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Date: Friday, May 19, 2000, 2:32 PM -0400
From: Cyberscape Digest <cyberscape@faulknerinfo.com>
To: @unspecified-domain
Subject: Faulkners Cyberscape Digest 05/19/00





CyberScape Digest 

CyberScape Digest is a weekly roundup of top internet stories. This issue
covers events from Monday 05/15/00 through Friday 05/19/00. 

America Online Has Busy Week
A big company like AOL is never out of the headlines very long, and this
week was no exception. While millions of schoolchildren are looking forward
to summer, the ISP unveiled AOL@School, a free service to schools that will
include separate portals for elementary, middle, and high school students,
and areas that are only accessible to teachers and administrators. The
student areas will not contain ads; they will feature links to educational
Web sites, such as the Library of Congress. Even so, critics said that
AOL's hidden agenda with the offering is to create a generation of AOL
customers. Not only did AOL go back to school, it also took a quick trip
across the border to Canada--in a manner of speaking, anyway. The company's
Canadian subsidiary launched its high-speed AOL Plus service over cable TV
lines, starting the trial service in Sturgeon Falls, a small town in
Ontario. Of course, automobiles are useful things if one is going
places--which may help explain AOL's deal with AutoNation. The two
companies formed a multi-year alliance in which AutoNation and its
licensees gained the exclusive right to retail new and used vehicles to AOL
subscribers who purchase a car or truck through their co-branded Web site.
Unfortunately, one leaves oneself open to all sorts of hazards if one
travels too fast--fines, for instance. The Securities and Exchange
Commission charged the company $3.5 million for improperly reporting
profits in six out of eight quarters during fiscal 1995 and 1996. According
to the SEC, AOL failed to factor in advertising costs to gain users as
expenses; instead, the company deferred the costs. If it had not, those
profits would have been losses. Oops. AOL will restate its income for those
quarters. Another hazard of traveling quickly might be surprises such as
with whom one is traveling. AOL's Netscape subsidiary hired engineer Robert
Ginda, who is involved with Jabber, an open-source project attempting to
create software that will convince different proprietary instant messaging
systems to talk to each other. In fact, Jabber just released version 1.0 of
its XML-based product. Those familiar with AOL's history of preventing
other companies' instant messaging products from connecting with its own
AOL Instant Messenger can only scratch their heads at this latest
development; the company isn't commenting on the matter. In any case, AOL
has a bumpy road ahead. Disney, long a vocal opponent of AOL's merger with
Time Warner, reportedly sent executives to several California cities to
meet with government officials. The cities are considering Time Warner's
applications to transfer its cable franchises to AOL-Time Warner. Among
other topics, the Disney executives discussed Time Warner's recent
temporary cut-off of the ABC network on its cable lines earlier this month.
AOL and Time Warner probably have other discussions on their minds right
now; the two companies set June 23 as the date that their shareholders will
vote on their proposed merger. 


Love Bug Investigation Continues
The National Bureau of Investigation in Manila continued its evidence
collection to determine who wrote and released the Love Bug virus that
caused billions of dollars of damage worldwide. Michael Buen, a college
schoolmate and friend of suspect Onel de Guzman, held a press conference to
emphatically deny any role in creating the virus. Woes piled up for de
Guzman: in addition to his being denied graduation from AMA Computer
College because his thesis was too malicious, school officials began
disciplinary procedures that could get him expelled from the college.
Meanwhile, investigators found, if not a smoking gun, one of the bullets.
On Sky Internet computers, an ISP in Manila used by de Guzman, law
enforcement officials discovered a password-stealing program configured in
the same way as the Love Bug. De Guzman's thesis conceptually outlined such
a program, without giving mechanical details--except for a configuration
program, which matched what was found on the ISP's computers. Another
bullet cropped up on one of 17 diskettes taken from the apartment de Guzman
shared with his sister and her boyfriend. That diskette contained a virus
program similar to the Love Bug, and claimed that Michael Buen authored the
program. The diskette also mentioned GrammerSoft, an informal programming
group at AMA Computer College. Of 40 names mentioned on the diskette, 30
belonged to students at the college. More ominously, the diskette held
Buen's resume, and a threat from Buen: "If I don't get a stable job by the
end of the month, I will release a third virus that will remove all folders
in the primary hard disk."  If he does, Philippines officials may not be
able to arrest him. The country has no laws that specifically forbid
computer crimes. Investigators originally planned to charge the creator of
the virus under a 1998 law regulating fraudulent use of "access devices,"
such as credit cards. However, Chief State Counsel Elmer T. Bautista nixed
this idea, pointing out that, since a computer hacker's intention is not to
defraud but to destroy files, computer hacking "cannot be considered
covered" by that law. The NBI will not challenge Bautista's decision;
meanwhile, the agency questioned seven students named on the diskette, all
of whom denied any ties to the virus and stated that they are no longer
involved with GrammerSoft. Finally, eight students at AMA Computer College
are fighting technology with technology: they worked together for a week to
take apart and create an antidote to the Love Bug. A spokesman for the
students was not certain that the antidote would work on all strains. 


