Eideard

Internet bandits devised an international scheme to hijack more than 4 million computers in more than 100 countries, manipulating traffic on Netflix, the U.S. Internal Revenue Service and other popular websites to generate at least $14 million in fraudulent advertising revenue.

Six of the seven people named in the indictment unsealed Wednesday are Estonians who are in custody in that country, and prosecutors said extradition was being sought. One Russian remains at large.

About 500,000 computers in the United States were infected with malware, including those used by individuals, educational institutions, nonprofits and government agencies like NASA, U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara told a news conference.

Bharara called the case the first of its kind because the suspects set up their own “rogue” servers to secretly reroute Internet traffic to sites where they had a cut of the advertising revenue. “On a massive scale, the defendants gave new meaning to the term ‘false advertising,’” Bharara said.

The problem was first discovered at NASA, where 130 computers were infected. Investigators followed a digital trail to Eastern Europe, where the defendants operated “companies that masqueraded as legitimate participants in the Internet advertising industry,” according to the indictment…

The indictment estimated the defendants “reaped least $14 million in ill-gotten gains” over a five-year period.

It’s easy enough to say “Don’t click unless you are certain of the source” but, the average user – or even a skilled user, presuming that’s who was fooled at NASA – is only going to spend a minimum amount of time before deciding whether or not an innocent-appearing email in their inbox is legit.

Better solutions require better protective software – or a better operating system. Unix-based operating systems like OS X can be relied upon to provide security beyond the capabilities of most hackers, most cyber-crooks. Additional steps and stages can be placed between a user’s computer and the world living out there on the Internet. The problem resolves back to beancounters who say they can’t or won’t spend that extra little bit. Pennywise and pound-foolish loses again.

All Americans will have broadband access to Internet and telephone services by the end of the decade under new rules adopted by U.S. regulators. The rules also reform a broken system of phone charges fraught with inefficiency and should result in $2.2 billion in savings passed down to consumers, the Federal Communications Commission estimates.

The FCC voted unanimously on Thursday to modernize its universal service program, aiming to help the 18 million Americans who have no access to broadband where they live and work.

The new rules will shift the roughly $4.5 billion in public money spent annually to subsidize telephone service for rural families to high-speed Internet in rural America and costly-to-serve areas…

“We are taking a system designed for the Alexander Graham Bell era of rotary telephones and modernizing it for the era of Steve Jobs and the Internet future he imagined,” FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said at the agency’s open meeting.

Broadband buildout to unserved areas could begin in early 2012 under the plan, bringing high-speed Internet to hundreds of thousands of homes in the near term.

The plan approved on Thursday would phase out funding for landline phone service over a period of years as companies move to a competitive bidding process for securing funds for broadband. Companies now receiving phone service subsidies would get first dibs in some areas to receive support for deploying broadband service.

The rules will also reform the complex system of payments among carriers called intercarrier compensation, gradually reducing per-minute intercarrier compensation charges…

The new Connect America Fund created by the rules will have a firm $4.5 billion a year budget, the first budget constraint ever imposed on the program.

FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell said the fund will not be able to exceed its annual $4.5 billion cap through 2017 without agency approval. “It is my hope that competitive forces will flourish and the development of new technologies will create additional efficiencies throughout the system,” McDowell said.

We all know how well Congress and the corporations sharing their beds strive for competitive forces.

Actually, politicians and administrative hacks may be stuck with the democratic basic premises of legislation that goes back to FDR and the Communications Act of 1934. Republicans hated it, then – I imagine they still do; but, they’re stuck with the egalitarian premises.

A Brooklyn-based artist has caught the attention of the Secret Service after installing a computer program on Apple Store computers that takes Webcam photos every two minutes, and posting those images on the Internet…

Kyle McDonald took the photos and posted them on a Tumblr blog called “People Staring at Computers.” He told Mashable that he got permission from Apple security guards to take photos in the store, but it’s unclear if they were aware that McDonald also meant installing software and snapping Webcam shots. Given that it attracted Secret Service attention, it’s safe to say that not everyone was excited by the project.

When asked on Twitter if he got permission from every person whose photo appeared on his blog, McDonald said no because “as i understand, photography in open spaces is legal unless explicitly prohibited.” He will, however, remove any photos if asked, he said. Well, duh?

It appears McDonald was committed, however; Apple wipes its computers every night, so he had to reinstall the program every day he took photos, Mashable reports. That program focused only on photos…

McDonald said the warrant he received from the Secret Service said his actions violated 18 USC section 1030. That deals with “fraud and related activity in connection with computers,” and covers, among other things, accessing a computer without authorization…

He took 1,000 photos over three days at computers in New York Apple Stores…

Sounds like a creep to me. Wonder if he considers public restrooms to be public spaces, too?

The first juror to be prosecuted for contempt of court for using the internet has been sentenced to eight months in jail.

