Targeted: Twitter Hit with Phishing Attack
Twitter, the popular microblogging site, has become the latest target of phishers. The company is warning its members to be careful of messages that redirect them to spoofed Twitter sites in an attempt to steal their user names and passwords.

"This particular scam sent out e-mails resembling those you might receive from Twitter if you get e-mail notifications of your Direct Messages. The e-mail says something like, 'hey! check out this funny blog about you ...' and provides a link," the company said.

Twitter went on to explain that the link redirects users to a site masquerading as the Twitter front page. Twitter advised its members to look closely at the URL field to see if it has another domain besides Twitter, but looks exactly like the microblogging home page. That, the company said, indicates a fraud.

If You Get Twicked

E-mail, cell phones, Facebook and now Twitter all have something in common: They are being used by fraudsters for phishing attacks, observed Marian Merritt, Symantec's Internet safety advocate.

"The scam messages, just like the phishing e-mails and Facebook phishing attacks, seem to come from someone you know and appear to be personal," Merritt wrote in the Norton blog.

For members who have clicked the link and given up their Twitter password to the phishers, the company said it is possible for the phisher to send out direct messages on your behalf that could trick your followers. In those cases, Twitter said users should proactively reset the passwords of their accounts.

"If you find yourself unable to log in to your account with your user name and password, please use the reset password link to regain access. This will send an e-mail to the address associated with your account, and you'll be able to create a new password," the company advised.

Will the Real Twitter Please Stand...

China Says Google and Baidu Push Vulgar Content
China is moving to rein in Web sites it deems inappropriate. The Communist nation has targeted Google and Baidu, the two dominant search engines there. The charge is spreading pornography and vulgarity.

China's Ministry of Public Security and six other government agencies launched the campaign on Monday.

The government "decided to launch a nationwide campaign to clean up a vulgar current on the Internet and named and exposed a large number of violating public morality and harming the physical and mental health of youth and young people," said a report on state television.

Low-Class, Crude and Damaging

China's government identified 19 Internet operators and Web sites that had not made moves to remove "vulgar" content. These operators and Web sites also allegedly failed to heed warnings from censors, according to the television report.

"Some Web sites have exploited loopholes in laws and regulations," said Cai Mingzhao, a deputy chief of the State Council Information Office. "They have used all kinds of ways to distribute content that is low-class, crude and even vulgar, gravely damaging mores on the Internet."

Repeat violators, as well as those that have a "malign influence," might be exposed, punished or even shut down, according to China.com.cn, one of the nation's official news Web sites. On Monday, the Financial Times reported that the Chinese government is arming censors with more advanced filtering software to catch the banned content.

Same Old Threats

According to Leslie Harris, CEO of the Center for Democracy and Technology, China is trying to flex its muscles. However, she said, if China is seriously concerned about vulgar content -- and if it is illegal -- then the government ought to take its complaint to Internet service providers.

"This is just a threat, and I think it's the same old-same old dressed up in rhetoric that is more internationally acceptable," Harris said....

Palm To Launch Nova OS, and Maybe a Smartphone
Palm's next-generation Nova operating system has been in the works for more than a year and is expected to be released this week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Also rumored is one more surprise -- a new smartphone using Nova.

Although the rumor of a new phone has been swirling since last month, it's expected to debut at CES on Thursday.

Jon Rubinstein, Palm's executive chairman, told Business Week that the company will launch a product that bridges Research In Motion's BlackBerry devices and Apple's iPhone. Rubinstein worked for Apple for nearly a decade.

Perfect Timing

Although analysts are seeing a downturn in mobile-phone sales, converged mobile devices such as smartphones are racking up success. Smartphones have most of the features of mobile phones, including personal information management, games, office applications, and multimedia, but a major differing factor is the operating system.

High-level operating systems -- including Android, BlackBerry, Linux, Mac OS X, Palm and Symbian -- are helping the smartphone market stand out, according to IDC.

Smartphones are expected to grow 8.9 percent worldwide this year, according to IDC. Beyond 2009, growth is expected to return to double digits faster than the overall mobile-phone market.

