CircleID: News Briefs

Bloomberg on Netflix as World's Biggest User of Cloud Computing

2013-05-09T12:39:00-08:00

Netflix is arguable one of the world's biggest users of cloud computing, renting all its computing power from Amazon Web Services, the cloud division of Amazon.com, which runs its own video-streaming service that competes with Netflix. Ashlee Vance from Bloomberg reports:

"Netflix has more than 36 million subscribers. They watch about 4 billion hours of programs every quarter on more than 1,000 different devices. To meet this demand, the company uses specialized video servers scattered around the world. When a subscriber clicks on a movie to stream, Netflix determines within a split second which server containing that movie is closest to the user, then picks from dozens of versions of the video file, depending on the device the viewer is using. At company headquarters in Los Gatos, Calif., teams of mathematicians and designers study what people watch and build algorithms and interfaces to present them with the collection of videos that will keep them watching."

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More under: Cloud Computing, Data Center

Hundreds of Syrian Domains Seized As a Result of Trade Sanctions

2013-05-09T09:29:00-08:00

"In apparent observation of international trade sanctions against Syria, a U.S. firm that ranks as the world's fourth-largest domain name registrar has seized hundreds of domains belonging to various Syrian entities, including a prominent Syrian hacker group and sites associated with the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad," reports Brian Krebs. "The apparently coordinated action ended with each of the site's registration records being changed to include Web.com's Florida address, as well as the notation 'OFAC Holding'."

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More under: Domain Names

Syrian Internet Back After 19-Hour Blackout

2013-05-08T10:09:00-08:00

The internet in Syria appears to have returned after a nationwide blackout knocked the country offline for more than 19 hours. Monitoring company Renesys noted signs of activity at around 14:30 GMT (17:30 local time) on Wednesday. Local state-run media had reported earlier that a "fault in optical fibre cables" was to blame for the blackout. However, experts dismissed this explanation as "unlikely".

Read full story: BBC

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More under: Access Providers

Google Adopts 'Palestine' Label for the Region's Search Page

2013-05-06T11:29:00-08:00

Google has changed the tagline on the homepage of its Palestinian edition from "Palestinian Territories" to "Palestine". The change, introduced on 1 May, means google.ps now displays "Palestine" in Arabic and English under Google's logo.

Google spokesman Nathan Tyler, in a statement given to the BBC on Friday, said: "We're changing the name 'Palestinian Territories' to 'Palestine' across our products. We consult a number of sources and authorities when naming countries." ... "In this case, we are following the lead of the UN, ICANN, ISO and other international organisations."

Read full story: BBC

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More under: Internet Governance, Top-Level Domains, Web

CERN Recreating First Webpage to Commemorate 20th Anniversary

2013-04-30T10:50:00-08:00

A team at the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN) has launched a project to re-create the first web page. The aim is to preserve the original hardware and software associated with the birth of the web. The initiative coincides with the 20th anniversary of the research centre giving the web to the world.

Read full story: BBC

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More under: Web

Arrest Made in Connection to Spamhaus DDoS Case

2013-04-29T12:15:00-08:00

According to a press release by the Openbaar Ministerie (the Public Prosecution Office), a dutch man with the initials SK has been arrested in Spain for the DDoS attacks on Spamhaus.

Brian Krebs reports: "A 35-year-old Dutchman thought to be responsible for launching what's been called 'the largest publicly announced online attack in the history of the Internet' was arrested in Barcelona on Thursday by Spanish authorities. The man, identified by Dutch prosecutors only as 'SK,' was being held after a European warrant was issued for his arrest in connection with a series of massive online attacks last month against Spamhaus, an anti-spam organization."

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More under: Cyberattack, Cybercrime, DDoS, Law, Security, Spam

ICANN Releases 5th Round of Initial Evaluation Results - 169 TLDs Pass

2013-04-22T07:37:00-08:00

Mary Iqbal writes to report that ICANN has released the fifth round of Initial Evaluation results, bringing the total number of applications that have passed the Initial Evaluation phase to 169. ICANN is targeting completing Initial Evaluation for all applicants by August 2013. To learn more, see: http://www.getnewtlds.com/news/Fifth-Round-of-Initial-Evaluations.aspx

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More under: ICANN, Top-Level Domains

Massive Spam and Malware Campaign Following Boston Tragedy

2013-04-17T15:48:00-08:00

On April 16th at 11:00pm GMT, the first of two botnets began a massive spam campaign to take advantage of the recent Boston tragedy. The spam messages claim to contain news concerning the Boston Marathon bombing, reports Craig Williams from Cisco. The spam messages contain a link to a site that claims to have videos of explosions from the attack. Simultaneously, links to these sites were posted as comments to various blogs.

The link directs users to a webpage that includes iframes that load content from several YouTube videos plus content from an attacker-controlled site. Reports indicate the attacker-controlled sites host malicious .jar files that can compromise vulnerable machines.