Mergers Making Headlines
Lycos decided that stock valued at $12.5 billion is a fair price for Terra
Networks to pay to convince it to become bilingual. The combined company
will be called Terra Lycos, have operations in 37 countries, and plans to
expand its US, European, and Latin American markets. The companies expect
to complete the merger by the end of September. For those wanting to send
the companies a card congratulating them on their upcoming nuptials, check
out Hallmark--once it finishes its own little wedding. The greeting card
company purchased Gift Certificate Center, which sells gift certificates to
consumers and to companies to use as incentives for their employees. GCC
will continue selling gift certificates through Hallmark's Web site, and
operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary. As everyone knows, birds of a feather
flock together--and so it is with Monster.com and Business Technologies
Limited, owner of RecruitmentScotland.com, Scotland's largest recruitment
site. Monster is purchasing the Scottish company in a deal worth $13.1
million. As near as can be determined, there is no truth to the rumor that
they will rename their Web site Loch Ness Monster. Finally, in another case
of like attracting like, QXL.com, a British-based online auction house,
agreed to purchase German Internet auction house Ricardo.de for stock
valued at more than one billion euros (US$1 billion). The deal, which
creates Europe's largest Internet auction house, will give Ricardo
stockholders 42.6 shares of QXL stock for every share of Ricardo stock they
own. 


Microsoft Fixes Some Mistakes; DoJ Points Out Others
Stung by the Love Bug, Microsoft revealed plans to release security patches
for its Outlook e-mail software that will hopefully prevent such problems
in the future. The patches, to be made available on Microsoft's Web site
sometime next week, will prevent users from opening virus-carrying
attachments and let them know when someone is trying to get into their
Outlook address books. Hackers have taken advantage of Outlook's
vulnerability for a long time, yet Microsoft is only now addressing this
problem; could it just be a coincidence that Microsoft was reportedly one
of the companies hit hard by the Love Bug? Meanwhile, the company
acknowledged a flaw in another piece of its software. The two most recent
versions of Microsoft's Internet Explorer contain a vulnerability that
allows hackers to steal cookies and thus gain access to sensitive user
information. The company promised to create a fix for the problem soon.
Sadly for the company, some folks aren't quite so willing to accept its
proposed fixes. The Justice Department argued that Microsoft's proposals
for changing its business practices will not prevent it from violating
antitrust law; further, the DoJ stated that Microsoft gave inconsistent
arguments about the dangers of breaking it up.  


House Involved With Two Bills Affecting Tech Companies
The US House Judiciary Committee sent a bill to the full House with
implications for the IT sector. If passed, the bill would get rid of the
limit on the number of H-1B visas available to non-US citizens for the next
two years. Dubbed the Technology Worker Temporary Relief Act and sponsored
by Lamar Smith (R-TX) and Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX), the bill attempts to
address the ongoing labor shortage suffered by high-tech companies. Critics
of the bill maintain that there is no shortage of technology workers in the
US, but companies would rather hire less expensive non-US citizens than pay
the higher salaries associated with US technology workers. The bill sets
certain limits on what sorts of companies will be able to use the
additional visas, and doubles the fee for processing an H-1B visa.
Meanwhile, the entire House passed a bill that started as a response to an
urban legend. H. R. 1291, the Internet Access Charge Prohibition Act of
2000, bans taxation on Internet access, as it was originally written. Its
sponsor, Fred Upton (R-MI), brought it to the floor to reassure his
constituents, who bombarded him with e-mail about the matter. In order to
appease telecommunications companies, however, an amendment was added to
the bill that excludes voice over IP from the ban. Providers of Internet
telephony and their supporters expressed dismay at the addition; the bill
is expected to meet with stronger opposition in the Senate. 