Joanne Fraill, 40, admitted at London’s high court using Facebook to exchange messages with Jamie Sewart, 34, a defendant already acquitted in a multimillion-pound drug trial in Manchester last year.

Fraill, from Blackley, Manchester, also admitted conducting an internet search into Sewart’s boyfriend, Gary Knox, a co-defendant, while the jury was still deliberating…

When the lord chief justice, Lord Judge, announced her eight-month sentence, Fraill said “eight months!” and put her head on the table in front of her and cried…

Sentencing Fraill, the judge said in a written ruling: “Her conduct in visiting the internet repeatedly was directly contrary to her oath as a juror, and her contact with the acquitted defendant, as well as her repeated searches on the internet, constituted flagrant breaches of the orders made by the judge for the proper conduct of the trial…”

Knox, Sewart’s 35-year-old partner, is applying for his conviction to be overturned on the basis of alleged jury misconduct. He was jailed for six years after being found guilty of paying a police officer to disclose information on drug dealers…

Fraill admitted emailing Sewart while the jury was still deliberating in the drugs trail in August last year because she felt “empathetic” and saw “considerable parallels” between their lives…

The lord chief justice, discussing the reasons for the sentence in the high court, acknowledged that Fraill was “a woman of good character” and was not involved in an attempt to pervert the course of justice. But “misuse of the internet by a juror” was always “a most serious irregularity and contempt”.

He warned that a custodial sentence for any juror committing similar contempts “is virtually inevitable”.

He added: “The sentence is intended to ensure the continuing integrity of trial by jury.”

The solicitor general made the relevant point: “Long before social networks, the courts have been in no doubt that discussions inside the jury room must stay there. The internet doesn’t make judges’ warnings not to talk about a case or research it any less important.”

According to Mozilla there are some 12 million Firefox 3.5 users out there surfing the interwebz, but Mozilla now needs them to upgrade to a more recent release. And Mozilla has drawn up plans on how to accomplish this mass move.

Firefox 3.5 users have two options. Mozilla would prefer that they upgrade to the latest Firefox 4.0.1 release, bringing them bang up to date. Alternatively, if they don’t want to go to Firefox 4 (perhaps because a plugin isn’t supported) then Firefox 3.6.x…

So, how will Mozilla deal with those still using Firefox 3.5?

Well, starting with those who have automatic updates enabled, Mozilla will push Firefox 3.6.18 to them after it has been released. Why 3.6.x as opposed to 4.0.x? Because Mozilla considers 3.6.x to be the security upgrade for Firefox 3.5 users.

However, before that happens all Firefox 3.5 will be given warnings that they are running an out of date browser on the default Google search page. Firefox 3.5 users will have also been warned via the firstrun messaging mechanism built into the browser. Mozilla can also send pop-ups to Firefox 3.5 users informing them of the end of life status of their browser.

And, then – say lots of people who claim to know better – Mozilla will upgrade your browser whether you choose to or not. WTF?

This silly git runs the risk of falling only 3-4 feet

Australian police say a man who plunged seven floors to his death from an apartment balcony was participating in the internet craze of “planking”.

Planking, increasingly popular in Australia, involves people lying flat on their stomachs in various and sometimes dangerous settings and then posting photographs on the internet.

Queensland state police Deputy Commissioner Ross Barnett told reporters that the dead man, aged in his 20s, fell from a balcony railing while a friend photographed him before dawn on Sunday in Brisbane city.

The man’s name has not been released pending notification of his family. He was previously charged with trespassing over a photograph on the internet of him planking on the bonnet of a police car.

Uh, I’d certainly say he qualifies for a Darwin Award.

A cuckolded computer consultant hired to link the city’s 1,400 schools to the Internet has been charged with downloading $3.6 million into his crooked pockets.

Willard (Ross) Lanham, aided by corporate giants IBM and Verizon, masterminded the massive fraud to enjoy a life of luxury from 2002 to 2008, according to a scathing report from the special schools investigator. “Lanham effectively stole from schoolchildren so he could buy fancy cars and valuable real estate,” said Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara.

Prosecutors described Lanham’s greed as staggering. He was charged with looting the Department of Education while earning a $200,000 annual salary and living with his family in a sprawling, two-story Long Island home.

As he earned an illegal fortune off phony companies, inflated fees and a pair of no-show jobs, officials said, he built three luxury homes on a piece of abandoned Long Island farmland.

Once finished, Lanham even named the private street after his estranged wife, Laura Lanham.

The couple have since endured a long, angry and ongoing three-year divorce, with the wife dumping her 57-year-old husband to pursue younger men while blogging about her “cougar” lifestyle…

The probe, aided by the city Department of Investigation, found Lanham was hired to work on three major DOE projects – including the highly touted “Project Connect.”

