Volume 14, Issue 07 Atari Online News, Etc. February 17, 2012 Published and Copyright (c) 1999 - 2012 All Rights Reserved Atari Online News, Etc. A-ONE Online Magazine Dana P. Jacobson, Publisher/Managing Editor Joseph Mirando, Managing Editor Rob Mahlert, Associate Editor Atari Online News, Etc. Staff Dana P. Jacobson -- Editor Joe Mirando -- "People Are Talking" Michael Burkley -- "Unabashed Atariophile" Albert Dayes -- "CC: Classic Chips" Rob Mahlert -- Web site Thomas J. Andrews -- "Keeper of the Flame" With Contributions by: Ferd Horvat To subscribe to A-ONE, change e-mail addresses, or unsubscribe, log on to our website at: www.atarinews.org and click on "Subscriptions". OR subscribe to A-ONE by sending a message to: dpj@atarinews.org and your address will be added to the distribution list. To unsubscribe from A-ONE, send the following: Unsubscribe A-ONE Please make sure that you include the same address that you used to subscribe from. To download A-ONE, set your browser bookmarks to one of the following sites: http://people.delphiforums.com/dpj/a-one.htm Now available: http://www.atarinews.org Visit the Atari Advantage Forum on Delphi! http://forums.delphiforums.com/atari/ =~=~=~= A-ONE #1407 02/17/12 ~ Germany Won't Do ACTA! ~ People Are Talking! ~ Hackers Target Putin! ~ Typosquatters Closed! ~ MegaUpload Wasn't Mega ~ NJ Programmer Freed! ~ Sites Hacked Over ACTA ~ Yahoo-Alibaba Failing! ~ Facebook and User ID! ~ 38 Studio's Game Debut ~ ~ New Twitter for All! -* A New Push for Cybersecurity *- -* Stronger Cyber Regulation Bill Urged *- -* FBI Could Take Down Internet for Millions! *- =~=~=~= ->From the Editor's Keyboard "Saying it like it is!" """""""""""""""""""""""""" Well, we dodged a weather "bullet" last week, and also this weekend. At the risk of jinxing myself, this has been the winter that wasn't! And I'm still not offering any complaints. If you've experienced bad, snowy winters at some point, you'll understand what I'm talking about! I don't have any ideas for discussion this week, as must be obvious with my weather observations above! It's been a long week, although I ended up with a shortened work schedule this week. Just too much going on to get going with commentary this week. But, you're not reading these issues for my comments, at least for most of the time! So, let's get to it! Until next time... =~=~=~= ->In This Week's Gaming Section - Schilling's Company Launches First Video Game! """"""""""""""""""""""""""""" =~=~=~= ->A-ONE's Game Console Industry News - The Latest Gaming News! """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" Schilling's Company Launches First Video Game A teenage Curt Schilling got a paper route so he could afford an Apple II just like the one his Little League coach owned. Three decades later with cash to spare from his baseball career, the retired pitcher has invested nearly $35 million into a business producing the sort of fantasy video game that first made him yearn for a personal computer. In New York on Monday to promote the first offering from his 38 Studios entertainment company, Schilling stopped in at a video game store and asked how "Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning" was selling. The answer was encouraging, though the conversation went a bit downhill when the clerk realized who Schilling was and turned out to be a Yankees fan. Schilling had long been a hard-core gamer when he led the Red Sox past New York with his bloody sock. In the early 1980s, his best friend's father - who was also Schilling's youth baseball coach - brought home an Apple II from his job as an engineer. Young Curt was soon hooked on "Wizardry," an early role-playing video game. The graphics felt cutting-edge at the time; Schilling was stunned the other day when he looked up some old screen shots and realized how primitive they look now. Always a fan of books like "The Lord of the Rings" series, Schilling kept inhabiting the world of role-playing video games throughout a 20-year major league career in which he won three World Series championships. Fascinated by technology, he owned a laptop in the early 1990s "before they were truly portable." "I wasn't really a big car or jewelry guy," Schilling said. "I always had the best laptop you can have." By the late 1990s, he was toying with the idea of launching a production company. Schilling got serious about it several years later. He recalled feeling disappointed by "EverQuest II," the sequel released in late 2004 to the popular multiplayer online game. Irked by certain elements, he'd wonder: "What were they thinking?" While playing online with several developers from Sony, which produced the game, Schilling would muse about hatching his own startup. "You do that, I'll definitely join your company," they'd tell him. They didn't quite believe him when he later actually offered them jobs. In October 2006, the business launched with 11 employees. Today, 38 Studios - as in his uniform number - has nearly 400. The cost of producing an intricate video game was just one of many surprises in store for Schilling. He knows he has the luxury of deep pockets instead of having to search for venture capital. Other investments have come from "high net-worth individuals" and the state of Rhode Island, where the company is headquartered. Schilling, 45, is partnered with comic book and toy creator Todd McFarlane and fantasy author R. A. Salvatore. "Reckoning," a role-playing game, was released last Tuesday. Up next