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The 18 year-old Owen Thor Walker has admitted his guilt in six charges of computer crime in a New Zealand court yesterday. The crimes he committed included being the leader of a cybercrime ring, setting up a botnet, infecting over a million PCs with a virus, and costing around US$20.4 million in losses for the local economy.

The actual charges against him are as follows:

• 2 charges of accessing a computer for dishonest use
• 2 charges of accessing computer systems without authorization
• Damaging and interfering with computer systems
• Possessing software for committing crimes

Walker, known online as AKill, Snow Whyte, or Snow Walker, is a home-schooled, self-taught programmer with a type of autism called Asperger syndrome; whose characteristics include difficulty with social interaction and obsessive and repetitive behaviour.

(Read the full post about ‘New Zealand teen admits guilt in hacker charges’…)

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I’m sure most of you will hope that the Catbox 360, but we’ve eaten more than our fair share of salt to know that this is but an impossibility - after all, I don’t think an animal who has such a fascination for balls of yarn will be able to find something as complicated as video games interesting. Apparently, this automatic litter box will activate the game each time kitty steps inside, and should it leave a log during the game, it will earn a bonus multiplier mode for additional points. Needless to say, the Catbox 360 has no pricing nor availability date attached to it. (Read the full post about ‘Catbox 360′…)

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I ran across this deal on Dell’s site and had to post. There are a limited 500 coupons to purchase the Western Digital 1.5TB Gigabit External HD for $279! Hurry up while coupons last, it won’t last long at this price…

Limited Quantity Deals! Save $200 Off Western Digital® 1.5 TB Gigabit External HD - My Book® World Edition® II HURRY while they last!

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Adobe is up and about this past few days. After launching Photoshop Express, here comes Adobe announcing that it’s AIR (Adobe Integrated Runtime), a cross operating system runtime used for developing various web applications that run both online and offline. Adobe AIR for Linux joins Windows and Mac in giving users with a rich interface to develop their applications. “Adobe’s decision to join the LF is a natural extension of its commitment to open standards and open source, which demonstrates its leadership and foresight in the software industry,” said Jim Zemlin, executive director at The Linux Foundation. (Read the full post about ‘Adobe breathes AIR into Linux Foundation’…)

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I love Skull Candy’s earbuds and headphones, so when I saw their booth at CES this year, I was so excited. Their booth didn’t disappoint. There were plenty of interesting headphones and backpacks in a wide variety of colors. Their booth had many headphones on the rack so you could see how they feel on your head.

They were also showcasing their Skullcandy FMJ headsets for the iPhone and the blackberry Curve. In January, they weren’t available yet and the staff at the booth only had one to show us, but they let us test it with our iphone.

(Read the full post about ‘CES 2008: Skull Candy’…)

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Gone have the days where any HDTV larger than 32-inches would be better as a plasma rather than a LCD screen. Now days LCD HDTVs such as the Philips 42PFL7432D have improved so much over the last year or so that they can easily compete head to head with plasmas. 42-inches is a very nice size for an HDTV and the 42PFL7432D looks nothing short of beautiful with it’s sleek glossy finish and rounded corners. One of the key features on this Philips 42PFL7432D is the unique “Ambilight” lighting technology which produces light around the edges and back of the HDTV. This “light show” for lack of a better description helps get you more involved in watching and also reduces eye strain. (Read the full post about ‘Philips 42PFL7432D Review’…)

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Toshiba has redesigned and added additional features to the 13.3-inch U400, 14.1-inch M300, 15.4-inch A300 (pictured) and 17-inch P300 have been redesigned with a fusion finish, feather-touch multimedia keys, white LED accents and built-in Dolby Sound Room technology along with sleep-and-charge USB ports allowing users to charge up their portable gadgetry with USB even if the laptop is powered on / off or in Sleep mode. No word on how much and when these redesigns will be available, so I’m afraid you’ll have to hang in tight. (Read the full post about ‘Toshiba Makes Over 4 Satellite Laptops’…)

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Posted Apr 1st 2008 6:56PM by Nilay PatelFiled under: Misc. gadgetsWe think Creative acted pretty foolishly in forcing Daniel_K to remove his modded drivers that allowed various Creative sound cards to work up to spec under Vista — customers had already bought the hardware, after all — but Daniel seems to understand why he’s at the center of the firestorm. Speaking to Custom PC, Daniel Kawakami admits that promising faster releases for more donations probably raised some red flags, but he’s not happy that Creative took to publicly threatening him on forums, and says that a simple private email would have probably worked a lot better. (Read the full post about ‘Daniel_K speaks out about his modded (better) Creative drivers’…)

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Overview You like driving with music one? Then go and get the latest audio set from LG. With a variety of new technical features, LG LAC-M9600 Audio Head Unit lets you enjoy listening music directly from a PC or mp3 player through a USB port. Available in silver color, LG LAC-M9600 Audio Head Unit will surely help you driving in a more enjoyable way. Features Bluetooth Handsfree. XDSS+ and MP3 Optimizer. Preset Memory of 24EA. CD-DA/R/RW CD- Text. Full RDS AM/FM Tuner. Sub woofer Line-out. LG LAC-M9600 Audio Head Unit comes incorporated with features like Bluetooth Audio Streaming, Station Auto Store, Personal Picture Skin and MP3/WMA Playback. (Read the full post about ‘LG LAC-M9600 Audio Head Units’…)

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Posted Apr 1st 2008 6:00PM by Nilay PatelFiled under: Handhelds, Home Entertainment Monsoon’s HAVA HD streamer doesn’t get quite as much love as the various Slingboxes, but it’s a fine piece of kit with features Sling doesn’t have quite yet, like pause and rewind — and now it’s got one more supported client platform, as the company’s using CTIA to roll out support for Nokia’s Internet Tablet OS. That means the N800 and N810 can now get in on the action, and the quality looks pretty decent — the crew over at Internet Tablet Talk got a chance to play with an early version, and they think it looks even better than the PC client. Hmm, looks like that WiMAX N810 could double as a fairly decent portable TV, eh? (Read the full post about ‘HAVA player hits Nokia’s internet tablets’…)

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