Twitter gone to the cats

500,000 follow cat on Twitter comic

He's one of the most popular users on Twitter. More than 500,000 follow his growing celebrity, his every adventure and, well, his cat naps.

Meet Sockington. Twitter's latest star is a microblogging cat who regales more than half a million with his musings on meal time, personal hygiene and the view from the top of the stairs.

Sockington, or "Socks" for short, is the cat of Jason Scott, a 38-year-old computer historian and computer administrator from Waltham, Mass. Since late 2007, Scott has been tweeting from Sockington's perspective — and finding a "Socks Army" of followers. (Many of his followers are pets, too.)

Dogs and cats in social media isn't anything new. Many have made Facebook pages (there are applications for both "Dogbook" and "Catbook") and Web sites for their pets.

The difference on Twitter is that the running thread of Sockington's feline commentary takes on the dimension of a comic strip. Scott has created a character with a particular voice by tweeting messages from Sockington's point of view like: "I must say no comment to the whole dining room incident. No questions please."

"He's kind of functioning like a 'Garfield' comic," Scott says. "He's like the 21st-century Garfield."

There's the risk that a tweeting cat will only further the impression that Twitter is a flash-in-the-pan success in a sea of online time-wasters. But in a way, Sockington is a parody of Twitter, where even a kitty cat's life — his daily trips to the litter box, his insignificant household travails — is beamed out to the world.

"Everybody wants this social media bubble. They want something where we're all chattering so much that we all get rich," Scott says. "And this cat makes everybody look like fools because he's got hundreds of thousands of followers. And he doesn't tend to follow anyone but other animals."

Scott's Sockington feed has benefited from being one of the accounts recommended to new Twitter users when they sign up. But the growth of the Socks Army has been gradual over the last year and a half.

Now, it's starting to potentially generate revenue. T-shirts are for sale with Sockington wisdom printed on them and Scott acknowledges he may one day accept larger, impossible-to-refuse offers to offset his credit-card debt.

"I'm happy that at the heart of it all is a funny little cat, and that's why all the attention is happening," Scott says. "There are much worse reasons to get this kind of national attention."

If you'd like to become a follower, Sockington's Twitter link is located here

Cybercriminals create botnet using Mac computers

A piece of malicious software unwittingly shared over a peer-to-peer network in January was the key tool in what security researchers are saying was the first known attempt to create a botnet of Mac computers.


Researchers at Symantec say the Trojan, called OSX.Iservice, hid itself in pirated versions of the Apple application iWork '09 and the Mac version of Adobe Photoshop CS4 that were shared on a popular peer-to-peer bittorrent network.

Once downloaded, the applications themselves worked normally, but the Trojan opens a "back door" on the compromised computer that allows it to begin contacting other hosts in its peer-to-peer network for commands.

Researchers Mario Barcena and Alfredo Pesoli of Symantec Ireland, writing in the April 2009 issue of the Virus Bulletin, say the network of infected computers attempted to initiate a denial of service attack on a website in January.

"OSX.Iservice is an interesting piece of malware - not only does it make use of Mac OS internals, but it is also the first Mac botnet that we are aware of," they wrote.

A botnet, or robot network, is a group of linked computers - sometimes called zombies - that have been commandeered, in some instances by criminals, to perform a host of actions, from connecting and infecting other computers to sending out spam or launching distributed denial of service attacks to bring down websites or web servers.

But traditionally, botnets have spread through PCs running Windows, and not Macs, in part because of the low market share of Macs worldwide.

Apple had 7.2 per cent of personal computer market share in the United States in the fourth quarter of 2008, according to technology analyst IDC, but was not among the top five PC makers worldwide, as ranked by shipments.

Kevin Haley, director of Symantec Security Response, said cybercriminals who want to create a botnet of computers traditionally attack machines running Microsoft's Windows operating system because the goal is to have the biggest network possible.

"It's a numbers game," said Haley. "If you're going to go after the largest market, you have to go after the largest target."

