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ACM TechNews - Monday, July 28, 2003



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ACM TechNews
Volume 5, Number 525
Date: July 28, 2003

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Top Stories for Monday, July 28, 2003:
http://www.acm.org/technews/current/homepage.html


"Totaling Up the Bill for Spam"
"Scientists Say 'Nay' to Computerized Voting"
"Are Military Computers Safe?"
"ACM's SIGGRAPH Addresses Immersive Technology"
"Signs of Life in Silicon Valley"
"Everything Is Watching You"
"A Gadget Geek's Dream Come True: Punch 'Print' for Anything You Want"
"Computer Language Translation System Romances the Rosetta Stone"
"Tech Giants Team on Secure-Computing Standards"
"WiFi Is Open, Free, and Vulnerable to Hackers"
"Privacy: For Every Attack, a Defense"
"The Tortoise, the Hare and the Internet"
"US Passports to Carry Digitally Signed Images"
"State Laws Fail to Suppress Spam"
"Engineers' Forecasts for Technology"
"Sensitive Sensors"
"The Sky's the Limit"
"Antennas Get Smart"

******************* News Stories ***********************

"Totaling Up the Bill for Spam"
Measuring the cost of spam, which takes into account such factors
as lost productivity and wasted time, is an imprecise science,
and estimates on its total toll vary:  Ferris Research reckons
that spam cost the United States $10 billion in 2003, while ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item1

"Scientists Say 'Nay' to Computerized Voting"
Computerized voting machines continue their onward march in the
face of growing dissent from computer experts, who warn that any
computer system used to collect and count ballots needs to be
backed up by a paper trail.  Most recently, a study from Johns ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item2

"Are Military Computers Safe?"
At a hearing to gauge the Department of Defense's cybersecurity
plans, witnesses such as Purdue University's Eugene Spafford
warned the House Armed Services Committee's Subcommittee on
Terrorism, Unconventional Threats, and Capabilities that the ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item3

"ACM's SIGGRAPH Addresses Immersive Technology"
SIGGRAPH conference chairman Alyn Rockwood of the Colorado School
of Mines reports that this year's event taking place this week in
San Diego features new sessions on immersive technology, which "expands
the experience beyond the standard visual in one direction, such ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item4

"Signs of Life in Silicon Valley"
Silicon Valley-based job recruiters and search firms are
experiencing a rise in business, indicative of growing confidence
among regional employers that the economy may be starting to
bounce back.  Technology Search recruiter Alan Hattman reports ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item5

"Everything Is Watching You"
Robotics scientists have come full circle on the best way to get
a computer to understand the physical world around it, from
giving a robot "eyes" to direct rays of light into a "mental
image" of its surroundings, to having objects in a room identify ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item6

"A Gadget Geek's Dream Come True: Punch 'Print' for Anything You Want"
Desktop manufacturing could allow people to construct new devices
on-demand, using 3D printers that build mechanic and electronic
parts out of organic polymers.  If someone's blender broke, for
instance, they could simply look up the design for a blender on ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item7

"Computer Language Translation System Romances the Rosetta Stone"
University of Southern California computer researcher Franz Josef
Och has created a computer language translation system that uses
statistical models to find the most probable translation for
given inputs.  "Instead of telling the computer how to translate, ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item8

"Tech Giants Team on Secure-Computing Standards"
IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and Sun Microsystems have announced a joint
effort with smaller security companies such as RSA Security,
Tripwire, and InstallShield to develop non-proprietary
secure-computing standards that are easier to integrate than ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item9

"WiFi Is Open, Free, and Vulnerable to Hackers"
Unprotected Wi-Fi access is epidemic, leaves the door open to
data thieves, and could serve as an anonymous launching pad for
hack attacks, according to experts.  The problem will only grow
with Wi-Fi, especially as hardware vendors continue to refuse to ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item10

"Privacy: For Every Attack, a Defense"
Americans' privacy is under threat from government and corporate
abuse of technology, but at the same time is being protected by
groups savvy to the danger.  E-Loan CEO Chris Larsen is one of
those protecting privacy, and has bankrolled a California ballot ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item11

"The Tortoise, the Hare and the Internet"
As the Internet developed rapidly in the mid 1990s, governments
around the world generally agreed to leave Internet regulation to
the private sector in the belief that would allow rapid
adjustment and accommodation of changing needs.  However, the ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item12

"US Passports to Carry Digitally Signed Images"
The U.S. governments plans to issue "smart" passports, featuring
embedded microchips that store a compressed image of the owner's
face, to U.S. citizens in October 2004.  Designed to prevent
tampering, the digital passports will include cryptographically ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item13

"State Laws Fail to Suppress Spam"
State laws have not been able to rein in spam, which continues to
grow at astronomical rates.  Of the 35 states that have laws
regulating spam, Delaware may have the toughest statute, in that
residents are required to sign up to receive unsolicited ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item14

"Engineers' Forecasts for Technology"
The 2003 technology survey of Electrical and Electronics
Engineers (IEEE) fellows asked participants about what would be
significant technology issues over the next 10 years.  Two-thirds
predicted that open-source computing would have a large impact on ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item15

"Sensitive Sensors"
A pair of scientists at the State University of New York at
Buffalo's mechanical and aerospace engineering department has
developed a powerful new magnetic sensor for PC hard drives.  The
nanoscale sensor creates large electrical resistance changes, ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item16

"The Sky's the Limit"
Global positioning system (GPS) technology, which is the basis of
"location-aware" products, has progressed far beyond the precise
military targeting applications it was originally developed for,
and is finding use in both commercial and non-commercial sectors. ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item17


"Antennas Get Smart"
Adaptive antenna arrays aim to lower the cost and upgrade the
quality of wireless communications by transmitting their signals
directly to mobile users and enhancing connections with
individual cell phones via signal manipulation, while keeping ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0728m.html#item18


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