SECURITY...

• Bypass found for Windows piracy check - Researcher Debasis Mohanty outlined what he said was a technique to trick Microsoft's Windows Genuine Advantage validation check in a posting to the Full Disclosure security mailing list on Monday. WGA is a software tool that verifies whether a particular copy of the operating system is properly licensed.  Using a secondary Microsoft validation tool called "GenuineCheck.exe," it may be possible for people to trick the checking mechanism, Mohanty said in the posting. They could then download and run supposedly restricted software from Microsoft's Download Center on a PC running a pirated version of Windows, Mohanty wrote.  Microsoft confirmed that the technique could circumvent the piracy check, but a representative said Monday that the company is not worried.
• TCP Does Not Adequately Validate Segments Before Updating Timestamp Value - Certain TCP implementations may allow a remote attacker to arbitrarily modify host timestamp values, leading to a denial-of-service condition. The following exploit code can be used to test the remote host for the mentioned vulnerability.
• Microsoft security guru: Jot down your passwords - Companies should not ban employees from writing down their passwords because such bans force people to use the same weak term on many systems, according to a Microsoft security guru: How many have (a) password policy that says under penalty of death you shall not write down your password?" asked Johansson, to which the majority of attendees raised their hands in agreement. "I claim that is absolutely wrong. I claim that password policy should say you should write down your password. I have 68 different passwords. If I am not allowed to write any of them down, guess what I am going to do? I am going to use the same password on every one of them."
• Over Half a Million Bank Accounts Breached - Bank of America Corp. and Wachovia Corp. are among the big banks notifying more than 670,000 customers that account information was stolen in what may the biggest security breach to hit the banking industry. Account information on the customers was illegally sold by bank employees to a man identified as Orazio Lembo, whom police said was doing business by illegally posing as a collection agency.
• China pirates give Warner a headache with multi-movie DVD's - Last fall, Time Warner Inc. quietly began selling cut-rate DVDs in China to better compete with cheap bootleg copies of its movies. But the bootleggers were already a step ahead - they started peddling DVDs that compress four or five movies onto a single disc.  Although their picture quality is far from perfect, they are watchable. And priced at 5 yuan -- or 60 cents -- a disc, they are helping steer buyers away from the cheapest legitimate alternatives on the market, including DVD movies from Warner, which start at $2.65.
• Want the Sith DVD? Go to Usenet - NZB files are supported by most popular newsreaders, including NZBGet for Mac and Linux, and NewsBin Pro for PC. There are now also several dedicated alt.binaries.nzb newsgroups. More dramatically, NZB allows web searches of files posted to Usenet, making Usenet almost as easy to use as eMule or Kazaa. This new file format and the rise of commercial high-bandwidth Usenet services -- such as NewsGroups and Usenet.com -- are fueling the revival of Usenet. Pirates now are discovering, to their surprise, that the old newsgroup system, patched with modern technology, outperforms most other P2P networks.

OFFTOPIC...

• Gates leaks "Halo 3"release date ... maybe - For all the fanfare about its new video-game console, Microsoft was decidedly quiet last week about one of the biggest questions in the industry: the potential timing of a third installment in its blockbuster "Halo" video-game franchise. Well, everyone except Bill Gates was quiet about it. In a cover story published last week in Time magazine, the Microsoft chief software architect was quoted as saying that the company would have "Halo 3" ready by the time Sony releases its PlayStation 3 next year. Time described him as "radiant with bloodlust" over the prospect of using the exclusive Microsoft game to foil the Xbox 360's rival. "It's perfect," Gates was quoted as saying. "The day Sony launches, and they walk right into Halo 3."
• Building the world's most powerful laser - In a building the size of a football stadium, engineers have assembled the framework for a network of 192 laser beams, each traveling 1,000 feet (305 meters) to converge simultaneously on a target the size of a pencil eraser. The trip will take one-thousandth of a second during which the light's energy is amplified many billions of times to create a brief laser pulse 1,000 times the electric generating power of the United States.
• Downloadable Brains and Depressed Computers In the Future - According to a leading British futurologist, death could become a thing of the past by the mid-21st century as computer technology becomes sophisticated enough for the contents of a brain to be "downloaded" on to a supercomputer. The loophole however lies in price. The technology might be expensive enough to remain a perk of the rich for a decade or two.
• Man sells vast collection of ancient software - A MAN who has a vast collection of software for computers is going to start selling them in the middle of June on Ebay. The collection, according to Elisoft.com, includes around 20,000 separate titles, many of which are for non IBM PC machines. The machines mentioned are the Apple II, the Amiga, the Atari, the Commodore 64, the Mac, the Timex (Sinclair), the TRS 80 and the Vic 20.