An example of a particularly successful botnet is the one created by the Conficker worm, which by some estimates is believed to have spread to as many as 12 million machines.

By comparison, the iBotnet, as the Symantec researchers have dubbed it, spread to only a few thousand computers before it was identified. A number of security firms say removal of the Trojan is simple once it has been identified.

The method used to infiltrate the computers - tricking users to install a Trojan hiding in a free version of software - is also a fairly basic way to access a computer, said Haley, and is not a technique exclusive to Macs or any particular vulnerability inherent in the computer's operating system.

Haley said downloading any file from an unknown source is a potentially dangerous practice, no matter what computer a person uses.

The malicious software, or malware, is unique, however in that it only clearly targeted Mac users and also included a variation - found in the corrupted Adobe Photoshop CS4 file - that used some of the functions on the Mac OS that relate to its own authorization services interface, according to the Symantec Ireland authors.

"With malware authors showing an increasing interest in the Mac platform, we believe that more advanced [user interface] spoofing tricks may be seen in the future," they wrote.

Ryan Naraine, the security evangelist at Kaspersky Lab, said that while a Mac botnet may not be practical for criminals, the discovery of the Trojan is proof that no operating system is inherently safe....Sorry Mac users.

It's alive!! Conficker wakes up

Computer worm updates via P2P, drops payload

The Conficker worm is finally doing something--updating via peer-to-peer between infected computers and dropping a mystery payload on infected computers, Trend Micro said on Wednesday.

Researchers were analyzing the code of the software that is being dropped onto infected computers but suspect that it is a keystroke logger or some other program designed to steal sensitive data off the machine, said David Perry, global director of security education at Trend Micro.

The software appeared to be a .sys component hiding behind a rootkit, which is software that is designed to hide the fact that a computer has been compromised, according to Trend Micro. The software is heavily encrypted, which makes code analysis difficult, the researchers said.

The worm also tries to connect to MySpace.com, MSN.com, eBay.com, CNN.com and AOL.com as a way to test that the computer has Internet connectivity, deletes all traces of itself in the host machine, and is set to shut down on May 3, according to the TrendLabs Malware Blog.

Because infected computers are receiving the new component in a staggered manner rather than all at once there should be no disruption to the Web sites the computers visit, said Paul Ferguson, advanced threats researcher for Trend Micro.

"After May 3, it shuts down and won't do any replication," Perry said. However, infected computers could still be remotely controlled to do something else, he added.

On Tuesday night Trend Micro researchers noticed a new file in the Windows Temp folder and a huge encrypted TCP response from a known Conficker P2P IP node hosted in Korea.

"As expected, the P2P communications of the Downad/Conficker botnet may have just been used to serve an update, and not via HTTP," the blog post says. "The Conficker/Downad P2P communications is now running in full swing!"

In addition to adding the new propagation functionality, Conficker communicates with servers that are associated with the Waledac family of malware and its Storm botnet, according to a separate blog post by Trend Micro security researcher Rik Ferguson.

The worm tries to access a known Waledac domain and download another encrypted file, the researchers said.

Conficker.C failed to make a splash a week ago despite the fact that it was programmed to activate on April 1. It has infected between 3 million and 12 million computers, according to Perry.

Initially, researchers thought they were seeing a new variant of the Conficker worm, but now they believe it is merely a new component of the worm.

The worm spreads via a hole in Windows that Microsoft patched in October, as well as through removable storage devices and network shares with weak passwords.

The worm disables security software and blocks access to security Web sites.

Carly Fleishmann: The Voice of Autism

Girl's writings opening new window on autism

A 13-year-old named Carly Fleischmann is challenging the conventional notions of autism, demonstrating emotional skills that lay hidden for years, until one day, a computer helped her reveal to the world what it's like to have her condition.

