Wordpress attacked by giant botnet

15 April 2013 Last updated at 06:06 ET

Wordpress has been attacked by a botnet of "tens of thousands" of individual computers since last week, according to server hosters Cloudflare and Hostgator.

The botnet targets Wordpress users with the username "admin", trying thousands of possible passwords.

The attack began a week after Wordpress beefed up its security with an optional two-step authentication log-in option.

The site currently powers 64m websites read by 371m people each month.

According to survey website W3Techs, around 17% of the world's websites are powered by Wordpress.

"Here's what I would recommend: If you still use 'admin' as a username on your blog, change it, use a strong password," wrote Wordpress founder Matt Mullenweg on his blog.

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• Bot - one of the individual computers in a botnet; bots are also called drones or zombies
• Botnet - a network of hijacked home computers, typically controlled by a criminal gang
• Malware - an abbreviation for malicious software ie a virus, trojan or worm that infects a PC
• DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) - an attack that knocks out a computer by overwhelming it with data; thousands of PCs can take part, hence the "distributed"
• Drive-by download - a virus or trojan that starts to install as soon as a user visits a particular website
• IP address - the numerical identifier every machine connected to the net needs to ensure data goes to the right place

He also advised adopting two-step authentication, which involves a personalised "secret number" allocated to users in addition to a username and password, and ensuring that the latest version of Wordpress is installed.

"Most other advice isn't great - supposedly this botnet has more than 90,000 IP addresses, so an IP-limiting or login-throttling plugin isn't going to be great (they could try from a different IP [address] a second for 24 hours)," Mr Mullenweg added.

Matthew Prince, chief executive and co-founder of Cloudflare, said that the aim of the attack might have been to build a stronger botnet.

"One of the concerns of an attack like this is that the attacker is using a relatively weak botnet of home PCs in order to build a much larger botnet of beefy servers in preparation for a future attack," he wrote in a blog post.

"These larger machines can cause much more damage in DDoS [Distributed Denial of Service] attacks because the servers have large network connections and are capable of generating significant amounts of traffic," he added.

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Bitcoin energy costs soaring

15 April 2013 Last updated at 08:31 ET

Bitcoin is facing fresh scrutiny after a report revealed the power requirements of the currency's miners.

Tracking website Blockchain logged 982 megawatt hours of electricity consumption over a 24-hour period by Bitcoin miners around the world.

According to Bloomberg, that is enough to power 31,000 homes in the US. Watchdog Ofgem claims the average UK household uses 3.3MwH per year.

Blockchain said the rough cost of that amount of power was $147,000 (£95,000).

However, it also suggested profits of $681,000 (£444,000) may have been made as a result of the mining.

Bitcoins are earned online by completing difficult computing tasks.

Mining involves solving a hard mathematical problem and miners typically use large numbers of computers to speed up the number-crunching involved.

The more mining takes place, the harder it becomes to mine new Bitcoins and the more power is required for the process.

Writer Mark Gimein described the energy requirements as "an environmental disaster" in a blog post for Bloomberg.

"Real-world mining of precious metals for currency was a resource-hungry and value-destroying process. Bitcoin mining is too," he wrote.

However, other analysts disagree.

Tim Worstall, a fellow at the Adam Smith Institute, dismissed the quantity of electricity being used for mining as "trivial" on the website Forbes.

"There are around 120 million or so households in the US. Therefore Bitcoin mining is consuming 0.025% of the US household electricity supply," he wrote.

"This is without even thinking about the energy requirements of business and industry. Do also note that that is the power consumed by global Bitcoin mining... I feel secure in stating that Bitcoin mining really isn't a real-world environmental disaster."

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Porn sites hit back at malware claim

15 April 2013 Last updated at 08:32 ET

Pornography websites identified as potentially putting their visitors at risk of downloading malicious software have hit back at the claims.

Last week, the BBC reported on figures that suggested two popular sites posed high levels of risk.

The research, conducted by security expert Conrad Longmore, referenced data compiled by Google.

One of the sites named, Pornhub, said the numbers quoted "grossly exaggerate" the threat.

Another, xHamster, admitted it did suffer problems "in the past", but that rigorous systems were now in place.

"We had an issue with malware in the past and we totally stopped working with that advertising agency because of that problem," a spokesman said in an email.

"Now our reliable partners are checking new advertisers very strictly, so it's almost impossible to put a new site with malware on xHamster.

