MikesWhatsNews, 10, 12, 2002 in today's issue #613 Reduce The Risk Through Safe Computing Human Authentication Project Design News Online Intenet Dot-Playground Calenz Disney's Treasure Planet pcAnywhere 11.0 Beta Testers Browser Parasites, Adware, Scumware, Spyware - Stamp them out CCC Calenz Display Calibration ____________________________________________________________ NOTE: Any time you see the " ++ ", it means there is more of the article, or story, on the linked site. Mike ____________________________________________________________ There is a complete archive of past MikesWhatsNews newsletters available to members on the Yahoo page, it is searchable by word or issue #. Here is the address direct to the messages; http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MikesWhatsNews/messages and; //www.freelists.org/archives/mikeswhatsnews/ ____________________________________________________________ WEB SEMINAR: REDUCE THE RISK THROUGH SAFE COMPUTING On Tuesday 10 December Sophos will present a live web seminar describing why anti-virus software is only part of the malware solution. The talk will detail how companies can best implement safe computing to reduce the threat of both existing and new, unknown viruses and worms. This presentation will give you the knowledge to effectively and dramatically reduce the threat of virus infection on your company's networks and desktops. Sign up now if you would like to attend and ask questions. http://www.sophos.com/link/reducerisk ____________________________________________________________ Try this intriguing Human Authentication Project Test from Carnegie Mellon University. http://www.captcha.net/humanaut/ It's a study on cryptogtaphy and passwords. thanks to Steve; http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pro_tech ____________________________________________________________ Design News Online http://www.designnews.com/ {Hardcore hardware portal} Think of it as an online mag for Dilberts. You know, engineers. Those unsung heroes that build, test, and improve the gadgets that make our lives easier. Well... most of the time. The print version has been in circulation for over half a century, but now you can get all of the new content straight from the Web site, too. Check out the reviews, learn about new products, and even search for occupations in the field of design and engineering. Funny, I thought they just drove trains? Thanks to; Christy ____________________________________________________________ Intenet Dot-Playground by Cynthia L. Webb ~ www.washingtonpost.com http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9400-2002Dec4.html The Internet is home to a wealth of information, some of it educational, some of it banal -- and some of it downright pornographic. Because of that last, widespread category, parents have gone to legislators, asking them to protect their children from adult content. Free speech issues abound, but that hasn't stopped Congress from approving -- and President Bush from signing -- a law to create an Internet safe haven for kids. Whether the "kids.us" domain will be a success is still unclear, because no one knows how accurately the online neighborhood can be regulated for appropriate content. The legislation is called the Dot Kids Implementation and Efficiency Act of 2002. ++ Thanks to; Thanks to; Jasmine, Owner/Group Moderator: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pro_tech and http://groups.yahoo.com/group/computersupport_2 A Technical Support Alliance Charter Member ____________________________________________________________ Disney's Treasure Planet ~ Demo <http://www.gamepro.com/index.html?/computer/pc/games/files/4323.shtml> Treasure Planet: Battle at Procyon, based on Walt Disney Pictures' upcoming animated feature "Treasure Planet," is a 3D action, real-time PC game by award-winning game developer Barking Dog Studios. In the game, players command "solar sail" powered space ships that resemble old-world vessels. Using their wits and courage, players must defend the queen and empire from marauding space pirates and a mysterious new enemy with virtually indestructible "Ironclad" ships. In single player mode, players receive battle training, can tailor their ships and weapons or jump right into their mission. In multi-player mode, up to four players can create customized fleets, including determining the space ships that they will use, the characteristics of their crew, weapons and more, and then go up against each other in strategic combat over the Internet. For players who want immediate action, a skirmish mode provides instantaneous mini-battles. Across all modes, the game features a simple, easy to master interface with advanced options for experienced RTS fans. ++ from; GamePro.com Weekly Newsletter: ____________________________________________________________ Invitation for pcAnywhere 11.0 Beta Testers (for Small, Medium, Large Businesses): The Symantec pcAnywhere team invites you to participate in the Symantec Enterprise Development Alliance Program (EDAP). As an EDAP participant, you will have the opportunity to provide technical feedback during pcAnywhere 11.0 corporate beta cycles. You will be provided information about the project, instructions on obtaining the beta build(s), and a dedicated project email address to submit comments and feedback. If you are interested, please