From an early age, it was clear Carly had autism. As a young girl, she would often rock back and forth for minutes on end, flail her arms and hit herself repeatedly. Equally troubling, she never gained the ability to speak.

Her father, Arthur Fleishmann, says many people who didn't know her assumed she was intellectually challenged.

"Even professionals labelled her as moderately to severely cognitively impaired. In the old days you would way mentally retarded, which means low IQ and low promise and low potential," he says.

Arthur and Carly's mother Tammy were advised to place her in an institution. Instead, they opted for a therapy called ABA -- Applied Behaviour Analysis, the kind of therapy now recommended for kids with autism but because of the expense and the need for specially trained therapists, isn't available to all children.

While Carly made progress through the therapy, speech continued to elude her.

"We tried hard to get her to talk but it wasn't in the cards for Carly," says her speech pathologist Barbara Nash-Fenton.

Then, two years ago, Carly surprised everyone. Working with a computer equipped with pictures and symbols, she started typing and spelling words. At first it was just words -- help, hurt, head, teeth -- but soon she was assembling sentences.

She typed slowly, using only one finger, and the words she wrote stunned all who knew her.

"All of a sudden these words started to pour out of her," says Nash-Fenton. "and it was an exciting moment because we didn't realize she had all these words."

"It was one of those moments in my career that I'll never forget."

Writing reveals secrets of autism

As Carly learned to write better, she began describing what it was like to have autism and why she does what she does, such as making odd noises and hitting herself.

"It feels like my legs are on fire and a million ants are crawling up my arms," Carly has written about the urge to hit herself.

"I want to be like Taryn," she has written of her twin sister, who does not have autism.

With her single typing finger, Carly has been able to demonstrate her emotional intelligence and witty sense of humour to a family who says they were stunned by what she revealed.

"We realized that inside was an articulate, intelligent, emotive person that we had never met. She was 10 at the time, and we just met her for the first time at 10 or 11 years old," says her father Arthur. "This was unbelievable because it opened up a whole new way of looking at her."

Through her writings, Carly has joked about her "yucky" siblings, shown that she understands their jokes and revealed a curiosity about boys -- even asking when can she go on a date.

"Inside, she is a perfectly normal 13-year-old girl. She has crushes, she likes music, she wants to be treated like every other 13-year-old," says her father.

Carly also has expressed her frustration about her condition and about how the world misunderstands her.

"It is hard to be autistic because no one understands me," she writes. "People look at me and assume I am dumb because I can't talk, or I act differently than them... I think people get scared with things that look or seem different than them. It feels hard. It feels like being in a room with the stereo on full blast."

Autism specialist Dr. Wendy Roberts has read some of Carly's writing and watched her on video. She says Carly is certainly unique in her abilities and provides some fascinating insights into the condition of autism.

"I think the initial reaction is that it is incredibly remarkable," she says. "It is amazing to think that somebody who has not been able to put her thoughts into words now has a mechanism to get some of her ideas across."

Roberts says it's unclear whether Carly's unusual language abilities makes her a rare case or whether her new writing skills are the result of her intensive training.

She says it's rare for someone with autism to have apraxia -- the inability to speak despite an understanding of language -- as well as such an obvious command of written words. Roberts says it may be that Carly possesses unique abilities that make her a rare case, or it may be that her early and intensive training simply drew the skills out.

"What she does is quite uncommon but there hasn't been a really good look at kids with severe apraxia to see what could they be taught with intense teaching," says Roberts. "And that really begs the question of are we giving children enough intensive intervention to see if we are missing a fairly small percentage of kids who have this ability. There may be children being missed because they have not had access to therapy."

"From a broader perspective it puts pressure on us to develop interventions that will allow written language to develop... so that we can develop more effective interventions."

The benefits of ABA therapy

Carly's parents say they are so grateful that their daughter was able to discover this way to communicate because it has made them rethink autism and made them realize that they made the right decision to provide Carly with intensive therapy.

