The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) is developing its own, private, computer network and web, a la the Internet and World Wide Web. The new computer network web, called the Global Information Grid (GIG) will provide military commanders a "God's-eye view" of the battle. The GIG will enable real-time digital communication and data dissemination through a familiar technology, similar to the World Wide Web, anytime and anyplace, under any conditions, with requisite security.
Internet e-mail scammers are using the popularity and allure of Google's Gmail service to phish for personal data, including e-mail addresses and passwords. Gmail e-mail accounts are one of the most coveted holdings for hip and techie Internet users. A quick eBay search proves the popularity of invitations to join Google's upcoming e-mail service that offers 1GB of mail storage.
In a report just issued by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the number of U.S. broadband users has nearly tripled between June 2001 and December 2003. As of the survey, 28 million lines of high-speed access to the Internet, defined as at least 200 Kbps bandwidth in at least one direction, are in use in the United States.
Metropolitan-wide broadband services may soon be coming from overhead. Sanswire Networks, LLC hopes to bring broadband to entire metropolitan areas via tiny airships. Atlanta, Georgia may be the first city to benefit from this interesting digital communication service, starting as early as next week.
Spam is an ever-increasing annoyance for e-mail users. Most people have some form of spam filtering application that reduces the instances of the frequently offensive unsolicited commercial messages. Many of these filters seek to identify spam based on the address from which the message is sent, but spammers are already wise to this trick, and spoofing is now commonplace. By hiding or misdirecting their transmission source, spammers make it exceedingly difficult for most users to determine from where the spam message actually came.