Ryan Naraine

Digital media heavyweight RealNetworks on Monday added the code for SMIL to its open-source Helix Community, a move that allows the creation of multimedia presentations that integrate streaming audio and video with images and text. The Seattle-based RealNetworks said the source code for SMIL 2.0 (Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language) would be available for Helix community […]

Microsoft has issued a fix for a buffer overflow vulnerability in the Windows 2000 ShellExecute API after a security researcher warned the flaw could trigger denial-of-service attacks . According to SecureNet Service (SNS), which reported the hole, Microsoft included a fix in Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 (Download location here). It affects Microsoft Windows 2000 […]

The Internet Security Systems’ X-Force unit has sounded an alarm for an increase in hacker activity between July 6-7 to coincide with a contest encouraging defacements of Web sites around the world. ISS raised its current threat level to ‘AlertCon 2’ to coincide with the site defacement competition, which awards prizes to intruders who successfully […]

For the second time in as many months, Microsoft has fixed a security hole in its .NET Passport single-ID application after details were posted to a public mailing list. In published reports, Microsoft confirmed the latest vulnerability could have compromised some older Hotmail accounts but said there was no indication that any accounts were hijacked. […]

Seattle-based image and archiving specialist Corbis has filed a multi-million dollar lawsuit against Amazon.com , accusing the e-commerce giant of the selling its images without its consent. Corbis, which is owned by Microsoft boss Bill Gates, is seeking damages and injunctive relief for federal claims, including copyright infringement and violation of the controversial Digital Millennium […]

A small San Francisco technology firm has slapped a patent infringement lawsuit against RealNetworks and Listen.com over the use of software to find, personalize and play streaming media. Friskit, Inc., founded by former Amazon.com vice president George Aposporos, said it filed the suit in federal court in Chicago, accusing RealNetworks and Listen.com of infringing patents […]

Digital media software giant RealNetworks on Monday announced its Helix Mobile technology would power the delivery of mobile content to Vodafone’s 112 million cell phone subscribers, a deal that provides some breathing room in RealNetworks’ battle with arch-rival Microsoft. Financial terms of the deal were not released. RealNetworks said its Helix Universal Mobile Server and […]

FEATURE: If money can’t buy you love, what’s the explanation for the overflowing cash registers in the online personals space — where high-traffic destinations have found big profits in user-created content? When success stories in the consumer-focused Internet are told, companies like eBay and Amazon.com will hog the limelight. But, for thousands of Web sites […]

Search technology powerhouse Google has released a new beta of its popular toolbar for Internet Explorer, adding a pop-up blocker, a controversial Blogger feature, and form-filling functionality. The pop-up blocker is aimed at suppressing the controversial online advertising format, but, in practice, it prevents all pop-ups, regardless of their purpose. Whenever the toolbar blocks a […]

Search technology powerhouse Google has released a new beta of its popular Internet Explorer toolbar, adding bells and whistles for surfers. But the integration of a “BlogThis” feature isn’t sitting well with some blog software firms. Just months after its acquisition of the Blogger “push-button” Web publishing platform, Google has added a “BlogThis” feature in […]

Microsoft has issued an alert for a security flaw in its flagship Windows Media Player 9 Series that leaves millions of users at the risk of intrusion. The WMP9 software, which streams multimedia content to millions of PC users, contains a vulnerability in the way an ActiveX control provides access to information. Windows Media Player […]

Microsoft on Wednesday warned of a security flaw in the ISAPI extension for Windows Media Services that could lead to code execution on Windows 2000 systems. In an advisory, Microsoft tagged an “important” rating to the vulnerability and urged systems admins to install a patch at the earliest opportunity. The company said the flaw was […]