PC & Network Support Services Limited

Release candidate’ in February, says site that nailed Vista SP1, XP SP3 dates

Microsoft will deliver Windows Vista Service Pack 2 (SP2) to manufacturing in April 2009, two months after it issues a final test version to users, according to a Web site that accurately predicted several Windows ship dates in 2008.

TechARP.com, a Malaysian Web site that nailed the release-to-manufacturing (RTM) dates for Windows Vista SP1 and XP SP3 earlier this year, said that Microsoft will post a release candidate — the final test version — of Vista SP2 in February 2009, finish the service pack next April and offer it to users via download from the Web at some point afterward.

The last was necessarily vague, if only because Microsoft has had trouble this year synchronizing service pack RTM dates with availability on Windows Update. It took six weeks last winter to get Vista SP1 in the hands of most users — and then only after a ruckus when Microsoft initially denied access to subscribers of its for-pay developer services — and a week to issue Windows XP SP3 in the spring. XP SP3 was delayed because of a data-corrupting compatibility bug with Microsoft’s own point-of-sale software.

Although Microsoft issued the beta of Vista SP2 to a limited number of testers a month ago, company officials have so far only committed to shipping the update sometime in the first half of next year.

According to Microsoft, Vista SP2 will include Windows Search 4, Bluetooth 2.1 wireless support, faster resume from sleep when a wireless connection has been broken and support for Blu-ray. Some of those features, including Windows Search and the Bluetooth support, have been available to Vista users for months through individual updates.

The service pack will update both Vista, the client version of Windows, and Windows Server 2008, the company’s corresponding server software.

Vista SP2 will require SP1 as a prerequisite, a factor that played to Microsoft’s ongoing recommendation that users deploy the first service pack as soon as possible.

Security researchers at Phion AG, an Austrian firewall company, report that Windows Vista has a TCP/IP vulnerability that could allow a local attacker to take control of an affected system.

The vulnerability has been tested on Microsoft Windows Vista Enterprise (32-bit and 64-bit) and Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate (32-bit and 64-bit). The researches consider it likely that other versions of Vista are affected. Windows XP, however, is not affected

Certain administrative rights are required for the vulnerability to be exploited. This makes it a risk primarily in malicious insider scenarios.

“To execute either the sample program or the route-add command, the user has to be member of the Network Configuration Operators group or the Administrators group,” the security advisory explains. “Since this buffer overflow overwrites kernel memory, it could be possible that members of the Network Configuration Operator group exploit this and take control over the operating system without any restriction.”

The advisory states that Phion notified Microsoft on Oct. 22. It’s not immediately clear when Microsoft will address the issue. In any event, Phion’s advisory includes details about a temporary fix.

Meanwhile, Vietnamese security research group Bach Khoa Internetwork Security (BKIS) has identified a buffer overflow vulnerability in the open source ffdshow multimedia codec that can be used compromise computers using any Internet browser in which the Windows Media Player plug-in has been installed.

The flaw has to do with the way the ffdshow software handles media streams. Upon parsing an extremely long link, ffdshow runs out of memory and returns a buffer-overflow error. This could be exploited by an attacker to execute remote code on the victim’s computer.

A person visiting a malicious Web site using a browser with the vulnerable codec installed would be subject to attack without further action.

BKIS says that users should update to the latest version of ffdshow. That includes those using software packages that make use of ffdshow, like K-Lite Codec Pack, XP Codec Pack, Vista Codec Package, and Codec Pack All in one.

A couple of days ago I wrote an article about the benefits of using an online backup service. This article has invoked quite a bit of interest and many of you have emailed me with questions about the service.

Most of the questions were of a similar theme so hopefully this FAQ will answer the majority of them:

How long does it take to set up?

Setting up the remote backup service usually takes 10 -15 minutes. It is a simple ‘walk-though’ process and help is available along the way. If you do experience difficulties a Customer Support Team is on hand to guide you through the process.

Where is my data stored?

With most remote backup services your data is securely stored at one or two, geographically dispersed data centres. These are high security facilities employing state-of-the-art technical and security measures to guarantee the integrity of your data.

Is Transmission Secure?

Yes, your transmissions are protected in several ways:

Encryption

Encryption converts data into an unreadable format to prevent unauthorised viewing or access. Most remote backup services encrypt all data before it leaves your PC, so that it travels over the network to the Secure Data Centres in an unreadable format.