TECHNOLOGY...

• Apple allegedly explores using Intel chips - Apple Computer has been in talks that could lead to a decision soon to use Intel chips in its Macintosh line, according to a report published Monday. The Wall Street Journal, citing two industry executives with knowledge of recent discussions between the companies, reported that Apple will agree to use Intel chips. Neither company would confirm the report, and an Apple representative told the Journal that the information should be characterized as "rumor and speculation."
• AMD releases a consumer electronics chip - The new Geode LX800 is an energy-efficient processor for small computers, set-top boxes, TVs and handhelds, according to Chief Technical Officer Fred Weber. The chip runs at 533MHz and is said to provide the equivalent performance of an 800MHz processor from Via Technologies.
• Firefox Developer Rips Netscape - Responding to Netscape 8's release and immediate security gaffe last week, a lead developer of Firefox lambasted the rival browser -- which uses much of the same code as Mozilla's Firefox -- as "unsafe."  Ben Goodger, a former top Mozilla Foundation developer who now works at Google -- albeit still at least part time on Firefox -- used his blog to blast Netscape. Goodger posted a link on his blog to a demonstration of exploit code that the original Netscape 8 was vulnerable to when it first rolled out early Thursday. "If security is important to you, this demonstration should show that browsers that are redistributions of the official Mozilla releases are never going to give you security updates as quickly as Mozilla will itself for its supported products," Goodger wrote.
• Bram Cohen to Release BitTorrent Search Engine - Bram Cohen and a small cadre of developers and entrepreneurs are in the final stage of launching an advertising-supported search engine dedicated to cataloging and indexing the thousands of movies, music tracks, software programs and other files for download over Cohen's popular BitTorrent protocol.
• Scientists Invent Ultra-Thin Camera Lens - A team of Canadian scientists have invented a camera lens that is five times thinner than a piece of paper, enabling even the smallest of cameras to take high-quality photographs
• Samsung Replaces Hard Drives With Flash - Samsung Electronics has developed a replacement for conventional hard drives that is based on flash memory chips. The company plans to begin mass production of the device in August, it says. The Seoul company is planning SSDs with parallel ATA interfaces in capacities up to 16GB. The 16GB devices will contain 16 memory chips holding 8 gigabits each, it says. Such chips sell for about $55 each on the spot memory market, according to DRAM Exchange Tech. That would put the chip cost of the 16GB SSD at almost $900.

HARDWARE... 

