Beware, This Virus Could be spoofing Your E-mail ID

A virus named W32klez.eml is now prowl in India and uses E-Mail spoofing as a part of its spreading strategy. This worm which manifests in various forms has the ability to send out e-mails ostensibly from a e-mail address of some innocent e-mail ID, which could very well be yours.

Detailed Story Here

Osama Bin Laden Would be happy!!!

A couple of years back, there was a big hue and cry about copyright violations on the Internet with pictures being copied without permission of the owners. This lead to the development of the technology  of "Steganography", the science of hiding text messages within pictures.

Now there appears to be the beginning of another chapter of  "Hiding of Messages within Digital Video Messages" being promoted by Copyright protectionists. Perhaps Osama may be beaming with happiness in his hideout that his next major attack can now be planned. While pictures could only carry small text files, the Video CDs can carry perhaps the entire strategy on a nuclear attack along with maps and tutorials.

Welcome to the era of Steganography ++

Detailed Story Here

Time for Verify4lookaliles service to be used.?

A Canadian Company doing business as Domain Name registrars has been forced to pay back $375,000 collected by falsely inducing public to register domain names in different TLD extensions...While the fraud has been adequately dealt with for the time being, it is necessary to observe that the main reason why such a fraud could be committed was because of the perception that web surfers could be mislead with the similar names.

Naavi.com strongly recommends that the service enumerated in www.verfy4lookalikes.com should be used in all cases where potential for confusion exists.

Details here

IPR Protection Crossing Limits?

Geeks built the Net. But as the commercial importance of the Net increased, the businessmen are taking over the net. What is unfortunate is that in the process of this take over, the Internet society is being so stifled that there is a danger of the system collapsing under the weight of the protective measures that are being hoisted on the society under various regulations.

Driven to the corner, the Cyber Society has started organizing itself to fight against the exploitation.The  GeekPAC and the American Open Technology Forum  (AOTF) are the two sister organisations that have been formed for the purpose.

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Taiwan To Organize Cyber War Drill

The threat of hacker attacks from China has prompted Taiwan to organize a Cyber War Drill to develop an organized a defense system for Taiwan's Cyber space. With a similar threat in India from Pakistan sympathetic hackers, it is necessary for India to consider similar measures. Perhaps the Ministry of Information technology needs to take some strategic steps in this regard.

In the mean time, Naavi.com is looking for partnership with IT security companies to put together a Cyber Space Protection Service for private sector Companies. Any suggestions are welcome.

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Japan may outlaw Net porn

After South Korea, increasing incidences of Cyber Porn are emanating  from Japan. A law passed in 1999 already makes it illegal to sell or distribute child pornography in Japan but does not cover online transmission of pornography.

It is now reported that Japan will ratify the EU cyber crime treaty within its jurisdiction which would cover action against Child Pornography on the Internet. The revision of laws is expected to be done by  January 2003. One has to wait and see if the adoption of the EU Cyber Crime Treaty would be restricted to the Pornographic Crimes only or whether it extends to other crimes as well since the Treaty has other far reaching measures such as the Copyright Violations, Hacking etc.

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More about the Treaty
Draft EU Treaty on Cyber Crimes
Related Article by Chetan Nagendra

How To Prevent Such Farce Patents?

It may come as a surprise to many that "Side Swinging" has been patented by a 7 year old boy in US. While one can appreciate the ingenuity of the boy or his advisors to have tested the Patent system for some thing which is a play, it is obviously a wrong patent since there is enough "Prior Art" to say that the patented method is too obvious. What we need to prove that the patent is wrong is some pictures of some body swinging side ways with a date stamp. (Naavi.com would welcome if some body can send such pictures to naavi@vsnl.com).

If this Patent holds, the New Zealand Cricketer Merrillier can patent his "Scoop" shot before Rahul Dravid starts exploiting it. or the Tamil Hero Rajanikant can expand his "Copyright" application to prevent mimicry artists from imitating his style  in stage plays to a "Patent" outside India.

