Lucent Technologies Inc. announced recently a 1.6 terabit per second long-haul optical networking system and said that Time Warner Telecom Inc. is the first customer for the new product. The Lucent WaveStar OLS 1.6Tb is a “high-capacity” dense wave division multiplexing (DWDM) system that Lucent says can enable every person in the U.S. and Canada to simultaneously transmit a one-page e-mail across the same network. Time Warner Telecom delivers last-mile broadband data, dedicated Internet access and voice services for businesses in 39 metropolitan areas in the U.S.
The WaveStar OLS 1.6Tb, which will be available this spring, offers up to 160 10Gbps of unidirectional wavelength on one fibre. The system uses Lucent’s “L-Band” optical amplifier, which enables network providers to transmit traffic through a previously unused frequency, or wavelength range, in a fibre. Using this amplifier and a new combiner/splitter that Lucent unveiled with the OLS 1.6Tb system, a network provider can double the number of wavelengths transmitted on the fibre from 80 to 160.
Variant of Melissa virus lifts its ugly head
Computer virus watchers are warning of a variant of the infamous Melissa virus that slips by detection software because of an altered file format. McAfee, a division of Network Associates Inc., said that it has received at least 20 reports of the virus, dubbed Melissa.w, striking. Hits have been reported in both Europe and the U.S.
McAfee has rated this variant of Melissa as a “low to medium risk,” which means it is not yet viewed as being as threatening as the original version of the virus, which is still rated “high risk.”
Linux Internet worm spotted
Kaspersky Lab, an international data-security software-development company, warns users about the real threat posed by the Ramen Internet-worm. According to recent reports, the worm has already caused several incidents of Web sites in different parts of the world being defaced. It has the ability to spread via the Internet and penetrates systems running Red Hat Linux versions 6.2 and 7.0. In order to gain access to a computer, the worm exploits three known security breaches in these operating systems. These breaches allow Ramen to take over the root access rights and unbeknownst to the user execute its code on the target systems.
Kaspersky Lab has received confirmation of Ramen penetrating several corporate networks. Among them are the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Texas A&M University, and Taiwan-based computer hardware manufacturer Supermicro. However, the aforementioned security breaches were discovered more than half a year ago. Right after this, Red Hat Linux developers immediately released corresponding security patches eliminating the problem.