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Xbox Live discounts Child of Light, Thief this week
Microsoft's Deals with Gold discounts Thief by 40 percent ($35.99) on Xbox One this week. Additionally, both Xbox Live Gold and Silver members can enjoy discounts on Assassin's Creed 4 add-ons on both Xbox One and Xbox 360, getting the game's season pass, Blackbeard's Wrath, Guild of Rogues, Freedom Cry and Illustrious Pirates DLC for 30 percent off each. As for the Xbox 360-specific deals, Gold subscribers can pick up Child of Light at 33 percent off this week ($10.04) as well as Flashback and Cloudberry Kingdom for 67 percent off ($3.29 each). Four games are slashed by 75 percent this week: I Am Alive, From Dust and Call of Juarez: Gunslinger are $3.74 each while Freefall Racers is $2.49. Lastly, both Gold and Silver subscribers can pick up Pro Evolution Soccer 2014 at 67 percent off ($19.79) as well as its World Challenge DLC at half-off ($2.49). All deals are good through next Monday, July 7. [Image: Square Enix]
Perfect Ten: Great MMO time travel adventures
Writers and geeks alike can't seem to get enough of time travel, although the ratio of horribly crafted time travel tales to fun and smart ones is pretty lopsided. I've come to realize that MMOs are positively littered with ways that players are invited to jump around the internal timeline of the game, and I wanted to share a few of them in this week's countdown. When you think about it, the proliferation of time travel quests makes a lot of sense from a developer viewpoint. There is a ton of lore that goes into each one of these virtual worlds, but for the most part the players are affixed to a very specific (and unmoving) point in time. Hopping about in time is a great way to experience other eras and actually see history instead of just reading it in a quest box. Plus, if done right, these quests can be quite memorable.
Flashback remake coming to PC on Oct. 1
The re-imagined version of side-scrolling action game Flashback will be available on October 1 through Steam. The new version of Flashback launched as a Summer of Arcade game last month for Xbox 360, and is set to come to PlayStation 3 at a later date. Although based on a classic game from 1992, this Flashback may rile those who come to it with nostalgia. Our review called it a half-baked Cool Sci-Fi Game™ remake that "lost [Flashback's] identity entirely." The game currently has a Metacritic rating of 51.
Flashback review: Identity lost
This isn't the Flashback I want to remember. This isn't the protagonist, Conrad B. Hart, this is some smarmy Nathan Drake wannabe doppelganger with a pocket full of bad one-liners. This is a version of Conrad whose drive to rip the lid off a conspiracy threatening the whole planet is diminished by his overly bro-tastic attitude and complete lack of tact in all things. This update of Flashback takes all of the intrigue and gravitas of an epic sci-fi story and bafflingly bloats it with terrible plot points and half-heartedly tacked-on mechanics that feel out of place and majorly useless.
Xbox Summer of Arcade 2013 full schedule, pricing revealed
This year's Summer of Arcade event kicks off on Xbox Live August 7 with Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, the Starbreeze-developed Xbox Live Arcade game where players must simultaneously control a pair of brothers stuck in the wilderness. Brothers will launch at 1,200 MS Points ($15). James Silva's Charlie Murder, a 2D beat-em-up starring a punk band for 800 MS Points ($10), will launch the following week, on August 14, Major Nelson reports. On August 21, VectorCell will push out its remake of classic adventure game Flashback for 800 MS Points ($10), and rounding out this year's festivities is TMNT: Out of the Shadows on August 28 for 1,200 MS Points ($15).
Microsoft announces Summer of Arcade lineup, beginning August 7
Microsoft announced this year's Summer of Arcade lineup for the Xbox 360, set to launch in August. Featured Xbox Live Arcade games include Activision's brawler TMNT: Out of the Shadows, an Ubisoft-published remake of Delphine Software's side-scrolling thriller Flashback, 505 Games' character-driven adventure game Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, and Ska Studios' punk-themed multiplayer beat-'em-up Charlie Murder. Specific release dates have not been announced. The Summer of Arcade campaign will kick off on August 7.
