Netflix: VPN crackdown claim 'false'

8 January 2015 Last updated at 14:10 By Kevin Rawlinson BBC News

Netflix has criticised "false" reports it has been cracking down on customers using a work-around to watch media blocked in their area.

The company denied reports it had stepped up its attempts to block access via virtual private networks (VPNs).

Netflix said its existing policy against the use of VPNs to circumvent geographical content barriers remained unchanged.

But it said its service would still work via some VPNs.

"The claims that we have changed our policy on VPN are false," said Netflix's chief product officer Neil Hunt.

Speaking at this year's Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, he said: "People who are using a VPN to access our service from outside of the area will find that it still works exactly as it has always done."

He was speaking in response to widespread claims that the popular media streaming firm had begun a crackdown on customers who used VPNs at the behest of studios unhappy at their licensing arrangements being ignored.

They followed complaints by Netflix users on Reddit that their normal VPN setups were no longer working.

Netflix said it did routinely block the work-arounds using "industry standard" techniques, but there was no special effort being undertaken to block more of them than usual.

'Failsafe'

According to Cnet, Mr Hunt said that the company had added a "failsafe" on its Android app to help users whose DNS provider was unreliable.

"It's not intended to steer people away from VPN, it's intended to make the application more robust when your own DNS provider is failing," he said.

"The reality is we blacklist known VPNs in accordance with our content contracts - Foxtel, for example, owns House of Cards in Australia so they kind of like us to block them. But we are not changing our policy. It remains the same as it ever was."

The BBC verified his comments with Netflix, which added: "Our terms of service state that you are not allowed to virtually cross borders because of content licensing systems."

Blocks

A spokesman told the BBC that the firm used industry standard technology to stop users doing so and that, contrary to the reports, it had not recently changed the way it did that.

Netflix is believed to favour the end of the traditional system, under which film and television rights are sold by geographical region.

In order to ensure the limits of those licences are respected, blocks must be installed. For example, items of hardware such as DVD players were designed only to be compatible with media designated to the same geographical region.

But, as such forms declined, studios began to rely more and more heavily on geographic blocks using the customer's IP address.

However, VPNs make the user appear to be in the country they wish, helping them get around such a barrier.

23.52 | 0 komentar | Read More

Sony: 'No playbook' for hack attack

9 January 2015 Last updated at 13:19 By Kevin Rawlinson BBC News

There was no precedent for how to deal with a hacking attack on the scale of that which hit Sony Pictures, its chief executive has said.

Michael Lynton said his firm had "no playbook" on how to respond.

In a wide-ranging interview with the Associated Press, he also described the scale of the attack, which the US government has blamed on North Korea.

But one security expert said that Sony should have spotted the danger and prepared contingency plans.

Lynton said that, immediately after the attack came to light, his company scrambled to restore communications, digging out old phones and working out how to pay staff with paper cheques.

'Adequately prepared'

"We are the canary in the coal mine, that's for sure," he told the Associated Press.

"There's no playbook for this, so you are in essence trying to look at the situation as it unfolds and make decisions without being able to refer to a lot of experiences you've had in the past or other people's experiences. You're on completely new ground."

And he told the agency of the scale of the data loss his company had suffered.

"They came in the house, stole everything, then burned down the house. They destroyed servers, computers, wiped them clean of all the data and took all the data."

He insisted his firm was "adequately prepared" but "just not for an attack of this nature", which he said that no firm could have withstood.

After a series of embarrassing leaks, the hackers threatened further attacks over Sony Pictures' film The Interview, which imagined the assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

Several cinemas refused to show it on its planned Christmas day debut and Sony Pictures pulled the film altogether.

Continue reading the main story

Every time you thought you were going down a path, every time people thought we've got this in hand, the next thing you knew we'd have another threatening email come through two days later or another series of events"

End Quote Michael Lynton Sony Pictures chief executive

But it was later released online. Lynton insisted that the studio always planned some sort of release but did not know how to carry it out.

He said he called Google's chief executive Eric Schmidt, who told him: "This is what we've been waiting for."

Schmidt agreed to help get the film out on Google Play and YouTube. Sony built its own website and Microsoft's Xbox and Apple's iTunes also ultimately agreed to release the film, Lynton said.

"We probably in retrospect should have said we're exploring other options, because that's exactly what we were doing."

