Iran topped a recent list of repressive regimes that most aggressively restrict Internet freedom. The list, published by Reporters Without Borders, is a part of the 2012 edition of the organization’s Enemies of the Internet report. One of the details addressed in that report is the Iranian government’s bizarre plan to create its own “clean” Internet. The proposed system, an insular nationwide intranet that is reportedly isolated from the regular Internet, would be heavily regulated by the government.

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Iran moving ahead with plans for national intranet

Kingston’s new HyperX 3K SSD has appeared, powered by a second-generation SandForce SF-2281 processor. Sizes ranging from 90GB to 480GB and are appropriately priced between $140 to $700 — depending on your storage tastes. With a SATA 6Gb/s interface wrapped in a black and aluminum casing, the HyperX 3K looks ready to spar with Intel’s similarly SandForce-powered SSDs. Kingston’s 2.5-inch drives have also finished the review party circuit, picking up some pretty positive responses. According to Anandtech‘s testing, the HyperX 3K performs almost as well as its 5K predecessor, landing just behind it for light workload tests (309.4 MB/s on average) and a heavy workload performance (225.8 MB/s) that netted it second place. Overall, they reckon the HyperX 3K is a “no-brainer,” offering great performance for less of those hard-earned dollars.

The relatively rugged design was the first thing that caught Storage Review’s eye, due to Kingston’s (presumably necessary) thermal armor. The site was suitably impressed by read rates, which were comparable to the original HyperX SSD. Write performance didn’t hold up quite as well during tests and due to the reduced quality of the NAND memory used, you will see a drop on total write cycles possible — something that mainstream users probably won’t lose much sleep over. Storage Review maintains that when it comes to both performance and pricing, Kingston’s latest “delivers on both fronts.” You can take a closer look at what both reviews have to say — and a whole load of tests — at the sources below.

Kingston HyperX 3K SSD review round-up: Cheaper than its predecessor and almost as good originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 10 Apr 2012 10:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Kingston HyperX 3K SSD review round-up: Cheaper than its predecessor and almost as good

Panos Ipeirotis, who writes the aptly named “A Computer Scientist in a Business School” blog, describes how he made national news by unraveling a multimillion-dollar “clickfraud” enterprise that used hidden frames, pornographic traffic brokerages, clever misdirection and obfuscation techniques, traffic laundering, skimmed traffic, and other techniques from the shadier side of the Internet’s ad-supported ecosystem to extract anywhere from $400K to $5M to date. The monetary losers were pornographic sites, but a number of high-profile “legit” sites were implicated, unwittingly used as “laundries” for the traffic. The scheme itself is awfully baroque, and Ipeirotis does an admirable job of laying it out, while introducing all these marvelously weird terms describing the modern practices of Internet grifters.

At this point, we now know how this person makes money. Clearly, there is click-fraud: the scammer is employing click-fraud services to click on the pay-per-click ads “displayed” in his parked domains. If some of the ads are also pay-per-impression, he may also get paid for these invisible impressions that happen within the 0x0 iframe.

Why the parked domains though? Why not doing the same directly within the porn site? The answer is simple: Traffic laundering.

What do I mean by “traffic laundering”? First, the ad networks are unlikely to place many ads within a porn site. On the other hand, they have ad-placement services for parked domains. Second, the publishers that get the traffic from the parked domains see in the referral URLs some legitimately-sounding domain names, not a porn site. Even if they go and check the site, they will only see an empty site full of ads. Nothing too suspicious. Hats off to the scammer. Clever scheme.

You think we are done? No. There is one more piece in the puzzle. How does the scammer attract visitors to the porn site?

The other interesting part: The porn website does not really contain porn! There are a few images but most of the links are to other porn website that actually host the video. In other words, the scammer does not even pay the cost of hosting porn!

Uncovering an advertising fraud scheme. Or “the Internet is for porn” (Thanks, Fipi Lele!)

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Unraveling a baroque, snarled, multimillion-dollar porn-ad clickfraud scam

Tired of reaching for the stylus, then your pen, oh, and then the stylus again? Wacom saw that, and updated the Bamboo Stylus with the new “Duo.” Half pen, half stylus, and all yours for £34 (about $50) next month.

