In a response to Computerworld’s article on NSA involvement in Windows 7 development, Microsoft stated: “Microsoft has not and will not put ‘backdoors’ into Windows.”

Not to nitpick here, but doesn’t this denial leave another “door” open? As in, couldn’t the NSA have stuck their own backdoor into Windows 7 while official Microsoft employees turned a blind eye? Or — and this may come as really shocking — could Microsoft have simply lied to us in the interest of national security??

Of course, but if you freak out over this potential lack of digital autonomy, you’re clearly a terrorist. [Computerworld via Digg]

OSA PB2 “Less-Lethal” Multipurpose Pistol
Ever since I watched Rosa Klebb trying to kill Bond with her shoe-dagger, I considered the Russians the world experts in tiny hideaway weapons. The PB2 is an eeency-weeency little double-barrelled “less-lethal” pistol weighing less than 200g, firing anything from rubber bullets to flares to flashbangs. It’s also got a safety and integral laser sights, which can be upgraded to near–Scott Summers strength on order. Just don’t practice on some poor country bumpkin like they did here. [OSA]

DrugWipe by Securetec
The DrugWipe is what makes the customs guys all-knowing. It’s a tiny drug test in a pocket. These plastic sticks can test up to four classes of illegal drugs in a single go. According to Securetec’s PR guy, your saliva can give you away 12 hours after doing — or even just being near — cocaine, weed, opium, meth or whathaveyou. All the government grunts have to do is wipe your tongue. Won’t open your mouth? They can also swipe your sweat and random stuff you’re carrying. [Securetec]

Spy Watch
When I approached the director of a small security/protection company to ask about this normal-looking watch, he wouldn’t tell me a whole lot. What I managed to squeeze out of him is that although it’s normal size, it also records audio and video. Near the two o’clock mark you can see a tiny lens, activated by buttons on the side. He wasn’t the only cagey guy on the show floor — the guys in a nearby booth forbade me from taking pictures of their micro surveillance gear.

Trikke uPT
The Trikke uPT (ultralight personal transporter) was the funnest (and funniest) thing at the entire expo, and that’s saying a lot when you’re surrounded by a pirateload of guns. It’s an idea so simple its inventor, the dark-suited Dutchman whizzing around on it, couldn’t figure why his potential buyers would spend any money at all on the wayyyy more expensive Segways parked in the next booth. The uPT is a trike tricked out with a 250W electric motor and a 35km range lithium-ion battery; it weighs just over 16kg. And like that blasted Segway, there are plenty of models to choose from. [Trikke]

RiotBot by Technorobot
The RiotBot is billed by its makers as “the first robot for riot control”. It uses a PS3-looking remote controller to zip this PepperBall-equipped metal beast at 20km/h into all kinds of riots. The carbine fires at 700 rounds per minute and can be operated for two hours. [Technorobot]

MaxFit Gloves
It’s usually next to impossible to do precise tasks with gloves on. Most of the time, your hands move around in the gloves, you can’t feel what you’re holding and you end up feeling as useless as a eunuch in a whorehouse. But the MaxFit workgloves are fanfriggintastic. They were the thinnest, grippiest workgloves I had ever worn. Their try-out test was having me grip an Armor-All lubed PVC tube, then try to twist it out of my hand — it didn’t budge. Unfortunately, though the site advertises that it’s good for construction, DIYers and backyard work, I couldn’t help but wonder what ulterior activities they were promoting it for at a security show. [MaxFit]

Piexon Guardian Angel
The Guardian Angel is a tiny plastic toy that looks like your niece’s water pistol, but it’s actually a lightweight, disposable two-shot explosive-propelled pepper-spray gun. The cartridges give it way more range than a spray can. Just don’t carry it around in Scandinavia or other places where it’s banned, or they’ll arrest you for it (like they nearly did with me two months ago). Buy the way, it’s interesting to note that the Piexon website names “liberal politics” as a chief reason for needing more protection these days. [Piexon]

Rimmex 288 Prototype Amphibot
The Rimmex 288 is a prototype amphibious robot that can roll straight into water — streams, rivers and lakes mostly, or just very muddy terrain — and then roll right back out again. Its single arm with six degrees of freedom can be swapped with whatever you like — from a gun to an X-ray, apparently, depending on your, uh, objectives. [ROV Developpement]

Apoorva Prasad is a freelance writer and photographer based in Paris, France, who recently covered the Milipol 2009 military-police expo for us. He has a thing for holo-scoped assault rifles and sounds disappointed when admitting he’s never been Tased.

According to the NSA’s Information Assurance Director, Richard Schaeffer, it’s important for the agency to work with Microsoft and other software makers because otherwise the increasing reliance on “private-sector computing products” could put national security at risk. By creating and maintaining high security standards, the agency hopes to reduce the danger of the “rising threat of cyberattacks”. Whew. That actually sounds quite reasonable and like a good thing, rather than cause to panic after seeing “NSA” and “Microsoft” in the same sentence. [NPR via Crunch Gear]

Essentially, it’s a polyurethane cage full of goodies that you store in the fridge and secure with a combination lock (included). Of course, there’s nothing preventing thieves from stealing the entire cage and working on it later with a hacksaw, but that’s a lot of trouble to go through for last night’s leftovers. [Perpetual Kid via RGS via OhGizmo]

Fortunately the virus is little more than a prank and not actually malicious. It only affects jailbroken iPhones with an SSH daemon installed. It preys on the fact that many users haven’t actually changed their SSH password from the default Alpine.

