Category Archives: Software

Sony DRM: A WMD in the Wrong Hands

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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It’s only been mere seconds since my last post, but this was too good to give up: A new trojan is out and it takes advantage of Sony’s malicious rootkit to hide its files via the prefix ‘$sys$’.

I think this is the ultimate proof that Sony has gone too far. ‘They were trying to protect their interests.’ Sure they were (I’m being sarcastic, in case you couldn’t tell) but there are limits. Various conventions throughout history have outlawed the use of WMDs. Weapons of Mass Destruction. Why? I mean, there has to be a reason that the US doesn’t nuke the terrorists, or vice versa; and there is. SALT I & II resulted in strategic WMD reductions for the US and USSR. Sony’s rootkits are practically in violation of the Geneva Convention as well…

I think the UN should step in… Now Japan has WMDs too.. Interesting.. WMDs make things too easy, drive the casualties too high, and overall are a just one big disaster. It takes little to no effort to achieve widespread chaos and destruction, and there is almost no preventive measure. Well, its official. Sony’s rootkit is a WMD. Since its release, it has been used by BMG-Sony for their shady protection schemes, WoW hackers, rumors abound that CS hackers use it as well, and now Virii and Trojan writers.

It is undetectable by any traditional spyware and Antivirus software, making it near impossible to clear your PC out. Rootkits are like cheats in AOE. They make an epic battle between good and evil all the more bloody and cheap. Spawning Cobras that can wreak havoc on Town Centers in minutes is not fun, its cheap, its evil, and its most certainly below the belt.

Payware…

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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It seems that I may have coined a new word :)!
Payware
I’m surprised its not already mainstream, I mean, come on, it fits the mold. Shareware, Spyware, Freeware, Adware….. I could write a mathematical formula for those names! Anyway, since it makes sense (for those of you who still did not get it: -ware is used to describe any SOFTware, and since for you give $$$ for those, they are hereby called payware.. DUH). It seems to now be quite a popular word! Another NeoSmart touchdown! :)

This is supposed to be a short post, kinda to give you guys a break from the heavier content of the previous posts, but, you know us, we can never be nice ;)
Come back in a couple of hours, we still have (give me a minute to count here…) 7 or 8 controversial topics to discuss here…

Sony & DRM

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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When I first heard about the Sony rootkits, I figured it was a bit of unobtrusive software that people had found just to complain about.
Where I currently reside, there are no Sony CDs, so I had not a chance to test it, and I figured that it would brew over soon, and there would be no need to mention it, especially seeing as bloggers world wide were covering this topic and ripping it from head to toe. But you know me, and you know NeoSmart Technologies: we like the ingenious stuff. The dirt that, without trying, is presented as wrapping paper.

What am I talking about?! Well, I figured that while everyone was discussing how evil Sony’s rootkits were, and how we can use to our benefit, sorry, how it can be used against us in WoW and CS, I’d look at something bigger and more important: what this means for Sony.
No, I am not talking about Lawsuits (though if you are interested, and reside in California or New York you can join the litigation suit!) those are plenty and too obvious. Sony has taken things too far, and in doing so, they have literally buried themselves alive.

Is it just me, or does anyone else seem to recall that Sony makes Playstation??? And that Sony is in a deadly neck-to-neck race with Microsoft and their XBox 360? Don’t worry if you forgot, apparently Sony’s President, and all of his PR staff have forgotten as well. It goes further than this….
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Grub Install Disk

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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If I seem a bit happy today, here is why: two days ago we started and finshed our ‘Repairing the MBR without Formatting’ Whitepaper. Basically it tells you the only way (never before discovered) to repair a FUBAR’d MBR without losing any data.
From there we went on to discovering our next project: a bootable Grub install disk/wizard. It will:

  1. Make fixing the MBR a lot easier (removes all Linux related steps);
  2. Make reinstalling Grub for *nix users a simple thing… No more rescue mode

Currently I’m working on this project with some very kind members from another forum, and the research half of R&D is going very smooth. I am personally very pleased with out progress, and we should have a beta out within a fortnight!

Vista 5231: The All-New Networking Center

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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The all new ‘Network Center’ is more than just a pretty face.

Networking appears to have been rewritten completely from the bottom up in Vista 5231. For those of you piping on about how its ‘just a number’ trust me, its not.

The new Network Center allows you to do somethings that users have demanded for years: for instance, configure multiple connections to automatically switch between themselves when connected to the appropriate network.

For example, at work you connect to one wireless router that does not use DHCP, and at home one that does, while at University you connect to a third that doesn’t. In XP you would have to manually configure 1 of the connections every time. In Vista, you don’t.

But it goes further than that: Vista automatically queries the SNMP for all local networks. I plugged in my Efficient Networks SpeedStream 5100b DSL modem, and Vista let me know that the address 192.168.0.1 could be used to access the configuration page for the SpeedStream.

The new ‘Network Map’ draws a cloud diagram of your PC and all the networks its connected to. It correctly identified that I was connected to a Wireless Network with my Wi-Fi adapter, and that I was connected to the Internet via my wired LAN connection. It correctly ID’d the routers/modems on both ends, and supplied the network name.

On the Command Line side it has also added the ‘route’ command which can be used by advanced users to dictate how traffic should be routed across the various simultaneously connected networks, and to quickly and easily solve issues that previously required luck and conformity.

Startup2Service on Vista

Posted on by Mahmoud Al-Qudsi
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I just finshed speaking to a MSDN representative, and got a couple of pointers on what programs and features from Vista can be integrated into Startup2Service.

