Quick Look: Hearts of Iron III Their Finest Hour [with Gameplay Video]

Their Finest Hour is the third full expansion for Hearts of Iron III, the grand strategy game from Paradox Interactive, and the package aims to update some of the game mechanics, fundamentally change at least one core game mechanic and add a couple of new scenarios.

People rarely play the self-contained scenarios that Hearts of Iron III offers, preferring to focus on the big picture of fighting the entirety of World War II while controlling one country.

For this Quick Look I decided to choose one of the scenarios, the one that deals with the Spanish Civil War and play it from both perspectives to see how Their Finest Hour changes the core structure of Hearts of Iron III.

The Spanish Civil War starts with the two sides evenly matched and there are sufficient gaps in the front lines to create a situation where a war of movement is the best idea, with t he aim to cut off the enemy forces, starve them of surprise and destroy them.

Unfortunately, the armies are mostly infantry and the rest period after an assault makes progress slow.

Tank forces seem to be much more useful, mainly because they tend to take less damage from infantry that lacks any kind of anti-tank support and they reduce organization much faster.

As the Republicans, I tried to retake the north of the country while holding Madrid and slowing down the enemy in the South which, as you can see in the video attached, as a tactics was met with limited success.

Later during the scenario I carelessly stripped down forces from around Madrid to shore up the southern defenses which allowed the Nationalist forces to take the capital, which basically created a death spiral for my own armies.

There are a lot of improvements in Their Finest Hour and most of them are better seen and explained while playing the core full World War II scenarios.

Worth a full Softpedia review? Yes.

Via: Quick Look: Hearts of Iron III Their Finest Hour [with Gameplay Video]

Cybercriminals Hijack 4.5 Million ADLS Modems in Brazil to Serve Malware

Present at this year’s Virus Bulletin conference, Kaspersky Labs researcher Fabio Assolini revealed that cybercriminals leveraged a vulnerability in the Broadcom chips of some ADSL modems to hijack browsing sessions and trick users into installing malware.

The security hole allows an attacker to perform a cross-site request forgery (CSRF) in the administration panel of the device to capture the access password. Once they obtained the password, the crooks altered the modem’s DNS settings to make sure that when users wanted to visit certain websites, they would be served malicious files.

Assolini’s paper – entitled “The tale of 1001 ADLS modems: Network devices in the sights of cybercriminals” – shows that over 4.5 million routers owned by users in Brazil were hijacked last year.

When victims wanted to visit Google, Facebook, or social network Orkut, they were presented with a pop-up message that urged them to install all sorts of Google applications, Sophos’ Graham Cluley explained in a blog post.

This was possible because the cybercrooks altered the modems’ settings to redirect internauts to one of 40 malicious DNS servers located around the world.

The malicious websites and apps pushed by the attackers from apparently-legitimate sites enabled them to steal all sorts of sensitive information, which they utilized to make a hefty profit.

For instance, one of the perpet rators told the researcher that he made around $50,000 (38,000 EUR) which he was planning to spend on trips to Rio de Janeiro.

Even after experts discovered the cause of the large number of virus infections – which is said to have affected not only consumers, but also organizations – it wasn’t an easy task to restore the DNS settings. That’s because the cybercriminals changed the devices’ access passwords.

In order to prevent such incidents from happening in the future, Assolini believes that researchers should be more proactive when it comes to reporting security holes in networking devices.

Furthermore, in this particular case, there are other entities that can be blamed. For instance, ISPs often lend their customers old and flawed equipment. On the other hand, Brazil’s national telecommunications agency ANATEL isn’t testing the security of modems and routers before approving them.

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Via: Cybercriminals Hijack 4.5 Million ADLS Modems in Brazil to Serve Malware

Google Kills Off AdSense for Feeds, Homepage Background Photos, News Badges

Google is not done with the year-long spring cleaning. As soon as Larry Page took over as CEO, Google started closing down or merging services and products that weren't getting much traction. The big ones are long gone now, but Google is still shutting down or changing features and smaller services to make for more streamlined products.

