Sophos warns of black dog virus

Cidu-A and Randon-R are trying to spread to a network near you. Unlike the most recent batch of viruses these two new threats do not use email for spreading themselves. Instead, they rely on network shares, with peer-2-peer swapping environments such as KaZaA helping to do the work. ...more

Epson gives digital cameras a PC mask

Epson has announced two new cameras that incorporate a processor, enabling them to act as a computer and print directly to an Epson printer. The PhotoPC Engine utilised in the new PhotoPC L-200 and L-300 digital cameras establishes a host client relationship with Epson printers so that the cameras can talk directly through a USB wire. The L-200 and L-300 cameras house a 2megapixel and 3megapixel CCD respectively and offer 3x optical zoom and Epson's PIM (Print Image Matching) II technology to help ensure the final print accurately reflects the original image. ...more

Be shows off its Aura

A new range of devices from Be Incorporated could see MP3 and streamed media moving out of the office and into the living room. The Aura specification sees a device at the heart of a home entertainment system that can encode music to MP3 and other formats from analogue and digital sources as well as downloading files from the Internet, via an in-built modem. The system also features the ability to purchase music online and organise all your files into a playlist system. ...more

Yahoo! blamed for another Chinese detention

The moral dilemma of doing business in China has been brought to the fore with the news that information from Yahoo! was used to jail a pro-democracy campaigner. Reporters without Borders says it has a copy of the verdict that put Jiang Lijun behind bars for four years in 2003 because of a series of online pro-democracy articles, and that evidence leading to conviction was provided by Yahoo!, through its Chinese partner Alibaba. The verdict claims that Yahoo! Holdings (Hong Kong) confirmed that the email account ZYMZd2002 had been used jointly by Jiang Lijun and another pro-democracy activist, Li Yibing. ...more

Google searches for meaning as a verb

The latest batch of 100 or so new words to make it into Merriam-Webster's dictionary will include google as a verb. Along with 'spyware' and 'mouse potato', 'google' has now entered common parlance according to the dictionary's researchers. The word is described as a transitive verb: 'To use the Google search engine to obtain information about (as a person) on the World Wide Web'. ...more