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Thursday, June 12, 2008 |
[NY Times technology columnist David Pogue relates his experience with cellphone spam and lesser or little known tools you may be able to use to block it. ]
5:42:33 PM 
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Monday, January 30, 2006 |
Connected Home Media: Steps you should take to secure a home wireless router. [Simply: change all default settings; enable encryption; reduce or eliminate the opportunity for "alien" devices to get on your network.]
2:29:09 PM
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Monday, June 27, 2005 |
Buffalo's kit is great for large homes or offices that need a wireless network with room to grow and range to spare.
8:42:43 PM
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IP Camera + Pocket PC = Security! [?? How about security tool instead!] Thanks to the dropping cost of camera technology and the proliferation of broadband connections and home LANs, affordable solutions are now available for the average consumer. [The article looks at a specific technology combination - D-Link DCS-900W IP camera and a Pocket PC equipped with a program called ViewCommander-Mobile - but contains good info on (wireless) ip cameras and setting the whole thing up.]
4:56:49 PM
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Saturday, May 14, 2005 |
Microsoft has added a key wireless LAN security specification to Windows XP. The specification, called Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 or WPA2, requires a Wi-Fi client to include the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) algorithm. WPA2 is an implementation of IEEE 802.11i, the wireless LAN security standard. The new, free software from Microsoft supports all features of WPA2, according to a Microsoft program manager.
7:16:49 PM
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Wednesday, February 16, 2005 |
Researchers have found a way to crack the code used in millions of car keys. The research team at Johns Hopkins University said it discovered that the "immobilizer" security system developed by Texas Instruments - a radio-frequency security system being used in more than 150 million new Fords, Toyotas and Nissans - could be cracked using a "relatively inexpensive electronic device." Texas Instruments was recently given demonstrations of the team's code cracking capabilities, but the company maintains its system is secure. Tony Sabetti, a business manager with Texas Instruments, said the hardware used to crack the codes is cumbersome, expensive and not practical for common thieves.
5:53:10 PM
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Monday, February 07, 2005 |
Coffee shop Web surfers beware: An evil twin may be lurking near your
favorite wireless hotspot. Thieves are using wireless devices to
impersonate legitimate Internet access points to steal credit card
numbers and other personal information, security experts warn.
5:14:04 PM
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Tuesday, November 23, 2004 |
SBC Communications Inc. on Tuesday launched Wi-Fi services at more than
600 Barnes & Noble bookstores nationwide. In addition, the
San Antonito, Texas, telecommunications company said
it plans to have wireless local area networks (LANs) ready for business
travelers at 88 Avis Rent A Car airport locations by early next year.
9:57:49 PM
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Wireless companies and federal safety officials list measures consumers can take to keep cell phone batteries from overheating: When removing battery, avoid putting it in contact with metal, such as keys or coins.
_Don't expose battery to water or extreme temperatures.
_Avoid crushing battery or dropping it against hard surfaces, especially when fully charged.
_If bought separately, make sure battery
and charger are compatible with the phone model. Check that components
are not manufactured for phones sold in other countries.
_Buy parts from an authorized dealer,
carrier or legitimate outlet, rather than secondhand dealers or off the
Internet. This decreases the
9:51:12 PM
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Safety officials have received 83 reports
of cell phones exploding or catching fire in the past two years,
usually because of bad batteries or chargers. Burns to the face, neck, leg and hip are among the dozens of injury reports the Consumer Product Safety Commission
has received. The agency is providing tips for cell phone users to
avoid such accidents and has stepped up oversight of the wireless
industry. There have been three voluntary battery recalls, and the CPSC
is working with companies to create better battery standards.
9:41:50 PM
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Tuesday, October 26, 2004 |
Ten or more years of mobile phone use increases the risk of developing acoustic neuroma, a benign tumor on the auditory nerve, according to a study released on Wednesday by Sweden's Karolinska Institute. The risk was confined to the side of the head where the phone was usually held and there were no indications of increased risk for those who have used their mobile for less than 10 years.
10:31:07 PM
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Saturday, October 23, 2004 |
Verizon Wireless is offering backup software for phone numbers and other information stored on cell phones. The company said it was offering Backup Assistant, which was developed by FusionOne. The software enables users to back up the information to a centralized location. The service and software is available to Verizon customers who use the operator's Get It Now service and use specific phones, including the LG VX6000, the company said. The service costs $1.99 a month.