'Damage control'

But, according to security expert Brian Honan of BH Consulting, his company should have been better prepared and should have detected such a large data loss.

"It is hard to understand how more than 100 terabytes of data would leave someone's network undetected."

He pointed out that it was not the first assault on Sony's systems and said the company could have been better prepared to deal with both the attack and its fallout.

He suggested that, in the light of lawsuits brought by Sony Pictures employees over the loss of their personal data, Lynton's comments could be "damage control".

He said the Sony Pictures chief executive could be "trying to use the fact that the FBI has said it was the North Korean state and super cyber-ninjas, that an ordinary company using ordinary defences would not be able to defend itself".

"If he can say they took reasonable precautions, they cannot be blamed," he told the BBC.

Lynton's comments came after the FBI director James Comey said his agency was sure North Korea was behind the attack because the hackers "got sloppy".

"In nearly every case, [the hackers] used proxy servers to disguise where they were coming from in sending these emails and posting these statements. But several times they got sloppy.

"Several times, either because they forgot or because of a technical problem, they connected directly and we could see that the IPs they were using… were exclusively used by the North Koreans."

23.52 | 0 komentar | Read More

Hi-tech helps cyclists stay safe

7 January 2015 Last updated at 02:51

Smart pedals that warn when a bike is stolen and helmets for cyclists that spot an imminent crash have been unveiled at CES.

The pedals have in-built sensors that spot when a bicycle has been nabbed and can report where it has been taken.

The prototype helmet has been developed by Volvo to warn a vehicle when it has got too close to a cyclist.

It also also lets cyclists know if they are in a vehicle's blind spot so they can take action to avoid a collision.

The helmet works with popular smartphone fitness monitoring apps that track the location and speed of a cyclist. This information is shared with any Volvo vehicles nearby that are equipped with the firm's City Safety system. This alerts drivers to the presence of a cyclist even if the rider is in a blind spot or when visibility is poor.

Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.

Tech to help cyclists stay safe

The system calculates potential trajectories of both bicycle and car and warns when a collision is imminent. It can also take control of a car to apply brakes if it gets too close to a cyclist. Drivers will be alerted via the car's head-up display and the rider will be warned through a light mounted on the helmet.

Klas Bendick, a spokesman for Volvo, said the system's ability to warn about imminent collisions could help save lives as accident data suggests 50% of all cyclists killed on the roads collided with a car.

"By exploring cloud-based safety systems, we are now getting ever closer to eliminating the remaining blind spots between cars and cyclists and by that avoid collisions," he said in a statement.

Pedal power

Also at CES, French firm Connected Cycle showed off its smart pedal that it hopes will help reduce the number of cycles being stolen.

"In Europe six bikes are stolen every minute and everyone who cycles in a city knows that bike theft is a real problem," said Connected Cycle founder Jean-Marie Debbasch.

Connected Cycle's pedal looks like any other but, he said, it can be used to turn an old, dumb bike into one that is much smarter.

"Inside the pedal we have GPS, a GPRS connection and also a sensor that captures your activity," said Mr Debbasch.

"Everything goes to the cloud and is displayed on a smartphone app.

"It is totally autonomous, it has its own generation of energy and internet connection so that you can be alerted if someone steals your bike," he said. The pedal has its own coded key to ensure that it can only be used by its rightful owner, he added.

The smart pedals on display at CES were prototypes, said Mr Debbasch, and the firm was now preparing a crowd-funding drive so it can finish development and start commercial pedal production.

Click here for more coverage from the BBC at CES 2015

23.52 | 0 komentar | Read More

MP calls for email disclaimer ban

7 January 2015 Last updated at 17:29

An MP has called for an end to "useless" legal disclaimers at the bottom of emails.

Sir Alan Duncan said the "meaningless missives" led to "forests' worth of paper" being wasted when emails are printed out.

He presented a bill that would ban the practice for public bodies.

Sir Alan told MPs the disclaimers were a hangover from the early days of the internet and could be replaced with a link to an attachment.

"We have all been there," he said.

"A short email comes in from a friend, colleague or company and we hit print and then we look in horror as page after page spews out."

'Heavy heart'

He said the creation of the world wide web by Sir Tim Berners-Lee was "a matter of national pride", but added: "This moment of innovative genius should not be allowed to be tarnished by the very worst of sluggish, bureaucratic verbiage that is represented by the e-mail disclaimer."

