TELECOM Digest     Mon, 19 Mar 2007 15:00:00 EDT    Volume 26 : Issue 77

Inside This Issue:                            Editor: Patrick A. Townson

    Most Computer Attacks Originate in USA (Jordan Robertson, AP)
    China Jails OnLine Editor for 'Subversion'(Reuters News Wire)
    Google Phone on the Way, Say Insiders (Eric Auchard, Reuters)
    City of Milwaukee Reaches Agreement With AT&T (USTelecom dailyLead)
    CommunicationsDirect News Daily Update (communicationsdirect_daily)
    Re: Troubles With Computers' Daylight Shift (Duh_OZ)
    Re: Troubles With Computers' Daylight Shift (Steven J. Sobol)

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Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2007 13:00:47 -0500
From: Jordan Robertson, AP <ap@telecom-digest.org>
Subject: Most Computer Attacks Originate in USA


By JORDAN ROBERTSON, AP Technology Writer

The United States generates more malicious computer activity than any
other country, and sophisticated hackers worldwide are banding
together in highly efficient crime rings, according to a new report.

Researchers at Cupertino-based Symantec Corp. also found that fierce
competition in the criminal underworld is driving down prices for
stolen financial information.

Criminals may purchase verified credit card numbers for as little as
$1, and they can buy a complete identity -- a date of birth and
U.S. bank account, credit card and government-issued identification
numbers -- for $14, according to Symantec's twice-yearly Internet
Security Threat Report released Monday.

Researchers at the security software company found that about a third
of all computer attacks worldwide in the second half of 2006
originated from machines in the United States. That makes the United
States the most fertile breeding ground for threats such as spam,
phishing and malicious code -- easily surpassing runners-up China,
which generates 10 percent of attacks, and Germany, which generates 7
percent.

The United States also leads in "bot network activity." Bots are
compromised computers controlled remotely and operating in concert to
pump out spam or perform other nefarious acts.

The legitimate owner of the computer typically doesn't know the
machine has been taken over -- and the phenomenon is largely
responsible for the palpable increase in junk e-mail in the past half
year.

Spam made up 59 percent of all e-mail traffic Symantec
monitored. That's up 5 percentage points from the previous
period. Much of the spam was related to stock picks and other
financial scams.

The United States is also home to more than half of the world's
"underground economy servers" -- typically corporate computers that
have been commandeered to facilitate clandestine transactions
involving stolen data and may be compromised for as little as two
hours or as long as two weeks, according to the report.

The study marks the first time Symantec researchers have studied the
national origins of computer attacks. The report focused on attacks
during the last half of 2006 on more than 120 million computers
running Symantec antivirus software. The company operates more than 2
million decoy e-mail accounts designed to attract messages from around
the world to identify spam and phishing activity.

Alfred Huger, vice president of Symantec Security Response, said
online criminals appear to be adopting more sophisticated means of
"self-policing." They're launching denial-of-service attacks on
rivals' servers and posting pictures online of competitors' faces.

"It's ruthless, highly organized and highly evolved," Huger said.

One of the most startling findings: The worldwide number of
bot-infected computers rose -- an increase of about 29 percent from
the previous six months, to more than 6 million computers total --
while the number of servers controlling them plunged. The number of
such "command-and-control" servers declined by about 25 percent to
around 4,700.

Symantec researchers said the decrease signifies that bot network
owners are consolidating to expand their networks, creating a more
centralized, efficient structure for launching attacks.

Twenty-six percent of the world's bot-infected computers were in
China, a higher percentage than any other country.

According to Symantec, Microsoft Corp.'s Internet Explorer was the
most-targeted Web browser, attracting 77 percent of all browser
attacks.

Symantec said it expects to see more threats begin to emerge against
Microsoft's Vista operating system. It also expects multiplayer online
games to be targeted by phishers, who fool users into divulging
passwords or other personal information by creating fake Web sites
that look like the real thing.

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press.

NOTE: For more telecom/internet/networking/computer news from the
daily media, check out our feature 'Telecom Digest Extra' each day at
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/more-news.html . Hundreds of new
articles daily. And, discuss this and other topics in our forum at
http://telecom-digest.org/forum (or)
http://telecom-digest.org/chat/index.html

For more news and headlines each day, please go to:
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/AP.html

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2007 12:58:32 -0500
From: Reuters News Wire <reuters@telecom-digest.org>
Subject: China Jails OnLine Editor for 'Subversion'


A Chinese court jailed an editor of a news portal for six years on
Monday for inciting subversion by publishing anti-government essays,
his lawyer said, the latest case in a government crackdown on dissent.

