Mark Hachman

LAS VEGAS—Firewalls could become redundant at some point in the future, a researcher said at the Black Hat conference here Wednesday. Paul Simmonds, global information security director at Imperial Chemical Industries plc and co-founder of the Jericho Forum, doesnt advocate dropping firewalls altogether. He argues that properly secured data wont need the firewall whether or […]

LAS VEGAS—A German consultant has released a tool that its creator says will allow modifications of the code stored within RFID tags, theoretically allowing consumers to wreak havoc in future retail deployments. The RFDump software allows a user equipped with an RFID reader, a laptop or PDA, and a power supply to rewrite the data […]

LAS VEGAS—Its as easy as “point, click, root.” At a heavily attended panel Wednesday at the Black Hat security conference here, HD Moore and “spoonm” unveiled the latest release of the Metasploit Framework, an exploit tool designed to quickly take over a variety of target platforms. Although the framework was developed several months ago, the […]

Seagate Technology has increased the warranty of almost all of its hard drives to five years, reversing a trend toward shorter-period warranties. The warranties will apply to all of Seagates internal desktop, mobile, and enterprise hard drives that buyers purchase today, excluding external drives, Seagate executives said. For the past year, the warranties on hard […]

Iomega Corp. said it plans to wind down its DCT small-form-factor storage operation, failing to find enough customers to keep the operation afloat. On Thursday, July 22, Iomega reported a net loss of $19.8 million for its second quarter on revenue of $77.6 million. Revenue dipped by 23 percent from a year ago, largely from […]

Seagate stumbled in its fiscal fourth quarter, but design wins with Creative Technology Ltd. and a raft of new products portend greater sales in the second half, the company said. Seagate Technology Inc., of Scotts Valley, Calif., reported a loss of $33 million on revenue of $1.34 billion, including $39 million in a one-time restructuring […]

Freescale Semiconductor Inc. recorded a small profit in its first official earnings reports, offsetting a loss in its telecoms unit. The Austin, Texas-based semiconductor spinoff from Motorola Inc. reported earnings of $43 million on net sales of $1.46 billion following a “separation” charge of $41 million. Net income decreased from the first quarter, when Freescale […]

Intel Corp. has moved its “Dothan” mobile processor into the ultra-low-voltage space, scattering additional price cuts among its mobile microprocessor lineup. Intel introduced the LV/ULV Intel Centrino 1.40GHz model 738, 1.10GHz model 733, and 1GHz model 723 alongside the platforms corresponding Pentium M counterparts. The Centrino bundles include, in addition to the processor, an Intel […]

The Wi-Fi Alliance announced a new policy Monday to prevent proprietary extensions to wireless standards from breaking compatibility with other devices. The alliance said it would pull its logo—certifying interoperability with other Wi-Fi products—from devices whose extensions made them inoperable with other devices. The policy seems to be the Wi-Fi Alliances response to the “good […]

Intel Corp. has pushed back the release of its next-generation Centrino mobile platform, aka “Sonoma,” according to sources close to the company. The chip set was originally slated for shipment in the second half of the year, and most industry watchers expected its release earlier than later. The issue concerns the “Alviso” chip set, part […]

Freescale Semiconductor Inc. suffered the first mauling of grumpy bears worried about a slowdown that a semiconductor industry organization says is due to arrive next year. The Austin-based spinoff of Motorola Inc. cut the price of its IPO (initial public offering) to $13 a share, down from an estimate range of $17.50 to $19.50. The […]

Gateway Inc. is in the midst of paring down its consumer-electronics product lines, according to company officials, potentially leaving the bulk of its consumer-electronics business out in the cold. Following the companys merger with eMachines Inc. in March, Gateway said it would slim down its PC product lines. Now, the company is also “defining” its […]