Password Protection

If a laptop is stolen or a desktop PC is left unattended, password protection ensures your data is protected from unauthorised access.

Removing the Hacker Threat

Most remote backup services do not create an opening for incoming connections and outgoing connections can be limited to specific ports at specific IP addresses.

What data should I back up?

It is important to backup your critical data:

• Data that would be difficult to replace, like your finances, My Documents etc.
• Used frequently, like your web browser bookmarks/favourites

It is not as necessary to backup operating system files or programs such as:

• Operating system files (Windows®)
• Temporary files (with the .TMP extension)
• Applications or program files and settings (with the .EXE, .DLL, or .INI extensions)
• Scan Disk error files (with the .CHK extension)

Free Remote Backup Service Trial – No Credit Card Required

With a remote or online backup service your data is automatically backed up each day to secure offsite data centres. In the event of a catastrophic event (fire, flood, explosion etc.) your data is recoverable with just a few clicks of a mouse.

Why whould you use a remote backup service?

All computers lose data. It’s not a case of ‘if’ but ‘when’. Whether you lose data through hardware failure, human error or a disaster such as fire or theft, a remote backup service ensures that your data is recoverable within minutes.

If you are backing up your data using tape, network drive, USB memory sticks or CD, you are not fully protected. These methods carry inherent risks and do not guarantee the security of your data. This is especially true in the case of a catastrophic event.

Free Remote Backup Service Trial – No Credit Card Required

How does a remote backup service work?

There are numerous services available but typically an online backup service works as follows:

1) Download the remote backup software
2) Select the files you’d like to back up and the daily backup time
3) The software encrypts your data for security and compresses it for speed of transmission
4) The data is sent to the primary offsite data centre
5) The data is then mirrored to a second data centre for complete security

In the event of data loss you can recover your data with a few clicks of a mouse.

One such remote backup service is provided by Clunk Click.

Clunk Click’s service is low cost, hands-free, completely secure and works quietly in the background. It automatically backs up your data to two secure offsite data centres each day and gives you 100% security and 100% efficiency.

Clunk Click’s service is a ‘set it and forget it’ process that allows you to get on with your work without having to worry about your backups.

For a Free 14 day trial (no credit card required) click on the link below:

Free Remote Backup Service Trial – No Credit Card Required

I was surfing the web the other night looking for an updated download and came across filehippo.com.

Eee Gads, I exclaimed, this is like an Aladdins Cave of useful software – I must write a little bit about this site on my blog as other people may find it useful too.

What is filehippo.com all about?

Well …. using their words (not mine) it’s goes something like this:

With FileHippo.com our aim is to provide you with the simplest method of downloading the newest versions of the best software – without the usual excessive popups or spyware and without the low quality software.

Features

* Only the best software, we focus on quality not quantity.
* Very fast servers with 100Mb connections, to make your downloads as fast as possible.
* We keep the old versions of programs, so if you update and don’t like the new version, you can always return to the old one.
* All software is 100% spyware and virus free.
* Filtering feature to allow you to only show Freeware and/or Non-beta software.
* Full support for resuming downloads and download managers.
* Change log and technical details for downloads.
* RSS feeds for all updates, categories and for individual programs.
* New European and US download servers

I’ve taken a cursory glance through the links on the homepage of FileHippo and discovered that some of the software I already use needs updating.

I have also discovered that some of the software archives also contain installers for Linux & Mac boxes in addition to the usual Windows ones – bonus!!

Here’s the link for your use:

http://www.filehippo.com/

Please Note:

This is not an endorsement of any of the software available on the site – just a post about a site that may be useful to you

Microsoft on Tuesday for the first time publicly demonstrated Windows 7, the next major release of its OS for PCs that Microsoft insists will reflect lessons learned from the widely panned Windows Vista.

Microsoft also laid out a road map for the release of Windows 7 and handed out a pre-beta version to developers at the Professional Developers Conference (PDC), where it also demonstrated new features in a keynote address Tuesday.

The first public beta of the OS will be available early next year, and subsequent test releases and release candidates will follow based on that feedback, said Steven Sinofsky, senior vice president of Windows and Windows Live at Microsoft.

Windows 7 is still targeted for release three years after Vista, he added. This would put its business release in late 2009 and general availability at the end of January 2010 if the OS remains on schedule.