9:00:37 AM
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Friday, October 22, 2004 |
Netgear has launched a home network wireless extender kit that uses power outlets to push coverage to any part of the house. Dubbed the WGXB102 54 Mbps Wall-Plugged Wireless Range Extender Kit, it includes two pieces, a range extender and an Ethernet bridge, both which plug into outlets. The bridge links the current home networking router with the home's power line system, while the extender plugs into the outlet at the other end to expand wireless access into house "dead spots." The kit works with 802.11b and 802.11g wireless routers, as well as wired routers, said Netgear.
7:38:42 PM
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Thursday, October 21, 2004 |
Tellular Corporation today announced that Sprint PCS is conducting a trial of the company's Phonecell® SX5T fixed wireless terminal. The product allows devices designed for wireline networks, such as telephones, fax machines, analog modems, and TV set-top boxes, to connect to Sprint's CDMA 1x network. The device provides a standard dial tone, as well as caller-ID, TDD/TTY, and gpsOne for E-911 compliance. The trial is being conducted in Charlotte, Indianapolis, Minneapolis, Richmond and San Antonio.
4:36:38 PM
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The world's largest software company is revving up to position itself as the largest supplier of software to car manufacturers, with a custom version of Windows CE controlling everything from in-vehicle entertainment to satellite navigation. Windows Automotive does not share a network with the low-level systems of a vehicle--so a software crash won't result in, say, brake failure. Microsoft's entry into the automotive market isn't exactly new. Since 1998, the company has been selling Windows-based navigation systems that show overhead maps on LCD screens in the dashboard. Some two dozen models from 10 car makers use that relatively expensive technology, Microsoft says. Making the LCD screen optional, however, makes the system cheaper and reduces worries about distracting drivers.
3:23:49 PM
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A new keychain gadget that lets people turn off most TVs — anywhere from airports to restaurants — is selling at a faster clip than it would take most people to surf the channels on their boob tubes. Hundreds of orders for the inventor's (Mitch Altman of San Francisco), $14.99 TV-B-Gone gadget poured in Monday after the tiny remote control was announced in Wired magazine and other online media outlets. The keychain fob works like a universal remote control but one that only turns TVs on or off. With a zap of a button, the gizmo goes through a string of about 200 infrared codes that controls the power of about 1,000 television models. Altman said the majority of TVs should react within 17 seconds, though it takes a little more than a minute for the gizmo to emit all the trigger codes.
3:19:03 PM
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Some New York City residents are taking advantage of a project offered by NYCWireless that teaches them how to set up a hotspot to share with their neighbors: Neighbornode is a project offered by NYCWireless that includes a package of open-source software that helps interested folks get started. NYCWireless is also offering workshops. People who set up the hotspots are encouraged to set up electronic bulletin boards that allow users to communicate with each other. So far, some of the hotspots are getting people together, for social reasons as well as neighborhood watch concerns.
No mention here of whether NYCWireless offers advice on avoiding the wrath of broadband providers like Time Warner, which sent out letters to people in New York City a while back warning customers against sharing their Internet connections.
3:13:10 PM
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Tuesday, October 19, 2004 |
A new free SANS newsletter has gotten rave reviews from unsophisticated end users - they really appreciate the plain non-technical writing and the cool examples. It's called OUCH! More than 500 security awareness professionals from around the US and the world helped them get it right. If you want to redistribute it to your users, that' allowed. The newsletter includes a pointer to a great phishing quiz for anyone who thinks he or she can spot a phishing email. To subscribe go to the newsletter page at the SANS portal and choose it.
12:22:32 PM
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Monday, October 18, 2004 |
If you subscribe to SBC's DSL service at a rate as low as $26.95 per month for their cheapest service, you are entitled to unlimited Wi-Fi hot spot service for $1.99 a month with a one-year commitment -- after receiving free service until April 2005.
1:13:59 PM
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Saturday, October 16, 2004 |
In four Monterrey, Mexico churches, Israeli-made cell phone jammers the size of paperbacks have been tucked unobtrusively among paintings of the Madonna and statues of the saints. The jarring polychromatic din of ringing cell phones is increasingly being thwarted — from religious sanctuaries to India's parliament to Tokyo theaters and commuter trains — by devices originally developed to help security forces avert eavesdropping and thwart phone-triggered bombings.
The Indian parliament had jammers installed after politicians ignored requests to turn off their cell phones and legislative sessions were constantly interrupted. In Italy, universities started using the blockers after discovering that cell phone-savvy teenagers were cheating on exams by sending text messages or taking pictures of tests.
Purchased for about $2,000 each, they can be turned on by remote control and emit low-level radio frequencies that thwart cell phone signals within a 100-foot radius. Users get a "no service" or "signal not available" message on their cell phones. Although Mexico has no law against the devices, the private use of cell phone blockers is illegal in the United States and most Western countries. But the tide is turning. [One can only hope ...]