Online Companies Doing the Deals, in B2B and Elsewhere
While Congress debates over whether to grant China permanent most favored
nation trading status, two groups teamed up to encourage direct online
trading between the US and China. The Excel Group and a company formed by
China's Light Industry Ministry each took a 50 percent stake in
ChinaTradingTime, an electronic marketplace intended to link more than
240,000 Chinese manufacturers to companies in the US and around the world.
The Web site handles both English and Chinese, language translation,
currency conversion, and product tracking. The Web site will be hosted by
Atlas Commerce. In other B2B news, fourteen mining and metals companies
linked up to create an online procurement marketplace, backing the project
with $100 million in capital. Founding members include Alcoa, Anglo
American, and Broken Hill Proprietary, along with other firms from
Australia, the Americas, Europe, and Africa. The chemical industry is
getting into the act with its own global online marketplace. Founders
include ATOFINA, BASF, Bayer, BP Amoco, Dow, DuPont, and Sumitomo
Chemicals. The open, neutral marketplace will encompass
supplier-to-supplier, supplier-to-customer, and distributor markets. Moving
from B2B marketplaces to the infrastructure that keeps the Internet going,
Covad Communications tied up an agreement with Bell Atlantic to share its
high-speed lines, which should help Covad speed its roll-out of DSL
services. For those who think wires are passe, Yahoo! made an agreement
with Telecom Italia Mobile to allow TIM subscribers to access a variety of
Yahoo services. Yahoo also made a deal with BBC News Online. The search
engine's UK &Ireland subsidiary will receive the top five stories from the
six main sections of BBC News Online's service, and the feed will be
updated every five minutes. Finally, OurHouse, iWon, and Spinway linked up
in a marketing deal. The program combines free Internet services with a
chance to double daily cash prizes. The service can be downloaded from
OurHouse's Web site, and lets users customize their iWon home page. If an
iWon winner made a purchase from OurHouse any time during the 31 days
before the drawing, the cash prize is automatically doubled.  

  

Love Bug Sequel May Prove Nastier Than the Original
While many variants of the Love Bug cropped up shortly after the first one
was released, none really proved to be nastier than the original--until
now. Several thousand computers are already infected with "Herbie: Love Bug
II," a virus that wipes files clean and hides by changing its appearance.
According to the alert at Symantec's Web site, the worm "overwrites every
file on the system that is not currently in use including mapped local
drives." This also includes critical system files. The worm arrives as an
e-mail with the subject heading "FW: filename.ext" (the filename.ext is
derived from the user's recently opened documents list). The size and name
of the attachment varies, but it always has a .vbs extension, which helps
in recognizing the bug. Note that this worm will rewrite every file on the
system regardless of extension, and after the worm rewrites each file, it
will append the extension ".vbs" to the file. Like the original Love Bug,
this worm sends itself to everyone in the victim's Outlook address book. 

  

Latest News in Napster's Continuing Soap Opera
Just three weeks after Metallica demanded that Napster forbid more that
300,000 users from accessing its free music-swapping service, rapper Dr.
Dre e-mailed a list to the company of 239,612 pirated recordings of his
songs which he wants Napster to block users from being able to access.
Napster is presently using a technology called MD5 which creates a unique
"fingerprint" of a file, thus permitting an easy way to determine if an
identical copy of a file was made. While the company is using MD5 to
identify songs in user libraries and to make sure that exchanged MP3 files
arrive without errors, the technology could also be used to prevent users
from exchanging particular files--such as those containing copyrighted
material. The technology is not without its problems for this purpose,
however; because of the MP3 encoding process, two different recordings of
the same song from the same CD on the same computer usually have two
different MD5 signatures. Still, it might be a better solution than
Metallica's. Shortly after Napster enacted a ban against the users on the
list given by Metallica, more than 30,000 Metallica fans protested that
they were wrongly banned. As a result, Napster restored the users, and will
leave them on the system unless Metallica sues the individual users within
10 days. Metallica has said that they will not sue all 30,000 users. Amidst
all this hullabaloo, Napster released Napster 2.0 Beta 6. The software
supports Windows Media Audio files as well as MP3, and includes an instant
messaging client. 

  

Justice Department Probes Web Site, Weighs WorldCom-Sprint Merger
Is it anti-competitive if several major airlines get together to create a
flight-booking Web site that allows the bypassing of travel agents? That's
what the Justice Department is looking into. The as-yet-unnamed Web site is
being financed by American Airlines, Continental Airlines, Delta Air Lines,
Northwest Airlines, and United Airlines. The site is expected to go live
later this year, and will compete with Travelocity and Expedia. Meanwhile,
a number of staff members with the DoJ reportedly believe that the proposed
merger between WorldCom and Sprint should be blocked because it violates
antitrust laws. Joel Klein, the department's antitrust chief, is meeting
with WorldCom and Sprint lawyers today to hear what they have to say about
the matter. At issue is the fact that the deal combines the second and
third largest long distance companies--which would also dominate Internet
switching services. The Federal Communications Commission and the European
Commission are also examining the transaction; the EC already sees
antitrust problems with the deal. 

