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Android 'smishing' vulnerability discovered by NCSU researchers; Google has a fix incoming
The art of smishing (SMS-Phishing) has been practiced for some time, but a discovery by the wizards at NC State University has uncovered a new vulnerability that could bring the aforesaid act back into the spotlight. Xuxian Jiang's research team recently identified the hole and confirmed that it impacts Gingerbread, Ice Cream Sandwich and Jelly Bean. Put simply, if an Android user downloads an infected app, the attacking program can "make it appear that the user has received an SMS, or text, message from someone on the phone's contact list or from trusted banks." This fake message can solicit personal information, such as passwords for user accounts. The team isn't going to disclose proof until Google patches it up, but the school has said that Google will be addressing it "in a future Android release." For now, however, Jiang recommends additional caution when downloading and installing apps from unknown sources, while also suggesting that folks pay close attention to received SMS text messages.
Pressure-sensing PC technology knows when you're busy, blocks notifications accordingly
We know better than most that when you're working to a deadline, constant pop-ups, notifications and pings can be a real pain. Our frustrations might soon become a thing of the past, however, with some help from boffins at the Graduate University for Advanced Studies in Japan. They are working on technology which monitors keyboard pressure and silences those distractions until it deems you're not busy, showing over 80 percent accuracy during volunteer testing. Understanding that quiet time is also appreciated for other tasks, they plan to use similar techniques to spot when you're staring intently at that report or -- more importantly -- attending to a beverage. It's still early days for the project, but if the stress-saving tech ever spawns a product, we'll take two please. [Image Credit: Getty Images / Jean Louis Batt]
Japanese group transmits electricity through 4-inch concrete block, could power cars on roads
The decision to invest in an electric vehicle would be much easier to justify if the car in question offered unlimited range. That appears to be the concept behind a Toyohashi University research group's wireless power prototype, which can successfully transmit electricity through a 10 centimeter-thick concrete block. During a demonstration in Yokohama, Japan, the team sent between 50 and 60 watts of power through a pair of concrete blocks to two tires, which then juiced up a light bulb (you can see the rig just above). The project is called EVER (Electric Vehicle on Electrified Roadway), and could someday be used to keep cars moving along a highway without any need to pull over for a recharge, thanks to a constant stream of electricity coming from below the road. There are some serious obstacles to overcome before EVER can get some wheels turning -- namely, a need to pump nearly 100 times the current maximum load through concrete that's twice as thick as what they've managed today, not to mention improving undisclosed efficiency levels -- but the group reportedly said that it's up to the task, making us fairly optimistic that such a solution could one day get us from A to B without petrol. Until then, you'll probably want to plan out a pit stop or two before you leave the garage.
Robot with tactile sensor is better at identifying materials than you are (but only wants to help)
Researchers at USC's Viterbi School of Engineering have developed a robot capable of identifying materials, thanks to a tactile sensor. The so-called BioTac sensor mimics the human finger, with flexible robot skin layered over a liquid filling -- and the skin even has fingerprints to increase the robot's sensitivity to vibration. Researchers trained the robot to recognize 117 common materials, and by making "exploratory movements" to feel out textures it was able to correctly identify materials 95 percent of the time -- a higher accuracy rate than humans achieve. Still, though the robot is an ace at understanding textures, it doesn't possess the ability to decide which materials are preferable to humans. For this reason, the USC team says it will focus more on applications such as human prostheses and consumer product testing. Relax: your fingers are still worth something -- for now.
IBM's Holey Optochip transmits 1Tbps of data, is named awesomely
Be honest: was there any doubt whatsoever that something called a "Holey Optochip" would be anything short of mind-blowing? No. None. The whiz-kids over at IBM have somehow managed to transmit a staggering 1Tbps of data over a new optical chip, with the fresh prototype showing promise for ultra-high interconnect bandwidth to power future supercomputer and data center applications. For those who'd rather not deal with esoteric descriptions, that's around 500 HD movies being transferred each second, and it's enough to transfer the entire U.S. Library of Congress web archive in just 60 minutes. Needless to say, it's light pulses taking charge here, and researchers are currently hunting for ways to make use of optical signals within standard low-cost, high-volume chip manufacturing techniques. Getting the feeling that your own personal supercomputer is just a year or two away? Hate to burst your bubble, but IBM's been touting similar achievements since at least 2008. Actually, scratch that -- where there's hope, there's Holey.
