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Barracuda Networks, Inc, the worldwide leader in email and Web security appliances, has launched the Barracuda Application Gateway NC 500 AG, the first and only enterprise-class Web Application Controller available for small and medium businesses (SMBs). Ideal for SMBs on a tight IT budget, this is the first appliance to fully secure Web applications and ensure compliance with regulations, such as Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) for $10,000.

“We are essentially bringing plug-and-play PCI compliance to the mass market,” said Stephen Pao, vice president of product management for Barracuda Networks. “Until now, most businesses in the SMB space were facing very expensive and time-consuming audits of their Web infrastructures in order to achieve PCI compliance. Further, these audits would be required every time the organization makes a change to their Web applications, so it is very possible that such costs could very quickly overwhelm a business.

“With the Barracuda Application Gateway NC 500 AG, SMBs will no longer have to worry about the recurring costs of application source code audits and instead they can achieve PCI DSS compliance without breaking the budget,” added Pao.

As the June 30, 2008 deadline mandating e-commerce businesses of all sizes be compliant with requirement 6.6 of PCI DSS quickly approaches, many SMB organizations have been left with no choice but to prepare for very expensive and very detailed custom application code reviews. The Barracuda Application Gateway NC 500 AG now provides these organizations with a cost-effective and powerful solution that will protect and maintain their Web infrastructure as well as satisfy PCI DSS requirements.

British chip designer ARM will demonstrate a prototype of Google Inc's Android mobile phone platform in action next week at the world's biggest wireless fair, a reliable source said.

It was not immediately clear on Thursday what the working model that ARM plans to show at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona would look like or who would supply the parts.

Google plans to deploy phones and services using the Android platform commercially in the second half of this year.

Google and ARM declined to comment on the report.

Google established an alliance of more than 30 carriers, handset makers, software firms and chipmakers in November to develop Android, which is based on open-source software and designed to make the Internet work better on mobile phones.

Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile and Taiwan's High Tech Computer Corp (HTC) have said they plan to offer phones based on the Android platform this year.

Internet search leader Google's entry into the wireless industry will upset established relationships between carriers, cellphone makers and customers and could challenge Nokia, Microsoft Corp and Apple Inc, among others.

Google is also bidding for wireless spectrum in the US in a move that pits it against entrenched carriers like AT&T and Verizon Wireless.
Its operator partners in the Open Handset Alliance include China Mobile, NTT DoCoMo, KDDI and Telefonica -- all of which have said they are working with handset makers to develop Google-based phones.

Repair work has started on one of three broken undersea cables providing data services to parts of the Middle East and Asia, a cable operator said, and a repair ship was expected to reach a second cable on Tuesday.

Undersea cable connections were disrupted off Egypt's northern coast last week when segments of two international cables were cut, affecting Internet access in the Gulf region and South Asia, and forcing service providers to re-route traffic.

A rising rupee and slowdown in the US economy may have affected sentiments in the Indian software sector, but the mood in the hardware sector is upbeat. What’s adding to their smile is a rise in the overall PC sales, which shot up 11 percent to cross 32.8 lakh in the first half of 2007-08. What’s more, its projected to cross 72.5 lakh units by end of 2007-08.

Interestingly, while sales of desktop PCs have gone up marginally, it is expected to reach 55.5 lakh units by 2008-end. But it’s notebook category that’s really pushing the market. Sales grew at 59 percent to cross 6.8 lakh units in first half of 2007-08. These are some of the findings of a MAIT (Manufacturers’ Association for Information Technology) study on the IT hardware industry.

The bi-annual industry performance review reveals most PC consumption now is being driven by the household sector. In fact, consumption in the business sector declined by almost 17 percent, while that of the household sector went up by 72 percent, So far, businesses had accounted for 62 percent desktop sales.

“The slowing down of business category consumption could be because this may not be their buying cycle or no new vertical of business may have emerged. However, sectors like telecom, ITeS, education, etc, continue to remain buoyant. And as e-governance programmes get finalised, sales may pick-up,’’ says Vinnie Mehta, executive director, MAIT.

The report shows larger businesses which contribute 55 percent of the PC market share, saw a decline in sales by 31 percent. The SMB section grew from 4 percent to 16 percent. This is one of the reason why the overall sales in desktop PCs moved southwards. Also, sale of MNC brands improved by 33 percent while Indian brands registered a decline of 24 percent and assembled ones went down 10 percent.

Interestingly, most of the consumption has come from the smaller cities as they now account for two-thirds or around 66 percent of the market. Also, while Pentium-IV processors had 68% market share, newer technologies too have made their presence felt.