Whirlpool user JD managed to track down the guy behind the virus and interviewed him on his blog. There are instructions on how to undo the rickroll if you’ve been victim to this virus, as well as a post dedicated to how to prevent future viruses hitting you through the same security hole.

Despite the somewhat questionable method of doing it, ikee has at least done one good thing in reminding us all of the importance of changing default passwords. If you’ve got a jailbroken iPhone, you should probably change all your passwords now. In fact, today’s probably a good day to change all your passwords for everything, just in case – because next time, it might not just be a picture of Rick Astley on your home screen…

[Whirlpool and JD's Blog – Thanks Craig!]

It’s not the first time we’ve seen this; Swiss developerMogo got busted gathering numbers and then calling people to harass them to buy more apps, which is certainly a more brazen move. Storm8 claims that this was a bug, but they’re getting sued anyways. It doesn’t pay to be shady, devs! [Boing Boing via Kotaku]

The way the test was conducted is that 10 viruses were introduced into a clean install of Windows 7 with the UAC settings on system defaults. While only one virus was blocked, two technically did not function properly for whatever reason. Still, this doesn’t leave much hope for those who decide to skip automatic patching, firewalls and antivirus applications. Let’s do the whole “Safer Computing” thing, shall we? [Sophos]

There are a thousand gigabytes in a terabyte, a thousand terabytes in a petabyte, a thousand petabytes in an exabyte, a thousand exabytes in a zettabyte, and a thousand zettabytes in a yottabyte. In other words, a yottabyte is 1,000,000,000,000,000GB.

In terms of data on current human scales, a yottabyte is nearly infinite (though I’m sure the NSA will manage to fill the thing in like two weeks, and iPods will come with yottabytes in just a few months).

To be fair, the yottabyte figure is just one estimate generated by a Pentagon think tank. The facility could hold a mere hundreds of petabytes. But either way, the prospect is as unsustainable as it is frightening. This one facility will burn through as much electricity as the entirety of Salt Lake City.

All of this data comes from the book The Secret Sentry: The Untold History of the National Security Agency by Matthew M. Aid. And while the paranoid among you may read it, I, MARK WILSON, HAVE NO REASON TO FEAR THE NSA’S INVOLVEMENT IN MY LIFE OR INFORMATION AT ALL. [NYBooks via CrunchGear]

In other words, this would be a great, inexpensive home surveillance cam. It’s supposed to be a snap to set up. You can access the feed, and control the pan and tilt of the camera from any PC or internet capable mobile phone. For $US300, Astak also throws in motion detection, night vision, two-way audio and a built-in DVR. I have to believe this is as good a feature set as you will find on a webcam at this price point.

ASTAK INTRODUCES WORLD’S FIRST SELF-CONFIGURING, STANDALONE INTERNET CAMERA IDEAL FOR KEEPING AN EYE ON HAPPENINGS AT HOME

YouTube, Twitter and iPhone ready, the affordable and easy-to-use Mole is the first “do it yourself, view from anywhere” solution for remote viewing and sharing

SAN JOSE, Calif.–October 28, 2009–The lowly mole is a victim of poor PR, but that’s about to change with Astak Inc.’s innovative new product, the Mole — a standalone Internet camera for consumers who need an easy and affordable way to capture, view and share unattended video over the Internet. Featuring automatic network configuration, the Mole makes it simple for home or business users to remotely view and share video in real-time from any web browser, social networking site, or Internet-capable cell phone, including the iPhone.

Unlike current webcams that require a PC for use, or IP cameras that are complicated to set up and often require customer software to view, the Mole is the first “do it yourself, view from anywhere” solution for home or business surveillance, health and family care (elder or children), social network sharing, pet or , bird watching, and other unfolding events such as social gatherings. The Mole is also an ideal way to keep an eye on business or home while travelling.

“The Mole will redefine home and business surveillance, and it also opens the door to using a remote camera for sharing unattended video, since it’s Web 2.0 ready,” said Jason Hsia, CEO of ASTAK. “Internet citizens are already uploading over 20 hours of video to YouTube every minute. When interesting or important events are underway, you can’t always be there to see or record them in person. That all changes with the Mole, where motion-detected events can be auto-uploaded to YouTube and a tweet auto-sent to your Twitter feed.”

A standalone Internet camera with advanced built-in software, the Mole provides auto-configuration so that the user can set up the camera in just a few easy steps and access their video privately without any network knowledge. Once set up, the Mole allows users to adjust the pan remotely to change the view instantly. While easy-to-use and affordable, the Mole camera includes high-end features such as motion detection activation, night vision, two-way audio, and a built-in DVR. The Mole also features both Ethernet or Wi-Fi connectivity.

The Mole is designed for direct access from any web browser, which lets users watch their video instantly, from anywhere, including the iPhone. The onboard software is specifically tailored for seamless Internet sharing including auto-uploads to YouTube. Users can also choose to receive real-time alerts via email or Twitter sent to their mobile phone or any IP-enabled device.

Available in early November 2009, the Mole will be distributed through Astak’s network of retail and distribution partners, including Fry’s, Costco, Amazon.com, Walmart.com and Astak.com, with an MSRP of $US299.00.

[Astak]