History of IBM Developments

1956 - FIRST MAGNETIC HARD DISK. IBM introduces the world's first magnetic hard disk for data storage. RAMAC (or Random Access Method of Accounting and Control) offers unprecedented performance by permitting random access to any of the million characters distributed over both sides of 50 two-foot-diameter disks. Produced in San Jose, California, IBM's first hard disk stored about 2,000 bits of data per square inch and had a purchase price of about $10,000 per megabyte. By 1997, the cost of storing a megabyte had dropped to around ten cents.

1957 - FORTRAN. IBM revolutionizes programming with the introduction of FORTRAN (Formula Translator). Created by John Backus, it soon becomes the most widely used computer programming language for technical work. For the first time, engineers and scientists can write computer programs in more natural forms, such as C=A/B rather than as strings of "machine language: 1s and 0s.

1997 - DEEP BLUE. The 32-node IBM RS/6000 SP supercomputer, Deep Blue, defeated World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov in the first known instance of a computer vanquishing a world champion chess player in tournament-style competition. Also after years of teamwork among Research and Microelectronics divisions, IBM introduced the CMOS 7S process, which allowed manufacturers to use copper wires to link transistors in computer chips instead of relying on traditional aluminum interconnects; a revolutionary advance in semiconductor technology.



Monday, October 22, 2012


Christian Science Monitor, New York, October 18
Google plummeted almost $80 per share, more than 10 percent, and trading in the stock was halted two and a half hours Thursday after a disappointing earnings report was published ahead of schedule and surprised investors.
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QUIZ: Stock market quiz: Can you predict the market based on the trader's face?
Bleak figures in the report about online advertising dragged down Facebookstock, too, and the Nasdaq composite index skidded 1 percent on a day when the broader stock market was mostly flat.
Google was trading at $754 per share at 12:30 p.m. EDT, then fell almost $20 in a minute after investors saw the report, a draft. It dropped as low as $676, and Google halted trading at 12:50 p.m., with the stock at $687.
The stock was halted until 3:20 p.m. Companies routinely halt trading when they have news to release to investors during the market day, but two and a half hours is an unusually long suspension.
When trading in Google resumed, the stock climbed slightly, but it still finished down $60.49, or 8 percent, at $695.
Google blamed a printing company, R.R. Donnelley & Sons, for filing its quarterly statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission more than three hours ahead of schedule.
R.R. Donnelley & Sons stock also plunged — as much as 71 cents, or 6.5 percent, to $10.14 — after the mistake. It later recovered most of the loss and ended the day down 9 cents.
The Google report said it earned $2.18 billion from July through September, down from $2.73 billion in the same period a year ago.
Profit came to $6.53 per share, and would have been $9.03 if not for accounting costs from employee stock compensation and restructuring charges related to Google's acquisition ofMotorola Mobility, a cellphone maker.
Still, analysts polled by FactSet, a provider of financial data, were expecting $10.63 per share.
Besides disappointing investors, the report was an embarrassment for Google. Near the top of the draft, the report said, "PENDING LARRY QUOTE," apparently a place to insert a quote from Larry Page, one of Google's founders.
The earnings report said that Google made about 15 percent less than a year earlier each time a user clicks on an online ad. That is the fourth straight quarter of erosion in Google's ad prices.
QUIZ: Stock market quiz: Can you predict the market based on the trader's face?
It is a warning sign for Facebook, which is trying to figure out how to make money off advertising on mobile devices.
Facebook stock declined 90 cents, or 4.6 percent, at $18.98, with most of the loss coming after Google's earnings report. The company went public in May at $38, but it has fallen as low as $17.55, in part because of investor concerns about ads.
"Google and Facebook are very reliant on online ads," said Scott Kessler, head of technology sector equity research at S&P Capital IQ, a research firm. "So if Google's results indicate a lack of demand and growth, that's obviously a worry for Facebook."
Google is the third-largest component in the Nasdaq composite, behind Apple and Microsoft. TheNasdaq finished down 31.25 points at 3,072.87.
The broader market fared better: The Dow Jones industrial average closed down 8.06 points, or 0.06 percent, at 13,549.94. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 3.57 points, or 0.2 percent, to 1,457.34.
The broader market is "waiting for a clear catalyst," said Quincy Krosby, market strategist atPrudential Financial. What investors most want, she said, is a sense of direction about earnings and the economy.
"We basically know what happened in the last quarter," Krosby said. "What we're looking for is what's next: Are we turning a corner? Will demand pick up at the end of the year?"
Analysts expect S&P 500 companies to say that overall earnings shrank in the third quarter compared with a year ago, according to S&P Capital IQ. That would be the first drop in exactly three years.
American Express reported quarterly revenue late Wednesday that fell short of Wall Street's expectations even though earnings were in line. Amex said card holders' rate of spending has slowed in recent months. Its stock lost $1.76 to $57.61.
Strong profits for the insurer Travelers sent its stock up 3.6 percent. The company said claims from catastrophes plunged compared to the same quarter last year, which helped earnings double. Travelers' stock gained $2.56 to $73.94.
BB&T bank, Philip Morris International and Boston Scientific all fell after reporting results that fell short of forecasts. Microsoft fell in after-hours trading after reporting its earnings.
Weekly applications for unemployment benefits surged to a four-month high, a sharp rise from the previous week. The Labor Department pointed to technical reasons behind the swing, mainly delayed figures from one large state, California.
QUIZ: Stock market quiz: Can you predict the market based on the trader's face?
Better earnings from Johnson & Johnson and other companies, along with encouraging reports on industrial production and the housing market, have pushed the stock market higher this week. The Dow is up 1.6 percent and the S&P 500 is up 2 percent.
In other trading Thursday, the yield on the 10-year Treasury note was 1.83 percent, up from 1.82 percent Wednesday. The euro lost 0.4 cent against the dollar to $1.307. Crude oil fell 2 cents to $92.10 per barrel.
Among other stocks making big moves:
— EBay jumped $2.63, or 5.4 percent, to $50.83 after posting better net income and more revenue from its PayPal payments service and its online markets. The company also raised its full-year estimates for earnings and sales.
— Verizon Communications surged $1.06, or 2.4 percent, to $45.78. The company said its wireless division signed up more customers in the quarter. Verizon said its customers also added more devices to its Share Everything plan.

