Monthly Archives: December 2007

New Zealand PC World Magazine & Bricking bug threatens most HP, Compaq laptops

http://pcworld.co.nz/pcworld/pcw.nsf/feature/97AA696BD2A49770CC2573B70079A28C

From the page: “The hacker who posted an exploit last week that threatened a large swath of Hewlett-Packard’s laptop lineup followed up with new attack code that can “brick” nearly every HP laptop.

In a post to the milw0rm.com Web site, a Polish security researcher who used the alias “porkythepig” spelled out a pair of vulnerabilities in an ActiveX control used by HP’s Software Update, the patch management program bundled with virtually every HP- and Compaq-branded laptop.

According porkythepig’s post, the Software Update bugs let an attacker corrupt Windows’ kernel files, making the laptop unbootable, or with a little more effort, allow hacks that would result in a PC hijack or malware infection. In either case, a drive-by attack could be conducted by feeding users an e-mail message with a link to a malicious Web site”

Medical myths even doctors believe

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-12/iu-mme121907.php

People only use 10 percent of their brains – Nope, we use it all.
Hair and fingernails continue to grow after we die – nope, the body “shrinks” as it dries out.
Eating turkey makes you sleepy – no more so than other meat
People should drink at least eight glasses of water a day – Nope you need 64 ounces of water, but that figure includes tea, coffee and food.