MS device to spread computing

IT Watch | K.Venugopal

Microsoft has decided to manufacture low-cost handsets based on its prototype Fone+ as part of its efforts to spread computing among the poor in developing countries. The Fone+ prototype was unve-iled by Microsoft last year and can be used to access the Internet.

Microsoft’s Unli-mited Potential Gr-oup, which focuses on the developing world, says that the device based on Wi-ndows Mobile operating system can be connected to the television and data can be read on screen. The software major is charting out the project on the assumption that television sets are common even in slums. It wants to use this available facility to spread IT rather than persuade the poor to purchase computers.

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Beware of pharming

After phishing, it is time for pha-rming. This is the name given to the new method adopted by malicious ha-ckers to steal information from Internet surfers.

Security researc-hers have warned that pharming is also prevalent in India.

What ‘pharmers’ do is to hide in a legitimate website and redirect traffic to a similar-looking bogus website. Internet users will end up revealing their user name and password. This will be misused by hackers for financial gain.

Pharming occurs mostly in websites of institutions such as banks involved in financial transactions. Security researchers said that pharming incidents might increase in India with the increase in online transactions.

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Hackers hit Internet

Hackers have be-come a major headache to Internet users, literally that is.

In an openly malicious attack, hackers recently plowed into the site of the Epilepsy Foundation and linked it up with pages with bright and rapidly flashing images.

This created migr-aines and minor seizures in many visitors who suffer from photosensitive epilepsy.

The hackers made use of a flaw in the Epilepsy Foundation’s software to post links to the flashing images.

According to the Foundation, the hacking was merely meant to hurt and not to make profit, as is the wont now. "They don’t realise how cruel it is," said Ken Lowenberg, senior director of site.

Last year, a group of malicious hackers had attacked a site that reads texts for blind people, disabling the service.