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WASHINGTON (AP) - Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah is strongly considering joining the crowded race for the Republican presidential nomination, GOP sources said Thursday. These Republicans said Hatch, a fourth-term senator and chairman of the Judiciary Committee, had begun to search for staff in the event of a candidacy. Asked whether he was thinking about entering the race, Hatch said, "I've had people come to me and I'm certainly courteously listening. I'm not pushing them away. I'm just listening." Hatch, 65, would face difficult obstacles if he were to decide to enter the race. Texas Gov. George W. Bush is the commanding front-runner in the polls and in money raised. NEW YORK (AP) _ Proving even more virulent than first believed, the computer virus Worm.Explore.Zip sprang back from a deceptively quiet weekend amid warnings that it uses more than just e-mail trickery to spread. Computer support lines were inundated Monday with calls about new outbreaks of the file-killing virus, which experts now say was also designed to spread within an organization through computer network links that enable co-workers to share files on each others' machines. As the epidemic first picked up steam last week, infecting tens of thousands of computers at major corporations, the primary mode of transmission had seemed to be a friendly e-mail that tricks the recipient into opening a contaminated file. By eliminating the need for a helping human hand, the Worm.Explore.Zip could prove more difficult to irradicate than the Melissa and Chernobyl viruses that struck earlier this spring by e-mail only. "As time goes on, the programs intruders are using are becoming more complex," said Mark Zajicek, a member of the government-chartered Computer Emergency Response Team at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. Over the weekend, the team found during tests that the virus would reappear seconds after being removed from a computer _ if that machine was linked by a network to another machine that was still infected. Most major corporations, universities and government agencies link thousands of personal computers in networks, helping people work together, but also making their machines vulnerable to the bug. "It only takes one opening, one infected computer within a company, to rapidly spread within that company," said Zajicek. "That helps explain what we've been seeing _ that the program wasn't spreading from site to site as quickly as it was within a site." The additional mode of contamination may also render some of the cures posted on the Internet by software companies last week less effective, said Zajicek "Based on the symptoms we've seen in our own test lab, we have seen cases where such fixes would not be effective," he said. Although nervous calls to computer support lines dropped off sharply over the weekend, a support technician for the anti-virus software maker Network Associates said Monday's call volume was even heavier than on Thursday and Friday, with 30 to 40 callers waiting on hold at any one time. The Federal Bureau of Investigation was trying to track down the author of the virus, but the agency declined to provide any updates on the probe over the weekend. It took only days earlier this spring for authorities to trace the digital footprints of Melissa and the Chernobyl virus that struck in late April. Worm.Explore.Zip, first detected in Israel about a week ago, began spreading rapidly on Thursday and Friday, infecting computer systems at many big corporations including AT&T, Boeing, General Electric and even Microsoft. On Monday, the crafty bug's victims even included one maker of anti-virus software. "It happened here to our chief operating officer, who was running anti-virus software, practicing safe computing," said Dan Schrader, vice president of new technology at Trend Micro, noting that the executive had forgotten about a single link he'd established months ago to share his files with another worker. "He went to open a PowerPoint (slide) presentation and it was empty." Worm.Explore.Zip targets computers using Microsoft Windows operating systems. The virus arrives in a person's e-mail box as a timely reply from an acquaintance. It then invites the recipient to open an attached file that will unleash a two-pronged attack, sending a copy of itself to the address of any arriving e-mail and destroying files stored on a person's machine. Among the files destroyed are those created by the writing program Microsoft Word, the spreadsheet program Excel and PowerPoint, which is used to create graphic presentations. Monday's new revelation about the way the bug works also fueled more debate about what terms to use to describe it. Because of the way it replicates, Worm.Explore.Zip actually does not fit the technical definition of a computer virus. Based on the e-mail mode of contamination, it best would classified as a "worm." HACKERS EXPLOIT NEW YORK (AP) - A small software company is giving away a tool that lets computer hackers exploit a major security flaw in a Microsoft program that runs about 1.4 million Web sites. The security threat could expose personal data such as credit card numbers to thieves, although no such attacks on Web sites have yet been reported. Microsoft's antagonist, a company called eEye, said it released the tool on the Internet because Microsoft wasn't acting fast enough to fix the problem. But Microsoft and many people discussing the controversy on the Internet Thursday decried the tactic as a dangerous publicity stunt. FRENCH BANKS LIST ACCOUNTS FROM WAR PARIS (AP) - French banks have handed a list of some 63,000 accounts held by Jews during World War II to a government panel investigating the systematic plunder of Jewish assets during the war. The Matteoli commission said this week all but a handful of the banks and various financial institutions have cooperated with its investigation. More than 100 French banks and financial institutions, including the branches of some foreign banks, collaborated with the pro-Nazi Vichy regime, which governed France from 1940-44. In recent months, France has come under increasing scrutiny for the official confiscation of Jewish assets, including priceless paintings, and its apparent unwillingness to return them at the war's end.
