Free Republic

As Bug Fighting Goes Year Round, Fans Bemoan Role of Performance-Enhancing Drugs, Money Like the baseball calendar in the U.S., China's cricket-fighting season is getting longer and longer. Purists fret that the pastime is being threatened by a money culture. Helping lead the effort to upend thousands of years of Chinese tradition is Xu Moxiao, a man determined to lengthen the customary autumn fighting season. He thinks year-round bug fights are better for fans and for the people who make money off the sport. "What I'm doing is trying to expand the good things," says Mr. Xu. Cricket fighting has...

Experts say the insects are from Asia and first appeared in Allentown, Pennsylvania back in 1996. They then spread throughout our area and beyond. There are no known predators, so the bugs continue to creep into homes through cracks and crevices. Experts say while last year was bad, this year will be worse. "I thought I heard something rattling in the baseboard and there were hundreds in one window," Wade added. Residents say they are under attack inside and outside of their home. "I was battling them out of the way," Milhaupt said. Milhaupt says she snags them with tissue,...

LS9, Inc., a privately-held industrial biotechnology company based in South San Francisco, specializes in the genetic alteration of bugs -- single-cell organisms, each a fraction of a billionth the size of an ant -- so that when they feed on agricultural waste like woodchips or wheat straw, they excrete crude oil.

Britain in grip of norovirus as cases hit 3m By Rebecca Smith, Medical Editor Last Updated: 1:50am GMT 12/01/2008 Three million people have been struck down by the winter vomiting bug - with experts fearing that cases could rise through this month and next. The norovirus season began a month earlier than normal this winter. Cases of the bug increased rapidly, with more than 200,000 people a week now catching the infection, official figures claim. Those with symptoms are urged to engage in good hygiene to prevent the virus spreading further Hospitals struggling to cope have closed hundreds of wards...

GPs urge millions hit by bug to stay at home By Rebecca Smith, Medical Editor and Aislinn Simpson Last Updated: 2:14am GMT 03/01/2008 Doctors' leaders warned people struck down by a violent stomach bug sweeping the country not to return to work as GPs reported that they were being inundated by sufferers. More than 100,000 people a week are catching norovirus, which causes sudden vomiting and diarrhoea, and the numbers contracting the disease will peak this month. The NHS advises patients affected to stay at home for 48 hours after they last suffered the symptoms Thousands of workers and children...

A flaw in Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT)'s Windows Home Server could lead to data loss under certain circumstances, the company has confirmed. Windows Home Server, released over the summer, aims to offer home users centralized media storage and home backup capabilities for networked PCs. Microsoft last week updated a support document acknowledging that files edited using certain programs and then stored on Windows Home Server could become corrupted. "Microsoft is researching this problem and will post more information in this article when the information becomes available," the Microsoft help documentation explains. "Until an update for Windows Home Server is available, we...

Unexplained Blue Cloud Floats, Darts Around Customers At Gas Station Witness: 'It Gives Me Chills' POSTED: 10:38 pm EST November 12, 2007 UPDATED: 10:54 pm EST November 12, 2007 A strange blue cloud seen floating and darting around customers, freezing for 30 minutes and then speeding from an Ohio gas station, remains unexplained even though it was caught on security cams. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- IMAGES: Strange Cloud Moves Around Station The ghostly image was seen moving near and over cars at a Marathon gas station located near the corner of State Road and Pleasant Valley in Parma on Sunday.

After 17 years underground, billions of cicadas emerging These flying insects live only about 30 days as adults, and their main goal will be mating.By TARA BURGHART The Associated Press CHICAGO | Coming soon: Brood XIII.It sounds like a bad horror movie. But it’s actually the name of the billions of cicadas expected to emerge this month in parts of the Midwest after spending 17 years underground.The red-eyed, shrimp-sized, flying insects don’t bite or sting. But they are known for mating calls that produce a din that can overpower ringing telephones, lawn mowers and power tools.Brood XIII is expected across...

