In the last couple of decades identity-theft has taken a lot of forms,here's something which is even more scarier. Think your keys are always safe?Think again.Computer programmers at UC San Diego have built a software called 'Sneaky' which can create an exact replica of a key from its image.
What is even more scaring is that the image need not be a good one,it can use an image of a key from almost any angle to create an exact replica.Cellphone pictures work and, in a chilling example, the team successfully reproduced a key using a shot taken with a telephoto lens from 200 feet away.
"You only need to click a few control points in the image of the key and the 'Sneakey' program does the rest," programmer Benjamin Laxton told a UCSD reporter, "It normalizes the key's size and position so that each pixel then corresponds to a known distance. From this information the height of each of the key cuts can easily be computed and likewise the bitting code can be extracted."
While the UCSD researchers have not released the Sneakey code to the public, they believe that anyone with a basic knowledge of MATLAB and computer vision techniques could build a comparable system.
What can you do to guard against it? Not much, save treat your keys like you do your credit card. Don't publicize its image, because that's all "Sneaky" and software like it would need.
I believe that Sneakey could be very useful for government and defense purposes, but it could be disastrous in the wrong hands. If you have pictures of your keys up on Flickr for any reason, now might be a good time to take them down.
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Google announced that it is developing an OS-the Google Chrome Operating System.Google Chrome OS will initially be targeted at netbooks,but will eventually be used on PCs as well.The Search giant says that it's a natural extension of the Google Chrome Browser. "Speed, simplicity and security are the key aspects of Google Chrome OS" said the blog post written by Sundar Pichai on Google Blog."Later this year we will open-source its code, and netbooks running Google Chrome OS will be available for consumers in the second half of 2010,"he added.What is even more interesting is that this announcement has come off just months before Microsoft launches the latest version of its OS -Windows 7.
Will Chrome OS stand out to strike at the heart of Microsoft's software empire??
"We're designing the OS to be fast and lightweight, to start up and get you on to the web in a few seconds," said the blog post written by Sundar Pichai, vice-president of product management, and Google's engineering director Linus Upson.Both men said that "the operating systems that browsers run on were designed in an era where there was no web" and that this OS was "our attempt to rethink what operating systems should be".
“The software architecture is simple — Google Chrome running within a new windowing system on top of a Linux kernel. For application developers, the web is the platform. All web-based applications will automatically work and new applications can be written using your favorite web technologies.”
The announcement could dramatically change the market share of the operating systems,challenging Microsoft's major pie in the OS market.The situation may be similar to the 'browser war' of the 90's.It seems Google wants to systematically eliminate or reduce the Microsoft's dominance in the OS market.
The big question is, will it stand out to the test of time?
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As a regular Gmail user,you might have wondered why Gmail is still with its Beta tag for so long.It's more than five years Gmail has worn the beta tag.Often this was ridiculed and even of jokes.The search giant has long argued that their applications are kept in the beta status for so long to reflect the amount of testing that needs to be performed.
However,with a view to appealing its business customers Google has dropped the beta name for Google Apps."The end result (many visible and invisible changes later) is that today, beta is a thing of the past. Not just for Gmail, but for all of Google Apps — Gmail, Calendar, Docs, and Talk." said Gmail product director Keith Coleman in a blog post.
"Since the beginning of the year, we've focused on making it as easy as possible for large enterprises to switch to Google," said Google Apps senior product manager Rajen Sheth in another blog post.
For those long-time Gmail users who are feeling hard to get used to using Gmail without that familiar grey "BETA" text greeting,you can still get the beta look.Just go to Settings, click on Labs tab, turn on "Back to Beta," and it'll be like Gmail never left beta at all.
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Were you ever frustrated with frequent pausing and playing while watching streaming video?This indeed is the case with those having a low bandwidth internet connection.If you wish to watch videos without interruptions,here is a software which helps you to get faster and smoother videos form YouTube or other streaming video websites.
Download it here.
website
Unique Video Acceleration Features
* Accelerates streaming videos from YouTube and over 150 sites!
* Reduces "movie freezes" and "buffering" problems!
* Video Accelerator for iTunes (Premium) accelerates the download of iTunes movies, music videos and TV shows up to 10 times faster!
* Feature to bookmark recently accelerated videos for easy replays!
* New automatic recovery implementation prevents SpeedBit Video Accelerator from being disabled
* Improved logging mechanism allows for PAC file probing prior to communication test execution
* Includes cool search tab feature for finding videos across the web right from your desktop!
