“Computer intrusions and network attacks are the greatest cyber threat to our national security,” he declared. For that reason, the FBI’s cyber division has begun to focus its attention exclusively on computer intrusions, while lesser “cyber-facilitated” crimes — typically crimes perpetrated over the Internet — are being pursued instead by the Bureau’s criminal investigative division.

Mueller testified that his agency has 1,000 specially trained “agents, analysts, and digital forensic examiners” who handle complex undercover operations and examine digital evidence.

The Bureau serves as executive agent for the National Cyber Investigative Joint Task Force, which consists of representatives from 19 law enforcement and intelligence agencies. “The task force operates through Threat Focus Cells — smaller groups of agents, officers, and analysts focused on particular threats,” Mueller explained.

He cited a handful of FBI success stories in the cyber-crime arena:

- Rove Digital – The FBI took down Rove Digital, a company founded by Estonian and Russian hackers that was committing a “massive Internet fraud scheme.” Seven individuals were indicted in the Southern District of New York, two have been remanded to U.S. custody, and both have pleaded guilty, Mueller reported.
- DDoS malware — The FBI and DHS released since October 2012 almost 168,000 Internet Protocol (IP) addresses that were determined to be infected with DDoS malware.
-Partnerships – The FBI’s cyber division is working increasingly with companies in the private sector to combat cyber threats, the FBI director testified.

Source: Jacob Goodwin

But after coming up with the idea for a system of gears and brackets, it took rather a while to get a US patent. “It wasn’t that difficult in terms of the work [needed to apply],” he says. “I got an attorney to prepare the paperwork and an artist to prepare the drawings to patent office standards. “Then it was a matter of waiting for about two and half years for the first patent, and another two years for the second one.”

While waiting for the first patent, Mr Stadnyk developed and refined his product, which he has called the RoboBracket, turning it into a viable product.

He now employs seven people at MadStad Engineering in Florida, which he launched in 2006, and his US manufactured windshields sell for under $300 (£197). His annual sales total more than $500,000. Mr Stadnyk said that despite the long wait to get the patent, “there was no dispute that this was something new and unique and patentable.” But in March this year the US government changed the rules.

Idea germ

To secure a patent for his next idea (a cosmetic product), Mr Stadnyk won’t have to prove he is the first inventor, he just has to make sure he’s the first inventor to submit the paperwork.

He says that could lead to multiple filings, making it more expensive and difficult for small businesses like his to compete with corporations armed with teams of lawyers.
An illustration from one of Apple’s iPhone patent applications Apple has been involved in a number of patent battles in recent years. Depending on the type of application, securing a single patent can cost between $3,000 and $10,000 in legal fees and a further $2,000 to $5,000 in government processing fees.

“My idea might just be a germ of an idea and not developed. But I file because I’m afraid someone else will file first, [even though] I’ve not had time to experiment to see if it actually works or will sell,” he says. “In the next few months I might find that it’s not going to work the way I want and have to change it. That means I have to file again.”

‘Wait and see’

The first-to-file regulation is part of the America Invents Act, which is aimed at streamlining the patenting process and bringing the US in line with patent laws in other countries.

Elizabeth Dougherty, director of inventor education, outreach and recognition at the US Patent and Trademark Office, acknowledges small business concerns, but says it’s too early to tell whether they’re justified.

“We have to wait and see,” she says. “Some of these procedures are so new and are just being rolled in for the first time; it’s difficult to know what the true case will be.”

She says the act does offer tangible benefits to some small businesses and lone-inventers, in the form of greatly reduced patent application fees. And she says US businesses will find it easier to partner with companies abroad because the patent laws are now more compatible.

‘Eureka moment’

The America Invents Act also aims to give businesses better access to the expertise found in many US colleges and universities.
British designer James Dyson British designer James Dyson successfully defended his vacuum’s patents in the early 2000s

Education institutions contain a wealth of research that often goes no further than the classroom. But small businesses are being encouraged to draw on these hubs of knowledge when developing an idea. And many small business themselves are formed as a direct result of student research.

“It’s about making science useful,” says Mark Crowell, executive director of University of Virginia innovation in Charlottesville.

“The old days when one sat in a garage or alone in a lab and had that eureka moment – it happens – but it’s no longer sufficient. You need people who understand markets, patent landscapes and finance and how to make something actually work once you’ve had the idea.”

He says securing intellectual property (IP) ownership has become increasingly challenging because of the volume of open-source knowledge and the huge number of existing patents. Investors often demand patents before they’ll fund further research or development.

