indiana

A few weeks ago, I brought you news that Indiana's Governor had signed into law HB 1197, a data breach and encryption bill that I worked on.

What I have not revealed, up until now is the coercion and arm-twisting that accompanied the passage of this bill. While the details may not surprise jaded readers, it certainly gave me a reason to dislike the entire process, as well one particular power-tripping legislator. Now that the bill, albeit a significantly slimmer version, has become law, I'm free to tell the story.

As regular readers of this blog know, I … Read more

With a stroke of the Governor's pen on Monday, Indiana became one of the few states in the country to provide strong incentives for businesses to encrypt sensitive customer data. Unlike many of the laws that pass through state legislatures - this one was not ghost written by lobbyists or special interests. It was co-written by a tech-savvy state legislator, and a blogger constituent .... me.

One of the biggest problems in the hundreds of data breach and data loss incidents that have been reported over the past few years is that so little of the data is encrypted. If … Read more

With Jeff Bakalar on Valentine's Day workout recovery, Dan Frommer of Silicon Alley Insider fame joins us in studio to talk about Microsoft's after school special program to stop kids from pirating, the Xbox 360's high failure rate, plus Indiana Jones 4's trailer hits the Interwebs, and please...oh please for the love of God...do not see Jumper.

Listen now: Download today's podcast

Whenever you type an address into an Internet browser, that address is instantly resolved into the site's numerical Internet address by a DNS server located somewhere in the world. On Tuesday, Symantec announced that online criminals have started to remotely redirect your home network router's DNS server so that whenever you type in a financial institution or other trusted site, your browser will instead be redirected to a bogus or phishing Web site.

The practice, called pharming, usually attacks the DNS servers directly, but this latest attack brings it all home (if you are using broadband connectivity). Fortunately, … Read more

Sun Microsystems has released the first results of a project to give its open-source Solaris effort a Linux-like programming approach and a stronger connection to other parts of the open-source movement.

Late Wednesday, the Santa Clara, Calif.-based server and software maker released for download Project Indiana, now formally called OpenSolaris Developer Preview. It's the precursor to a supported product due in early 2008 that's slated to be called OpenSolaris 3/08.

In the long run, Sun hopes to make Solaris more digestible to a larger audience, much of which is familiar with Linux but not with noted … Read more

Trying to install Solaris in the past was one of those experiences that made me pine for a prebuilt virtual machine disk format. A new version of Sun Microsystems' OpenSolaris-based operating system, though, attempts to amend that.

As of Monday, Solaris Express Developer Edition is now in its third version, craftily named 9/07. Sun gave the installation routine, for the first time in 12 years, "a complete and massive rewrite," said Dan Roberts, director marketing for Solaris and OpenSolaris. The new installer has the same plumbing underneath, but presents a much less technically nitty-gritty interface. However, it'… Read more

Unlike a lot of my colleagues here at CNET Networks, I'm not a gamer. My tactics in hand-to-hand combat games entail less adroit maneuvering using precise button combinations and more random mashing of various buttons in the faint hope that if I mash fast enough, I'll accidentally stumble across some winning combination that I can never hope to recreate. And my skills in driving games may leave you concerned about my actual, real-life driving skills. (Don't worry, I know not to mow down unsuspecting pedestrians. Usually.) So it's a little odd that I'm here writing … Read more

The Transformers movie produced by Stephen Spielberg opens Wednesday, July 4, and we're still not sure who's most excited.

Is this a movie for the children, or the children of the '80s who are going to let their nostalgia for Autobots and Decepticons lead them down the toy and car aisles?

General Motors has gotten in on the act with a whole line of Transformers vehicles for adults, while Hasbro has toys for the kids.

The film industry seems to be targeting Generation Xers, who are now themselves becoming parents, with a slew of resurrections, and the toy … Read more