Underground hackers are hawking zero-day exploits for Microsoft’s new Windows Vista operating system at $50,000 a pop, according to computer security researchers at Trend Micro.

The Windows Vista exploit—which has not been independently verified—was just one of many zero-days available for sale at an auction-style marketplace infiltrated by the Tokyo-based anti-virus vendor.

In an interview with eWEEK, Trend Micro’s chief technology officer, Raimund Genes, said prices for exploits for unpatched code execution flaws are in the $20,000 to $30,000 range, depending on the popularity of the software and the reliability of the attack code.

Bots and Trojan downloaders that typically hijack Windows machines for use in spam-spewing botnets were being sold for about $5,000, Genes said.

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With the recent release of Microsoft’s newest potential cash cows, Windows Vista and Office 2007, the company is expecting a wave of upgrades from users seeking the latest functionality. But what if you’re not looking for new bells and whistles? What if you want to keep your old operating systems, such as Windows 2000, running as long as possible?

Microsoft isn’t making it easy for you. Office 2007 and the software for the company’s much-hyped Zune music player won’t install on Windows 2000. As other new products emerge from Microsoft in 2007 and beyond, more and more of them are likely to leave Windows 2000 out of the party.
Which of these installation restrictions are caused by a real lack of capabilities in Windows 2000, however? Are any of them merely a “squeeze play” by Microsoft to convince buyers that it’s necessary to immediately upgrade all PCs to Vista and all servers to Server 2003 or the forthcoming Longhorn Server?

One example of this conundrum is Microsoft’s Windows Defender program. This antispyware program can be downloaded for free, but it will only install on Windows XP, Server 2003, and higher. The application won’t install on Windows 2000, according to Microsoft’s own product documentation.

View: Full Story Via: Information Week

35 days before Windows XP was officially released, a pirated key, called the “devils0wn”, began circulating around the web which allowed users to run a pirated copy of the operating system. Since then, the key has been used thousands of times and is now a part of Windows XP history. Trying to follow in devils0wn’s footsteps, a new crack for Windows Vista is rumored to have become available. Called “Windows Vista All Versions Activation 21.11.06″, the key reportedly unlocks any version of Vista. Sounds great for pirates, right? Maybe it is, depending where you stand on software piracy.

Those who download “Windows Vista All Versions Activation 21.11.06″ will end up with anything but a cracked version of Vista. The file is neither a crack nor key generator, but it is a trojan installer that installs the malware known as “Trojan-PSW.Win32.LdPinch.aze.” According to APC Magazine, most antivirus scanners will recognize the trojan, but NOD32 and Norton’s latest signatures do not.

While most of us dread the thought of a new piece of malware in the wild, it’s hard not to like the motive behind this trojan. Nevertheless, any propagation of malware is a bad thing so I’m happy to hear that most scanners can stop this one.

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News source: Ars Technia

Microsoft expects software piracy, which costs the company billions of dollars every year, to ease with the introduction of its new Windows Vista operating system and Office 2007 software suite, CEO Steve Ballmer said Thursday.

Microsoft launched Windows Vista to businesses Thursday, releasing the first major upgrade in five years of its dominant operating system that sits on more than 90 percent the world’s computers.

In an interview, Ballmer said that more than 20 percent of its software running around the world is pirated and the company aims to lower that figure with a new authentication program to run in Windows Vista and Office 2007.

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News source: VAR Business

When the smartest businesspeople on the planet - the Google guys, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates - all say the future of their companies is in video, who are we to argue? Google is buying YouTube. Apple is set to launch the iTV, which will wirelessly connect your TV to your Mac.

The much delayed operating system launches on Nov. 30 for business users and in January for consumers. And like any new rev of the OS that still commands 90 percent of the PC market, Vista has the power to take a technology and make it mainstream.
Pumping cash into the global economy

Just as Windows 3.1 led to mass adoption of the graphical user interface and Windows 95 popularized the browser, Vista will slowly but surely transform the PC into a true multimedia device. The computer has already absorbed the telephone’s capabilities; Vista’s role is to throw in the TV too.

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News source: Money

Just talked to Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates in advance of tomorrow’s Very Big Deal launch of the new Vista Windows operating system and new generation of Microsoft Office. (Funny — I saw Sun Chairman Scott McNealy last night, and he joked that Windows and Office make up “120% of Microsoft’s profits.”)

Though we didn’t really intend to talk about the Zune music player, it did come up — and, you’re hearing it here first, Gates says that if Apple will make iTunes music playable on Zune, he’ll make Zune music playable on iPods. Though, of course, Gates knows what it’s like to hold all the cards, and right now Jobs holds all the cards in digital music.

Said Gates: “If Apple said any song on the iPod could be played on Zune, we’d say the same thing. Because they have such a high market share, they’re not interested in interoperability, but that’s too bad.”

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News source: USA Today

About 200 Linux commands for serious newbies. To get more examples on how each command is used, use this command:

#>man commandname

Where commandname is an command you pick from the table below. If no manual exist, then that command is most likely unavailable for your Linux distro. Ignore it and proceed with other commands.

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News source: True Hacker

What do you need?

At a glance, here is a list of features that are not in every edition of Windows Vista. If the table cell is highlighted in blue then the corresponding features are in the corresponding edition of Vista. This should be your first place to look. If there are features you need or want you’d better get the edition that has them.

The Windows Home Basic N and Business N will be available in the EU only. There are also K versions for Korea. These versions have certain features and applications removed to cater to anti-trust laws in the EU and Korea. I have not included the K versions in this comparison. Also not included is Windows Vista Starter edition. That version is scaled down ever further than Windows Home Basic and will only be available in certain regions such as India, Russia, Mexico, Brazil, Thailand, and Indonesia. All up there are 17 versions of Windows Vista if you count all of the N, K and standard versions in both 32 bit and 64 bit editions. But, cutting out Starter edition, the K versions and just acknowledging 32 bit and 64 versions, you’re left with a choice of seven major editions.

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News source: VIArena

54 Vista RTM Wallpapers

Here is a set of 54 wallpapers that come pre-installed in vista:

View: Windows Vista (RTM) Wallpaper Set

The pirated Vista comes with a product key that users can enter to activate a version of the products on their computers without paying for them, a report on the Web site of The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper said. A product key is a unique serial number tied to each package of a software product.

A second download, called an “activation crack,” can then be applied that bypasses the activation process intended to guarantee that the Vista OS being downloaded is legitimate, the Herald reported. Pirated copies of Office 2007 can be downloaded just with the product key with no second activation code required.

But Microsoft said in a prepared statement that those pirated copies of the OS won’t work for long.

“The copies available for download are not final code and users should avoid unauthorized copies which could be incomplete or tampered. This unauthorized download relies on the use of pre-RTM [release-to-manufacture] activation keys that will be blocked using Microsoft’s Software Protection Platform. Consequently, these downloads will be of limited value,” the statement said.

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News source: InfoWorld