Latest News - Page 2704

Gabe Newell has taken to Reddit to talk about Valve's new modding policy, where our Lord and Savior took many questions regarding the controversial paid mod subject. Newell said that Valve's goal is now to make modding better for both creators, and gamers.

Newell said: "Our goal is to make modding better for the authors and gamers. If something doesn't help with that, it will get dumped. Right now I'm more optimistic that this will be a win for authors and gamers, but we are always going to be data driven". The boss of Valve also explained why the company used Skyrim as their first title under the new policy, where he said: "Skyrim is a great example of a game that has benefitted enormously from the MODs. The option for paid MODs is supposed to increase the investment in quality modding, not hurt it".

He continued: "About half of Valve came straight out of the MOD world. John Cook and Robin Walker made Team Fortress as a Quake mod. Ice frog made DOTA as a Warcraft 3 mod. Dave Riller and Dario Casali we Doom and Quake mappers. John Guthrie and Steve Bond came to Valve because John Carmack thought they were doing the best Quake C development. All of them were liberated to just do game development once they started getting paid. Working at Waffle House does not help you make a better game".

Project Cars has been delayed a few times now, but it will be released on May 8 for the Xbox One, PS4 and PC, with news floating out already that Slightly Mad Studios is already working on a sequel to the driving game. We already know that Project Cars will be one of the best looking games on the market, with support for virtual reality headsets, and up to triple 4K monitor setups.

The news is coming from Slightly Mad Studios' boss, Ian Bell, where he referred to Project Cars as a 'Destiny-like' experience. He took to the World of Mass Development forums, where he said: "A very short update for now as I'm jet-lagged to hell and back but the good news is that we will be continuing the WMD setup for pCARS2. We will open new forum sections when the game (pCARS1) ships to support the new users and you WMD experts will all have access and we'd greatly appreciate your assistance advising new users".

Bell continued: "I'll be implementing a new non-profit return form of WMD for pCARS2 (to avoid the FSA hassle) and will set a purchase time limit of 2-3 months for those who want to take part. Following this, involvement will be closed. The tiers won't have the higher cost options that we currently have (probably capped at 100 pounds with excellent benefits) and those who want to approach me personally to invest in the new game can do so providing it's at or above 50k.

Cybercriminals launching ransomware attacks typically demand immediate payment with very little paper trail - and that often means relying on bitcoin transactions. However, the anonymity of bitcoins is now being overlooked due to the volatility of the cryptocurrency, with hackers converting the funds quickly.

The cyber group responsible for infecting users across the world with Cryptolocker likely made over $3 million before it was targeted by investigators. Besides pre-paid cash cards, bitcoins - which were once valued at more than $1,100 each, but now worth less than $250 - make it less appealing for money laundering behavior.

"I've seen this discussion in underground forums among Russian criminals," said Etay Maor, senior fraud prevention strategist of IBM Security, in a statement to The Register. "They use Bitcoin for the money laundering part and take payment with it, but they'll move it out almost immediately. Most of them won't keep bitcoins - they don't like the valuations Bitcoin has - so they just use it as a layer of obfuscation, and move it to a different form of money."

The long-in-the-making feature film adaptation of Blizzard's MMORPG 'World of Warcraft' has been delayed by three months, and now set to launch in the middle of the 2016 summer blockbuster season.

Previously announced for a March 2016 release, Legendary Studios and distributor Universal Pictures have now announced a three month delay for the picture, which will now hit screens worldwide on June 10 2016, with the first teaser trailer for the picture likely to be released at ComicCon in July.

Directed by Duncan Jones (son of David Bowie), 'Warcraft' stars Travis Fimmel, Paula Patton, Ben Foster, Robert Kazinsky and Dominic Cooper, along with a cast of thousands of Orcs and other digital creatures courtesy of Industrial Light and Magic.