"If we had done what so many people told us to do years ago, we wouldn't have the child we have today. We would have written her off," says her father Arthur. "Then what would she be today?"

"We never would have seen she could write these things. Can you imagine? We would have never have gotten out of her how articulate she is how intelligent she is," he says. "Now, she tells us stories, she teases her brother. She just does it in a different way, she does it with her computer."

Carly's writing has progressed so far in the last two years, she's now starting to write a book. It's a take-off on herself and she's already come up with the title: "Elephant Princess."

Her writing has also helped her therapists help her more effectively.

"We've actually learned a lot about Carly," says her therapist Howard. "Since she has been able to type she has been telling us how it feels to be in her skin -- like ants are crawling up her arm. For us, this is very important. It helps with how we treat Carly, even how doctors treat Carly.

"I think Carly has a lot to teach us."

Carly has said she would like to tell the world about what it's like to have autism, so that others can understand what it's like.

"Autism is hard because you want to act one way but you can't always do that," she has written.

"It's sad that sometimes people don't know that sometimes I can't stop myself and they get mad at me. If I could tell people one thing about autism it would me that I don't want to be this way but I am. So don't be mad. Be understanding."

Carly's blog can be found here.

The Conficker Worm: April Fool’s Joke or Digital Armegeddon?

The Conficker worm is scheduled to activate on April 1, for those of you who are long time readers, you'll know that I have been warning you about this virus for a few months now, back on January 16 2009 with the first virus alert, then again on February 14th 2009 when Microsoft announced the reward leading to the arrest and conviction of those responsible for the chaotic virus.

The remaining unanswered question is: Will it prove to be the world’s biggest April Fool’s joke or is this virus as bad as some experts believe it to be?

Conficker is a program that is spread by exploiting several weaknesses in Microsoft’s Windows operating system. Various versions of the software have spread widely around the world since October 2008, mostly outside the United States because there are more computers overseas running unpatched, pirated Windows. (The program does not infect Macintosh or Linux-based computers.)

An estimated 12 million or more machines have been infected. However, many have also been disinfected, so a precise census is difficult to obtain.

It is possible to detect and remove Conficker using commercial antivirus tools offered by many companies. However, the most recent version of the program has a significantly improved capacity to remove commercial antivirus software and to turn off Microsoft’s security update service. It can also block communications with Web services provided by security companies to update their products. It even systematically opens holes in firewalls in an effort to improve its communication with other infected computers.

Given the sophisticated nature of the worm, the question remains: What is the purpose of Conficker, which could possibly become the world’s most powerful parallel computer on April 1? That is when the worm will generate 50,000 domain names and systematically try to communicate with each one. The authors then only need to register one of the domain names in order to take control of the millions of zombie computers that have been created.

Speculation about Conficker’s purpose ranges from the benign — an April Fool’s Day joke — to far darker notions. One likely possibility is that the program will be used in the “rent-a-rogue-computer” business, something that has been tried previously by the computer underground. Just like Amazon.com offers computing time on its network for rent, the Conficker team might rent access to its “network” for devious purposes like spamming.

The most intriguing clue about the purpose of Conficker lies in the intricate design of the peer-to-peer logic of the latest version of the program, which security researchers are still trying to completely decode.

According to a research addendum to be added Thursday to an earlier paper by researchers at SRI International, in the Conficker C version of the program, the infected computers can act both as clients and servers and share files in both directions. The peer-to-peer design is also highly distributed, making it extremely difficult for security teams to defeat the system by disabling so-called super-nodes.

Conficker’s authors could be planning to create a scheme like Freenet, the peer-to-peer system that was intended to make Internet censorship of documents impossible.

Or perhaps the Conficker botnet’s masters have something more Machiavellian in mind. One researcher, by the name of Stefan Savage, a computer scientist at the University of California at San Diego, has suggested the idea of a “Dark Google.” His theory is, What if Conficker is intended to give the computer underworld the ability to search for data on all the infected computers around the globe and then sell the answers? Malware already does this on a focused basis using a variety of schemes that are referred to as “spear phishing,” in a reference to the widespread use of social engineering tricks on the Net.