“It’s changed the nature of what we do. We discuss IP for new drugs earlier in the day than we did 25 years ago. Before, if we could just get a patent on the initial compound, we felt we were home free. Today we are more sophisticated, and because of the knowledge that’s out there, it takes a lot more.”
Defensive applications
A banner being held up by a protester in India Medical patents are often criticized by some groups for preventing cheaper generic drugs

Some 565,000 patent applications were filed in the US last year and the US Patent and Trademark Office is struggling to keep pace with the backlog.

“The sheer volume speaks to the creativity and status of innovation in America,” says Ms Dougherty. “It’s very positive. We haven’t seen a dramatic decline with the change in law or because of the economy.”

But Randolph Smith, owner of Washington-based law firm Smith Patent Office, says 95% of patents will never leave the drawing board. Large companies in particular obtain them as a defensive measure to prevent competitors from developing a similar product.

And he warns that small businesses must stay abreast of patent law changes if they want to stay competitive.

“A recent survey showed that only 9% of small businesses realise we’ve had the biggest change of patent law in the last 50 years,” he says.

But the resistance is already under way.

The glasseslike device, which allows users to access the Internet, take photos and film short snippets, has been pre-emptively banned by a Seattle bar. Large parts of Las Vegas will not welcome wearers. West Virginia legislators tried to make it illegal to use the gadget, known as Google Glass, while driving.

“This is just the beginning,” said Timothy Toohey, a Los Angeles lawyer specializing in privacy issues. “Google Glass is going to cause quite a brawl.”

As personal technology becomes increasingly nimble and invisible, Glass is prompting questions of whether it will distract drivers, upend relationships and strip people of what little privacy they still have in public.

A pair of lens-less frames with a tiny computer attached to the right earpiece, Glass is promoted by Google as “seamless and empowering.” It will have the ability to capture any chance encounter, from a celebrity sighting to a grumpy salesclerk, and broadcast it to millions in seconds.

“We are all now going to be both the paparazzi and the paparazzi’s target,” said Karen L. Stevenson, a lawyer with Buchalter Nemer in Los Angeles.

Google stresses that Glass is a work in progress, with test versions now being released to 2,000 developers. Another 8,000 “explorers,” people handpicked by Google, will soon get a pair.

Among the safeguards to make it less intrusive: you have to speak or touch it to activate it, and you have to look directly at someone to take a photograph or video of them.

“We are thinking very carefully about how we design Glass because new technology always raises new issues,” said Courtney Hohne, a Google spokeswoman.

Developers, however, are already cracking the limits of Glass. One created a small sensation in tech circles last week with a program that eliminated the need for gestures or voice commands. To snap a picture, all the user needs to do is wink.

The 5 Point Cafe, a Seattle dive bar, was apparently the first to explicitly ban Glass. In part it was a publicity stunt — extremely successful, too, as it garnered worldwide attention — but the bar’s owner, Dave Meinert, said there was a serious side. The bar, he said, was “kind of a private place.”

The legislators in West Virginia were not joking at all. The state banned texting while driving last year but hands-free devices are permitted. That left a loophole for Google Glass. The legislation was introduced too late to gain traction before the most recent session ended, but its sponsor says he is likely to try again.

In Las Vegas, a Caesars Entertainment spokesman noted that computers and recording devices were prohibited in casinos. “We will not allow people to wear Glass while gambling or attending our shows,” he said.

Louis Brandeis and Samuel Warren famously noted in 1890 that “numerous mechanical devices threaten to make good the prediction that ‘what is whispered in the closet shall be proclaimed from the house-tops.’ ”

Glass is arriving just as the courts, politicians, privacy advocates, regulators, law enforcement and tech companies are once again arguing over the boundaries of technology in every walk of life.

The Senate Judiciary Committee voted last month to require law enforcement to have a warrant to access e-mail, not just a subpoena. The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s use of devices that mimic cellphone towers to track down criminals is being challenged in an Arizona case. A California district court recently ruled that private messages on social media were protected without a warrant.

“Google Glass will test the right to privacy versus the First Amendment,” said Bradley Shear, a social media expert at George Washington University.

Google has often been at the forefront of privacy issues. In 2004, it began a free e-mail service, making money by generating ads against the content. Two dozen privacy groups protested. Regulators were urged to investigate whether eavesdropping laws were being violated.

For better or worse, people got used to the idea, and the protests quickly dissipated. Gmail now has over 425 million users. In a more recent episode, the company’s unauthorized data collection during its Street View mapping project prompted government investigations in a dozen countries.

