is not safe, the site will open and the you may enter your user id and password in it and the people behind it will steal all your money!!.

New records are set and security experts are worried. Just between January and June this year, the number of fake antivirus programs detected grew by 585 percent, according to a report released on Wednesday by the Anti-Phishing Working Group.

During the same period, the number of banking Trojans, designed to steal account information for financial sites, increased 186 percent. The number of phishing Web sites reached 49,084, the second highest number recorded since the record of 55,643 in April, 2007. The number of hijacked brands hit an all-time high of 310 in March and remained at a high level through June.

"The Internet has never been more dangerous," said APWG Chairman, David Jevans in a statement. "In the first half of 2009, phishing escalated to some of the highest levels we've ever seen. Of even greater concern is the skyrocketing sophistication and proliferation of malicious software designed to steal online passwords and user names. New malicious software such as the Zeus Trojan, exhibit a level of sophistication that would make the best software programmers envious."

According to the APWG report, the number of infected computers rose by more than 66 percent between Q4 2008 and the end of June 2009 to reach almost 12 million, 54 percent of the computers scanned.

The Finjan Cybercrime Intelligence Report also examines the increasing sophistication of software designed for online banking theft and notes that some of these programs, such as the URLzone Trojan, have developed anti-forensic techniques to conceal account looting from automated anti-fraud systems and from the eyes of victims.

The tech industry's response to these trends can be seen in initiatives like Microsoft's online anti-scam campaign, it's newly released free Security Essentials software, and calls for greater industry cooperation.

Google offer: $10 Million for ideas that can change world

Google has launched a project called, 'Call for ideas to change the world by helping as many people as possible,' and it is offering $10 million for the implementation of the best five ideas that can change the world. The company has already shortlisted 16 ideas that have the potential to help the most number of people.

The 16 ideas such as building a real time, user-reported news service and making educational content free online were shortlisted from thousands of ideas submitted by people from different parts of the world.

As per descriptions available on the website, the user-reported news service would help people find and report timely, important local information. "Implementation of this idea would involve creating a system that enables ordinary citizens to easily report news that's happening around them, from meaningful local events to important global stories," the website said.

Other ideas include creating genocide monitoring and alert system, promoting health monitoring and data analysis and building better banking tools for everyone. The public can vote on these ideas till October 8.