Day: October 5, 2007

Americans wrong about computer security

Most Americans believe their computers are protected against viruses and spyware, but scans found that a large number had outdated or disabled security software, according to a poll released on Monday. Fully 87 percent of Americans polled said they had antivirus software, 73 percent said they had a firewall and 70 percent said they had antispyware software, according to the survey by security software maker McAfee and the National Cyber Security Alliance. But when pollsters asked to remotely scan the respondents’ computers, the story turned out to be very different. While 94 percent of those polled had

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October 5, 2007 No Comments

Lawmaker urges FCC clampdown on access charges

A senior Democratic lawmaker on Tuesday urged the Federal Communications Commission to help cut fees that major U.S. phone carriers charge rivals for access to high-capacity lines serving business and wireless customers. Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.), chairman of the House telecommunications subcommittee, said the FCC should reinstate regulations that would force Verizon Communications and AT&T to provide affordable access to high-capacity fiber-optic lines. “Unless this market failure is corrected, (the fees) could have a negative impact on all wireless broadband deployment…Markey said at a subcommittee hearing. For more info click here

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October 5, 2007 No Comments

Spam-scam crackdown nets $2 billion in fake checks

An international crackdown on Internet financial scams this year has yielded more than $2.1 billion in seized fake checks and 77 arrests in the Netherlands, Nigeria and Canada, U.S. and other authorities said on Wednesday. The scammers, often West African organized crime groups, use ploys such as “spam” e-mail offering to pay recipients “processing fees” for depositing checks, which later turn out to be phony, and sending the ostensible proceeds to the scammer, authorities said. For more info click here 

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October 5, 2007 No Comments