send an email indicating so to cdp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Please include your name, title, company name, address, and phone number. ____________________________________________________________ Browser Parasites, Adware, Scumware, Spyware - Stamp them out http://allentech.net/parasite/index.phtml Parasites are unsolicited commercial software applications installed on your computer, usually without your knowledge - or consent. Parasites work through your browser, assault you with unwanted advertising, spy on your web surfing habits, compromise your system's security and stability, and even alter the content and links that you see in web pages! We ourselves became aware of parasites only after we noted a sharp decrease in our bookstore earnings while our bookstore traffic had increased more than three fold! 'Click-thrus' were up - but sales simply evaporated! This was traced directly to sales links being hijacked by parasite programs! If our experience is typical then the problem is enormous! Few of these parasites provide any benefit to the user, indeed most users are unaware that they have parasites installed on their system at all! Parasites may be grouped by names that best describe what they do: Adware Unleashes a torrent of unwanted advertising banners, pop-ups, pop-unders, etc., on the lucky user, best described as a plague. Scumware Adds advertising links to web pages, for which the page author does not get paid, and hijacks affiliate-program payments by substituting the page owner's affiliate identifier with another! Usually designed by people who hang out around school yards in their free time. Scum. Spyware Watches everything the user does on-line and transmits that information back to marketing companies - or other interested parties. Some of the other 'side benefits' of these programs are, they leave security holes whereby arbitrary code can be executed on the user's computer, and they degrade system performance and cause errors and crashes because they are usually badly-written. ++ ____________________________________________________________ Christies Computer Corner thanks to Christy; <1stPicksoftware-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=subscribe> Calenz http://www.calenz.com/main.htm Freeware Calenz. It's a calendar. It's colourful, customizable & changable. It's cool. Calenz is a personal calendar which runs locally on your PC. It allows you to enter any events for days on or after today and Calenz will remind you on the events occurring today and tomorrow. Use it as a means to remind you of important or special days and to schedule your timetable. Calenz can load when Windows boots up and it will notify you with a window of the events happening today and tomorrow. It minimizes automatically after you have read the events or when there are no events. ~~~~~~~ Display Calibration http://www.displaycalibration.com/ Most regular users don't think much about screen resolution. That's a promise your monitor makes every New Year's Eve. Right. So, this site was created to help you calibrate your screen so it shows you stuff the way it should. Some colors, while pretty, may actually bring harm to your eyes. You may need to change the brightness, contrast, color depth, and screen resolution; test and tweak these factors in a flash. I promise you'll like the results. Of course, YMMV... so check your systems manual first. Thanks to; Christy Was this forwarded to you ? Get your own subscription here: <1stpickPCtips-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=subscribe> ____________________________________________________________ Antivirus software is a good choice to scan your system for possible viruses, however no virus scanner is 100% effective as manufactures cannot keep up with the rapid change of viruses that happens daily. Be sure to update yours regularly. http://www.hackfix.org/software/antivirus.html ______________________________________________________________________ Please feel free, to offer constructive criticism, as that will help me keep it interesting. I also welcome any submissions about new products, web pages, or articles of interest. All submissions posted in MWN will be given proper credit. "MikesWhatsNews" believes in giving credit where credit is due but at times deadlines and information that is very important to readers we accidentally misspost an item. If you believe something to be miscredited, or you know the author of one of the articles which we have posted as 'unknown', please do let us know so we can correct the information where applicable. Many times in a article you may see a click here for more information, or to go to a link, these often will not work, as the original information, was taken from a page with HTML links. This is when you will want to go to the webpage indicated in the article, ++ ,for 'the rest of the story' ***MfM*** indicates that I am adding my own information to a particular article. `~*~*~*~*~*~` Mike ~It's a good day if I learned something new. You can read a sample of my newsletter on my web page http://www.mwn.ca My virus pages ~ http://virusinfo.hackfix.org mytech@xxxxxxxxxxx ~*~*~*~*~ Was this forwarded to you? Want to subscribe? Send an email to mikeswhatsnews-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=subscribe. 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