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Researchers at TippingPoint Technologies’ Digital Vaccine Laboratories have found a way to infiltrate and seize control of one of the world’s largest spam-spewing botnets. By reverse engineering the encryption they have successfully cracked into the botnet. They basically have the ability to create a fake Kraken server capable of overtaking a redirected zombie.

Essentially, TippingPoint can now overtake the infected system and cause it to connect to TippingPoint’s fake Kraken server and receive a command to kill the target process handing the communication. In other words, they CAN stop the spam spewing from these machines. The catch is, they would be sending remote commands to someone’s computer without their knowledge which has caused an ethical dilemma. If they send the commands and stop the spam they are basically hacking the infected computer to do something the end user doesn’t know about.

Personally, I say they send the commands… the computers are already infected. I can however see the issue they have, nobody wants their machine doing anything without their permission. They don’t want to be as bad as the bad guys.

Read more on the issue at eWeek.

Ok so the Alltel Touch got a new ROM update that added EVDO Rev. A. It also fixed some BlueTooth issues and added video messaging.It didn’t however, include aGPS (wierd huh?)

While Sprint users are waiting (and waiting) for the Windows Mobile 6.1 update that we assume will have REvA and GPS (only WM6.1 was officially announced) apparently some craft folks over at PPCGeeks have managed to take the Alltel ROM, rip it apart and get it to install on the Sprint Touch. So… if you’re comfortable with it you can now get not only RevA but GPS on your Sprint Touch as well!

• Sprint Rev A + GPS
• Verizon Rev A + GPS - some have reported this isn’t totally stable yet

Worldometers is managed by an international team of developers, researchers, and volunteers with the goal of making world statistics available in a thought-provoking and time relevant format to a wide audience around the world.

It’s pretty interesting to see information on the number of books sold, cars sold, computers sold, water used versus people without viable drinking water, etc.Here’s a screenshot of a small portion of the stats they show (note that when you view it on the website below the statistics are being update in real-time.:

http://www.worldometers.info/

Many moons ago I got REALLY tired of installing XP, and then downloading updates/applying service packs. Turns out you can slipstream the service packs onto a new Windows XP installation disk. Essentially this allows you to create a Windows XP installation with the Service Pack already part of the install.

So, what IS slipstreaming? Back when Microsoft was developing Windows 2000, the company decided to create up a more elegant way of integrating service packs and other fixes back into the core OS, so that enterprise customers could always maintain an install set of the latest version of Windows, ready to be installed at any time on new machines. It’s also useful for end users who reinstall often. Paul Thurott’s SuperSite detailed this for the release of SP2.

Thurott’s method requires that you hit the command line for the slipstream creation. It’s not difficult process, however there’s an easier method using a free tool called nLite.

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Coming at ya straight from LifeHacker is the Top 10 Amazon Power Shopper Tools:

You already love the one-stop convenience of shopping online at Amazon.com, but chances are you’re not getting everything you can out of this feature-packed shopping engine. Did you know Amazon can email you suggestions from Mom’s wish list two weeks before her birthday? Automatically ship you a new case of toilet paper every two months? Refund the difference on the price of an item you purchased that went on sale? Several advanced Amazon features and third party apps and add-ons can help you get the best deals and the stuff you want delivered to your door right on time. After the jump, add our favorite 10 Amazon power-shopper tools to your cart.

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