Hackers

A man has finished building an enormous computer in the sitting room of his bungalow in Cambridge.
James Newman started work on the "Megaprocessor", which is 33ft (10m) wide and 6ft (2m) high, in 2012.
It does the job of a chip-sized microprocessor and Mr Newman has spent £40,000 ($53,000) creating it.
It contains 40,000 transistors, 10,000 LED lights and it weighs around half a tonne (500kg). So far, he has used it to play the classic video game Tetris.
In a video demonstration he admits the game isn't easy to play.
Mr Newman, a digital electronics engineer, started the project because he was learning about transistors and wanted to visualise how a microprocessor worked. The components all light up as the huge device carries out a task.
"The machine on your desk may be a million times better than what I have built - but mine is much prettier," he told the BBC.
"Mine has 10,000 times more LEDs."
Mr Newman hopes the Megaprocessor will be used as an educational tool and is planning a series of open days at his home over the summer.
"I doubt I'll be able to sell it," he said.
"My dream is that it goes to a museum or educational institute so that people can learn from it."

About the Deer Cam
***Note 3-20-16 10:45pm PST: Deer Cam is frozen. It will be back online tomorrow at 3:00pm PST.***
***Note 3-20-16 10:00pm PST: The Deer Cam computer will likely crash in the next 5 hours, and the admin is away. If the Deer Cam is offline, it should return 3-21-16 by 3:00pm PST***

San Andreas Deer Cam is a live video stream from a computer running a hacked version of Grand Theft Auto V, hosted on Twitch.tv. The hack creates a deer and follows it as it wanders throughout the 100 square miles of San Andreas, a fictional state in GTA V based on California. The deer has been programmed to control itself and make its own decisions, with no one actually playing the video game. The deer is ‘playing itself’, with all activity unscripted… and unexpected. In the past 48 hours, the deer has wandered along a moonlit beach, caused a traffic jam on a major freeway, been caught in a gangland gun battle, and been chased by the police.

For more information about the San Andreas Deer Cam project,

http://bwatanabe.com/GTA_V_WanderingDeer.html

Brent Watanabe : San Andreas Streaming Deer Cam, 2016;

Ransomware is a type of malware that locks you out of your
computer until you pay a ransom. In some cases, it can actually
cause more serious problems by encrypting the files on your
system's hard drive.
Last year, Symantec discovered an android malware with hybrid
characteristics of Fake AV and Ransomware. Last month,
Bitdefender identified an android version of Ransomware which
was being sold in the underground market. The malware bluffed
victims into paying a ransom but didn't actually encrypt the files.
Until now, there have been no reports of android malware that
encrypts the files.
Security researchers at ESET say they have spotted the first
variant of Ransomware that encrypts files in your Android Device.
The malware, dubbed as Simplocker, shows a ransom message
written in Russian which informs victims that their device is
locked for viewing and distribution child p**n.
It scans the SD card for certain file types such as image, document
or videos, encrypts them using Advanced Encryption Standard
(AES), and demands money in order to decrypt them.
It also gathers information about the infected device and sends to
a command and control server. The server is located in Tor
".onion" domain for purposes of anonymity.
Don't Pay:
"We strongly recommend against paying up – not only because
that will only motivate other malware authors to continue these
kinds of filthy operations, but also because there is no guarantee
that the crook will keep their part of the deal and actually decrypt
them" Researchers at ESET say.