A New Research to Make Computers Hacker-proof

A bad news for hackers:

Hackers can now be discouraged from hacking into user accounts despite having access to passwords, reveals a new research from Lebanon. According to the Key-Pattern Analysis (KPA), a new approach developed by the American University of Beirut, the password stolen by hackers can become ineffective. KPA is an attempt to scrutinise the speed with which a user taps the keys as well as measuring the gaps between keystrokes, the beat of their typing.

Biometric profile:

The result can be a biometric profile of the way individual users type in their password.

If the biometric profile does not match the user, then the password fails even if it is "correct, reports the International Journal of Internet Technology and Secured Transactions."

However, Ravel Jabbour, Wes Masri and Ali El-Hajj at the university point out that a modified keyboard would be inconvenient for an organisation or individual.

So, the team instead has incorporated "intra" timing that measures how long each key remains pressed, which gives them the beat of the typing and is a much more robust parameter.

The programme gathers information about how the users type in their password by recording the electronic signals from a standard keyboard as keys are pressed and released. Users would be expected to repeatedly type their password at the log-in registration stage to record a reproducible typing pattern for permitting a log-in.

LG Crystal, A Terrific Cell Phone

LG are known for their original and creative phone ideas and the LG Crystal is another unique design. This is the first mobile to have a completely transparent keyboard. The phone, not being too dissimilar to the Samsung Tocco Ultra, consists of a touch screen user interface combined with a slide down keypad. The main difference from the Samsung though is that the crystal has a completely touch sensitive keypad as well. There are no separate keys with just a flat, see-through surface with numbers etched in.

The main display, as well as being touch screen has a very high resolution 800 x 480 pixels and 16 million colours as well as the actual size of the screen is quite impressive also being 3” diagonal. The features on this phone are also pretty cool such as the ability to draw a character on the screen to access your music, inbox, etc even if they are a slight bit gimmicky. But you can’t help but feel that with a price of up to £350 SIM-free LG could have given you something a little more special.

One problem that I have found after a couple of weeks of use is that when texting, you have the option of an on-screen QWERTY keyboard which is good and easily accessible but sometimes it locks up and you have to exit your text to unfreeze the phone.

Although the transparent keypad looks snazzy and is a great show off at the pub the original and cool design took all of 10 seconds for the novelty to wear off and for the £350 phone to slip into my pocket to be used just as I used my old, reasonably priced one.

To conclude, the new LG Crystal is a cool new design that could definitely be developed and the features are all quite neat concepts with a pretty good camera. The only drawback with this original mobile is the massive price tag associated with a phone that doesn’t quite give me all I wanted for the money I splashed out.

Battery – Standard battery, Li-Ion
Camera – 8 megapixel camera (3264×2448 pixels) with LED flash, autofocus and night mode, this mobile phone also has video and a secondary video-call camera

Data Features – GPRS Class 12 (4+1/3+2/2+3/1+4 slots, 32 – 48 kbps), EDGE Class 10 (236.8 kbps), Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g, Bluetooth v2.0 with A2DP, USB and 3G (HSDPA, 7.2 Mbps)

Display – 3-inch TFT capacitive touchscreen (16-million colours/480 x 800 pixels) featuring S-Class Touch UI, Multi-touch input method, Accelerometer sensor for UI auto-rotate, Transparent touch-sensitive keypad, Gesture Shortcut and Handwriting recognition

Size and Weight – 105 x 52.5 x 13.4mm

Networks – 2G Network GSM 850/900/1800/1900 and 3G Network HSDPA 2100

Memory Features – Phonebook and photo-call memory, plus Call records at 40 dialled, 40 received, 40 missed calls, also comes with a microSD (TransFlash) card slot up to 16GB

Sound – Vibration alert, MP3 ringtones, Speakerphone, Downloadable polyphonic and Dolby Mobile

Other Features
• Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional OS
• SMS, EMS & MMS Messaging
• Email
• Instant Messaging
• Java MIDP 2.0
• TV-out
• HTML, WAP 2.0/xHTML Browser
• FM radio
• FM transmitter
• Games
• DivX, XviD, MPEG4 player
• MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA player
• Document viewer (DOC, XLS, PPT, PDF)
• Voice memo
• Organizer
• Alarm
• Calendar
• Notepad
• Calculator
• Clock
• To-do
• T9

What are the profit margins for wholesale mobile phone dealers?

The mobile industry presented incredible prospects in terms of business when the device was first developed. Today, even though the competition in the entire supply management chain is fierce, but more wholesalers seem increasing interested to plunge into the business. All of this is because of the fact that despite tough competition, the mobile industry offers decent profit margins and a magnificent growth rate.

While manufacturers around the globe are busy developing newer models of hi-tech phones, there is a constant demand for simple and cheaper sets in the market. Wholesalers have little profit margins in the sale of these cheap sets but since cheaper sets are not that durable, they need to be replaced fairly often. This keeps a steady demand for these sets, offering a fair profit for the suppliers as well as others.

There are many ways of increasing these profit margins.

1. Catalogue:

One of the ways to do so is by offering your clients and customers a catalogue. By using catalogues, one can cut down the rental, maintenance costs on the warehouses. Because of the tough competition in the market, one cannot raise the wholesale prices of the items so it’s a smart idea to cut down on the associated expenses instead.

