WebProNews

Tag: Russia

  • Google Briefly Ran an Asteroid-Themed Doodle but Quickly Pulled It After the Events in Russia

    Today, in celebration of asteroid 2012 DA14’s near miss of Earth, Google planned to run a new Doodle on its homepage. In fact, they did run it for a short time. But if you visit the Google homepage right now you won’t see any asteroid-related Doodle.

    That’s because Google removed it.

    And yes, it’s for the reason you suspect. Google took down the animated Doodle out of respect for those injured in Russia by that huge meteor shower. Reports indicate that over 500 people were injured as a result of the shower – most from broken glass and other parts of structures ripped apart by the meteorites. Google confirmed this to ABC News:

    Out of respect for those injured in the extraordinary meteor shower in Russia earlier today, we have removed today’s doodle from the Google homepage. The doodle was created to mark Asteroid 2012 DA14 passing Earth.

    So, here’s the Doodle you weren’t supposed to see. It will live on forever here.

    [via SearchEngineLand]

  • Meteorite Falls in Russia, Lights Up the Sky [VIDEO]

    A meteorite only a few meters long fell to Earth above Chelyabinsk, Russia early this morning. The shockwave caused by the object shattered windows and caused hundreds of injuries.

    A video of the event has quickly become one of the most-watched videos on YouTube today. It shows the object appear in the sky over the Russian city and break up in a flash of bright light.

    While astronomers today were watching asteroid 2012 da14 as it made its close miss of the Earth, the object depicted in the video was too small for scientists to have predicted today’s event.

    “Current information, which is not yet complete nor confirmed, points to a small asteroid,” said Detlef Koschny, head of Near-Earth Object activity at the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Space Situational Awareness (SSA) program. “There is no way it could have been predicted with the technical means available today. What can be said with near certainty is that this object has no connection with asteroid 2012 DA14.”

    The SSA program, along with NASA’s Near-Earth Object Observations Program (“Spaceguard”) are both searching the sky for objects that could pose a danger to Earth in the future. NASA’s OSIRIS-REx program will launch a probe in 2016 that will visit an asteroid that has a 1 in 2,400 chance of hitting the planet in the late 22nd century.

    “Today’s event is a strong reminder of why we need continuous efforts to survey and identify near-Earth objects,” said Thomas Reiter, ESA’s director of Human Spaceflight and Operations. “Our SSA programme is developing a system of automated optical telescopes that can detect asteroids and other objects in solar orbits.”

    (Image courtesy Eumetsat/ESA)

  • Google Honors Feodor Chaliapin With A Google Doodle

    February 13th marks the 140th birthday of Russian opera singer Feodor Chaliapin, and Google showed a doodle on its home page in Russia.

    While it’s still the 13th here in the states, it has already moved on into the 14th in Russia, where Google is now showing the George Ferris doodle discussed earlier. Presumably, we’ll be getting that one here in the U.S. at midnight.

    A Google search for Feodor Chaliapin returns the option to see results about the opera singer or his son Feodor Chaliapin Jr., an actor. If you select the singer, you’ll see Google’s Knowledge Panel for him.

    Here’s a sample of Chaliapin’s work:

    More recent Google doodles here.

  • Leonid Gaidai Gets Google Doodle Tribute

    Leonid Gaidai Gets Google Doodle Tribute

    Google is running a doodle on its home page in Russia, honoring comedy director Leonid Gaidai.

    “We (along with Thus, Balbes and Byvalyi) wish a happy 90th to Russian director #LeonidGaidi,” Google tweeted through its Doodles account.

    Gaidai directed 23 titles including a handful of short films, according to IMDB. He’s credited as a writer on 17 titles. He also acted in titles.

    Here’s what Google’s English version of his Knowledge Panel looks like (he has one in Russian as well):

    Leonid Gaidai

    More recent Google Doodles here.

  • Displair Turns Water Vapor Into A Floating Touchscreen

    There were a few strange devices and inventions at this year’s CES. Some of the standouts included a smart fork and a touchscreen that can form buttons on its surface. None of that can compare, however, to Displair.

    Displair, a startup out of Russia, was showing off its new display technology at CES last week. As its name suggests, it creates an interactive touchscreen out of a wall of water vapor. In a way, it’s kind of like a hologram, but it seems much cooler based solely upon the fact that it was totally unexpected.

    Terrific movie about Displair by Victor Kossakovskiy from Displair on Vimeo.