He joked that the Labour Party had - "in a marked departure from the norm" - embraced austerity in relation to its 50-word disclaimer, and reported "with a heavy heart" that his own party's version ran to 183 words.

During his time as International Development Secretary, he said he had reduced his department's disclaimer to 17 words.

His bill, introduced under the 10-minute rule, would ban the practice but in the meantime he urged those with the power to do so to amend long disclaimers voluntarily.

The legislation was accepted at first reading, but it is unlikely to become law in its current form without government support due to a lack of parliamentary time.

23.52 | 0 komentar | Read More

Gates drinks water from human faeces

7 January 2015 Last updated at 18:00

Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.

WATCH: The moment when Bill Gates drinks the water recycled from human faeces

Bill Gates has drunk a glass of water made from human faeces, to showcase technology he said could provide clean water in the developing world.

The Microsoft founder said he wanted to begin sending processing plants around the world after tests later this year.

The project was welcomed by WaterAid, which said that it could particularly help in urban areas.

According to the charity, some 748 million people worldwide lack clean drinking water.

In a video posted on his blog, Mr Gates watched as the human waste was fed into the processor, before drinking the end product from a glass.

'Sewer sludge'

"The water tasted as good as any I've had out of a bottle. And having studied the engineering behind it, I would happily drink it every day. It's that safe," he wrote in the blogpost.

In the video, the developer of the Omniprocessor system, Peter Janicki, says the raw "sewer sludge" is first boiled, during which process the water vapour is separated from the solids.

Those solids are then put into a fire, producing steam that drives an engine producing electricity for the system's processor and for the local community.

The water is put through a cleaning system to produce drinking water.

"Why would anyone want to turn waste into drinking water and electricity?" Gates asked.

The answer, he wrote, was because "diseases caused by poor sanitation kill some 700,000 children every year, and they prevent many more from fully developing mentally and physically".

He added: "If we can develop safe, affordable ways to get rid of human waste, we can prevent many of those deaths and help more children grow up healthy."

Sustainable services

According to a report released by the World Health Organization and Unicef in 2013, data collected two years earlier showed that 2.5 billion people worldwide lacked "improved sanitation facilities".

Figures from WaterAid suggest that the number of people in the world without access to safe water has fallen by about 20 million since then.

The charity said that the technology could "first and foremost benefit those who already have some access to sanitation, rather than those without".

"If the technology can be rolled out at a scale that makes it viable for smaller investors or entrepreneurs, then this could be a catalyst for changing the sanitation landscape in urban areas in the developing world," said its sanitation technical support manager, Ada Oko-Williams.

WaterAid said the introduction of this type of plant could "help to facilitate the need to complete the sanitation cycle, by creating a market for the creation of a sustainable services around the safe collection, transportation, treatment, disposal, and indeed reuse of human waste".

'Seed money'

Mr Gates said that a pilot of the Omniprocessor was due to go ahead in Senegal later this year and that he hoped to begin sending working plants to India and other countries soon after.

"If we get it right, it will be a good example of how philanthropy can provide seed money that draws bright people to work on big problems, eventually creating a self-supporting industry.

"Our goal is to make the processors cheap enough that entrepreneurs in low- and middle-income countries will want to invest in them and then start profitable waste-treatment businesses."

But he acknowledged that "the history of philanthropy is littered with well-intentioned inventions that never deliver on their promise", adding that he hoped the planning undertaken on the Omniprocessor project would mean that it did not join this list.

The project was funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

23.52 | 0 komentar | Read More

Sony Pictures hackers 'got sloppy'

7 January 2015 Last updated at 20:51

The US is confident that North Korea was behind the Sony Pictures cyber-attack last year because the hackers "got sloppy", the FBI has said.

The bureau's director James Comey said the group posted material from servers used exclusively by the North Koreans.

November's attack on the company saw the leak of sensitive documents, and film The Interview briefly shelved.

Cyber security experts have been sceptical about the FBI's assertion North Korea was to blame.

After Sony's decision to temporarily cancel the film's release was described by US President Barack Obama as "a mistake", Sony later released the film in independent cinemas and also distributed it online.

Proxy use

The comedy's plot revolves around a plan to assassinate North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

Pyongyang has denied being behind the cyber-attack, but described it as a "righteous deed".

In retaliation, the US has placed sanctions on three North Korean organisations and 10 individuals.