In his keynote, Sinofsky said Microsoft is learning its lessons from Vista, which was widely criticized by users and the press, and spoofed famously in humorous television advertisements by competitor Apple.

Sinofsky acknowledged that some of the criticism was deserved, particularly around Microsoft’s lack of preparing its hardware, software and peripheral partners for Vista’s release, even though it was more than five years in the making.

Early Vista users experienced incompatibility with applications and found that devices and peripherals would not work with the OS because drivers weren’t available upon the release of the OS.

Microsoft won’t repeat this mistake with Vista, Sinofsky said, and because the OS kernel — or its underlying code base — is the same as the one in Vista and Windows Server 2008, all of the devices and applications that work with those OSes should also run on Windows 7.

“All of this device and compatibility work will pay off in Windows 7,” he said.

Microsoft also will tweak the User Account Control feature (UAC), which was new in Vista, so it will be less of an inconvenience and work more efficiently for users, Sinofsky said.

UAC prevents users without administrative privileges from making unauthorized changes to a PC. But because of how it was set up in Vista, it can prevent even authorized users on the network from being able to access applications and features they should normally have access to.

UAC did this through pop-up windows, which also were spoofed by Apple in television ads because Vista users reported they appeared so frequently, even when users were performing authorized tasks.

Sinofsky acknowledged that Microsoft “went a little too far with UAC,” but as a result the Windows client OS is now more secure. In Windows 7, Microsoft will focus on the security aspects of UAC but will ensure it is not an invasive feature for users, he said.

During Tuesday’s keynote, Microsoft showed off some new features in Windows 7, including a streamlined view of all the files and folders contained not only on a user’s PC, but also any other PCs on networks that the users are allowed access to.

This feature is called Libraries, and it will improve desktop search in Windows 7 by allowing users to search more comprehensively across PC folders than ever before, according to Microsoft.

Microsoft also changed its Gadgets feature, another new Vista feature. Gadgets are mini-applications that give users quick access to information, such as stock prices or weather, with icons that users in Windows 7 will be able to move around the desktop. In Vista, gadget icons were confined to a task bar.

Perhaps the sexiest new Windows 7 feature demonstrated Tuesday was its touchscreen interface, which lets people use their fingertips and small hand gestures to control applications on their PCs.

Microsoft demonstrated how touchscreen controls can replace the mouse for things like opening the taskbar and choosing a Windows Explorer window. If a user opens a folder with photos in it in Windows Folder, they can scroll through those photos using their fingers, and drag a photo into a Windows Paint application window and draw directly on the photo.

Original Article

Earlier this month an official AMD presentation pointed to 2009 as Windows 7′s release year. Now, Asus CEO Jerry Shen has mentioned a similar release time frame in an interview with Laptop Magazine.

During a brief discussion about operating systems, Shen plainly told the site, “We don’t plan on putting Vista on any of the Eee PCs. I think in the future in the second half of next year we will put Windows 7 on Eee PCs. For now it will be Linux and XP and then Windows 7 and not do Vista.” In other words, Windows 7 systems should be out in consumers’ hands some time next year — a little sooner than the 2010 general availability time frame Microsoft has often suggested — and Eee PCs will get the latest-and-greatest OS release.

Shen revealed a few interesting OS-related details in the interview, too. Laptop Magazine asked if Asus was seeing higher return rates for Linux-powered netbooks, to which Shen replied, “I think the return rate for the Eee PCs are low but I believe the Linux and Windows have similar return rates. We really separate the products into different user groups. A lot of users like the Windows XP, but in Europe a lot of people want the Linux option.”

Interestingly, Shen also said Asus will introduce Windows XP-based Eee PCs with an “easy mode” desktop this quarter. On Linux-powered Eees, the “easy mode” takes the shape of a tile-based desktop with tabs and shortcuts to common applications. Users will reportedly be able to switch back to the “full” operating system if they want, though.

Original Article Written By:

Cyril Kowaliski of The Tech Report

Simon Cable explains the ins and outs of securing mobile phones.

It was only a matter of time before the virus writers started to exploit the mobile platforms and recently these viruses have become more malicious and started to present higher levels of risk for business and personal users.