The scam was simple: He hired contractors at low hourly rates, persuaded subcontractors to bill the city at a much higher rate and pocketed the difference, officials said.

In all, his Lanham Enterprises allegedly was paid $5.3 million for consulting work that cost his company only $1.7 million.

The accused swindler even ripped off his own brother, hiring him for a $40-an-hour consulting job while charging the city $225 an hour, a criminal complaint charged.

IBM and Verizon kept their corporate mouths shut over anything they may have noticed in the course of the fraud. I’m never surprised when systems run by elected officials are inefficient – though they needn’t be. Corporate governance should be a bit more consistent.

Verizon has said they will return any inappropriate profits. Nice of them.

In a major crackdown on online gambling, the FBI and U.S. Attorney’s Office have charged the founders of the three biggest Internet poker sites with fraud, illegal gambling and laundering billions of dollars in illegal gambling proceeds.

The FBI said Friday it’s indicting 11 defendants — including the founders of PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker and Absolute Poker — with bank fraud, money laundering, and illegal gambling offenses. The feds also seized five Internet domain names used by the companies to host their poker games and issued restraining orders against 75 bank accounts in 14 countries used to process payments. The U.S. attorney’s office is also seeking $3 billion in damages. The defendants could face maximum penalties of 30 years in prison $1 million fines.

Visitors to FullTiltPoker.com and AbsolutePoker.com Saturday were met with a notice from the FBI declaring the domain names had been seized by federal authorities — along with a reminder that illegal gambling is a federal crime.

PokerStars posted a statement early Saturday through its computer software and on Twitter saying the company has had to suspend real money play to customers based in the U.S., according to the Associated Press.

“Please be assured player balances are safe. There is no cause for concern,” the statement said. “For all customers outside the U.S. it is business as usual…

The feds say the sites violate the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act passed in 2006. The offshore poker companies have argued they operate outside the reach of U.S. law. The U.S. government considers Internet gambling to be illegal. Still, it’s been estimated up 15 million Americans gamble up to $6 billion per year online.

Like most American morality the question comes down to money. It’s why most drugs – especially marijuana – were made illegal. And booze – for a spell. Leadership and ethics once again are missing in action from the arena of gaming and American politics.

People who want to gamble will find a way. One of the greatest temptations in archaic moralizing is the opportunity to violate a law you know is stupid.

Google and Twitter have launched a service to allow people in Egypt to send Twitter messages by leaving a voicemail on a specific number after the last internet service provider in the country saw its access cut off late on Monday.

The new service, which has been created by co-ordination between the two internet companies, uses Google’s speech-to-text recognition service to automatically translate a message left on the number, which will be sent out on Twitter with the “#egypt” hashtag.

Ujwal Singh, co-founder of SayNow and Abdel Karim Mardini, Google’s product manager for the Middle East and north Africa, said in a blog post that “over the weekend we came up with the idea of a speak-to-tweet service – the ability for anyone to tweet using just a voice connection … We hope that this will go some way to helping people in Egypt stay connected at this very difficult time…”

No internet connection is required. That will be important for users in Egypt after Noor Group, which had been the last internet service provider connecting to the outside world, went dark late on Monday. It had remained online after the country’s four main internet providers – Link Egypt, Vodafone/Raya, Telecom Egypt and Etisalat Misr – abruptly stopped shuttling internet traffic into and out of the country last Friday…

Mobile phone service was restored in Egypt on Saturday, but text messaging services have been disrupted during the continuing protests.

And no one really knows how long mobile phone service will stay up. Mubarak – or the army – may decide to shut down communications, again. Especially if they conclude that repression works better for them than tolerance of dissent.

Meanwhile – kudos to progressive geeks at Google and Twitter.

Egypt’s shutdown of the Internet within its borders is an action unlike any other in the history of the World Wide Web and it might have only taken a few phone calls to do it.

“It’s something I’ve never seen; it’s totally unprecedented,” said James Cowie, the co-founder and chief technology officer of Renesys, an IT company in New Hampshire that helps Internet service providers monitor the security of Web networks and infrastructure.

“Over a period a period of about 20 minutes, it’s as if each of the primary service providers started pulling the routes that lead to them. It wasn’t like a simultaneous withdrawal.

“Nobody flipped an off switch or hit a big red button. It was one by one until they were all gone.”

The Egyptian government cut off nearly all online services between midnight and 12:30 a.m., Egyptian time, on Friday, Cowie said — something he noted on his company’s blog as he witnessed the blackout…

“Egypt is a modern country; the government doesn’t own the Internet,” Cowie said. “There are private companies of varying sizes that own and operate their own infrastructure. But it seems that they got a call and so they turned it off.”

This is perfectly legal according to the laws of some countries. And if ISPs wish to do business in such countries they will sign contracts that agree to the laws of the land.

Some members of Congress are trying to change that.