Insta daily

To hamper and battle online pornography and other illegal activities, China has decided to put two virtual police officers in charge of a patrol that will see to such things. As per the reports, the two virtual officers, a man and a woman “will appear either on motorcycles, in a car or on foot, at the bottom of users’ computer screens every 30 minutes to remind them of Internet security”. These two virtual police officers will be scrutinizing news portals, web sites and all online forums that are based in Beijing. These surveillance officers won’t only keep an eye on the porn sites but also catch up websites that promote superstition, gambling, fraud and other such illicit things.

Till now, the Internet surveillance centre of the Beijing municipal public security bureau claims to have closed some 244 websites, 40 online pornographic novels and 128,000 Web pages dealing with pornographic materials. Zhao Hongzhi, deputy chief of the centre said, “We have achieved visible results in recent months but there is still a long way to go”. The service also enables users themselves to complain and report any such illegal activities by clicking on the pop-up icons with which they’ll be connected to Internet surveillance centre.

However, despite keen watch over sites, pornography is rampant. It must be noted that China bars signals or black outs TV screens, if and when CNN, BBC or any such networks take up topics which are related to China like Tibet, Taiwan or media liberty. The whole commotion is an after effect of the announcement that was made by Chinese President Hu Jintao, in April stating that measures would soon be taken up to get the country free of such ‘unhealthy’ content.
With China in the lead, I am sure the example will be soon followed by many other nations.

Source: Reuters

Those who think that Internet is the driving-force for the growth of porn industry, Matt Richtel of the New York Times will make them rethink. In his two-page long post, Richtel has logically argued how pornographers are losing their hopes in online for the promotion of their business.

Undeniably, Internet has played a pioneering role in creating a mass market for the X-rated content since long. The pornographers have exploited online as the most effective tool to market their products in the global market by offering free and low cost videos and images.

Internet has now turned nightmarish for the pornographers. The online availability of low-cost photos and videos has made their way to X-rated DVDs. The development and diffusion of low-cost digital technology has attracted novice pornographers to enter into DVD market, rather depending on Internet.

Richtel said,

And unlike consumers looking for music and other media, viewers of pornography do not seem to mind giving up brand-name producers and performers for anonymous ones, or a well-lighted movie set for a ratty couch at an amateur videographer’s house.

Although, some of companies admit that they were success in selling subscription to their web sites and in offering movies for download or watching online. However, the online revenue is growing slowly, which is not supporting the decrease in video sales and rentals.

According to AVN, the revenue from online subscriptions and sales was $2.8 billion in 2006, up from $2.5 billion a year ago. There is an increase. However, it is no match to the e-commerce growth shared by many industries.

In the last two years, the Red Light’s sales have come down by 30 percent. So also Nectar Entertainment Business whose sales dropped by 25 percent. They are struggling against the DVD competitors. On the other hand, the DVD prices are dropping steadily to attract more and more customers.

However, the traditional pornographic film companies are still keeping their hopes on online. They are focusing on quality to challenge the DVD competitors.

Are you worried about not getting enough time at home to exercise or about not being able to make it to the gym? Relax folks, relax! Does your mobile phone, laptop, PC or PDA have the Windows Media OS? Then look no further, just download this new Fitness Video from California-based Slimtree.com and get going. A download will cost you not more than 99 cents.

Slimtree.com President and Founder had this to say:

Slimtree.com, The Broadband Gym is an innovative pioneer in the diet and fitness industry. With several patent pending services and expanding branded product line and our unparalleled commitment to better serve our customers’ needs, we continue delivering the most complete and mobile service in the industry. We are proud to be the first company in the world to offer the 99 cent fitness video download service.

Slimtree offers an assortment of videos that you can download ranging from yoga to pilates to aerobics to dance exercise as well as ones on cardiovascular exercise, weights and many more. You can opt for a 30-day pass and download as many videos as you want each for 99 cents and watch each of these videos any number of times during the 30 day time period after which the video(s) becomes inactive. An additional 1$ will be added to your total purchase. Before you buy, you can view free samples of each video at the site.

Vincent Zarasua of Merrill Lynch had this to say:

Consumers no longer have to drive to the local gym, schedule appointments for yoga classes or pay $150/month to a personal trainer to exercise. Now, they can use the fitness video download service, which can be accessed whenever and wherever they want. For a professional like myself, keeping fit and healthy has always been a priority but one I rarely found enough time for. The Slimtree.com service is private, convenient, inexpensive and totally accessible.

To know more about the Slimtree video(s), you can visit the site or e-mail the company at contact@slimtree.com. But Slimtree advises customers to consult a physician before starting on a regular exercise regimen.

So folks, exercise your way to discover the new you!

Via: Business Wire

A report released by the U.K. government and GetSafeOnline lately has revealed the fact that our of every 10 internet users, more than one fell prey to online fraud last year. Startlingly, the total number of the victims was 3.5 million with each suffering a loss of £875.