Core Security is reporting a remote buffer exploit for the OpenBSD operating system. This is also being reported on /. Title: OpenBSD's IPv6 mbufs remote kernel buffer overflow Class: Buffer Overflow Remotely Exploitable: Yes Locally Exploitable: No   Advisory URL:http://www.coresecurity.com/?action=item&id=1703Vendors contacted:OpenBSD.org   Vulnerability Description The OpenBSD kernel contains a memory corruption vulnerability in the code that handles IPv6 packets. Exploitation of this vulnerability can result in: 1) Remote execution of arbitrary code at the kernel level on the vulnerable systems (complete system compromise), or; 2) Remote denial of service attacks against vulnerable systems (system crash due to a kernel panic)...

There is a major zero day bug announced in solaris 10 and 11 with the telnet and login combination. It has been verified. In my opinion NOBODY be should running telnet open to the internet. Versions of Solaris 9 and lower do not appear to have this vulnerability. The issue: The telnet daemon passes switches directly to the login process which looks for a switch that allows root to login to any account without a password. If your telnet daemon is running as root it allows unauthenticated remote logins. Telnet should be disabled. Since 1994 the cert.org team has recommended...

The number of Colorado lodgepole pines killed by bark beetles jumped nearly fivefold in 2006 as the explosive, decadelong bug epidemic continues to gain steam. About 4.8 million lodgepoles were killed this year, up from roughly 1 million trees last year, according to Bob Cain, an entomologist with the U.S. Forest Service in Golden. The lodgepole acreage under attack by mountain pine beetles jumped about 50 percent this year to 644,840 acres, up from 430,526 acres last year. The new numbers, which are considered preliminary, come from aerial tree-damage surveys conducted this summer. "We had a significant increase in both...

New strain of hospital bug linked to 49 deaths By Caroline Davies (Filed: 02/10/2006) A virulent strain of a superbug has been linked to at least 49 deaths in three Leicester hospitals this year, the local NHS trust has revealed. Figures released by the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust said the superbug clostridium difficile (C Diff) was probably responsible for the deaths of 28 patients, and possibly contributed to the deaths of a further 21 found to be infected. Another 29 cases have been referred to the coroner. The superbug, a common cause of diarrhoea, is carried without side...

Security flaw in RealVNC 4.1.1   Update #2 (05/11/2006) - We have a proof of concept. You can see if your vulnerable. See our latest post for details Update (05/08/2006) - We have installed RealVNC 4.1.1 on as many fresh computers as possible. We wanted to make sure this is a real problem - indeed it is. Every single time we were able to access the machine without a valid password. We are still trying to see what is different about our viewer that exposes this flaw. We are currently developing a new product that would allow users to...

New York -- A federal judge said Friday the government was within constitutional boundaries when it put a powerful eavesdropping device in a cell phone, turning a suspected mobster into what one defense lawyer called a "human microphone." The judge said the government got proper approval from other judges as it steadily increased the scope of audio surveillance in an effort to destroy the leadership of the Gambino crime family during a three-year probe. The eavesdropping was initially limited to a cell phone and a restaurant but was eventually expanded so the recording device could be used in any location...

Australians win Nobel for linking bug to ulcers 13:56 03 October 2005 NewScientist.com news service Andy Coghlan Two Australians have won the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for establishing that bacteria cause stomach ulcers, it was announced on Monday. Working at the Royal Perth Hospital, Barry Marshall and Robin Warren established beyond all doubt in the 1980s that Helicobacter pylori causes stomach ulcers by infecting and aggravating the gut lining. Moreover, they showed that ulcers could be cured altogether by killing the bacteria with antibiotics. Hitherto, ulcers had been considered uncurable. Instead, patients' symptoms were treated with a...