Like many Silicon Valley companies, Google takes the attitude that people should have nothing to hide from intrusive technology.

“If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place,” said Eric Schmidt, then Google’s chief executive, in 2009.

Glass is a major step in Google’s efforts to diversify beyond search, and potentially an extremely lucrative move. Piper Jaffray, an analyst firm, estimates that wearable technology and another major initiative, self-driving cars, could ultimately be a $500 billion opportunity for the company. In the shorter term, IHS, a forecasting firm, estimates that shipments of smart glasses, led by Google Glass, could be as high as 6.6 million in three years.

Thad Starner, a pioneer of wearable computing who is a technical adviser to the Glass team, says he thinks concerns about disruption are overblown.

“Asocial people will be able to find a way to do asocial things with this technology, but on average people like to maintain the social contract,” Mr. Starner said. He added that he and colleagues had experimented with Glass-type devices for years, “and I can’t think of a single instance where something bad has happened.”

An incident at a Silicon Valley event shows, however, the way the increasing ease in capturing a moment can lead to problems — even if unintentionally.

Adria Richards, who worked for the Colorado e-mail company SendGrid, was offended by the jokes two men were cracking behind her at the PyCon developers conference. She posted a picture of them on Twitter with the mildly reproving comment, “Not cool.”

One of the men, who has not been identified, was immediately fired by his employer, PlayHaven. “There is another side to this story,” he wrote on a hacking site, saying it was barely one lame sexual joke. “She gave me no warning, she smiled while she snapped the pic and sealed my fate,” he complained.

Critics lashed out at Ms. Richards, using language much more offensive than the two men used. SendGrid was hacked. The company dismissed Ms. Richards, saying there was such an uproar over her conduct, it “put our business in danger.”

“I don’t think anyone who was part of what happened at PyCon that day could possibly have imagined how this issue would have exploded into the public consciousness,” Ms. Richards reflected later. She has not posted on Twitter since.

Twitter’s app – called #Music – is expected to be made available to download for Apple’s iPhone shortly. No app has been made for users on Google’s Android or the Windows Phone platforms – but there will be a web browser-based version. It will initially be available in the UK and Ireland, US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, with more countries being added soon.
Surfacing songs

The app was likened to a “21st Century mixtape” unveiled on Good Morning America. In a blog post, Twitter’s Stephen Philips explained: “It uses Twitter activity, including tweets and engagement, to detect and surface the most popular tracks and emerging artists. “It also brings artists’ music-related Twitter activity front and centre: go to their profiles to see who they follow and listen to songs by those artists.”He added that half of the social network’s users follow at least one musician.

“This is why artists turn to Twitter first to connect with their fans — and why we wanted to find a way to surface songs people are tweeting about.”Apple tried its own music recommendation engine – but closed it last year Ahead of the app’s release, Twitter gave several musicians early access. They included Moby, who wrote: “It’s a really interesting music resource.”

Apple’s failure
Many companies have tried to tap into the potential of social recommendation for music.
London-based Last.fm, which was bought in May 2007 by CBS for £140m, analyses what a user listens to and offers suggestions based on the tastes of other Last.fm members who enjoy similar artists. Apple also dipped its toe into the market with Ping – a service built into its iTunes software that promoted music it thought users may like.
At its launch, the late Steve Jobs said: “We think this will be really popular very fast because 160 million people can switch it on today.” Ping was closed in September last year.

The hashtag #music is also featured on the newly-launched music.twitter.com. Reports suggest the new service will offer personalised recommendations on music through its own dedicated app. US celebrity host Ryan Seacrest confirmed the existence of Twitter’s new app on Thursday via a tweet: “playing with @twitter’s new music app (yes it’s real!). there’s a serious dance party happening at idol right now”. The music app could be announced as soon as Friday.

The We Are Hunted acquisition actually happened in 2012, according to reports, suggesting that the music service has long been in the works. In seven years, Twitter has accumulated 200 million users worldwide, who now send an average of 400 million short messages – or tweets – every day. Twitter’s latest move comes as music streaming – where the songs are hosted on servers by companies such as Spotify rather than bought and kept on consumers’ computers – has taken off amid a boom in digital downloading.

The streaming market is now worth £49m to record labels in the UK, the trade body BPI has said. It comes as iPhone-maker Apple is reported to have agreed a deal with the biggest music label Universal to create an internet radio service similar to Pandora using its iTunes platform.