  

ICANN Criticized for More Closed Door Meetings
ICANN established two committees, the Nominating Committee and the Election
Committee, to handle nominating and managing the election of five "at
large" members to the ICANN board. Unfortunately, ICANN created those
committees at closed-door meetings, and did not solicit public comment,
which many critics feel represents a return to its earlier secretive
behavior. The at-large board members speak for the Internet user community
and participate in ICANN's decision-making process. 

  

AT&T Offers "Free" Wireless Internet Access
As with offers of free computers and free Internet access, AT&T's offer of
free wireless Web access includes a catch or two. First of all, the
service, called Digital PocketNet, only includes unlimited access to about
40 Web sites, chosen by AT&T. The list includes such perennial favorites as
eBay, Barnesandnoble.com, and MapQuest--all chosen not so much for their
popularity, but for the fact that they provide content appropriate for
display on mobile phones. The other catch is that a prospective user of
AT&T's service must purchase one of two wireless Internet phones from AT&T
and sign up for its digital wireless voice plan. These phones aren't cheap,
either; the R280LX from Ericsson costs nearly $100, while Mitsubishi's
MobileAccess T250 weighs in at a hefty $200. For those who want to access
additional Web sites and use services such as faxing, e-mail, a calendar,
and a to-do list, AT&T offers two flat-rate plans for $6.99 and $14.99.  

  

Economic Dot-Com Fallout Continues--Two Companies Going out of Business
After just six months, online apparel retailer boo.com collapsed under its
heavy load of debt. The company failed to convince investors to provide it
with the $30 million it needed to keep operating, leaving it owing $25
million to advertising agencies and other creditors. Boo.com asked KPMG to
become its liquidator. Meanwhile, generation-Y Webcaster Digital
Entertainment Network told its staff that it has run out of money and can
no longer pay them. The company is filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
Ironically, DEN's president denied "false rumors" last Friday that the
company lacked sufficient funds to continue operating past the end of May. 


IPO Market Begins Showing Signs of Life Again
Technology companies began to brave the Wall Street roller coaster again.
CarsDirect.com filed for an initial public offering of stock. The online
car seller hopes to raise $135.5 million, which it will use on advertising,
operations, and debt reduction. Handspring revealed that it will offer 10
million common shares in a range of $19 to $22 per share. The company filed
for the IPO near the end of March. It will use the $190.2 million it hopes
to raise for general corporate purposes. Analysts will no doubt watch this
debut closely, to see how it compares with Palm's IPO. Both companies had
the same founders. Encouragingly, New Focus proved that technology
companies could still have very successful IPOs. The fiber-optics products
seller saw its stock climb from $20 to close at $51 on its first day.
Finally, Lineo filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission for its
IPO. The company is a developer of embedded Linux systems and is the sister
company of Linux distributor Caldera.
   

  

Outage Ticker: Bell Atlantic, Sprint
On Monday, Bell Atlantic reportedly lost a DACS, which took out 280 T3s for
three and a half hours in the northeastern corridor and New York City.
Sprint reported brief outages in Pennsauken, Chicago, and Fort Worth.  

  

Cyberscape Delight: Food, Lingerie Lure New Yorkers Online in Droves
The second annual online lingerie fashion show conducted by Victoria's
Secret gave surfers a less frustrating experience than last year's show.
The company increased the amount of traffic its servers could handle by
tenfold; two million users viewed at least some part of the show. Some
areas, such as New York City, still reported problems. Speaking of New
York, the city that never sleeps features more than 18,000 restaurants to
feed its seven million residents, and every one of them treasures their own
favorite eateries. Understanding this, it is perhaps not too surprising
that when New York City's Department of Health put the health inspection
records of all those restaurants online, its Web site received more traffic
than it could handle. At 45,000 hits per hour, the site's traffic after the
records went up doubled the amount of traffic from the day before. Poor New
York--even online, its residents face traffic jams. 


*** Terri Wells, Faulkner Information Services *** 

  

CyberScape Digest, Copyright 2000, Faulkner Information Services. All
rights reserved. 




Please contact me with any problems or questions 
  
Thank You
flash@faulkner.com

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Missy Harvey
Computer Science Librarian
Engineering & Science Library
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA  15213

http://www.library.cmu.edu/usr/missy/

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