On April 17th, a second botnet began using a similar spam campaign. Instead of simply providing a link, the spam messages contained graphical HTML content claiming to be breaking news alerts from CNN.

Cisco became aware of a range of threats forming on April 15th when hundreds of domains related to the Boston tragedy were quickly registered. Regarding the botnet spam-specific threat – from a volume perspective – peaks approach 40% of all spam being sent. (Source: Cisco)

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More under: Malware, Security, Spam

Over 80 European Organizations Demand Protection for Net Neutrality

2013-04-17T11:37:00-08:00

Today, more than 80 organizations, represented by The European Consumer Organization (BEUC) and European Digital Rights (EDRi), sent a letter [PDF] to the European Commission demanding the end of dangerous experimentation with the functioning of the Internet in Europe and the protection of the principles of openness and neutrality.

"The Internet's unique value is openness. The experimentation by certain European access providers with blocking, filtering and throttling of services creates borders in an online world whose key value is the absence of borders." explains Joe McNamee, Executive Director of EDRi. "This reckless experimentation will continue unless the European Commission puts a stop to it."

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More under: Access Providers, Net Neutrality, Policy & Regulation

China and the United States Agree on Forming Joint Cybersecurity Working Group

2013-04-15T09:10:00-08:00

China and the United States will set up a working group on cybersecurity, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Saturday, as the two sides moved to ease months of tensions and mutual accusations of hacking and Internet theft. Speaking to reporters in Beijing during a visit to China, Kerry said the United States and China had agreed on the need to speed up action on cyber security, an area that Washington says is its top national security concern.

Read full story: Reuters

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More under: Cyberattack, Cybercrime, Internet Governance, Security

Fourth Round of Initial Evaluation Results for New TLDs

2013-04-15T07:58:00-08:00

Mary Iqbal writes to report that ICANN has released the fourth round of Initial Evaluation results, bringing the total number of applications that have passed the Initial Evaluation phase to 131. ICANN is targeting completing Initial Evaluation for all applicants by August 2013. To learn more, see http://www.getnewtlds.com/news/Third-Round-of-Initial-Evaluations.aspx.

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More under: ICANN, Top-Level Domains

SPECIAL: Updates from the ICANN Meetings in Beijing

2013-04-12T09:43:00-08:00

CircleID, once again, in collaboration with the team from Dyn Inc. and ICANN Wiki, brings you video blogs and updates from the 46th ICANN meeting in Beijing, China (7-11 April 2013).

Stay tuned as we keep this page updated through out the meetings.

Comments and questions? Please post them below in the comment section of the page or send us an email.

* * *

Update / Apr 12, 2013 — Ray King of ICANNWiki talked with Ben Crawford, CEO of CentralNic.

Update / Apr 12, 2013 — Dyn's Rich Peterson talked with UNH School of Law's Mary Wong.

Update / Apr 12, 2013 — As part of our ICANN 46 coverage, Ray King of ICANNWiki chats with Chuck Gomes, a member of the Registries Stakeholder Group.

Brought to you in partnership with Dyn Inc and ICANN Wiki. Please add your feedback and suggestions using the comment form provided on this page or contact us directly.

Video Coverage of past ICANN meetings:
ICANN 44 Meetings in Toronto
ICANN 44 Meetings in Prague
ICANN 43 Meetings in Costa Rica
ICANN 42 Meetings in Dakar
ICANN 41 Meetings in Singapore
ICANN 38 Meetings in Brussels
ICANN 37 in Nairobi, Kenya
ICANN 36 in Seoul, South Korea
ICANN 35 in Sydney, Australia
ICANN 34 in Mexico City

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More under: Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains

Total Domain Names Pass 252 Million Worldwide

2013-04-08T10:15:01-08:00

More than six million domain names were registered in the fourth quarter of 2012, bringing the total number to more than 252 million domain names worldwide across all top-level domains (TLDs) as of Dec. 31, 2012, according to the latest Domain Name Industry Brief from Verisign. The increase of 6.1 million domain names globally equates to a growth rate of 2.5 percent over the third quarter of 2012, and marks the eighth straight quarter with greater than 2 percent growth. Worldwide registrations have grown by 26.6 million, or 11.8 percent, year over year.

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Third Round of Evaluation Results for New TLDs

2013-04-07T08:50:00-08:00

Mary Iqbal writes to report that ICANN has released the third round of initial evaluation results, bringing the total number of applicants to pass Initial Evaluation to 93. ICANN has now completed the initial evaluation of all but 13 IDN Top Level Domains. To learn more, see http://www.getnewtlds.com/news/Third-Round-of-Initial-Evaluations.aspx.

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More under: ICANN, Top-Level Domains

NCUC Workshop: One World, One Internet? New gTLDs & Competition in a Changing Global Environment

2013-04-02T13:12:00-08:00

The Noncommercial Users Constituency (NCUC) has organized and is holding a policy workshop, One World, One Internet? New gTLDs & Competition in a Changing Global Environment, next week in Beijing at ICANN-46. The program, which brings together top Western and Chinese experts, will explore pressures for integration versus fragmentation of the Internet and implications for ICANN, as well as different competition and regulation perspectives as they relate to new gTLDs.

