NewsScan Daily, 19 August 2003 ("Above The Fold")

NewsScan Daily, 19 August 2003 ("Above The Fold")
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"ABOVE THE FOLD"
        Good Worm vs. Bad Worm
        Phishing Expedition Targets Citibank Customers
        Software Bridges Language Gap
        Neumann: Power Grid Held by Band-Aids, Baling Wire
        Music Industry is 'Overreaching,' Says Senator Coleman
        A Rival for WiFi

FEATURES
        Flash Card
        Honorary Subscriber: Sir Robert Peel

GOOD WORM VS. BAD WORM
A new computer worm surfaced yesterday, intended to kill off the pesky 
Blaster worm that has infected hundreds of thousands of computers running 
the Microsoft Windows 2000 and XP operating systems. The new worm, dubbed 
"Nachi," is spreading quickly, says Joe Hartmann, director of North 
American antivirus research for Trend Micro. Its design is technically 
superior to Blaster, giving it the ability to propagate more quickly, 
according to Internet Security Systems. But its cleanup job leaves 
something to be desired -- Nachi takes only two of the three steps 
necessary to fully excise Blaster, and fixes only systems running the 
English, Korean or Chinese versions of Windows 2000 and XP, says Hartmann. 
"It may help an end user here and there," but even benevolent worms may do 
more harm than good, he notes. Networks in Japan slowed to a standstill 
yesterday thanks to the worm's efforts to download software patches from 
Microsoft.com onto large numbers of machines. A Microsoft spokesman says 
users would be better off downloading the patches themselves. (Wall Street 
Journal 18 Aug 2003)
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB106124450041420000,00.html (sub req'd)

PHISHING EXPEDITION TARGETS CITIBANK CUSTOMERS
Citibank warned its customers yesterday not to respond to an e-mail message 
that threatened to close their checking accounts if they failed to provide 
their Social Security Numbers on a counterfeit Web site. Citibank officials 
said they were working with law enforcement agencies to track down the 
perpetrators, and urged customers to delete the e-mail and call the 
customer service number on their ATM cards. This latest scam is an example 
of "phishing" -- using spam to lure users to fake Web sites masquerading as 
the real thing and attempting to deceive them into divulging personal 
financial data. (Reuters/Los Angeles Times 19 Aug 2003)
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-wrap19.2aug19,1,5099048.story?coll=l 
a-headlines-technology

SOFTWARE BRIDGES LANGUAGE GAP
Twenty-three-year-old Tu Nguyen decided to tackle the communications 
problems encountered when English-speaking customers frequented his 
parents' Saigon Restaurant in Omaha, Neb. A student at the University of 
Nebraska at Omaha, Nguyen developed what he calls the Intelligent Pocket 
Order Delivering System -- a handheld device that waiters can use to take 
orders in English, and which then transmits them to the kitchen in 
Vietnamese. The device has applications outside the restaurant industry, 
says Nguyen. It could also be used in other service industry sectors, such 
as hotels and hospitals. The invention won Nguyen the $25,000 first prize 
in the recent Imagine Cup sponsored by Microsoft. (AP 18 Aug 2003)
http://apnews.excite.com/article/20030818/D7T0EI080.html

NEUMANN: POWER GRID HELD BY BAND-AIDS, BALING WIRE
Computer security expert Peter Neumann of research firm SRI International 
says the nation's power infrastructure "is all Band-Aids and baling wire. 
And, of course, it's all dependent on computers" and is "riddled with 
security and reliability flaws." Professor Ramnath Chellappa of the 
University of Southern California notes that "most computer networks are 
only as good as the weakest point." As the blackout illustrated, if a 
hacker could break into one undefended piece of the system, the effects 
could cascade through the grid. Neumann says that the energy industry needs 
to update the system to make it robust enough to survive any problem: 
"There's a tremendous opportunity here." (USA Today 19 Aug 2003)
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2003-08-18-cyber_x.htm