In contrast to PCs, the printer market has not been so buoyant. While 6.8 lakh units were sold, there was still a 10 percent decline in sales due to poor off take in the enterprise market.

The MAIT study shows internet penetration in the top 22 cities was 48 percent among businesses and 18 percent among households.

Microsoft Corporation on Monday released Service Pack 1 for Windows Vista to manufacturing for the first set of languages - English, French, Spanish, German and Japanese.

Vista SP 1 is the first major package of updates and fixes for Windows Vista operating system.

However, current Windows Vista users will have to wait till mid-March to download SP 1. Microsoft will begin delivering Windows Vista SP1 to Windows Vista customers who have chosen to have updates downloaded automatically by mid-April.

Mike Nash from the Windows Product Management group at Microsoft wrote in a blog that the Vista SP1 improves performance, reliability and compatibility.

“Service Pack 1 is a very important milestone because it addresses many of the key issues that our customers have identified with Windows Vista over the last year both, directly and through programs like the Customer Experience Improvement Program,” the blog said.

With Vista SP 1, systems run faster and more reliably than they did with the "Gold" release of Windows Vista. SP1 also includes changes focused on improving the performance of Windows Vista in areas that impact the customer experience the most.

“For instance, with SP1, copying or moving files around your PC, your home network or your corporate network should now be much faster -- up to 50 per cent faster in some scenarios (according to our internal tests). In addition, on many kinds of hardware, resuming a Windows Vista-based PC from sleep is faster on Service Pack 1,” Nash said.

Microsoft’s OEM partners will get SP1 to start producing new PCs running Windows Vista with SP1 pre-installed.

“We will also start the manufacturing process for retail product of Windows Vista with SP1. Both will be available in stores for new Windows Vista customers in the coming months,” he added.

Microsoft also started the process to manufacture DVDs for its enterprise customers who get its software via its Volume Licensing program. The Windows Vista operating system was launched in 2007.

Microsoft also announced the Released to Manufacturing (RTM) of Windows Server 2008 code-named ‘Longhorn’, will be available for purchase to new customers on March 1.

It would appear that Christmas is not over and it is not too early for Valentine’s Day, as some of January’s most prevalent attacks were spam disguised as Christmas greeting eCards or love letters.

Together, they represent more than 11 percent* of the total threats for the month of January. A report from Fortinet, provider of unified threat management (UTM) solutions has said that Valentine campaigns and Christmas greeting were among the top 10 most reported high-risk threats for January 2008.

The report was compiled by Fortinet’s FortiGuard Global Security Research Team, using intelligence gathered from FortiGate multi-threat security systems in production worldwide.

Displaying the power of Storm, a new worm variant – Small.FQS – took the No. 3 position in a one-day Valentine’s campaign. Arriving on January 16, Small.FQS charmed readers with emailed links to a Storm infection.

“With eCards and Valentine spam saturating email accounts along with other threats from last month, we would remind users to ‘think before clicking that link.’ In a cyber world littered with dark alleys, not everyone online is your friend,” said Derek Manky, security research engineer for Fortinet. “It should be noted that most legitimate eCards come in the form of a link to the eCard hosting site, using a unique ID, rather than as attachments.”

Trojans Pushu.BYC and Pushdo.DGH were responsible for the proliferation of Christmas greeting eCards, which earned them the No. 4 and No. 6 spots, respectively, on the top 10 threats list.

New adware Agent worked its way onto the top 10 list at No. 8, pushing Bdsearch and TCent from last month off the list.

Cyberoam, a division of Elitecore Technologies announced that the Q4 email threat trends of 2007 revealed a steep rise in attacks using social networking techniques targeting user psychology and behavior patterns.

Spammers launched attacks by predicting user behavior patterns, such as looking for easy cash and discounted gifts during the holiday season, or preying on consumer trust to generate interest in cheap pharmaceutical products and stocks.

Existing security solutions were unable to block the new spam formats and techniques, resulting in an alarming rise in spam levels reaching 96 percent by the end of 2007. Spammers used the Storm Worm, an aggressive and self-preserving botnet, to generate, host and distribute large amounts of spam and malware in 2007. Consequently, the Storm Worm’s massive outbreak accounted for 7-10 percent of all global spam traffic at its peak. Experts agree, however, that the worm has yet to reach its damaging potential.

The Address Validation Spam sending seemingly harmless, incoherent or empty email messages from an unfamiliar address was used to validate the email addresses in the botnet owners’ list. The ‘clean’ list was then rented out at a higher value to spammers and other cyber villains. Spam attacks in short, intense waves by the Stration malware maximized damage in the first few hours of the attack before anti-virus signature updates could be released.

