Windows

More than $250,000 is offered by Microsoft to programmers who can develop new security defense for Windows OS family to protect users against attacks that exploit the software bugs.

Microsoft's Blue Hat Prize announced on Wednesday at the Black Hat security conference will pay $200,000 for the best “novel runtime mitigation technology designed to prevent the exploitation of memory safety vulnerabilities.” The two runners up will receive $50,000 and a MSDN Universal subscription valued at $10,000, respectively.

A new application appeared on the iTunes store to allow users to spy on their children or family members who own the iPhone. Spykey application is Windows based and is basically a keylogger that transmits every key pressed to an iPhone application (£2.99 from the iTunes store).

In the description you may read that the application is discovering cheating partners or protecting children.

Previously Apple delisted applications that spy on iPhone users. Thus, Retina's Mobile Spy, for example, is now restricted to jailbroken iPhones.

New updates have been released by Adobe to patch Reader PDF and Flash animation applications. The patches fix the flaws widely used by hackers to penetrate and take control of end user machines.

In the latest patch Adobe fixes a serious bug in Flash that allows attackers to remotely execute malicious code on machines that run the software, and there are reports it's being actively exploited, Adobe said.

Now users who want to have an option to shut down their PCs remotely from their iPhone can do it with the new app. Thus, if you are sitting in your chair and watching your favorite TV program you do not wish to leave, while there is a PC turned on in another room, you may switch it off via your iPhone or iPad device with the new iShutdown app.

Microsoft hopes to gain leading positions in the growing business software market with a new multibillion dollar business. The Redmond company making its main profit on Windows and Office franchises hopes to bereave a big market share from giants like Oracle Corp, SAP AG and start-up online vendor Salesforce.com Inc.

"The opportunities to make a good business economically are wonderful," said Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer in a telephone interview on Monday. "We're pretty pumped up."

Adobe is developing a patch to its Flash media player to address a critical vulnerability exploited in targeted attacks to install malware on users’ PCs. According to a blog post written by an independent security researcher Mila Parkour the attacks are launched using emails that attach a Microsoft Word document that contains a booby-trapped Flash file.

Clicking on the document causes Windows-based machines to install a backdoor known as Zolpiq, separate researchers from antivirus provider Kaspersky said.

A new way to hijack Windows machines was found by researchers in the course of some experiments. Experts at InfoSec Institute, an information security services company, tried the MITM, or man-in-the-middle, attacks that exploit features that present in recent versions of Windows to make it easy for computers to connect to networks using the next generation IPv6 protocol.

According to Jack Koziol, a program manager at InfoSec Institute, the attack may also exploit features of Apple's OS X for Macs, however the proof-of-concept has not been tested on that platform.

A Windows Trojan has been adapted to infect Mac OS machines, according to the latest report by a security firm Sophos. The malware is being under development to set a backdoor on Macs with hackers behind the scheme seeking for potential buyers.

The author called the malware BlackHole RAT while security experts dubbed it as MusMinim. It is a version of Windows Trojan called darkComet. Net security firm Sophos describes the malware as "very basic", while even its author characterizes the malware as a work in progress.

Microsoft will release a Kinect for Windows SDK "starter kit" this spring according to the announcement made by the company. The kit will be launched "to make it simpler for the academic research and enthusiast communities to create rich natural user interfaces" using the motion-sensing device.

Linux running PCs are vulnerable to Windows oriented autorun style attacks as it was proved by a security researcher. Jon Larimer, of IBM's X-Force security division, conducted a research and found that autorun is not absolutely extraneous to Linux architecture. Larimer developed a demo to show how it might be possible to insert a USB stick with modified code into a Ubuntu PC to get rid of a screensaver without entering a password – and display the user's desktop.

Dell Inc unveiled its new tablet device for business users that will run Microsoft Windows operating system. While many experts believe current version of Windows is not very good for tablet environment Dell says its commercial customers give preference to a familiar and secure architecture of Microsoft software.

Previously the computer maker launched its tablets on Google’s Android operating platform.

Several versions of Microsoft Windows operating system have vulnerabilities that may be exploited by hackers to remotely take control of a personal computer.

This week Microsoft warned of the bug in a special alert saying that it has yet to develop software to plug the hole in Windows or to figure out a workaround to the problem.

The Redmond reports that it does not know any attacks to date that tried to exploit the flaw which involves the way Windows renders graphics on versions of Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008.

Microsoft has issued the final version of its free security solution after a five-month beta testing program. The new version features updated heuristic engine as well as the addition of network intrusion detection technology.

Besides, the slightly redesigned dashboard allows users to manage Microsoft's firewall from inside MSE. MSE 2.0 also features tighter integration with Internet Explorer as a mechanism for protecting against web-based threats.

Last week Microsoft started offering free antivirus software to its customers via Windows’ built-in update service. The move was questioned by a security vendor who is concerned by the anti-competitiveness of the Redmond’s behavior.

Microsoft started offering Security Essentials as an optional download to the users of Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7.

“Consumers have turned their backs on Microsoft. A company that once symbolized the future is now living in the past.” This is what CNN Money says about the once popularized hi-tech brand.

The paper cited a resigning Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie who said that cheat death, Microsoft must escape Windows on the PC, and adapt to the new world order.

Ozzie joined the Redmond team in 2005 and participated in Microsoft’s move to online services with Windows Azure that followed his 2005 memo on Internet Services Disruption.