• Creative launches Neeon "smallest" HDD MP3 player - Creative launched its latest hard drive-based MP3 players on Friday. The new arrivals include the 5GB Zen Neeon, a 20GB version of its Zen Micro, this time simply dubbed the Zen, and a Zen-branded version of its MuVo V200. The black 8 x 4.7 x 1.6cm, 75g shell contains a 5GB drive, FM radio, microphone and line-in port for direct-to-MP3 encoding.
• AboCom to showcase new WiFi and Bluetooth devices at Computex - Network equipment maker AboCom Systems will showcase its latest WiFi devices, including the HGW810 router and its WR-201 wireless AP sound card as well as its BSH203 Bluetooth stereo headset at the upcoming Computex Taipei 2005 (May 31-June 4), according to company sources. The HGW 810 is a completely wireless and wire integrated router that incorporates three devices - a wireless access point supporting IEEE 802.11a/b/g standard, an 8-port switch with four ports exclusively for full-duplex 10/100Mb and four ports exclusively for Gigabit Ethernet and four USB2.0 ports, the sources said.
• DFI LanParty UT NF4 Ultra-D - Zone365 published a review of the DFI LanParty UT NF4 Ultra-D motherboard.
• Asus Extreme Radeon AX800XL/2DTV - HotHardware.com has posted a review of the Asus Extreme Radeon AX800XL/2DTV video card
• Sapphire Radeon X850 XT PE VIVO AGP - When it comes to the features and specifications that really matter, the PCI Express and AGP forms of the X850 XT PE card are no different. The X850 XT PE is clocked at 540MHz for the core and 590MHz for the memory while the X850 XT is clocked at 520MHz and 540MHz, respectively. This, of course, makes the X850 XT PE ATI's top card right now.
• EVGA GeForce 6200 TurboCache 64MB PCI-Express - The performance of the GeForce 6200 TurboCache performed very well in all the benchmarking compared to the ATI X300. For the overclocking, the EVGA GeForce 6200 TurboCache has an increment of 92MHz for the core and 125MHz for the memory. That brings it up from the default at 350/550MHz to 442/675MHz. The only bad thing is the poor bundle, anyway who cares as long as the performance of the graphic card is good.
• Logisys Wireless Remote Multi-Function Panel - PimpRig posted a new review up on a pretty unique multi-function panel in that it allows you to remotely start-up/shut down your PC
• Vantec Iceberg 5 VGA Cooler - The performance difference between the stock cooler and the Vantec Iceberg 5 definitely shows that the Vantec Iceberg 5 performs very well, keeping the GPU almost 15C lower than stock cooler.

GUIDES... 

• Maximum CPU Temperature - Hardware Secrets posted an article about maximum CPU temperature
• Bursting the Athlon 64 Memory bandwidth bubble - Mad Shrimps posted an article about Athlon 64 Memory bandwidth.
• How to run the 32-bit Explorer shell on Windows x64 - One of the first things many users notice about Windows XP and 2003 x64 Editions is that they do not support any kind of shell integration (Deskbars, Toolbars, Context-menu handlers like WinRAR, etc). The reason for this is that 64-bit processes cannot communicate with 32-bit processes or libraries. Running the 32-bit shell maintains all the benefits of having a 64-bit OS underneath, allows the full use of standard 32-bit Windows shell integration, while still allowing you to run both 32-bit and 64-bit applications side-by-side.

SOFTWARE...

• Windows XP Professional x64 Edition Trial Download - The Windows XP Professional x64 Edition trial software download (550MB) is available at no charge. After you have completed the download registration process, you will receive an e-mail message with a link to the download page. The download page will include the download file and a product key for the trial software. The file will be in ISO format and must be burned to a CD or DVD before you can install the software on your computer
• AVG Antivirus 7.0.322 Build 531 (free) - AVG Free Edition (download ~ 11MB) is the well-known anti-virus protection tool. AVG Free is available free-of-charge to home users for the life of the product. New AVG 7.0.322 program update was released with a host of changes and news: significantly improved Accessibility support (screen readers), support of more compression and archive types, digital signature for AVG installation files.
• Aim Ad Hack 4.0.6 - AIM Ad Hack (download) is the only program that fully removes the ads and options you don't want in AIM instead of just hiding them. Thats why you may still get pop ups and audio ads in other AIM programs. Also AIM Ad Hack actually modifies AIM itself, it is not a program that loads every time along with AIM like deadaim and after you run AIM Ad Hack once it never needs to be run again until you upgrade to a new version of AIM.
• 7-Zip 4.19 Beta - 7-Zip (download) is a file archiver with high compression ratio.
• foobar2000 Normal 0.9 Beta 3 - foobar2000 (download beta) is an advanced audio player for the Windows platform. Some of the basic features include ReplayGain support, low memory footprint and native support for several popular audio formats.
• NGO ATI Optimized Driver v1.5.5 (2.5) - The NGO ATI Optimized Driver is a tweaked version of the ATI Catalyst driver. The main purpose is to satisfy the users with a better performance and better image quality.The Driver has support for all Radeon cards.