After nearly a decade, Microsoft’s vision for how to protect especially sensitive information within Windows remains largely that–a vision. For years, the software giant has promised to deliver a secure way to shuttle around key bits of information. Once known as Palladium and more recently dubbed the Next Generation Secure Computing Base, or NGSCB, the approach was once a key part of Longhorn, the next version of Windows. Although the first piece of that is arriving in Longhorn, it’s only a thin sliver of what Microsoft has been working toward since describing its idea of "trusted Windows" a decade ago.

A hacker has created a virus that targets music lovers by deleting MP3 files on infected computers, according to antivirus company Sophos. The worm, dubbed Nopir.B, spreads over peer-to-peer networks and appears to have originated in France, security researchers at Sophos said Friday. Nopir.B is designed to look like a DVD-cracking program, to fool people looking for a program that will circumvent copy-restriction technology on the discs. When the worm is downloaded and run, it attempts to delete all MP3 music files and wipe some programs from the infected PC, the company said in its advisory. Sophos said it believes the author of the virus may be looking to stamp out music piracy.

Microsoft is announcing the general availability of the long-awaited 64-bit version of Windows later on Monday. The company will start selling 64-bit editions of both Windows Server 2003 and Windows XP Professional. The new Windows won’t be showing up on retail shelves, though. Customers who buy a desktop or server with a 64-bit chip will have the option of getting the new operating system, while people who own an existing 64-bit machine will have the option of trading in their old 32-bit Windows for the 64-bit upgrade.

Microsoft on Monday plans to show off pretty much the dream portable computer–a tiny tablet computer as thin as ten sheets of paper with a camera, a battery that lasts all day, and a price of about $800. The only problem is that it’s still several years from reality. Microsoft commissioned the 6-inch-screen prototype, but still doesn’t know exactly when it will be commercially feasible. It will probably come at least a year or two after the arrival of Longhorn, the new version of Windows set to ship at the end of next year.

Workers distracted by phone calls, emails and text messages suffer a greater loss of IQ than a person smoking marijuana, a British study shows. The constant interruptions reduce productivity and leave people feeling tired and lethargic, according to a survey carried out by TNS Research and commissioned by Hewlett Packard.

MailList King brings all the power of a complete mailing list server to your PC, allowing you to easily create, manage and communicate with the people interested in your Web site, products or organization. MailList King integrates with all popular email software (Outlook, Outlook Express, Eudora, Netscape, etc.) or directly with your mail servers to retrieve mailing list messages (subscribes, unsubscribes, undeliverable messages, etc.) and deliver processing acknowledgments, double opt-in confirmations and the personalized, rich text messages that you create. Version 5.11 has been released, with unsubscriber list importing, improved member forwarding and various fixes.

Microsoft officials told beta testers on Thursday that the second beta release of its Windows Server 2003 R2 update is now available for download. Microsoft made the R2 Beta 2 bits available on its Betaplace Web site. R2 is a fairly minor version of Windows Server, built on the recently released Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1) code base. R2 integrates a number of the myriad Windows Server 2003 feature packs that Microsoft has shipped since April 2003, plus adds a few new features.

We’re moving the ZATZ Online Store to a new server today, so there will be some downtime. It should be back up and running tomorrow. We’ll be moving the rest of the ZATZ Web sites over to new boxes in the next day or so, therefore there may be some site downtime. All should be running smoothly shortly.

Software engineers at Microsoft’s security research center confirmed a potentially dangerous security hole in fully patched Windows 2000 systems that could put users at risk of malicious hacker attacks. According to an advisory from Israel’s GreyMagic Software, the bug was detected in Windows Explorer, which allows users to navigate through the Windows file system by default. GreyMagic discovered that the preview pane, or Web view, in Windows Explorer could be targeted to launch malicious code on machines running Windows 2000 Professional, Windows 2000 Server and Windows 2000 Advanced Server. Any other application that uses the Web View library under Windows 2000 is also vulnerable, the company warned.

Microsoft announced disbursement of half a million dollars in scholarships, benefiting the largest number of undergraduates since the scholarship program’s inception in 1989. The announcement reflects the company’s commitment to making the technology field more accessible to a broader student population. Each year, Microsoft awards the scholarships to approximately 30 students from across the United States, Canada and Mexico in recognition of their passion for software, academic excellence and ability to make a difference in the software industry.