Spammers gained financially by using traditional image spam techniques, promoting pharmaceutical products and pump-and-dump stocks with images that included non-clickable URLs and stock ticker symbols. Recipients interested in the products and stocks opened a web browser and manually typed in the URLs, driving up the sales of cheap pharmaceutical products and stock prices.

Spam emails using holiday subject lines easily slipped past anti-spam filters and users’ suspicions. These emails took users to malicious websites and attempted to download Trojan software. Most anti-spam solutions were ineffective, as blocking emails leveraging holiday-themed keywords often resulted in false positives.

The Q4 2007 Email Threat Trend Report, prepared in collaboration with Commtouch, revealed that botnets are becoming more sophisticated and difficult to control. Traditional IP blocking technologies are unable to maintain pace with the dynamic IP activation and deactivation of innumerable botnets.

Microsoft recently announced the launch of the office 2008 version for Mac, its upgraded Mac-specific office suite complete with efficient applications and simpler to use functions. With this all new Office 2008, the Microsoft division combines comfortable applications with user-friendly functions which will help to deliver the ultimate in cutting-edge performance, luxury and style to any Mac user.

The Microsoft office 2008 for Mac Home and student version will compress three licenses for word, excel and PowerPoint at an affordable price of Rs. 6900.

The office 2008 version for Mac is specially targeted at small business and information workers. Its upgraded design provides outstanding comfort which enables the Mac user to achieve more and share ideas seamlessly. This version is also widely available in all retail outlets at an affordable price of Rs 18600.

Microsoft has also brought a special edition of office 2008 for Mac users. This product features the complete office 2008 for Mac productivity suite specially packaged with a full version of Microsoft Expression Media for Mac. This will help the user to empower the media savvy Mac user with smart digital asset management. The special edition of office 2008 for Mac users is priced at Rs 23250.

The arrival of a truly mobile Web, offering a new generation of location-based advertising, is set to unleash a "huge revolution", Google Inc chief executive Eric Schmidt said on Friday.

"It's the recreation of the Internet, it's the recreation of the PC (personal computer) story and it is before us -- and it is very likely it will happen in the next year," he told a panel at the World Economic Forum.

Current estimates for mobile advertising are cautious, with consultancy Forrester predicting revenues of under $1 billion by 2012.

But Schmidt said this figure was too low and failed to take into account the fact the mobile Web was reaching a tipping point.

Google aims to be a prime mover by bidding for coveted airwaves to launch an open U.S. wireless network, pitting it against established telecommunications players. The move will take the Silicon Valley-based company well beyond its core Web search and online advertising franchises.

Some analysts are worried at the high costs involved but Schmidt said he was confident location-based advertising -- which could, for example, direct hungry travellers to nearby restaurants -- would be "a very, very good business".

Content providers, already struggling in the modern world of music and film downloads, are less convinced that mobile Internet is a minefield.

"It is not going to be easy to hang on the price of content," said Howard Stringer, chief executive of Sony Corp.

Spam has become a major concern and many a times, there's more of spam than legitimate mail coming into a user's mailbox. Sorting and deleting all this spam from the inbox takes a toll on productive time. To evade spam, there are plenty of paid and free anti-spam software available. But if you are using Vista on your desktop or laptop then you don't have to go for third party software. It offers you a mail client that is designed to protect users from bulk spam mail. Here we will show you how to configure Windows Mail in Vista to block incoming spam. Vista Windows mail also comes with an option that detects phishing mails and protects users from getting 'phished.' You can even define your own list of banned email IDs, in case Vista is not able to detect spam coming in from them.

• Open Windows Mail, configure your account, click on 'Tools' and junk email options. Select the level of protection: No Automatic Filtering, Low, High, and Safe List Only
• To block phishing attacks, configure Windows Mail by clicking Tools> Junk e-mail options. Select 'phishing' and tick 'Protect My Inbox from messages with potential Phishing Links'
• Sometimes, legitimate mails get blocked and sent to junk folder. To avoid this right-click on the legitimate mail and select junk E-Mail>add Sender to Safe Senders' list
• To set a block list of your own from Junk mail option go to Block Senders tab and add all the email IDs that you want to block on your Windows mail

The channel community is slowly realizing the potential of retail business and is investing considerably in building showrooms.

This spent indicates the awareness of partners on the need for moving along with current trends and their spirit to keep themselves ahead in the race. This is why they have started marketing their brands and promoting their retail outlets on various platforms.

While these activities attract more customers, they also catch the attention of some burglars on the prowl to make a quick buck by breaking into stores and taking flight with some high-end products.

