By Paul Thomson :: 4:19 PM
Netflix has added new content from Hasbro to its on-demand video streaming service, the company announced late this week.
In a continuation of the partnership that Netflix inked with Hasbro in April, new titles coming to the service include shows such as My Little Pony Friendship is Magic, Transformers Prime, Transformers Rescue Bots, Littlest Pet Shop, and Kaijudo: Rise of the Duel Masters.
Episodes of these shows will appear on Netflix’s instant service approximately one month after they air on cable channel The Hub. The Hub is a channel that is jointly owned by Hasbro and the Discovery Channel’s Discovery Network.
“The success of Hasbro Studios content on Netflix has been remarkable and we are proud to add more shows and extend our relationship throughout North America,†explained Ted Sarandos, Netflix’s Chief Content Officer. “In a very competitive field, Hasbro Studios has risen to become a major content player with shows that kids watch and families trust.â€
In numbers recently released by Netflix, the company says that over 2 billion hours of child-friendly programming was streamed across its service last year.
By Cynthia Herbert :: 4:02 PM
Many websites built on the blogging and content management system WordPress are currently under attack by a group of hackers attempting to gain access to the sites to use them in Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) attacks.
The infected machines are then, in turn, attempting to gain access to other WordPress installations, to quickly grow the size of the botnet. Security experts say this is one of the most robust WordPress attacks to date, and the hackers have succeeded in building a very strong botnet of infected systems.
There are currently nearly 100,000 IP addresses in use by the infected systems, and this could grow as the hackers turn additional WordPress installations into subservient systems. Two popular managed hosting services, HostGator and Resellers Panel are undergoing a very heavy attack by the botnet right now – both services specialize in WordPress hosting packages.
Hackers are bute-force punching their way into the WordPress backend by trying 1,000 – 2,000 password combinations against the “admin” username on WordPress systems. WordPress users with easy-to-guess passwords are at the most risk for having their systems compromised.
To avoid having your WordPress instances violated, John Dolan, a freelance security expert, suggests that users go into their WordPress settings “right now, as soon as possible, and update their passwords,” he said. “It should be changed to a complex password, not a dictionary word, and it should use a mixture of capital and lowercase letters, as well as numbers and another character, like a question mark, for example.”
In addition to making sure your password is secure, Dolan also recommends that WordPress users look into a service like CloudFlare, an online security vendor that monitors your website’s incoming traffic and deflects attacks from known bots and spammers.
What to do if your WordPress instance has been hijacked? “Talk to your hosting provider,” says Dolan. “They most likely have experience with this, and can help you wipe your WordPress install and restore your latest backup.”
By Gilbert Falso :: 2:56 PM
The man accused of a shooting at the mall location of a community college extension campus in Virginia had apparently alluded to the crime he was about to commit on the 4chan forum website.
Neil MacInnis, accused of shooting two women at the mall, posted a very detailed account of what he planned to do at the mall, and also provided a link for people to listen in on the shooting as he carried it out. He made his posting just a few minutes before the shootings took place.
MacInnis was a student at the college, and no motive has yet been given for the shooting, The two women were taken to the hospital, and their condition has not been updated.
Below is a screenshot of MacInnis’ postings on the 4chan message board.
By Gilbert Falso :: 10:06 AM
Today is the day that Twitter officially announces and launches its new music service and iOS application.
The secret has been out for a little while, at least in bits and pieces. Twitter has acquired music discovery service We Are Hunted, and will brand the tool as its own music service. We Are Hunted has closed down, and all users accounts associated with it have been removed as well. Twitter is launching the new service at music.twitter.com, and though the page is currently live and allowing Twitter users to authenticate, the service does not appear to be functional quite yet.
Twitter will likely flip the switch to make the service and its application (iOS only at this point) live sometime later in the day today.
According to sources close to both companies, Twitter’s new music service will work closely with the social network, show artists and tracks that are trending online, and also help users to surface new artists and generes that might appeal to them, through recommendation engines and advice from friends and followers.
The service will stream tunes and videos live online, and will also allow users to purchase tracks they like directly from Apple’s iTunes marketplace.
By Cynthia Herbert :: 9:37 PM
In the digital age that we now live in, your online data and electronic assets are sometimes just as important – some might argue, more important – than your physical assets. What happens to these zeros and ones after you die? Who gets control? How do they get control? How do service providers know you’ve passed away?
Google is attempting to address some of these concerns with a service that it announced earlier today. With a new functionality added to Google accounts, users can set up plans for what happens to their Google services after they die. Users can have accounts and data deleted, send messages after they’ve passed on, or hand over data access to a family member or friend.
“We hope that this new feature will enable you to plan your digital afterlife – in a way that protects your privacy and security – and make life easier for your loved ones after you’re gone,†the company said in a blog post about the new features.
The function, called Inactive Account Manager, works as follows. You can set your Google account to delete your data after three, six, nine or 12 months of inactivity on the account. Or, that period of inactivity can trigger a message for prearranged trusted contact, like a family member, to receive data from some or all of Google’s participating services. Right now, the Google services that work with Inactive Account Manager include Blogger; Contacts and Circles; Drive; Gmail; Google+ Profiles, Pages and Streams; Picasa Web Albums; Google Voice and YouTube.
Before Google takes any action, it will attempt to make sure you are dead, by sending a warning text message to the cell phone on file, and also sending you an e-mail address giving you one last chance to stop the transfer or deletion.