A statement on Apple’s China website said “misunderstandings” may have led to the perception “Apple’s attitude was arrogant” towards Chinese customers. Mr Cook promised to improve the repair policy on the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S, and to improve warranty information.”We are aware that a lack of communications… led to the perception Apple’s attitude was arrogant and that we do not care and attach importance to consumer feedback,” Mr Cook wrote. “We express our sincere apologies for any concerns or misunderstandings this gave consumers.”

Apple said it would enhance communication with Chinese consumers and strengthen oversight of authorised resellers. Earlier this year, Mr Cook said he expected China to replace North America as Apple’s largest source of revenue. China is currently Apple’s second-largest market, with more than 17,000 outlets selling its products. The company says it has eight stores in mainland China, with another three in Greater China, which includes Hong Kong.

‘Incomparable arrogance’.
State broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV) first criticised Apple on 15 March on a show about consumer rights and safety. The program accused Apple of failing to offer new replacement iPhones if major repairs are needed during a one-year warranty.

People’s Daily
Following on from that, the state’s flagship newspaper, People’s Daily, portrayed Apple as the latest Western company to exploit Chinese citizens. Last week the paper ran an editorial headlined: “Strike down Apple’s incomparable arrogance”. “Here we have the Western person’s sense of superiority making mischief,” the paper wrote. “If there’s no risk in offending the Chinese consumer, and it also makes for lower overheads, then why not?” However, some observers in China called it hypocrisy that the paper often does not feature incidents where Chinese companies have been named as part of food safety scares, environmental violations or corruption scandals.

Apple will now offer full replacements of iPhone 4 and 4S models, and a one-year warranty will start from the date of replacement. It will also allow customers to offer feedback directly, Mr Cook said. Apple is not the first foreign company to come under pressure from Chinese media. Last year, CCTV featured McDonald’s and Carrefour for food safety violations. The companies later apologised. Most recently, the parent company behind KFC, Yum, apologised after reports that chicken from some of its suppliers had excess amounts of hormones and drugs.

The Galaxy S4 follows on from last year’s S3, a product that sold over 40 million units worldwide.
At a lavish, Broadway-themed event in New York, the company also demonstrated the phone’s ability to take two different pictures at once.

Analysts widely regard Samsung to be the biggest challenger to Apple’s dominance of mobile products.The Galaxy S4 will be rolled out globally at the end of April.Following the launch, shares in Samsung fell 1.7% in early trade in Seoul on Friday amid worries the market for phone upgrades was “flattening out”.

The company’s head of mobile communications, JK Shin said 327 mobile operators in 155 countries will carry the handset.Samsung Galaxy S4 The device will be made available in two colours, white and black.In the UK, Vodafone, Three, Orange, T-Mobile and EE have all announced plans to offer the device on their networks.

Through a series of role-playing scenes, the South Korean firm demonstrated the phone’s key features.Much was made of the device’s ability to be controlled without touching it.Using “Smart pause”, the user can pause a video by looking away from the screen.Additionally, the “Smart Scroll” software analyses the user’s eyes and wrist to scroll through emails and other content.
‘Gimmicky’

“The debut of nifty eye motion-sensitive controls to allow users to pause video and scroll through pages using eye movements alone is smart,” said telecoms expert Ernest Doku from uSwitch.com.

“For commuters crammed in trains – or just those who love a bit of futuristic tech that makes their lives easier – this novel feature will really help the Galaxy S4 to stand out.”
Continue reading the main story

However, Charles Golvin from Forrester Research worried the swathes of new features may alienate some customers. “The larger question is how much of this stuff can people actually use,” he told the BBC.

“There’s no question that there’s a lot of powerful technology and innovative features – but whether people will care about them or use them I’m not sure. “Including an image of yourself in a picture that you’re taking for someone else – yes, I think that’s a bit gimmicky. “But on the video side, for a live chat where it’s compositing you and your image to show both you and what you’re seeing – that’s not a gimmick.”
Lighter and thinner

In another scene, depicting a backpacker in Shanghai, the phone was shown to translate English text into Chinese speech – before translating Chinese speech back into English text.
SAmsung press event The dual camera function takes pictures using both rear and front cameras

The dual camera feature makes use of the device’s front and rear cameras simultaneously, blending the pictures together to make sure the picture taker is not “left out”.

The rear has a 13 megapixel camera, while the user-facing camera captures pictures at 2 megapixels.The phone weighs 130g, and is 7.9mm thick – making it slightly lighter and thinner than the S3. The device uses Samsung’s HD AMOLED technology, giving the S4′s screen – which is marginally bigger than the S3′s – a resolution of 441 pixels-per-inch. As predicted by several industry experts before the event, most of the presentation focused on the phone’s software rather than hardware.