The Intermediate People's Court in Ningbo in the eastern coastal
province of Zhejiang convicted Zhang Jianhong, better known by his pen
name is Li Hong, of "inciting to subvert state power," lawyer Li
Jianqiang told Reuters.

"The sentence is too heavy," the lawyer said by telephone. "The
accusations that Li Hong attacked the government through his essays is
total nonsense. All he did was to exercise his freedom of speech
guaranteed in China's constitution."

Zhang was detained last September and the "Aegean Sea" Web site he ran 
was shut down.

Court officials could not be reached for comment.

China is the world's leading jailer of journalists, with at least 32
in custody, and another 50 Internet campaigners also in prison,
according to Paris-based press watchdog Reporters Without Borders.

In August, a Beijing court jailed a Hong Kong-based reporter of
Singapore's Straits Times for five years on spying charges, days after
a court jailed a Chinese researcher for the New York Times for three
years for fraud but dismissed a more serious charge of illegally
leaking state secrets.

Copyright 2007 Reuters Limited.

NOTE: For more telecom/internet/networking/computer news from the
daily media, check out our feature 'Telecom Digest Extra' each day at
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/more-news.html . Hundreds of new
articles daily. And, discuss this and other topics in our forum at
http://telecom-digest.org/forum (or)
http://telecom-digest.org/chat/index.html

For more news and headlines, please go to:
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/newstoday.html

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2007 12:26:32 -0500
From: Eric Auchard, Reuters <reuters@telecom-digest.org>
Subject: Google Phone on the Way, Say Insiders


By Eric Auchard

Google Inc. is developing its own mobile phone, according to industry
insiders and analysts, while a Google official in Spain last week
acknowledged the company is "investigating" such a project.

Google isn't commenting directly on leaks from Europe and the United
States which describe a low-cost, Internet-connected phone with a
color, wide-screen design. Newspaper and blog reports in recent months
have Google shopping its phone design to potential mobile phone
manufacturing partners in Asia.

"Mobile is an important area for Google," Google spokeswoman Erin Fors
said on Friday. "We remain focused on creating applications and
establishing and growing partnerships with industry leaders to develop
innovative services for users worldwide. However, we have nothing
further to announce."

Gadget enthusiasts who only two months ago were obsessed with the
potential revolutionary impact on the phone industry of Apple Inc.'s
iPhone device -- due out in June and at prices starting at $500 --
have shifted their attention to whether Google is developing an even
lower-cost phone.

"We obviously need another mythical mobile to drool over and speculate
about -- and the natural candidate is, of course, the so-called Google
phone," geek hardware site Engadget wrote earlier this month.
http://tinyurl.com/3b7bow

To be sure, feverish speculation about Google products has been wrong 
before. Google was widely reported to be building its own line of 
personal computers a little over a year ago. What in fact materialized 
was a set of free software programs designed to make any existing 
Windows PCs easier to use.

But Richard Windsor, a phone analyst with brokerage Nomura in London,
told clients late last week that unspecified Google representatives at
a major European conference in Germany had confirmed the company is
working on its own phone device.

"Google has come  out of the closet at the  CeBIT trade fair admitting
that it is  working on a mobile  phone of its own," Windsor  said in a
note entitled "Google Phone: From myth to reality."

"This is not going to be a high-end device but a mass market device
aimed at bringing Google to users who don't have a PC," he said.

Over the past year, Google has branched out beyond computers to bring
Web search, e-mail, mapping and other Web services to millions of new
and existing phone browsers worldwide. Rivals Microsoft Corp. and
Yahoo Inc. also are racing to run Web services on mobile phones.

Simeon Simeonov, a Boston-based venture capitalist with Polaris
Venture Partners, said in a March 4 blog post
http://tinyurl.com/2z23o7 that an "inside source close to the company"
had informed him that Google was developing a "Blackberry-like, slick
device."

The device Simeonov describes could handle voice over Internet
phone-calling. He said it is being developed within a 100-person
mobile phone group at Google that includes Andy Rubin, the creator of
Sidekick, a popular phone/Internet device that he developed at a prior
company he founded, Danger Inc.

Lending further clues, Isabel Aguilera, head of Google's Iberian
operations, was quoted last week in Spanish news site Noticias.com as
acknowledging the existence of a part-time project by some Google
engineers to develop a mobile phone.

In her interview at http://tinyurl.com/2feypv/, translated from
Spanish, the Google executive said her company "has been
investigating" developing a mobile phone that works both as an
Internet access device and as a way to extend Internet use to emerging
markets customers.