Venture capitalists are pouring money into cybersecurity companies, with high-profile data breaches still capturing headlines. Security companies supported by VCs in the United States generated a massive $1.77 billion in 2014, a figure higher than the previous record of $1.62 billion generated in 2000, according to statistics.

There is increased flexibility in the cybersecurity sector, with companies providing protection to consumers, corporations, hardware infrastructure, software, and specialized niche services.

As the Internet of Things (IoT) generates headlines for its beneficial flexibility for consumers, there is an underlying concern related to connected security. "It's a huge threat," said Alex Doll, founder of the TenEleven Ventures capital firm focusing on information security, in a statement to the Wall Street Journal. "It's great that everything is connected, but all that data is one click away" from being hacked.

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) wants to launch an unmanned spacecraft to the moon in 2018, in an important first step towards a possible manned mission to the same target. Even if a manned launch doesn't occur, JAXA hopes to use collected data for a possible mission to Mars.

JAXA previously reached the moon's orbit in 2008 with the SELENE spacecraft, helping collect information about the lunar surface. The space agency hopes the Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) will launch onboard the Epsilon rocket, which is a solid-fuel rocket with only one live launch.

"This is an initial step and a lot of procedures are still ahead before the plan is formally approved," said a JAXA spokesperson in front of the media. A mission to the moon could cost anywhere from $83.4 million up to $125 million, and the Japanese government is working on a proper project roadmap.

Continued cyberattacks against US residents rack up an impressive number of victims, with twice as many Americans reporting a breach following year-over-year statistics analysis. Unfortunately, one in five consumers say they suffered a credit score hit due to identity theft - and financial experts recommend shoppers request a credit report to check on any problems.

However, eight in 10 Americans note they have become more proactive in protecting their own personal information, as more than half of surveyed consumers aren't entirely sure if companies can keep personal data safe.

"The increase in data breaches affecting personal information has given consumers significant cause to be cautious about their activities, both online and off," said Ernie Almonte, chairman for the American Institute of CPA's National CPA Financial Literacy Commission, in a statement published by MoneyWatch.

The United States government understands it is a prime target for cybercriminals across the world, especially organized crime and state-sponsored hackers trying to conduct cyberespionage. John Carlin, Assistant Attorney General for National Security, spoke during RSA about the mentality of teaching foreign actors "that it is not okay to steal from American companies."

Even though the NSA has sophisticated cyberespionage capabilities, the government didn't pay enough attention to keeping critical infrastructure secure. The government is trying to catch up and will make changes, but is ready to put political and economic pressure on select governments for their cyber actions.

However, there are more aggressive tactics possible, including the indictment of five senior leaders of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) in China last year - and economic sanctions placed on North Korea for its reported involvement in hacking Sony.

The US government wants to improve its cybersecurity and recruit skilled workers, but is struggling because of lackluster recruitment programs leading to an underwhelming cybersecurity labor pool, according to the Partnership for Public Service and Booz Allen Hamilton.

In 2014, there were almost 70,000 cyber intrusions that negatively impacted the governments' networks and systems, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported earlier in the year.

"Our interconnected world requires a seamless team of cyber defenders to protect our networks," according to the report. "Those defenders must be able to operate quickly and collaboratively in ways that cut across both private and public organizations."

G.SKILL continues to dominate the RAM market with the announcement of the world's first 128GB kit of 2800MHz DDR4 RAM, which comes in 8x16GB sticks. We have memory timing of CL16-16-16-36 at 1.35V, with the new kit falling into their growing Ripjaws 4 line of RAM.

The new sticks are from Samsung, with their 8Gb ICs baked onto G.SKILL's product at the impressive 20nm process. This has allowed an entire new level of performance, and with 16GB sticks, something that has previously only been attainable by server memory. The new 128GB kit is perfect for the high-end workstation, with G.SKILL's new Ripjaws 4 128GB kit already validated on the ASUS X99 Rampage V Extreme motherboard, running in its intended quad-channel.

