Friendster, the once high-flying social network, have received some recent good news as a key patent application has been approved.

The patent covers “A System, Method and Apparatus for Connecting Users in an Online Computer System Based on Their Relationships within Social Networks.” Friendster wants to be sure that you grasp this fact.

“Friendster, an online community that connects people through networks of friends, announced today that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has awarded a new U.S. Patent titled “A System, Method and Apparatus for Connecting Users in an Online Computer System Based on Their Relationships within Social Networks” (Number 7,069,308). The patent, which was awarded to Friendster and lists Jonathan Abrams as the inventor, outlines a system, method and apparatus for connecting users in an online computer system based on their relationships within social networks.“

Source: arstechnica

Lexar has identified a potential issue in JumpDrive FireFly products sold between April 1 and May 31, 2006 in the U.S. in the following capacities: 256MB, 512MB, 1GB and 2GB and JumpDrive Secure II 1GB products sold at Fry’s in the U.S. between May 16 and May 31, 2006.

Lexar recalling these products because certain configurations of these products have a potential to overheat, creating a potential risk of injury and property damage. The potential for the products to overheat was identified by Lexar during testing; no reports of overheating during use have been reported. All affected products shipped to retailers have been returned to Lexar and most retail stores have already received replacement products and are actively selling them.

Source: Lexar

Internet security experts have discovered a new phishing scam that uses voice recordings to pilfer money from PayPal accounts.

In the newest social engineering attack, identity thieves have spammed fake PayPal account compromise warnings to lure users into dialing a phone number and giving up credit card information.

Unlike normal phishing e-mails, there is no URL or response address. Instead, the e-mail urges the recipient to call a phone number and verify account details.

It is a Southern California area code (805) that greets callers with the following automated voice recording: “Welcome to account verification. Please type your 16-digit card number.”

On a personal note, If they use a telephone it means that this is traceable via the phone company, and the police can find out who owns this telephone number. Then how come the authorities don’t do anything ?

Source: eWeek

A lunar-probing satellite, part of China’s three-stage moon mission, will beam 30 pieces of local music to the earth based on public demand after its launch next year.

The Commission of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence, in charge of the lunar project, said it had begun seeking recommendations from the general public for the music to be transmitted from space.

Source: hindu.com

Bruce Schneier on his site indicating that the U.S. Navy may be patenting the Firewall. Whether or not it is their intention to do so is unclear.

From the patent description: “In a communication system having a plurality of networks, a method of achieving network separation between first and second networks is described. First and second networks with respective first and second degrees of trust are defined, the first degree of trust being higher than the second degree of trust. Communication between the first and second networks is enabled via a network interface system having a protocol stack, the protocol stack implemented by the network interface system in an application layer.”

Source: Slashdot

For the new Blu-ray and HD-DVD formats, Hollywood implemented a complete copy protection scheme; almost everything has to be encrypted and authenticated. Despite the crypto-stuff in Advanced Access Content System and High Bandwidth Digital Content Protection, they left the backdoor wide open - they forgot about the PrintScreen button. Using this function you can create exact digital copies of a film picture by picture and reassemble them to a stream

Source: Slashdot

The Windows Vista Team Blog shows the new non-Windows Aero theme.

Windows Vista uses the Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) to deliver some amazing user experience features collectively called Windows Aero which include; Desktop Composition, Glass window frames with colored glass, window thumbnails and Flip3D, a new window management facility. All of the Windows Aero features are enabled in Windows Home Premium, our Business SKUs, and Ultimate assuming you have the appropriate hardware. On Home Basic, you get Desktop Composition with opaque colored glass windows frames.

If you don’t have a display driver capable of running WDDM you’ll get the Windows Vista Basic theme which does not benefit from some of the more graphically intensive features such as desktop composition and glass window frames. This is a good, clean interface called the Basic or Standard theme, but lacking the glass window frames of Aero.

Toshiba and SanDisk plan to jointly spend about 600 billion yen ($5.2 billion) to build a new flash memory plant in Japan to better compete with rival Samsung Electronics, Japanese newspapers reported on July 7.

Source: eWeek

Sky subscribers can now text instructions to their Sky+ boxes from anywhere in the world, thanks to a new service that makes your remote look as slick as the penny farthing.

The service, which launched yesterday, is available to all Sky+ customers. Once users have registered their mobile phone numbers on the My Sky section of the Sky Active menu, they can instruct the box to record a show by texting its name, channel, date and time to a special number.

In a month or so, users will be able to access their Sky+ menus online and on 3G handsets.

Source: TheRegister

“Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest” opens Friday (July 7), but the Walt Disney Co. also has high hopes for the property in the strikingly different media of massively multiplayer online games.

“Pirates of the Caribbean Online” will become a reality next year when Disney Online reveals an original story set within the mythology of the “Pirates” film trilogy.

Source: Reuters

Fancy turning your copy of Skype into a watch-anywhere TV viewer? Now you can, courtesy of Japanese company Novac, which today announced a box that turns any suitably-specified PC into a machine for beaming TV shows to anyone on the internet.

The key is in the software. The box itself is an analogue TV tuner - not digital, alas. The code connects the digitised video into a video-conferencing stream that can be sent via a local copy of Skype out to any other machine running the VoIP software. Sending a Skype instant message to the source lets you change channels.

Source: TheRegister

A hole in Microsoft Excel has been identified that could allow attackers to take control of a computer, a security group said Thursday–the third vulnerability affecting the popular spreadsheet program to surface in less than a month.

The flaw is due to a memory corruption error that occurs when handling or repairing a document containing overly long styles, the French Security Incident Response Team said in an advisory.

The flaw, which affects Excel 2000, 2002 and 2003 and Office 2000, XP and 2003, “could be exploited by attackers to execute arbitrary commands by convincing a user to open and repair a specially crafted Excel file,” the advisory said.

Source: News.com