"The problem is that even reliable advertisers sometimes can be hacked. For example, in the past we had such issues with one of the top five porn paysites in the world.

"Their ad system was hacked and used for malware."

'Clearly a problem'

Mr Longmore - who published the study on his blog - called the response a "non-denial denial".

"The data is open to interpretation, but there was clearly a problem just one week ago, there may not be a problem today," he said.

"There might be a problem tomorrow, of course."

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Pornhub prides itself on providing the optimal user experience"

End Quote Pornhub spokeswoman

The research was based on statistics from Google's diagnostic service which crawls web pages for harmful content and posts a 90-day review of what it finds.

For xHamster, Google's figures indicated that "suspicious" content was found on the site as recently as 6 April.

The most recent instance of "suspicious" content found on Pornhub was on 28 January, according to the figures.

But Manwin, the company that owns Pornhub, told the BBC the risk was "minute".

"On average, the website serves over 15.5 billion ads every month," a spokeswoman said.

"Isolated incidents of malware are immediately caught, and minute when considering the mammoth amount of traffic our site receives.

"Pornhub prides itself on providing the optimal user experience, in an environment safe from the threat of infection from third-party malvertisements."

She added that according to Pornhub's own figures, only 0.003% of advertising displayed on its site in a three-month period was potentially harmful.

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Kobo unveils 'high-def' e-readers

15 April 2013 Last updated at 14:43 ET By Leo Kelion Technology reporter

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Kobo boss Michael Serbinis talks to Rory Cellan-Jones

Ebook seller Kobo has released what it is describing as a "high definition" e-ink based device.

The Aura HD's 6.8in (17.2cm) screen offers a resolution of 265 pixels per inch (ppi).

That puts it ahead of Amazon's bestselling Kindle Paperwhite which offers 212ppi on its 6in screen.

The launch comes at a time when ebook sales are booming, but some analysts suggest interest in black and white e-ink devices has started to wane.

Kobo is owned by the Japanese retail giant Rakuten which bought the company in 2011.

In the UK it has benefited from a tie-up signed the same year with bookseller WHSmith.

Kobo's chief executive said that this and similar deals with other bricks-and-mortar chains in other countries had helped his company enjoy rapid growth.

"Last year sales of e-readers for Kobo tripled year-over-year growing far faster than the competition and vaulting us into the number two spot worldwide," Michael Serbinis told the BBC.

The market leader is Amazon which sells its hardware at the UK's Waterstones book chain.

The manufacturers make little if any profit on hardware sales but instead seek to make money from sales of ebooks and other media themselves. Here again the US firm looks to have the edge.

"Amazon retains more than three quarters of the market in the UK according to the publishers I've spoken to," Benedict Evans, Enders Analysis's digital media expert, told the BBC.

"In fact people have been quoting anything from 80 to 90% of the country's ebook sales being accounted for by Amazon - with that figure split between e-readers, the Kindle tablets and its app for phones."

When asked if Kobo was in fact a long way behind its US rival, Mr Serbinis replied: "Not as far as you'd think."

Children's books

Kobo boasts that the Aura HD's screen is the highest-resolution e-ink display on the market, adding that the device's Freescale processor also makes it the fastest at turning pages.

The machine goes on sale in the UK and North America this month, and elsewhere from May.

Its £140 suggested retail price makes it about £30 more expensive than the Kindle Paperwhite and Barnes & Noble's Nook Simple Touch. The Aura HD is also slightly heavier.

However, one industry watcher believed it would still have at least niche appeal.

"I think its interesting that they're going for a point of differentiation, aiming for the high-end of the e-ink market," said Philip Jones, editor of the Bookseller magazine.

"I struggle to see an HD screen being a big selling point, however it could prove popular with people wanting to buy childrens' books or non-fiction titles which feature illustrations."

Rocketing sales

The value of the UK's physical books market fell by nearly 5% over the course of 2012 in value terms, according to market researchers at Nielsen Bookscan.

By contrast they said that the country's ebook market swelled by about 100% over the same period accounting for about £150m of sales.

Other countries are also seeing rapid growth - Kobo's boss highlights Brazil and India as emerging economies with huge potential. Even so, his firm may find it increasingly hard to maintain market share.

"We are still in an early kind of land grab and competition is growing," said Andre Breedt, Nielsen's research and development analyst.

