During the past few weeks, some PC users that use an anti-virus program called AVG posted on various internet message boards. They note that the program will no longer be free. They are correct in a sense.

AVG version 7.1 will no longer be supported from January 15, 2007. However, the program will have a new version which is 7.5 and it will still remain free.

A spokesman from GRISoft, the company that develops the program, noted that the message in the pop-up dialogue box (which notifies the users that 7.1 will no longer be supported soon) was not as clear as what the company is trying to say to its users.

Microsoft Office 2007 will have a function that will let users skip product activation of up to 25 times. If the users still did not activate the software suite, the software will go into reduced-funtionality mode. This means that:

1. Users will not be able to create new documents.
2. Users cannot edit existing documents but they will still be able to view them.
3. Documents can be printed but they cannot be saved.

There are more limitations in the reduced-functionality mode but without those three things, the software will be pretty much useless.

The Chief of Microsoft’s Vista Development has announced that the upcoming Microsoft operating system, Vista, will contain more drivers than any of the previous operating systems that Microsoft has released before.

Those that will buy Windows Vista will find a DVD that contains 19,500 drivers. There are also thousands of drivers that are available via Windows Update. Microsoft’s current operating system, Windows XP, only contains 10,000 drivers on its CD. Vista also uses Windows Update for fixing any issues in the operating system, whether it’s a minor or a major problem.

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Even as we talk about Linux certification, it is interesting to first understand the very concept of Linux Operating System. Linux is different from other popular operating systems like Windows and Unix that are popular in the industry.
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In just a few days, The Trusted Computing Group (TCG) will release its software infastructure specifications.

The role of the specs is to help software technology improve its security.

TCG will provide a guideline on how programs can use a Trusted Platform Module (TPM) which is a chip that stores encryption keys and other data. TPM also provide information to the security software on whether there were any changes on a PC since the last time it logged on the network.

Microsoft Vista supports TPM version 1.2 but Vista only uses it within the Bitlocker encryption tool component.

Software developer, SecureWave, will release a tool which scans enterprise desktop and laptop computers. The name of the program is called DevSensor. It will be free to SecureWave’s partners of value-added resellers.

The software scans all the devices that are currently attached to the computer. Some of the details that the software scans for is the manufacturer’s name, the brand, and the model number of the device.

By collecting the data of the PCs, the enterprises can tell how vulnerable they might be such as data escaping through USB drives or malware entering their network via an mp3 player.

A flaw has been found in the drivers of a Broadcom wireless device.

The people that are affected are those that use the Broadcom BCMWL5.SYS wireless device driver. The type of attack that this flaw is capable of is a buffer overflow attack.

The bug affects only driver, not the cards.

The version of the affected driver is 3.50.21.10 but other driver versions may also be affected. The driver is bundled on the new PCs from manufacturers such as HP, Dell, and Gateway.

An updated driver has already been released by Broadcom to its partners but only the only company that has uploaded an official update is Linksys.

McAfee, a company that develops anti-virus softwares, has released a statement that warns the users of Windows operating system of Real Media files.

They reported that Real Media files may be affected by a worm called W32/Realor. The worm does not exploit the RealOne program or other Real players. The worm was released on the same day that Microsoft released a patch for Adobe’s Flash player.

One of the goals of a malicious code, such as this worm, is to make infected videos more popular. A worm in MySpace called Samy used techniques on building a long list of friends for a MySpace user named Samy.

Google is in the process of making these type of attacks to be difficult.

Windows XP Service Pack 2 users who have the Automatic Update feature switched on will soon have their Internet Explorer 6 turn into Internet Explorer 7 as users systems get the latest updates off the Microsoft site.
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