Recently, Ludhiana experienced such a nuisance with as many as six thefts taking place within one month, including two at IT retail outlets.

Such incidents are a wakeup call for other retailers to take precautionary measures and implement robust safeguards before they fall prey to any such cases. It signifies that though technology has grown leaps and bounds, its use in securing an office needs careful reconsideration.

Doing enough?

The recent spate of thefts, in one case by a trusted employee of the company, as well as a fire in Nehru Place, have also raised the question as to whether partners are doing enough to secure their offices.

Thefts, especially, are of prime concern as such attacks can happen to anyone. And how should partners prevent unauthorized access to their premises is an important issue. After the recent theft incident at Ludhiana-based Secant Technologies, Paramjit Singh Juneja, CEO of the store has immediately installed electronic hooter system and also appointed a guard to avoid such cases in future.

This measures have rang an alarm bell for other dealers in the town, who are vulnerable to burglary. Most dealers have, thereafter, installed CCTV cameras in their stores and have directed night guards to be more vigilant.

Others are thinking of other ways by which to secure their offices and shops.

Lesson from past

Kishore Makhija, CEO of Raipur-based Priyanka Computer Services said that he got the act together after a theft attempt was made on his shop. Immediately after that incident, he beefed up the security by all possible means.

“I installed Zicom security tools in my office only after an attempt of theft was made in the office. Before that I was not concerned more about investing on this aspect,” he said.

Ajaya Kumar of Park Electronics has been another target of burglars few months back when his retail outlet in Noida was raided. After the incident, he too installed CCTV cameras in his store.

However, it is noted that many channel partners are yet to safeguard their premises despite reports of numerous thefts. They are too involved in their daily business and ignore chances of robberies or natural calamities.

Expenditure on the security upgradation in a store depends on the choice of products and technology and the dealer’s budget. They could pick technology according to their budget and it could vary between Rs 5,000 to Rs 50,000, or more.

Technically empowered

The level of security installation in a store depends on the size of business. Partners who have bigger stores or have multi-retail outlets take the matter quite seriously, while those with smaller size or single outlets feel they will be spared the ordeal.

Chandigarh-based Sandeep Vig said that he takes security measures in his office depending on the availability of stock. If the stock is of high value he makes sure to assign his few trusted employees to stay in the office for 24 hours and keep vigil.

“I take extra care when the stock is large. Otherwise I always keep certain measure in routine so that any cases of thefts do not occur. For instance I never assign the responsibility of handling keys of the store to one person. I keep rotating it among the employees so that there is no tendency of misusing it,” he said.

Besides the self-implemented safeguard methods, technology is now helps make surveillance and security easier.

There is CCTV, burglar alarm and even lockdown systems where the entire premise is sealed in case of a theft.

One such adopter of physical security technology is Ravi Nandi of Indore’s Business Automation. He installed IP cameras in his store through which he could keep an eye on all the activities of the office.

“Security is an important aspect and I have taken the right measure to safeguard my office and store. Through the IP cameras, I can keep a watch on the happenings in my office on my laptop, even when I am physically not present there,” said Nandi.

He also highlighted that though there are many options available in the market that could tighten the security in the office channel partners don’t take the matter with utmost concern and there is lack of awareness among them to spend some time and money towards this.

Channel’s woe

Taking the issue of theft and burglary with serious concern and getting oneself updated with the anti-theft technology is not the only solution to protect channel partners. There are other issues beyond the dealer control.

Such areas include the support of police and sensitization of judiciary towards theft cases. There were many instances of the police going slow on filing the first information report. Further, when the case is forwarded, there is a delay in courts taking it up. This means that the dealer might have to wait for several years to get the judgment and in the interim make several rounds of the court.

“It is not only about getting ourselves technologically strengthened against theft or burglary. Even though we have all the proof and recording of culprit through CCTV cameras, after the incident has occurred, it all depends on the co-operation of police and judiciary, which are unfortunately lacking in our system,” said Kumar from Park Computers.

In such a scenario, many opine that local associations can play an important role to get the case registered and even pursue it.

Popular video Web site YouTube.com is opening up its service to run on millions more phones which are capable of using high-speed wireless links, the company said on Thursday.

YouTube, a unit of Google Inc, says it is extending its service from a handful of phones to a broader range of devices used by 100 million consumers worldwide that rely on high-speed links to stream videos to mobile screens.

"It's basically the full YouTube experience you can get on the desktop -- on the phone," said Dwipal Desai, YouTube's mobile product manager. "We expect it to get fairly popular from our past experiences."

The Web video sensation now only provides a full mobile video service to users of Apple Inc's iPhone and to devices sold by Helio, a small U.S. wireless provider that targets young, tech-savvy consumers. Helio is a unit of SK Telecom Co Ltd and EarthLink Inc.

