Windows Defender now removes Superfish malware… if you’re lucky

First the good news. Microsoft today released a signature update for Windows Defender, the anti-malware software that’s built in to Windows, to enable it to both detect and remove the Superfish malware that Lenovo installed on some systems . Defender’s removal process seems to be quite robust, both uninstalling the software and removing the dangerous certificate that Superfish installs. However, it doesn’t appear to clean any contaminated installs of Firefox or Thunderbird; for that, you’ll want to check out our manual removal instructions . Uh oh… 2 more images in gallery Now the bad news. While Windows Defender is supplied as part of Windows and works well enough, Microsoft gave it some rather strange behavior  as a concession to third-party anti-malware vendors . If a third-party anti-malware product is installed, Windows Defender will automatically disable itself. Many Lenovo systems include trial versions of anti-malware software; during the duration of these trials, Windows Defender will be inactive. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Windows Defender now removes Superfish malware… if you’re lucky

NVIDIA To Re-Enable GeForce 900M Overclocking

jones_supa writes: One week after NVIDIA disabled overclocking on their GeForce 900M mobility lineup, a representative of the company has reported that NVIDIA will be bringing back the disabled feature for their overclocking enthusiasts on the mobility front. On the GeForce Forums, he writes, “We heard from many of you that you would like this feature enabled again. So, we will again be enabling overclocking in our upcoming driver release next month for those affected notebooks. If you are eager to regain this capability right away, you can also revert back to 344.75.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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NVIDIA To Re-Enable GeForce 900M Overclocking

TrueCrypt Audit Back On Track After Silence and Uncertainty

itwbennett writes: In October 2013 Cryptography professor Matthew Green and security researcher Kenneth White launched a project to perform a professional security audit of TrueCrypt, partly prompted by the leaks from Edward Snowden that suggested the NSA was engaged in efforts to undermine encryption. Their report, published in April 2014, covered the first phase of the audit. Phase two was supposed to involve a formal review of the program’s encryption functions, with the goal of uncovering any potential errors in the cryptographic implementations—but then the unexpected happened. In May 2014, the developers of TrueCrypt, who had remained anonymous over the years for privacy reasons, abruptly announced that they were discontinuing the project and advised users to switch to alternatives. Now, almost a year later, the project is back on track. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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TrueCrypt Audit Back On Track After Silence and Uncertainty

23andMe gets FDA approval, but only to test rare Bloom syndrome

For over a year now, 23andMe has been effectively banned from offering its US customers health-related genetic tests. The company is still selling its personal DNA kits, but the information it can provide is limited to ancestry-related reports and raw genetic data. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was behind the original clampdown in 2013, but this week it’s given the company its blessing for a new test. With the fresh approval, 23andMe can now offer to look for signs of Bloom syndrome , a rare disorder which is characterized by short stature, sun-sensitive skin and increased cancer risk. While this is a specific test, rather than the broader health reports it offered before, 23andMe calls it an “important first step” to offering detailed genetic advice in the US once more. Filed under: Misc Comments Source: 23andMe

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23andMe gets FDA approval, but only to test rare Bloom syndrome

800,000 people get bad tax info in latest Healthcare.gov snafu

Healthcare.gov just can’t catch a break — it’s been targeted by hackers and shared personal information with marketing companies in the past six months, and now it’s trying to clean up a mess for the nearly 800, 000 people it just sent incorrect tax information to. The Obama administration confirmed the issue earlier this morning, and officials promised on the Healthcare.gov blog to contact affected households via phone call and email over the next few days. Needless to say, don’t file your taxes yet if you signed up for health insurance using the site this past year. Better safe than sorry, right? Alas, the news came too late save some 50, 000 people who already filed their returns — they’ll be given instructions on how to re-file soon enough. This all might come as welcome news to people who didn’t want to sit down with a copy of TurboTax for an hour, but it could wind up being a crushing blow to affected people who really needed that tax refund soon. Officials told The New York Times they weren’t exactly sure how the glitch happened (expect an investigation to follow shortly), but 80 percent of the folks who used Healthcare.gov to sign up for insurance were in the clear as far as the IRS is concerned. Updated tax forms are expected to hit people’s mailboxes in early March, so be sure to keep your eyes peeled. Comments Via: New York Times Source: Healthcare.gov Blog

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800,000 people get bad tax info in latest Healthcare.gov snafu

Apple Hires Include Car Interior, Transmission, New Vehicle And Auto Safety Engineers

 Apple’s car ambitions may go well beyond simply developing tech that benefits from automotive advances to serve its existing offerings. A new breakdown by 9to5Mac of the employees amassed under Apple’s automotive lead Steve Zadesky includes a list of talents that go well beyond skill sets which would be useful in building a better version of the dashboard infotainment software… Read More

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Apple Hires Include Car Interior, Transmission, New Vehicle And Auto Safety Engineers

Microsoft’s First Azure Hosted Service Is Powered By Linux

jones_supa (887896) writes “Canonical, through John Zannos, VP Cloud Alliances, has proudly announced that the first ever Microsoft Azure hosted service will be powered by Ubuntu Linux. This piece of news comes from the Strata + Hadoop World Conference, which takes place this week in California. The fact of the matter is that the news came from Microsoft who announced the preview of Azure HDInsight (an Apache Hadoop-based hosted service) on Ubuntu clusters yesterday at the said event. This is definitely great news for Canonical, as their operating system is getting recognized for being extremely reliable when handling Big Data. Ubuntu is now the leading cloud and scale-out Linux-based operating system.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Microsoft’s First Azure Hosted Service Is Powered By Linux

Apple will fix your older MacBook Pro’s video problems for free

Did you snag a MacBook Pro before 2014 only to run into corrupted video , no video at all or spontaneous reboots? You won’t have to shell out for a fix if you’re out of warranty. After more than a year of reports, Apple is launching a repair program that will mend your laptop for free if its graphics are going haywire. You’re covered so long as you bought a 15- or 17-inch MacBook Pro between early 2011 and the end of 2013, including the first two generations of Retina models . The program will be available as of February 20th if you’re in the US or Canada, and a week later in the rest of the world. Only a “small percentage” of systems are affected, Apple says, but it won’t hurt to check coverage even if everything is hunky dory. Filed under: Laptops , Apple Comments Source: Apple

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Apple will fix your older MacBook Pro’s video problems for free

Scotland’s Police Lose Data Because of Programmer’s Error

Anne Thwacks writes Assistant Chief Constable Wayne Mawson told the [Scottish Police Authority] committee that a total of 20, 086 records had been lost because a computer programmer pressed the wrong button between May and July last year. He added: “….they had been properly put on the system by the officers as a result of stopping and searching people, but we lost the outcome of it as a computer programming error. We have been working really hard to recover that data. I have personally overseen the sending out of several thousand emails to officers and follow-up audits. We have been working hard with HMICS to oversee everything that we do, to make sure it is done properly and I am pleased to say that the vast majority of that data, those results, are now back on the system.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Scotland’s Police Lose Data Because of Programmer’s Error