Tequila Huang, VP of Research & Development with G.SKILL said: "During development of these DDR4 16GB modules, we see amazing future potential for 128GB (16GBx8) memory kits in extreme high capacity operation on upcoming platforms. We will be witnessing the beginning of a new set of standards for extreme capacity and performance DDR4 memory kits on both current and future computing platforms. Needless to say, we are very excited for this release".

We're four months into 2015, and we still don't know when the Oculus Rift is coming out. But during Facebook's recent earnings call, where we found out 1.44 billion people use the social network each month, the company said: "We have not announced any specific plans for shipment volumes in 2015 related to Oculus". The last time we had a play with the Oculus Rift, was the Crescent Bay prototype at CES 2015 earlier this year.

The statement came from Facebook CFO David Wehner, who added: "Oculus is very much in the development stage, so it's very early to be talking about large shipment volumes".

With competition heating up in the VR space thanks to the likes of Sony and its Project Morpheus headset, but more so with HTC and Valve with their Vive headset, Oculus VR might not have the dominance in the VR industry that most thought they did previously. Things could change very quickly, and I think they will, which is why I'm hoping is the reason behind Oculus VR being so quiet about it all.

reTXT Labs recently launched reTXT, a secure and private mobile messaging app, so users have more control of text messages. The messaging service uses end-to-end encryption to help make sure outsiders are not likely to be able to snoop on messages. It's a unique offering for consumers, as most of the security-focused messaging services are designed more for the corporate world.

reTXT users can edit sent messages, delete sent messages, clarify any misunderstood messages, name group message threats, and opt in or out of group messages. In addition, it's even easier to send photo and video messages or use a device's microphone to send voice messages, the company noted.

"The tools we provide make texting and messaging easier for the person who communicates privately with family, friends and colleagues every single day," said Kevin Wooten, co-founder and CEO of reTXT Labs.

After a limited worldwide theatrical release, the 2015 sci-fi thriller 'Ex Machina' is now opening wide across the world to positive reviews and now the film's distributor A24 has released a smartly edited trailer is littered with quotes from tech luminaries such as Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Larry Page and Professor Stephen Hawking over their concerns regarding artificial inteligence.

The r-rated micro-budgeted experimental film starring Domhnall Gleeson, Oscar Isaac (both to be seen next in 'Star Wars' sequel 'The Force Awakens' and Alicia Vikander and helmed by Alex Garland is earning much applause for its vision of the near future, earning an 88% fresh rating from aggregate reviewer Rotten Tomatoes.

'Ex Machina' is now playing in the United States, and will hit select screens in Australia on May 7th.

Cybercriminals, largely motivated by breaching networks to steal money and collect personal information, are becoming more difficult to identify, according to a leading cybersecurity expert.

"In 2010, when responding to breaches, almost every time we'd look at the evidence and we kinda knew who [the hackers] were," said Kevin Mandia, president of FireEye, in a statement published by Re/Code. "Right now we're starting to get more groups that we're labeling unknown. We have like 400 of them."

There is increased focus on cybersecurity, but trying to accurately identify and track threat actors - while preventing them from breaching networks - is an extremely complex issue. Unfortunately, companies must realize that they are likely to suffer a data breach at some point, and should focus more on breach crisis to ensure they can bounce back as quickly as possible.

In just a few short weeks, the much anticipated sequel to 'Mad Max'; 'Fury Road' will hit screens worldwide, with a flurry of pre-release trailers commanding much attention. Strangely, the long in production video game from Avalanche Studios has been much quieter. But now Warner Bros. Games has released the first trailer of in-game footage, and it looks highly encouraging - especially for a license tie-in.

Officially announced at E3 2013, the 'Mad Max' game was originally announced for Windows, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One before being delayed when the theatrical release of 'Fury Road' was announced last year, but now, the previous generation console versions have been abandoned.

Bizarrely, despite the long gestation, the game still won't make the May theatrical release date, but will instead drop in September when the Blu-ray and DVD version of the film is released.

