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TechNews Alert for Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2004



Title: ACM TechNews (HTML)
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ACM TechNews
February 4, 2004

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Welcome to the February 4, 2004 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for IT professionals three times a week. For instructions on how to unsubscribe from this service, please see below.

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HEADLINES AT A GLANCE:

  • Europe Blames Weaker U.S. Law for Spam Surge
  • Rock the Vote
  • PC Makers Set to Face Costs of Recycling
  • High-Speed Internet's Hurdles Still Considerable
  • Q&A: Open-Source Guru Eric Raymond
  • Firms Develop Gesture-Operable Digital Home Electronic Devices
  • Matrix Plan Fuels Privacy Fears
  • Unpopular Argument: Sending Tech Jobs Abroad Is Good
  • Pentagon Kills LifeLog Project
  • Why This One Is Scarier
  • Neural-Chaos Team Boosts Security
  • DARPA-Funded Linux Security Hub Withers
  • The Internet2 Commons: Supporting Distributed Engineering Collaboration
  • Twentysomething
  • Dual Curses: Viruses and Spam
  • Computer Makers Tackle E-Waste
  • Where Have All the Programming Jobs Gone?
  • The Rise of Telecities

     

    Europe Blames Weaker U.S. Law for Spam Surge

    Brightmail estimates that more than half of all email in the European Union is spam, and Europeans claim U.S. anti-spam laws, which are far more lax than European regulations, are chiefly to blame. Eighty percent of EU spam is written in English, and that same percentage apparently originates from ...

    [read more]

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    Rock the Vote

    Four computer experts recommended that the Defense Department halt its Secure Electronic Registration and Voting Experiment (SERVE) on the grounds that the system is susceptible to hacking and errors. But though they were invited by the Pentagon to appraise the SERVE system, Defense officials and ...

    [read more]

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    PC Makers Set to Face Costs of Recycling

    Computer manufacturers are bracing for two major directives on the disposal of personal computers by the European Union that will have a significant impact on the cost of doing business. "It's the sheer cost that will be most damaging to our members," explains Dudley Ollis, program manager for ...

    [read more]

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    High-Speed Internet's Hurdles Still Considerable

    University students and researchers at 205 U.S. universities enjoy a next-generation Internet experience using the Internet2 network. Students consume as much bandwidth as is allowed them and will take their need for Internet speed into the working world, says Georgia Institute of Technology ...

    [read more]

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    Q&A: Open-Source Guru Eric Raymond

    Open Source Initiative President Eric Raymond, author of "The New Hacker's Dictionary" and the more recent "The Art of Unix Programming," notes that programmers in school are now being trained on both Windows and Linux. He adds that "it's all PCs today," meaning that the next crop of programmers ...

    [read more]

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    Firms Develop Gesture-Operable Digital Home Electronic Devices

    Development of gesture-operable input devices for home electronics is accelerating in a variety of industries, including gaming and automotive. The Remote Controller for Wearable Home Electronics Appliance developed by Toshiba's Human Centric Laboratory allows users to activate and deactivate ...

    [read more]

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    Matrix Plan Fuels Privacy Fears

    The Multistate Anti-Terrorism Information Exchange (Matrix), a quick-access information repository that integrates state-based data with privately held data, is currently in use by six states and being considered for use in several others despite privacy worries and concerns that the system is too ...

    [read more]

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    Unpopular Argument: Sending Tech Jobs Abroad Is Good

    Many U.S. technology executives believe the offshore outsourcing of programming and other IT jobs will bolster the economy and raise Americans' security and standard of living. Subscribers to this belief follow the theory of comparative advantage, which posits that countries that ...

    [read more]

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    Pentagon Kills LifeLog Project

    The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (DARPA) LifeLog project, an initiative to chronicle every aspect of a person's life in a single database, was quietly disbanded in January by the decree of the Pentagon, much to the relief of civil libertarians who argued it could be used as an ...

    [read more]

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    Why This One Is Scarier

    The Mydoom computer worm's success in shutting down the SCO Group's Web site through a denial-of-service attack waged by 25,000 to 50,000 infected zombie" computers raises the bar for malware in terms of damage and sophistication, but some security experts believe Mydoom was created as a ...

    [read more]

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    Neural-Chaos Team Boosts Security

    Researchers at Israel's Bar-Ilan University have integrated a neural network encryption scheme with chaotic signal synchronization to generate code that is very difficult to crack. The scheme involves two identical synchronized systems--one at the sender's location and one at the ...

    [read more]

    to the top


    DARPA-Funded Linux Security Hub Withers

    The Sardonix project, a two-year-old Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)-backed research project designed to track Linux code for security audits, has been largely abandoned, says Sardonix founder and computer scientist Crispin Cowan, chief research scientist at WireX ...

    [read more]

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    The Internet2 Commons: Supporting Distributed Engineering Collaboration

    The George E. Brown, Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES) project started by the National Science Foundation three years ago is an initiative to leverage the national cyber infrastructure to conduct research aimed at making built environments more resistant to earthquakes. ...

    [read more]

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    Twentysomething

    IT jobs in the federal government are proving very attractive to younger-generation information professionals, particularly those facing unemployment or underemployment in the private sector because of the economy. Such interest is vital when measured against the imminent ...

    [read more]

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    Dual Curses: Viruses and Spam

    A Web-based survey of senior executives conducted by Computerworld and Ferris Research finds that viruses and spam are the biggest email-related headaches. IT managers are fearful of zero-day attacks because virus authors are exploiting software vulnerabilities faster. Meanwhile, spam is ...

    [read more]

    to the top


    Computer Makers Tackle E-Waste

    The mounting problems of electronic waste and the introduction of e-waste legislation in more than 50 percent of U.S. states over the last 12 months is spurring IBM, Gateway, and other computer manufacturers to ramp up their recycling initiatives. International Data estimates that typical PCs last ...

    [read more]

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    Where Have All the Programming Jobs Gone?

    IEEE-USA contends that the trend to offshore engineering is partly responsible for the job losses programmers and other IT professionals have sustained in recent years. Ron Hira, who chairs IEEE-USA's R&D Policy Committee, reported that American IT workers are suffering from ...

    [read more]

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    The Rise of Telecities

    Arthur C. Clarke Institute executive director Joseph N. Pelton argues that the trend toward megacities characterized by faster transportation systems, centralized infrastructure, and increased urbanization is wrong-headed and will only increase populations' vulnerability to terrorist attacks, natural ...

    [read more]

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