is a product code-named "Copernicus," a multiplayer online game. Schilling said he never realized how difficult it was to ensure the program would work with players using different gaming systems. "The only thing I've seen that could be harder is missile defense systems," he said. Never lacking for confidence, Schilling plans for 38 Studios to create all sorts of products and someday become a "multibillion dollar entertainment company." =~=~=~= A-ONE's Headline News The Latest in Computer Technology News Compiled by: Dana P. Jacobson Senators Launch New Push for Cybersecurity Bill Leading senators introduced a cybersecurity bill on Tuesday aimed at safeguarding the nation's water and power systems, which experts have warned often only have the most rudimentary protections against hackers. Senators John Rockefeller and Dianne Feinstein, both Democrats; Susan Collins, a Republican, and Joseph Lieberman, an independent, drafted a comprehensive bill that would require the secretary of homeland security to designate certain infrastructure as critical and compel steps to safeguard against hackers. "The prospect of mass casualty is what has propelled us to make cybersecurity a top priority for this year, to make it an issue that transcends political parties or ideology," Rockefeller told the Senate on Tuesday morning. He noted hackers' success in breaking into sensitive government agencies and Fortune 500 companies, and warned that air traffic control, rail switching networks and chemical pipelines could be the next target. Under the bill, some financial networks, or portions of networks, could be deemed critical if damage to them could result in catastrophic economic damage to the country. The Department of Homeland Security would have the power to penalize companies that do not put in place appropriate safeguards. However, companies that have good security and are hacked anyway will not be liable for damages. The legislation would also ease information-sharing between the federal government and the private sector to combat cyber crime and espionage, and would require the government to take steps to secure its own networks. Last, it would update recruitment of cybersecurity experts into the federal workforce. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid last year called for the drafting of a comprehensive cybersecurity bill, and this 207-page bill is the product. Defense contractors such as Lockheed Martin Corp have been among the high-profile victims of cyberattacks. Others include Google Inc, Citigroup and Nasdaq OMX. Industry has fought back and succeeded in stopping previous cybersecurity bills, even though experts have warned for years that portions of the U.S. critical infrastructure - particularly water and electrical plants - sometimes have woefully inadequate defenses against hackers. Industry opposes additional regulations as burdensome and argues it should focus on fighting hackers instead of complying with government rules. Companies will likely try to weaken the measure in coming weeks and months, said James Lewis, a cybersecurity expert for the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "The spin is that it's burdensome regulation and will hurt innovation. The counter to that is 'OK, we'll sacrifice national security,'" he said. "It would be really nice to have something (legal) in place but just because we need it doesn't mean we're going to get it." The House of Representatives is considering legislation that overlaps with the Rockefeller bill on some points. Republican Representative Mac Thornberry, who oversaw the writing of a report outlining Republican priorities, supports regulation to require better cyber defenses for critical companies. A key difference would be that the companies' usual regulator, rather than the Department of Homeland Security, would oversee the new regulation. Experts Urge Stronger Cyber Regulation Bill Cybersecurity experts are urging senators to close loopholes in legislation to give the government more power to force critical industries to make their computer networks more secure. Two experts are saying the bill could allow many companies to avoid regulation entirely or drag out the process for up to eight years before they would actually have to improve their computer security. The legislation would limit the number of industries subject to regulation to those in which a cyberattack could cause "an extraordinary number of fatalities" or a "severe degradation" of national security. "So an individual infrastructure owner, such as a rural electricity provider, has no responsibility under this title if it can show that an undefended cyberattack would only cause an ordinary number of fatalities?" said Stewart Baker, in testimony prepared for the committee's hearing on the bill Thursday. "How many dead Americans is that, exactly?" Baker, a former assistant secretary at the Department of Homeland Security who is now with the law firm of Steptoe & Johnson, and James Lewis, a cybersecurity expert and senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the bill takes important steps toward improving computer security. But they said the measure has been weakened by corporate and other interests arguing against any attempt at regulation. By using "terms like mass casualties, mass evacuations, or effects similar to weapons of mass destruction, we are essentially writing target lists for our attackers," said Lewis, also in prepared testimony. "They will attack