Articles by Jay Lyman

A "bot" -- a piece of malicious software that can spread and function much like a computer virus orworm -- is seizing on vulnerable MySQL database software running on Windows systems to spread and scan for newvictims While the MySQL Bot, also known as the Spool CLC, is mitigated by the limited number of Windows machinesrunning MySQL, it managed to ...

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) this week released what it described as three key recommendations, or pre-standard specifications, that will address performance and reliability issues for Web services, the joining of software applications inside and among different organizations' IT architectures While there has been a rush to roll in-house app...

As the controversy over peer-to-peer (P2P) networks goes before the U.S. Supreme Court, the recording and film industries are enlisting celebrities to help make the case that network operators should be held liable for the illegal file sharing that occurs over their networks. The tech industry, meanwhile, fears that an adverse ruling might stifle innovation...

Security software giant Symantec -- which has grown to cover a wider range of security solutions with acquisitions and partnerships -- this week rolled out two e-mail security appliances featuring anti-spam, antivirus and e-mail firewall The company said Symantec Mail Security 8200 Series appliances -- two different models aimed at organizations of...

Texas Instruments and Nokia announced today that a new single-chip mobile phone solution will take cutting-edge chips to the volume market of simple mobile phones Delivering on a promise to provide a single processor with digital baseband, memory, logic, radio frequency, power management and analog functions, TI said its Digital RF Processor (DRP) ...

Sony seems to be finding success for its portable PlayStation, or PSP, with nearly a million units shipped in less than two months, but that is not stopping the electronics giant from planning new features for the device In a recent talk, Sony executive Ken Kutaragi boasted of 800,000 PSP units shipped in Japan, where the device was released last D...

Wireless access to the Internet through WiFi hot spots is widening to include more public places, but users of the often free wireless networks are being warned that security risks are also growing The most recent cautionary advice came from UK researchers at Cranfield University who indicated "evil twin" WiFi or 802.11 wireless networks may be use...

Electronics giant Toshiba this week announced new software that turns mobile phones into remote access controllers for PCs, allowing users to access the Internet and e-mail with a PC desktop displayed on a handset The software, dubbed "Ubiquitous Viewer," provides access to Windows computers and includes functionality for the Microsoft Office suite...

Facing competition from the more widely available and less expensive DSL broadband Internet connections, Comcast has announced a speed increase in its residential cable broadband service The cable giant said the speed bump -- which increases the current 3 megabits-per-second download speed up to 4 mbps and the current 4 mbps service up to 6 mbps --...

Microsoft may not be delivering its next-generation version of Windows desktop and server software known as "Longhorn" as early as expected or promised, but the company has just released the Avalon graphical interface, formerly a key component of Longhorn, for developers Longhorn is not expected until next year at the earliest, but Microsoft -- in ...

The saying "Don't mess with Texas" took on new meaning this week as the Lone Star State's attorney general sued a college student and his alleged accomplice, accusing them of being among the world's most prolific senders of unsolicited e-mail The lawsuit is an application of the federal Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Mark...

Google responded yesterday to a bug that would allow users of the company's Gmail beta software to e-mail themselves a message which would then drag other information from other e-mails transmitted with the service While a Unix community group known as HBX Networks detailed the quirk and provided examples of how to get data from strangers' e-mail, ...

Drawing on the expanded partnership they announced last year, Microsoft and SAP have created the Portal Development Kit (PDK) for Microsoft's .Net platform on SAP's NetWeaver, promising the benefits of integration and interoperability The two software heavies said that with the development tools for .Net -- to be used within SAP's NetWeaver environ...

As security experts warn that search engines can be used by attackers to search out vulnerable systems, new software shows that search technology can also be used to promote security: McAfee's SiteDigger 2.0 uses Google to learn where the computer systems of organizations are vulnerable to exposure and attack McAfee said the software tool, which u...

Microsoft is again being forced to respond to serious Internet Explorer security holes coupled with exploit code that could allow attackers to saddle Windows users with spyware, Trojans or other trouble, even if they have updated with Microsoft's Service Pack 2 (SP2) Security research firm Secunia reported and posted an example of the latest explo...

Chip challenger AMD is poised to announce its new mobile processor, dubbed Turion, to take on the increasingly significant mobile PC market and to shorten Intel's head start in the thinner and lighter PCs that are popular currently Although it has aggressively challenged and won market share from Intel with its server and desktop computer processor...

Bill Gates made a big announcement about a deal with TiVo, the digital video recording company, but it was the Microsoft head who might have wanted to hit rewind as his presentation crashed to a blue Windows screen during his Consumer Electronic Show (CES) keynote yesterday Gates, making the presentation with late night television host Conan O'Brie...

Although celebrities such as Jackie Chan, rapper Ludacris and baseball legend Cal Ripken Jr. will make appearances, the real stars at the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas this week will be the cutting-edge gadgets Now considered to be the biggest IT show in North America after last year's cancellation of Comdex -- which was m...

Some of the world's leading handset manufacturers and wireless carriers announced an agreement to develop advanced technology, dubbed "Super 3G," for sending high-resolution video at speeds 10 times today's third-generation wireless The deal, announced by Japanese giant NTT DoCoMo, included participation from European firms Vodafone, Siemens and Al...

Two new variants of the Cabir mobile phone virus have been discovered, indicating that the source code for the virus is available in the malware underground. Even more troubling, the new variants are smarter than the old The attackers appear to be following the same path as Internet worm writers, improving upon each other's work and creating more e...