But will Palm have a piece of that market? Some observers are already counting Palm out, while others insist that's premature.

Palm's Future

Palm's move to release a new OS and phone could not come at a better time for the struggling company. A successful operating system will save Palm from a lot of speculation about what it has been working on in the past year.

"This will be a way for them to say you have all this money from U2's Bono and Elevation Partners -- what do you have to show for it?" said Ramon Llamas, senior analyst of mobile devices, technology and trends...

Revamped FileMaker Pro 10 Arrives with New Design
As Macworld gets under way, FileMaker has announced a new version of its database software: FileMaker Pro 10. The new product line also includes FileMaker Pro 10 Advanced, FileMaker Server 10, and FileMaker Server 10 Advanced.

The company says the new interface "delivers the most dramatic design changes in over a decade." Among other things, there's a newly redesigned and customizable status toolbar, which makes commonly used features more easily available to save time.

Search Saves, Script Triggers

Other new features in the latest FileMaker include the ability to automatically save the results of a search and script triggers, which allow scripts to be launched based on user actions or time limits.

The saved searches can be named as a set, so a user, for instance, can find all customers in a given region who meet a given set of criteria -- and save and name the results. The saved searches can also be specific to a user.

A script trigger, comparable to a spreadsheet macro, can help automate tasks and increase productivity. The trigger can be called by a specific action, such as clicking in a field; FileMaker Pro 10 comes with five predefined, object-based triggers, and seven layout-based triggers.

For reports, the new product allows a user to make changes in underlying data from within a report, and changes to data will immediately be reflected in the database.

Enhanced SQL Support

A new "See It, Use It, Learn It" interface is intended to get users up and running quickly. Ten new layout themes and 30 starter databases, including such applications as invoicing and asset management, are included in version 10.

Enhanced support includes the ability to display, access and use data from more SQL sources than before, such as SQL tables in Microsoft SQL Server 2008, Oracle 11g, and MySQL 5.1 community edition. Additionally, a new function...

Lenovo Releases Dual-Screen Mobile Workstation
Lenovo has released a new mobile workstation expressly designed to eliminate the user compromise of having only one display available on the go.

Called the ThinkPad W700ds, the new dual-screen machine sports a primary screen with 1920x1200-pixel resolution and a second 768x1280-pixel color display that slides out from the machine's cover. "That's 10.6 inches on the diagonal," said ThinkPad team member Wes Williams.

Covering All the Angles

The integration of a second color screen only contributes a few extra millimeters of thickness compared to the machine's predecessor, the single-screen W700. Like an automobile's rear-view mirror, the second screen can be tilted up to 30 degrees.

The primary color display, which measures 17 inches diagonally, delivers 400-nit luminance performance when users select the WUXGA screen option. By comparison, the luminance delivered by most computer displays typically ranges between 50 and 300 nits.

"The 400-nit display is super-bright," said Lenovo spokesperson Kristy Fair. "There are other optional displays, but the 400-nit is the brightest."

Moreover, the WUXGA screen's 72 percent wide color gamut enables a color intensity boost of more than 50 percent. "Color gamut is the screen's ability to display a wide range of colors -- the higher the gamut, the more intense the colors are," Fair explained. "For users in fields like photography and digital content creation, this is important."

Customization Options

Every time Williams used to go on the road he had to lug around a second monitor, a color-calibration unit, a digitizer and pen, and a backup hard drive as well as the computing system. "Now there is a better way," Williams said.

The ThinkPad W700ds provides users with a wide array of configuration options to meet mobile workstation needs. For example, it can be customized with solid-state storage, dual integrated hard drives that can be configured for high-speed or mirror RAID, and...

LG Announces Broadband HDTV with Netflix Built In
As more movies and TV shows become available via the Internet, making the "last connection" between online and high-definition TVs is the key remaining obstacle to transforming the Net into a full entertainment medium. On Monday, LG Electronics moved to bridge that connection with the announcement of HDTV sets that are broadband-enabled and contain Netflix streaming software.