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NEW COMPUTER VIRUS NEW YORK (AP) - The latest outbreak of a computer virus began easing Tuesday as infected companies carefully reconnected e-mail and file-sharing links the bug used to spread. Experts warned, however, that due to its crafty design, the Worm.Explore.Zip virus could remain a serious risk for weeks. Five days after the epidemic took hold, anti-virus software companies reported the torrent of calls to customer-help lines was starting to ebb. A government-chartered anti-virus team at Carnegie Mellon University reported that firsthand accounts of outbreaks were leveling off. But since the virus can lay dormant in an unused machine, the aftershocks could extend beyond the days it took to contain the Melissa and Chernobyl viruses this spring. SENATE OKS BILL WASHINGTON (AP) - The Senate approved legislation Tuesday that supporters said could save the economy from being crushed by lawsuits against companies in connection with Year 2000 computer problems. But the White House has threatened a veto, saying the bill gives too little protection to consumers, and the 62-37 vote was five short of the two-thirds that would be needed to override such a veto. The measure, authored by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., with input from several Democrats, attempts to head off what some estimate could be billions of dollars in lawsuits by encouraging mediation and giving companies 90 days to fix year 2000 computer problems before they can be taken to court. IBM CHIEF WARNS
ON WASHINGTON (AP) - IBM Chairman Louis Gerstner Jr. warned Congress Monday against hastily enacting legislation to govern the fast-changing technology industry, saying that policies rushed into place now could become obsolete quickly. Gerstner, speaking at the Joint Economic Committee's High Tech Summit, said the rise of networks that connect people around the world already has begun to transform education, business and government. But he estimated that this process is only about one-sixth of the way complete, and that more information is needed to develop a model for public policy. LYNYRD SKYNRD JACKSONVILLE, FL (WJXT) - The Lynyrd Skynrd legacy is living on in Jacksonville Beach.The Freebird foundation just opened a new recording studio... "Made In The Shade Recording". Judy Van Zant Jenness...widow of Skynyrd front man Ronnie Van Zant, says coming from a family of musicians they thought this would be a good thing to do. Judy Van Zant Jenness; "We just feel like through this studio we can help the local musicians with more affordable rates and a good place with a good vibe to come and record." The new recording studio is open and ready for business. INTEL SET TO FACE HILLSBORO, Ore. (AP) - In the past decade Intel's billion-dollar computer chip plants have transformed this sleepy farm town into a silicon forest of high-paying jobs, new subdivisions and rush-hour traffic jams. Now, having found out that it's possible to have too much of a good thing, the locals are offering Intel a new set of tax breaks that contain a unique proviso: Don't create too many jobs. As part of a $200 million tax-break package expected to be approved Tuesday, the county will, in effect, fine Intel $1,000 for every manufacturing job created over a cap of 5,000. It's an unprecedented answer to the problem of too much economic development, too fast. And it comes at a time when other communities are going to extremes to attract big businesses and the jobs they bring. eBAY STOCK PLUNGES SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) - Business was buzzing on Internet auction site eBay Monday, but that didn't prevent investors for pushing the company's stock down 18% as fallout continued from last week's 22-hour outage. Shares of EBay dropped $29.87{ to $136 in trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market, the first trading day since eBay said it would refund fees for all active auctions from Thursday and Friday, costing it between $3 million to $5 million in second-quarter revenue. Shares of the popular auction house, which has attracted more than 3 million users in 50 countries, are now down more than 43% from the $234 high reached in April. STUDY: INTERNET USERS WASHINGTON (AP) - The number of people over 16 in the U.S. and Canada using the Internet has climbed to 92 million, with almost as many women as men online, according to a new survey released Thursday. The study by Nielsen Media Research and CommerceNet also shows dramatic increases in the number of women who made at least a single purchase using the Internet, rising 80% over nine months ago. The most popular items for women to buy on the Web were books, CDs and videos with 9.6 million purchases of those items taken together. But in a twist, the number of women buying computers over the Internet climbed fastest at 160% to 1.3 million during the past nine months. GOTO.COM PLANS IPO
PASADENA, Calif. (AP) - Fledgling Web search engine company GoTo.com Inc. plans to go public Friday, hitting the market just as investors appear to be losing their appetite for Internet stocks. GoTo.com executives hope the initial public offering raises a windfall of cash, as stock offerings have done for other Internet companies over the past year. But the big, easy money from IPOs may be a thing of the past, analysts say. A steady slide in Internet stocks suggests investors have begun to look askance at sky-high valuations and are deciding that some stocks aren't a good bet. MICROSOFT SOLICITS WASHINGTON (AP) - Microsoft Corp. has discreetly added a message to the Internet site visited by millions of people who use its Windows software urging them to write to Congress about the government's antitrust case. The move suggests an intensified public relations campaign by Microsoft as trial testimony nears an end and pressure grows to resume settlement negotiations with government lawyers. It comes days after Microsoft's billionaire chairman, Bill Gates, testified before a sympathetic Senate panel and met privately with key lawmakers. The affected Microsoft Web site draws millions of visitors each month to update their copies of Windows, the operating system software that runs most of the world's personal computers. |