    One of the more interesting applications of Displair is in film. The technology’s creators say that they can display 3D images naturally without the need of glasses. Even more impressive, the technology could see the true return of smell-o-vision by loading the vapor with custom scents that compliment the on-air action.

    Like most crazy new technologies, Displair is still in its infancy. Those at CES got to see it in action though, and even played around with it for a bit. Check out Huffington Post’s Jason Gilbert playing a round on Fruit Ninja on Displair. It’s absolutely wild.

    As commenters have pointed out, the technology has quite a bit of input lag. That’s fine at the moment as it’s not exactly geared towards consumer consumption nor gaming. It’s primarily meant for enterprise applications. Even then, most businesses would probably be more interested in using something like Microsoft’s PixelSense. That being said, it’s only a matter of time before technology like Displair catches on to project images into three-dimensional space.

  • Facebook Slowly Conquering the World, Still Trails in Russia, China

    It’s Facebook’s world – every other social network is just living in it. Big blue’s virus-like spread has been well-documented, as the company has spent the past three years making up ground in countries like Brazil, Mexico, India, and more to become the most-popular social network in the world (and in a majority of countries).

    Social media analyst Vincenzo Cosenza has been tracking the state of social media across the world since 2009, and every six months he has put out his “World Map of Social Networks.” In June, he looked at 137 countries using Alexa data and found that Facebook was the most-popular social network in 126 of them, a truly overwhelming majority.

    Now that six months have passed, it’s once again time for another map. This new map does indeed show gains for Facebook, but holdouts remain in various countries in the East.

    As of now, Facebook holds sway over 127 of the 137 countries Cosenza analyzes. The major countries that boast networks more popular than Facebook include Russia, China, and Iran.

    What’s interesting is that the map now features the least amount of networks ever considered. As of December 2012, only 5 networks dominate the world: Facebook, QZone, V Kontakte, Odnoklassniki, and Cloob.

    V Kontakte and Odnoklassniki battle it out in Russia, of course, and QZone dominates the Chinese market. Cloob is the network of choice in Iran, where Facebook is more or less blocked by the government.

    Although Facebook’s only unconquered territories lie in Asia, Facebook currently has the most of its 1 billion+ users hailing from Asia.

    “One of the drivers of its growth is Asia that with 278 million users, surpassed Europe, 251 million, as the largest continent on Facebook. North America has 243 million users, South America 142 million. Africa, almost 52 million, and Oceania just 15 million (source: Facebook Ads Platform). In the latest months Zuckerberg’s Army conquered Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia and Vietnam,” says Cosenza.

    Here’s a nice little GIF of Facebook’s global takeover, from 2009 to the present.

    [Vincenzo Cosenza via The Next Web]

  • Open Internet Scores A Win At ITU, China And Russia Withdraw Bids For Internet Control

    The world has been watching and waiting for the past week as nations from around the world are meeting in Dubai to discuss the future of the ITU. The conference could have significant implications for the open Web as some nations are asking for more control over the Internet. Thankfully, it appears that some nations are beginning to back off from this potentially disastrous proposal.

    TechWeekEurope is reporting that nations including China, Russia and others have taken their controversial proposal off the table for now. It would appear that the reason for the withdrawal was due to the negative response the proposal received from citizens all around the world.

    Google is leading one of the largest campaigns against the ITU with its #freeandopen campaign. As of now, over 3 million people have signed in support of Google’s efforts to keep the Internet out of the hands of those who would abuse it. It’s unknown if Google’s other concern – a proposal to tax Internet companies – has been killed yet.

    As for governmental bodies, the US and European Union have been aligned against any proposed changes to how the Internet is governed. Last week, the US House of Representatives unanimously passed a Senate resolution that affirmed the US’ stance on any proposed takeover of the Internet. Late last month, the European Parliament issued a similar resolution that rejected any change to how the Internet is currently handled.

    All that being said, the ITU conference isn’t over until December 13. There’s still a lot to be concerned about, including the recent passage of a deep packet inspection standard. For now, however, you can take a minute to catch your breath.

  • 56 More Countries Get iTunes Store

    56 More Countries Get iTunes Store

    Apple announced today that it has launched the iTunes Store in 56 new countries, including Russia, Turkey, India, and South Africa. It is now available in a total of 119 countries.