Our latest version (in labs: 0.6.11.0) is 100% compatible with Vista. Besides that we can tell you that it will work on non-English versions of Windows, and that it is 100% working with Microsoft Antispyware (which is the best!). What’s more, it is not only OK with MS Antispy, it is integrated with it!

Yes, it will allow clean programs to be added as services, and the ‘dirty’ ones to be denied!We have a couple more tricks up our sleeve(s), but you’ll have to wait a bit longer. Beta 2 is almost here, and it will be spectacular.

Taking Back the Web

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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Believe it or not, this post is not about the browser wars. We come very close to discussing them, but that is not the point, there are plenty of other posts and plenty of other times for that. It just hit me though: anyone that has every used Mozilla Foundation’s popular web browser, Firefox, knows that their slogo is “taking back the web.”

No problem, er, but, just wondering here: “Since when did the web ever belong to Firefox or Mozilla anyhow?” A more appropriate catch-phrase would be Hijacking the Web, or Stealing the Web, or Redirecting the Web This Way, or even The Web the Firefox Way. Don’t get me wrong, I like Firefox, but unless by this they mean putting the web in the hands of opensource…. wait, nope, it was never theirs either.

What do you think? Does it do the trick?

Either way, in all reality its MS’ Battle to take back the web. If Firefox wants share. OK by me, just get your terminology straight.

Opera 8.5 in Short

Posted on by Mahmoud Al-Qudsi
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This is a very quick post, I have been out of the country for most of last week. (Cyberterrorist on the loose! :P)

Anyway, with Opera’s new debut in the 100% freeware market, no ads, no catches, its on everyone’s minds. I have said it time and time again, that no matter how good of a browser Opera is, so long as it packages with ads, or sells at a fee, it will never be number one.

1) Their motto: “The Fastest Browser on Earth”
I have to ask: is the browser fast, or does it load pages fast? Either way, they need to recheck their game plan.

a) Most competent browsers are now equally fast (AOL and MSN Explorer not included obviously), since they load pages almost as fast as your PC can receive. Also, with 60+% of America on broadband, a nano-second load-time is as negligible as the weight of an electron in chemistry :).

b) The browser (as a program) is fast, but certain parts of it are murder. I’m talking about the message boxes. Do you want to save this password? or Would you like to subscribe to this web feed? They load fast enough, that’s not the problem. The problem is that it takes 3+ seconds for the box to unfreeze. Whilst its frozen, its useless. Obviously.

2) Its very pretty. Believe it or not, this is the slickest-looking browser on the web. Firefox with themes does not count, I mean, what kind of company cannot make a decent theme for its browser to ship with??? But Opera? Its beautiful. I enjoy looking at it.

3) Very incompatible. Of the three leading browsers (no need to list them, esp. since this bulletin includes Opera as one of the three), Opera fails the Acid test the worst. But forget Acid, no crazy webmaster writes pages like that. If they do, they should be banned from writing pages. Hell, ban them from using a PC! But, Opera is not compatible with any BB-code shortcuts, AT ALL. I’m typing this from Opera 8.5, just to be fair, and I have to manually hit the B button for bold and the i button for italics. No ctrl+b and ctrl+i for me…. Also it has issues displaying many CSS-Positioned tables.

This may not have been as brief as I intended it to be, but it’ll do ;) I hope this clears up what Opera needs to do to get some more ground. Its a nice browser, but not yet ready for the masses I’m afraid.

The All New Nissan Pivo “Car”

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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This is the all-new Nissan Pivo. Its name comes from the 360-degree rotating cabin atop the platform-on-wheels. To us, it looks more like a toy car than a real, live automobile; but it sure is nifty. It runs on pure electricity – from a lithium-ion battery. It uses drive-by-wire the whole way through, so no mechanical brake fluid or steering cables. Here’s a description from Wikipedia:

The Pivo really doesn’t even have an engine. It is powered by a lithium-ion battery. The battery has a super motor that creates one of the lowest emissions yet in any vehicle. The design of the vehicle is very futuristic because of many features the Pivo has shown. The Pivo’s cabin can revolve completely around (360 degrees) and is very easy to maneuver because of it. The Pivo sports very high-tech gadgets, as well. It features Nissan’s Around View Monitor which reduces blind spots by displaying the outside surroundings on screens mounted on the inside of the car’s A-pillars.

Macicide

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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Mac Mini

Mac is committing suicide. Dramatic? Maybe, but nevertheless 100% true. In several bold strokes, they have practically killed off their fan club. Between leaving PPC, going on a rampage asking webmasters to pull vids of MacIntels, telling fans to stop complaining, and becoming another Microsoft.. Then there was the whole issue with the iPod Nano screens that scratch and tear, that are useless if you expected such a costly investment to last longer than a couple of days, and even more was the ardent denial of bad engineering. Then this (from CNET News):

Consumers who buy a Mac Mini this week may or may not end up with a machine that’s faster than the desktop Apple Computer was selling in prior weeks. The company confirmed to CNET News.com that it has started offering machines that in some cases have improved processing powers and other enhancements.

This is tantamount to saying ‘We will ship a couple of better Minis in a basket of rotten eggs. Keep buying, you might get lucky.’ No contender has ever stooped so low before. Yep, not even ‘big bad Microsoft’ Apple is going down, and the coroner’s preliminary report is suicide, er, Macicide.

Source: CNET News