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The Weekly Round-Up: 21.05.04
From Amstrad to Zombies...

By silicon.com

Published: Friday 21 May 2004

When one thinks of shopping malls one naturally thinks of zombies and not just because of the counter staff in Boots.

Film director George A Romero has much to do with this association thanks to his seminal horror flick Dawn of the Dead.

In the movie, a group of humans flee the risen (and peckish) dead and barricade themselves inside a huge mall to bond, scream and act irrationally until a suitable zombie-eradication solution presents itself.

Meanwhile, zombies seem to be scattered all over the technology landscape recently.

First, it was banks of zombie PCs, poised to unleash denial of service annihilation in the next wave of hacker hostilities (find out more - if you dare - here).

This week - and hence the tenuous shopping mall-zombie intro - it’s the use of indestructible radio frequency ID (RFID) chips by major retailers in stores.

A silicon.com report this week revealed the controversial little tracking tags can remain active and can't be destroyed easily – rather like the undead.

(For the full story see here and if the whole RFID debate has passed you by there's a handy cheat sheet here.)

Major retailers on both sides of the pond are trialling the chips now with Wal-Mart, House of Fraser, Marks and Spencer and Tesco all looking at how to use the technology.

However, opponents of RFID technology claim the chips can be used to track people and infringe on privacy.

In March, German shoppers were outraged to find the tracking tags turning up in their loyalty cards as well as consumer goods such as razors (see here).

An in-store device was meant to disable the tags as shoppers left the supermarket with a 'kill command'.

However, the commands failed to work properly with the result that shoppers and their goods could (in theory at least) be tracked outside a store as well as inside.

Zombies are notoriously tricky things to kill.

Shotguns, chainsaws and other heavy weaponry have varying results on the shambling, groaning blighters.

(For the record: the Round-Up's recommended weapon for de-zombification is a lawnmower - as featured in Peter Jackson's pre-hobbit gore-fest Braindead.)

But there appears there is an easy way to kill zombie RFID chips and silicon.com reader Chuck M knows what it is.

What's more, he was kind enough to tell us, although the Round-Up doesn't recommend you try it.

Chuck wrote: "Any RFID tag can be destroyed by moderate electromagnetic pulse... Ask any manufacturer if their tag can survive 10 seconds in a microwave oven (concentrated electromagnetic energy) and they will invariably answer 'No'."

'Half measures' clearly cut no mustard with Chuck.

Most consumers would balk at nuking newly purchased items in their microwaves but not Chuck. (You can but admire his fervent opposition to potential civil rights abuse.)

He adds: "Send them too much [energy] and 'poof!' no more device."

Hmm, no consumer goods either but many thanks for the email, Chuck.

Meanwhile, in further RFID news, a Spanish nightclub has taken a big step in ridding clubbers of the need to carry cumbersome notes of money around with them.

Possibly taking inspiration from ivory-tinkling crooner Cole Porter, the club is offering to insert RFID chips under the skin of clubbers.

Customers can pay for their drinks by waving the body part containing the chip over a scanner. The correct money is then deducted from the customer's account.

According to reports, the chip need not just be implanted in the hand - the chip can be inserted in any part of the body that can be flashed in front of the scanner.

Ahem.

Anyone possessing a particularly exuberant dancing style should take extreme care when bopping too close to the tills.

After all, one energetic Travolta-esque swirl of the jacket over the head could result in you buying the bar a round of drinks...

'Free Nelson Mandela' was a defining call for freedom during the 1980s.

'Free Sven Jaschan' is unlikely to gain the same support during the 'naughties'.

Sven Jaschan is the German youngster who has admitted writing some variants of the Sasser worm that caused around half a billion dollars of damage - if you believe that type of figure - to businesses around the world (see here).

Although facing some very serious charges Sven's spirits may have been raised by news that some of his supporters had started a fund-raising campaign for the modern-day malware martyr.

A post to security mailing list Full Disclosure described Sven's actions as a "harmless wake-up call" and claimed he did the world a favour by exposing a flaw that could have affected something more important than business networks, like hospital IT systems.

(Coastguards don’t seem to matter it appears: see here)

The site managed to raise a couple of hundred dollars, which weren't intended to cover his legal costs (the Round-Up suspects this is just as well).

However, the malware author's hopes of a having a good time before doing jail time were dented after the site closed a few days later.

