Saturday, September 13, 2008

Privacy/security breach?IPhone Snaps Everything You Do


What is apple upto? I mean... this is totally a privacy breach for any user who just uses a iPhone because he likes it.

wired.com says
While demonstrating how to break the iPhone's passcode lock in a webcast, iPhone hacker and data-forensics expert Jonathan Zdziarski explained that the popular handset snaps a screenshot of your most recent action -- regardless of whether it's sending a text message, e-mailing or browsing a web page -- in order to cache it. This is purely for aesthetic purposes: When an iPhone user taps the Home button, the window of the application you have open shrinks and disappears. In order to create that shrinking effect, the iPhone snaps a screenshot, Zdziarski said.

The phone presumably deletes the image after you close the application. But anyone who understands data is aware that in most cases, deletion does not permanently remove files from a storage device. Therefore, forensics experts have used this security flaw to gather evidence against criminals convicted of rape, murder or drug deals, Zdziarski said.

"There's no way to prevent it," Zdziarski said during the webcast. "I'm kind of divided on it. I hope Apple fixes it because it's a significant privacy leak, but at the same time it's been useful for investigating criminals."

Now what is that means?It means.. to catch such people,everyone is a suspect?And every user who buys an iPhone will have to suffer such things? This is not the right feature if its breaching your security and privacy.I hope wpple will do something in this regard.

iPhone 2.1 firmware

Apple has released new iPhone 2.1 software on its iTunes online service that offers to decrease dropped calls, improve the battery life, improve e-mail reliability, improve text messaging notification, reduce 3rd-party application crashes and reduce the time it takes to sync the device with a computer.

Users have noticed more "bars" on the connection meter and have reported that it was faster performing key tasks. Last month's update from Apple drew some criticism from users that claimed that it did not enhance access to high-speed data networks as Apple had predicted. In this update, Apple also patched 8 security vulnerabilities including the "passcode bug" they fixed last January but failed to include in the July iPhone 2.0 update.

It seems now iPhone will be more of interest if it gives what it claims to provide!What you say?Lets hope this will bring it to what people expect from apple.

Saturday, September 6, 2008

Google : Chrome EULA Update!


We just have discussed the issues about 'chrome is having and Google has done it right!Google has changed their EULA and now its your rights on your content,finally :).

The search engine has been quick to rectify this issue, attributing the whole issue to accidental copy and paste. Under Section 11 of Google's Universal Terms of Service, Google retains a license to transmit or display content through its services, as per US copyright law. However, the section in Chrome was not updated. Mike Yang, Senior Product Counsel at Google, writes:
"[Our] license is limited to providing the service. In Gmail, for example, the terms specifically disclaim our ownership right to Gmail content. So for Google Chrome, only the first sentence of Section 11 should have applied. We're sorry we overlooked this, but we've fixed it now..."
The updated EULA now reads:
"You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services." And, yes, these terms are retroactive."

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Google Chrome - reasons to avoid

This is something really we should consider.I read this on neowin. Google chrome is a big thing these days.Everyone is talking about this small piece. But here users have submitted the flaws and vulnerability in this browser. It talks about what the users must keep in mind before use it because just the name of google. Google has released the thing without the patch for the problems.

Neowin said,
"The first, is the popular "carpet bomb" vulnerability that still exists within Chrome, as pointed out on our forums by our member matessim. This vulnerability allows malicious websites to drive by download and execute programs on your machine. Our visitors may remember the uproar that this same vulnerability caused for Safari users, and that Apple patched the carpet-bombing issue with Safari v3.1.2. Chrome is vulnerable to this exploit because it is based on the same engine, WebKit 525.13, and Google did not patch or update the engine before releasing the software.

The other, and less technical, problem with Chrome exists in its EULA. More specifically, the point that would seem to give Google rights to anything you post on the Internet while using their browser, mostly in conjunction with the promotion of its services."
As the google EULA says,
"By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any content which you submit, post or display on or through, the services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the services and may be revoked for certain services as defined in the additional terms of those services."
Which should not be in some browser which is an Open Source piece and expected to be a good software from a reputed company. I mean what google wants to prove?

So please think before you use it without the patch released and about your information sharing with google :).

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Paint.NET v3.36

Whats New:

• Improved: Effect rendering should be a little faster now.
• Changed: Implemented some changes to the "Add Noise" effect that were suggested by a forum member.
• Changed: The canvas background color is now always #c0c0c0.
• Changed: The auto-updater should now correctly detect .NET 3.5 and newer, which will help to save bandwidth when Paint.NET v4.0 is released (it will require .NET 3.5).
• Fixed: Paint.NET now works on a system that has the .NET 3.5 SP1 "Client Profile" installed.
• Fixed: When zoomed in and the cursor is to the top-left of the image (negative coordinates), the ruler is now highlighted in the correct area. Fixed: The effect rendering system no longer sets the "Tag" property on the configuration dialog.
• Fixed: Some incorrectly authored plugins would cause a crash when loading their support details (author, copyright, etc.).
• Fixed: There was a bug in the color wheel for IndirectUI that caused it to show the wrong values at initialization.
• Fixed: There was a performance problem for effects that used the IndirectUI color wheel control.
• Fixed: In some rare cases, Paint.NET would crash while shutting down.
• Fixed: When using the "Fixed Ratio" feature of the Rectangle Selection tool, it would crash if 0 was specified for both the width and height.
Paint.NET v3.36

Google launches new browser!

Google is launching an open source web browser to compete with Internet Explorer and Firefox.

The browser is designed to be lightweight and fast, and to cope with the next generation of web applications that rely on graphics and multimedia. Called Chrome, it will launch as a beta for Windows machines in 100 countries, with Mac and Linux versions to come.

"We realized... we needed to completely rethink the browser," said in a blog post by Google.

The new browser will help Google take advantage of developments it is pushing online in rich web applications that are challenging traditional desktop programs.

Google has a suite of web apps, such as Documents, Picasa and Maps which offer functionality that is beginning to replace offline software.

Is this will be a successful browser, because there are many of them now rocking the market. Firefox,Safari and IE will face a tough competition?Is this a way to kill all other companies or so, because google is entering in everything on the internet now.May be this is helpful to growing technology,but may be it can make monopoly or something like that.Lets hope a better Open source thing from google.

BBC News