"Multipurpose devices such as smartphones and tablets will become a much bigger part of the market than dedicated devices like e-readers. And in some countries you've now got mobile phone operators getting involved, as well as operating system makers like Apple and Google.

"You also have supermarkets buying up some of the smaller e-reader companies - so I think that more innovative devices and brands will be launched in the future."

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Audit Office to investigate 4G sale

16 April 2013 Last updated at 06:06 ET

The National Audit Office (NAO) will investigate the government's sale of super-fast 4G mobile phone spectrum after the money raised fell far short of forecasts.

The NAO said it would conduct a value-for-money study of Ofcom's auction.

This year's auction raised £2.3bn, which was £1.2bn less than the amount the chancellor said it would raise.

The NAO said it would shortly set out the terms and timing of the study on its website.

George Osborne's Autumn Statement on the government's finances, which was delivered in December, included the figure of £3.5bn that he expected to raise from the spectrum sell-off.

It allowed him to maintain at the time that government borrowing was falling.

The amount was also far lower than the £5.2bn actually offered by all the bidders, as an eBay-type system was used, whereby the highest bidder puts on the table the maximum it is prepared to pay, but is required to pay only slightly more than the sum offered by the next highest bidder.

Resource

The NAO's move was prompted by a complaint by Labour MP Helen Goodman.

She was concerned by remarks made by Ed Richards, the chief executive of regulator Ofcom, which arranged the auction, to the effect that raising money was not the prime purpose of the sale.

Mr Richards told the BBC at the time that the figure was lower because "we are in very, very different times", adding that maximising the size of the auction was not the objective it was set by the government.

He added: "What we were trying to do was ensure that a valuable economic resource was brought into productive commercial use."

The 4G auction sold off a large slice of radio spectrum to Everything Everywhere; Hutchison 3G UK; Niche Spectrum Ventures, a BT subsidiary; Telefonica (O2); and Vodafone.

4G is far quicker than the previous widely-used spectrum of 3G.

The auction of 3G, 13 years ago, raised £22.5bn, a far greater amount than expected at the time.

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Samsung probed over 'fake reviews'

16 April 2013 Last updated at 06:34 ET

Fair-trade officials in Taiwan are looking into reports that Samsung paid people to criticise rival HTC online.

Samsung is alleged to have hired students to post negative comments about phones made by Taiwan's HTC.

Samsung, based in South Korea, said the "unfortunate incident" had gone against the company's "fundamental principles".

If found guilty of engaging in "false advertising", Samsung and its local agent could face fines of up to of 25m Taiwanese dollars (£547,000).

Taiwan's Fair Trade Commission had begun an investigation after receiving a series of complaints, a spokesman told the AFP news agency.

A local website had published documents appearing to show Samsung had been recruiting students to criticise HTC and praise Samsung anonymously on the web, reported PC Advisor.

Samsung Taiwan said it had not been told about the investigation, however the subsidiary put a statement on its local Facebook page saying it had "ceased all marketing activities that involve the posting of anonymous comments".

It said all future marketing work would be more in line with its company philosophy of transparency and honesty.

"The recent incident was unfortunate, and occurred due to insufficient understanding of these fundamental principles," it said, adding that it was planning training for employees to ensure events were not repeated.

In early 2013, Samsung was fined by Taiwanese authorities for an advert that misled consumers about the camera on the Galaxy Y Duo.

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Spotify begins Latin America push

16 April 2013 Last updated at 07:02 ET

Music streaming service Spotify has launched in Mexico - its first push into the huge Latin American market.

The Swedish start-up, which has more than 24 million active users, has also gone live in Asia - in Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore.

Launches in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Iceland mean the service is now accessible in a total of 28 countries.

Spotify is the leader in music streaming globally, but analysts expect Apple to make its move soon.

It is believed, but not confirmed, that Apple has come to an agreement with several major labels, including Universal Music, to launch a streaming service which has been informally dubbed "iRadio".

A music industry source told the BBC he expected Apple's product to be available by the third quarter of this year.

However, Spotify's head start in the market has seen it amass more than six million paid subscribers since its launch in 2008.

Real riches

Income from these customers, coupled with advertising and large private investments, has gone towards paying more than $500m (£327m) to rights holders so far.

The company expects to pay out another $500m in 2013, it added.

Key to this expansion will be further inroads in markets adopting digital music in greater numbers.

According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), Mexico is the 16th largest digital music market in the world. Since 2008, its digital music market has grown by 17%.

