The Flipside of Being Connected All the Time

Earlier, we have seen a number of problems arising from the exploding trend of computers being always online.

Forget software and operating systems, even malware is now regularly updated by hackers. A security update by Microsoft, while not taking care of the problem, instead showed a BSOD if the rootkit in question was on the system. When the hackers realized it, they patched the rootkit, making the problem seemingly disappear

In another incident, a school in the US is being sued by outraged parents of students for invasion of privacy. The school issued laptops to all its students, then kept tabs of what is going on in their households by using a spyware that could even send back data from the webcams on the laptops. Why the school thought that it needed to do this is beyond comprehension.

In yet another case, PC gamers with a legit copy of Assassin’s Creed II are being unceremoniously thrown out of the game if their internet connection is lost - as an anti-piracy measure. We feel that DRM has gone too far in this case.