China Spies On Skype Conversations.
A surveillance system in China that monitors and archives certain Internet text conversations that include selected political keywords,has been discovered by a group of Canadian human rights-activists and computer experts. The system tracks text messages sent by customers of Tom-Skype, a joint venture between a Chinese wireless operator and Skype. Some of the keywords triggers the monitoring service are “Tibet”, “Communist Party” or “Democracy”. The stored messages also contained internet addresses, user names and other information which could make the senders and recipients easily identifiable. Skype confirmed that Chinese users of Skype have been spied upon and their communications and identities recorded. Skype is owned by eBay.
Jamaica wins the medal tally, by population
Jamaica ranked first in Beijing Olympic medal tally by population, highly ahead of China and the United States. In Australian researcher Simon Forsyth’s “gold medal tally by per million population“, Jamaica was winning with 2.1582. The runner-up is Bahrain and Estonia the third. Jamaica also holds the top in total medal tally and weighted medal score both by per million population. India, the second most-populated country in the world, ranks last in all three tallies. Complete list can be found in Forsyth’s website.
Photos for the Blind
A Chinese designer has designed a new Camera for visually impaired people. The camera named “Touch Sight” has has a lightweight, flexible Braille display sheet which displays a 3D image by embossing the surface, allowing the user to touch their photo. In addition to the Braille display sheet “Touch Sight” includs a unique feature which records sound for three seconds after pressing the shutter button. When taking photographs it should be held against the forehead like a third eye. Its proved that its the optimal position to capture the image.
Walmart Sales slowing down.
Walmart world’s largest retailer said its sales growth is slowing down in US. However the retailer sees growth in its international stores in Latin America, the UK and China. Walmart is expanding its overseas presence aggressively. It has 330 stores in Brazil and planning to invest $1.1 bn next year to open 80 more. Wal-Mart has been subject to criticism by various groups and individuals. WalMart has also faced accusations involving poor working conditions of its employees. If considered as an individual economy Walmart is the 8th largest trading partner of China ahead of Russia, Australia and Canada.
Beijing Olympics Medal Count.
| Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total | |||
| 1 |  |
China | 22 | 8 | 5 | 35 |
| 2 |  |
United States | 10 | 9 | 15 | 34 |
| 3 |  |
Germany | 7 | 2 | 3 | 12 |
| 4 |  |
South Korea | 6 | 7 | 3 | 16 |
| 5 |  |
Italy | 6 | 4 | 3 | 13 |
| 6 |  |
Australia | 5 | 4 | 7 | 16 |
| 7 |  |
Japan | 5 | 3 | 3 | 11 |
| 8 |  |
Russian Fed | 3 | 8 | 3 | 14 |
| 9 |  |
France | 2 | 7 | 6 | 15 |
| 10 |  |
Great Britain | 2 | 2 | 3 | 7 |
For a complete list of medal count see the Google gadget at the bottom right. China still leads with 22 gold medals.
Beijing Olympics Medal Count.
| Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total | |||
| 1 | |
China | 6 | 2 | 0 | 8 |
| 2 | |
South Korea | 3 | 2 | 0 | 5 |
| 3 | |
United States | 2 | 2 | 4 | 8 |
| 4 |  |
Czech Republic | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| 5 | |
Italy | 1 | 2 | 1 | 4 |
| 6 | |
Japan | 1 | 0 | 2 | 3 |
| 7 | |
Australia | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| 7 |  |
Spain | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| 7 |  |
Netherlands | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| 10 | |
Great Britain | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
So far China leads with 6 Gold medals in Diving, Shooting,Judo and Weight lifting. United States won 2 Gold medals in fencing and swimming. 3 of the Chinese Gold medals won by women. For a complete list of medal count see the Google gadget at the bottom right.
China behind Cyber Attacks
Titan Rain was the U.S. government’s designation given to a series of coordinated attacks on American computer systems. Titan Rain hackers gained access to many U.S. computer networks, including those at Lockheed Martin, Sandia National Laboratories, Redstone Arsenal, and NASA. At the International Crime Science Conference held in London, UK security expert, John Walker, CTO of forensics consultancy Secure-Bastion, said that the Chinese government was behind the ‘Titan Rain’ attacks. The academic made his comments during a Q&A session when he was asked about state-sponsored terrorism. The attacks were identified as coming from servers in China, but the Chinese government has never officially been accused of being behind the assault. The International Crime Science Conference is organised by the Centre for Security and Crime Science at University College London.
See Also:
Pentagon Site hacked.
First Apple Store in China.
Apple opened its first store in China. The new store is located in Beijing’s newest Village at Sanlitun. The store carries the same design as Apple’s other retail stores but with a multilingual Genius bar. iPhone is not available in China at this point. This will be their 219th retail store worldwide.
Sharon Stone is not welcome in film festival
Hollywood actress Sharon Stone sparked outrage across China earlier when she commented that last month’s devastating earthquake in the Sichuan region might be “karma” for the country’s treatment of Tibet. A spokeswoman for the Shanghai International Film Festival said that the U.S. actress is not welcome at this year’s event. The actress later apologized for her comments.
Cracking Zipingku dam in China
The Zipingku dam is near to the epicenter of the 7.9-magnitude earthquake, by the small town of Dujiangyan. Dangerous cracks appeared in the structure after Monday’s earth quake. Xinhua News Agency said Wednesday that 2,000 troops had been sent to work on the Zipingku Dam, upriver from Dujiangyan in Sichuan province. More than 14,000 people were still missing and nearly 26,000 people had been buried. The Dujiangyan project, built in 256 BC, is more than 50 kilometers from the provincial capital of Chengdu and irrigates 666,000 hectares of land. Its the world’s oldest irrigation system.
Photo Source:flickr.com/photos/christait/1072716442/
See Also:
New Madrid Fault lines shaking.
Wikipedia allowed in China
Chinese authorities have lifted a block on the English-language version of online encyclopedia Wikipedia. Still politically sensitive topics such as Tibet and Tiananmen Square are not allowed to appear. Wikipedia, which is written collaboratively by volunteers, has more than 2 million articles in English.
Flights to North Korea
Air China becomes the world’s only foreign airline to fly regularly to North Korea’s capital Pyongyang. Air China said previously that it saw the financial potential in the route, primarily from the Chinese tourist business.
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