The new models, including both LCD and plasma, have an Ethernet connection, do not require an external device, and allow Netflix members to watch streaming movies. The new sets will be demonstrated at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, which opens this week.

A Growing Alliance with Netflix

The announcement extends LG's growing alliance with Netflix, which offers more than 100,000 movies via mailed DVDs and a smaller but growing collection of more than 12,000 titles available for instant streaming. LG's BD300 Network Blu-ray Disc Player was the first such player to offer streaming movies from Netflix. Recently, LG said its players would also be able to deliver CinemaNow movies on demand and YouTube videos.

The broadband TVs, expected to be available in the spring, will let any Netflix member with an $8.99 per month membership or higher to watch an unlimited number of films.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said LG Electronics "was first to embrace Netflix as a streaming partner a year ago" with the Blu-ray player, so it is "fitting" that LG is the first to introduce Netflix streaming to HDTVs.

Netflix members who get the new LG set will use the movie service's online user interface to choose movies and TV episodes. The selections will be available instantly and begin playing in as little as half a minute. The TV's remote control will allow users to browse and choose selections, read summaries, rate movies, rewind or fast-forward.

'Forget the Bridge'

Bobby Tulsiani, an analyst with Forrester Research,...

Freescale Engineers Low-Cost Netbook Processor
Freescale Semiconductor is entering the fast-growing netbook market with a solution that promises to make possible portable devices that feature 8.9-inch displays, eight hours of battery life, and prices under $200.

Freescale's solution is based on its new i.MX515 processor featuring ARM Cortex-A8 technology. The solution includes software, components and resources that aim to help OEMs rapidly develop and deploy netbooks.

"We see a huge opportunity in the netbook market as consumers demand more cost-effective and higher-performing solutions," said Lisa Su, senior vice president and general manager of Freescale's networking and multimedia group. "Our solution for netbooks will enable OEMs to develop compelling products that feature cell-phone-like battery life at extremely aggressive price points."

Explosive Market

Freescale is offering a netbook reference design based on the i.MX515 processor created in collaboration with Pegatron. The reference design incorporates the processor, Canonical's Ubuntu operating system, a new power management integrated circuit from Freescale, the SGTL5000 ultra low-power audio codec, and Adobe Flash Lite for mobile devices.

According to ABI Research, consumers are expected to purchase 140 million netbooks in 2013, compared with only 15 million in 2008. Often priced between $300 and $400, netbooks provide more than enough performance for a host of Internet activities such as social networking, Web surfing and using e-mail.

"As was evident in the 2008 holiday season, the netbook market has exploded due to consumer demand for affordable and compact devices that allow users to conduct routine tasks like social networking or shopping on the Web," said Philip Solis, principal analyst at ABI. "The netbook market is still in its infancy, and it represents a huge market opportunity for companies like Freescale. As advanced platforms for netbooks become increasingly available, price points will drop and the market will expand."

Keeping Costs Low

The Freescale solution is engineered to keep costs low by incorporating highly integrated...

Apple CEO Steve Jobs Reveals Hormonal Imbalance
As the much-anticipated Macworld Conference & Expo begins, Apple CEO Steve Jobs is putting rumors of his health to rest. In a letter addressed to the Apple community, Jobs said he is still in charge and will be the first to inform Apple's board if his health should get in the way of running the Cupertino, Calif.-based company.

Jobs posted the letter after speculation about his health ran rampant following a December announcement that he would not keynote Apple's last appearance at Macworld. Vice President Philip Schiller will deliver this year's keynote on Tuesday.

The CEO said his weight loss throughout last year was not because of his rare form of pancreatic cancer.

A Simple Remedy

"The reason has been a mystery to me and my doctors," Jobs said. "A few weeks ago, I decided that getting to the root cause of this and reversing it needed to become my #1 priority. Fortunately, after further testing, my doctors think they have found the cause -- a hormone imbalance that has been robbing me of the proteins my body needs to be healthy."