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More often than not bloggers and web designers have faced the problem of cleaning up HTML errors.As HTML pages contain a lot of tags and with a slightly complex syntax,its usual that one can do a lot of mistakes while writing an HTML file.There are a lot of free HTML validators which can easily check for syntax and other errors in HTML files and validate them automatically.One such free validator is the Free CSE HTML Validator for basic HTML editing and automatic correction.
The process of cleaning up errors becomes even more easier if a plugin is available which is nicely integrated with your browser.
If you are an ardent lover of Firefox then you can use HTML Validator Firefox plugin to check for errors in HTML files.Whenever there are errors,it shows number of errors & a warning icon at the bottom right of the Firefox window.
Tabs are provided inorder to toggle between Original HTML,Cleaned up HTML,Original browser and Cleaned browser.Errors are spotted which can be easily corrected. You can add indents to element content or set tags and attributes to uppercase. Download HTML Validator Firefox extension to check for HTML errors within Firefox.
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Microsoft finally killed its old instant web messenger,the service officially retired on June 30,2009.It didn't completely do away with its old web messenger,now Microsoft's IM - Windows Live Messenger - is integrated into Hotmail and Windows Live People.Microsoft made an official announcement of this earlier on its Windows Live blog.
“With new web-based instant messaging (IM) now available from Windows Live Hotmail worldwide, we are preparing to retire MSN Web Messenger. The old MSN Web Messenger experience will end on June 30, 2009,” a member of the Windows Live team stated. 
While MSN Web Messenger is no longer available now, users have the new version of Messenger on the web at their disposal. The best place to access the Cloud flavor of Windows Live Messenger is through Microsoft's email service. In Windows Live Hotmail, in the upper right hand side corner, next to Options, the service offers the new web-based IM, based on Windows Live Messenger.
“With Hotmail’s new web-based IM, you can chat from your Hotmail inbox or contact list, instead of going to MSN Web Messenger. Go directly to the Windows Live People page (also known as “your contact list”) at People Live and sign into Messenger to continue instant messaging on the web with your Messenger friends. Instant messaging from Hotmail makes it easier to communicate and share in new ways in comparison to MSN Web Messenger,” the Windows Live representative added.
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A Welcome news for all Gmail Users.Gmail,one of the most popular webmail providers have increased the email attachment size limit.Initially attachments were allowed only upto 10MB.They went on to double it to 20MB which is still unmatched by most email providers.
Now Gmail has quietly increased the size limit of the attachments it can send and receive to 25 megaytes (MB)in size.This indeed a good news for Gmail lovers who frequently share photos, songs, videos and documents with others.
However,there's a twist in the story.
If you wish to send a 25MB email attachment to your contacts who use other email services with smaller attachments,they won't be able to receive your message and the mail will bounce back.For now you can only send a mail with 25MB attachment to only Gmail contacts.
Gmail users using Flash-based multiple attachments will face some problem.The error which pops up is "attachment failed".Switching to the basic uploader in the settings solves the problem.
Hope other email service providers will soon catch up with Gmail.
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"Windows" Worlds widely used Operating system has a major problem of viruses, spy wares and Trojans, to over come the problem with these we use anti virus software prepared by major companies like Kaspersky, Norton, Bitdefender, etc., but most of the anti virus software's has obsolete database for new viruses.
But how would it be if we get a anti virus software inbuilt within windows??
Yes! Microsoft is planning to release Windows7 with Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE code named 'Morro') Present XP and Vista users can also download and install Microsoft Security Essentials from Microsoft official site.
Microsoft provides a quick explanation on their official page:
You’re too busy to spend a lot of time worrying about protecting your PC. With Microsoft Security Essentials Beta, you get high-quality protection against viruses and spyware, including Trojans, worms and other malicious software. And best of all, there are no costs or annoying subscriptions to keep track of.
Security Essentials is easy to install and easy to use. Updates and upgrades are automatic, so there’s no need to worry about having the latest protection. It’s easy to tell if you’re protected – when the Security Essentials icon is green, your status is good. It’s as simple as that.
When you’re busy using your PC, you don’t want to be bothered by needless alerts. Security Essentials runs quietly in the background, only alerting you if there’s something you need to do. And it doesn’t use a lot of system resources, so it won’t get in the way of your work or fun.
Microsoft today released the Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) beta on microsoft.com/security_essentials (redirects to Microsoft Connect which requires a Windows Live ID).