The sanctions are believed to be the first time the US has moved to punish any country for cyber-attacks on a US company.

Mr Comey had been addressing delegates at the International Conference on Cyber Security in New York.

He said there was evidence the hackers had used proxy servers in an attempt to disguise the attack's origins, but sometimes neglected to do so, revealing, the FBI believes, the true location.

But experts remain unconvinced that the US has proved its case.

"To be frank, director Comey has not revealed anything new," said Brian Honan, a security researcher.

"Various IP addresses have been associated with this attack, from a hotel in Taiwan to IP addresses in Japan.

"Any IP address connected to the internet can be compromised and used by attackers."

23.52 | 0 komentar | Read More

Samsung forecasts 37% profit fall

8 January 2015 Last updated at 02:53

Samsung Electronics has forecast a 37.4% fall in quarterly operating profit from a year earlier.

In its pre-earnings guidance, the firm forecast an operating profit of 5.2tn Korean won ($4.74bn; £3.14bn) for the three months to December.

Analysts had expected an operating profit guidance of about 5tn won.

Shares in the firm, which is the world's largest TV and mobile manufacturer, were up in early morning trade in South Korea on the news.

The firm's final fourth-quarter earnings are expected later this month.

Continue reading the main story

[Samsung's] new models are basically an improvement of existing products, but they pride themselves on being innovative, so they really have to start focusing on that to stay in the game"

End Quote Andrew Milroy Frost & Sullivan

Samsung has been struggling of late against cheaper electronics manufactures, especially in China, which is the world's largest smartphone market.

In particular, its flagship Galaxy smartphone line has been losing market share to cheaper models.

The firm said its quarterly sales would probably come to approximately 52tn won, up from 47tn won in the earlier quarter and in line with most expectations.

Future outlook?

Analysts agree competition in the smartphone market, particularly in Asia, has become more intense than ever.

Chinese handset maker Xiaomi, with which Samsung competes on the domestic front in China, said on Monday it had more than doubled its revenue in 2014, just a week after it was named the world's most valuable tech start-up.

"Xiaomi has proven to be very, very successful and is number one in China already," Frost & Sullivan's Andrew Milroy told the BBC.

"More than that, the firm has come from nothing in the last couple of years, so Samsung has to start being more competitive."

Mr Milroy said the South Korean electronics giant had to focus on innovation in order to get ahead.

"It's not come out with anything spectacularly innovative recently," he said.

"Its new models are basically an improvement of existing products, but they pride themselves on being innovative, so they really have to start focusing on that to stay in the game."

23.52 | 0 komentar | Read More

Ukraine blames Russia for German hack

8 January 2015 Last updated at 12:56

Ukraine's prime minister has blamed the Russian secret service for a hack attack against German government websites.

A pro-Russian group has already claimed responsibility but this is the first suggestion that it was backed by the Russian government.

Prime Minister Arseny Yatsenyuk made his remarks ahead of a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

But one expert questioned what real evidence there was for the claims.

CyberBerkut

The attack targeted webpages for Mrs Merkel and the German parliament. Both sites were inaccessible from 10:00 Wednesday until the evening.

A group calling itself CyberBerkut claimed to be behind it. Berkut refers to Ukraine's now disbanded elite riot police force who were accused of beating, torturing and shooting demonstrators.

Ahead of his meeting with Mrs Merkel, Mr Yatsenyuk was asked by German TV reporters if pro-Russian hackers from Ukraine were responsible.

"I strongly recommend that the Russian secret service stop spending taxpayer money for cyber-attacks against the Bundestag and Chancellor Merkel's office," he replied.

Reasonable doubt?

Tit-for-tat cyber-attack accusations are becoming more and more common even though it is notoriously difficult to pinpoint where an attack originates.

"It is interesting that countries are blaming each other for cyber-attacks even though the information they put in the public domain often doesn't substantiate their claims," security expert Prof Alan Woodward told the BBC.

He said that he would have thought that governments would be sure "beyond reasonable doubt" before making such serious accusations.

"The international community seems very quick to blame each other on the balance of probability which doesn't seem enough to me," he said.

This week, the FBI added more to its theory that North Korea was behind the Sony Pictures hack in November, reiterating that IP addresses linked to the attack were used exclusively by the secretive nation.

Prof Woodward questioned the FBI claims.

"None of these addresses were actually in North Korea. They were in Singapore, Taiwan and all over the place."

