Mac: As the popularity of the Mac platform increases, so too does the risk of malicious attacks. Doorstop X offers a reliable solution, providing an extra layer of protection for your Mac. The firewall has been specifically designed with Leopard users in mind, and features an easy-to-use interface, which displays security information and settings in a series of window panes.

iPhone: TweetDeck is one of the most popular desktop Twitter clients out there - and at long last an iPhone version of the app has arrived. It hasn’t half bad either. TweetDeck for iPhone displays everything that’s going on on Twitter in a highly organized way. As with the PC and Mac versions, TweetDeck for iPhone uses a system of columns to make it easy for you to track who’s doing what.

Windows: Singing along to your favorite bands is fun, provided you know the lyrics. And if you don’t, let LyricsFetcher do the hard work for you. This app scans your music library in iTunes or Windows Media Player, finds the lyrics to all your songs in the blink of an eye, and pastes the information directly into the files’s ID tags.

If you’ve never performed a backup of your hard drive, then you’re risking potential disaster if it fails or that “on” switch simply doesn’t work one day for some reason. We all come-up with poor excuses for not doing so - our external drive is full, we don’t have time, we simply forgot etc. but CrashPlan is an application that definitely leaves no room for excuses. These are some of the ways you can backup with CrashPlan:

• Online Encrypted and unlimited size hard drive backups online for a modest fee
• PC/Mac Backup your hard drive to another PC or Mac and vice versa
• External Drive Backups performed in real time to USB and Firewire drives
• Friends You can even select a friend over the net to backup your files to

Best of all, not only does it work across platforms and is free but using CrashPlan couldn’t be simpler.  I setup CrashPlan on a Mac and within a minute, a backup of my entire hard drive was being performed to my USB drive. Note that the program is only free for personal use (they’ve got a special CrashPlan Pro for companies) although it is supported by a few ads. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the worst nightmares I’ve had lately is about my precious Android-powered phone being stolen. It would be a complete disaster, no only because of the money value, but also because of all my personal information stored in that small device. So I started looking for a way to protect my HTC Magic in case it got stolen, and finally found this application in the Android Market: SimChecker.

With SimChecker you can configure your phone to send the coordinates for its current location, both by GPS and WiFi network positioning, as soon as the device detects a new, unknown SIM card. The coordinates can be sent either by text message to another phone number, or by e-mail to a predefined address. You can also check both options to be on the safe side.

In this way, as soon as somebody else tries to use your phone with a different SIM card, you’ll get an immediate report about its location. What’s more, if you enable text message alerts, you’ll also get the actual phone number that SIM card is linked to, which may help you trace the phone back to the person who has it now. Another feature I’d like to see would be the possibility to automatically erase all your personal data from the phone in case it’s stolen, but SimChecker doesn’t include it - yet.

In any case, remember that the best way to keep your phone safe is taking proper care of it: don’t leave it lying around, always use a blocking code and jot down the IMEI code in case you need to block it.

Windows: After a few months in alpha stage, Opera 10 has finally reached the beta milestone in its development. The new Opera 10 Beta web browser has a 40% faster engine and flawless support for Web standards, as well as a customizable speed dial, inline spell-check, automated crash reporting, and the so called Opera Turbo for fast browsing on slow connections.

Mac: If you don’t trust Keychain on the Mac, then take a look at the newly updated 1Password. This tiny but powerful application allows you to store and manage multiple identities and passwords for use in all sorts of programs, websites or browsers. 1Password works with most major browsers and includes an extension to quickly access your credentials while you’re surfing the net.

iPhone: Personally, whenever I go to a theme park I’m usually the one who volunteers to stay at the bottom and look after the bags. I did manage to pluck up the courage to install Rollercoaster Rush on my iPhone though. The aim of the game is to get your carriage from the start of the track to the finish without derailing it. Your only means of doing this is by tapping the right side of the iPhone to accelerate and the left side to brake.

BlackBerry: Did you know that BlackBerrys can help you lose weight? Or at least they can if you install Health & Diet Manager on them. This app allows you to take control of your nutrition and overall health, to help you lose weight and give you more energy. Health & Diet Manager helps you manage all kinds of aspects of your daily life, from tracking your health related stats (pulse, blood pressure, hours slept, etc.), to creating an action plan for your eating and exercise.