But to do something like that on such a huge scale? That would be a dragnet — and a genuine horror story.

What's going to happen on April 1st 2009? will most of the internet come crashing down? will millions of computers be wiped out? Or is this like the so-called Millenium Bug? lots of sizzle, very little steak.. (oh great, now i'm hungry, should have had a bigger breakfast) We'll have to wait and see......

Hollywood couldn't write this script....

Thoughts? what do you think will happen a week from today?

Computer programmer creates USB 'finger drive'

A Finnish computer programmer who lost one of his fingers in a motorcycle accident has made himself a prosthetic replacement with a USB drive attached.

Jerry Jalava uses the 2GB memory stick, accessed by peeling back the "nail", to store photos, movies and programmes.

The finger is not permanently attached to his hand, so it can be easily left plugged into a computer when in use.

Mr Jalava says he is already thinking about upgrading the finger to include more storage and wireless technology.

"I'm planning to use another prosthetic as a shell for the next version, which will have removable fingertip and RFID tag," he wrote on his blog, ProtoBlogr.net.

Half of Mr Jalava's left ring finger had to be amputated last summer after he crashed into a deer while riding his motorbike near Helsinki.

He says he was inspired to create the unique storage device when doctors treating him joked that he should have a USB "finger drive" after finding out that he was a software developer.

Hard drive "click of death" demonstrated on video

Have you ever had a hard drive start making that awful clicking sound which you later found out meant certain death? It's not a nice feeling. You know what I'm talking about... Especially if you've never invested in a backup solution. That realization that all of your valuable data might be gone - forever. In this excellent video, by the guys over at TechWareLabs we get a sneak peek into what actually causes the sound and what - if anything - can be done about it. Although it may not make you feel any better if this has happened to you, there's a certain morbid fascination in understanding exactly what caused so much pain and heartache.

How to Shutdown your Computer with a Cell Phone

You can remotely shut down your computer from anywhere in the world using any cell phone with text messaging capabilities, a PC or Mac, along with Microsoft Outlook, an email account and a Kwiry account. It's pretty straight-forward and simple to accomplish. This video guides you through the step by step setup process.

A really neat, and pretty useful trick I HAD to share! let me know what you think...

*VIRUS ALERT* Downadup virus exposes millions of PCs to hijack

A new sleeper virus that could allow hackers to steal financial and personal information has now spread to more than eight million computers in what industry analysts say is one of the most serious infections they have ever seen.

The Downadup or Conficker worm exploits a bug in Microsoft Windows to infect mainly corporate networks, where -- although it has yet to cause any harm -- it potentially exposes infected PCs to hijack.

Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer at anti-virus firm F-Secure, says while the purpose of the worm is unclear, its unique "phone home" design, linking back to its point of origin, means it can receive further orders to wreak havoc.

He said his company had reverse-engineered its program, which they suspected of originating in Ukraine, and is using the call-back mechanism to monitor an exponential infection rate, despite Microsoft's issuing of a patch to fix the bug.

"On Tuesday there were 2.5 million, on Wednesday 3.5 million and today [Friday], eight million," he said. "It's getting worse, not better."

Hypponen explained the dangers that Downadup poses, who is most at risk and what can be done to stop its spread.

How serious is it?

It is the most serious large scale worm outbreak we have seen in recent years because of how widespread it is, but it is not very serious in terms of what it does. So far it doesn't try to steal personal information or credit card details.

Who is affected?

We have large infections in Europe, the United States and in Asia. It is a Windows worm and almost all the cases are corporate networks. There are very few reports of independent home computers affected.

What does it do?

It is a complicated worm most likely engineered by a group of people who have spent time making it very complicated to analyze and remove. The real reason why they have created it is hard to say right now, but we do know how it replicates.

How does it spread?

