I'm doing lots of Cut&Past(E)ing nowadays because my energy is focused on laying some groundwork for an exciting challenge ahead. MEDIA has always been a major part of my life -- earning me mostly bread&butter, wit' some "kaya" thrown in once a w"ile when my "exquisite"/fine (self praise allowed/aloud hear?here!) English writing is appreciated. HI-dare desibelles:)
I find that The Malaysian Insider -- bless 'em, t's steal FOC! -- and sometimes The Nut Graph -- bless 'em, but unless sufficient numbers of Samaritans respond quickly to their SOS, they may not be around to render public service! -- cometh an Update on the latest happenings in New Media.
Saturday August 08 2009
Twitter service spotty as attacks continue
Russian court won’t halt Politkovskaya murder trial
What you post online can come back to haunt you
Hacker attacks silence Twitter, slow Facebook
Japan eyes e-politics as political rivalry grows
Spurs probe Twitter rant on striker Bent’s page
Tory leader Cameron no fan of Twitter
UK publishes Twitter guidelines for ministers
Twitter attack said to target blogger
Twitter is a service for friends, friends and co-workers to communicate and stay connected. — Reuters pic
NEW YORK, Aug 8 — The meltdown that left 45 million Twitter users unable to access the service on Thursday came in two waves and was directed at a single blogger who has voiced his support for the Republic of Georgia in that country's continuing conflict with Russia.
Facebook's chief security officer Max Kelly told CNet that the attack was aimed at a user known as Cyxymu, who had accounts on Facebook, Twitter, LiveJournal and other sites affected by Thursday's cyber assault.
In an interview with The Guardian, the blogger said he believed the strike was an attempt to silence his criticism on the behaviour of Russia in the conflict over the South Ossetia region in Georgia, which began a year ago yesterday.
How did a targeted attack against a single user manage to cripple Twitter for almost an entire day? The assault was two-pronged, said Beth Jones, a security analyst with Internet security firm Sophos.
Early Thursday, the attackers sent out a wave of spam in the name of Cyxymu. The technique, known as a "joe job," is intended to discredit a web user by making him appear as though he is the source of a large amount of junk e-mails.
"They're literally designed to smear someone's online reputation," said Jones.
"These hackers wanted to make him look responsible for millions of spam e-mails that went out yesterday morning."
The messages contained links to Cyxymu's accounts on several social networks and websites, including LiveJournal, Twitter and Facebook.
The next leg of the attack, Jones said, was a distributed denial of service (DDOS) attack designed to knock Cyxymu off the web. The hackers used a botnet, a network of thousands of malware-infected personal computers, to direct massive amounts of junk traffic to Cyxymu's pages on Twitter, LiveJournal, YouTube and Facebook in an attempt to disable them, Jones said. The impact on everyone else was "collateral damage."
Twitter was overwhelmed by the attack and its site was paralysed for hours. Facebook, certain Google websites and LiveJournal had better defences, but still faced temporary problems.
It's possible that Cyxymu was targeted because the user was so active online, Jones said.
"They knew where to find him," she said. "Some of the others might not have been so overt."
The attacks coincided with the one-year anniversary of the Russia-Georgian conflict.
"When the conflict started a year ago, there were various denial-of-service attacks coming from both sides, attacking websites." — NYT
Some crap -- or is it bulls..? -- from the powers-that-be, erhh, bull...
I advise you go to the orignal portal www.themalaysianinsider.com, to read aMore...
Najib signals back down in scope of royal commission
Najib defends cops, calls mass rally an inconvenience
To reduce crime the IGP must go, Kit Siang demands
PM and AG’s justifications for inquest laughable — Kim Quek
Challenges for ‘1Malaysia’ — Lim Sue Goan
Najib’s inner circle
Indonesian billionaire leads list of powerful economic players
Umno Selangor sokong 100 hari Najib
MCMC now says study is on Internet use
CYBERJAYA, Aug 7 — With the government at sixes and sevens over a controversial plan to filter the Internet, the Malaysian Communication and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) today clarified it is only proposing a study to “gauge the use of the Internet in a positive and safe manner”.
The commission said reports on the study has been taken out of context and sensationalised although information, communication and culture minister Datuk Seri Rais Yatim confirmed this morning that authorities aim to police the Internet to shut out smut.
However, prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak said later in the day that the government will not censor the Internet.
“MCMC in conjunction with this year’s World Telecommunication and Information Society Day’s theme: Protecting Children in Cyberspace and in line with our own efforts to promote positive use of the Internet and to ensure the safety of children and the conduct of businesses online, is proposing a study to gauge the use of the Internet in a positive and safe manner”,” it said in a statement.
The commission noted the study coupled with it’s regular annual Household Use of Internet Survey, would give them a better view on Malaysians’ online preferences.
“The data gathered through the study would help to spur the creation of more Malaysian-based online content and applications,” it contended.
It added the study would give it a better understanding of undesirable activities such as on online frauds and scams, phishing and identity theft as well as spam.
“This will help us to develop suitable approaches to reduce the incidence of such abuses. It is possible, that such approach may, amongst others, encompass encouraging parents to filter the internet at home using internet filtering technology or for ISPs to make available such tools for users to download,” the MCMC said.
It pointed out that as Malaysia is moving towards achieving the target for broadband penetration of 50 per cent by end 2010, “more and more people, especially parents, are concerned about the adverse effects of the Internet, particularly on children”.
“The action taken by MCMC to undertake the study is no different from actions taken by responsible regulatory agencies and governments from the developed and developing countries around the world,” it concluded.
The Malaysian Insider reported yesterday that Malaysia’s plan involves an Internet Filter at the gateway, affecting the ISPs. It is learnt that four companies have sent bids for the project to be decided by December.
China has aborted a similar plan called “Green Dam Youth Escort” last July 1 after a public outcry that objected to mandatory filtering software in every computer.