Mac: Nowadays, having a Mac doesn’t mean you have to do without Windows. In fact, you can use both at the same time if you run one in a virtual environment like VirtualBox (now updated to version 2.2.4). With VirtualBox, you can install any version of Windows (as long as you have the boot disk), Linux, Solaris and just about any other operating system you can think of. Best of all, it’s absolutely free to use!

Windows: Whenever you use any application on your computer, you leave certain traces on the system that not only compromise your privacy but also take up valuable disk space. With Wipe you can easily get rid of those usage traces, deleting history items, auto-complete entries and recent document lists in just two clicks.

Hulu looks set for UK launch in September [Daily Telegraph]

Rockstar co-founders form 4mm Games [gamesindustry.biz]

Universal and Warner sue internet TV station Zattoo [Last100]

Beautiful ‘Rosie’ Android UI video surfaces [AndroidGuys]

Mac OS X Java security hole exposed [TUAW]

Symbian boss talks up Symbian for netbooks (yeah…) [Engadget]

Rise of the zombie computer [BBC]

Firefox could be destroyer of Facebook [ReadWriteWeb]

Apple ‘definitely not’ buying Twitter [Guardian]

EA posts bad numbers for 2008 - buyout possible? [Mercury News]

Poll: Still use RSS? [PollDaddy]

Zooity - social network like it’s 1987 [Zooity]

5% of Americans use Twitter [Digital Influence]

[Image from Google]

Get more from Google Latitude [Google Mobile Blog]

Ubiquity to be integrated into Firefox [ghacks.net]

Apple & Google being investigated amid antitrust concerns [NYT]

Windows 7 RC released to consumers - exclusive video [Softonic]

UK spy agency’s £1bn Mastering The Internet project [Times Online]

Could Apple buy Twitter? [Gawker]

 
[Image via Google]

Google promotes user profiles in vanity searches [Google Blog]

What’s in store for Ubuntu 9.04? [ghacks.net]

RPS interview: Mafia II [Rock, Paper, Shotgun]

Twitter suspends beta feature, upsets developers [TechCrunch]

First Google Android laptops spotted [Computerworld]

New US military command to focus on cyber security [WSJ]

Could Comcast build an app store? [Contentinople]

Windows: Have you ever wanted to test a program but were afraid of possible consequences for your PC? Here’s your life vest! Returnil Virtual System creates a temporary disposable copy of your system on a virtual partition that lets you test anything without ruining your actual system. Simply reboot and you’ll be back to your dear computer.

Symbian: Want to get in shape for the summer? Nokia Activity Monitor is an innovative utility that lets you monitor your level of physical activity using your phone. The program makes use of the accelerometer, a sensor included on some of the newer Nokia handsets. Activity Monitor uses this sensor to count the steps you take throughout the day.

Mac: Sick of browser crashes due to unstable tabs? Stainless is a new super lightweight browser that looks like Google Chrome but is much simpler and operates each tab independently. The advantage of this is that if you’re experiencing slow page loads due to Flash plugins or Java problems, it won’t affect the rest of the tabs!

During the recent Conficker scare, Mac users could at least sleep easy that their systems were in no danger of being infected. That may no longer be the case however according to security experts Symantec.

Although it was first spotted in January, Symantec have examined it in further detail and claim to have discovered a botnet named OSX.Iservice that hid itself in pirated versions of Apple’s iWork ‘09 and Adobe Photoshop CS4 and were shared on a bitorrent network.

Symantec announced that:

OSX.Iservice is an interesting piece of malware — not only does it make use of Mac OS internals, but it is also the first Mac botnet that we are aware of.

As described the The Register, an infected user will commonly experience that their Mac CPU resources are permanently running at 100% as the botnet links-up with other infected Macs. The scary thing is, OSX.Iservice (nicknamed iBotnet by Symantec) is the same type of thing as the Conficker botnet on PCs that has wreaked such havoc across the world. The good news is that it only reached around a 1000 Macs before it was identified and removal is simple. Also, unlike a PC virus which can infect a computer by simply clicking on a link, iBotnet requires users to double click on a file for it to get into your system.