The worm does not spread over email or the Web. However if an infected laptop is connected to your corporate network, it will immediately scan the network looking for machines to infect. These will be machines that have not installed a patch from Microsoft known as MS08-067. The worm will also scan company networks trying to guess your password, trying hundreds and hundreds of common words. If it gets in, even if you are not at your machine, it will infect and begin spreading to other servers. A third method of spreading is via USB data sticks.

How can I prevent it infecting my machine?

The best way is to get the patch and install it company-wide. The second way is password security. Use long, difficult passwords -- particularly for administrators who cannot afford to be locked out of the machines they will have to fix.

What can I do if it has already infected?

Machines can be disinfected. The problem is for companies with thousands of infected machines, which can become re-infected from just one computer even as they are being cleared.

Did this alert reach you too late? Has your computer already been affected? share your stories...

Scientists use Playstation 3's to create a super computer

Computer hobbyists, geeks and researchers take note:
Two U.S. scientists have created a step-by-step guide on how to build a supercomputer using multiple PlayStation 3 video-game consoles.

The instructional guide, Which was posted online this week at ps3cluster.org, allows users with some programming knowledge to install a version of the open-source Linux operating system on the video consoles and connect a number of consoles into a computing cluster or grid.

The two researchers say the guide could provide scientists with another, cheaper alternative to renting time on supercomputers to run their simulations.

University of Massachusetts Dartmouth physics professor Gaurav Khanna first built the cluster a year ago to run his simulations estimating the gravitational waves produced when two black holes merged.

Frustrated with the cost of renting time on supercomputers, which he said can cost as much as $5,000 to run a 5,000-hour simulation, Khanna decided to set up his own computer cluster using PS3s, which had both a powerful processor developed by Sony, IBM and Toshiba, but also an open platform that allows different system software to run on it. Currently, PlayStation 3 gaming systems retail for about $400 (Canadian funds).

On the how-to-guide, Khanna says the eight-console cluster is roughly comparable in speed to a 200 node IBM Blue Gene supercomputer. Khanna says his research now runs using a cluster of 16 PS3s.

The fastest supercomputer in the world, IBM's Roadrunner supercomputer at Los Alamos National Laboratory, has 3,250 nodes and is capable of 1.105 petaflops, or 1.105 quadrillion floating point operations per second, about 100,000 times faster than a home computer.

Massachusetts Dartmouth computer scientist Chris Poulin, who co-wrote the instructional manual with Khanna, wouldn't reveal the number of flops the system can achieve, but says that anecdotally, the cluster has allowed him to run simulations in hours, simulations that used to take days to perform on a powerful server computer.

Khanna is not the first researcher to use PS3s to simulate the effects of a supercomputer. The University of Stanford's Folding at Home project allows people to help with research into how proteins self-assemble — or fold — by downloading software onto their home PS3s, creating a virtual supercomputer. Their research is currently targeting proteins relevant to diseases such as Alzheimer's and Huntington's disease.

But the guide posted by Khanna and Poulin is the first that might allow someone to set up a supercomputer in their own home.

Poulin said there are two major practical issues, however, that might limit the practicality of a PS3 cluster supercomputer.

The first issue is power. He said the video-game consoles use about 200 to 300 watts per unit, so finding a room that could hook up eight of the consoles might be an issue for hobbyists, he says.

"I think if you put four or more than four of the systems on one plug you'd probably blow a fuse," says Poulin.

The second issue is memory. The console has only 256 MB of RAM, far less than most personal computers available right now. Poulin said that while the low memory wouldn't be a problem for straightforward computations, running multiple simulations or programs could tax the system. As a result, simulations running on the cluster would have to be tailored to consider the cluster's memory limitations.

Poulin said he hopes the project will help open doors to more partnerships between industry and universities that will lead to better access to supercomputing power.

"That's ultimately the goal here," he said. "We want to make things easier, no matter what kind of supercomputer you are using."