    “The iTunes Store features local artists including Elka in Russia, Sezen Aksu in Turkey, AR Rahman in India, and Zahara in South Africa, international artists including The Beatles, Taylor Swift and Coldplay, and world-renowned classical musicians including Lang Lang, Yo Yo Ma and Yuja Wang,” Apple says. “Customers can choose from over 20 million songs available to purchase and download on the iTunes Store.”

    “Movie fans can choose from a wide selection of films available for rent or purchase from the iTunes Store, with many available in stunning HD, from major studios including 20th Century Fox, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, The Walt Disney Studios and Warner Bros. Pictures, as well as leading local distributors,” the company notes.

    Users, of course, have access to the App Store, which features 700,000 apps, which are actually available in as many as 155 countries.

    Apple launched iTunes 11 last week. The company also recently announced the addition of AC/DC’s music to its catalog, which was apparently a really big deal.

  • Mark Zuckerberg Talks Medvedev, Fashion on Russian Late Night

    Mark Zuckerberg Talks Medvedev, Fashion on Russian Late Night

    As you may have heard, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is currently on a highly-publicized trip to Russia. Yesterday, he toured the city of Moscow, visiting the Red Square and a McDonalds. He then met with Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev to discuss technology and expansion in the country.

    Of course, Zuckerberg knows that Russia is a big market that’s basically untapped. Russian-born social network Vkontakte dominates in the country. Some seemed to think that Zuckerberg may be secretly on a developer and engineer-finding mission.

    Either way, Zuckerberg had time to do hit late night talk show circuit. Zuckerberg spoke with Ivan Urgant, host of popular late night show Evening Urgant. Evening Urgant is broadcast on “the biggest country-wide broadcaster with the largest audience in Russia,” Channel One. So I guess it’s comparable to Zuckerberg appearing on Leno, Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel, or Fallon in the U.S.

    When asked about his meeting with Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, there’s what Zuckerberg had to say:

    “It was a lot of fun. We had an interesting conversation. He’s very supportive of developing the technology industry here in Russia. We’re really excited about this too – a lot of what I’m here to do is to talk to developers and engineers and entrepreneurs here who are going to build stuff using Facebook, and build a lot of new Russian companies. So, it was an interesting conversation.”

    The topics of conversation ranged from serious to casual, for instance Zuckerberg talked about his famous attire (and the fact that he wore a suit to speak to Medvedev:

    “You know, I actually went to boarding school, so I had to wear a jacket and tie everyday. So when I was done with that, I just decided that I was going to wear a t-shirt for the rest of my life.”

    If you can put up with the Russian voiceover, Zuckerberg responds in English and it’s a pretty fun interview. Check it out below:

  • Mark Zuckerberg Travels to Russia, Meets Prime Minister Medvedev [PHOTOS]

    Mark Zuckerberg Travels to Russia, Meets Prime Minister Medvedev [PHOTOS]

    Facebook is the biggest social network in the world, as it dominates the market in a majority of social-media active countries across the globe. Russia is not one of those countries. In an effort to boost Facebook’s presence in this corner of the world, Mark Zuckerberg traveled to Moscow to meet with Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev.

    While in Russia, Zuckerberg met with PM Medvedev – as well as various government officials tasked with innovation. According to the AFP, Russian officials have confirmed that Zuckerberg and Medvedev discussed “cooperation in IT technology and start-ups in Skolkovo – the tech-focused area out side Moscow that Zuckerberg will also visit during his trip.

    It looks like Zuckerberg and Medvedev have concluded their conversation, as Zuckerberg just posted this photo to his Facebook page a couple of hours ago (note: no hoodie):

    “Good conversation with Prime Minister Medvedev,” he says.

    According to reports, Zuckerberg spent some time sightseeing before his meeting with the Prime Minister, walking around Red Square in a hoodie. It appears as though he cleaned up before the big meeting. Keeping it true American, Zuck also stopped and had a bite at a McDonalds.

    Zuckerberg posted a pic of this, captioned “Hello, Moscow.”

    Although the trip is being marketed as an “innovation discussion,” there are some on the Russian end that feel like Zuckerberg may be trying to recruit some top talent.

    Facebook is fighting an uphill battle in Russia, as local social network Vkontakte dominates the market. Its founder, 27-year-old Pavel Durov, is a St.Petersburg-based entrepreneur that has been called the Russian Mark Zuckerburg.