It’s natural that hackers will increasingly target Macs as their popularity increases and sales of PCs sag. There is after all a hell of a lot of money to be made from cyber crime. However, it’s also natural that security software developers such as Symantec will seek to “heighten awareness” of such events in order to encourage Mac users to buy their security software so you sometimes have to take news like this with pinch of salt.

Macs are still much safer than PCs but maybe the moral of this latest scare is to be very careful opening files that you have downloaded from dubious sources.

Windows: Is your computer too slow or unstable? The reason may be in the Windows Registry, which is usually bloated with errors, broken references, invalid entries and other issues after an intensive computer usage period. With Auslogics Registry Cleaner you can easily scan the Registry and get rid of all those errors in a couple of clicks, saving a backup copy just in case

Java phones: If you constantly need access to email and are fed up with ducking into Internet cafes to check your latest messages then give emoze a try. emoze is a push email and messaging service for your mobile phone, that lets you send and receive messages in real time. Not only this, but it also gives you access to your contacts, tasks and calendar events.

Mac: Want to get creative with paint but not get your hands dirty? Scribbles is designed for kids but it has to be said, it’s a hell of a lot of fun for adults too and is one of the easiest paint programs you could wish to use. Spray, paint or write in an elegant calligraphy font, Scribbles makes painting fun.

Classic text-based adventure Zork makes a return [Guardian]

Conficker/Downadup activating! [BBC]

Microsoft will allow Windows 7 users to downgrade to XP [ZDNet]

Exclusive Apple iPhone 3.0 screenshots leaked [The Boy Genius Report]

Use a colour filter in your searches on Google Images [Google Blog]

April 1st is nearly upon us, which means you must be prepared for two things: one, finding all sorts of pranks and hoaxes on the web, and two, facing the attack of Conficker.C, the latest version of the Conficker worm which is due to be activated on this very day.

Conficker’s aim seems to be the creation of a botnet that would enable the worm’s coders to control millions of computers worldwide and use this massive collaborative force to launch attacks on particular websites, send spam messages and other similar tasks. However, some people think this could be the biggest April Fool’s joke ever played on the web, and security experts think there’s no actual danger for your PC, as long as it’s clean before the dreaded date. In any case, if you want to be on the safe side, pay attention to these tips to avoid Conficker.C:

• Make sure your Windows system us up to date. Launch the Windows Update tool and download any security patches you haven’t installed yet. As an optional security measure, you can also Download Microsoft Malicious Software Removal tool – always as a complement to your current anti-virus tool, not as a replacement for it.
• Disable the Autoplay functionality. One of the spreading methods used by the Conficker worm is an autorun file that infects USB removable devices. To avoid the risk of immediate infection when connecting one of those devices on your PC, learn how to turn the Autoplay feature off.
• Run a quick scan to search and remove worms. Download and launch F-Secure Easy Clean, a free standalone security tool that helps you find and remove malware, spyware and worms, including Conficker.C.
• Use a specific ‘vaccine’ against Conficker.C. McAfee has released a special build of their McAfee AVERT Stinger tool, with which you can scan your system and clean any Conficker variant. This tool will be updated on a daily basis to grant you support for possible future versions of the worm.
• Check your system with online security tools. If all four previous steps are not enough for you, have a look at our list of online ant-virus tools, perfect for scanning your whole system or just a single file without having to install any application.

Windows: Your computer loads a handful of services every time it launches, and not all of them are necessary. With Vista Services Optimizer you can choose which ones to load depending on the way you use your PC, what software you install and which devices you connect to it. You can create different profiles and use system preferences more efficiently.

Pocket PC: If you’d told me 20 years ago that I’d one day be playing a 3D version of Breakout with strobe-style explosions and synthesized robot speech, I’d have called you an idiot. I’d be scoffing down humble pie now, because 3D Brick Bricker delivers exactly the gaming experience I could never have dreamed up back in the day.

Mac: Nowadays, who needs a TV when you’ve got the internet? Livestation brings together one of the most impressive and widest selection of mainstream channels under one easy to use and beautifully presented package. Watch BBC World, CNN, MTV and more all for free!