Coversant, the first provider of inter-enterprise Collaborative Messaging software, today announced the release of SoapBox Platform 2007 — the industry’s most advanced offering for custom development and deployment of highly scalable collaborative IM solutions. Independently verified tests(1) proved performance benchmarks of up to 250,000 concurrent users and 5,000 messages per second on a single SoapBox Server — further making it the most affordable platform for scaling instant messaging applications to serve large user populations. These results are nearly double the performance of competing XMPP-based servers in the Enterprise Instant Messaging space.RIPL Corp. of Seattle, an operator of next-generation social networking applications, recently selected the SoapBox Platform 2007 as its collaborative messaging solution of choice after a battery of independent tests at HP Labs. “We looked carefully at the other XMPP messaging solutions out there,” explains Bill Messing, a former executive at MSN and Classmates.com who is now CEO of RIPL. “We agreed on the Coversant platform after determining it was the lowest cost to own and operate, both per server and per user. They are worlds ahead of the competitors we evaluated in both scalability and responsiveness, and we can see them coming to dominate their market within several years.”
SoapBox Platform 2007 includes updates to the company’s flagship SoapBox Server and the SoapBox Studio suite of software development kits, the latter recently made freely available (see “Coversant Open Sources SDKs,” 11/28/06). The SoapBox Platform is ideal for independent software vendors (ISVs), Internet service providers (ISPs), and other custom development organizations that build and deploy community-driven web applications or mobile service offerings for social networking, online auction, online community, and other Web 2.0 destinations. For corporate enterprises, SoapBox Platform 2007 supports increased numbers of federated servers across more domains to foster secure collaboration across business boundaries to all of a company’s external customers, partners, and suppliers. (more…)
MOBILE PHONE firm Nokia has released a short-range wireless
connection specification that is smaller and more energy-efficient than
Bluetooth.
According to Reuters, Nokia has decided to name
the device Wibree, although it is not clear why. We think it means
small runny French cheese in Bulgarian.
Nokia said the new technology can work alongside Bluetooth short-range
wireless connections and uses up to 10 times less power. It provides a
radio link of up to 30 feet between devices.
It will move short-range wireless technology into areas that Bluetooth
has been unable to go. So far watches, sensors, wireless mice, health
monitors can’t use Bluetooth due to power problems.
Broadcom, CSR, Epson and Nordic Semiconductor have signed a licence to
use the technology.
L’INQ
Reuters
Japan’s Sony Corp (NYSE:SNE - news), reeling from a string of
technical problems, has kicked off its bid for industry dominance in
high-definition DVDs, announcing a December launch for its Blu-ray
machine.
The new DVD player-recorder will hit the shelves on December 8, going
head-to-head with a rival format developed by electronic giants led by
Toshiba Corp., which in July released the first home-use HD DVD
recorder-player.
In a replay of the VHS-Betamax battle between two types of video
cassette tapes in the late 1970s, two different DVD formats are hitting
the market offering cinematic quality images and interactive
entertainment.
The Blu-ray machine will go on sale in Japan with price tag of about
300,000 yen (2,560 dollars) for the 500 gigabyte hard disk drive
version, Sony announced at an electronics show east of Tokyo.
“This time we are quite confident there will be no delays,” said Sony spokesman Takashi Yoshida.
Sony was forced to push back the launch of the eagerly awaited
PlayStation 3 (PS3) because of technical problems with the Blu-ray
player inside, dealing a blow to the electronic giant’s recovery from a
profit slump.
Worries over Sony’s production problems have been raised by a spate of
recalls of its computer batteries, culminating in the company’s
announcement last week of a global replacement program.
Sony shares took another beating Tuesday, closing down 130 yen or 2.7
percent to 4,600 on worries about the growing cost of the battery
recalls and jitters about whether the PS3 will match high expectations,
dealers said.
Analysts said the Blu-ray recorder could also see a subdued launch as
the high price and confusion over the two different types of formats
deter buyers.
Demand for Blu-ray recorders at the year-end holiday shopping season
looks set to be “very low”, said Standard and Poor’s equity analyst
John Yang.
“I don’t see how Blu-ray is going to differentiate itself from the
other current technologies. It’s not going to be a flop but it’s going
to be a very challenging market not just for Sony but for the Blu-ray
camp,” he said.
Japanese electronics makers have invested heavily in the future of DVDs
and are fighting a fierce campaign to try to convince consumers that
their product should become the dominant format.