3:27:05 PM
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Wednesday, October 13, 2004 |
Ten or more years of mobile phone use increases the risk of developing acoustic neuroma, a benign tumor on the auditory nerve, according to a study released on Wednesday by Sweden's Karolinska Institute.
8:27:09 PM
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Thursday, September 23, 2004 |
A mobile wireless system being tested in Oregon allows police officers in the field to check fingerprints against state and national databases.
3:26:52 PM
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Tuesday, September 21, 2004 |
NetGear hops on the underexploited portable access point market with its sub-$90 802.11g portable device. Its unique feature is an external switch for changing between a single user mode, multi-user shared mode, and configuration. It lacks WPA at the moment, but support is promised.
9:53:16 PM
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Linksys releases legal antenna add-ons for several of its Wi-Fi gateways.
9:49:24 PM
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Gateway's 7000 service access points include all the security and authentication that an office of 5 to 25 users need: Gateway released its two 7000 series models a few months ago and have received very little press. The unit comes in 802.11g ($299) and 802.11a/g ($399) configurations. It sports support for all the popular standards, including 802.1X passthrough, WPA-PSK, WDS (Wireless Distribution System), and others. [Review at Wi-Fi Networking News]
9:47:50 PM
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3Com Corp. Monday unveiled several new wireless networking products for small business customers who need certain enterprise-level features but can't afford enterprise-level prices. The new products include a wireless print server, a travel access router, a high-speed PC Card adapter, and two new access points.
9:25:48 PM
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While Wi-Fi is hot, security is not. Even the makers of Wi-Fi routers, access points and other gadgets privately say that as many as 80 percent of home users don't bother to enable basic encryption or other protections against connection theft, eavesdropping and network invasion. Experts say that while Wi-Fi hardware makers have made initial setup easy, the enabling of security is anything but. Meanwhile, average users are no longer tech savvy. [while] The gadgets are mainstream, appearing on the shelves of Wal-Mart and other mass retailers.
6:59:01 PM
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Here are the symptoms of the problem: A Wi-Fi-enabled computer running Windows XP is working fine one minute, pulling up Web pages and processing e-mail. Then, for no reason, the connection drops, websites fail to come up and the e-mail flow stops. The small wireless connection icon in the taskbar says the signal from the access point is strong, so the problem isn't that the user wandered out of radio range. The icon even shows that the computer's Wi-Fi hardware is sending information to the access point -- it's just not getting anything back. And manual attempts to re-establish the connection through XP's built-in wireless configuration tool won't do the trick. Even more bizarre, the connection sometimes comes back on its own.
The trouble seems to arise from a tool in Windows XP called Wireless Zero Configuration, a feature that was meant to do away with the mishmash of software drivers and configuration utilities. Microsoft disputes the notion that there's a problem with the way Windows XP works with Wi-Fi.
4:54:27 PM
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Monday, September 20, 2004 |
[Loads of information and links here for those considering switching carriers but wanting to keep (or not) their current number]
12:14:28 PM
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Friday, September 17, 2004 |
WLAN equipment vendors Linksys and Netgear Tuesday announced wireless and wired routers with built-in voice-over-IP (VoIP) capabilities aimed at home uses and small offices. Both vendors are co-marketing with VoIP vendor Vonage to offer voice service as well as hardware.
4:19:05 PM
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Pocket PC users who were expecting to use Skype Technologies' SkypeOut service to make telephone calls via the Internet may find themselves without a dial-tone. Skype introduced version 1.0 of its Internet telephony application for Pocket PCs last week, but this version does not work well on all Pocket PCs, users report.
3:25:27 PM
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Friday, September 10, 2004 |
Hoping to extend wireless internet access to people without broadband, a Texas company is introducing a base station that works with any dialup connection. But don't expect it to make pages load any faster. By Elisa Batista.
10:34:04 PM
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D-Link is now shipping new wireless antennas designed to expand the range of wireless networks in small and home offices.
6:48:36 PM
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The first known virus aimed at Microsoft's Windows CE operating system was sent to several anti-virus firms by its author over the weekend to prove that Pocket PCs and Smartphones are vulnerable to attack.
6:44:33 PM
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Two key improvements for the security and performance quality of Wi-Fi devices are scheduled to reach wireless network users this year as the adoption of wireless technology continues to grow within businesses and home users.
6:07:28 PM
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Monday, August 23, 2004 |
Some say that if you find an unsecured Wi-Fi signal in a public place, it's okay to use it. Others say that's stealing. The law comes down on both sides of the issue, says attorney Mark Rasch.
11:15:18 AM
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