2. Market Rates:

The mobile phone wholesalers and dealers should also keep an eye on the Market rates. If you have no idea about the market trends and the costs of certain items, you will not be able to asses the compatible price and hence lose much of your profit margin. You will only be able to eke out a reasonable profit if you have a clear idea as to what the market has to offer. Remember, your offer must be close to the market rates, neither too inflated nor too wafer thin.

3. International Market:

The rates offered by the local market might be the complete opposite of those in the international or say in any of the South Asian countries where the IT sector is at its zenith. The difference between the currency and the rates in the local markets, these countries can make a considerable difference in the prices. In any case, as a wholesaler, you might want to consider importing from or exporting to any such countries to further fatten up your profit margins.

Young more eager to pay via mobile fones

The

mobile

and banking industries have been all abuzz lately about offering consumers the ability to pay for items through their cell phones. But how do consumers actually feel about this?

Survey results

releas

ed yesterday by MasterCard tried to gauge how comfortable people would be using their cell phones to pay for items on the go at stores, restaurants, and other retail outlets. And

like many surveys focused on new technologies, this one showed a fairly big gap in feelings between the young and the not-as-young.

Among those 18 to 34 years old, 63 percent said they would be at ease using their mobile phones to make purchases. But among those 35 and older, only 37 percent expressed the same level of comfort.

Younger people feel much more dependent on their cell phones in general, the survey found. About 65 percent of those in the 18 to 34 range said they'd feel more naked without their phones than their wallets, compared with only 34 percent of those 35 and older who said the same thing.

Kelton Research, which polled 1,000 people, conducted the survey between April 15 and April 22 through an e-mail invitation and online survey.

Looking at other results of the survey, more men (51 percent) than women (40 percent) would be comfortable using their phones to make a mobile payment. Slightly more men (49 percent) than women (45 percent) would be impressed by someone who used their cell phone rather than a credit card to pay for something. Yet women (50 percent) more than men (36 percent) feel more exposed without their cell phones than their wallets.

But as always, security is a major concern. Almost 62 percent of those polled said they'd need to be sure that their personal information was safe in order to make a purchase through their mobile phones.

Mobile phone makers, wireless carriers, and financial companies have all been busy trying to ramp up the mobile payments technology of near-field communications, or NFC. With the necessary NFC hardware and credit card information stored on their phones, consumers would be able to pay for items and services by touching or passing over other equipped phones as well as NFC-enabled registers and terminals. The technology is seen as the next step beyond existing contactless mobile payment systems such as Visa's PayWave and MasterCard's PayPass.

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-20064657-93.html#ixzz1Mykx5ruH

New devices boost MP3 use at home

Request Multimedia and S3 have developed new products that may expand the popularity of digital music beyond portable devices and desktop PCs.

S3, which markets the Diamond Rio portable MP3 player, today unveiled the Rio Digital Audio Receiver, designed to stream digital music from the PC to stereo speakers throughout a house using existing phone lines. In addition, Request today began shipping a home MP3 player that stores hundreds of hours of MP3-coded music on a 17GB hard drive.

The new digital music appliances are another indication that the MP3 craze is not a portable phenomenon alone. Although pocket-sized devices such as the Rio and Creative Labs' Nomad popularized MP3, electronics companies are recognizing it as a potential "killer app" for home networking.




MP3 is a popular standard for compressing digital music into manageable file sizes.

"There's a lot of interest, and it will develop over time as the technology becomes more mainstream," said Kevin Hause, an analyst with International Data Corp. He added that the market is still in its infancy, which offers opportunities for companies outside the consumer electronics realm, such as S3, a maker of graphics chips, and start-up Request.

"This market may be a couple hundred thousand units, which isn't as interesting to Sony or Thomson as it is to a start-up company," Hause said. "It's a good opportunity to put a stake in the ground, especially for a company like S3 with Diamond who wants to continue their market leadership."

S3’s strategy, for example, is to integrate Diamond's home networking technology and the Rio product line, with the goal being a home full of digital stereos and speakers connected by S3 technology.

"When you think about what a home network is useful for, the applications of digital media and entertainment jump to the top of the list," Hause said. "It's the next logical step in enabling other types of devices."

The Rio Digital Audio Receiver is a sort of stop-gap solution. The appliance transfers music stored on the PC to a receiver, which then pipes music throughout the house using existing phone lines, Diamond said. For example, a person could plug S3-compatible speakers into phone jacks in the bedroom and the kitchen and use the receiver to play different songs in each room.

"We're continuing to make good on our promise to take digital music beyond the PC," Mike Reed, director of marketing for the Rio group at S3, said in a statement today.

The device works with Real Networks' music management software and with Diamond's own proprietary software. Rio's Digital Audio Receiver is priced at $299.

The new Audio Request appliance from Request is essentially a large hard drive connected to speakers that acts as a digital music server for the home. The 17GB drive can store up to 300 hours of songs and can store songs from a CD after it is played once.

Eventually, Request plans to sell a device that connects directly to the Internet to permit the downloading of MP3 music without a PC. But this first version acts as a middleman: It will receive and store music from the PC and send it to the home stereo. The company also announced a deal today with eMusic, which will provide sample MP3 music to Audio Request users.

"Listening to music directly from CDs will soon become a thing of the past," Steven Vasquez, Request's CEO, said in a statement.

The Audio Request is priced at $799.95.