Apple expanding Target collaboration to mini-store outlets - by aby benedict

Thought Apple is already sitting pretty inside Target stores across the nation inside hyper-controlled displays which noone can touch, they’ve been tipped to be expanding to store-within-a-store inside the year. According to a source speaking with Apple Insider, Apple is planning on operating Apple-branded mini stores inside 25 larger Target stores throughout the nation later this year. Visitors of the 1,000+ Best Buy stores across the USA may already have noticed similar miniature Apple stores inside the warehouses there – this would be something very similar inside what your humble narrator so lovingly calls the Big Red Living Room.

You’ll recall, if you’re an avid SlashGear reader, that I’ve been writing several articles in the past few months about Target and how they could improve their mobile-minded tech section of their stores in many various ways. What I’ve been concentrating on is Android tablets since even though it may appear that they’re selling some, the fact of the matter remains: Apple is already doing it better. Now with a retail expansion inside Target to a full fledged min-store, the rest of the mobile showing for Android, Windows Phone, and the rest, wont stand a chance. They’ll stand much less of a chance than they did before, that is.

Apple already had not only its own special stands for their iPods and their iPads under plastic, they had (and still have) spots in the smartphone section that CLEARLY dominate the competition with central viewing and twice the space for showing. Apple is set to continue the domination here with a miniature store that’s not only curated to the level they desire, but will newly allow people to actually play around with the devices they so obviously need to buy. While this may seem novel to those of you who have Apple stores in their area (we have three!), these new stores will sit in areas that otherwise wouldn’t be able to sustain a real deal gigantic sized Apple store on its own.

Japan working on powerful cyber weapon, knows best defense is a good offense - by aby benedict

The Japanese government has been (relatively) quietly churning away on an advanced new cyber weapon. In the post Stuxnet age it's no surprise that a government would be working on powerful new tools todefend its digital borders, but this particular virus (developed with help from Fujitsu) is raising eyebrows with some over how it accomplishes its goals. Essentially, when it detects an intruding piece of malware, the program follows the virtual trail left behind back to the attack's source -- disabling every machine it encounters along the way. The goal, obviously, is to stop the spread of a malicious piece of code by finding and shutting down, not just the source, but all middleman PCs that are also now potential hosts. In some admitedly extreme scenarios this weapon could potentially spiral out of control, taking out far more computers than intended. Nightmarish hellscapes dominated by computers run amok aside, its definitely interesting and we understand how it might cause some concern. Check out the source for a few more details.

Sony flashes new XQD memory cards, your pre-ordered Nikon D4 smiles coyly - by aby benedict

We've been eagerly awaiting some of that next-gen XQD memory since it was announced right around a month ago, and now that we have something worthy to pop it in, we're doubly buzzed. Sony's the first to step forward, kicking off with QDH16 ($129) and QDH32 ($229) cards where the number represents the capacity. When the specs first came out of the darkroom there was talk of 5Gb/s write speeds; these might not be quite that rapid, but at 1Gb/s (125 MB/s), we're still not complaining. Sony thinks the cards will be good for up 100 frames in RAW format in continuous shooting mode, based on its tests. There'll also be a card reader and adapter for easy portability, both setting you back a further $45 when the whole lot hits the shelves in February. Click the PR after the jump for more info.

Nikon D4 hands-on and manufacturer sample images - by aby benedict

With the onslaught of CES launches still several days away, the big news today is the D4, Nikon's brand new full-frame digital SLR camera. The 16.2 megapixel DSLR offers 1080/30p video capture, an extended ISO range of 100 to 204,800, a 91,000-pixel 3D color matrix meter and a top high-speed shooting option of 11 frames-per-second. And with the D3 first hitting stores nearly five years ago, this FX-mount successor was long overdue. Earlier today, Nikon held its D4 launch event in Asia, previewing the camera before a group of journalists in Hong Kong. We were on hand for a first look at the massive $6,000 pro body, and were quite pleased with what we saw. Jump past the break for our impressions.

In what seems to be a move consistent throughout the industry, the D4's body is strikingly similar to its half-decade-old predecessor. There's no edgy new design to speak of, and all of the controls are exactly where you'd expect them to be. That's not to say Nikon didn't make a few tweaks, however. First, there's a full set of vertical controls for firing the camera and adjusting key settings without awkwardly reaching around the body to access the buttons up top -- an improvement that's sure to be appreciated by portrait and wedding shooters. The main shutter release was also moved slightly forward, for a more natural feel, and a dedicated movie capture button was added. There's also a new pair of joystick-like controls for navigating menus and moving around an image while zoomed in during playback. Overall, the additional controls improve upon the interface without introducing clutter -- an advantage granted by the generous body size.

A larger body also means more room for ports, and the D4 has plenty. To the left of the 3.2-inch, 921k-dot LCD you'll find a proprietary connector for the TW-5A plug-in WiFi adapter that can be used to network cameras wireless and even fire them remotely, using the built-in web server. Below that is a full-size Ethernet jack, if you'd prefer to go the wired route. There's also a remote connector, microphone input jack (!), headphone jack, mini-USB and an HDMI port, which can be used both for video playback and piping out an uncompressed live preview feed, for capturing raw video using a external device. There are also two memory card slots available -- one CompactFlash and one XQD, for use with the high-speed next-gen format announced last month. All the main multipurpose controls are just to the left of the memory card slots, while secondary buttons can be found below and to the left of the LCD -- essential controls are now backlit, making them possible to find in the dark.