Flashback gets a do-over on XBLA, PSN
Ubisoft has a remake of Flashback in the works for Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network. This Unreal-powered version is helmed by VectorCell, the French studio behind horror game Amy. It is owned by the original Flashback's lead designer, Paul Cuisset.Flashback was first developed by Delphine Software and released over 20 years ago on the Amiga. The stylized platformer, which was later ported to Genesis, Mega-CD, PC and Mac (amongst others) centers on Conrad B. Hart, an amnesiac who finds a message – recorded by himself – warning of an alien plot threatening Earth.%Gallery-185241%
Security Researcher Brian Krebs outs the man behind the Flashback malware
In April 2012, security researchers discovered a new piece of malware targeting OS X users. The malware was dubbed "Flashback" and reportedly infected more than 600,000 Mac users, including about 200 machines on Apple's Cupertino campus. The malware was able to infect so many machines because it was cleverly masqueraded as a fake Adobe Flash installer. Once active, the malware would inject ads from pay-per-click providers into search results instead of sourcing the ads from Google. The security firm Symantec estimated that the malware had the potential to net its creators upwards of US$10,000 a day, but further analysis indicated that the actual payout was much lower. From our analysis we have seen that, for a three-week period starting in April, the botnet displayed over 10 million ads on compromised computers but only a small percentage of users who were shown ads actually clicked them, with close to 400,000 ads being clicked. These numbers earned the attackers $14,000 in these three weeks, although it is worth mentioning that earning the money is only one part of the puzzle -- actually collecting that money is another, often more difficult, job. Many PPC providers employ anti-fraud measures and affiliate-verification processes before paying. About a week after the malware was first publicized, Apple issued a software update to remove the malware from affected machines. Over the past few months, investigative reporter and former Washington Post journalist Brian Krebs did a bit of sleuthing and was able to piece together a number of clues which purport to reveal the identity of the man behind the Flashback malware. By lurking on forum threads on a Russian-language site dedicated to black-hat SEO, the art of deceptively manipulating search results for monetary gain, Krebs was eventually able to acquire some revealing information. In a private message obtained by Krebs, he found that one user with the handle "mavook" was looking to get an invitation to Darkod, a cybercrime forum. In order to prove his bonafides, mavook took responsibility for the Flashback botnet while boasting that he specializes "in finding exploits and creating bots." Krebs adds: The senior member that Mavook petitions is quite well-known in the Russian cybercrime underground, and these two individuals also are well-known to one another. In fact, in a separate exchange on the main BlackSEO forum between the senior member and a BlackSEO user named JPS, the senior member recommends Mavook as a guy who knows his stuff and can be counted on to produce reliable attack tools. Following that, Krebs took a look at mavook's profile page and saw that his personal homepage was at one point mavook.com. Krebs was then able to look at old WHOIS registration records and come up with a name -- Maxim Selikhanovich, a 30-year-old from Saransk, Russia. The full details behind Krebs' investigation are rather interesting and worth checking out in their entirety.
iPhone 5th anniversary flashback: Welcome to 2006 and the height of Apple Phone predictions
Happy 5th birthday, iPhone. Looking back, 2006 was an awesome time to be rolling in predictions. The drumroll for the iPhone was steady, furious, and demanding. As the tempo grew as Macworld 2007 grew near, everyone was hoping for something amazing, and Apple delivered. Five years after the device finally debuted, and customers got their hands on this amazing device, we raise a toast to the iPhone. Cheers! Recent Apple patents for phone, PDA, new cube? Here we go with the Apple patent game again, and this time around it looks like we have blasts from the past and the future. Engadget first tracked down a patent filed by Apple yesterday (pictured... More Apple tablet rumors Here's the rumor that won't go away. United States Patent Application #20060026536 (which features the signature of Jonathan Ive) concerns "...Methods and systems for processing touch inputs are... Taiwan manufacturer gets order for Apple "iPhone" handset Hon Hai, aka Foxconn Electronics, won't comment or confirm, but the cat seems to really be out of the bag now. This latest batch of iPhone reports feels like less of a rumor than previous... Also of interest: Rumor: Apple iPhone could be sold unlocked? Rumors: Google and Apple sitting in a tree? iPhone not going to be called iPhone? Concept-iPhone Compendium Would you buy an iPhone? More 'evidence' of a looming iPhone uncovered TUAW predictions for Macworld 07
Daily Update for May 15, 2012
It's the TUAW Daily Update, your source for Apple news in a convenient audio format. You'll get all the top Apple stories of the day in three to five minutes for a quick review of what's happening in the Apple world. You can listen to today's Apple stories by clicking the inline player (requires Flash) or the non-Flash link below. To subscribe to the podcast for daily listening through iTunes, click here. No Flash? Click here to listen. Subscribe via RSS
Apple releases Leopard update, Flashback removal tool
Apple has released a security update for Leopard, the first in quite a while, as well as a Flashback removal tool for that version of the OS. According to Apple, Leopard Security Update 2012-003 "disables versions of Adobe Flash Player that do not include the latest security updates and provides the option to get the current version from Adobe's website." Also, the Flashback Removal Security Update "removes the most common variants of the Flashback malware. If the Flashback malware is found, a dialog will notify you that malware was removed. In some cases, the update may need to restart your computer in order to completely remove the Flashback malware." Grab them both to secure your Leopard machine.
Apple issues Leopard update with Flashback removal tool
Folks still rocking Apple's Leopard may have been feeling left out after Lion and Snow Leopard both got an update for addressing that Flashback malware. If you're one of them, you'll be glad to know that Apple has finally issued a Leopard fix that comes with a removal tool for the vulnerability afflicting its big cats. In addition to a 1.23MB Flashback update, Apple also released a second 1.11MB fix for Leopard that disables versions of Adobe Flash Player that don't have the requisite security updates. Both should further whittle down the number of Apple computers affected by the Flashback trojan. For the actual updates, feel free to pounce on the source links below.