The challenge presented today is multi-faceted, primarily because our mobile devices are increasingly powerful and are performing so many additional tasks. There are now over 300 pieces of malware that infect mobile devices, some of which can infect PCs or servers as well. They are spreading around by every means possible; SMS, MMS, Bluetooth, WAP, Wi-Fi, email, images, video clips, Instant Messaging and Voice over IP, are all known to be used by mobile viruses to spread.

It is important to tighten up on network defences and implement software to protect all types of messaging systems. Once a company device is infected with a piece of mobile malware confidential information may no longer be safe. Data integrity and compliance may also be compromised.

One of the current leaders in the mobile security field commissioned some market research and the results were slightly worrying. Symantec found that in Germany, on average, only 33 percent of men and 65 percent of women with smart phones claimed to be using any sort of security. However, 90 percent of those interviewed stored personal information like email addresses and phone numbers in their smart phone, 25 percent stored passwords on their phone and 20 percent even stored PIN numbers and credit card information!

In the UK a separate survey, also commissioned by Symantec, revealed that only 50 percent of users were concerned that their smart phone might be the target of hackers.

What should you do to protect your mobile phone?

Protecting your devices against attacks from hackers is possible and there are some basic things that everyone should be doing…

1 . Deactivate functions such as Bluetooth, Wireless LAN, and infrared when they are not in use. At the very least the phone should be set as ‘invisible’ under normal circumstances, so that it is less easily recognised by would-be hackers

2. It goes almost without saying that files from unknown sources received by any means (Bluetooth/MMS/SMS etc) should neither be opened nor installed, e.g. telephone numbers or links attached to short messages from unknown senders. The same applies here as with the home PC. Great care must be taken with unsolicited emails from unfamiliar sources

3. You should only download material from sources which you trust and which, as far as possible, are safeguarded by signatures

4. The decisive factor as far as security is concerned is of course having the proper programmes and security functions in place. These include virus scanners and firewalls which ensure protection when the user is surfing the net or checking emails and their attachments. In particular, anti-virus software is essential when the mobile telephone is being synchronised with a PC.

There is a good choice of mobile security solutions available from all of the leading security vendors today. It is essential that customers have a firewall in place to protect devices from unwanted probes or attacks, irrespective of their source or the method they are using. Scanning and checking incoming messages and files to ensure cleanliness from viruses and malicious or unwanted SMS messages is also essential.

The first company to release a solution to these emerging threats was a Finnish anti-virus firm called F-Secure. They were the first to develop software to protect both Symbian and Windows Mobile devices and they remain a market leader in this field today.

The larger anti-virus firms have more recently been able to develop and put to market a very good solution which also ticks all the required boxes.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer on Thursday defended Vista’s honor – again – but at least gave a nod to enterprise buyers that planned to skip it and upgrade when Windows 7 launches.

Ballmer, speaking at the final keynote at the Gartner Symposium ITxpo in Orlando, came to the stage in the middle of an economic swoon where enterprises are still debating whether to upgrade to Vista. Ballmer spoke via a Q&A with Gartner analysts Neil MacDonald and David Mitchell Smith.

First, Ballmer defended Vista’s honor as he had at last year’s Gartner’s powwow.

“The adoption rate of Vista is faster than the adoption rate was of XP two years in,” said Ballmer, who noted that there were issues with compatibility. “We had a great success with security and starting to see a ramp with adoption.”

MacDonald countered with Gartner survey data that 61 percent of respondents are thinking about skipping Vista. Ballmer said that Microsoft would be ready for that outcome too. Mentioning Windows 7 – he quipped about the creative naming convention of using just “7″ – he indicated that Microsoft would be ready for folks that want to skip Vista. In fact, he said Windows 7 would be compatible with Vista.

“Our next release of Windows will be compatible with Vista. The key is let’s get on with it. We’ll be ready when you want to deploy Windows 7.”

Ballmer was asked why Windows 7 is considered a major release instead of just the second revision of Vista. His reply: “It’s not minor because it’s a lot more work than a minor release. It’s a major release.”

Ballmer also noted that Windows 7 will improve the operating system shell. “Windows 7 will be Vista, but a lot better,” he said, noting cleanness of user interface. Is this fit and finish improvement? Gartner analysts kept referring to Windows 7 as a Release Candidate 2.

Another key question: Given the economic environment, why upgrade to Vista?

“If people want to wait they really can,” said Ballmer “but I’d definitely deploy Vista.”