In the latest cleaning batch, Google announced retiring several products and features as well as merging some into other existing products.

AdSense for Feeds getting the axe, FeedBurner may be next

AdSense for Feeds is getting the axe, it's no big surprise, RSS feeds are mostly an anachronism these days, for better or for worse.

Rumors about Google's RSS tool FeedBurner impending demise have been intensifying lately and the shutdown of the monetization platform is only adding to the legitimacy of those rumors. AdSense for Feeds will be retired starting October 2nd and will be killed off for good on December 3rd.

No more background images on the Google homepage

Google is also killing off custom background images for the Google homepage. With iGoogle already on its way out, background images were the last way users could customize the Google homepage.

The feature, dubbed Classic Plus, was introduced a couple of years ago, but it seems Google doesn't think it's seeing enough usage to justify keeping it.
< br /> Users won't be able to upload new images starting October 16 and the background images will stop displaying in November. Any photo uploaded for the feature will still be available in Google+ Photos/Picasa.

Badges in Google News

One feature that seemed, if not ridiculous, at least out of place is being removed as well, Badges for Google News. These badges were supposed to spur people to spend more time on the site and read more news there, but gamification really doesn't work everywhere, or even in most places.

Other smaller features and products

Insights for Search has been merged into Google Trends which is getting a redesign to accommodate the merger. Places Directory, an Android app that was designed to help users find nearby places is getting shut down as well. Finally, +1 Reports in Webmaster Tools are being removed since the same data is available in G oogle Analytics.

Via: Google Kills Off AdSense for Feeds, Homepage Background Photos, News Badges

Big Developers Praise Mountain Lions Gatekeeper, But Hobbyists Dont

OS X developers selling software through the Mac App Store are satisfied with the inclusion of Gatekeeper in OS X 10.8. The security-centric feature determines which software gets installed on a Mac, and which programs don’t.

Allowing three types of program installation, one of which removes all restrictions, Gatekeeper is viewed as a thoughtful addition by many developers in the industry, including Delicious Monster, Iconfactory, Panic, and many others.

Interviewed by ars technica, the studios all conve ned that end-users are much better off with Gatekeeper, than without.

But that thought isn’t shared by hobbyists.

Wesley Reynolds used to maintain a popular Dropbox Droplet widget, but now he gave up development, in part because of Mountain Lion and GateKeeper.

“I could pay my $99 to find out how to fix this problem and sign my app, but I did this as a bit of a hobby to learn how dashboard widgets work, and the $99 was too big a pill to swallow,” Reynolds said.

“I think Gatekeeper is pretty much killing the hobbyist coder on Mac,” he said. “No longer will you be able to grab the tools for free that you need to code a program and then share it with whoever may be interested in it.”

Reynolds continued, saying “It was exciting for me to have created a handy little widget as an experiment to learn about Dashboard Widgets, and then, just because it's done, throw it up on the Web and have many thousands of people download it and use it.”

“Now, a hobbyist coder can still download the tools for free, and learn to code and make a neat app that will run on their computer, no problem, but they can't give it to anyone over an Internet connection without Gatekeeper kicking in,” he added.

What most people will probably extract from this opinion is that Apple is to blame for “killing the hobbyist coder on Mac.”

Actually, it’s the imminent rise of malware on OS X that’s causing it. Apple is simply taking the natural steps to protect its user base.

Via: Big Developers Praise Mountain Lions Gatekeeper, But Hobbyists Dont

Simon Cowell and Will.i.am Looking for the Next Zuckerberg in X Factor for Tech

If you aren't getting enough of reality TV, who does frankly, don't worry, there's more coming your way. And if you're tired of singing, dancing, cooking, etc. shows, reality TV mogul Simon Cowell and rapper Will.i.am, known for his unique spelling skills and for being part of the Black Eyed Peas, are teaming up for something utterly original, an X Factor for Tech (working title, presumably).

In X Factor for Tech young would-be entrepreneurs will compete to become the next Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs or Bill Gates, for the older demographics, i.am told The Sun.

