As soon as the email archives’ contents were made publicly available, arguments broke out. Was there proof of data manipulation that could flip the entire climate debate topsy-turvy? Were scientists at the university working to keep works by climate skeptics out of journals? Answers to either question are unclear. According to New Scientist, there was no evidence of actual data manipulation, but some of the email exchanges could be construed as attempts to suppress some research.

No matter how those questions wind up being resolved, in the end the trouble doesn’t seem to be in the contents of the emails or in the data, but in the fact that the Climate Research Unit restricted access to the climate data to those it deemed “bona fide researchers.” Maybe some of the accusations the unit faced could’ve been avoided had the data been more freely shared in the first place. [New Scientist]

Photo by coda

Starting today, users can attach all types of files – except images embedded in the body of the email. These messages now go through the outbox when you’re online or offline, allowing Gmail to capture the attachment either way. [Gmail Blog via TechCrunch]

The project’s name reflects how much faster Nigeria is able to deal with the problem now. Previously, officials would use cyber raids and petitions (seriously? Like a “Sign here if you want to see this guy busted for identity theft” petition?) to deal with the problem. Now they’re implementing a drop-kick shut down procedure that, according to officials, could take up to 5000 fraudulent emails offline per month.

The Nigerian Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has been working closely with Microsoft to develop a solution that should be fully operational by 2010. [Ars Technica, image of Nigerian scammer via Fox News]

“Got the Wrong Bob?” is a new Google Labs feature that you can turn on in Gmail. It works by analysing groups of people that you usually email together. For example, if you accidentally include your boss Hank in with your normal key party invite group when you meant to invite country singer Hank Williams Jr, well, Gmail will ask if you meant this Hank instead of that Hank. This will in turn save you a boatload of awkwardness (or a magical night where you learn more about your boss than you ever thought possible, but that’s neither here nor there).

So go ahead, check it out and see if it works. It certainly can’t hurt, right? [Official Gmail Blog via Esquire]

He told Commonwealth Club of California forum attendees that he recently responded to an email that appeared to come from his bank, stopping only when he was asked for his password. Using his experience as an example, he went on to speak about the ever increasing threat of cybercrime. One smart-ass citizen responded to his warnings thusly:

“I’m not worried about a teenage hacker reading my e-mail. I’m worried about you reading it.”

Ballsy — I’ll give him that. But it appears that we have little to worry about as far as Muller is concerned. He’s too busy reading every email in his inbox that’s from Zimbabwe or in all caps. [SFGate]

“123456″ was the most popular password, appearing 64 times. Yes, that’s but one digit away from this famous Spaceballs clip:

Other trends? The next top 20 most popular passwords were Spanish names, just under half the American population used all lower case letters, and only 6% used an alphanumeric combination.

Also, about 20% of the passwords were only six characters long…though the longest password was the awesome “lafaroleratropezoooooooooooooo”. [The Inquirer]

The New York Times says Microsoft, Google and Yahoo have confirmed the addresses are real, and that they’re helping affected users recover their accounts.

Even though you generally have to be pretty damn gullible to fall for one of these fake sites (or open strange-looking email attachments), now might be a good time to change your webmail password…something you should be doing every now and then anyway. [BBC via New York Times]

The emoticon used to be a much humbler character(s) than the cheesy, animated jobs that now populate too many emails and forum threads. They used to be, well, just useful, not annoying. And for a time, it was good. Then, when a fatter intertubes came along, the bandwidth-munching animated icon began to proliferate. Like rabbits. Calicivirus, anyone?

So, a little history is in order. Why? Perspective. And because those who ignore the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them. ;) Oops. sorry.

The first person documented to have used the smiley and sad faces icons was Professor Scott E. Fahlman in 1982. And here’s the message:

19-Sep-82 11:44 Scott E Fahlman :-)
From: Scott E Fahlman

I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:

:-)

Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark
things that are NOT jokes, given current trends. For this, use

:-(”

However, he wasn't the first to come up with a character-based shorthand. Teletype machine operators, as early as 1973, and probably long before that date, used “emoticons” to express themselves.

Feel the need to know more? Wikipedia has the full lesson.

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