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The Telecom Digest for May 7, 2012
Volume 31 : Issue 111 : "text" Format
====== 30 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ======
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Date: Sun, 6 May 2012 10:44:10 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: 'The Single Biggest Change in Education Since the Printing Press'
Message-ID: <p0624083ecbcc367883d2@[10.0.1.5]>
'The Single Biggest Change in Education Since the Printing Press'
Rebecca J. Rosen
The Atlantic
MAY 2 2012
A new joint initiative between Harvard and MIT demonstrates the
schools' desire to open themselves up to more people.
Over the past few years, the tools that could make for really
excellent online distance learning have emerged in a piecemeal
fashion. We have reliably good videoconferencing, live video
streaming, collaborative document editing, and so on. We don't know
how best to translate classroom education to the online realm, but
the tools are there, and, sooner or later, someone is going to figure
it out.
In such an environment, the dons of elite education could batten down
the hatches and try to preserve the limited-supply model that has
served them well (see: newspapers, record labels, publishing houses).
Or, they can choose to embrace the openness and radically democratic
accessibility the Internet makes possible.
This morning two of the top universities announced a collaboration
that signals they are taking the latter path: MIT and Harvard are
each pouring $30 million into a nonprofit partnership edX, which they
hope will make the top-notch faculties and courses of their schools
available for free to millions of people around the world -- free for
anyone with an Internet connection. In presenting edX, the
initiative's new president, Anant Agarwal, called the opportunity
presented in online education "the single biggest change in education
since the printing press."
Though the online platform will have a second-fiddle status compared
with the on-campus experience (online students will be able to attain
certificates of mastery but not traditional degrees), the effort
reveals a public-minded spirit that animates both schools. At the
core of this program is a belief that the excellence of the education
available at MIT and Harvard should be available -- in an online
format -- to anyone who has the commitment and desire to make it
through an online course. It's a reminder that these schools aren't
just institutions with long, venerable histories, but also
collections of living people -- people whose values and ideas shape
how these universities exist in the world today.
The video below of the press conference this morning fills out some
of the details of the project.
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/05/the-single-biggest-change-in-education-since-the-printing-press/256655/
***** Moderator's Note *****
When I was in High School, I used to hang around the AI lab at
MIT. The generosity and guidance that the AI staff gave me was the
reason I decided to attend college: those men and women showed me, as
nothing else could, that knowlege - and the hard work needed to obtain
it - is a precious thing that provides its own reward.
I applaud both Harvard and MIT for taking this step.
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: Sun, 6 May 2012 10:44:10 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: How the Blind Are Reinventing the iPhone
Message-ID: <p06240834cbcc2fd1f467@[10.0.1.5]>
How the Blind Are Reinventing the iPhone
By Liat Kornowski
The Atlantic
At first many blind people thought that the iPhone would never be
accessible to them, with its flat glass screen. But the opposite has
proved true.
Maria Rios, 66, woke up at 6am. She got out of bed in her little
second floor apartment on the north side of Central Park, and checked
her iPhone for the weather. Then she felt around in her closet, where
she had marked her navy blue garments with safety pins, to tell them
apart from her black ones. In the adjacent room, her roommate Lynette
Tatum, 49, picked out a white sweater and dark denim slacks. She used
her VizWiz iPhone app to take a photograph and send it to a
customer-service rep who lets her know what color the item is.
For the visually impaired community, the introduction of the iPhone
in 2007 seemed at first like a disaster -- the standard-bearer of a
new generation of smartphones was based on touch screens that had no
physical differentiation. It was a flat piece of glass. But soon
enough, word started to spread: The iPhone came with a built-in
accessibility feature. Still, members of the community were hesitant.
But no more. For its fans and advocates in the visually-impaired
community, the iPhone has turned out to be one of the most
revolutionary developments since the invention of Braille. That the
iPhone and its world of apps have transformed the lives of its
visually impaired users may seem counter-intuitive -- but their
impact is striking.
Watching Rios and Tatum navigate the world with the aid of their
iPhones is a lesson in the transformative and often unpredictable
impacts that technology has on our lives. After getting dressed, they
strap on their backpacks, canes in hand, and walk out the door. They
can't see the sign someone hung in the elevator, informing them the
building is switching to FIOS, but the minute they're outside the
fact they can't see is a minor detail. They use Sendero -- "an app
made for the blind, by the blind," says Tatum -- an accessible GPS
that announces the user's current street, city, cross street, and
nearby points of interest. What it's missing, adds Tatum, is a
feature that tells you which bus is arriving and what its next stop
is. In the meantime they walk a couple of blocks south to catch the
M1 downtown.
...
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/05/how-the-blind-are-reinventing-the-iphone/256589/
Date: Sun, 6 May 2012 14:43:01 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: New ransomware impersonates the U.S Department of Justice
Message-ID: <p06240850cbcc7641b2a1@[10.0.1.5]>
New ransomware impersonates the U.S Department of Justice
By Dancho Danchev
ZDNet
May 5, 2012
Summary: Security researchers from Trusteer have intercepted a
ransomware variant being pushed using the Citadel crimeware platform.
Security researchers from Trusteer have intercepted a ransomware
variant being pushed using the Citadel crimeware platform.
The ransomware is pushed using drive-by malware attacks. Upon
execution the following activities take place:
Once installed on the victim's computer, the ransomware locks-up
the targeted machine and displays a warning message notifying the
user that they have violated United States Federal Law. The web
inject screen (below) claims the IP address belonging to the
infected machine was identified by the Computer Crime &
Intellectual Property Section as having visited websites that
contain child pornography and other illegal content.In order to
unlock their computer, the victim is instructed to pay a $100 fine
to the US Department of Justice using prepaid money card
services. The payment service options presented to the victim are
based on the geographic location of their IP address. For example,
users with US IP addresses must pay using MoneyPak or Paysafecard.
What's particularly interesting about this campaign, is that it's a
decent example of campaign optimization performed on behalf of the
cybercriminals behind it, adding multiple monetization vectors in it.
Not only will they earn revenue out of the ransomware variant, they
will also be able to successfully hijack online banking transactions
thanks to the Citadel crimeware that will also remain active on the
system.
...
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/security/new-ransomware-impersonates-the-us-department-of-justice/11955
-or-
http://goo.gl/mp9WB
***** Moderator's Note *****
Neal Stephenson's latest work, "REAMDE", is a fictitios account of a
ransomware attack which affects a computer owned by a professional
criminal. It's a great read, and I recomend it.
More to the point of this report, ransomware is the next step in the
evolution of malware: hackers are no longer content to sell purloined
credit card numbers or even online banking credentials. The black hats
have graduated to retail, and are demanding payments directly from
victims, thus bypassing the gangsters who were acting as
very-well-paid middlemen.
Bill Horne
Moderator
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