  • Russian Billionaire Wants Other Billionaires To Fund His Immortality

    Russian Billionaire Wants Other Billionaires To Fund His Immortality

    You may recall a super crazy plan from one Russian billionaire that’s hoping to fund the first immortality project. Dmitry Itskov is pretty young at 31, but he hopes to live forever with the help of science and robotics. He needs help, however, from the billionaire community to complete his objective – becoming immortal by 2045.

    In an open letter from Itskov, he implores billionaires to start funding “cybernetic immortality and the artificial body.” For you see, Itskov doesn’t want to make an immortal body. It’s impossible to stop aging as our bodies will just wither and die sooner or later. His plan involves something far more sci-fi and it’s way cooler as a result.

    If you’re familiar with the idea of transferring consciousness to a machine, then you already have a leg up on understanding what Itskov hopes to do. His plans for 2045 involve transferring the human consciousness to a machine and preserving said consciousness. It would essentially mean transferring the consciousness in our brain to a synthetic brain. Our humanity would be supposedly intact, but none of our original body would remain.

    Of course, that’s still quite a ways off. For now, he’s hoping to have some other exciting technology available by the year 2015. He calls them “android avatars” that are controlled via a “brain-computer.” You’re no doubt thinking of James Cameron’s Avatar films and that’s exactly what Itskov has planned. He hopes to use these “android avatars” to help people “work in dangerous environments, perform rescue operations, travel in extreme situations, etc.” He also hopes the technology would allow people with disabilities to walk again or experience lost senses.

    You might think that sounds a little bit too much like sci-fi. Surprisingly enough, the technology is almost here and will be readily available later on down the road. It’s actually the least sci-fi of all the milestones that Itskov has planned.

    Take for instance his plans for 2025. He hopes to create a robot that can take in the brain of an otherwise damaged beyond repair body. It’s not exactly the transferring of human consciousness as the machine would still be dependent on the brain. It’s still crazy sci-fi techno-magic and a lot of people would disagree with his timetable.

    His goal for 2045 isn’t simply immortality. That plays a large role in it, but Itskov sees it as the next step in human evolution. In his mind, death is but a genetic defect that needs to be eradicated. There are plenty of scientists who would disagree with that statement, but let Itskov have his fun. He hopes that the immortality project will advance humanity to new plateaus of “energy generation, transportation, politics, medicine, psychology, sciences, and so on.”

    Of course, when you’re immortal and in the body of a super robot, a lot of things could get done. It’s an exciting thought, but one that we must temper into reality. The human consciousness and its relationship with the brain is still something that’s not understood completely. We’re making progress all the time, but I doubt that we’ll able to transfer the human consciousness, independent of the brain, to a synthetic one in the next 33 years.

    Russian Billionaire Immortality

    Itskov is a dreamer and I admire him for that. He hopes that there are other billionaires out there who want to dream with him. That’s why he’s offering to “coordinate your personal immortality project entirely free of charge” to anybody who’s willing to pony up the funds to continue the research. I’m sure that there are a lot of billionaires who would want to live forever, but Itskov must take into account that people would use this technology for nothing but evil. The one assurance we have is that evil men will die. If Itskov succeeds, we may no longer have that assurance.

  • Steve Jobs To Be Immortalized In The Tech Capital Of Russia

    Regardless of what you think of the Apple co-founder, a lot of people have mountains of respect for Steve Jobs. When he passed away last year, people showed their respect in a variety of ways. Budapest went the strange route and built a statue of Steve Jobs flashing gang signs. St. Petersburg, Russia is now continuing that fine tradition.

    RT is reporting that a private foundation has announced a competition for local artists and designers to come up with a design for the proposed Jobs monument. There will be no limits on creativity so we could end up with another strange statue that confuses and amazes. It could also be something entirely different. The foundation says that it could be a “memorial board” or “electronic installation.”

    So why is the statue being built in St. Petersburg? According to the foundation, it’s the center of Russian information technology. The city is host to the Leningrad School of Programming while the Russian Facebook, VKontake, was also founded in the city.

    The city does not yet have a location to which they will place the statue as that will be decided after the winning concept is selected. Who knows? The winning monument could be a Steve Jobs version of Lenin’s crypt. People can visit a wax dummy of the late Jobs lying in a crypt perfectly preserved for the rest of time. A little macabre, sure, but the Russians have already proven that they’re fine with worshipping dead historical figures like gods.