He thinks that cybercrime is increasingly becoming part of the political agenda.

"It is interesting that all the rhetoric seems to be coming from countries that have existing tensions. They are using specific cyber-attacks for political point-scoring."

German intelligence agencies have said that they face about 3,000 cyber-attacks each day. About five of these come from foreign intelligence agencies, the head of German domestic intelligence agency said recently.

23.52 | 0 komentar | Read More

Universal sues over prison mixtapes

8 January 2015 Last updated at 16:02

Music giant Universal is taking firms that create mixtapes for US prisoners to court over copyright issues.

Tapes featuring artists such as James Brown, Eminem, Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder are often sent to prisoners as part of a wider care package which includes toiletries and food.

The firms selling the packages say they help "eliminate contraband" in prisons.

Universal disagrees and is seeking damages of $150,000 (£99,371) per infringed song.

'Contraband personified'

The case, which was filed in California on Tuesday, was spotted first by the Hollywood Reporter.

It published details of the case, in which Universal accuses companies such as the Centric Group of stealing the work of its artists.

"Defendants boast on their website that their business 'was developed to eliminate contraband,' yet the infringing copies of plaintiffs' sound recordings and musical compositions, in which defendants unlawfully transact and from which they unjustly profit, are contraband personified," states the lawsuit.

It goes on to define what a mixtape is: "Mixtapes are a form of recorded music in which DJs combine (or mix) tracks, often recorded by different artists, on to a single CD, sometimes creating overlaps and fades between songs, and/or reflecting a common theme or mood.

"Such so-called 'mixtapes,' unless authorised by the copyright owner or owner of corresponding state law rights, are nothing more than collections of infringing, piratical compilations of copyrighted or otherwise legally protected sound recordings and copyrighted musical composition."

The lawsuit states that record companies and music publishers discovered earlier this year that mixtapes were being included in care packages for prisoners.

It added that defendants "sometimes sell their infringing products substantially below market value, in order to promote, market, and profit from their sales of other goods and services".

Centric Group has so far not commented on the case.

23.52 | 0 komentar | Read More

Ageing-tech expert sought by DWP

9 January 2015 Last updated at 15:45

The government is seeking an expert in systems that are more than 40 years old to revamp technology used by the Department for Work and Pensions.

The DWP's systems are responsible for many core public sector tasks - such as BACS transactions used to pay wages.

Its new chief technology officer (CTO) will make use of a £1bn annual budget.

However, one public sector tech expert warned against falling into the trap of big IT overhauls.

'Old stuff'

Speaking to Government Computing Magazine, the executive director for the government digital service, Mike Bracken, acknowledged the department's creaking-tech situation.

"Like every part of government, we have lots of old stuff," he said.

"Everyone knows that. DWP, because it's biggest, probably has more than other parts and that stuff is just going to have to be addressed and we're going to do that with them.

"And that's going to be hugely exciting and liberating for that organisation."

Much of the system underpinning the work of the DWP was first developed in the 1970s.

Its maker and maintainer, Fujitsu, describes its system as the "workhorse behind the UK government's revenues and benefits systems".

New era

The CTO will receive a £135,000 salary, and will work under Mayank Prakash, the director general for digital technology at the DWP.

On a mini-site set up to advertise the new role, Mr Prakash said it was "one of the most challenging and rewarding technology roles in the UK today".

As well as moving the DWP away from old tech, the CTO would need to introduce "next generation web, social, mobile, cloud, big data and deep learning technologies" to the mix.

However Mark Ballard, a journalist who writes about public service technology for Computer Weekly, warned against big government IT projects.

"The coalition government lambasted the last lot for big, complex and expensive IT projects," he wrote in an email to the BBC.

"But when you've got an organisation like the DWP which, last time I checked, had 90,000 staff and handled £70bn of social secuity payments to 8 million households and a operated a national network of job centres to boot, your IT systems are going to be big and complex.

"The coalition originally billed its own Universal Credit as a £2bn, two-year programme. But it has since slipped out that the budget was £12bn, and it's taking rather longer than expected. So the coalition is making exactly the same mistakes."

He added: "It aims ultimately to automate government services and deliver them through web apps.

"It hopes this way to cut about 80% of the staff who handle public enquiries in call centres and so on. And it hopes this will help it break up big public bodies such as DWP, to make way for private providers."

23.52 | 0 komentar | Read More