Panelists include:

Tarek Kamel, Senior Advisor to President for Governmental Engagement, ICANN
Markus Kummer, Vice President of Public Policy, The Internet Society
William J. Drake, NCUC, and International Fellow and Lecturer, University of Zurich
Yongge Sun, Director, The Internet Society of China
He Baohong, MIIT China Academy of Telecommunication Research
Leonid Todorov, Deputy Director for Government and International Relations, Russian Registry for TLDs

When & Where:

The workshop will be held on Wednesday April 10, 2013 from 13:00 to 15:00 (Beijing time) in Function Room 8AB of the Beijing International Hotel. The workshop is open to everyone and is free to attend. However, for planning purposes, it is requested that you please register. Interpretation and remote participation facilities will be provided by ICANN, more details on this on ICANN's website.

More Details on the workshop provided by NCUC.

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More under: ICANN, Internet Governance, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains

INET Denver: IPv4 Exhaustion and the Path to IPv6

2013-04-01T11:45:00-08:00

INET Denver is April 17, 2013 — register today to reserve your spot!

You won't want to miss this unique opportunity to join IPv6 networking professionals from across North America, who will attend to learn the latest on IPv4 exhaustion and how to transition to IPv6. The INET Denver agenda will bring together top experts in the networking field to discuss the latest on IPv4 exhaustion in our market, and the TCO of IPv6.

The line up of speakers includes industry experts like:

John Curran, President & CEO, ARIN
Owen DeLong, IPv6 Evangelist, Hurricane Electric
Lee Howard, Director of Network Technology, Time Warner Cable
Dr. Patrick Ryan, Public Policy & Government Relations Counsel, Google

When:

April 17, 2013
Registration: 12:00 - 1:00 PM
INET Denver: 1:00 - 6:00 PM
Refreshments: 6:00 - 7:30 PM

Where:

Grand Hyatt Denver
1750 Welton Street
Denver, CO 80202

Additional Details:

http://www.internetsociety.org/events/inet-denver

Registration:

http://www.internetsociety.org/form/inet

The INET Denver will co-locate with the 2013 North American IPv6 Summit. Take part in this unique opportunity to learn from top experts in the networking field discussing the latest on IPv4 exhaustion in our market and the TCO of IPv6.

Don't delay and register today!

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More under: IP Addressing, IPv6

Second Round of Initial Evaluations for New gTLDs

2013-04-01T10:31:00-08:00

Mary Iqbal writes to report that ICANN has released the second round of Initial Evaluation Results on March 29. ICANN is currently reviewing new gTLD applications at a rate of 30 applications per week and has plans to increase that to 100 per week. ICANN is targeting completing Initial Evaluation for all applicants by August 2013. To learn more, visit www.GetNewTLDs.com/news.

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More under: ICANN, Top-Level Domains

U.S. CERT Issues Alert on DNS Amplification Attacks

2013-03-31T09:22:00-08:00

Neil Schwartzman writes to report that U.S. Cert issued Alert TA13-088A on Friday March 29, 2013. "It is a solid how-to guide to test for, and remediate DNS configurations that can be used for Distributed Denial of Service attacks."

From the Alert: "While the attacks are difficult to prevent, network operators can implement several possible mitigation strategies. The primary element in the attack that is the focus of an effective long-term solution is the detection and elimination of open recursive DNS resolvers. These systems are typically legitimate DNS servers that have been improperly configured to respond to recursive queries on behalf of any system, rather than restricting recursive responses only to requests from local or authorized clients. By identifying these systems, an organization or network operator can reduce the number of potential resources that the attacker can employ in an attack."

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More under: Cyberattack, DDoS, DNS, DNS Security, Security

A Closer Look at Recent Submarine Cable Failures

2013-03-29T19:29:00-08:00

In light of the recent submarine cable failures, Doug Madory from Renesys has a detailed report on what has happened to some of the providers in four countries along the route of the cable: Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and India.

Madory writes: "It has been a rough few weeks for the global Internet, given numerous submarine cable failures and the largest DDOS attack ever reported. While we're hard-pressed to find evidence of the purported global Internet slowdown due to the DDOS attack, the dramatic impacts of yesterday's SMW4 submarine cable cut were profound. Recent reports that the cable break was the result of sabotage, makes the incident even more intriguing."

Read the full report here.

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More under: Access Providers, Broadband

Largest DDoS Attack To Date Aimed at Spamhaus Effects Global Internet Traffic

2013-03-27T08:31:01-08:00

The internet around the world has been slowed down in what security experts are describing as the biggest cyber-attack of its kind in history. A row between a spam-fighting group and hosting firm has sparked retaliation attacks affecting the wider internet. It is having an impact on popular services like Netflix — and experts worry it could escalate to affect banking and email systems.

Read full story: BBC

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More under: Cyberattack, DDoS, Spam