Continue reading Wacom Bamboo Stylus Duo lets you draw something on tablets and paper

Wacom Bamboo Stylus Duo lets you draw something on tablets and paper originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 10 Apr 2012 07:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Wacom Bamboo Stylus Duo lets you draw something on tablets and paper

Continue reading Toshiba intros Qosmio X875 gaming laptop with Ivy Bridge, fairly tame digs

Toshiba intros Qosmio X875 gaming laptop with Ivy Bridge, fairly tame digs originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 10 Apr 2012 08:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Toshiba intros Qosmio X875 gaming laptop with Ivy Bridge, fairly tame digs

An anonymous reader writes “Utah’s Medicaid hack estimate has grown a second time. This time we have gone from over 180,000 Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Plan (CHIP) recipients having their personal information stolen to a grand total of 780,000. More specifically, the state now says approximately 500,000 victims had sensitive personal information stolen and 280,000 victims had their Social Security numbers (SSNs) compromised.”

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Medicaid Hack Update: 500,000 Records and 280,000 SSNs Stolen

Iran topped a recent list of repressive regimes that most aggressively restrict Internet freedom. The list, published by Reporters Without Borders, is a part of the 2012 edition of the organization’s Enemies of the Internet report.

One of the details addressed in that report is the Iranian government’s bizarre plan to create its own “clean” Internet. The proposed system, an insular nation-wide intranet that is isolated from the regular Internet, will be heavily regulated by the government. According to a report published today by the International Business Times, Iranian government officials have announced that the new system will be ready to deploy within five months.

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Iran plans to unplug the Internet, launch its own “clean” alternative

What’s the best way to deter a thief? Ruin the spoils, of course. Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint have agreed to a broad outline that will culminate in the creation of a central database for stolen cellphones. The goal? To block lifted units from functioning on US shores. Over the next six months, each firm will build out its own stolen device database for integration into a larger, central database, said a Wall Street Journal source, with regional carriers joining the effort over the following two years.

“We are working toward an industry wide solution to address the complexity of blocking stolen devices from being activated on ours or another network with a new SIM card,” said a T-Mobile spokesperson, “This is not a simple problem to solve.” The quartet of wireless providers hope to imitate the success UK carriers have seen with similar efforts. With any luck, the program will put an end to massive phone-heists and the awkward public relations stunts that imitate them.

US carriers agree to build stolen phone database, blacklist hot handsets originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 09 Apr 2012 23:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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US carriers agree to build stolen phone database, blacklist hot handsets

Hate going into AT&T stores and interacting with real humans? Worry not, as unlocking your AT&T iPhone is turning out to be a simpler process than expected for some users. The process can still be performed in-store by AT&T personnel, but it can also be done at home with the help of AT&T chat, Apple, and iTunes.

We reported on Friday that AT&T would begin unlocking iPhones for qualified customers beginning Sunday, April 8. That was yesterday, and readers have begun reporting back with their experiences. As it turns out, all you really need is an active Internet connection and your iPhone’s IMEI number to get started (you can get it from your iPhone under Settings > General > About). After logging into AT&T’s website with your account credentials, you can then bring up AT&T’s Wireless Support Chat where you can request your device be unlocked.

As long as you meet the criteria—your phone isn’t associated with an active-term commitment, you’re out of contract, and your account is in good standing—AT&T will likely approve the request. But then it comes down to Apple, which has to push your unlock code to your e-mail address before you can proceed (this happens within 72 hours, but many users have said it took an hour or less). Once you receive the code, you must perform a backup and restore of the device through iTunes while tethered to a computer.

As with most processes that are user-facing, the unlock process doesn’t always work smoothly. AT&T’s own documentation on the process points to this Apple support document on troubleshooting unlock issues, though there are a number of forum threads dedicated to discussing the nuances of performing the unlock procedure as well. Do you have any extra tips to offer for those who have yet to go through the process?

Update: We have begun hearing that AT&T is making users call to initiate the unlock process instead of using the website chat feature. Still less effort than going into a retail outlet, but human interaction is somewhat required.

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No human interaction required: AT&T iPhone unlock can be done via iTunes (Updated)

Does your electronic device have you a bit hot under the collar these days? A researcher at NC State has developed a faster and less expensive method for cooling gadgets — especially those that tend to crank the heat up. Dr. Jag Kasichainula, an Associate Professor of Materials Science and Engineering, authored a paper on the research that implements a “heat spreader’ composed of a copper-graphene composite and an indium-graphene interface film to cool devices. Because the two materials exhibit a high thermal conductivity, they allow the device to cool more efficiently while distributing said heat — 25 percent quicker than the pure copper in many pieces of tech. And if that wasn’t enough, the research also details the process for creating the composite using electrochemical deposition. “Copper is expensive, so replacing some of the copper with graphene actually lowers the overall cost.,” Kasichainula notes. If you’re itching to read a full rundown of the findings, the full text can be accessed via the source link below.

NC State researcher finds more efficient way to cool devices, looks to cut costs too originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 09 Apr 2012 17:42:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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NC State researcher finds more efficient way to cool devices, looks to cut costs too