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Sunday, October 21, 2012


By AFP
PARIS
Middle Eastern oil and gas companies have been targeted in massive attacks on their computer networks in an increasingly open cyber war where a new virus was discovered just this past week.

The United States and Israel, believed to behind the first cyber sabotage campaign that targeted Iran's nuclear program, are now worried about becoming targeted themselves.
"There have been increasing efforts to carry out cyber attacks on Israel's computer infrastructure," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said earlier this month, without giving details.

Netanyahu spoke just days after Washington issued a veiled warning to Iran over digital attacks and outlined a new digital warfare doctrine.

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta also referred publicly for the first time about the "Shamoon" virus that hit Saudi Arabia's state oil company Aramco in August, disabling more than 300,000 computers.

The virus also hit Rasgas, a joint venture between US oil firm Exxon Mobil Corp and state-controlled Qatar Petroleum.

Panetta called the sophisticated virus "the most destructive attack that the private sector has seen to date."

It took Aramco, the world's biggest oil company, two weeks after the August 15 attack to restore its main internal network, but the group said that oil production had not been disrupted.

However the threat that digital attacks could cripple vital infrastructure is real, with Panetta warning of the possibility of a "cyber-Pearl Harbor" to justify a policy of moving aggressively against threats.

A disruption to Saudi Arabia's oil exports could cause oil prices to spike from their already elevated prices and tip the fragile global economy into recession.

In what was interpreted as a veiled threat against Iran, Panetta said the U.S. military "has developed the capability to conduct effective operations to counter (cyber) threats to our national interests."

A senior U.S. administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told AFP the cyber-attack on the Gulf oil giants was believed to be carried out by a "state actor" and acknowledged that Iran would be a prime suspect.

U.S. officials have "more than a suspicion" that Iran was to blame for the August attacks, said James Lewis, who has worked for the State Department and other government agencies on national security and cyber issues and who is now a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.

He said the U.S. authorities were used to cyber espionage from Russia and China, but were surprised by the swift rise in Iran's digital warfare capability.

"A lot of people didn't think it would develop this quickly," he said.

However it is unsurprising that Iran would seek a cyber-warfare capability after having hundreds of centrifuges used to enrich uranium ruined by the Stuxnet virus in 2010.

Stuxnet marked a transformation for computer viruses, which had previously been used for spying or by organized crime, into a tool for sabotage.

It is widely suspected to have been the work of the United States and Israel, which believe Iran's nuclear program aims to produce a bomb.

Tehran insists its nuclear program is for peaceful uses only. Iran has been victim of other digital attacks as well.

In April it was forced to unplug computers at its Kharg oil terminal from the Internet after they came under cyber-attack, and in November last year an explosion at a missile terminal was attributed by U.S. media to a computer virus.

Only 'scratched the surface' of cyber warfare in Middle East

Kaspersky Labs, which detected the "Flame" and "Gauss" viruses believed behind those attacks, announced Monday it had found a new cyber espionage weapon it dubbed "miniFlame.”

It described the virus as "a high precision, surgical attack tool ... designed to steal data and control infected systems during targeted cyber espionage operations."

Kaspersky said "we have only just scratched the surface of the massive cyber espionage operations ongoing in the Middle East. Their full purpose remains obscure and the identity of the victims and the attackers remains unknown."

Christian Harbulot, the head of the Economic Warfare School in Paris, warned that "it is extremely difficult to undo the knot" in what is also a propaganda war.

He said Iran could be behind the "Shamoon" virus, but that "it could be an additional pretext to weaken Iran" which is already under international embargo over its nuclear program.

For Nicolas Arpagian at France's National Institute of Advanced Security and Justice Studies, the latest attacks "show that arsenal of digital weapons is getting bigger, and that when you have such an arsenal the use of cyber weapons is bound to become more commonplace."
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