Researchers capture first-ever images of atoms moving inside a molecule
The headline sums it up nicely but really, those photographic acrobatics account for only part of the story. Starting from the beginning, a research team led by Louis DiMauro of Ohio State University used an "ultrafast" laser to knock an electron out of its orbit, which scattered off the molecule as it fell back toward its natural path. That ripple effect you see in that photo up there represents any changes the molecule went through during the quadrillionth of a second that transpired between laser pulses. Yes, that's the kind of rare, psychedelic shot that's sure to earn DiMauro and team bragging rights, but the scientists also say this technique could have practical implications for observing -- and ultimately manipulating -- chemical reactions at an atomic level. Of course, it could be a long time yet before scientists analyze complex proteins in such detail: for the purposes of this experiment, the researchers stuck with simple nitrogen and oxygen molecules, with which chemistry scholars are already quite familiar. In fact, the researchers don't elaborate at all on specific studies where this technique might be useful, but you might want to hit up the source link nonetheless for some of the more technical details of how they pulled off this experiment in the first place.
Researchers get CPUs and GPUs talking, boost PC performance by 20 percent
How do you fancy a 20 percent boost to your processor's performance? Research from the North Carolina State University claims to offer just that. Despite the emergence of fused architecture SoCs, the CPU and GPU cores typically still work independently. The University hoped that by assigning tasks based on each processor's abilities, performance efficiency would be increased. As the CPU and GPU can fetch data at comparable speeds, the researchers set the GPUs to execute the computational functions, while the CPUs did the prefetching. With that data ready in advance, the graphics processor unit has more resources free, yielding an average performance boost of 21.4 percent though it's unclear what metrics the researchers were using. Incidentally, the research was funded by AMD, so no prizes for guessing which chips we might see using the technique first.
Researchers develop 'wireless optical brain router' to manipulate brain cells
Optogenetics might be a relatively unknown area of neuroscience, but it's one that, thanks to some new research, could soon find itself (and its rodental subjects) in the spotlight. For the uninitiated, it's the practice of manipulating animal cells using light (with a little help from gene therapy). Until now, optogenetic equipment has been large and unwieldy, making testing on subjects (read: rats) painstaking. Startup, Kendall Research, has changed all this, creating wireless prototypes that weigh just three grams (0.11 ounces). By eschewing bulky Lasers for LEDs and Laser diodes, the equipment is small enough that it can be attached to the rodents. At that point, their brain function can be manipulated with the touch of a button, and different parts can be stimulated without breeding mutant variants -- a controversial practice that doesn't even yield results in real time. The "router" is powered wirelessly by super capacitors below test area, and researchers can conduct experiments remotely, even automatically. Human applications for this are still some way off, but we're sure our future overlords will make good use of it.
Slime molds could hold key to new kinds of intelligence, help Statue of Liberty walk
See that yellow amoeboid slime mold? It's up to something. A team of Japanese scientists at Future University Hakodate led by professor Toshiyuki Nakagaki has found evidence that physarum polycephalum -- or grape-cluster slime -- are capable of navigating mazes and can organize their cells to find the most direct route. Nakagaki and others believe this could be the key to designing bio-computers capable of solving complex problems. According to Nakagaki, the slime's cells appear to have a kind of information-processing ability that allows them to "optimize" the route along which the mold grows to reach food while avoiding stresses -- like light -- that may damage them. Over at Kyushu University, researcher Atsushi Tero told the AFP news agency: "Computers are not so good at analysing the best routes that connect many base points because the volume of calculations becomes too large for them. But slime molds, without calculating all the possible options, can flow over areas in an impromptu manner and gradually find the best routes." Tero and other researchers have expressed hope that slime mold networks could be used in future designs of new transportation systems, electric transmission lines and understanding the human nervous system. Just remember, if you're going to coat the interior of the Statue of Liberty with some pink slime you found in the sewer, make sure you play some upbeat music to go along with it. It's just a good idea in the long run.
IBM rig doesn't look like much, scans 10 billion files in 43 minutes
Someone ought to gift these IBM researchers a better camera, because their latest General Parallel File System is a back-slapping 37 times faster than their last effort back in 2007. The rig combines ten IBM System xSeries servers with Violin Memory SSDs that hold 6.5 terabytes of metadata relating to 10 billion separate files. Every single one of those files can be analyzed and managed using policy-guided rules in under three quarters of an hour. That kind of performance might seem like overkill, but it's only just barely in step with what IBM's Doug Balog describes as a "rapidly growing, multi-zettabyte world." No prizes for guessing who their top customer is likely to be. Full details in the PR after the break.
