The Internet has spawned a virtual subculture of "johns" who share information electronically about prostitution, potentially making them harder to catch, according to a new study co-authored by a Michigan State University criminologist. The research by MSU`s Thomas Holt and Kristie Blevins of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte challenges the common perception that sex custome...

In disaster-struck areas where terrestrial communications may be down, the deployment of rescue teams becomes extremely challenging. A team led by Assistant Professor Lee Yee Hui from the School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Nanyang Technological University (NTU), aims to provide solutions to this problem by using high-speed satellite communication links. The NTU team is working with t...

You can teach an old dog new tricks, say UCLA scientists who found that middle-aged and older adults with little Internet experience were able to trigger key centers in the brain that control decision-making and complex reasoning after just one week of surfing the Web. The findings, presented Oct. 19 at the 2009 meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, suggest that Internet training can stimulate ...

Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University and Intel Labs Pittsburgh (ILP) have combined low-power, embedded processors typically used in netbooks with flash memory to create a server architecture that is fast, but far more energy efficient for data-intensive applications than the systems now used by major Internet services. An experimental computing cluster based on this so-called Fast Array of Wi...

Two decades ago, studies showed that computer users were violating best practices for setting up hack-proof passwords, and not much has changed since then. What`s clear, say researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and IT University in Copenhagen, is that until human factors/ergonomics methods are applied to the problem, it isn`t likely to go away. They will present the results of their ...

Adolescents with psychiatric symptoms such as attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), social phobia, hostility and depression may be more likely to develop an Internet addiction, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. Although the Internet has become one of the most significant information resource...

Fake Internet postcards circulating through e-mail inboxes worldwide are carrying links to the virus known as Zeus Bot, said Gary Warner, director of computer forensics at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). Zeus Bot has been named America`s most pervasive computer Botnet virus by Network World magazine, reportedly infecting 3.6 million U.S. computers. "These fake postcards ask use...

European researchers have created a new software abstraction called Autonomic Communication Elements (ACEs) which will enable ecosystems for service networks, and make the future ‘internet of things’ a reality, now. The internet is evolving in front of our eyes: Web 2.0 is beginning to reach it is potential as a ‘platform’, a computing and service delivery system in its own...

Dating websites will soon be able to compare partners in terms of whether the personal body odour of the other party will be pleasant to them. This has a very serious biological background. If the start-up company Basisnote get their way, we will soon not only be able to match looks and interests in the profile of a potential partner with our own preferences. Now even the individual smell of the o...

The Internet could be used as an early warning system for potential ecological disasters, according to researchers from Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University and the University of East Anglia. Ecosystem services such as water purification and food production are of fundamental importance for all planetary life. However, these are threatened by sudden changes in ecosystems caused by v...