In order to prevent such farce, India should first set up its own "Business Patent Approval Body" so that Indians can start taking patents of their own and also provide a protective umbrella against the operation of erroneous  international patents in India.

Detailed Story in TOI

Also Read Hereo n IBM/MS Plot

Can We Declare Cyber Cafe a place of worship?

In the context of the pending verdict from Mumbai High Court in the case concerning protection of minors from Cyber pornography, it is necessary to raise questions such as..Can We Declare Cyber Cafe , a Place of Worship?

Detailed Story Here

Is Google Taking its Customers for a Ride?

Google the popular search engine is facing a patent infringement suit from Overture on paid listing of sites. Apart from the patent issue, the case has opened a debate on whether the system of "Sponsored Links" being used by Google is unethical and self defeating...

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Will Commercial interests kill Consumer interests in Net Telephony?

If Netizens expect to reap in big benefits with the introduction of Net Telephony  in India, they may be sadly disappointed. Already commercial interests are calling on the politicians to tweak the guidelines to disable free voice chat facilities available in services such as Yahoo Messenger or MSN messenger services. It is being suggested that such sites are blocked or the service vendors requested to obtain ISP license.

...in the past, "VSNL" has expressed its inability to "Block "sites either for preventing "Pornography" or "Sedition". If the ISP s are made to use the "Blocking" provision for protecting a few thousand rupees of income of ISP s it would be an anti-consumer move.

The correct posture for ISP is to take steps to introduce their own Instant Messenger services and get a better brand exposure as well as try to provide such services within India so that their Internet access business grows.

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The Dilemma of Cyber Cafes..Phase II

Cyber Cafe's and ISP s seem to be ignoring the long term effects of the proposed changes in law suggested by the "Expert Committee" to the Mumbai High Court. The report which was meant for protecting Children from Cyber Pornography has suggested several changes in law that will affect the Cyber Cafes and ISPs.. The report will be coming up for hearing at the Mumbai High Court on April 13th.

There is an urgent need for ISP s and Cyber Cafe owners to re examine the effect of the recommendations on their business and take protective action before it is too late.

Naavi.com urges legal professionals, Cyber Cafe owner's associations  and ISP s to study the details given here and act at the earliest.

Naavi

April 4, 2002

Detailed Article here

Rs 2860 crores Outlay for SMART Governance ?

Working group on Convergence and E-Governance constituted by the Planning Commission for the formulation of the strategies during the tenth plan period (2002-2007) has submitted its report..The Ministry of Information Technology has invited suggestions on the report to be sent by public before 10th April 2002.

Interested persons are suggested to go through the detailed report and submit their comments.

Details Here

Interception of Communication under ITA-2000, CCB-2002 (Proposed) and POTA-2002

The  debate on the Prevention of Terrorism Act in the joint sitting of the Parliament on 26th of March  has caused concern amongst the apolitical observers about the future of law enforcement in India. ..If the arguments of the opposition are to be believed,  Indian Police  are not fit enough to carry the special powers envisaged in the Act to prevent terrorism.

In discussing the provisions of POTA, one of the clauses that came for objection from the opposition was the clause on "Interception of Communication".  This argument has made it necessary to take a fresh look at the relevant section in ITA-2000 as well as the similar provision contained in Communication Convergence Bill and compare them with the provisions in POTA...

Detailed Story Here

RBI getting Ready to be a Certifying Authority

The Reserve Bank of India which is the Central Bank of the country is reported to be getting ready to be licensed as a Certifying authority for issue of Digital Certificates, through its technology arem IDRBT (Institute of Development and Research in Banking technology). IDRBT is expected to be the preferred service provider for the Banking sector. Will RBI use its authority to become a monopoly for the Banking industry and shut off the private sector from this market?..We have to wait and see.

Related Article in Financial Express