Scientists find less damaging defibrillation method, heart tissue relieved
Good news, aging Earthlings: a team of researchers have found a way to shock a coding patient's heart, while leaving other organs and tissues undamaged from the defibrillator. The device send a single high voltage pulse of electrical energy to a patient's chest in order to fix an irregular or nonexistent heart beat; traditionally, what often results is damage to point of contact and surrounding skin cells, muscles and tissues, but a team of whiz kids have seemingly figured out a way to dodge the dreadfulness. Led by scientists Stefan Luther and Flavio Fenton, the team claims that by using a series of five pulses of less potent shocks (instead of a single concentrated charge), docs can see an 84 percent reduction in damaging power. This new technology -- coined low-energy antifibrillation pacing (LEAP) -- can also be used in implanted defibrillators, not just the well-known flappy paddles. Due to the relatively low emissions, both the patient and such implants have extended lives. And that, friends, is good for us all -- given the impending Robot Apocalypse, we'll be needing those extra years just to hold down the fort.
Prototype glasses use video cameras, face recognition to help people with limited vision
We won't lie: we love us a heartwarming story about scientists using run-of-the-mill tech to help people with disabilities, especially when the results are decidedly bionic. Today's tale centers on a team of Oxford researchers developing sensor-laden glasses capable of displaying key information to people with poor (read: nearly eroded) vision. The frames, on display at the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition, have cameras mounted on the edges, while the lenses are studded with lights -- a setup that allows people suffering from macular degeneration and other conditions to see a simplified version of their surroundings, up close. And the best part, really, is that the glasses cull that data using garden-variety technology such as face detection, tracking software, position detectors, and depth sensors -- precisely the kind of tech you'd expect to find in handsets and gaming systems. Meanwhile, all of the processing required to recognize objects happens in a smartphone-esque computer that could easily fit inside a pocket. And while those frames won't exactly look like normal glasses, they'd still be see-through, allowing for eye contact. Team leader Stephen Hicks admits that vision-impaired people will have to get used to receiving all these flashes of information, but when they do, they might be able to assign different colors to people and objects, and read barcodes and newspaper headlines. It'll be awhile before scientists cross that bridge, though -- while the researchers estimate the glasses could one day cost £500 ($800), they're only beginning to build prototypes.
Scientists develop algorithm to solve Rubik's cubes of any size
A computer solving a Rubik's cube? P'shaw. Doing it in 10.69 seconds? Been there, record set. But to crack one of any size? Color us impressed. Erik Demaine of MIT claims to have done just that -- he and his team developed an algorithm that applies to cubes no matter how ambitious their dimensions. Pretty early on, he realized he needed to take a different angle than he would with a standard 3 x 3 x 3 puzzle, which other scientists have tackled by borrowing computers from Google to consider all 43 quintillion possible moves -- a strategy known simply as "brute force." As you can imagine, that's not exactly a viable solution when you're wrestling with an 11 x 11 x 11 cube. So Demaine and his fellow researchers settled on an approach that's actually a riff on one commonly used by Rubik's enthusiasts, who might attempt to move a square into its desired position while leaving the rest of the cube as unchanged as possible. That's a tedious way to go, of course, so instead the team grouped several cubies that all needed to go in the same direction, a tactic that reduced the number of moves by a factor of log n, with n representing the length of any of the cube's sides. Since moving individual cubies into an ideal spot requires a number of moves equal to n², the final algorithm is n²/log n. If we just lost you non-math majors with that formula, rest assured that the scientists expect folks won't be able to apply it directly, per se, though they do say it could help cube-solvers sharpen their strategy. Other that, all you overachievers out there, you're still on your own with that 20 x 20 x 20.