Sony and its main rivals are showcasing their latest products at the
Ceatec conference which runs through Saturday in Makuhari, Chiba
Prefecture, looking to win over a crowd of visitors which last year
reached almost 200,000.
As well as the DVD players, rows of sleek high-definition 103-inch
plasma display panel are on display along with a bicycle-riding
humanoid robot.
Sony shareholders are eager for some good news after the battery fiasco.
The company, which is in the midst of painful restructuring including
10,000 job cuts, has much riding on the success of its Blu-ray
technology.
Along with the PlayStation 3, Blu-ray is seen as crucial to the
company’s recovery from a profit slump under its first foreign boss
Howard Stringer.
Sony was forced to delay the global launch of the PS3 by six months
until this November and earlier this month pushed back the rollout in
Europe, Russia, the Middle East, Africa and Australasia again until
March.
A successful launch of Blu-ray could help restore some lustre
to Sony’s reputation for innovation, after the company that brought the
world the Walkman fell behind other companies like Apple with its iPod
hit music player.
The malware headache began for Robyn when she saw a MySpace bulletin
from a friend inviting her to view new photos. She knew the friend in
real life, so she went ahead and clicked the link. The site looked like
a photo-sharing site, but one she had never heard of. Then her computer
practically froze. A few days later, her MySpace friends received
photo-viewing invites that seemed to come from her.
“It definitely wigged me out,” says Robyn, who asked that her last name not be used. She hasn’t touched that computer since.
Like pickpockets at a festival, money-minded malware authors are
drawn by the huge crowds visiting social networking sites. In an August
report, Internet security firm ScanSafe states that, on average, one in
every 600 pages on the sites hosts some form of malware. The report
says Facebook tended to be more secure given its previous member
restriction to those with educational e-mail addresses, but the site
has since opened its doors to everyone.
And these days, those viruses and worms are after your wallet.
“There’s a great deal of money in it for people to be able to get your
personal data,” said Lysa Myers, virus research engineer for McAfee
Avert Labs, in an e-mail interview.
Poisoned Banner Ads
One major attack took place in July, when iDefense, a research and
security company, discovered a poisoned banner ad that appeared on
MySpace, Webshots, and many other sites. The new type of attack ad
downloaded adware onto an estimated million computers, according to
iDefense. The threat went after low-hanging fruit by exploiting an
image file (.wmf) vulnerability. It’s a vulnerability that was reported
and fixed way back in January. But in the huge numbers game of social
networking sites, the attack still found plenty of victims.
And the game is growing ever larger. MySpace ranks as the sixth
most-visited site in the world, according to Alexa.com, which analyzes
Web traffic and puts Flickr at number 39 and Facebook at number 69.
Most social networking sites more than doubled their user base between
July 2005 and July 2006, according to comScore Media Matrix.
It’s not just eager teens visiting the sites, either. The ScanSafe
report found that social networking sites now account for 1 percent of
at-work Web browsing. This may not seem like much, but consider just
how much Web traffic goes in and out of most every business in the
nation.
Good Defense Necessary
Even if the site maintainers are on the ball–MySpace generally gets
decent marks for closing new-found holes and threats on its site–the
sheer number of people involved can present an irresistible target for
crooks. To keep your system safe, make sure you’ve got a layered
defense with good antivirus and antispyware programs, and a firewall.
PC World’s Spyware and Security Info Center contains the latest
security software reviews and rankings, and a link to our Internet
Safety Tool Kit.
In addition, Dan Moniz, a security consultant in San Francisco,
recommends using a browser other than Internet Explorer. “The way that
Internet Explorer is hooked in with the operating system can cause some
problems,” he says. The July banner ad attack targeted Internet
Explorer.
As if downloaded malware weren’t enough, future attacks could twist
things so that the browser attacks a site. At the BlackHat Internet
security conference in Las Vegas this year, Moniz and HD Moore, head of
the
Metasploit project and a well-known hacker, presented a novel
proof-of-concept hack. It showed that a poisoned site could infect a
Web browser using Javascript such that the browser becomes an attacker
and infects visited blogs or social networking sites. It could spam
links to malware downloads or overwhelm blogs with casino advertisement
comments, for instance.
Like many proof-of-concepts, this one might never become a real
threat. It still has to find an open security hole to infect the
browser in the first place, and it might never interest malware writers
who have plenty of other profitable methods currently in use. But it’s
one more example of a party crasher just waiting to spoil the fun.
39 queries. 0.461 seconds