MSE is the company's free, real-time consumer anti malware solution for fighting viruses, spyware, rootkits, and trojans. The beta is available in English and Brazilian Portuguese for the first 75,000 users, although Microsoft says this is a target number, and it is willing to increase it if necessary.
Screen Shots:
MSE come with three different flavors:
Remember that you will need to meet the minimum requirements:
Click Here to Download Microsoft Security Essentianls Beta.
Note : You require a genuine Windows Operating System to install Microsoft Security Essentials, If you are using pirated Windows operating system you cannot install Microsoft Security Essentianls Beta
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Most of the cyber masses search images with popular search engine Google,but have you ever tried searching images in a different way??? you might even wonder whether there are any ways for searching images, the answer is a big Yes! you can search images in Google with a funny java script.
This trick is very simple and easy to implement, lets go:
Steps
1. For instance if your searching for flowers in Google image search and to implement JavaScript clear the current URL in address bar (Google Image search result URL )
2. Copy and Paste the following JavaScript in address bar.
3. Now you can see the images circling your browser in Google image search result.
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GMail access blocked by your school or office administration?This is the problem many encounter-GMail Blocked.Here is a guide with various tricks to unblock your favorite GMail and enjoy the full mail access at your organization.
1. Using Different URLs
This trick might seem silly,but might work at times.Instead of using the URL gmail.com try using different URLs like mail.google.com,google.com/mail to access your GMail account when GMail is blocked at your school or office. This trick works only if your network/IT administrator has blocked gmail.com alone and left the rest of the domains open (unblocked) as they are not widely known to people. Here is the list of alternative URLs to access GMail
* https://gmail.com
* http://google.com/mail
* http://mail.google.com or https://mail.google.com
* http://googlemail.com
2. Access Blocked GMail Using iGoogleGMail is available as a gadget to iGoogle and you can use this gadget to access GMail. When you access GMail through iGoogle all the communication with the GMail servers is routed through iGoogle servers. So this defeats all the restriction and filters applied by IT administrators in blocking gmail.com domain.
To access GMail through iGoogle,
1. Login to iGoogle using your Google Account
2. Add GMail gadget to iGoogle by clicking this link or by using Add Stuff on screen
3. That’s all. Start accessing your GMail inside iGoogle.
3. Access GMail Using Opera Mini Simulator
Use Opera Mini Browser Online Simulator application to access GMail in a small screen window. Opera Mini is a popular web browser for mobile phones. It allows users to work with live demo of Opera Mini that functions exactly like it would when installed on a handset. 
Point your browser to http://www.operamini.com/demo/ and start accessing blocked GMail using the URL m.gmail.com.Reading mails on mobile simulator is definitely not convenient as reading them on a full screen browser computer. But when you need to access your GMail urgently, this trick might be helpful to you.
4. Use Microsoft Outlook Or Other Mail Programs To Access GMail
Using POP3/IMAP Configure your mail clients like Outlook, Live Mail, Lotus Notes to
access GMail using POP3 or IMAP protocol. This trick of accessing GMail when blocked is mostly useful for working professionals as they should be definitely using some mail client for official mail access.
You can find the instruction to configure POP3 and IMAP access for various mail clients over here and here
5. Launch GMail from Google Talk
In few organizations only Gmail is blocked but not Google Chat . If that is the case with your organization we can use it to our advantage. Then you can launch GMail from Google Talk application. Sign in to GTalk and click on the envelope icon to launch GMail.
6. Use Your Smart Phones
If you have internet connection on your mobile, you can make use of your mobile phone to access GMail.GMail has an excellent native application for most of the mobiles like iPhone, Nokia, Android, Windows Mobile, etc. The ease at which
you can read and reply to mails through GMail for Mobile is
amazing. It is my favorite mobile application. 
You can download GMail application for mobiles from Google
7. Use Proxy Web Site To Bypass
Using proxy website to beat censorship is one of the popular ways for unblocking any kind of websites. When we try to access GMail using a web proxy, the web proxy hides our IP address and uses it’s own IP address to load the page.
8. Nothing Working? Then Bribe Your IT Administrator
If none of the above methods worked for you then take help of someone at IT department and get access to GMail. Bribe them 
Offer small gifts, drinks or something else they like. 
Either you can ask them to grant access for your PC or get details of internal proxy server that allow GMail access.
What do you do to access GMail when it is blocked? Share your experience in the comments. We love to hear from you.
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