In January, Engadget circulated a photo purporting to be a prototype
Internet phone with a wide, color screen designed by Google and built
by Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.. This unconfirmed report replaced an
earlier theory published by The Observer in December that Google was
working with Taiwan's High Tech Computer Corp. (HTC) on a mobile
phone.

A source at a rival Internet company who has talked to the same mobile
phone manufacturers said on Friday that "Google is going to build
their own phone, whether it is with HTC or Samsung or some other ODM
(original device manufacturer)."

Windsor, the London-based Nomura analyst who tracks mobile phone
handset makers like Nokia of Finland, argues that a Google Phone "will
meet with limited success and lose money" because it lacks the
necessary phone industry relationships to reach the massive scale
needed to compete.

Copyright 2007 Reuters Limited.

NOTE: For more telecom/internet/networking/computer news from the
daily media, check out our feature 'Telecom Digest Extra' each day at
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/more-news.html . Hundreds of new
articles daily. And, discuss this and other topics in our forum at
http://telecom-digest.org/forum (or)
http://telecom-digest.org/chat/index.html

For more news and headlines, please go to:
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/newstoday.html

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2007 12:30:33 CDT
From: USTelecom dailyLead <ustelecom@dailylead.com>
Subject: City of Milwaukee Reaches Agreement With AT&T


USTelecom dailyLead
March 19, 2007
http://r.smartbrief.com/resp/gtlMfDtusXoiqJCibuddELuB

TODAY'S HEADLINES


NEWS OF THE DAY
* City of Milwaukee reaches agreement with AT&T
BUSINESS & INDUSTRY WATCH
* Ericsson snags enough shares to complete Tandberg buy
* Sprint tests unlimited offer in San Francisco
* TV, tech companies square off over unused airwaves
* Viacom wants to weave its own Web
USTELECOM SPOTLIGHT
* Register for NXTcomm today!
HOT TOPICS
* AT&T invests in IP network expansion
* Cisco Systems buys WebEx for $3.2 billion
* FTTP aims to speed entertainment delivery
* Hawaiian Telecom invests in its network
* FCC commissioners appear before House telecom panel
TECHNOLOGY TRENDS
* Study: Telecoms, satellite gain ground in video market
* Q&A: Cisco chief talks technology and leadership
* New Hearst building: Wired for wireless
* The drama of going from 60 minutes to 60 seconds
* TVA, Motorola test mobile WiMAX in Rio
* VoIP techs get serious about enforcing patents
REGULATORY & LEGISLATIVE
* Proposal moves telecoms, cable toward parity in Connecticut

Follow the link below to read quick summaries of these stories and
others.  

http://r.smartbrief.com/resp/gtlMfDtusXoiqJCibuddELuB

------------------------------

Subject: CommunicationsDirect News Daily Update
From: communicationsdirect <communicationsdirect@communicationsdirect.com>
Reply-To: communicationsdirect_daily-owner@communicationsdirectnews.com
Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2007 11:28:03 EDT


********************************
PricewaterhouseCoopers Presents
The CommunicationsDirect Daily Update
For March 19, 2007
********************************

Our new poll: How many mobile devices do you typically carry?
Visit our web site to vote.

Vodafone, Skype Develop Mobile VoIP Solution
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/150/23318?11228

     Vodafone and the leading peer-to-peer VoIP provider, Skype, have
     developed a mobile VoIP solution, Starfish, which enables
     consumers to make mobile calls over the internet. According to
     reports on the La Tribune website, Vodafone is undecided as to
     whether to offer the service for fear of cannibalising its
     regular mobile phone business.  ...

Yodio: Podcasts with a Purpose
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/150/23310?11228

     Hoping to become a recording star? Yodio wants to help.  The
     Seattle-based startup is offering an integrated, one-stop digital
     audio publishing service and marketplace--a Web community anyone
     can visit to self-record, produce and buy/sell personal audio
     recordings (i.e., podcasts). In a world where personal
     communication can be ...

Nokia Files Complaints Against Qualcomm
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/130/23308?11228

     ESPOO, Finland -- Nokia Corp., the world's largest maker of
     mobilephones, said today it has filed complaints against wireless
     technology company Qualcomm Inc. in Germany and the
     Netherlands. The complaints request declarations that Qualcomm's
     European patents are exhausted in respect of products sold in
     the ...

Will WebEx Change Cisco?
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/120/23306?11228

     Cisco Systems Inc. is acquiring WebEx Communications
     Inc. as part of its goal to lead the next generation of
     business communications, but the hefty $3.2 billion buy would sit
     alongside other acquisitions that analysts say have languished.
     Yesterday, Cisco agreed to buy WebEx in a $3.2 billion cash deal
     set to close by ...