what we choose not to defend." The legislation is intended to ensure that computer systems running power plants and other essential parts of the country's infrastructure are protected from hackers, terrorists or other criminals. The Department of Homeland Security, with input from businesses, would select which companies to regulate, and the agency would have the power to require better computer security. U.S. authorities are increasingly alarmed about the constant attacks that target U.S. government, corporate and personal computer networks and accounts. And they worry that cybercriminals will try to take over systems that control the inner workings of water, electrical, nuclear or other power plants. The most glaring example of that was the Stuxnet computer worm, which targeted Iran's nuclear program in 2010, infecting laptops at the Bushehr nuclear power plant. Business groups argue that more regulation is not the answer and that any new mandates will drive up costs without really increasing security. Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn. and chairman of the Homeland Security panel, said the bill will better arm the country against enemies and terrorists who "who would use the Internet against us as surely as they turned airliners into guided missiles." And Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the senior Republican on the committee, said the attacks threaten U.S. economic stability. One study, she said, estimated that global cybercrime costs as much as $388 billion annually. During a Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing Thursday, Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the legislation is needed to help combat a rising threat to the U.S. homeland. "We can't place enough emphasis on it," he said, adding that there is no sanctuary in the U.S. that is adequately protected against cyberattacks by fringe groups and hackers. Germany Refuses To Sign ACTA Amid Protests Germany will not sign an international anti-piracy treaty, despite having already agreed to it in principal, government sources in Berlin said Friday, February 10. The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), initiated by the United States and Japan, seeks to protect intellectual property rights, "including infringement taking place in the digital environment." It was signed by the European Union and 22 of its 27 member states in January. Germany said at the time it would soon follow suit. But since January, the treaty has been the subject of protest, mainly online, by people who say it will require signatory countries to punish even non-commercial breaches of copyright with criminal prosecution and jail terms. Tens of thousands of people are expected to take part in protests in 60 German cities on Saturday, M&C reported, citing DPA. US Sites Hacked as Objections Grow To Piracy Deal Opponents of a controversial global copyright treaty counted three victories Friday as American government websites were hacked and the Eastern European nations of Poland and Slovenia distanced themselves from the deal. Sites belonging to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission and the National Consumer Protection Week were vandalized by Anonymous, a loose collection of cyber rebels who have helped lead the charge against the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or ACTA. The hackers replaced the sites with profanity-laced statements and a violent German-language video satirizing the treaty. At the same time, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Friday the country was abandoning plans to ratify the deal. He said he now sees his earlier support for ACTA as a mistake. "I was wrong," he said at a news conference. His announcement came after Slovenia's government also said Friday that it is halting the ratification of ACTA. "This agreement is obviously not a matter of understanding, but of major misunderstanding," Slovenian Education Minister Radovan Zerjav said. The developments are bad news for industrialized countries such as the United States, which have pushed ACTA as a way of defending the entertainment industry and luxury goods manufacturers from pirates and counterfeiters. American officials spent years negotiating ACTA in an effort to harmonize intellectual property protection across different countries. The goal is to help countries fight everything from fake pharmaceuticals to pirated music, but grass-roots activists - many of them in Eastern Europe - have been waging weeks of protests against what they see as moves intended to clamp down on free expression and Internet privacy. So far around 20 countries have signed up to the deal, a key step before ratification. Four EU countries have now backed away from it - Poland, Slovenia, Bulgaria and the Czech Republic - and its approval at the European Union level appears increasingly uncertain. Tusk also said Friday that he sent a letter to the European People's Party, a center-right group in the European Parliament to which his Civic Platform belongs, urging it not to back ACTA in its current form. Back in the United States, the Trade Commission confirmed that the sites had been compromised, saying in an email that they had been taken down and wouldn't be brought back "until we're satisfied that any vulnerability has been addressed." Anonymous boasted of stealing a large amount of personal data from Trade Commission employees - including everything from banking statements to dating website