An appeals court has upheld the prosecution of a Michigan man who was charged with production of child pornography after downloading and burning pornographic pictures from the Internet. The pictures were created by a Russian website that the man was not affiliated with in any form. From the court decision: ‘After reviewing the dictionary definition of the word make, the circuit court stated that the bottom line was that, following the mechanical and technical act of burning images onto the CD-Rs, something new was created or made that did not previously exist.’

Source: Slashdot

Square Enix, Inc., the publisher of Square Enix entertainment products in North America, announced a simultaneous launch for FINAL FANTASY XI: Treasures of Aht Urhgan, the third expansion pack for the title. The long-awaited release of FINAL FANTASY XI for Xbox 360 video game and entertainment system from Microsoft will also be available that day. Specifically, retail product and service will be available in April 18 in North America, April 20 in Europe and Japan.

FINAL FANTASY XI, the first cross-platform, cross-continent massively multi-player online role-playing game (MMORPG) will be accessible on Xbox 360 for the first time to players in North America, Europe and Japan. Gamers will be able to communicate and play together no matter where they are or from what platform they connect — the PlayStation(R)2 computer entertainment system, Windows operating system or Xbox 360.

FINAL FANTASY XI (which is required to play any of the expansions) and does not require the Chains of Promathia and Rise of the Zilart expansion packs. The third expansion will be sold separately for PlayStation 2 and Windows users at North American retailers for a suggested retail price of $29.99 (USD).

The minimum system requirements for FINAL FANTASY XI on Windows: Windows 2000/XP, Intel Pentium III 800Mhz or faster processor, 128MB RAM, DirectX 8.1 compatible sound card, DVD-ROM drive, 56K or faster Internet connection, and GeForce series or Radeon 9000 series video card with 32MB of RAM. A DVD ROM drive is required to install Treasures of Aht Urhgan and the Vana’diel Collection.

Nobody was ever arrested for leaking the secret source code for parts of the Windows operating system in 2004, but a hacker who sold a copy online afterward was sentenced to two years in federal prison Friday.

William “IllWill” Genovese, 29, will serve three years of supervised release following his prison term, during which he’ll be subject to electronic monitoring through special software installed on his computer, under the terms handed down by federal Judge William Pauley in New York. He remains free on bail, and is scheduled to report to prison March 14.

According to court records, an investigator hired by Microsoft took Genovese up on his offer and dropped two Hamiltons on the secret source code. The investigator then returned and arranged a second $20 transaction for an FBI agent, which led to Genovese’s indictment under the U.S. Economic Espionage Act, which makes it a felony to sell a company’s stolen trade secrets. After consulting with his public defender, Genovese pleaded guilty last August.

Source: wired

SHOUTcast 1.9.4 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (application crash) and execute arbitrary code via format string specifiers in a content URL, as demonstrated in the filename portion of a .mp3 file.

SHOUTcast is Nullsoft’s Free Winamp-based distributed streaming audio system.

French Security Incident Response Team rates this vulnerability as critical and recommend that you upgrade to version 1.9.5

To help your customers avoid inadvertent non-compliance, beginning in January, Microsoft will be removing the full Windows operating system software bits from the Volume Licensing CDs.

There is a misperception that Volume Licensing agreements cover the full Windows desktop operating system. The upgrade license does not provide a full, or initial, license for the Windows operating system. The Windows XP Professional desktop upgrade license is for upgrade purposes only. There are no changes to the terms of the Volume Licensing agreement, nor the Windows XP Professional upgrade license product use rights.

To provide clarity around the Windows desktop upgrade license and help customers avoid inadvertent non-compliance, Microsoft will be removing the full Windows operating system software bits from the Volume Licensing Welcome and Comprehensive Kit CDs beginning in January, 2006. Customers will receive CDs that include upgrade bits per their rights under the Volume License agreements. The full software bits will remain available to Volume Licensing customers through a secure online site (Microsoft Volume Licensing Services website) or by ordering a CD, but customers must have a qualifying operating system installed on their PCs in order to obtain the Windows Upgrade license

The recent move by Apple Computer to begin shipping Macintosh computers that use microprocessors from Intel could open the door to more attacks against computers running the company’s OS X operating system, security experts warn.

The shift to Intel processors from the Motorola Power PC processors will make it easier to create software exploits for Macintosh systems, and could result in a steady stream of Mac exploits in years to come.

The change could put more pressure on Apple to build security features into OS X, according to interviews conducted by eWEEK.

Apple declined requests for interviews. In an e-mail statement, the company said that the security technologies and processes that have made Mac OS X secure for PowerPC remain the same for Intel-based Macs.

Source: eWeek

Amazon.com Inc.’s A9.com search engine has incorporated Zoom Information Inc.’s index of businesspeople as the default source for people information, the companies said Tuesday.

The ZoomInfo service can be accessed by selecting the “people” box on the A9.com homepage. ZoomInfo provides summaries describing the person’s work history, education and accomplishments. ZoomInfo also allows registered users to monitor and manage their own summaries.

Source: informationweek

In a sign that video games are becoming more popular as family entertainment, a national survey released Thursday indicates joysticks aren’t just for kids.

Thirty-five percent, or about one in three parents, say they play, too, and 80 percent of that segment play video games with their children, according to the new survey commissioned by the Entertainment Software Association, a video game industry group.

The average “gamer parent” spends 19 hours a month playing video games, and spends roughly half that time playing alongside kids, the survey found.

Two-thirds of the gamer parents said they feel that playing video games has brought their families closer together.

Source: AP