Russia

Spontaneous iPhone combustion? Again?

When an iPhone spontaneously combusts, it's an event. You know, like a film star getting shot or a married singer getting caught with a dancing concubine.

I therefore bring red-hot news of an iPhone 4 that allegedly began to fizz and burn at an Apple service center in Moscow.

No, it didn't include so many topless pictures of President Vladimir Putin that the phone just couldn't cope. Instead, the Planet iPhone enthusiast site in Russia reports that a customer brought in the phone because it simply wouldn't switch on.

The service center guru, Alexey Zykunov, apparently … Read more

Win a vacay for downloading 419GB over 3G?

With carriers the world over doing their best to reduce customers' data usage, Russian telco MegaFon took the unusual step of encouraging bandwidth hogging instead, with prizes going to top downloaders.

That's right, the carrier gave out prizes worth up to $33,000 to a bunch of winners for using the most amount of data within a week on its 3G unlimited data service. … Read more

Microsoft identifies suspected Kelihos botnet author

Four months after taking down the Kelihos botnet, Microsoft today identified the man it believes was behind the massive infection designed to deliver spam and steal data.

In an amended complaint (PDF) filed today with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, the software giant accused Andrey N. Sabelnikov, a resident of St. Petersburg, Russia, of writing the code for and participating in the creation of the Kelihos malware. The complaint further alleges that Sabelnikov used the malware to control and nurture the Kelihos botnet.

Kelihos comprised about 41,000 infected computers worldwide and was capable … Read more

Doomsday Clock moves 1 minute closer to catastrophe

Tick, tock. The infamous Doomsday Clock, which represents how close mankind supposedly is to its annihilation, has been moved one minute closer to midnight.

The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists (BAS), which created and maintains the symbolic clock, announced its decision yesterday.

"It is five minutes to midnight. Two years ago, it appeared that world leaders might address the truly global threats that we face. In many cases, that trend has not continued or been reversed. For that reason, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists is moving the clock hand one minute closer to midnight, back to its time in … Read more

Obscene tweet on Russian president's Twitter feed

Russia seems to be experiencing a little tension currently.

The ruling party is being confronted with something very dangerous--apparent opposition. Small but perfectly formed Prime Minister Vladimir Putin was recently booed during an appearance at a wrestling match.

Then the nation held elections that U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton suggested might not have been the apogee of democracy.

Perhaps this odd state of affairs might explain why President Dmitri Medvedev's Twitter feed was adorned with a retweet that included the phrase "Stupid sheep getting f***ed in the mouth."

The way Reuters' mouth expresses it, … Read more

Russia, China 'aggressive' cyberspies, U.S. report frets

It's like the Cold War never ended: U.S. intelligence agencies see Russia and China as the most significant threats to the nation's interests.

The difference this time is that the field of engagement isn't proxy states in Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia, but in the vast digital reaches of cyberspace.

In a new report to Congress, titled "Foreign Spies Stealing US Economic Secrets in Cyberspace," the Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive (ONCIX) points to "significant and growing threats to the nation's prosperity and security" from other nation states, including historic … Read more

U.S. battery firms reportedly targeted in online attack

The FBI is investigating denial-of-service attacks targeting several U.S. battery retail Web sites last year that were traced to computers at Russian domains in what looks like a corporate-sabotage campaign, according to documents published yesterday by The Smoking Gun.

The October 2010 distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks on Batteriesplus.com and Batteries4less.com also targeted other battery-related Web sites and have been used to attack a "wide range" of United States-based businesses, causing combined estimated financial losses of more than $600,000, according an FBI analysis of attack logs provided to the agency by an unnamed network security … Read more

Russian campaign: Strip for Putin, win an iPad 2?

Leave it to Russia to combine nudity, politics, and gadgets. With a presidential election approaching in 2012, an active movement is under way to get popular former president and current Prime Minister Vladimir Putin back into the presidential seat.

What better way to drum up support for the candidate than having women who support Putin appear to suggest stripping down for a chance at winning an iPad 2? According to an article in The Telegraph, a video proposing just that showed up on parliamentarian Kirill Shchitov's blog. You can check it out below. Don't worry. It's safe for work.

The busty woman in the video scribbles, "I will tear my clothes off for Putin" on a tank top with blazing red lipstick. The iPad 2 makes a sultry cameo appearance for incentive. (Clarification, 1:52 p.m. PT: There is some debate as to whether the girls in the vid are literally talking about stripping or are simply using a Russian pun for "I will tear" to say they love Putin so much they will tear anyone apart who is against him and show it by ripping their clothes apart.)

In any case, the video is definitely suggestive, as the girl featured in it says, "Please upload a video where you tear something or someone apart for your president" and she proceeds to tear her shirt apart. The campaign comes courtesy of a group that calls itself Putin's Army. Women are encouraged to submit videos of themselves tearing their clothes for Putin, and one lucky winner will take home an Apple tablet.… Read more

Nyet! Russian ATMs can tell if you're lying

Don't you hate it when ATMs refuse to do what you want, like give you cash in an emergency when you're overseas? Well, prototype ATMs in Russia come with built-in lie detectors that can reject customers who aren't telling the truth.

Major retail bank Sberbank is testing out an ATM that can automatically process credit card applications. It incorporates a voice-analysis system that can determine when someone is lying.

Sberbank has set up the prototype at its Branch of the Future showpiece branch in Moscow. The machine takes passport, fingerprint, and face scans, and asks questions such as "Are you employed?" and "At this moment, do you have any other outstanding loans?"

Speech Technology Center developed the software, which can detect nervousness and distress just like a polygraph. It measures the tone and pacing of speech to detect involuntary changes.

The algorithms were partly based on police interrogations in which the subjects were found to be hiding the truth. … Read more