information. The Trade Commission said that while it was still investigating the hack, "the nature of the site limits information that could have been accessed." MegaUpload Indictment Reveals Site Wasn't That Mega Looks like the piracy going on over at file sharing site MegaUpload was less rampant than expected, reveal documents from the site's indictment. "The file-sharing site claimed to have had more than 180 million registered users, but in fact, the document says that Megaupload’s internal databases show that the site had only 66.6 million as of Jan. 19, 2012," according to The Washington Post's Sarah Halzack. "Furthermore, the records reveal that only 5.86 million of these users ever uploaded a file to either Megaupload.com or Megavideo.com, prosecutors said." The file-uploading site's numbers may look relatively small, but that doesn't mean there wasn't a good deal of activity from some users. And those who never uploaded a single file, still partook, feeding off of the files of power users like "VV," a user detailed in the indictment. Again, per The Post, "[VV] uploaded approximately 16,950 files to Megaupload’s sites. These items were viewed more than 34 million times." Now that's one mega busy uploader. Hackers Target Putin's Vote-Monitoring System Hackers have tried to crash a vast network of Web cameras which Vladimir Putin has ordered to allay fears of vote-rigging in the March presidential election, a deputy minister said on Friday. Putin, facing the biggest protests of his 12-year rule after a disputed December parliamentary election the opposition said was rigged, ordered 182,000 Web cameras to be installed at the 91,000 polling stations. As early voting began in the most desolate corners of Russia for sailors and reindeer herders, Putin inspected a polling station in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk where the first two cameras went live on the www.webvybory2012.ru website. The cameras will stream footage of ballot boxes and vote-counting during the election to the site, which Putin's supporters hope will take the sting out of allegations of ballot-stuffing by authorities. But Deputy Communications Minister Ilya Massukh told Reuters that the system, operated by state-controlled Rostelecom, had already fallen victim to regular distributed denial-of-service attacks (DDOS) originating in Russia. "We are launching this site ahead of time in order to understand the nature of the threats," Massukh said. During a DDOS attack a network is bombarded by so many requests that it eventually crashes. Putin said theft and vandalism was also a problem. "The most important thing is that the gear does not get swiped. There have been such incidents already," said Putin, who in recent weeks has faced mass protests at which Russians have called on him to step down. The official demand of the protest leaders, a fragmented group of politicians, activists, journalists and bloggers, is for a re-run of the parliamentary election they say was fraudulent. Russia denies the vote was rigged. Official results show Putin's ruling party won 49.3 percent of the vote. Opposition activists have shown dozens of videos shot by volunteers as evidence of ballot-stuffing. The clips showed neat stacks of ballots filled in for Putin's party inside boxes and election commission officials filling in the ballots themselves. To date 54,000 polling stations have been equipped with cameras. Massukh said that at 4,000 polling stations in remote places cameras will not be shown live. The recording equipment is placed in a safebox and the key is held by election commission officials. "This will be the most transparent election in the world," he said. "Russia can give a lesson in democracy to the world." The government plans to spend 13 billion roubles ($434 million) on the system. Critics say cameras are unlikely to prevent election officials re-writing results lists or mass directives to staff of state organizations to vote for Putin. Massukh said election officials will have to count the ballots in front of the cameras and then read out and show the results to the cameras. NJ Programmer Freed as NY Court Orders Acquittal A smiling former Goldman Sachs computer programmer was freed from prison Friday after a surprise ruling from a federal appeals court reversed his conviction on charges he stole computer code. "Justice occasionally works," declared the beaming programmer, Sergey Aleynikov. He said he "just jumped all over the place" at 6 a.m., the moment he read and repeatedly reread an email from his lawyer informing him that the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan had reversed his conviction. The words were, he said, "'We won!'" The reversal came less than a day after defense lawyer Kevin Marino told a three-judge panel that Aleynikov was wrongly convicted. The 42-year-old North Caldwell, N.J., man had already served a year of a more-than-eight-year prison sentence after a jury convicted him in December 2010 of stealing trade secrets and transporting stolen property in interstate and foreign commerce. Aleynikov said outside court that he looked forward to seeing his family, including his 8-, 6- and 3-year-old daughters. "This is such big news to me that I don't have time to think about what will happen tomorrow," said Aleynikov, dressed in a gray sweat suit and white sneakers. "Today, it's a victory." His lawyer said: "I've never felt better in my life." The highly unusual immediate dismissal of a conviction