Welcome to another edition of the Prompt newsletter.

This week we've got information on how to cheat at the Olympics, a warning for anyone whose first name falls at the start of the alphabet, plus the latest news on a malicious space worm intruder.

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Hazel Butters
CEO
Prompt Communications

iPhone ad ruled misleading

By Laura Beynon

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has ruled the iPhone television advert as misleading, after television programme Watchdog received complaints from consumers regarding the appearance of its webpages. In the advert Apple claims that "all the parts of the internet are on the iPhone". However, ASA have said: "because the iPhone does not support Flash or Java Script, two programs that form part of most webpages – the claim is misleading." Apple claim that the advert does not refer to the specific appearance of the webpages and only refers to the availability of webpages.

It has been revealed that a web browser called Safari is used on the iPhone to view and display webpages. However the browser does not support Flash or Java Script, software programs used to display graphics and animations. Therefore it comes as no surprise that consumers have complained about the quality of webpages on the iPhone.

The ASA have said: "the advert gave a misleading impression of the internet capabilities of the iPhone and it must therefore not be aired again in its current form." Apple did not want to comment on the ruling.

It seems that the ruling has had no affect on iPhone sales, with the demand of the new iPhone 3G remaining creditably high. Analyst Gene Munster has revealed that Apple is on track to beat his previous estimate of 4.1 million iPhone sales during the September quarter.

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If your name begins with A – be warned

By Kathryn Cave

A paper presented last week at the CEAS 2008 revealed that the earlier the first letter of your name comes in the alphabet, the more spam you're likely to receive. Richard Clayton, a security expert from Cambridge University's computer lab, informed audiences that if your name begins with an A you'll be targeted by 15% more spam than if your name starts with the letter Z.

As Clayton explains in his team blog, this is because many spammers perform "Rumplestiltskin" attacks. This is the practice where wily spammers run through a dictionary, guessing names and sending millions of emails in an attempt to hit genuine people. But spamming, like any job, is susceptible to the pitfalls of human error: spammers are far more industrious when they start at A than they are by the time they finally get to Z.

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An honest way to cheat

By Ellie Turner

The Beijing Olympics are a golden memory now, especially for those athletes involved in the Water Cube, and more importantly for those that were wearing the Speedo LZR Racer suit. The Guardian looked in detail at the suit in question.

Does, or maybe this time, has technology and science got in the way of celebrating a human achievement?

People began talking about the incredible Speedo suit but then just accepted that they were witnessing world records being smashed left, right and centre, but when the 100m sprint got a new world record it was an almighty feat. The makers of the Speedo suit have been strangely quiet, accepting not much credit at all (until you hit their website) anyone would think they were a British company with a reserved stiff upper lip.

The way this remarkable suit works is by engineering the surface so that it is smooth, not rough. The tradition to date has been to make suits rough so that a thin layer of turbulence results in water-water friction, but in the new suit a composite material creates very low suit-water friction directly. The swimsuits also have elastic properties that squeeze the body much more than traditional suits; uncomfortable but evidently worth it!

"It's clearly not cheating because it doesn't break any of the rules," says Mike Caine, director of the Sports Technology Institute at Loughborough University. "It's no worse than one athlete training with a better exercise machine than another," he says.

I'm sure sports equipment and clothing would never be questioned to a point that it wouldn't be able to be part of the Olympic dream, but is it a step closer to 'cheating' in a sport, the same way as perhaps taking steroids is banned?

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Space worm alert

By Terryn Landman

Astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS) have gone head to head with a malicious intruder: a space worm. Albeit one of the digital variety rather than a giant carnivorous predator.

Two laptops on the ISS have been infected with W32.Gammima.AG. The year-old Windows worm is not a significant threat as it is designed to steal login information for online games. The worm also plants a rootkit on the infected computer and sends stolen data to a remote server.

While malware is a common threat for your average computer user, one has to wonder how a laptop orbiting 215 miles above the earth would become infected. Especially given the fact that computers on the ISS are not directly connected to the internet, although they do have access to a satellite data link.

NASA officials are investigating how the virus managed to stow away on ISS computers. One theory is that an astronaut may have inadvertently carried the virus into space on a USB drive. If that is the case, the laptops could have become infected once the memory device was plugged into the computers. The astronauts were using the laptops to write emails and to store information on nutritional experiments.

All laptops on board the ISS have been loaded with the latest Norton Antivirus software and definition files, but there are other security measures NASA, and those of us on the ground, can take. Disabling autorun for all devices will prevent malware like W32.Gammima.AG from infecting a system. It may be a little inconvenient, but computer security clearly isn’t rocket science.

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Mozilla makes monster mash

By David Wilby

As part of its ongoing mission to usurp Microsoft as the browser king, Mozilla Labs this week launched Ubiquity, an experimental plug-in intended to help users connect with the Web using natural language. Although it’s early days, the concept is certainly attractive, and could potentially launch an entirely fresh method of achieving tasks online, using everyday language to allow users to explain what it is they want to do, rather than creating search strings.

Mozilla is promising that Ubiquity will enable on-demand, user-generated mashups with existing open web APIs, allowing mere mortals as well as Web developers to remix their web experience so it fits their needs, regardless of what they are trying to achieve. Think of it this way - Ubiquity would allow us to enquire: “Can I get a table for twelve for tonight in a quality, reasonably priced Italian restaurant in West London, within walking distance of a tube station?” rather than forcing us to mess around searching for ‘italian restaurant + west london’, and then trawling around review sites, maps and so on.

According to CNET, Mozilla has already released a prototype of Ubiquity for all platforms, as well as a tutorial, as an "illustration of a concept".