But it is in Brazil where real riches lie. In 2011, Apple launched its iTunes music store in the country - with high sales volumes surprising critics who assumed the region was too entrenched in a culture of pirating music.

In IFPI's most recent report on the area, a Universal Music spokesman said: "We are seeing a significant rise in sales of smartphones and growing internet access in Brazil.

"Once consumers have the hardware, they need the media."

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Facebook SOS rapist jailed for life

16 April 2013 Last updated at 08:36 ET

A serial sex offender finally brought to justice after a girl he raped pleaded for help on Facebook has been jailed for life with a minimum sentence of nine years.

David Edgerton, 23, of Connah's Quay, Flintshire, admitted abduction and rape after dragging the girl into woods.

The judge asked the authorities to explain why he was free for so long.

A Mold Crown Court jury convicted him of rape, attempted rape and attempted abduction of three other victims.

Judge Merfyn Hughes wants the police and Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to give an explanation to the families of the victims.

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"Start Quote

As requested, we will look into any previous involvement there may have been from the police or CPS, and will provide further information to the judge"

End Quote Crown Prosecution Service

There had been a number of complaints made against Edgerton previously.

• In 2009, Edgerton raped a Deeside woman at her home, but the case did not proceed to trial.
• In 2011, he assaulted a 10-year-old girl in Broughton, with a clear intent to carry out a sexual offence. However, he was thwarted when two members of the public intervened. The attack was not pursued at the time.
• In August 2012, Edgerton raped a Warrington woman in her 40s, and was one of the charges the rapist was convicted of at Mold Crown Court.
• In summer 2012, he first tried to abduct a schoolgirl at Leeswood. A few hours later he returned to the same spot and abducted and raped the other schoolgirl.

During that harrowing attack, his victim managed to message her sister's Facebook account on her mobile phone, writing "help" and "raping me" after being dragged off a street into Blast Woods at Leeswood.

The judge said that when one or even two complaints had been made, a decision not to prosecute may have been reasonable decision making.

But when further complaints were made, then a more holistic approach by police and the CPS may well have prevented the Leeswood attacks, he said.

'Serious sexual predator'

Following the convictions in February, a spokesperson for the CPS said: "As requested, we will look into any previous involvement there may have been from the police or CPS, and will provide further information to the judge."

Continue reading the main story

"Start Quote

The courage and bravery these victims have demonstrated following their own terrifying experiences is outstanding"

End Quote Det Supt John Hanson North Wales Police

After sentencing, Det Insp Iestyn Davies of the North Wales Police major incident team who led the investigation, described Edgerton as a "serious sexual predator" and said the area was a safer place.

Det Supt John Hanson, the force's head of public protection, said: "The courage and bravery these victims have demonstrated following their own terrifying experiences is outstanding.

"The maturity of Edgerton's victims following the offence in Leeswood last summer; to provide the specially trained officers with the indelible evidence to implicate Edgerton was crucial to this investigation.

"Every single one of his victims were prepared to give evidence at his trial."

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Alibaba steps up battle with Android

16 April 2013 Last updated at 09:13 ET By Leo Kelion Technology reporter

Alibaba - China's biggest e-commerce company - has ramped up efforts to promote its mobile operating system.

The firm has set up a one billion yuan ($162m; £105m) programme to support app developers and is offering monthly payments to handset makers for every phone using its platform they sell.

A Chinese government report recently warned China had become "too dependent" on Google's Android operating system.

Alibaba previously accused Google of blocking Acer from adopting its system.

The Taiwanese hardware maker invited members of the press to an event last September to show off a new handset running Alibaba's Aliyun operating system (OS). However, on arrival the writers were told the event had been cancelled.

Alibaba later said that Google had threatened to "terminate Android product co-operation and related technical authorisation with Acer" if the launch had proceeded.

The search giant replied accusing Alibaba of using Android's development tools and other resources to create its software, adding that Aliyun's software store contained pirated Google apps.

As a result Google said that Acer and other members of the Open Handset Alliance (OHA) - which co-ordinates Android's development - would not support Aliyun unless it was rewritten to be fully compatible with Android in order to prevent the ecoystem from fragmenting.

Alibaba's OS subsequently struggled to find favour. Haier - a firm best known for its fridges and washing machines - became the best known brand to offer mobiles powered by the system.

