Monday, March 17, 2008
Personalized Tech Support
Rush Limbaugh was having problems with his Mac OS. Particularly, his email was not being backed up daily as it was supposed to and other Mac users posted on Limbaugh's site that they had the same frustrations. The heart of the problem seemed to be Time Machine, which stores backup copies of files, and Back to My Mac, which enables remote computer access.
Rush made a plea for help on his national radio show and was assigned a personal technician. Today, all is well. Limbaugh explained the fix on his show which included deleting the null mail folder and rebuilding the applications internal directory using the terminal command.
Limbaugh feels like if this is a global problem, and it seemed many had experienced it, they're well on the way to getting a global fix.
Rush Limbaugh was having problems with his Mac OS. Particularly, his email was not being backed up daily as it was supposed to and other Mac users posted on Limbaugh's site that they had the same frustrations. The heart of the problem seemed to be Time Machine, which stores backup copies of files, and Back to My Mac, which enables remote computer access.
Rush made a plea for help on his national radio show and was assigned a personal technician. Today, all is well. Limbaugh explained the fix on his show which included deleting the null mail folder and rebuilding the applications internal directory using the terminal command.
Limbaugh feels like if this is a global problem, and it seemed many had experienced it, they're well on the way to getting a global fix.
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Hack Your Heart
There are defibrillators that are implanted into a patients heart. (Millions of these have been implanted. Vice President Dick Chaney has one.) They monitor the heart and automatically apply a shock when needed to keep the heart on its normal rhythm. Doctors can read data from these as part of an exam, determining the condition of the patient.
While emphasizing that there is no immediate danger to patients, a team of computer experts, electrical engineers and cardiologists disclosed that these devices can be hacked. They made one defibrillator reveal the patients information stored on it, caused it to fire improperly, and ran the battery down prematurely.
They pointed out these problems for industry awareness. They also suggested ways to resolve the vulnerabilities. It was noted that there are no known cases of this hacking in the past.
There are defibrillators that are implanted into a patients heart. (Millions of these have been implanted. Vice President Dick Chaney has one.) They monitor the heart and automatically apply a shock when needed to keep the heart on its normal rhythm. Doctors can read data from these as part of an exam, determining the condition of the patient.
While emphasizing that there is no immediate danger to patients, a team of computer experts, electrical engineers and cardiologists disclosed that these devices can be hacked. They made one defibrillator reveal the patients information stored on it, caused it to fire improperly, and ran the battery down prematurely.
They pointed out these problems for industry awareness. They also suggested ways to resolve the vulnerabilities. It was noted that there are no known cases of this hacking in the past.