IBM outs integrated circuit that's made from wafer-size graphene, smaller than a grain of salt
Lest you don't care what your circuits are made of, listen up: graphene's the thinnest electrical material, comprising just a single atomic layer. In addition to its electrical, thermal, mechanical, and optical properties, researchers dig it because it has the potential to be less expensive, more energy-efficient, and more compact than your garden-variety silicon. So imagine IBM's delight when a team of company researchers built the first circuit that fits all the components, including inductors and a graphene transistor, on a single wafer -- a setup that consumes less space than a grain of salt. The advantage, scientists say, is better performance than what you'd get from a circuit combining a graphene transistor with external components. In fact, the researchers got the circuit's broadband frequency mixer to operate at 10GHz , a feat that could have implications for wireless gadgets running the gamut from Bluetooth headsets to RFID tags. That's all just a layman's explanation, of course -- check out the latest issue of Science for the full paper in all of its technical glory.
Researchers build synthetic synapse circuit, prosthetic brains still decades away
Building a franken-brain has long been a holy grail of sorts for scientists, but now a team of engineering researchers have made what they claim to be a significant breakthrough towards that goal. Alice Parker and Chongwu Zhou of USC used carbon nanotubes to create synthetic synapse circuits that mimic neurons, the basic building blocks of the brain. This could be invaluable to AI research, though the team still hasn't tackled the problem of scope -- our brains are home to 100 billion neurons, each of which has 10,000 synapses. Moreover, these nanotubes are critically lacking in plasticity -- they can't form new connections, produce new neurons, or adapt with age. All told, the scientists say, we're decades away from having fake brains -- or even sections of it -- but if the technology advances as they hope it will, people might one day be able to recover from devastating brain injuries and drive cars smart enough to avert deadly accidents.
15 Minutes of Fame: Researcher Nick Yee digs into the numbers, people behind WoW
From Hollywood celebrities to the guy next door, millions of people have made World of Warcraft a part of their lives. How do you play WoW? We're giving each approach its own 15 Minutes of Fame. If you're into research about the World of Warcraft and the world of MMORPGs, the name Nick Yee will be instantly recognizable. A research scientist at the Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), Yee is well known in WoW circles for his work on The Daedalus Project, an online survey of MMORPG players that's yielded profiles of gamers and the gaming life that are ripe for the picking. Despite a powerhouse academic background, Yee's no ivory tower recluse. He's an active WoW player who relishes the happy intersection of game time as background for work time. And while his Daedalus Project has been "in hibernation" for some time now, Yee's been working on a new study for PARC. We'll chat with Yee about his work after the break -- plus test your knowledge of your fellow WoW players in a special quiz he's prepared especially for WoW Insider readers spotlighting findings from his new MMORPG research.
EVE's Council of Stellar Management to be discussed at GDC 09
We mentioned that CCP Games plans to have a presence at the Game Developers Conference this year, but they've opted to give another presentation about EVE Online as well. CCP's Lead Economist Dr. Eyjólfur Guðmundsson and Researcher Petur Johannes Oskarsson will speak about player governance in the virtual space, as exemplified by EVE Online's "Council of Stellar Management" (CSM). For those who haven't heard of it, the Council of Stellar Management is something unique to EVE Online. It exists to convey the sentiments of the playerbase to EVE's developer, CCP Games. The idea is that it will ensure that CCP Games is developing and balancing the game in ways that fit the interests of the subscribers. It also allows for concerns between the players and developers to be addressed in a direct way by CCP Games.CSM representatives are not selected by the developers, who largely maintain a hands-off stance on how the CSM is run. The players themselves organize their own election campaigns and the playerbase votes for who the best women and men are for the role. Each CSM term lasts for six months, during which time regular meetings take place, one of which happens in Reykjavik, in 3-days (or more) of face-to-face sessions with CCP Games. The GDC 09 session is titled: "The Council of Stellar Management: EVE Online Bridges Worlds for a Society".
Psychologists talk gaming addiction, online friendships
1UP's Scott Sharkey has written an article titled "Hook It to My Veins: Can Videogaming be an Addiction?" in which he provides anecdotal experiences with excessive gaming and conversations with two experts -- researcher/author Neils Clark and psychology lecturer Dr. Nadine Pelling. The conclusion is made pretty quickly: yes, video games can be an addiction. Big surprise there! But the details can be wishy-washy, it turns out. Virtual worlds are the subject of in-depth analysis. Clark borrows from a theory by J.R.R. Tolkien by suggesting that gaming addiction is about a conflict between what ought to be a primary world, and a secondary fantasy world. Gamers with a problem have difficulty prioritizing, or even acknowledging that the gaming world is secondary. Immersion is an important part of enjoying a game, right? But if you're thinking about how you need to make sure the primary world gets its due attention, then you're not immersed anymore -- so begins the problem.