MUSIC INDUSTRY IS 'OVERREACHING,' SAYS SENATOR COLEMAN
Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.), chairman of the Senate Governmental Affairs' 
Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, has called "excessive" the plans 
of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) to sue people who 
illegally share songs on the Internet, but the RIAA has written the senator 
to assure him it's not interested in pursuing small violators. RIAA 
president Cary Sherman has not specified how much illegal distribution 
constitutes a substantial violation, but Sherman said that in cases it 
brought last year against college students who were illegally distributing 
tens of thousands of songs, the RIAA settled cases for $12,500 to $17,000 
each. Coleman, a former prosecutor who has himself used the Web site 
Napster to download music, says the RIAA has been cooperative but that the 
music industry is "overreaching" by filing lawsuits against individuals. 
(AP/San Jose Mercury News 18 Aug 2003)
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/6562543.htm

A RIVAL FOR WIFI
The Silicon Valley startup company Airgo Networks has been working on a 
higher-speed and longer-range alternative to the WiFi standard for wireless 
connection to the Internet. Industry analyst Craig Mathias of the Farpoint 
Group cites the new competition to WiFi as evidence that the pace of 
technological innovation is as fast as ever: "Just as the revolution starts 
to happen, some people are saying that it's over. Clearly, we are in the 
early days of wireless data." By using large amounts of computing power to 
send numbers of signals from closely spaced antennas, Airgo's MIMO 
technology(which stands for multiple-input, multiple-output) claims to 
offer more than double the speed and two to six times the range of current 
WiFi communication. (New York Times 18 Aug 2003)
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/18/technology/18WIFI.html

*****

FLASH CARD
      "A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds." (Sir Francis 
Bacon)

HONORARY SUBSCRIBER: SIR ROBERT PEEL
      Today's Honorary Subscriber is the 19th century British prime 
minister Sir Robert Peel (1788-1850), who is best remembered for his 
founding of the London police force in 1829. The London police are still 
called "bobbies" after Robert Peel's nickname.
      Peel was the founder of the Conservative Party, and twice served as 
prime minister. He was born wealthy and at 21 he was in the House of 
Commons and serving as undersecretary for war and the colonies. Later, as 
chief secretary (1812-1818), he maintained order in Ireland by forming the 
Irish police force nicknamed "peelers" by the Irish. He actively opposed 
granting Roman Catholics the right to vote, but ten years later helped 
draft the Catholic Emancipation Act granting them suffrage. As leader of 
the Conservative party and prime minister from 1841 to 1846, he worked to 
reform and later abolish the Corn Laws that contributed to the Irish food 
crisis by keeping food prices high. After seeing the hardships of the 
potato famine in Ireland he became an advocate of free trade.
      Peel was born in Bury, Lancashire, in 1788. His father was a wealthy 
cotton manufacturer and member of parliament, who educated him to become a 
politician, sending him first to Harrow School and then Christ Church, 
Oxford, where he won a double-first in classics and mathematics. In 1809 
his father rewarded his academic success by buying him the parliamentary 
seat of Cashel in Tipperary. He made an immediate impact when Charles 
Abbott, the Speaker of the House of Commons, who complimented him for 
delivering "the best first speech since that of William Pitt."
      When Lord Liverpool became prime minister in 1812, Peel was appointed 
chief secretary for Ireland. In this post he attempted to end corruption in 
Irish government. He tried to stop the practice of selling public offices 
and the dismissal of civil servants for their political views. In 1817 he 
retired from his post in Ireland, returning to England as the member of the 
House of Commons representing Oxford. In 1822 Peel rejoined Lord 
Liverpool's government when he accepted the post of Home Secretary, and 
over the next five years he was responsible for large-scale reform in the 
legal system, successfully repealing over 250 old statutes and reforming 
London's Metropolitan police force.
      For the remainder of his life, Peel remained an active player in 
British politics. Twice in times of crisis he was called upon to form new 
governments. In dealing with the religious conflicts in Ireland, he found 
himself in conflict with Daniel O'Connell, the Catholic Member of 
Parliament who led the cause of Irish emancipation from union with Britain. 
Peel made sincere efforts to improve the situation in Ireland, but when he 
finally succeeded in repealing the oppressive Corn Laws, it was too late to 
relieve famine in Ireland. It also so split his support in parliament that 
he was forced to step down as prime minister. He died four years later in 
1850 as the result of a fall from a horse.

See 
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0312216394/newsscancom/ref=nosim 
for a biography of Peel by T.A. Jenkins -- or look for it in your favorite 
library. (We donate all revenue from our book recommendations to adult 
literacy programs.)

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