    I’m sure whatever the Russians come up with won’t be nearly as bad as the statue in Budapest or those creepy action figures that were being made in China.

  • Russian Developer Hacks iOS To Get Free In-App Content

    Piracy isn’t that big of a problem on iOS. The amount of work required to circumvent the App Store and get free stuff just doesn’t seem worth it when most apps give you a way of obtaining in-game content through regular gameplay instead of buying it. Would you use software to get free in-app content if you didn’t have to jailbreak your phone?

    A Russian developer going by the handle of ZonD80 has effectively hacked iOS to allow him free access to in-app purchases. The hack works on all devices running iOS 3.0 all the way to the newest version, 6.0. What’s even more fascinating (or worse depending on your definition) is this particular hack doesn’t require jailbreaking on the user’s part to access.

    The developer has started up a Web site (we obviously won’t link to it) that provide users with all the tools necessary to get free in-app purchases. According to 9to5Mac, the developer is currently accepting donations to continue the project and keep the server that’s hosting the hack active.

    Arguments for or against such a hack aside, the actual methodology behind it is fascinating. Users need only install two small programs from the developer’s site and then connect via Wi-Fi. After changing the phone’s DNS, a user just needs to hit like and enter their Apple ID. It’s stupid simple and something that Apple will want to stop immediately.

    Fortunately for some developers, the method employed by those using this hack doesn’t work on all apps. Developers that use Apple’s method of validating receipts for in-app purchases will find that their app can not be affected by this hack. Developers will probably want to start implementing that into their apps right now.

    Here’s a video from ZonD80 that shows how simple it is to use the hack. We here at WebProNews do not condone the theft of digital content. This is good code at work, however, and Apple would be wise to hire this guy for future security.

  • Hackers Break Into Banks And Steal 60 Million Euros

    McAfee and Guardian Analytics released a joint report today saying that more than 60 firms have suffered from what it has called an “insider level of understanding.” The automated malicious software program was discovered and it was designed to use servers to process thousands of attempted thefts from both businesses and private individuals.

    “The fraudsters’ objective in these attacks is to siphon large amounts from high balance accounts, hence the name chosen for this research – Operation High Roller,” the report said. “If all of the attempted fraud campaigns were as successful as the Netherlands example we describe in this report, the total attempted fraud could be as high as 2 billion euro.”

    What makes this crime so different is that the hackers were able to get into the bank servers and install constructed software that is automated. Because it is on the inside, it is able to get around the normal alarms that alert the system of abnormalities and do its job. Which is to siphon money out of large accounts.

    MacAfee has identified a bunch of servers being used for this crime. “They have identified 60 different servers, many of them in Russia, and they have identified one alone that has been used to steal 60 million euro,” Sky News defense and security editor Sam Kiley said.

    The 60 million euros that have been taken are all that has been identified so far, but this has the ability to be one of the largest thefts of money in the history of the world.

  • Lunar Orbit Trip For You To Cost $100 Million

    Lunar Orbit Trip For You To Cost $100 Million

    SInce the dawn of human space flight, I would highly doubt that there is a single human that hasn’t at least once in their life looked at the moon and thought, “I’d love to go there.” With new advances in technology and the recent bonanza of private companies either launching stuff into space or planning permanent trips to Mars, it is now going to get easier and easier for anyone to live out those dreams.

    The problem of inconvenience will disappear, but the high price will continue to be a problem. For years the Russians charged people $25 million to launch into low Earth orbit, recently it went up to $35 million. A company named Excalibur Almaz has announced that it is selling tickets to lunar orbit for the low rate of only $100 million! I understand that it is expensive, but for an upstart it really seems like they are just trying to fund their company that hasn’t even had a single launch yet.

    When will the launch happen? there is no info yet. As of right now, Excalibur Almaz isn’t even doing flight tests of its capsule until next year. So I could see them being prepared to actually launch a human by 2015-2016.

  • Move Over Planes, Trains Are Making A Comeback

    I am absolutely terrified of planes. The idea of being hurtled through the air at hundreds of miles per hour in a giant steel coffin does not sit well with me. That’s why I’m all for trains making a comeback and it looks like they are.

    The Web Urbanist reports that the U.S. and Russia just inked a deal that would build a tunnel under the ocean in the Bering Strait between Alaska and Russia. It would connect with pre-existing railways and allow the countries to transport freight between the two without the use of planes or boats.

