Bug affects Internet Explorer 6 and Internet Explorer 7
Microsoft has warned that hackers are already exploiting the flaw, which could allow them to remotely take control of a computer running Microsoft's Windows operating system. Computer users running Internet Explorer 5.01 or the latest release, Internet Explorer 8, are not affected by the vulnerability.
"At this time, we are aware of targeted attacks attempting to use this vulnerability," Microsoft said in a security advisory. "We will continue to monitor the threat environment and update this advisory if this situation changes."
Google has added a patch to its latest beta and stable versions of Chrome to make the browser work better with Microsoft’s Hotmail site.
With the patch, Chrome tells Microsoft’s site it’s actually Apple’s Safari browser, sidestepping a compatibility issue that had caused problems using the site.
“While the Hotmail team works on a proper fix, we’re deploying a workaround that changes the user agent string that Google Chrome sends when requesting URLs that end with mail.live.com,” Chrome Product Manager Mark Larson said in a blog announcement. It also fixes a problem sending mail from Yahoo Mail, he said.
The patch is in Chrome 1.0.154.46, which also fixes a severe security problem. read more
Intel on Thursday showed off a wireless electric power system that analysts say could revolutionize modern life by freeing devices from transformers and wall outlets.
Intel chief technology officer Justin Rattner demonstrated a Wireless Energy Resonant Link as he spoke at the California firm's annual developers forum in San Francisco.
Electricity was sent wirelessly to a lamp on stage, lighting a 60 watt bulb that uses more power than a typical laptop computer.
Most importantly, the electricity was transmitted without zapping anything or anyone that got between the sending and receiving units.
"The trick with wireless power is not can you do it; it's can you do it safely and efficiently," Intel researcher Josh Smith said in an online video explaining the breakthrough.
"It turns out the human body is not affected by magnetic fields; it is affected by elective fields. So what we are doing is transmitting energy using the magnetic field not the electric field."
Examples of potential applications include airports, offices or other buildings that could be rigged to supply power to laptops, mobile telephones or other devices toted into them.
The technology could also be built into plugged in computer components, such as monitors, to enable them to broadcast power to devices left on desks or carried into rooms, according to Smith.
"Initially it eliminates chargers and eventually it eliminates batteries all together," analyst Rob Enderle of Enderle Group said of Intel's wireless power system.
"That is potentially a world changing event. This is the closest we've had to something being commercially available in this class."
Previous wireless power systems consisted basically of firing lightning bolts from sending to receiving units.
Smith says Intel's wireless power system is still in an early stage of development and much research remains before it can be brought to market.
Rattner spoke of technological transformations he expects by the year 2050.
"You'd like to cut the last cord," Smith said.
"It's great that we have wireless email and wireless internet and stuff like that but at the end of the day it would be nice to have wireless recharge as well."
By MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP Business Writer
SAN FRANCISCO - In an assessment that could lead to a substantial charge against its future profits, Google Inc. believes its $1 billion investment in advertising partner AOL is souring.
The Mountain View-based company disclosed in a quarterly report filed late Thursday with the Securities and Exchange Commission that the 5 percent AOL stake that it bought in 2005 "may be impaired." Impairment is an accounting term used to describe an acquisition or investment that has eroded.
Unless there is an about-face, the acquiring company eventually must absorb a charge on its books to account for the diminished value of its holdings.
Google acknowledged for the first time that it might have to recognize a loss on its 5 percent stake in AOL, whose struggles have made it a financial albatross for its owner, Time Warner Inc.
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