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Pirates Sneer at Intel Chip
`The new Intel chip has an electronic identifier which might do everything
`from making e-commerce safer to threatening the thriving pirated software
`market. The pirates aren't worried. But privacy advocates are. By Polly
`Sprenger.
`
`INTEL THURSDAY SAID
`
`ADVERTISEMENT
`
`1
`
`APPLE 1013
`
`POLLY SPRENGER
`S C I E N C E
`JAN 22, 1999 9:25 AM
` that its next-generation processors include a feature that will
`identify online users as they traverse the Web.
`Intel says its Processor Serial Number Control utility will protect e-commerce
`transactions. When the feature is activated, the computer's identifier can be
`matched against the sensitive information the user inputs, validating the exchange.
`Intel (
`INTC) also claims that the new utility will make pirating software more
`difficult.
`Pirates are unimpressed. Privacy advocates are worried.
`Their fear is that the feature can be used to identify users who visit sites without
`making a purchase, even when they haven't voluntarily given out their information.
`Intel said users can turn the feature off easily, but the chip is built to immediately
`broadcast an identifying serial number as soon as it is connected to the Internet.
`Patrick Gelsinger, vice president and general manager of Intel's desktop products
`group, said the feature has far-reaching implications for protecting online
`copyrighted material. The serial number would create an electronic stamp of the
`material's point of origin, Gelsinger said.
`

`

`2
`
`For software manufacturers, the new chip feature shows promise as a weapon
`against piracy. If each software license can only be used on the computer with the
`correct serial number, the market for pirated software goods essentially evaporates.
`Software vendors have been asking Intel for years to build some kind of
`identification into its hardware, the company said.
`Peter Beruk of the Software Publisher's Association said the chip could help his
`organization with its anti-piracy efforts. "We're going to support any technology that
`helps protect the licensing of software," Beruk said.
`But, he added, the privacy issue was troubling, and the industry shouldn't endorse
`an anti-piracy effort that threatens the privacy of honest Web users.
`The pirates themselves only shrugged.
`"This won't stop piracy, because someone very soon will compile a patch or some
`other way to outsmart it, and then the piracy will be right back on track with new
`blood," said one member of the Warez community. "If I've thought of this, the
`market strategists at Pentium have thought of this as well."
`Other members of the online underground elite were even less interested in the
`announcement.
`"It's an invasion of privacy that the hackers and Warez are not concerning
`themselves with " said another Warez member
`

`

`If You Don’t Already Live in a Sponge City, You Will Soon
`
`3
`
`themselves with, said another Warez member.
`Jim Yankelevich, director of technical operations for LaptopSales.com, an online
`retailer, said the new chip is nothing more than a gimmick to sell computers.
`Yankelvich said he used to be a software pirate "in a long forgotten time" and
`doesn't see how it will be effective in combating piracy.
`"As we have already found out, tracking computer users is not as easy as it sounds,"
`Yankelvich said. "As far as the technological ramifications -- the extra security will
`boost e-commerce, maybe for no other reason than that it makes consumers feel a
`little safer. Piracy will probably not be affected by this, because companies will be
`slow to catch on, and by the time they do, someone somewhere will figure a way to
`defeat it."
`MORE FROM WIRED
`Less pavement and more green spaces help absorb water instead of funneling it all away—a win-win for
`people and urban ecosystems.
`

`

`Ebola Is Back—and Vaccines Don’t Work Against It
`
`4
`
`MATT SIMON
`Public health officials are racing to contain an outbreak in Uganda. It’s an urgent warning to the rest of the
`world.
`ESTHER NAKKAZI
`

`

`Goats and Sheep Are Brawling in the Rockies. Blame Glacial Melt
`
`The Quest to Treat Binge-Eating and Addiction—With Brain Zaps
`
`5
`
`The climate crisis may explain fights as disappearing ice fuels interspecies competition—with goats nearly
`always winning.
`OLIVER MILMAN
`Delivering small bursts of electric current via brain implants has long been used to treat Parkinson’s and
`epilepsy. Can it work for psychiatric conditions?
`EMILY MULLIN
`

`

`Worried About Nuclear War? Consider the Micromorts
`
`How Iodine Pills Can—and Can’t—Help Against Radiation
`
`6
`
`Calculating the likelihood of dying in a nuclear conflict sounds like an impossible task, but it could give us
`a whole new way to think about the risk.
`MATT REYNOLDS
`East European governments are starting to distribute the tablets as a precaution, but there are limits to the
`protection they offer, and who might need them.
`EMILY MULLIN
`

`

`Where Did Omicron Come From? Maybe Its First Host Was Mice
`
`Ukraine’s Biggest Nuclear Plant Needs a Safety Zone
`
`7
`
`The Covid virus can infect many animal species. The variant that tore through human populations last
`winter may have previously circulated in rodents.
`MARYN MCKENNA
`Atomic energy experts are calling for protections for the Zaporizhzhya plant, which has become a pawn in
`the war, thanks to power outages and nearby shelling.
`RAMIN SKIBBA
`

`

`WIE LR)
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`8
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`S U B S C R I B E
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