Morning Broadband Bytes - 1) Get Coffee 2) Read Morning Broadband Bytes 3) Start Day

•Around the Industry:
Shaw quits Canadian Cable Telecommunications Association
Sony tries to make itself look good; 'unearths new' copy-protection threat
Commentary: Telco's arrogant stand on content
The future of Wi-Fi Is free
Gartner: Halt all critical BlackBerry deployments now
180solutions crows about added security, eliminates 180searchAssistant
•SecurityBits:
Microsoft: Stealth Rootkits are bombarding XP SP2 Boxes
AIM worm chats with intended victims
•TidBytes:
New Firefox loses features
The term 'podcast' declared Word of the Year
Europeans warn Google
•More news from around the industry, SecurityBits, and interesting Tidbytes inside!

Around The Industry:
•Shaw quits Canadian Cable Telecommunications Association:
Shaw Communications severed its ties with the Canadian Cable Telecommunications Association (CCTA), saying its goals and interests differ from those of other members. According to Shaw, the company would be better off if it didn't have to seek industry consensus and instead mapped out its own strategies. The CCTA represents 77 cable firms ranging from small players to giants such as Rogers and Cogeco. Among the organization's roles is to represent the industry's views in front of regulatory bodies.
•Sony tries to make itself look good; 'unearths new' copy-protection threat:
Sony and the Electronic Frontier Foundation digital rights group jointly announced they had found and fixed a new computer security risk associated with some of the record label's CDs. The danger is associated with copy-protection software included on some Sony CDs created by a company called SunnComm Technologies. The vulnerability could allow malicious programmers to gain control of computers that have run the software, which is typically installed automatically when a CD is put in a computer's CD drive.
•Commentary: Telco's arrogant stand on content:
Paul Budde, of Budde Communication, via SkyReport: "It's pretty arrogant when all telcos talk about content in the various triple play and mobile networks, as if they can dictate the agendas of the content industry. Broadband portals, where telcos want to monopolize certain content in exclusivity models, is another example of being dismissive of the far more successful business models content providers have been using for many decades. The telcos are also contemptuous of their users, who want to be able to access information freely without having to double up access subscriptions, which are being bundled in with access to content."
•The future of Wi-Fi Is free:
The convergence of two trends, lower Internet and equipment costs combined with higher revenue potential, has led to a crossover point where hotspot installations can more than pay for themselves in terms of additional foot traffic and the resulting increase in sales. This is especially true if the Wi-Fi service is provided free of charge to the customer. Edge Consult recently did a study comparing various free and paid HotSpot plans showing that on average 'profits under the free hotspot schemes are 533% higher than the paid for services, a result of the higher indirect sales generated by the increased customer traffic lured to the location by the free hotspot service on offer.'
•Gartner: Halt all critical BlackBerry deployments now:
Gartner has advised its clients to halt all mission critical deployments of Research In Motion's Blackberry e-mail devices because of RIM's legal battle with NTP. The research note advises enterprises to "stop or delay all mission-critical BlackBerry deployments and investments in the platform until RIM's legal position is clarified" because "US BlackBerry users would lose messaging services… and international users would lose message service while travelling in the US".
•180solutions crows about added security, eliminates 180searchAssistant:
For years, critics have accused 180solutions of making it easy for hackers to download the software without a computer user's knowledge. While the company has argued that the fault rested with the lawbreakers and not the software, it has continued to bolster security in recent months. In addition to launching the new Seekmo Search Assistant, which will notify 180solutions of fraudulent downloads, the company announced that it will do away with 180search Assistant, one of its more controversial products.
•BellSouth Offers WiMAX To Gulf Coast:
BellSouth said it will extend the wireless high-speed service to customers in Hurricane Katrina-devastated Gulfport and Biloxi, Miss. The former RBOC said the pre-WiMAX service will feature downstream speeds up to 1.5Mbps. The Atlanta-based firm lost several regional offices and suffered serious damage to several others as a result of Hurricane Katrina. BellSouth officials have said they are using pre-WiMAX technology primarily to bring broadband to rural customers and now, as it turns out, to disaster victims.
•Bluetooth roadmap updated but UWB wars could scupper it:
The Bluetooth Special Interest Group, which controls the development of the short range wireless standard, is shortly to publish an updated roadmap that defines plans up to the third quarter of 2007, with the focus on interoperability with UltraWideBand. UWB is certainly the best future survival plan for the more established platform, but the Bluetooth community face a real dilemma on how to proceed should the fight over future standards for UWB remain unresolved for a long period.
•BT: It's IP or bust:
Speaking at the FT World Telecommunications Conference, the chief executive of BT Wholesale admitted that BT can't afford to run today's legacy equipment in parallel with new IP-based infrastructure: "People say to us, can't your PSTN equipment run for another fifteen years? Well, in pure engineering terms it can... but the cost and complexity of running legacy equipment alongside a new IP network will bust the business case for 21CN."
•Telewest suffers email problems:
According to ISP Review, E-Mail users on UK ISP Telewest's broadband platform have reportedly been suffering from problems (downtime, slow mail collection etc.) during peak periods of usage. The provider is aware, but fears that it may take until the end of this week before it's completely resolved. We do not know whether this has impacted everybody or just a few.

SecurityBits:
•Microsoft: Stealth Rootkits are bombarding XP SP2 Boxes:
More than 20% of all malware removed from WinXP SP2 systems are rootkits, according to senior official in MS's security unit. The open-source FU rootkit in many different versions of Rbot, the IRC backdoor used to infect Windows PCs with spyware, ranks high on the list of malicious software programs deleted by the free Windows worm zapping utility. In addition to the FU rootkit, the WinNT/Ispro family of kernel mode rootkits features in the top-five list every month, and Hacker Defender, another rootkit available for sale on the Internet, has also been detected and deleted regularly.
•AIM worm chats with intended victims:
A new worm that targets users of AIM is believed to be the first that actually chats with the intended victim to dupe the target into activating a malicious payload, IM security vendor IMlogic warned. The worm arrives in an IM that states: "lol thats cool" and includes a URL to a file "clarissa17.pif". When unsuspecting users have responded, perhaps asking if the attachment contained a virus, the worm has replied: "lol no its not its a virus". The virus disables security software, installs a backdoor, tweaks system files, then starts sending itself to contacts on the victim's buddy list.
•Happy Holidays! Beware of IM greeting cards:
Akonix said it has identified a new IM worm, named W32/Aimdes.E, that disguises itself as a holiday greeting card. Aimdes.E is downloaded once a recipient opens the greeting card. Upon execution, the memory-resident worm propagates through an IM network by sending the following message to other users listed on the infected user's buddy list: "The user has sent you a Greeting Card, to open it visit: »g{BLOCKED}aol.com/index.pd?sourc···ard.com". Akonix has classified the worm as low risk.

Hardware, Software, and other TidBytes:
•New Firefox loses features
•The term 'podcast' declared Word of the Year
•Europeans warn Google
•Time Warner, Microsoft Near Ad Deal: WSJ
•Virtual Earth becomes Windows Live Local this week
•Microsoft releases Windows Server 2003 R2 update
•Sophos: Gates will be proved wrong about spam

EU wants to cripple Google News service

Re: EU wants to cripple Google News service

Bell South not the evil monster users claim

Re: Bell South not the evil monster users claim

Firefox 1.5 add-ins problem??

Re: Firefox 1.5 add-ins problem??

Re: Firefox 1.5 add-ins problem??

Re: Firefox 1.5 add-ins problem??


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