A note on the site said:

"We're closed.

Actually, we were unable to get a hold of mr. Jaschan in a timely manner, so we have decided to stop our fundraiser. Losing the paypal account didn't exactly improve the case either, and it seems all other online payment services have even worse fees..."

Jaschan is also suspected of being the malware author behind all 28 versions of the pesky NetSky worm.

Sallow, disaffected youth Sven (who did little to dispel the myth that virus writers are sallow, disaffected and youths) claimed he released the malware in order to try to drum up business for his mother's ailing PC support company (see here).

Just trying to cheer up mum? Flowers normally do the trick, Sven...

The dot-com boom was a time of Epicurean decadence.

(The Round-Up was there and has the scars to prove it.)

Champagne was on tap, langoustines were scattered around PR parties and electronic business cards were being beamed from Palm Vx to Palm Vx as if the owners were on a mission to save the rainforests.

Meanwhile, what was going on in the toilets of some parties was suspect in the extreme but seemed to involve lots of sniffing and giggling.

Dutch conman Shamoon Rafiq, who clearly missed the party first-time round, took advantage of the excitement generated by the imminent Google IPO to swindle some wealthy New York types out of their treasured greenbacks.

He pleaded guilty this week to promising an inside track to coveted Google stock options to a small group of investors.

His con kicked off late last year as excitement about the search engine's IPO spread.

Using his position as a business development manager for BT in New York, Rafiq charaded as a venture capitalist and college buddy of Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page.

Rafiq offered investors the lure of "preferred stock", available only to Page and Brin's inner circle, and raised $350,000.

He then proceeded to blow the lot on strippers, clubbing, wildly extravagant tips and jewel-encrusted watches for his chums.

Well thank goodness he didn't squander it.

The scam was brought to light after one of the investors started doing some homework.

Rafiq now faces up to five years in jail.

Meanwhile, excitement about the Google IPO heralding a new dot-com boom should probably be tempered with a little common sense (see here)

So put the langoustines and champagne back on ice, just for the time being.

Though with five years behind bars, Rafiq might end up missing the next party when it kicks off...

silicon.com's latest special report looks at the thorny issue of ageism in IT.

Regular columnist Martin Brampton starts the debate in his latest column.

The fact that ageism exists in tech circles is irrefutable, he argues.

What is more difficult to state is what we understand by it and what we can consequently do about the problem.

Arguments over discrimination due to race, sex or sexual orientation are often black and white - but when it comes to discrimination due to age the issues are a little greyer, if you'll excuse the pun.

Read the rest of his column here: here.

Have you ever been affected by ageism in the tech industry? If so silicon.com wants to hear your story.

Please email your stories to editorial@silicon.com.

(We'll treat all correspondence in the strictest confidence.)

And finally, Amstrad chairman Alan Sugar is to take on the role made famous by Donald Trump when US reality show 'The Apprentice' comes to UK screens (see here).

Sugar will oversee 14 would-be entrepreneurs in a series of weekly assignments to test their business skills and entrepreneurship.

Each week he gets to sack one of the hopefuls.

Sugar said in a statement: "My good news/bad news approach to business has earned me a reputation for being blunt but you've got to have what it takes to make it in business."

The eventual winner will be offered a job for a year and command a six-figure salary with one of Sugar's companies.

Sugar rose to fame with the launch of the affordable, mass-market Amstrad computer in the eighties.

However, the company later came adrift when it tried to make IBM-compatible machines – largely through the wobbly disk drives.

Sugar also has the honour of being featured in one of the finest headlines to ever grace silicon.com (see here for proof) and the ignominy of being effectively hounded out of his role as chairman of North London football club Tottenham Hotspur by the fans.

Spurs supporters identified Sugar as one of the main reasons for the side's lack of silverware since their glorious yesteryears.

However, since he left the club it has continued to not win anything and it transpires the reason for the lack of silverware had little to do with chairman after all and was in fact because Spurs are rubbish.

Until next week, the Round-Up will be keeping well away from N17 and staggering around shopping malls muttering "Brains, brains for the master..."

In the meantime take a look back at the headlines of the week...

Athens Olympics braced for wave of cyberattacks

BT boosts profits

Napster launches in UK amid media circus

Microsoft breaks into UK public sector CRM

3G prizes will go to 'second movers'

Police let down by e-crime ignorance