The South Korean government believes they have found evidence that shows North Korea is behind cyberattacks aimed at its financial sector and nuclear operators. The malicious code was designed to delete files from infected PCs, which prevented banking customers from transferring money online or withdraw money in-person.

"The malicious codes used in the attack were same in composition and working methods as 'Kimsuky' codes known to be used by North Korea," according to the South Korean prosecutor's office, and noted by CNN. In addition, some IP addresses were traced back to Shenyang, China, which is along the border between China and North Korea - with North Korea reportedly relying on China's more established Internet infrastructure to launch attacks.

North Korea's growing cyber ability tends to be focused on South Korea, with financial institutions, nuclear power operators, and private sector companies all targeted in the past.

Browsing the Whirlpool forums we came across a post by user GeoffBRO! exclaiming that WWE will finally be coming to the PC platform in the next few days.

Bundled on Steam with 10% off and a free DLC, the game opens in approximately five days time and will set you back $49.49.

Sporting multiple language options, it also has to be said that this is one new game the you certainly don't need a beastly PC for - recommending users invest in an NVIDIA GTX 570 and Intel Core i5-3550 @ 3.30 GHz to ensure smooth game play. For most PC enthusiasts this should be no issue as these kind of specifications were common for many in 2011.

Patriot has just announced its new Ignite M2 SSDs, based on the super-small M.2 next-generation form factor (NGFF) standard. The new Patriot Ignite M2 measures in at just 22m wide, and 80mm long.

As for its speeds, we have up to 560MB/sec sequential reads and 320MB/sec writes, with 4KB random read and write speeds of 90/70K IOPS. Patriot's VP of Engineering, Les Henry, explains: "We are happy to announce the Ignite M2 addition to our family of SSD products. With the Ignite M2, Patriot now offers a full range of SSDs, from 2.5" SATA 3, to mSATA and now M.2. The Ignite M2 drives are the perfect storage solution for those looking to build/upgrade their small form factor PCs".

Patriot's new Ignite M2 SSDs come in 240GB and 480GB sizes, with the Phison S10 controller and SATA 6Gbps standard. The 240GB model has an MSRP of $109.99 while the 480GB costs $209.99, with both models available through Fry's Electronics, Amazon, and Newegg.

During Facebook's Q1 2015 earnings report, the social network has said that there are now over 1.44 billion people using Facebook each month, which is up 13% year-over-year. From those 1.44 billion users, 1.25 billion of them were on mobile, which is a bigger increase of 24% year-over-year.

Facebook has 936 million daily active users, and 798 million mobile daily active users (an increase of 17% and 31% year-over-year, respectively). This is something worth noting: around 65% of Facebook's users are using the social network daily, with 64% of those on mobile using it every single day. The numbers are continuing to grow, where if we compare the mobile-only monthly active users from Q1 2013 (just two years ago now) where it was at 189 million, compared to 581 million in Q1 2015.

Other noteworthy numbers: there are 800 million people on WhatsApp per month, 700 million on Groups per month, 600 million people using Messenger each month, and 300 million people using Instagram per month. Insane numbers, which are joined by 45 billion messages sent daily, 4 billion videos viewed per day, 650 million people connected to sports Page of some kind, and there are now over two million advertisers using Facebook.

Earlier this year, Sony Pictures surprised fans by shelving plans for the Andrew Garfield 'Amazing Spider-Man' series and allowing Marvel to jointly share the rights to the character, allowing the classic Stan Lee creation to appear in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

But with the intrinsic value of the property, they haven't ceded all rights to the Disney owned company and so today Sony Pictures have announced an upcoming animated 'Spider-Man' feature to be helmed by 'The Lego Movie' and '22 Jump Street' directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller, for release in 2018, according to a report via ComingSoon.

The first film from the freshly rebooted live action 'Spider-Man' series will be released a year earlier on July 28, 2017 and will be co-produced by Marvel head Kevin Feige.