Safari successfully exploited in seconds in Pwn2Own contest

From Ars Technica

Putting his money where his mouth is, so to speak, security reseacher Charlie Miller exploited Safari in mere seconds to take control of a test MacBook in the Pwn2Own contest held during the CanSecWest security conference. In fact, he did so with a default configuration and all security updates applied. Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 and Mozilla's Firefox 3 were also successfully exploited later in the afternoon.

What can one say? These were fully patched machines. Apple OS/X fell first then Microsoft Windows, and the researchers say it is much easier to exploit OS/X than Windows. This is yet another sign that Apple is lagging behind in the system quality stakes.

Windows 7 build 7048 vs. Windows 7 beta 1 vs. Vista vs. XP performance shootout - which is best?

From ZDNet Blogs

It’s clear that some of the results here are all over the place, and I’m putting this down this the fact that Windows 7 is still a work in progress (and realistically, probably will be for a good 9 - 12 months after launch) and drivers are still pretty new. However, four patterns do emerge:

• Windows 7 is, overall, better than both Vista and XP.


• As Windows 7 progresses, it’s getting better (or at least the 64-bit editions are).


• On a higher-spec system, 64-bit is best.


• On a lower-spec system, 32-bit is best.

Microsoft seem to have taken the lessons learnt during the Vista debacle to heart and that is good news for users of their products. Personally I have been happy using both Vista 64-bit and Leopard (OS/X 10.5.6). I am looking forward to both Windows 7 from Microsoft and Snow Leopard (OS/X 10.6) from Apple.

SA's tangled web

From My Broadband:-

According to a report released this week at the Internet Governance Forum, South Africa has fallen a long way in the African rankings since 2000, when it had 2.4 million subscribers representing 53 percent of internet users across the continent.

In 2009 South Africa represents only nine percent of Africa's total internet subscriber base, with 5.1 million users.

I think price is a major factor, but with Seacom scheduled to come online in the middle of this year, access prices are expected to drop substantially. Let's hold thumbs...