As well as the “touchless” technology, the company also introduced the Samsung Hub – a multimedia storage facility that can be shared across multiple Samsung devices.

The case comes a week after Galaxy smartphone manufacturer failed to secure an iPhone ban in Japan.Samsung has pursued a number of claims against Apple in courts worldwide, but has won only a minority of the cases.

It said in a statement it was disappointed by the court’s decision and would consider whether to file an appeal.”For decades, we have heavily invested in pioneering the development of technological innovations in the mobile industry, which have been constantly reflected in our products,” a spokeswoman said.

Legal battles between the two companies began in 2011, when Apple first sued Samsung in the US for alleged intellectual property infringements.Other court cases have taken place in France, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands, Italy, South Korea and Japan.

According to the latest stats from comScore, Facebook was the most popular mobile app in the United States in 2012. The Google Maps app held the top position until October, when Apple rolled out its latest mobile operating system, iOS 6, and replaced the built-in Google Maps app with its own, less accurate version.

Of course, Facebook also had a hand in its own success. Its number of monthly unique visitors rose steadily over the course of the year. In August, the company rolled out a long overdue revamp of its iOS mobile app for iPhone and iPads, significantly speeding up the launch, scroll and browsing times. User reviews in Apple’s App Store shot up as a result, and in December the company followed up with a better version of its Android app.

Facebook started 2012 facing criticisms of its mobile strategy, and while there are still lingering questions about how it will make money off of mobile, these stats show its adept at transferring the Facebook experience to tablets and smartphones.

People aren’t just opening their Facebook app the most, they’re spending astonishingly large chunks of time in the app, poking around and reading up on their friends. The social network’s app was the single largest, single app time suck, accounting for 23% of the time people spend using mobile apps, according to comScore. Instagram was a distant second accounting for just 3% of the time people spend in apps. Google’s app with the most engagement was Gmail, but in total 10% of users’ time was spent across various Google apps.

The more interesting story in the coming year might be Google’s rise to dominate all mobile platforms, not just its own Android operating system.

Facebook may have the No. 1 spot locked up, but Google apps account for the next five most popular apps. After Maps, Google Play, Google Search, Gmail and YouTube were the top apps on Android and iOS devices in December. Google only re-released an iOS version of its Maps app in December, which could continue to fight back and possibly overtake Facebook in 2013.

Apple’s only app on the list is iTunes, coming in at 8th place. Rounding out the top 10 list are Pandora Radio, Cooliris and Yahoo! Messenger.

Source: CNN News

Smartphones purchased after Saturday can’t be legally unlocked without permission from the carrier, according to a recent ruling by the Library of Congress.

Congress passed the Digital Millennium Copyright Act in 1998, making it illegal to access copyrighted content and break digital rights management technologies. The software that locks a smartphone to one carrier is covered by the act, and unlocking a phone is the process of freeing a device so that it can be used with a different wireless carrier.

The Library of Congress has the ability to grant exemptions to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which it has done in the past for smartphone users who wished to unlock their phones. That changed with the most recent group of exemptions that went into effect October 28, but the switch included a 90-day grace period that ends Saturday, as TechNewsDaily pointed out.

The new policy only applies to new locked phones purchased after Saturday, meaning it will still be legal to unlock phones purchased before January 26 without permission.

One way to get around the requirement is to buy a full-priced unlocked phone that doesn’t have a contract, but doing so adds hundreds of dollars to the phone’s price tag. Carriers subsidize the costs of smartphones to draw new customers in with contracts, usually for two years, and then make back the money from monthly voice and data bills.

In its latest ruling, the Library of Congress decided the software on a phone is only licensed to the end user, meaning they don’t own it, so therefore the software is not covered by fair-use rules.

Groups that lobbied to keep the exemption argued that making unlocking illegal is anti-competitive and could result in costlier phones and more electronic waste since some consumers would have to buy a new device to switch carriers.

But the final ruling says there are more options now for obtaining an unlocked phone than in previous years. Many phones are available unlocked for full price, and carriers do have policies in place for unlocking phones. Currently the rules vary from carrier to carrier.

For example, AT&T will unlock an iPhone for current or past customers as long as all contracts have been fulfilled. And Verizon’s iPhone 5 is usable on AT&T’s network.

However, it’s unclear whether carriers will tighten these rules about unlocked phones in the future.

Source: CNN News