Smartcard hacked

Researchers of Radboud University in Nijmegen, in the Netherlands, managed to crack and clone London's Oyster travel card, says The Register.

They were able to take free rides on the Underground and even perpetrated a DDoS (distributed denial of service) attack on a Tube gate.

Researchers Wouter Teepe and Bart Jacobs used a regular laptop to put credit back on their Oyster card. They plan to publish their research in October. Wouter Teepe promised they will not release software to manipulate the cards.

According to BBC News, lifesaving equipment in hospitals may be switched off by radio-frequency identification (RFID) devices used to track people and machines, Dutch scientists claim.

The latest research, conducted at Vrije University in Amsterdam, tested the effect of holding both "passive" and powered RFIDs close to 41 medical devices, including ventilators, syringe pumps, dialysis machines and pacemakers.

A total of 123 tests, three on each machine, were carried out, and 34 produced an "incident" in which the RFID appeared to have an effect - 24 of which were deemed either "significant" or "hazardous".

Companies can use a free online version of the new Wasp BarcodeMaker software to discover whether bar codes can make their businesses run more efficiently, says Data Collection Online.

In today's hyper-competitive business environment, small businesses need the same high levels of automation, functionality and accountability as their larger counterparts, but cannot afford expensive enterprise software packages.

Even the smallest business can save time and money by using bar codes to count inventory, track assets and more.