Daily Update for May 1, 2012
It's the TUAW Daily Update, your source for Apple news in a convenient audio format. You'll get all the top Apple stories of the day in three to five minutes for a quick review of what's happening in the Apple world. You can listen to today's Apple stories by clicking the inline player (requires Flash) or the non-Flash link below. To subscribe to the podcast for daily listening through iTunes, click here. No Flash? Click here to listen. Subscribe via RSS
Flashback was earning about $10K per day
People often wonder about what motivates the creators of malware. In the case of the Flashback malware that infected several hundred thousand Macs, it turns out that the motivator was money. A post on the Symantec official blog listed the stages of infection from Flashback: A user visits a compromised website. The browser is redirected to an exploit site hosting numerous Java exploits. CVE-2012-0507 is used to decrypt and install the initial OSX.Flashback.K component. This component downloads a loader and an Ad-clicking component. That ad-clicking component is what made the money for the scoundrels who wrote the malware. As the Symantec post explains, the malware specifically targets searches made on Google. Depending on the search query, the malware redirected the Mac user to another page chosen by the attacker, and the attacker received revenue from the click-through. Since Google never received the intended ad click, they lost revenue. Symantec analyzed a similar botnet last year and determined that about 25,000 infected machines could net the attacker about US$450 per day. Based on the breadth of the Flashback attack, they estimated that the malware was earning its creators almost $10,000 per day. If you haven't updated your Mac to counteract a possible Java malware attack, or run Apple's free tool for removing the malware from Macs that don't have Java installed, be sure to run Software Update as soon as possible to protect yourself. [via Macworld]
Another Mac Flashback variant out, but still uses same (patched) vulnerability
We're not quite done with Flashback yet. The good news is that the number of Macs affected by the trojan has gone down greatly, but the bad news is that there's a new variant of it out in the public. It's called Flashback.S, and just like the original, it can worm its way into a Mac's home folder without the admin password. But the new version still just takes advantage of that same vulnerability in Java, and that's already been patched. So if you've updated your Java post-Flashback, there's nothing to worry about. It's been quite a nuisance for Mac owners, however!
Flashback infections down from over half a million to under 150,000 in eight days
According to Symantec, the OSX.Flashback.K infection is declining each day. The current number of infected Macs is now around 140,000, down from 600,000 a week ago. If you think you may be infected, you can run a Flashback removal tool from either Kapersky or F-Secure. Apple also has a tool for Lion users without Java installed. OS X users should install the latest Java update from Apple which will protect you from a future infection.
Around 140,000 Apple machines still infected with Flashback malware, says Symantec
By now, we're all quite familiar with the Java-driven trojan that's affected thousands of Apple's rigs, and while the numbers seem to have drastically dropped since the first Cupertino fix, there's still a plethora of machines carrying the bug. According to Symantec, the number of infected computers is now at around 140,000, seeing a decline of over 460,000 since April 9th. Still, the security outfit remains puzzled by the fact, as it expected the digits to be somewhere near the 99,000 mark by now. Perhaps this is due to some folks not even being aware of Flashback's existence, or maybe not checking for software updates as often as most of us. Either way, we hope you've already used one of the tools Apple handed you.
BBS version of Google takes you back in time, won't hog your phone line
If the third digit of your birth year is a nine (or heck, a zero), you'll likely never have experienced the true agony joy that was BBS or Bulletin Board Systems. Well, thanks to nostalgic developer Norbert Landsteiner, you can take a glimpse at how your dad got online with an HTML / JavaScript emulation BBS Google. Likewise, more seasoned travelers of the internet can take a trip down memory lane and see what Mountain View's search engine might have looked like "back in the day." All the details are there, right down to the familiar modem tones and ASCII graphics, it's even somewhat functional (when the API isn't over its limit.) So, want to appreciate that browser you complain about on twitter all the time over your LTE connection? Tab on down to the source link for a lesson in gratitude.
Apple issues Flashback removal tool for 10.7 Lion systems not running Java
The Flashback OS X trojan continues to cast a rainy shadow over Mac owners' sense of security, and even though a fix has been released, this was only for what Apple considered "the most common variants." Users of Lion, who don't have Java installed, weren't included in that initial run, but there is a new removal tool just for them. So, if you're running 10.7 and never installed Oracle's virtual machine, make sure you point your browser at the source link below.
Flashback removal tool for no-Java 10.7 Lion now available
The security risks of having a Java virtual machine/runtime environment on your Mac have been highlighted over the past two weeks, as the Flashback trojan spread widely by taking advantage of a vulnerability that Oracle had patched months ago -- but that Apple had not. There is a mitigating factor, however, in that Apple does not ship a JVM with Lion; users who need it have to opt in and download it. Today, Apple released a standalone Flashback removal tool for Lion installs that don't have Java. While Apple's Java package has now been updated repeatedly both to patch the exploit and to Flashback-proof the system as a whole, Lion users without Java installed were left out. In theory they could be affected by the Flashback trojan itself even if they weren't susceptible to the specific means of infection that this variant uses. The 356KB download is recommended for all Lion users without Java installed.
