Latest news

Netflix has confirmed another expansion to their streaming catalog, adding new seasons of popular shows.

The service has added the final seasons of both "The Office" and "30 Rock," alongside the latest seasons of Parenthood and Parks and Rec.

Netflix has an ongoing deal with NBC, last updated in 2011.

If you are a superfan of the show, you can now binge watch all 192 episodes of The Office, start to finish, and all 135 episodes of 30 Rock.

For the time being, the updated seasons are available only in the U.S.

Late last month, Apple unveiled two new iPhones for their loyal consumers, the iPhone 5C and the iPhone 5S.

The 5S would be the new flagship device while the iPhone 5C would take the place of the iPhone 5 at a lower price point. The "C" in 5C stands for "communication" but it might as well stand for color as the device was made to stand out with a new lineup of colorful models.

Apple has used their marketing muscle (and let's face it, genius) in creating the iPhone 5C, which is not a new device at all, but it is certainly made to look and feel like one. When launched with the updated iOS 7, which in itself is more colorful and refined, Apple does a fine job of making a repackaged iPhone 5 seem like a brand new phone.

On to the phone itself, continue with our review to see if the device is worth your $99 (on contract), or $550 (off contract).

Symantec has managed to shrink the ZeroAccess botnet by around a quarter, cutting off over 500,000 computers from the yet-unidentified operators of the notorious network.

The botnet hit as many as 1.9 million infected "zombie" PCs. Unlike other botnets that have been dismantled by targeting centralized command and control services, ZeroAccess uses a decentralized system where groups of infected computers communication new instructions from the operators of the networks.

Those unlucky enough to be part of the botnet likely have their computer used to mine BitCoins and carry out click fraud.

Symantec managed to cut off a huge chunk of zombie PCs from the botnet by poisoning the communications between infected computers. It started its operation when it noticed an updated ZeroAccess malware was going through the network which would make it much more difficult to disrupt communications.

ISPs have been informed about computers that have been axed from the botnet by Symantec, so that their customers can be told they are running infected machines.

The European Commission has indicated that it is closer to a settlement with search giant Google in a three-year old anti-trust probe.

After being told by the European regulatory body that it needs to go back and come up with more concessions, Google has reportedly provided more offers to Commissioners that could end the case.

"We have reached a key moment in this case. Now with significant improvements on the table, I think we have the possibility to work again," competition commissioner Joaquin Almunia told the European Parliament.

Specifics of Google's concessions were not revealed but they are expected to make Google's search results more clear. For example, Google's own services will be clearly identified as such in search results, while its rivals may also be able to attach their own corporate logos to results.

Website will also be able to control better what content from their site is shown on Google's results.

In 2010, a group of rivals in search and e-commerce complained to the European authorities that Google was abusing its dominant position in search to push its own other services ahead of those that compete with it.

The FBI has arrested the alleged operator of the Silk Road marketplace and has taken the hidden service offline.

The Silk Road was a marketplace for buying and selling narcotics, existing as a Hidden Service on The Onion Router (TOR) network. It enabled users to buy and sell narcotics - both illegal and prescription drugs - using the BitCoin digital currency.

For years the site operated without being located by law enforcement agencies, who instead had to rely on sting operations to attempt to disrupt the trade of drugs.

If you attempt to visit the Silk Road now, you will get the following notice.

According to a report, a small group of Microsoft investors are lobbying the Microsoft board to push Bill Gates out as chairman of the Redmond-based software giant.

Gates co-founded Microsoft 38 years ago and has been one of the biggest names in technology ever since. The success of Microsoft's products has made him one of the wealthiest individuals in the world, allowing him to focus primarily on philanthropic efforts after stepping down as Microsoft chief executive.

While he is still a popular figure at Microsoft, Reuters is citing sources familiar with a move at Microsoft by three of its top investors to have him step down as chairman. The investors, and the sources, remain unnamed.

Their argument is that the presence of Bill Gates as chairman will make it extremely difficult for a new chief executive to take the company in a new direction. Steve Ballmer is set to leave Microsoft very soon, though the board has insisted that his strategy will remain on course.

Gates owns roughly 4.5 percent of Microsoft, making him still the largest individual shareholder. He has been selling around 80 million shares of Microsoft per year under a pre-set plan, which if left continue will deplete his stake in Microsoft by 2018.

There have been a fair share of Apple iWatch rumors over the years, but only a few have really ever stuck.

One of those is that the company will almost certainly use a flexible OLED screen for the wearable device, and today we have another report claiming the same.

Chosun Ilbo reports that Apple has been prototyping the flexible displays, and that "a prototype of the 1.5-inch has already been made."

Additionally, 1.3 and 1.4 inch devices are being tested, as well.

As always, Apple has never confirmed the existence of the watch, which means it is definitely in the works, potentially with a 2014 release date.

The popular torrent tracker H33t.eu has gone dark.

Once a very popular site, the original H33t was taken down after court orders were obtained by Universal Music Group for copyright infringement.