    Bering Strait

    Planes, Trains and Bering Strait

    The project will reportedly cost about $100 billion. That’s a lot of money, money that a lot of countries can’t just go spending on awesome, but initially unnecessary, projects like this. The two countries were apparently able to justify the cost since projections put the tunnel at being able to transport 100 million tons of freight a year.

    While the initial use will be used for industrial uses, it’s not too far fetched to imagine it also being used for passengers. While some people would obviously be more inclined to fly over the ocean, I’m sure the Pteromerhanophobics (including myself) would be more than happy to take a train ride under the ocean. Considering that bullet trains can now hit speeds of about 200 mph, it wouldn’t take that much longer to reach international destinations.

    Besides, underwater tunnels are just the first step to installing evacuated tube transports for 4,000 mph speeds across the ocean floor. Technology is going back to trains so that we can all travel like the folks in Futurama.

  • Angry Birds Credit Cards Coming Soon…..To Russia

    What is left for Rovio to do after having their Angry Birds games downloaded over 1 billion times? Get into a partnership with a Russian bank to have an Angry Birds credit card of course.

    According to the Moscow News, the company is working with Internet Retail Solutions (Irsol) on branded MasterCard cards that will be available in Russia on June 4. Irsol said that they will print out 100,000 cards and then will determine if there is enough demand for more cards to be printed.

    This, once again, falls into Rovio’s new found push to move away from a “video game only” business approach, and more into a multimedia approach. They have a theme park, have acquired new studios, and have a movie/cartoon in the works. They seem to really want to capitalize on the Angry Birds name and good public opinion while they still can to build a better brand.

    Picture courtesy of Promsvyazbank

  • NATO Missile Defense Shield Is Up And Running

    The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has announced at its Chicago, Illinois conference that it’s long awaited missile defense shield is up and running for the first time. What it is being used for is the real question. The allies maintain that the defense shield is in place for one reason right now…Iran. But even that has some critics. Professor Theodore Postol of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is one of these critics saying: “The fundamental long-term threat from Iran is from nuclear weapons. But for now Iran does not have the bomb. A ballistic missile without a nuclear weapon,” he says, “is like a terrorist bomber without an explosive vest.”

    The network of US early-warning satellites; a new high-powered X-Band radar based in Turkey; and at least one Aegis-equipped US warship, deployed in the Mediterranean, capable of shooting down an incoming ballistic missile. It will also rely on some of Nato’s European members will offer elements of their existing air defenses: Patriot missiles in Germany and the Netherlands for example to further bolster the system. “Missile defense,” Professor Sean Kay, an expert on Nato said, “is a very important step towards re-invigorating the core collective defense foundation of Nato, which all the allies should appreciate.”

    In turn Russia is not happy, going as far in recent weeks to having Putin threaten airstrikes against sites related to the shield. It feels as though this shield is making their Nuclear capability diminished. Dmitri Trenin, Director of the Carnegie Center in Moscow is one of Russia’s most acute strategic observers. “Russia,” he says, “sees US ballistic missile defense plans as global in scope”. “The concern,” he believes, is that “strategic defense impacts upon strategic offense; devaluing the deterrent value of Russia’s own nuclear arsenal.”

    picture courtesy of the BBC

  • Pirate Pay Aims To Kill Sharing Over BitTorrent

    You’re not misreading that headline, there is a new company called “Pirate Pay.” It’s not some kind of illegal service that offers to pay people for the amount of content they pirate, but rather aims to kill piracy on the Internet.

    Pirate Pay is a Russia-based company that has one simple goal – to kill torrents. It’s actually not as simple as it sounds. As TorrentFreak explains, the technology that Pirate Pay has built doesn’t get rid of the torrents, but rather stops users from sharing the information between each other through BitTorrent.

    According to Pirate Pay CEO Andrei Klimenko, the idea started when they were building traffic management software. They found that they were able to effectively kill BitTorrent traffic so they went head first into what may become a huge business for them if entertainment companies come knocking.

    While they have only had one major client so far, they’re already received plenty of funding from Microsoft. The software giant has reportedly invested $100,000 into the company through the Microsoft Seed Financing Fund. I bet Microsoft will want to use the service to stop all the pirated copies of Windows 7, and soon to be Windows 8, floating around the Internet.