Ericsson to Triple EDGE Data Speeds
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/140/23304?11228

     Ericsson will use the EDGE Evolution standard to boost current
     GSM network speeds up to 1 Mbps. Ericsson committed to prepare
     the software upgrade by 2009.  EDGE Evolution is an improvement
     in data performance over GSM networks that will increase speeds
     up to 300%, as well as improve coverage, latency and spectrum
     efficiency.  With ...

Disgruntled Alcatel-Lucent Workers Converge In Paris
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/120/23301?11228

     Thousands of European Alcatel-Lucent workers marched through
     Paris yesterday to protest the company's restructuring plan,
     which calls for thousands of job losses on the continent.  Job
     losses and job relocations are on the front burner in France
     nowadays because of the presidential election set for April and
     May.  Union ...

Survey: SAN Extension on the Rise
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/140/23299?11228

     SAN extension, largely left for dead several years ago, shows
     signs of renewed growth.  According to the 2007 Enterprise User
     Survey on Storage Area Networks Storage Transport Services,
     published this week by Heavy Reading, 136 enterprise IT managers
     worldwide report growing interest in SAN extension and other ...

Broadcasters Increasing Use of Addressable Advertising
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/120/23296?11228

     SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- National TV networks and local broadcasters
     are increasing their use of addressable advertising products, and
     are also expanding their plans for addressable advertising on
     their Internet portals, reports In-Stat. With the explosion of
     video, especially broadcast TV programming, flooding onto the
     Internet, ...

Your feedback on our e-letter is always welcome. Send email to:
CommunicationsDirect Editor <telecom_direct_editor@us.pwc.com>

Copyright (C) 2007 PricewaterhouseCoopers.

------------------------------

From: Duh_OZ <ozzy.kopec@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Troubles With Computers' Daylight Shift
Date: 17 Mar 2007 20:57:29 -0700
Organization: http://groups.google.com


On Mar 16, 6:04 pm, Steven J. Sobol <sjso...@JustThe.net> wrote:

> In article <telecom26.7...@telecom-digest.org>, Duh_OZ wrote:

>> Tech showed up today to fix the clock on the XP (SP1) boxes.

> Why on God's green earth are you still running SP1? Do you realize how
> many security hotfixes you don't have installed on those boxes?

We don't have admin rights so we can't do updates.  I did ask the tech
why we aren't on SP2 and he replied "SP2 causes problems".  I then
told him it has been a while since SP2 has been out, no?  He said
"yeah" and left it at that.  My guess is "big brother" ordered no
machines to be upgraded to SP2 unless absolutely necessary.

At the end of next week I'll ask people in the main office (I am off
site) if any machines are on DST.  Hopefully they will come up with a
plan that doesn't include "just wait until 02:00 on the first Sunday
in April" :0)

------------------------------

From: Steven J. Sobol <sjsobol@JustThe.net>
Subject: Re: Troubles With Computers' Daylight Shift
Date: Sun, 18 Mar 2007 06:06:51 UTC
Organization: Glorb Internet Services, http://www.glorb.com


In article <telecom26.76.4@telecom-digest.org>, T wrote:

> Our Debian boxes worked just fine, but we had to patch a couple of
> older RH7.3 boxes.

Here's the way it went for me:

** Suse 10: nothing required, it shipped out of the box with the
changes.

** Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3: only needed to update the appropriate
RPM package.

** Red Hat 8 and 9: too old to have updated packages, end-of-life
products, and therefore had to download the tzdata tarballs and
compile from source. Only took a few minutes for each server.

** Windows XP - there were some client machines that didn't update
properly for whatever reason (all SP2, btw). Ours at home ... all
three of them ... did.

** Windows 2000 - have to manually update DST data, but it's not
difficult to do.

> Same for me. Sounds like his host info changed and the server doesn't
> recognize it. Time to hose the entry for his login in
> /etc/sshd/known.hosts

That's it. Although PuTTY is a Windows client, so the file is
somewhere else. I forgot about known_hosts :)

> Your tech worker isn't worth much. Windows XP SP1 couldn't be fixed 
> other than downloading and using tzedit.exe. 

> This means your machines NEVER update since SP2 is the current
> version, and it automatically applied the time zone file.

SP1 isn't supported anymore by Automatic Updates either, which is a
really really good reason to put SP2 on all of your XP boxes.

Steve Sobol, Professional Geek ** Java/VB/VC/PHP/Perl **
Linux/*BSD/Windows Victorville, California PGP:0xE3AE35ED

It's all fun and games until someone starts a bonfire in the living room.

------------------------------


TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly to telecomm-
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End of TELECOM Digest V26 #77
*****************************