With the recent shutdown of MegaUpload, the popular file sharing service, users have complaint that they have lost access to their data which they had uploaded on the MegaUpload service. This is the collateral damage as a result of criminal proceedings against Kim Dotcom, Founder of Megaupload and other members of the team.

18 Mega related domains were seized by the authorities including Megastuff.co, Megaworld.com, Megaclicks.co, Megastuff.info, Megaclicks.org, Megaworld.mobi, Megastuff.org, Megaclick.us, Mageclick.com, HDmegaporn.com, Megavkdeo.com, Megaupload.com, Megaupload.org, Megarotic.com, Megaclick.com, Megavideo.com, Megavideoclips.com and Megaporn.com.

Soon after the arrests and seizure of property and assets linked with MegaUpload and other domains, it was discovered that the data uploaded onto the servers maybe lost forever due to the inability of the company to pay its hosting and server bills. The files that might soon be deleted range from personal photos to work related documents in the millions which have nothing to do with copyright infringement which is one of the charges put up against the founder and his team besides conspiracy to commit money laundering and criminal copyright infringement.

MegaUplaod has contacted the United States Attorney’s office to request to unfreeze assets so server and hosting bills can be paid so users can get access to their personal data. MegaUpload lawyer says that they are doing everything they can to ensure that the data is not lost and that users can get access to it so they can make backups.

But good news has surfaced a few hours ago where it was revealed that the data has been saved for two more weeks after talks with related parties.

This move comes as a huge hit to cloud based services everywhere. The destruction of user data is simple unacceptable and the prosecuting parties should ensure that users get access to their data before it is destroyed.

The CES has showcased a lot of cool new devices soon to be released into the wild. In the tablet PC arena, Acer has been the fore runner in announcing a brand new tablet with a Quad-core processor and 1080p video recording. The new Iconia A700 is running on the Nvidia Tegra 3 1.3Ghz processor and has a 10.1 inch display with the latest version of Android, Ice Cream Sandwich as the operation system.

The tablet comes with a mini-HDMI and mini-USB ports, micro-SD slot and a 5-megapixel rear camera. The tablet is competing with Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1 and the latest Asus Transformer Prime.

Unfortunately, this is just a teaser and there is no official release date or any confirmation if this model will be released at all since this is more of a showdown of who has better tech.

Nokia has finally announced its Lumia 900 smartphone at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas which has been rumored for quite some time now. The rumors were put to rest when Nokia CEO Stephen Elop introduced the 4G LTE-enabled device.

The devices houses a 1.4Ghz CPU, 512MB RAM, 8-megapixel back facing & 1-mega;pixel front facing camera with dual LED flash and a 4.3-inch AMOLED display running Windows Mobile and comes in black and cyan. Nokia has partnered with AT& T to launch this model in the U.S. as well moving into a highly competitive market from their usual emerging markets.

Nokia has signed an exclusivity deal with AT&T which will be the only carrier to have the Lumia 900 available running on its 4G LTE network.  The company says that this device has been specifically made for the U.S. which can be seen as Nokia’s attempt to re-enter the market.

Whether Nokia can capture the market with their brand of Windows Phone is a mystery but should be interesting to see how it unfolds.

The South Korean electronics giant has announced that it is bringing its mammoth tablet like phone, the Samsung Galaxy Note to the U.S. The Galaxy Note looks like a tablet but is essentially a phone with a massive 5.3 inch Super AMOLED display and a 1280×800 resolution, 1.5Ghz dual-core processor, 8 mega-pixel rear facing and 2 mega-pixel front facing camera with 1080p video recording and 16GB internal storage which is expandable to 32GB and running Android 2.3.6.

Looking at the specifications built into the phone, it can be said that the Galaxy Note has had a bit of an identity crisis. Samsung announced at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Monday that it will be bringing this giant tabletesque phone to the United States with AT&T and will run on the carrier’s 4G network.

Staying true to the name, the phone has a stylus which comes with it and is housed inside the device to take notes as if writing on paper. It seems to be an excellent device but its utility remains to be seen.

Back in April, the number of daily activations was just 350,000 which has doubled in the last eight months. 44.2 percent of users in the U.S. have smartphones running Android according to a recent study from Nielsen. The divisions indicated was 15.8% for HTC, 10.4% for Samsung and 10.7% for Motorola. The study also indicated that though iOS and Android are both popular operating systems among all group, Android is leading in each age group.

The launch of the latest version of Android dubbed Ice Cream Sandwich which will run on both tablets and smartphones might just be a game changer for Android in its war against iOS. The Samsung Galaxy Nexus which is the first smartphone to run the latest version is already a hot seller and now an update has been rumored and users are awaiting the update anxiously.

GoDaddy, One of the largest ICANN accredited domain registrar in the world which was one of the 150 supporters SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) has withdrawn its support for the Act after many companies and individuals closed their GoDaddy.com accounts after the company released statements supporting the act. CEO of Cheezburger Ben Huh threatened to remove over a 1000 domains names from GoDaddy if they kept support SOPA and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales said that domains would be moved away from GoDaddy because their support of SOPA was “unacceptable”

GoDaddy CEO Warren Adelman said “As a company that is all about innovation, with our own technology and in support of our customers, Go Daddy is rooted in the idea of First Amendment Rights and believes 100 percent that the Internet is a key engine for our new economy,”

Many other companies have started removing their names from the list as the internet backlash has increased when the names of the supporters were released. A list of companies can be found here.