    As mentioned, Pirate Pay has had one major client so far. The film “Vysotsky. Thanks to God, I Am Alive” was distributed through Russia by Walt Disney Studios Sony Pictures Releasing. The joint company hired Pirate Pay to stop any BitTorrent traffic in regards to this title. After 30 days of protection, they were able to prevent 44,845 copies of the film from being shared over BitTorrent.

    As TorrentFreak points out, Pirate Pay didn’t say how many people got through their blockade. They also don’t make any mention of the fact that people could just try again when Pirate Pay wasn’t blocking P2P traffic.

    If anything, Pirate Pay is an interesting concept. It seems that the company only stops BitTorrent traffic for the amount of days that the companies pay for their services. While it could be a good block to keep people from pirating a film or album for the first month after its release, it does nothing to stop later piracy unless the company keeps paying for their service which costs anywhere between $12,000 to $50,000.

    While I don’t think it’s right to punish legitimate users or sue consumers over piracy, I think I’m ok with Pirate Pay’s tactics. It would be especially nice if they only go after torrents during the first month then let off the enforcement. That way studios can have a better chance of getting sales in the first month, and then hopefully get more sales in later months through word of mouth and social media. Once again, the old mantra is true: If you treat your customers right, they’re going to reciprocate the motion.

  • Anonymous Takes Down Kremlin Web Site As Part Of #OpDefiance

    If you follow world politics, you may have heard that Vladimir Putin is back in charge as president of Russia. The former president turned prime minister turned president again has caused quite a bit of stir within the country with many people protesting what they feel was a rigged election.

    In solidarity with the protest movement, the Russian branch of Anonymous attacked and took down the Kremlin’s Web site according to The Moscow Times. The attack took place at 11 a.m. on Wednesday as part of a new campaign called #OpDefiance

    A representative for the Kremlin said that they knew about the attacks and were ready for them. Unlike a lot of governmental agencies that only start to take Anonymous seriously after they’re attacked, it would appear that Russia has been prepared. The representative said, “They are serious attacks, but the expertise of our professionals is no joke.”

    The reason behind the Russian government being ready for such attacks is that Putin has been a long time target of Anonymous actions. We reported back in February on an Anonymous operation that leaked emails from a pro-Putin group. The emails suggested that Putin was using his power to attack enemies of his political agenda while paying off newspapers to give him positive coverage.

    Here’s the video Anonymous put together announcing #OpDefiance. If you want to follow the exploits of Anonymous operations in Russia, the official Twitter account appears to be @Op_Russia. There are other Russian Anonymous accounts, but this one seems to get the news of takedowns first.

    We’ll keep you updated on any further Anonymous activities. The attacks in Russia are probably not over and won’t be for a while. Putin is relatively unpopular in the country so things might get interesting in the coming days.

  • Russian National Arrested for Hacking Brokerage Accounts

    In another instance of cyber fraud relating to Russia, a Russian national has just been charged in the U.S. for gaining illegal access brokerage accounts, and secretly making odd trades, to the benefit of the criminal ring he was working with.

    Since he was going after Americans, New Yorker Petr Murmylyuk, 31, likely would’ve had an easier time eluding authorities if he’d conducted the hack while living in Russia – it would appear that the unspoken rules of the hacking trade in that country generally state that if one were to hack, don’t hack a fellow Russian, try to hack an American, and don’t practice Scientology. In all seriousness, Russia is cracking down on cybercrime, with the country-wide auditing of ISPs to slow down rampant media piracy, and the recent SWAT team arrest of a teen who was trying to extort millions from an oligarch.

    Petr Murmylyuk, 31, who lives in New York, hacked into several brokerage accounts, resulting in losses in the millions. He is charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, unauthorized access to computers and securities fraud, and could face up to 5 years, along with a $250,000 fine. The U.S. District Attorney’s Office of New Jersey alleges that Murmylyuk would break into the accounts, and then change the user info to keep his victims from ever noticing the trades he was making. Murmylyuk and his ring would then sell options from the hacked accounts to their own fraudulent accounts, and then turn around and sell them back for up to nine times the price, minutes later.

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is also filing a civil suit against Murmylyuk, who was also running a similar scam to where he’d sell securities at inflated prices from his fake accounts to the accounts he’d hacked. Murmylyuk is also accused of tapping foreign nationals to open up bank accounts so he’d have a place to move his “winnings,” which cost Fidelity, Scottrade, E*Trade, and Schwab about $1 million each. Murmylyuk is presently in custody in Manhattan.