PC makers would not have to meet the deadline of installing or packaging the software called Green Dam Youth Escort before July 1 according to various tech sites.

“We’re pleased with the delay on this issue that is part of a broader, historic struggle between openness and repression—not just in China but Iran and North Korea. Ultimately, we would like to see the US government negotiate issues of Internet openness and freedom in a broad, systematic way as part of trade and other international agreements,” said Ed Black of Computer & Communications Industry Association.

Source: Ars Technica

Guest Post by Brian V. Brian is 18 and owns a southern California based PC repair business.

Microsoft has just announced that Windows 7 Anytime Upgrade discs are going to be sold at major retail stores around the globe.

Like other Windows 7 discs, all versions of Windows 7 will be available to users on one single disc. All you need to do is enter your product hey and the installer will know which version you are licensed to use. According to the article to upgrade your version of Windows 7 all you have to do is…
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There has recently been an increase in the amount of technicians joining our forum and talking about making the jump from a 9 to 5 job to becoming self employed.
Perhaps the company they were working for is downsizing and they preparing for the worst or they have already been laid off. Whatever the cause I want to make sure that any soon-to-be technicians are prepared for the jump.
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An ATO spam has been intercepted by Sophos. ATO stands for Australian Tax Office. The subject is “2008 – 2009 Recalculation of you tax refund”.

Two screen shots are included in the blog entry. The first shows the message. It is very short and it notifies the user that he or she has a tax refund. In order to get the refund, the user must complete a form on the link that is included in the email.

The link goes to a bogus Tax Office website.

Source: Sophos

Lenovo has announced their Windows 7 upgrade plan promotion.

Those who bought a computer with Windows Vista from June 26, 20009 to January 31, 2010 are entitled for a free Windows 7 upgrade.

Home Premium PCs can be upgraded to Windows 7 Home Premium. Business edition computers can get the Windows 7 Professional upgrade while the Vista Ultimate users will get the Windows 7 Ultimate versions.

The company’s announcement follows HP’s deal that was announced on Thursday. The deals are only available to businesses and consumers that have less than 25 PCs.

Source: Information Week

A review on the beta version of Microsoft’s antivirus software called Morro has been posted at The Washington Post’s website.

The beta version is limited to 75,000 downloaders in the U.S., Brazil, or Israel according to the article. The review includes a few screen shots. The first one shows the screen that would show up after the user installed the program.

In the second image, two windows are shown. The first is the software making a quick scan. The other shows how much memory it uses on a system.

Source: The Washington Post

The prices for upgrade and full editions of Windows 7 has been revealed by Microsoft in its Windows Team Blog.

Windows 7 Home Premium upgrade edition costs $49.99 if a user pre-orders it before July 11. However, it is only limited “until supplies last”. After July 11, it will costs over twice as much. The full version would cost $199.99.

The full versions of Ultimate and Business are $299.99 and $319.99 respectively.

Also, Windows 7 in Europe is now called Windows 7 E.

Source: The Washington Post

VirtualBox is a free virtualization product which allows you to run another operating from within your current one. While this is technically not a “repair tool”, it is very useful to computer technicians for testing and training purposes. For example, I used virtualization software to create a Windows XP virtual machine and infected it with a virus so I could show Technibble readers via video how to manually remove a virus. Once I was done creating the video I rolled back the virtual machine state and it was a fresh copy of Windows XP again. I also use a virtual machine to test all of the Repair Tools of the Week I recommend.

Computer Technicians can do the same and break or infect an operating system to learn how to fix it without the concerns of damaging live operating systems. VirtualBox is one of the easiest virtualisation software to use since all you really have to do is install the software, press New and follow through the prompts such as what OS you want to install and how much hard drive space you want to give it. You can tell it to use your real CDRom drive to load an operating system on it or you can even mount an ISO which will emulate a CDRom disk.

If you want to learn how to remove viruses, fix certain problems, experiment with other operating systems such as Linux without the fear of messing up your current operating system, this is a great way to do it and increase your skillset.
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The makers of SUPERAntiSpyware (which is a great malware removal product that many technicians use) have provided me with 10 SUPERAntiSpyware Professional LIFETIME licenses to give away.
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First it was spammy viral marketers and childish pranks.  Now Twitter has reached the same level of insecurity as everywhere else on the web, as scammers have begun to tweet out malware-ridden links. While this isn’t YATW, these malware makers are hijacking trending topics to push their poison into the wild.

Mashable reports on how scammers have begun to spread links to sites “Twitterbest” and “Zasaden” on the .mp domain. Both host the commonly seen flash codec trojan which prompts the user to allow installation of what is supposedly an update to Adobe Flash player, and in actuality a rogue anti-virus utility, this one going by the name of “Fast Anti-Virus 2009.” The name may sound familiar to technicians on the front lines of virus removal, as it has been used by rogue anti-virus programs dating back to at least May.

Avoiding the bad domains is only half of the battle though, due to the fact that the vast majority of URLs posted on Twitter are via URL shortening services. Without 3rd party tools, there’s no way to tell where these links terminate before clicking them, and the trust instilled in most people by social media provides a sufficiently wide opening through which to ram a trojan exploit.

The upside is that since Twitter is apparently already censoring trending topics, we might be one step closer to finally getting rid of them altogether.