A scaled-down version of YouTube with selected clips is also available to subscribers of the No. 2 U.S. mobile service, Verizon Wireless, a venture of Verizon Communications Inc and Vodafone Group Plc.

Desai said that most of the phones sold by Verizon Wireless would not support the full-fledged streaming service and that it was not yet clear when this might change.

The company is also testing software that will make it easier for mobile phone users to upload videos from phones onto YouTube.com, potentially allowing for far greater use of video to document people's everyday lives.

Desai did not say how YouTube plans to make money.

Typically, YouTube and other Google services wait until they have found a large audience before the company seeks to introduce advertising to help pay for the service.

"Right now we are focused on building a user base on alternative screens and we'll look at monetization in the future," said Desai.

Monetization is a code word among Internet companies for running advertising alongside Web content.
The service will run on select devices from U.S.-based Motorola Inc, South Korea's LG Electronics, Finland's Nokia and Sony Ericsson, jointly owned by Japan's Sony Corp and Sweden's Ericsson.

YouTube for Mobile will be available in 17 countries and 11 languages.

A Russian university has bought one of the world's most powerful supercomputers, the first time that such sophisticated technology has been exported to the former Soviet Union, makers IBM said.

The Moscow State University has selected a Blue Gene device capable of 27.8 trillion operations per second to use in research on nanotechnology and scientific applications such as modeling the heart, an IBM spokesman said.

"This agreement with IBM heralds a new era of supercomputing in Russia," said Viktor Sadovnichiy, rector of the university.

The world's most powerful supercomputer is a Blue Gene device owned by the U.S. Department of Energy and used at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to model the ageing of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile and predict potential problems.

IBM said the supercomputer sold to Moscow University would be among the 50 most powerful supercomputers in the world but had received an export license from U.S. authorities and would be used “purely for scientific research”.

The Department of Computational Mathematics at the Moscow University paid around $5 million for two racks of the supercomputer, which can run 2,600 times faster than the fastest home PC and should be operational by April 2008.

Because of advances in technology, each rack of the supercomputer is about the size of a U.S. domestic fridge and additional racks can be added as requirements grow.

The Blue Gene version used by the U.S. government is almost 20 times more powerful than the one bought by Moscow.

Saudi Arabian Airlines announced that it has awarded a long term next generation IT infrastructure transformation contract to Wipro Arabia Ltd. Wipro Arabia, a joint venture between Wipro Ltd. and Dar Al Riyadh Group, provides IT Solutions & Services in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The 5 years agreement, which is valued at over $100 Million, was signed in a gala ceremony in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

As a part of its privatization program, Saudi Arabian Airlines has undertaken an extensive business transformation exercise, which will create an organization designed around innovation, agility and customer centricity. An IT Master Plan aimed at overhauling central IT was developed for supporting this transformation. By leveraging cutting edge Information Technology, Saudi Arabian Airlines will effectively transform into a world-class service provider to maintain its position as the leading airline in the region.

To enable Saudi Arabian Airlines realize its vision, Wipro Arabia will deliver a futuristic, scalable & efficient managed infrastructure platform based on industry standards and best of breed technology choices. This will become the bedrock for driving all operations and business transformation at Saudi Arabian Airlines. The scope for Wipro Arabia includes data centre consolidation & management, integration and management of a highly secure converged network and comprehensive enterprise wide Managed Infrastructure & Security Services.

Speaking on the occasion, Khalid Almolhem, Director General of Saudi Arabian Airlines said, “Building a customer centric organization culture and systems is a key priority area for us. This is what will differentiate Saudi Airlines from its competitors and ensure market leadership for us. It is highly reassuring to have Wipro as our partner in this transformational journey. We will extensively leverage Wipro’s innovations in technology lifecycle management and service delivery to create an agile and empowered organization.”

Suresh Vaswani, President – Wipro Infotech & Global IT Practices said, “We are delighted to be partnering Saudi Airlines at the cusp of their transformation. Wipro will combine its service delivery excellence & deep technology expertise to deliver a seamless experience for the customers of Saudi Airlines. We value the partnership with Saudi Airlines and are committed to making this initiative a success.”

Mowafaq Jelaidan, VP – Information Technology, Saudi Arabian Airlines said, “We required a strong technology partner to architect an effective and efficient managed IT infrastructure, enabling enterprise wide customer-centric services. We selected Wipro because of their strong service delivery processes & frameworks, breadth of technology talent, immense credibility with technology principals and customers, and industry leadership in Managed Infrastructure Services.”