Windows Help and Support Center offers Web-based technical support to users. A Google researcher, Tavis Ormandy, not only found a zero-day vulnerability that he says makes things easy for a remote attacker, but also publicly demonstrated how the error works. This error is said to be in the Help and Support Center, which supports remote links to help with the use of hcp://addresses. Windows XP SP2 introduced a system where the program runs in a restricted mode where links from addresses on a special whitelist only are given access. But the flaw allows bypass of this whitelist. Tavis Ormandy disclosed this error to the public. Acco...

Millions of computers from around the world still run on Windows XP. But Microsoft says it is withdrawing all support and security updates for computers using Windows XP Service Pack 2 and Windows 2000 operating systems. With all those cyber gangs controlling the botnets that steal data and hijack online back accounts, infected corporate PCs are high in demand. This decision by Microsoft raises the risk profile of all those corporate networks who continue to use these operating systems. According to a Qualys estimate, about 50% of Windows XP machines used by businesses are SP2 machines. Qualys is the company that takes care of co...

Google Chrome OS As if Computex had not already had enough big announcements between all of the tablets, from Asus and netbooks from MSI, Google has added their announcement to the mix. Their highly publicized operating system (not Android, the other one) will be released in Fall of 2010. Chrome OS, a truly web-based operating system, should start appearing in netbooks before the end of the year, according to Google. Not only will it launch this fall (between September 22 and December 21), but Google expects millions of people to use it right away. While it remains to be seen if their enthusiasm is warranted (like Android and Yo...

Google, which was known as one of the few companies flexible enough to let its employees use an operating system of their choice, now tells all new employees to choose between Apple’s Mac OS and Linux – and not Windows OS, according to the latest report from the Financial Times. Having suspended the use of Windows OS because of security concerns towards the end of last year, Google is publicly stating that the security problems with Windows and the China hacking fiasco are behind this decision. Its 10,000 employees are being moved off Windows. According to sources, Google continued to use Windows because some of its employees...

MeeGo v1.0 The newly created and oddly named open source mobile operating system from Intel and Nokia has been released. MeeGo, a combination of Intel's Moblin and Nokia Maemo, is designed for netbooks, tablets, mobile phones, and any other mobile device you can imagine. This first release is primarily designed for netbooks and has been released in hopes that developers will begin creating applications for it. Nevertheless, folks at MeeGo considered it stable enough to call it v1.0, although every developer seems to have their own vision of what stable really means. The release counts among its features: Instant sychronized ...

The Fedora Project announced today the release of the latest version of their free and open source Linux operating system, called Fedora.  The Fedora Project is sponsored by Red Hat Inc., one of the most recognizable names in commercial Linux distribution. Fedora is the community version of Linux that serves as a template for future releases of Red Hat's commercial server offering, Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). Fedora 13 adds many new features that focus on desktops, netbooks, virtualization, and server administration. Among the newest features are: Easier installation process and device management Free 3D drivers for many...