Doctors expect it will take some time before Jobs will regain weight and bring his body mass back to normal, according to Jobs. "The remedy for this nutritional problem is relatively simple and straightforward, and I've already begun treatment," he said.

Jobs, who said he is happy to be spending time with his family during the holidays instead of preparing a speech for Macworld, said he wanted to put rumors about his health to rest so that everyone can just relax and enjoy the show.

"I will continue as Apple's CEO during my recovery," he said. "I have given more than my all to Apple for the past 11 years now. I will be the first one to step up and tell our...

Bringing Broadband to the Urban Poor
Anthony Celestine was a latecomer to the Internet Age. The 40-year-old Harlem resident has owned a small Jani-King commercial cleaning franchise since 2004, but until recently, the New Yorker hadn't owned a computer or even surfed the Web or had an e-mail address. "I didn't know what none of that stuff was," he says.

Now he uses the Internet all the time to scout out new customers, communicate with Jani-King headquarters in Dallas, and trade e-mails with fellow franchisees on how to do certain kinds of jobs better. "I talk to my franchise brothers about what works and what doesn't," says Celestine, "I'm learning about new procedures faster than before. It's like riding a bike and then switching to a car. It's just a whole better world with the PC."

Celestine entered that world earlier this year when he moved from Brooklyn to an apartment in Harlem and got a PC and a high-speed Web hookup as part of his rental agreement. Celestine's apartment is owned by Harlem Congregations for Community Improvement [HCCI], a 22-year-old, $240 million nonprofit community development organization based in Harlem's Bradhurst neighborhood. HCCI was able to provide the computer and Internet connection thanks to the efforts of other nonprofit groups and an organization that funds affordable housing projects.

The Broadband Have-Nots

Millions of Americans -- many of them also residents of the inner city -- remain on the other side of the chasm that separates those who have high-speed Internet access from those who don't. President-elect Barack Obama has taken to delivering a weekly address not only over the radio but also through videos on Google's YouTube. Yet almost half of U.S. adults don't have the necessary broadband connections that make it easy to view those messages, according to recent data from the Pew Internet & American Life Project. A...

Microsoft's Windows Vista: The 64-Bit Question
Buy a new copy of Windows Vista or a new computer today, and you'll have a decision to make: Should you go for the 64-bit version of Windows Vista, or the 32-bit version?

We've all been using various 32-bit versions of Windows for years now, but clearly the future belongs to 64-bit computing. What do you need to know before you get a jump on destiny? Here are some answers.

Q: Why would I want to run 64-bit Windows?

A: You'll get access to more system memory. The 32-bit versions of Windows -- Vista and XP -- can access a maximum of 4 gigabytes (GB) of system memory. In practice, however, some of that system memory is reserved for the operating system and other processes, so your applications end up with significantly less. It's not uncommon for a computer with 4 GB of memory installed to have only 3 GB available once the operating system and other processes stake their claim to the memory.

While 3 GB may have seemed like a lot of memory a few years ago, today all you need to do is run a memory-hungry photo program, load a half-dozen large files, and you could be pushing the limits of your installed memory.

The 64-bit version of Windows Vista can access much more than 4 GB of RAM. Vista Ultimate, Enterprise, and Business can access 128 GB of RAM. Home Premium can access 16 GB, while Home Basic will max out at 8 GB.

Having the ability to access more memory in your computer gives you a couple of advantages. First, you can load more applications and more files within those applications. Second, your overall computing experience should be smoother, since swapping from one application to another will hopefully take place in memory and not rely on caching data to the hard...

Web Pirates in China Raid the Sports World
An important National Football League game on a recent Saturday night was dark on millions of television screens, but it lighted up an untold number of laptops.

Millions of U.S. fans could not watch the game between the Baltimore Ravens and Dallas Cowboys on television. Yet they could watch any number of illicit live streams on the Internet.

The major U.S. professional sports leagues are finding that pirated feeds of live games are now common and that they could soon become a menace to their businesses, which are themselves ever more reliant on Internet subscriptions services.