Just like this type of reality TV shows have revolutionized the music industry and given rise to huge stars, over and over again, you can expect the next Google or Facebook to come out of a show like this. Or maybe not.

Via: Simon Cowell and Will.i.am Looking for the Next Zuckerberg in X Factor for Tech

Dexter Season 7 Premiere: Are You?

The seventh season of Showtime’s “Dexter” is officially on, with the premiere episode airing just hours ago. First reactions to it are positively raving: finally, we have an answer to that long-standing question of what Deb will do when she finds out about Dex.

Though the first episode, “Are You…?” touched on other topics as well, it mainly dealt with the issue of Deb’s reaction to learning that her foster brother Dexter was a cold-hearted, possibly serial killer.

*Fans who have not seen the season premiere yet are encouraged not to read any further than this – major spoilers ahead.*


As fans must know, season 6 ended with the biggest cliffhanger in the entire series (yes, even bigger than Rita’s death at the end of season 4), when Deb (Jennifer Carpenter) walked in on Dexter (Michael C. Hall) during one of his killing rituals.

It was then only to be expected that this season would deal with the ardent question: would Deb still love Dex if she knew him as he really was, the soulless monster he never ceased to be?

Even so, the way “Are You…?” did it still surprised, as both E! News and TV.com point out.

After the rather lackluster season 6, the season 7 premiere showed lots of promise, a return to “Dexter&rdquo ; form, by being creative, original and, just as important, smart.

It tackled the question head-on and left no room for silly guesses. It put Dexter and Deb on the spot, showing how heavily her new find would weigh in the balance of their already-delicate relationship.

“With one word, ‘Yes,’ which Dexter says to Deb at episode's end when she searches his apartment and finds his blood sides and asks if he's a serial killer, Dexter once again left us with our jaws in the floor,” E! writes.

TV.com agrees: with only 2 more seasons to go, “Dexter” is finally on the right path. Whether our favorite (anti-)hero will be able to survive this new crisis, which is bigger than anything he’s ever been confronted with, is still a guess.

“This is the episode that the show needed. There was still a lot of fluff, but the only people who really matter right now are Dexter and Deb, and ‘Are You…?’ suggested that finally, the show is willing to play the one card it has left. We might be in for great final run,” the e-zine says.

If you’ve seen the season premiere already, drop us a line in the comments section to tell us what you made of it.

Via: Dexter Season 7 Premiere: Are You?

Internet Explorer 9 Is the Most Secure Browser, Better Than Chrome Study

A week after Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 9 got hit by a critical vulnerability, security research firm NSS Labs rolled out a study to reveal that this particular IE version is actually very secure.

Security experts examined the security features of four leading browsers, namely Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and Apple Safari, with IE 9 performing the best when it comes to malware protection.

Each browser was tested with all available updates installed on Windows 7 workstations, the security firm guarantees. And the results are rather surprising.

Internet Explorer 9 blocked 95 percent of malicious activity, NSS Labs said in a press review, while Chrome came second with 33 percent. Safari and Firefox block less than 6 percent, which is a bit worrying given their market share at this moment.

The click fraud malware tests again brought Internet Explorer 9’s security features in the spotlight, as Microsoft’s browser blocked 96.6 percent of this particular threat. Again, Chrome was placed second with 1.6 percent, while Firefox and Safari blocked 0.8 and 0.7 percent, respectively.

“Given Chrome’s prominence and increasing market share, we predict ongoing increases in click fraud unless Google takes serious steps to improve its click fraud protection,” said Dr. Stefan Frei, research director, at NSS Labs.

Internet Explorer 9 was recently affected by a critical security flaw that allowed attackers to execute malicious codes on the vulnerable computers, stealing private data and compromising sensitive information. Microsoft reacted very quickly and issued a fix in less than 3 days, which made security experts believe that the Redmond-based firm actually knew about the bug since July.

Via: Internet Explorer 9 Is the Most Secure Browser, Better Than Chrome Study