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Computer crash traps minister SECURITY guards smashed their way into an official limousine with sledgehammers to rescue Thailand’s finance minister after his car’s computer failed. Suchart Jaovisidha and his driver were trapped inside the BMW for more than 10 minutes before guards broke a window. All doors and windows had locked automatically when the computer crashed, and the air-conditioning stopped. "We could hardly breathe for over 10 minutes," Suchart told reporters. Fizzer irks Netizens A new and complex computer virus called Fizzer spread rapidly across the Internet, infecting computers across the world via e-mail and the file-swapping service Kazaa, computer security experts said. Businesses in Asia were the first to report the attack, followed by reports of tens of thousands of infections in Europe, and experts were expecting more cases in North America. Vincent Gullotto, who heads up an anti-virus response Team at Network Associates Inc. in Beaverton, Oregon said Fizzer was a complex virus that combined previously known tactics from other malicious viruses. Fizzer has the capability to disable computer users’ anti-virus and firewall software, but is otherwise not a threat to users’ personal files. The biggest headache was the extra traffic it generated, bogging down corporate networks. SMS to snare truants Two Irish schools are testing a new scheme using modern mobile phone technology to take the temptation out of playing truant. Under the scheme, a database records the names of absent students each day and automatically sends out a text message to parents notifying them if their child missed roll call. "If the absenteeism is legitimate, parents can ignore the message. If not, they can contact the school," David Sweeney, principal of Dublin’s Portmarnock Community School — one of the two pilot sites — said. However, he noted there had been some resistance from students to supplying their parents’ mobile numbers. A spokesman for Dataset IT Systems, which operates the technology, said interest in the scheme was growing. Mirroring moves by Britain, the Irish government beefed up legislation last year to fine and even imprison parents for failing to deal with persistent truancy by their children. Disadvantage for women A technology gender gap
puts American working women at a disadvantage in competing for
high-paying jobs in the new economy that offer family-friendly benefits,
a new study has reported. Women have achieved parity with men when it
comes to getting four-year college degrees, but are not sufficiently
prepared to move into some of the fastest-growing technology-related
fields, including systems analysis, software design and engineering,
research released by the American Association of University Women
Education Foundation found. |
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