A New Zealand teenager is facing a 10-year jail term after being accused of leading an international group of computer hackers called the A-Team that infiltrated more than a million computers worldwide and swindled their owners out of £12.5m .
The 18-year-old, working from his bedroom, is said to have collaborated with American associates in hijacking hundreds of thousands of computers around the world.
The case is part of an international crackdown on hackers who create networks of computers known as "botnets" to access personal bank accounts, steal credit card information or bombard users with spam. Eight people have already been charged, pleaded guilty or have been convicted since the operation under the auspices of the FBI began in June and more warrants are pending in the US and overseas.
Science & Technology
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| ©National Geographic/artist's rendering |
| Dakota, a 67-million-year-old "dino mummy" unveiled today by a British paleontologist, is seen here in an artist's rendering. |
The extraordinarily preserved hadrosaur, or duck-billed dino, still had much of its tissues and bones intact, encased in an envelope of skin.
One American student sent major corporations, governments and even the Vatican on the defensive after coming up with Wikipedia Scanner, a software program that reveals who changed Wikipedia entries.
Wikipedia.com is an online encyclopedia edited by general users, who write articles on every imaginable subject. Since it is written by users, anyone can edit, delete and arrange the articles on Wikipedia.
What Virgil Griffith did was come up with a program that reveals who edits these articles, via a system where it scans the I.P address and cross-references it with the I.P. directory.
Wikipedia.com is an online encyclopedia edited by general users, who write articles on every imaginable subject. Since it is written by users, anyone can edit, delete and arrange the articles on Wikipedia.
What Virgil Griffith did was come up with a program that reveals who edits these articles, via a system where it scans the I.P address and cross-references it with the I.P. directory.
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| ©Unknown |
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From the deserts of the American southwest to the pine forests of the Deep South, drought-weary residents have one thing on their minds: "I wish it would rain!" Technically, what they should be wishing for is "more streamflow," says Dr. Ashutosh Limaye, a hydrologist at the National Space Science and Technology Center (NSSTC) in Huntsville, Alabama.
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| ©Unknown |
Japanese electronics giant NEC Corp. said Friday it has created a world-first real-time translator on a cellphone, which can instantly turn Japanese travellers' words into English.
The person you're speaking with may be looking at you, but are they really paying attention" Or has the person covertly shifted their attention, without moving their eyes" Dr. Brian Corneil, of the Centre for Brain and Mind at The University of Western Ontario in London, Canada has found a way of actually measuring covert attention. His research "Neuromuscular consequences of reflexive covert orienting" is posted on the Advance Online Publication of "Nature Neuroscience".
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| ©ESA/ DLR/ FU Berlin (G. Neukum) |
| This image was taken by the High-Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC), onboard ESA's Mars Express imaged the Noctis Labyrinthus region, the 'Labyrinth of the Night' on Mars. The HRSC took these pictures on 25 June 2006 in orbit 3155, with a ground resolution of approximately 16 m/pixel. This colour scene has been derived from the three HRSC colour channels and the nadir channel. |
These images taken by the High-Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC), onboard ESA's Mars Express imaged the Noctis Labyrinthus region, the 'labyrinth of the night' on Mars. The HRSC took these pictures on 25 June 2006 in orbit 3155, with a ground resolution of approximately 16 m/pixel. Noctis Labyrinthus lies at approximately 6.5 south and 260 east. The Sun illuminates the scene from the north-west, top right in the image above.
ESA's Venus Express has revealed Venus as never before. For the first time, scientists are able to investigate from the top of its atmosphere, down nearly to the surface. They have shown it to be a planet of surprises that may once have been more Earth-like, and still is, to a certain extent. Scientists hope that by studying atmosphere and climate of Venus, we may be able to better understand phenomenon such as global warming our own planet, Earth.
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| ©NASA |
| Mars (left), Earth (middle), Venus (right) with relative sizes. |
A partially mummified hadrosaur discovered by a teenager in North Dakota may be the most complete dinosaur ever found, with intact skin that shows evidence of stripes and perhaps soft tissue, researchers said on Monday.
Enough of the animal remains to show it ran quickly and was far more muscular than scientists believed such dinosaurs were.
Enough of the animal remains to show it ran quickly and was far more muscular than scientists believed such dinosaurs were.
A 500-year old mystery surrounding the centre-piece of the alchemists' lab kit has been solved by UCL (University College London) and Cardiff University archaeologists.
Since the Middle Ages, mixing vessels - or crucibles - manufactured in the Hesse region of Germany have been world renowned because of their ability to withstand strong reagents and high temperatures.
Previous work by the team has shown that Hessian crucibles have been found in archaeological sites across the world, including Scandinavia, Central Europe, Spain, Portugal, the UK, and even colonial America. At the time, many people tried to reproduce them but always failed.
Now, writing in Nature, the researchers reveal using petrographic, chemical and X-ray diffraction analysis that Hessian crucible makers made use of an advanced material only properly identified and named in the 20th century.
Since the Middle Ages, mixing vessels - or crucibles - manufactured in the Hesse region of Germany have been world renowned because of their ability to withstand strong reagents and high temperatures.
Previous work by the team has shown that Hessian crucibles have been found in archaeological sites across the world, including Scandinavia, Central Europe, Spain, Portugal, the UK, and even colonial America. At the time, many people tried to reproduce them but always failed.
Now, writing in Nature, the researchers reveal using petrographic, chemical and X-ray diffraction analysis that Hessian crucible makers made use of an advanced material only properly identified and named in the 20th century.