The reasons for such huge fraud were as simple as that. Some users didn’t install up-to-the-minute security software. Some used the same password for different sites. Such downsides easily catch the eyes of the internet baddies. Many users accepted that they replied to the spam mails in order to get off the mailing lists.

Well, 46 percent of the users surveyed exposed they used no anti-spyware software, while 7 percent said they didn’t even use any anti-virus software. Half of the polled users said that they were themselves responsible for the scene while some blamed the banks or internet firms for the increasing online fraud.

The report dubbed “Internet Safety: The State of the Nation” revealed that 12 per cent of internet users fell as quarry to fraud last year. Six per cent of internet users suffered fraud shopping online while four per cent fell victims to bank card fraud.
Tony Neate, the managing director of Get Safe Online said:

If we all take greater care to protect our personal information online, we can reduce the majority of these criminal activities. Our message is that each one of us has to take greater personal responsibility for our own online security.

Visit Get Safe Online to know more about online safety.

A recent survey conducted by Silicon Valley based security-software firm Symantec has revealed that the U.S. is the biggest source as well as target of malevolent computer activities in the world.

The States only made up for the 33 percent of the computer attacks (spam and code coercion included) between 1st July and 31st December 2006. Moreover, 31 percent global computer threats also hit U.S.

The reason for such activities is simply linked to the ever-increasing internet infrastructure in U.S. Since 19 percent of the total internet users are living in States only, it easily falls prey to the malicious computer activities.

Symantec further claimed that “the US will remain the highest ranked country for malicious activity until another country exceeds it in numbers of Internet users and broadband connectivity.”

Via: rediff

Long nine years of treachery in which countless altered postage stamps were sold to to unsuspecting collectors on eBay and other Internet auction sites- could be the stickiest spam on the internet till the date. And, the most notable thing is that the man behind the big scam hasn’t been charged with a crime till now. Even his identity is said to be known to eBay security, law enforcement officials and a few foremost stamp experts.

The accused is thought to be a stamp dealer living in upstate New York. A retired FBI agent who has investigated many stamp fraud cases during his tenure describes it as the “the most prolific and most notorious” scam ever perpetrated in eBay’s problematic stamp-collecting category.

He has been put to investigation by law enforcement, suspended by eBay and exposed in Internet forums associated to stamp collecting. eBay had suspended identified accounts earlier but a small group of collectors that exposed the scam says that the counterfeiter just moved the operation to another Internet auction site for a few months before getting back to eBay to carry on the same.

The latest personification came to a halt on Jan. 29 when eBay security suspended two accounts after the collectors showed decisive evidence that forged stamps were being sold. But the aggravated philatelists say there is little uncertainty that the crook will soon be back in business on eBay.

Via: msnbc

Internet is not only what we experience on our computer. If we take a deeper look, it is also about a comprehensive network of cumbersome cables, switches, and bulky devices. And a hotel by the name of One Wilshire in downtown Los Angeles can be taken as a home for internet carriers.

The famous roadside hotel is a 30-storey building out of which 23 floors have been designed to house some of the most important communications infrastructure in the country. The occupants of this building are connection hardware from around 300 Internet and global telecommunications. Along with the US firms such as AT&T and Google, carriers from Europe and Asia are also there in the hotel.

Moreover, these carriers can get familiar to each other as simple hotel guests and that is pretty easy since they all are under a single covering. For your info, when the December 2006 earthquake hit Taiwan and made all the voice data to stop by splitting undersea fiber optic cables, One Wilshire re-routed some of the Internet and voice traffic with their facility within a few days.

Via: BoingBoing

A worst attack on internet servers was witnessed on Monday when three of the Internet’s 13 DNS “root servers” (responsible for controlling global internet traffic) were intensely smacked by a remote-controlled network of thousands of zombie computers. The so-called “denial of service” attack was intended to engulf many of the root servers with colossal amounts of traffic.

Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at UK anti-virus firm Sophos stated the attack to be “the most serious attack against these domain name servers.” Last time such kind of attack hit the servers in 2002 when all the 13 root servers fell prey to it and the internet traffic came down radically.

The investigation in under process and some reports have traced the attacks to be from Korea but Cluley cited that this is not a sign that all the offenders are from Korea.

Via: newscientisttech

Two online hackers have been put behind the bars by a Dutch court for infecting millions of computers with Toxbot and using the hijacked systems to commit online crimes. The main doer was sent to prison for two years while the second one has been imprisoned for 18 months. Moreover, the lead offender has been ordered to pay 9,000 euro as fine while the other one needs to pay 4,000 euros.

The younger one aged 20 years has been held responsible for developing Toxbot and another Trojan called Wayphisher. The other one aged 28 years helped to spread the Trojan horses. Both the perpetrators were arrested lat year in the month of October.