However, Alibaba has now announced that five other companies are to begin selling handsets using its OS, which has now been rebranded Amos (Alibaba Mobile Operating System).

They are Konka, Zopo, Amoi, G'Five and Little Pepper. All five have previously made Android phones, but none are members of the OHA.

'Too dependent'

China overtook the US to become the world's biggest smartphone market last year.

Android accounted for 90.1% of the market in the July-to-September quarter, according to a report by research firm Analysys International. It said Apple's iOS had fallen to a 4.2% share and Symbian had a 2.4% share.

Google makes little money from Android's Chinese success - it does not charge manufacturers to use the system and most app sales in the country are made through local stores rather than its own Google Play marketplace and users prefer to use rivals' search engines.

Despite Android's popularity, the US firm only accounted for 4.25% of all China-based web searches in February compared with Baidu's 70.49% share, according to research firm CNZZ.

Despite this, China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued a research paper in March raising concerns about Android's dominance.

"Our country's mobile operating system research and development is too dependent on Android," it said.

"While the Android system is open source, the core technology and technology roadmap is strictly controlled by Google."

It added that China had the talent to develop a successful OS of its own, but stopped short of suggesting specific measures to bring this about.

Local tech firms Baidu and Huawei do market their own systems, but they are only reskinned versions of Android.

Credit checks

If Alibaba's Amos system does find success it could prove lucrative for the firm.

Phones installed with the OS access the company's own email, mapping and search services.

More significantly they might also help the firm bolster its mobile e-retail sales.

In total about 53bn yuan ($8.6bn; £5.6bn) of goods were sold via handsets in China last year - but Alibaba's chief technology officer recently told the Economist magazine: "Mobile is a new game where we don't have the edge yet."

For now the company is taking advantage of its popular Taobao site to promote devices made by its partners. A new section dedicated to the handsets is being created.

In addition Alibaba plans to let some customers pay for their phones by subscription without needing to make an initial down-payment. It said it would use shopping and payment records from shoppers' activities on its own sites to check their creditworthiness.

It now hopes to attract more manufacturers through an offer to pay them one yuan (16 cents; 11p) per month for each Amos-powered phone they sell.

"Alibaba is a very established brand in China and has good relationships with the vendors and promotional channels they need to make this work," said Chris Green, a tech analyst at Davies Murphy Group.

"The challenge still lies in trying to crowbar its OS onto devices, though the subsidy now offered may encourage more handset makers to build dedicated devices. But even if Amos succeeds in China, it has little chance of catching on anywhere else."

Alibaba is privately owned but has signalled it intends to float its stock soon. Analysts say the company could be valued as high as $120bn.

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No ads allowed on Google's glasses

16 April 2013 Last updated at 10:38 ET

Developers working on apps for Google's smart glasses have been told they will not be allowed to place advertising within the device's display.

The newly-published terms and conditions for developers working on Glass also prohibit companies charging for apps.

The glasses, which have a five megapixel camera and voice-activated controls, have started to be shipped.

The first devices will go to developers and "Glass Explorers".

Google held a competition earlier this year inviting potential users to come up with ways to use the device, while developers have been eager to be among the first to try out the technology.

As part of the announcement, Google also gave the first official details of the device's specifications.

The bone conduction transducer allows the wearer to hear audio without the need for in-ear headphones - sound waves are instead delivered through the user's cheekbones and into the inner ear.

The company promises a battery lasting for "one full day of typical use".

Its display is the equivalent, the company says, of looking at a 25in (63cm) high-definition screen from eight feet away. The device is able to record video at a resolution of 720p.

It has 16GB on-board storage, and connects with other mobile devices via Bluetooth and wi-fi.

Data usage

To date, it is privacy groups that have offered the strongest dissenting view against Google's plans with Glass.

One campaigner from a group called Stop The Cyborgs, wrote "We want people to actively set social and physical bounds around the use of technologies and not just fatalistically accept the direction technology is heading in."

He predicted that the focus of coverage about the device would shift from talking about the "amazing new gadget that will improve the world" to "the most controversial device in history".

For developers, that controversy could begin with wondering how exactly they will be able to make money from the device.

Also keeping an eye on the excitement generated by Google will be Japanese firm Telepathy Inc.

Their device, the Telepathy One, has been touted as a possible competitor to Google Glass.

Chinese search giant Baidu has also confirmed it is working on a Glass-like project - but details are so far scant.

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