Microsoft has confirmed today that they will be releasing Zune software for Macs by the end of the year, following many months of speculation.
Says the software giant: “Later in 2010 Microsoft will make a public beta available of a tool that allows Windows Phone 7 to sync select content with Mac computers.”
Windows Phone 7 owners should be able to quickly connect their smartphones to their Macs, and sync media content stored on their hard drives.
Microsoft first announced the news via Twitter: “Daily #WP7 Announcement: I’m glad to confirm that Mac users would be able to use Zune on their Macs to sync with #WP7. More details soon.”
The company finally unveiled its initial WP7 lineup earlier this week, with two phones headed to T-Mobile, three headed to AT&T and one each on Verizon and Sprint next year.
Result for: mac computers
Graham Cluley of the Sophos security firm has written about a hidden change in Mac OS X 10.6.4 that is not mentioned in its release notes. Specifically, Apple included an update to the malware protection built into Mac OS X to protect against a backdoor Trojan the Cupertino-based Mac-maker identifies as “HellRTS”.
Sophos has been tracking the same trojan since April as OSX/Pinhead-B. It is distributed by malicious sources as the iPhoto application. The malware can provide a attacker with full access to an infected Mac, allowing for the taking of screenshots, sending spam, reading the clipboard, accessing files and so on.
“Unfortunately, many Mac users seem oblivious to security threats which can run on their computers. And that isn’t helped when Apple issues an anti-malware security update like this by stealth, rather than informing the public what it has done,” Cluley wrote.
“You have to wonder whether their keeping quiet about an anti-malware security update like this was for marketing reasons. ‘Shh! Don’t tell folks that we have to protect against malware on Mac OS X!’”
Building on that point, Cluley recalled a recent twitter entry from a colleague telling of how he had overheard an Apple Store employee tell potential customers that it was impossible for Macs to be infected with viruses.
“There’s a lot less malicious software for Mac computers than Windows PCs, of course, but the fact that so many Mac owners don’t take security seriously enough, and haven’t bothered installing an anti-virus, might mean they are a soft target for hackers in the future,” Cluley writes.
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Result for: mac computers
Prosecutors in Michigan have filed fraud charges against an iPod repairman who allegedly received over 9000 replacement iPod Shuffle devices by entering serial numbers into Apple’s online web site. He then flipped the devices for full profit.
The man, Nicholas Woodhams, age 23, sold mostly all of the stolen iPods for $49 USD each, making over $400,000 USD profit.
“We’ve been cooperating with the government and are in the process of negotiating a resolution,” said Woodhams’ lawyer, Randall Levine. “He is one of those guys who is computer-savvy. This is a very bright man who did not fully appreciate the seriousness of the situation.”
The government is currently looking to seize all of Woodhams’ assets, including two cars, a motorcycle, seven Mac computers and an undisclosed amount of cash, supposedly in the hundreds of thousands.
Being an independent iPod repairman, Woodhams had full knowledge that he could get free replacements if Shuffle devices were having problems.
“Through trial and error, the defendant determined that he could guess valid, warrantied serial numbers and enter them into Apple’s Web site for ‘replacement’ units without ever in fact purchasing or possessing the ‘original’ units,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Nils Kessler added.
