The New York Times is reporting that a team of researchers led by Matt Blaze has discovered that technology used for decades by law enforcement agents to wiretap telephones has a security flaw that allows the person being wiretapped to stop the recorder remotely. It is also possible to falsify the numbers dialed. The flaws are detailed in a paper being published by the IEEE. Someone who thinks he’s being wiretapped can apparently just send a low tone down the line that turns off the recorder. The link has a demo.

http://www.crypto.com/papers/wiretap.pdf

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BellSouth Executive Officers Want to Rig the Internet in their own favor….
Executive Wants to Charge for Web Speed
Some Say Small Firms Could Be Shut Out of Market Championed by BellSouth Officer

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/30/AR2005113002109.html

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On Tuesday FCC chairman Kevin Martin spoke to a forum, sponsored by the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee in Washington, which has been examining indecency on radio and television. Martin told the forum that the FCC will soon release a report that concludes that offering TV programming a la carte is economically feasible and in the best interest of consumers. Today, instead of subscribing to the channels they want to watch, cable and satellite TV consumers must buy packages that include a standard set of channels. This new FCC report advocates a la carte TV pricing

http://news.com.com/New+FCC+report+advocates+a+la+carte+TV+pricing/2100-1034_3-5975559.html?tag=nl

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Media Centre that downloads from P2P?

Yes, you read the headline correctly! A Dutch company has developed the worlds first media center that gets its content from P2P networks. The hardware, called Lamabox, gets content from P2P networks such as eDonkey, Fasttrack (Kazaa), Gnutella, Overnet and also has BitTorrent support. The developers have said that they know the product is “somewhat controversial” but are relying on a past court case to protect them from any legal troubles.

The court case actually was the Supreme Court’s ruling on Kazaa (when it was Netherlands-based). The ruling only classifies the uploading of copyrighted material as illegal. However, the company has set aside some money for legal defense just in case. The hardware was presented at a consumer trade show in Utrecht last week. It is basically a hard disk drive that plugs into your TV that has search and download support for the P2P networks.

What makes this even more offensive to the entertainment industry is that it has a “P2P Spider” that constantly searches out new content; making the procedure automatic if the user wishes it. Music or movies can then be selected on the TV screen for playback. The first LamaBox (with 40 GB) will sell for €279. A 400 GB version with a DVD burner will cost €479.

The company said it has had a lot of interest particularly from foreign countries. Supply is limited however, as each of these devices is handmade. I think the question of whether or not this company will face legal action from the entertainment industry should be changed to “when” it will.

http://www.afterdawn.com/news/archive/7072.cfm

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/11/29/p2p_mediacenter/

obviously this is should be expressed with a resounding and proverbial…..

to the RIAA/MPAA……….

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Coffee improves short-term memory and speeds up reaction times by acting on the brain’s prefrontal cortex, according to a new study.

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8401

[ok, so that last one isn't technology related......OR IS IT?]