One of the main threats to internet in the current time are Botnets. Though authorities are doing darn good to keep a tab on such malicious activities, it’s getting hard to add a full stop since internet baddies are using more and more refined technology and tactics.

Via: Cnetnews

In a first ever diplomatic move Sweden will become the first country to open its embassy in Second Life, a virtual world which has seen offices of Dell and IBM.

Swedish institute director Olle Waestberg said,

“We are planning to establish a Swedish embassy in Second Life primarily as an information portal for Sweden.”

So it will not issue passports and visa but will act as an information portal to guide people. Swedish institute is a agency of Swedish foreign ministry whose main task is to supply info on the country.

Waestberg further said,

“Second Life allows us to inform people about Sweden and broaden the opportunity for contact with Sweden easily and cheaply.”

Second life is the fantasy world that is inhabited by people who have their presence in the form of Avatar. It has all the ingredients of the real world like economy (Linden Dollars) and you can also buy property in the game by these dollars.

In the longer term Swedish embassy will have its own island to create a hub for other Swedish companies.

Via: Theage

China now holds the number one position in the world to have the largest number of infected PCs by Malicious Botnets. Security company Prolexic states that Asia only contains 50 percent of the world’s total infected computers. The top-notch reason for swift rise in Botnets in China is high usage of pirate softwares. Moreover, online criminals and internet baddies exploit the weak cybercrime legislation.

If you commit a cybercrime in China, you face execution. If you do the same thing outside of China, the government won’t bat an eyelid.

Invaders have started finding new tactics around many common DDoS defence systems and are adding that potential to their Botnets. The list of top six infected countries of the world includes five from Asia only with US at number two.

Via: PCPRO

Making a hit list of 300 students of their school and some famous personalities have landed 6 girls of rural high school of Tennessee in trouble.

The girls have been charged with conspiracy to commit criminal homicide and were taken to juvenile facility.

School authorities discovered the list from the trash can and it had names of almost 300 persons ranging from students, faculty members and famous personalities like Oprah, Tom cruise and even Energizer Bunny was mentioned in the list.

School Principal Tommy Layne said at first he considered it to be a joke but the reality hit him when the authorities found word ‘Kill’ in the 9th grader MySpace pages and posts.
Principal Layne said he came to know about this when a visibly shaken student came with his grandmother and said that his name has appeared on the hit list.

The Police Chief of Dunlap where the trail will take place, Clint Huth did not give much detail but said the postings were like “Let’s kill these people”.

Already the education system in USA is on tenterhooks after the recent spate of school shootings that have claimed many lives but the present case can be a case of a bad joke but authorities jumping the gun.

The rural high school has 600 total wards in various classes and students are scared when the list became public. Many students chose to stay home and the court hearing is scheduled for Friday.

Via: CNN

As storm was gathering in Europe another storm was picking up its pace on net. In the first biggest attack of the virus the Trojan horse ‘Storm Worm’ by antivirus vendor F-secure left many PC’s infected and the true scale of devastation that it caused is yet to be gauged.

As the most business scan there mails for executable files so they might have been saved but according to reports the home PC’s will be the worst hit segment.

Net users were lured into the trap as the e-mail that arrived offered latest news on weather, Chinese missile test and Fidel Castro’s death. Upon downloading the executable portion got executed and the Virus started building its own network and that zombie PC then becomes a botnet as it will open the security door and then can be remotely controlled and the rootkit ensures that the program stays hidden.

Generally all these botnets are controlled by a single server but in this case it worked like a peer to peer network with no central control there by making it hard to detect and destroy.

Each of the infected machines will combine with list of subsets of the botnet network and none of the hosts has full list of the other infected hosts.
Director of the Anti-virus research Mikko Hypponen said that when the virus was first unleashed it was undetectable and

“The bad guys are putting a lot of effort into it–they were putting out updates hour after hour.”

According to mail service vendor MessageLabs this was a very aggressive campaign and said that it must be the handy work of first timers who wanted to make a name for themselves.

Senior technology consultant for Sophos (another Anti-virus vendor) Graham Cluley says that they think more such attacks are on the way and this botnet will be hired for spamming, adware circulation or will be handed over to extortionists to distribute Denial-of-service attacks.

Via: Newscom

A sort of self praise came out of Microsoft’s office when it said that it’s IE7 or Internet Explorer 7 has reached 100 million downloads. This info was shared by Tony Chor the Group Program Manager.

Although the majority of these downloads where upgrades to the existing IE6 and in reality the Explorer share in the market shrink by 1 per cent to 79.6 per cent while its immediate rival Mozilla Firefox market share grew from 13.5 percent to 14 per cent.

Although it’s too early to predict the IE downfall but still Microsoft will have to pull all stops in order to maintain the lead.

Via: Waleg