About SOPA

SOPA gives both the U.S. government and copyright holders the authority to seek court orders against websites associated with infringing, pirating and/or counterfeiting intellectual property. The implication of having the bill pass is that it could drastically change the way the Internet operates. For example, if a website is accused of containing copyright-infringing content (such as a song, picture or video clip), the site could be blocked by ISPs, de-indexed from search engines and even prevented from doing business with companies

I’ve been using Android for a while and I love it. It is the most flexible mobile operating platform on the market and gives the user a great experience. I’ve compiled a list of useful tips & tricks to help you get the most out of your Android experience.

Connect your Computer to the Internet through your Phone’s Data Plan

Android 2.2 got a very useful new feature called Portable Wi-Fi Hotspot. It allows you to connect to the Internet through your phone’s data plan.

To setup the Portable Wi-Fi Hotspot, Press MENU, then tap Settings >Wireless & Networks and check the Portable Wi-Fi Hotspot. If you have concerns for battery, plug in your phone to your computer and select USB Tethering – You cannot push a Wi-Fi network through this feature, it will always use your phone’s data plan.

Quickly Search Using Your Voice

Hold down the “Search” button for a few seconds and a “Speak Now” dialog box will appear. Say what you want to search and Google will search for it. If can do more than just search as well. Try saying “navigate to [place]” and it will perform those commands.

Move Applications to SD Card Without Rooting

Prior to Android 2.2 (Foryo), users had to install a third party App2SD app to move apps but as of 2.2, this feature has been added to the OS. Since not all applications have been made to support App2SD as the developers just haven’t gotten around to adding that function. On rooted devices, this can be done quite easily but if your device isn’t rooted, you can follow these steps on an unrooted phone:

1. Download the Android SDK and enable USB Debugging mode
2. Plug your device into the computer
3. Launch the Command Prompt on your computer [Start > Run > type "cmd"]
4. Navigate to the “\tools\” directory in the location where the Android SDK has been installed. Use cd \path\to\folder to go to the tools folder, if the SDK is on the C drive root type C:\Android SDK\tools
5. Type “adb shell pm setInstallLocation 2″ in the Command Prompt and press Enter
6. Unplug your computer and now you should be able to transfer all your applications to the SD card

Nowadays there is greater competition and faster speeds being offered. Home users are now getting speeds that were previously only available on corporate connections and are enjoying applications like YouTube, Netflix, Hulu etc. all of which offer rich content. To get the experience that the users want, a reliable service offering from the broadband service provider can make or break a customer. The customers experience will greatly depend on the quality of service being provided to enjoy all the content-rich applications that are available.

Having said that, it is also very important for users to look at the bigger picture when choosing a service provider as their decision is directly linked to their satisfaction. A recent study that was released which ranked O2 UK as one of the top broadband internet service provides with a whopping 89% customer satisfaction rate right after PlusNet which has come up this year. O2 UK was dominating the charts in 2010 as well.

Reliability of connection and value for money are still ranked high by customers using broadband internet which leaves room for providers to improve their services further.

The rankings were:

1. PlusNet (90%)
2.  O2 (89%)
3. Sky Broadband (81%)
4. Virgin Media (79%)
5. Orange (75%)
6. BT (74%)
7. TalkTalk (70%)
8. AOL UK (67%)

For a more detailed view of the results of the study conducted, check here

What version number for this release will be is still unclear, come to think of it, we don’t even know the version number for ICS yet. It could be 2.3.6 or 4.0 or whatever Google decides to make it. Having said that, ICS has some major functional, architectural and and layout changes so the next round of game changing upgrades might just get pushed to Jelly Bean instead of ICS.

Why a new release is coming out so soon when ICS is still in Alpha phase is a little baffling. But it seems like the powers that be will make us wait for watch.

The hackers behind the Duqu botnet have shut down their spying operation and erased all data on the 12 known command & control servers that were used to control all computers infected with Duqu on October 12, 2011 as per Kaspersky Lab, a Moscow-based security firm.

Experts say that Duqu was designed by advanced hackers and were most likely backed by a government. Earlier reports suggested that Duqu was an off-shoot of the highly sophisticated Stuxnet worm which attacked Iran’s nuclear program by sabotaging their centrifuges. Duqu creators scrubbed all their command & control servers which were being used to manage the infected computers globally and then made sure they had not left any traces behind. All servers going as far back as 2009 were completely erased of all data. After their scrubbing operation was completed, the attackers updated the OpenSSH versions on all servers from 3.4 to 5.8 to make sure no other cyber criminals stole their servers and possibly because the newer version has some functions that were of use to the attackers.

Experts say that this phase of the operation has been shut down but that is not to say that they will not return with an even more scary worm. Initial research showed that the worm used zero-day exploits to infect systems.

Its a scary thought that the hackers who made this worm are still out there and might even be working on scarier version.