"We never felt that the jewel in our crown, the live games, would be vulnerable," said Ayala Deutsch, senior vice president and chief intellectual property counsel at the National Basketball Association.

The tangible effect on the leagues' business today is small, but the stakes are large: Each sells the rights to its live games to broadcasters for billions of dollars. And each is trying to increase revenue by selling rights for games on mobile phones and the Web.

Major League Baseball has perhaps the most advanced online business among the major sports and offers a season of games streamed online for $79.95, a price that league executives say will be reduced slightly in 2009. Robert Bowman, the chief executive of MLB.com, said that piracy hurt business but that "it's embryonic: It's not widespread, and we have a distinct advantage in that we have a better product."

Deutsch was host recently to a gathering of sports leagues around the world to discuss ways of combating live-game piracy. "We view it as an international issue," she said.

This is because sports leagues abroad face the same issue, and because the pirates themselves, the hubs of the peer-to-peer networks that facilitate the illicit streaming of live games, reside mostly outside the United States....

Technology Innovations for Tough Times
For General Electric, innovation isn't just about developing better technologies; it's also about not wasting cash on the wrong ones. That focus on saving money is even more important now that the economy has gone into a tailspin, dragging down GE's earnings and share price. The company's researchers have a surprising tool that could help: a method pioneered back in Stalin's Soviet Union.

It's called TRIZ, a Russian acronym for the phrase "the theory of solving inventor's problems." The core ideas were dreamed up by engineer and science fiction writer Genrich Altshuller, whose critique of the Soviet Union's record on invention in the late 1940s landed him in the gulag. There, he learned from imprisoned scientists and, when he was released, put together a step-by-step innovation method for people who aren't born with the gifts of Edison or Einstein. Since then, his theory has evolved into an elaborate system for analyzing problems and generating solutions. In contrast to brainstorming, TRIZ uses deep analysis of possibilities based on science and math algorithms.

These days, TRIZ is coming on strong at corporations hungry for new ways to improve innovation and productivity beyond what they've already achieved with the widely adopted Six Sigma and Lean techniques. In addition to GE, TRIZ fans include Intel, Samsung, and Procter & Gamble, as well as smaller companies like FuelCell Energy, a Danbury [Conn.] leader in power-generation fuel cells. The company employed TRIZ to evaluate the expensive flanges it uses to join pipes in its generators. After weighing the component costs, effectiveness, and complexity of assembly, FuelCell switched to a new clamping technique that will slash costs by 50 percent.

Rigorous Review Up Front

GE similarly uses TRIZ at the front end of the innovation process. Small project teams bring problems with them to TRIZ training sessions and use the method...

A Move Toward More Privacy Online
Yahoo has announced that it will no longer hold some personally identifiable search information for more than 90 days. The company is hoping that the new policy will give it a competitive advantage with users who care about privacy. It also is an encouraging development for the cause of Internet privacy.

Many users do not realize that search engines hold onto the words that they type, and the addresses of Web sites that they visit -- often in ways that can be traced back to specific users. If you use Google, Yahoo or Microsoft search engines to find out more about cancer drugs, drug addiction or radical politics, the company may keep that information. And it may turn the data over to the government if presented with a valid subpoena.

Privacy advocates have long objected to these policies. In many cases, they argue, users have no idea that the information is being kept. Some of these advocates have been pushing, in the U.S. Congress, for Internet privacy laws that would limit data retention.

Yahoo has decided to move in a pro-privacy direction on its own. Until now, its policy was to hold onto search data in personally identifiable ways for 13 months. The 90-day limit that it is adopting is considerably better than Google's, which holds onto personally identifiable search data for nine months, or Microsoft's, which holds data for even longer.

Some privacy advocates object to the way in which Yahoo intends to make the data anonymous. The company says that it will remove the last eight bits of a user's Internet Protocol, or IP, address -- a number that can often be traced to a specific computer -- and take other steps to scrub identifiable data. Critics argue that even so, it may still be possible to trace the data back to...