We weren't permitted to publish photos and video shot with the D4, so unfortunately we can't speak to the camera's image quality, though we were able to dig up some samples captured by Nikon photographers, including two shot at ISO 6400. Of course, we're just as curious as you about what it's like shooting at ISO 204,800, but it appears that we'll need to wait at least a few more days to find out.

Worm steals more than 45,000 Facebook logins | News - Security - by aby benedict

A nasty bit of malware making the rounds on Facebook has reportedly made off with the usernames and passwords of more than 45,000 users.

Most of those affected by the worm--called Ramnit--are from France and the United Kingdom, according to a bulletin issued by security researchers at Securlet. It is capable of infecting Windows executables, Microsoft Office, and HTML files, according to McAfee.

"We suspect that the attackers behind Ramnit are using the stolen credentials to log-in to victims' Facebook accounts and to transmit malicious links to their friends, thereby magnifying the malware's spread even further," Securlet said in its bulletin. "In addition, cybercriminals are taking advantage of the fact that users tend to use the same password in various web-based services (Facebook, Gmail, Corporate SSL VPN, Outlook Web Access, etc.) to gain remote access to corporate networks."

The worm was first discovered in April 2010 stealing sensitive information such as stored FTP credentials and browser cookies. In August 2011, after malware developers borrowed source code from the Zeus botnet, Ramnit "went financial." With that added strength, Ramnit was able to "gain remote access to financial institutions, compromise online banking sessions and penetrate several corporate networks." Approximately 800,000 machines were infected between September 2011 and the end of the year.

The security researcher has notified Facebook and provided the social-networking giant with all the stolen credentials found on Ramnit's server.

Pod2g Posts Update With A Short FAQ Session On Untethered Jailbreak For iPhone 4S And iPad 2 - by aby benedict

I think it is fair to say that the majority of iPhone users involved in the jailbreak community have been keeping their gazes firmly fixed on the Twitter and BlogSpot accounts of developer Pod2g in the last couple of months. In November of 2011, he tweeted, somewhat out of the blue, that he had managed to find a bug in iOS 5 which he believed could ultimately lead to a distributable jailbreak. Less than two months later he remained true to his initial discovery and in partnership with the Chronic Dev and iPhone Dev Teams released a jailbreak capable of untethered iOS 5.0.1 on older A4 devices.
But what about the iPhone 4S and iPad 2 which are the current generation devices and come equipped with Apples dual-core A5 chip? Unfortunately, at the time of releasing the Corona (anagram of racoon) jailbreak, the research and development process had not allowed the teams involved to include the A5 units on the list of supported devices. Pod2g had also tweeted out two days ago that he felt the need to disable to ability for readers to post comments on his blog posts and that he was sorry for the genuine comments which would be affected by this. If history is anything to go by, I can only assume that he was first of all receiving far too many comments to be able to get through himself with detracting from his work, and that a lot of the comments were negative from users who believe they have a God given right to a jailbreak.

With what I imagine is a retort to some of the negative comments he has received, Pod2g has todayposted a new blog entry answering a few frequently asked questions in the hope of clearing up some of the confusion. Not one of his longer, more insightful posts but it does give clarity to a number of questions which have been on the minds of A5 device owners.

The first answer relates to the fact that Pod2g actually has his own iPhone 4S on an untethered jailbreak, so how come it hasn’t been released when it is technically possible to achieve? This is all down to the legalities involved in distributing a jailbreak for public consumption. The exploit used by Pod2g to inject the untethering files requires the use of an Apple developer account and until they can find a distributable exploit which enables them to set the Corona files into the correct position it remains an impossibility to release.

The next two questions are very similar to one another and focus of the fact that the A4 jailbreak was easier to release because a tethered jailbreak was already available, which sets a good foundation for the Corona files to be installed. Unfortunately to release a tethered A5 jailbreak would also require a distributable exploit which they do not have yet.

Finally, the last piece of the blog entry, which I have to admit saddens me a little – pod2g, release this stuff quick, [your insult here], I’ve waited enough now. Unfortunately this attitude towards developers and the teams who provide jailbreaks is far too common. I think it is fair to share that the average jailbreak user (myself included) is unaware of the huge technical process that goes into providing a jailbreak from start to finish. Another thing we need to bare in mind is that most of the time these guys are providing these tools free of charge and rely on donations – albeit sometimes very generous donations.

So what was his answer to the final question? If he could, he would of course. Work will continue on finding the requires exploits and hopefully we will see an A5 liberation soon.

iPhone 4S And iPad 2 Untethered Jailbreak Coming Next Week, Confirms Pod2g! - by aby benedict

Yes, you read it right! Pod2g has just confirmed the release date of iPhone 4S and iPad 2 untethered jailbreak. According to a very recent tweet from pod2g, an untethered jailbreak for A5 devices could be expected next week.

In case you’re not aware, pod2g few days ago released his untethered jailbreak for all A4 devices. The iPhone hacker had some problems with iPhone 4S but it looks like that problems are now being solved.

A5 devices, meaning iPhone 4S and iPad 2, haven’t got a bootrom jailbreak exploit yet like limera1n for A4 devices which allowed permanent jailbreak for these devices.

We’ll keep you informed whenever the tool is released. Make sure to subscribe to our newsletter here.