by the appeals court came in a case that tested the boundaries of what can be considered a crime as companies seek to protect their intellectual property from competitors. Aleynikov has been in prison since he was sentenced in March. A three-judge appeals panel heard arguments Thursday, but the judges gave no indication they would reverse the lower court hours later with a terse, one-paragraph order. The 2nd Circuit said it would issue a written ruling "in due course" to explain its decision. Marino said Aleynikov's immediate reaction when he spoke to him early Friday was: "There is justice in the world." "It's justice because Sergey Aleynikov did not commit either of the crimes with which he was charged," Marino said. "The government's attempt to stretch this criminal federal statute beyond all recognition resulted in a grave injustice that put Sergey Aleynikov in prison for a year." In oral arguments before the 2nd Circuit, Marino called it "ridiculous" and "preposterous" that his client was facing eight years in prison because he was found to have information that was not a product that Goldman Sachs sold in interstate and foreign commerce. A prosecutor had asked the court to uphold the conviction, saying protection of trade secrets was the only way companies could retain their technological advantages. Prosecutors declined to comment Friday, though they agreed during a court appearance that Aleynikov could be released on his own recognizance without conditions while everyone awaited the full appeals court opinion, which was unlikely to be released for weeks. Aleynikov, a naturalized U.S. citizen who emigrated from Russia in 1990, was first arrested in July 2009 as he returned from a trip to Chicago to the offices of his new employer, Teza Technologies LLC. Prosecutors accused him of taking trade secrets from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in 2008 to help his new company gain an advantage with high-speed trading. He made $400,000 a year as a vice president at Goldman Sachs. His move to Teza enabled him to be paid $300,000 annually, with a $700,000 bonus in his first year and a revenue-sharing plan that would have added $150,000 annually. During a two-week trial, Marino told jurors that his client was merely trying to copy parts of the company's software that were taken from public software codes. He acknowledged that Aleynikov had violated the company's confidentiality agreements but said that was a civil matter. The trial brought into focus sophisticated computer programs that use mathematical formulas to execute scores of trades in short periods of time after evaluating moment-to-moment developments in the markets. The government said Goldman Sachs makes millions of dollars a year in profits from high-frequency trading and carries a competitive advantage over rivals because of the speed of its computer programs. At sentencing, Aleynikov said he very much regretted "the foolish decision to download information before I left Goldman Sachs," though he added that only some of the information he took was proprietary to the company. He said he "never meant to cause Goldman any harm, and I haven't acted with malice to anyone at the bank." After he was freed, Aleynikov said he did not know what he would do next, though he noted that he believed his skills were up to date. He said he did not have access to a computer in the prison but continued to write computer programs "in my head." Typosquatting Sites ‘Wikapedia’ and ‘Twtter’ Have Been Shut Down Two fake websites posing as Wikipedia and Twitter have been kicked off the Internet and fined £100,000 ($156,000) each. The companies behind typosquatting websites capitalize on typos - they register domain names that are similar to highly trafficked website names, and are usually missing a letter or have common misspellings of popular sites. Typosquatting websites such as ‘Wikapedia’ and ‘Twtter’ are popping up on the web to trick unsuspecting web users into clicking on fake ads that claim the user has won a prize. In the case of these two sites, to receive a prize, like an iPad, people were asked for their cellphone number. The site sent a text with a pin and more texts with survey questions. Each time a person responded to the survey questions via texts he or she was charged £1.50. PhonepayPlus, the UK watchdog body responsible for regulating premium rate telephone services that booted ‘Wikapedia’ and ‘Twtter’ from the web, wrote in a statement: "In both cases, the landing pages for the ‘squatted’ sites looked like the genuine sites the consumer was searching for - the ‘squatted’ sites used the same logos, colouring and fonts. "These ‘squatted’ sites informed consumers that they had won or could claim a prize, such as an iPad. In both cases, consumers were given the impression that to enter or claim they simply had to enter their contact details and answer some questions." The companies, Amsterdam-based R&D Media Europe and Unavalley BV, fined for the Wikapedia and Twtter sites, were ordered to repay those who were charged for responding to survey questions, since pricing was not clearly stated on the prize ads. Yahoo-Alibaba Talks Falling Apart Talks between Yahoo Inc and China's Alibaba Group over the U.S. Internet giant's Asian assets have hit an impasse, throwing their plans for a $17 billion tax-free asset swap into question, according to sources briefed on the situation. The snag in negotiations came on the same day that activist investor