Wikipedia bans Scientology edits

Wikipedia's arbitration committee ruled to permanently block contributions and edits to Scientology articles from Internet addresses originating from the Church of Scientology's headquarters, reports The Wall Street Journal.

The decision follows six months of debate among administrators of the user-edited encyclopaedia, who found conflicts between Wikipedia editors who were Scientology enthusiasts and those who disliked the religion.

Some 430 Scientology entries on Wikipedia resulted in constant battles over revisions between the two camps. User accounts were created for the sole purpose of deleting or adding information on Scientology, a practice seen as harmful to Wikipedia's neutrality principles.

A new Personal Data Guardianship Code is being introduced, in an attempt to cut the number of high-profile data breaches in the UK, says Computing.co.uk.

The BCS and the Information Security Awareness Forum are responsible for the 13-page code, which aims to help organisations and employees who handle personal data understand their individual responsibilities.

"It promotes best practice and provides 'common sense' guidance, and also lays out information for the data subject," according to the launch information.

A security researcher says Twitter users over the weekend were the target of a scam that tried to infect them with rogue anti-virus software and other malware, in what is one of the first times the micro-blogging site has been hit by a known for-profit attack, reports The Register.

The problem started after a flurry of tweets directed users to a Web site promising "Best Video". The site appeared to offer content from YouTube, but behind the scenes, the site delivered a PDF document designed to infect those using vulnerable versions of Adobe's Reader program. Victims then received an urgent warning that their systems were infected and needed to be cleaned using fraudulent security software.

"This attack is very significant," Kaspersky researcher Roel Schouwenberg says. "It would seem that at least one criminal group is now exploring the distribution of for-profit on Twitter.”

Britain's biggest broadband supplier has been accused of limiting download speeds on its cheapest package without giving users a clear warning, says the BBC.

BT Broadband cuts the speed users can watch video services like the BBC iPlayer and YouTube at peak times.

A customer who has signed up for an up to 8Mbps package can have their speed cut to below 1Mbps.