EDS coughs up over Tax Credit debacle

"EDS is to stump up £71.25m to settle its dispute with Her Majesty’s Revenue & Revenue over the disastrous system the services giant built to support the UK’s Tax Credit system in 2003."

Lost Rhapsody

A tribute to the TV show Lost, set to Weird Al Yankovic's "Bohemian Polka" (his version of Bohemian Rhapsody).

Free E-Book: "God's Debris" by Scott Adams

Scott Adams announced on his blog that he is giving away the e-book version of God's Debris.

"Imagine that you meet a very old man who—you eventually realize—knows literally everything. Imagine that he explains for you the great mysteries of life—quantum physics, evolution, God, gravity, light, psychic phenomenon, and probability—in a way so simple, so novel, and so compelling that it all fits together and makes perfect sense. What does it feel like to suddenly understand everything? God's Debris isn’t the final answer to the Big Questions. But it might be the most compelling vision of reality you will ever read. The thought experiment is this: Try to figure out what’s wrong with the old man’s explanation of reality. Share the book with your smart friends then discuss it later while enjoying a beverage."

Let me know when you've read it!

EarthCore And Ancestor: Two Free Podcast Novels

Following my Podcast theme, I'd like to introduce you to two Podcast novels by Scott Sigler.

EarthCore
Deep below a desolate Utah mountain lies the largest platinum deposit ever discovered. A billion-dollar find, it waits for any company that can drill a world's record, three-mile-deep mine shaft.

EarthCore is the company with the technology, the resources and the guts to go after the mother lode. Young executive Connell Kirkland is the company's driving force, pushing himself and those around him to uncover the massive treasure.

But at three miles below the surface, where the rocks are so hot they burn bare skin, something has been waiting for centuries. Waiting ... and guarding. Kirkland and EarthCore are about to find out first-hand why this treasure has never been unearthed.

Ancestor
On a remote island in Lake Superior, scientists struggle to solve the problem of xenotransplantation -- using animal tissue to replace failing human organs. Funded by the biotech firm Genada, Dr. Claus Rhumkorrf seeks to recreate the ancestor of all mammals. By getting back to the root of our creation, Rhumorrf hopes to create an animal with human internal organs.

Rhumkorrf discovers the ancestor, but it is not the small, harmless creature he envisions. His genius gives birth to a fast-growing evil that nature eradicated 350 million years ago -- an evil now on the loose, and very, very hungry.

Big Brother is watching: 1984 becomes a reality in the UK

I can't believe this is being allowed. The UK police are using taxpayer's money to build a nation-wide network of cameras to issue speeding tickets to taxpayers. All your movements will be monitored, logged and stored for two years, in order to tackle 'serious crime' such as speeding and identifying untaxed and uninsured vehicles.

This isn't a solution to serious crime, as any good thief already has a way around it.

The Dilbert Blog

Scott Adams has a blog! I think this might make it onto my daily links.

Tape It Off The Internet

The future of television, or the next Grokster? Watch this space...

Virtual Machines

Commercial Virtual Machines:
Microsoft Virtual PC 2004
VMware Workstation

Free Virtual Machines:
Bochs IA-32 Emulator Project
Xen virtual machine monitor
QEMU
WINE (Wine Is Not an Emulator)

How to crash Windows on demand

I just watched Hak.5 episode 1x03.5 and got this handy little 'developer' tip for crashing Microsoft Windows on demand:

1. Open Regedit.exe
   
2. Open HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servicesi8042prt\Parameters
   
3. Create a new DWORD Value called "CrashOnCtrlScroll" with the value 1
   
4. Reboot
   

Now when you want to force a Blue Screen Of Death, just hold down the right CTRL key and press ScrollLock twice. BOOM! BSOD.

My Favourite Podcasts

Since iTunes integrated Podcasts I've been trying out a few to see whether I like the idea of listening to people rambling on about various (mainly tech-related) subjects, much to the annoyance of my girlfriend. Some of the podcasts I've tried are truly awful, some aren't so bad, and others are really quite good. Here are my current podcast favourites. First, the specific links to the podcast feeds themselves:

Best of Moyles

Weekly round up of the funniest bits of the Chris Moyles show from BBC Radio 1.

Diggnation (Video version)

Diggnation (Audio only)

Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht review the top stories of the week from the social network bookmarking site, Digg.com.

dl.tv - Digital Life TV (Video version)

with Patrick Norton.

Home Network Help

Christiaan Stoudt gives you advice on setting up and looking after your home network and PC.

IT Conversations: Security

Various topical interviews and talks with security experts.

Lost: The Transmission

Discussions about the TV show Lost.

Security Now!

Steve Gibson discusses hot security topics with Leo Laporte.

Slashdot Review

A 10 minute summary of the stories on Slashdot.

Systm

Kevin Rose and Dan Huard do hardware hacking.

The Signal

A Serenity/Firefly Podcast with Les Howard.

This Week in Tech

with Leo Laporte, Patrick Norton, Kevin Rose, John C. Dvorak, and other tech 'luminaries'.

Here are the main web sites where you can find out more about each of the shows:

Best of Moyles

Diggnation

Digital Life TV

Home Network Help

IT Conversations

Lost: The Transmission

Security Now!

Slashdot Review

Systm

The Signal

This Week in Tech

Let me know what your favourite podcasts are in the comments section, or if you subscribe to any of these on my recommendation.

Sony, Rootkits and Digital Rights Management Gone Too Far

Mark Russinovich from Sysinternals has discovered that Sony BMG uses rootkit technology and modifies your Windows kernel to stop you copying their CDs. The rootkit cannot be uninstalled and attempts to do so will disable access to your CD player. Also, it has been noted that the software is poorly written and is the cause of many a blue screen of death. Look out for crashes reporting problems related to Aries.sys.

Not only that, but once you have this software on your machine it's trivial for other hackers to leverage off it and hide their files on your machine! Just by creating a file whose name starts with $sys$ anyone with access to your PC can hide files from you.

My advice: if you own any CDs that are copy-protected, do not put them in your PC, but if you do, make sure you have autorun disabled (hold down the shift key when inserting the CD) and do NOT accept any software installations off the CD.

Steve Gibson discusses this with Leo Laporte in Episode 12 of their Security Now! Podcast - well worth a listen.

More reports and discussions are available.

Sony BMG has also provided an update which removes the cloaking properties of the software (but does not remove the copy-protection software itself).

2005-11-07 UPDATE:
Mark Russinovich has another article about the dangerous patch that released by Sony BMG. He also confirms that the malware sends something back to Sony's server.

Molly Wood at Cnet.com sums up her feelings on this.

World of Warcraft hackers using Sony BMG rootkit.

Is privacy possible in the digital age?

Is privacy possible in the digital age?