Daniel Loeb, of hedge fund ThirdPoint, sought to install his own slate of directors on Yahoo's board, further highlighting the turmoil engulfing the one-time Web pioneer. Loeb, who has opposed Yahoo's previous efforts to strike a minority investment deal with private equity, disclosed plans to nominate former NBC Universal CEO Jeff Zucker, along with himself and two others, for Yahoo's board in a regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday. A collapse of the proposed Asian asset deal - referred to as a cash-rich split-off - would mark the latest setback for an erstwhile Internet leader struggling to turn its business around and appease unhappy shareholders. Yahoo, whose revenue slid by more than a fifth last year, brought in former PayPal President Scott Thompson as chief executive in January, five months after Carol Bartz was fired. Two people briefed on the situation described the deal as effectively dead in the water - noting the unreasonable terms sought by Yahoo during talks in Hong Kong and a disconnect between Yahoo's negotiating team and its strategic stakeholders. Alibaba Group, whose Chinese e-commerce unit Alibaba.com is listed in Hong Kong, and Japan's Softbank Corp, which owns around 30 percent of Alibaba, planned to seek clarity on the matter from Yahoo's Thompson, one of those sources said. "They (Yahoo) left town knowing how everybody felt ... Alibaba and Softbank are going to be reaching out to the new CEO to get clarity on what the heck happened," said the source. Yahoo appeared to see things differently. The company had not been informed that the tax-free deal was officially off the table, and it remained committed to continuing negotiations, according to one of the sources familiar with the matter. Yahoo representatives including Chief Financial Officer Tim Morse returned to the United States late on Monday after a week of negotiations in Hong Kong, and another call was set for this week, that source said. Yahoo and Alibaba officials declined to comment. The sources said Yahoo and its Asian partners could still strike another, simpler and taxable, deal, but there was no agreement yet on the price at which Yahoo should sell. One of the sources close to the matter said Yahoo was not going to revisit the price of the deal, even though Alibaba's value may have risen while the talks were going on, and any increase could influence whether the deal on the table made sense for Yahoo. None of the sources wanted to be named in this article due to the sensitive nature of the private talks. Yahoo shares closed down 4.7 percent at $15.36 on Tuesday, the stock's biggest one-day percentage drop in 16 weeks. "I think the deal's either dead or it's going to take a lot longer to complete, which means we don't have a near term catalyst; hence the sell-off," said Brett Harriss, an analyst with Gabelli & Co. The deal would have seen the return of Yahoo's slices of Alibaba and Yahoo Japan back to those companies, in exchange for unspecified assets. Investors had hoped Yahoo, after years of foot-dragging, would finally arrange for the sale of its Asian assets, considered among the most valuable parts of its portfolio. AllThingsDigital, which initially reported the snag in the negotiations on Tuesday, cited one source as saying discussions "completely halted" after negotiators from Yahoo - whose chairman, Roy Bostock, is due to step down and whose CEO is barely a month into the job - changed tack on what they wanted from the deal. The report gave no details. It was unclear what exactly had caused the sudden impasse in negotiations, roughly two months after the various parties had agreed to basic terms for a deal. A third source familiar with the talks said Yahoo's negotiators had a change of heart, though it was unclear why. "Over the last few days in Hong Kong, it became evident that they don't really have a desire to do this deal," that source said, dismissing speculation both sides might have split on valuation terms agreed in December. "A cash-rich split appears to be toast." The slightly different interpretations over the current state of the deal by people familiar with the matter raised the possibility that the public airing of the latest snag could be a negotiating tactic. "It could be a negotiating ploy by either side, or it really could be a breakdown in negotiations," said Gabelli's Harriss, noting friction in the relationship between Yahoo and Alibaba. Alibaba founder Jack Ma has tried to buy back the 40 percent of his company owned by Yahoo several times in recent years, only to be rebuffed by Yahoo. The rocky relationship between the companies came to a head last May when it was revealed that Alibaba had abruptly handed Alipay - one of Alibaba's crown jewels - to a company controlled by Ma, apparently without Yahoo's knowledge. "I find it very hard to believe that Alibaba and Softbank will just walk away," said Ryan Jacob, chairman and chief investment officer of the Jacob Funds. If the companies can't agree deal terms, Jacob speculated Alibaba might team up with private equity investors in the United States and seek to acquire Yahoo outright - allowing Alibaba to regain its shares from Yahoo, while private equity could take control of Yahoo's U.S.