Internet Security Online

Imagine this: A reputable security company releases an eternally-free, “enterprise-class,” anti-malware engine that doesn’t waste CPU cycles, or otherwise molest your machine. Windows users rejoice that they can surf without fear of PTM (Porn-Transmitted Malware), and they line up to buy the company’s other, for-cash, products. A national holiday is named in honor of the “firm that saved the internet.”

That’s the dream that Comodo CEO Melih Abdulhayoglu is trying to fulfill with Comodo Anti-Virus V1.0, a free anti-malware offering designed to slot-in with Comodo’s other gratis goods, like VerificationEngine, Comodo Personal Firewall and iVault.

BOSTON—Gathered in the subterranean confines of a decommissioned vault in the basement of the Boston Stock Exchange, a panel of IT security experts told the assembled crowd that short of locking all their proprietary information in such a contraption, there may be little hope for securing their data.

Apple Computer on Thursday patched more than 40 vulnerabilities in its Mac OS X operating system, associated applications, and the Cupertino, Calif. company’s Mac and Windows versions of the QuickTime multimedia player.

The Mac OS X upgrade, dubbed Security Update 2006-003, contains 31 fixes and ups the operating system to version 10.4.6. It was the third collective update of the OS since the first of the year.

Sites that pay to have their links pop up on search engine result pages are nearly three times more likely to harbor spyware or adware, or hassle users with spam than URLs generated by the engine’s algorithms, research released Friday claimed.

And search engines are cashing in, reported McAfee’s SiteAdvisor service. By its estimate, the search industry made $1.1 billion from risky sponsored links last year.

Researchers from Microsoft’s anti-malware engineering team are working on an automated way to sort through the thousands of malware families and variants attacking Windows computers.

The company unveiled its plans at the EICAR (European Institute for Computer Anti-Virus Research) conference in Hamburg, Germany, proposing the use of distance measure and machine learning technologies to come up with automatic classification of viruses, Trojans, spyware, rootkits and other malicious software programs.

Microsoft confirmed Wednesday that it will continue to patch third-party products that impact Windows.

Tuesday, Microsoft pushed out a patch to Windows XP, 98, and Millennium users for Flash Player, an Adobe-owned multimedia application that’s bundled with those operating systems. It was the first time that the Redmond, Wash. developer had issued an update for a non-Microsoft product using its Windows Update service.

ICANN’s rejection of the controversial .xxx supported Top Level domain (STLD) moved the issue of a dedicated porn area on the Web back to ground zero: its opponents expressed relief Thursday that the demise of the proposed TLD will keep children from easy access to adult sites while advocates of the TDL domain complained that an opportunity to control porn site watching has been lost.

ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) clamped a tight lid on the issue, forbidding its directors — who voted 9 to 5 to reject the domain proposal — from discussing the issue for 48 hours. ICANN said it will release details on the vote next week.

A spyware distributor noted for an extensive use of rootkits that make its software difficult to delete has closed shop, citing unspecified practices of its distribution partners as the reason.

ContextPlus, which spread spyware and adware, including software that hijacked searches and programs that leveled systems with egregious numbers of pop-up ads, has posted a message on its Web site saying it’s out of the business.

LOS ANGELES—A co-owner of a Hollywood video game store that caters to celebrity clients on Wednesday pleaded guilty to participating in a conspiracy to violate federal copyright laws by selling Xbox video game consoles modified to play pirated games.

File this under the downside of computer dating: a German computer technician was sentenced to life in prison Tuesday for dissecting and eating a victim he met on the Internet.

The bizarre case of the “Rotenburg Cannibal” initially came to light after an Austrian student found another posting by the defendant who was trolling the Internet. Armin Meiwes claimed he was only following the wishes of Bernd Juergen Amando Brandes, who was a willing victim, according to Meiwes. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3286721.stm