In fact, H33t.com's nameservers were completely wiped from the domain records of its domain registrar Key-Systems, says TF.

The nameservers for the .EU doimain have been deleted, as well, and the site remains down.

A few commenters on the original source have found ways to access the files, but they require a workaround.

According to Quartz, Twitter will make its IPO filing public this week.

The social network filed with regulators on September 12th to go public, but it did so confidentially and with no timetable. The "S1" it filed is available for companies with under $1 billion in revenue.

Twitter is expected to be valued as high as $15 billion.

Sources say Twitter will pick the NYSE over the Nasdaq for its IPO, following Nasdaq's disastrous handling of the Facebook IPO last year.

If all goes well, Twitter will be a publicly traded company before the week of November 28th.

As the company continues to prove that it can do nothing right, BlackBerry has announced that it is still committed to releasing BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) for Android and iOS despite a failed launch a week ago.

The company had planned to launch the app last week, but it only made its way to the Australian iOS App Store before being pulled. A leaked Android .APK also broke the company's servers. Since then, the company has stayed mum on details of the app, leaving fans in the dark.

Today, BlackBerry gave a little update on the app:

Still 100% committed to bringing #BBM to Android and iPhone. Sign up at http://t.co/mr8J7pUDAT to know when #BBM4All

-- BBM (@BBM) September 30, 2013

Toshiba has announced today that it will layoff 3000 from its struggling TV division, a full 50 percent of the employees in that division.

In addition, the company will end production at two of its three overseas factories. It was unclear whether its factories in China, Indonesia or Poland would be the ones being closed.

Outsourced production would be increased by 100 percent, and 400 staff members that are being moved to other business units.

Toshiba's TV division has been losing money for two years straight due to weak sales for new devices in Europe and also at home, in Japan. The company recently announced it would cut back over $100 million in costs between its PC and TV divisions in 2013, and then double that figure next year.

According to TorrentFreak, the 'Breaking Bad' finale set a record for most pirated downloads in its first 12 hours of availability online.

Over 500,000 downloaded and shared the episode via just a few popular torrent sites, with most of the downloaders coming from Australia, the U.S. and UK.

"Data gathered by TorrentFreak shows that 12 hours after the first copy of the episode appeared online, more than half a million people has grabbed a copy through one of many torrent sites. Never before have so many people downloaded a Breaking Bad episode, making it a strong contender for a top spot in our most-pirated TV-shows of the year chart," the site wrote.

Despite being available live on TV in the U.S., TF believes most still find downloads more convenient: "One of the explanations for this defiant behavior is that these downloaders simply prefer to torrent the show out of habit. As reported earlier, even among those who have a Netflix subscription, many prefer to grab a copy via torrent sites as they find it more convenient."

Alleged internal documents from Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo appear to reference the oft-rumored Sony Xperia Z1 Mini.

The company recently launched the 'Honami' Xperia Z1, but following in the footsteps of other manufacturers, there will be a 'mini' version of the device.

In the documents, the phone is referenced to as the 'Sony Xperia Z1 f.'

The phone will be powered by a quad-core 2.2 GHz Snapdragon 800 and include the difference making 20.7 MP camera. The display will be much smaller, at 4.3" (720p) compared to the full-sized 5" 1080p display of the Z1. The phone will also be 127 x 64.9 x 9.4 mm vs 144 x 74 x 8.5 mm and the battery will be significantly smaller at 2300 mAh vs 3000 mAh.

Reports are coming in this week that Microsoft's Internet Explorer zero-day (CVE-2013-3893), which remains unpatched, has been exploited for at least three months now.

Microsoft first acknowledged the vulnerability earlier this month, and has issued one of their "Fix It" tools to help contain the dangers until a full patch is released.

Researchers at FireEye say the attacks can be tied to a Chinese hacking group and the attacks have been aimed at Japanese organizations.

Says researcher Alex Watson of Websense: "Our ThreatSeeker Intelligence Cloud reported a potential victim organization in Taiwan attempting to communicate with the associated malicious command and control server as far back as July 1, 2013. These C&C communications predate the widely-reported first use of this attack infrastructure by more than six weeks, and indicates that the attacks from this threat actor are not just limited to Japan."

"Websense Threat Intelligence indicates that the threat actor's attacks were not limited only to Japan as previously reported. The use of separate IP addresses, domain registrations, and permutations to dropper locations indicates a high degree of segmentation between attacks and different teams using the same tool sets, exploits and C&C infrastructure."

Lenovo has unveiled their Vibe Z flagship device today, following the launch of the Vibe X at this year's IFA event.

The Z has a metal body but a similar design to its older brother, and the company has said the phone is aimed at young adults outside of China.

On the spec side, the Vibe Z has a large 5.5" display with 1080p resolution, is powered by a 2.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 chipset, 2GB RAM and an Adreno 330 GPU.

At launch, the device will run on Android 4.2.2.

For cameras, the device has a 13MP rear sensor with LED flash, and the front has an overkill 5MP sensor. Overall, the phone is just 6.9mm thick.