Accessibility

The 404 1,015: Where we take Katie Linendoll to sleepaway camp (podcast)

Former CBS Early Show tech correspondent, HSN host, and all-around protogeek Katie Linendoll checks in with us today and brings gifts! She'll tell us about her long history with consumer tech and her new show on Spike TV's All Access Weekly, a show with a live audience that covers gaming, comics, and gadgets. Even cooler--they film out of the old MTV TRL studio!

We'll also cover the breaking news of the day: AirBnB bought its competitor Crashpadder in advance of the 2012 Summer Olympic Games, Angry Birds Space comes out tomorrow, and the Girl Scouts of America debut their new Netiquette Pledge.

Thanks again to Katie for joining us today, and be sure to check out All Access Weekly every Thursday at midnight!… Read more

Researcher to demo smartphone attack at RSA

A researcher plans to demonstrate an attack on a smartphone at the RSA security conference this week that starts with social engineering via a text message and leads to a malicious Web link that triggers a browser exploit and silently downloads a Trojan.

"It's a demo of a new attack vector on mobile, using a Remote Access Tool" called Nickispy, which showed up a few months ago in China, said Dmitri Alperovitch, formerly of McAfee Labs who is chief technology officer at a brand new startup called CrowdStrike. "No one has publicly demonstrated an end-to-end attack … Read more

What to do when the OS X Finder requires passwords for managing files

By default OS X is set up so you can access and edit files you create and only requires authentication to edit files in system directories or in other user accounts (provided you are an administrator). This allows for a fairly seamless workflow when working with the resources your account has access to, and notifies you when you are editing files that could affect other users or the system as a whole.

This setup is determined by the permissions settings in the system, which you can see if you select a file and get information on it. At the bottom … Read more

Google set to give a little backbone to Kansas City high-speed Net

Google is ready to start laying fiber-optic lines in Kansas City, Mo., and Kansas City, Kan., for its Google Fiber project to catalyze the shift toward higher-speed Internet access.

Google announced the project two years ago and announced Kansas City as the lucky recipient of the 1-gigabit-per-second Internet access. It turns out it's not easy to deploy that fast a network for hundreds of thousands of people, though, and as Google works its way through the challenge, faster broadband is gradually arriving elsewhere, too.

Kevin Lo, general manager of Google Access, announced today that Google is done surveying and … Read more

How to share Internet from your laptop to smartphone (and other devices)

Many smartphones or other devices do not support the same network configuration that is easily shared from laptop to laptop.

This guide can show you a free way to share your network connection with these devices without also needing to install any third-party software on Windows Vista or 7 (though it's possible on XP too). Keep in mind that this works best when your laptop is connected via a cable. Ultimately, this method is ideal for sharing the Internet connection in a hotel room (many rooms have only one ethernet cable) from your laptop to other devices.

All you'… Read more

Vint Cerf: Internet access isn't a human right

Although some countries around the world argue that Internet access is a fundamental right, one of the "fathers of the Internet," Vint Cerf, doesn't see it that way.

"Technology is an enabler of rights, not a right itself," Cerf, who is also a Google's chief Internet evangelist, wrote yesterday in an editorial in The New York Times. "There is a high bar for something to be considered a human right. Loosely put, it must be among the things we as humans need in order to lead healthy, meaningful lives, like freedom from torture … Read more

Access your computer with your iPhone

TeamViewer is an app that lets you connect to Macs and PCs via the Internet to share desktops, transfer files, walk through presentations, and control other computers remotely--all right from your iPhone. It's even free for noncommercial use, making it a great choice for your pro bono troubleshooting for friends and family, or just for accessing your own Mac from the road.

The interface is simple: you open TeamViewer and you're prompted to either create a session or wait for one. A unique ID and password are created for each session, and you need to have TeamViewer on … Read more

How to master the art of passwords

Passwords are a way of life for nearly everybody who uses any kind of software. No viable alternative is imminent: fingerprint readers, retina scanners, voice identification, and USB tokens all have limitations. Nothing is as simple and inexpensive as an old-fashioned string of keystrokes.

Web services and network managers nearly always require a minimum degree of password difficulty to prevent standard password-cracking techniques from guessing them quickly. We're also cautioned not to reuse the same passphrases on different sites and are routinely blocked from recycling the passwords we've used previously.

Considering the number of times PC users sign … Read more

Got a new PC? Get a perfect starter kit - now 83% off

Just in time for the holidays, CNET has partnered with top consumer software publishers to offer an exclusive bundle of six products worth $177.88 for just $30! That's a 83% discount on the leading anti-virus, system care, PDF creator, compression and remote access software.

This great software bundle lets you protect your computer, create and compress documents, and stream media content from your computer to any connected device!

The New PC starter-kit bundle includes the following six software:

Avira Antivirus Premium 2012 - Protect your computer against viruses, malware, adware, spyware, and phishing: reg.$29.99 Smith Micro … Read more