-based Internet business. "Having U.S. partners just makes the most logical sense, because they're going to need help on financing, and in the long term they really don't want the core Yahoo business anyway," said Jacob, whose firm owns shares in Yahoo. Analysts say Yahoo failed to take aggressive action in past years to reverse a decline in advertising revenue in the face of competition from Google Inc and Facebook. This month, Bostock announced he and three other directors would step down, following co-founder Jerry Yang out the door. Yang was excoriated for turning down a rich Microsoft Corp acquisition bid in 2008. ThirdPoint's Loeb said the recently announced changes to Yahoo's board, including Yahoo's announcement of two new board members, do not put the company on "the right track." Yahoo fired back with a statement on Tuesday that it was disappointing that Loeb "has chosen a potentially disruptive path, just as the company is moving forward under new leadership." Alibaba has received fully underwritten commitments from six banks for a $3 billion loan it would use to buy back part of the Yahoo-held stake, sources told Reuters' LPC service. The loan could be put in place within days, with Alibaba.com expected then to make an announcement to the Hong Kong stock exchange, where its shares have been suspended since last Thursday. FBI Could Take Down Internet for Millions on March 8 The Federal Bureau of Investigation may soon be forced to shut down a number of key Domain Name System (DNS) servers, which would cut Internet access for millions of Web users around the world, reports BetaBeat. The DNS servers were installed by the FBI last year, in an effort to stop the spread of a piece of malware known as DNSCharger Trojan. But the court order that allowed the set up of the replacement servers expires on March 8. In November of last year, authorities arrested six men in Estonia for the creation and spread of DNSCharger, which reconfigures infected computers’ Internet settings, and re-routes users to websites that contain malware, or other illegal sites. DNSCharger also blocks access to websites that might offer solutions for how to rid the computer of its worm, and often comes bundled with other types of malicious software. By the time the FBI stepped in, DNSCharger had taken over computers in more than 100 countries, including half-a-million computers in the US alone. To help eradicate the widespread malware, the FBI replaced infected servers with new, clean servers, which gave companies and individuals with infected computers time to clean DNSCharger off their machines. Unfortunately, DNSCharger is still running on computers "at half of the Fortune 500 companies," and at "27 out of 55 major government entities," reports cybersecurity journalist Brian Krebs. These computers rely on the FBI-installed DNS servers to access the Web. But if the court order is not extended, the FBI will be legally required to remove the clean servers, which would cut off the Internet for users still infected with DNSCharger. Companies or other agencies that are unsure whether their systems are infected with DNSCharger can get free assistance here. And private users can find out if they are infected using instructions provided here. Facebook Dabbles With Validating User Identity Facebook on Thursday began testing a way for celebrities, journalists, athletes and others with massive followings to have their identities validated at the globally popular online social network. "The new process enables people to verify their identities by submitting a government issued ID," Facebook said in an email response to an AFP inquiry. "Once verified, they'll also have the option to more prominently display an alternate name (nickname, maiden name, byline, etc.) on their timelines in addition to their real name." The validation option was being rolled out as a minor update to the Subscribe feature at Facebook for people with large numbers of followers. The benefits of confirming people's identities online have been touted by Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg at the company's developers conferences. Twitter has long validated accounts of high-profile users of the one-to-many text messaging service as a way to instill confidence in the reliability of "tweets." The New, New Twitter Now Available to Everyone The rollout of Twitter’s new and enhanced website is complete and is now available to all Twitter users. "It’s been available for mobile phones, via the mobile web, Twitter for iPhone and Twitter for Android, and we’ve been rolling it out steadily to Twitter.com. Now, everyone has access to it," said Twitter in a February 16 post on its blog. The latest version of Twitter was first introduced in December 2011. The new version of the site was designed to provide an overhaul of essential features and to make it easier for new users to start interacting on the site. Key features of the new design include the ability to click tweets within your stream to reveal an expanded timeline of photos, videos, retweets and favorites; a Connect tab to see who has followed you, mentioned you or retweeted your tweets; a Discover tab which presents a personalized stream of interesting content; and expanded profile and brand pages. Facebook began the worldwide rollout of expanded profile pages, called Timeline, in December. Earlier this week Facebook quietly introduced verified accounts for selected prominent public figures and provided them with an option to list a pseudonym which will appear alongside their birth name on their profile. =~=~=~= Atari Online News, Etc. is a weekly publication covering the entire Atari community. 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