Small but perfectly formed, Pelagibacter ubique is a lean machine stripped down to the bare essentials for life.Humans have around 30,000 genes that determine everything from our eye colour to our sex but Pelagibacter has just 1,354, US biologists report in the journal Science. What is more, Pelagibacter has none of the genetic clutter that most genomes have accumulated over time. There are no duplicate gene copies, no viral genes, and no junk DNA. 'Chicken soup'The spareness of its genome is related to its frugal lifestyle. The shorter the length of DNA that needs to be copied each generation, the...

A security update for the Firefox open-source browser has been released by the Mozilla Foundation, a move that follows the public disclosure of exploit code for two "extremely critical" vulnerabilities. Mozilla Firefox 1.0.4, released Wednesday, addresses vulnerabilities that surfaced earlier this week. The update includes several security fixes, as well as a fix to DHTML errors that were encountered at some Web sites, according to a posting on Mozilla's Web site. The update is designed to address the two flaws, which when combined could allow malicious attackers to engage in cross-site scripting and remote system access. Although the two vulnerabilities...

Firefox seems to be heading Internet Explorer's way with security research company Secunia stating on its website that two vulnerabilities found in the popular browser can be exploited to conduct cross-site scripting attacks and compromise a user's system. The Mozilla Foundation is aware of the two potentially critical Firefox security vulnerabilities. They maintain that there are currently no known active exploits of these vulnerabilities though a "proof of concept" has been reported. Mozilla stated that it is aggressively working to provide a more comprehensive solution to these potential vulnerabilities and will provide that solution in a forthcoming security update. Users...

RealNetworks has released a security patch to fix a flaw in its RealPlayer software that could allow compromised code to be run on users computers. The flaw, which was rated "highly critical" by Secunia, is in the most recent versions of the software for both Windows and OS X. Also, Secunia said that some of the older Linux versions were at risk for the flaw. "RealNetworks has received no reports of machines compromised as a result of the now-remedied vulnerabilities," the company said on its website. "RealNetworks takes all security vulnerabilities very seriously."

Symantec has reported glitches in its antivirus software that could allow hackers to launch denial-of-service attacks on computers running the applications. In a notice posted on its Web site this week, Symantec detailed two similar vulnerabilities found in its Norton AntiVirus software, which is sold on its own or bundled in Norton Internet Security and Norton System Works. The flaws, which could lead to computers crashing or slowing severely if attacked, are limited to versions of the software released for 2004 and 2005. The Information-Technology Promotion Agency of Japan, a government-affiliated tech watchdog group, identified the first instance of the...

Just a day after one security firm warned of a vulnerability in Firefox and Mozilla, a rival disclosed that another eight threaten the open-source browsers. The Danish security firm Secunia on Tuesday laid out the flaws, most of which could be used by criminals to spoof, or fake, various aspects of a Web site, ranging from its SSL secure site icon to the contents of an inactive tab. Other bugs can be exploited remotely by hackers able to introduce code of their own choosing on the vulnerable machine, possibly taking control of it or giving them access to files. For...

Electronic bug found in police station State police are investigating the discovery of a listening device found in a clerical office at Providence police headquarters. 01:00 AM EST on Monday, February 14, 2005 BY GERALD M. CARBONE Journal Staff Writer PROVIDENCE -- A worker in Police Department headquarters found what is thought to be a sophisticated listening device covertly mounted beneath her desk, and the Rhode Island State Police are investigating whether someone was bugging the department. According to police Sgt. Robert Paniccia, president of Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 3, this is what happened: Last Monday at 5:30 a.m.,...

For a market segment Microsoft was said to have won decisively in the mid-1990s, the company spent a lot of time in 2004 putting out fires on the browser front. Like the ghost of the Netscape browser rising to haunt its slayer, Firefox emerged with a vengeance from the Mozilla open-source group, which was founded by Netscape in 1998 and last year spun off by parent company Time Warner. Firefox started off the year a prerelease, name-challenged project by a group that had lost much of its credibility after chronic delays and significant setbacks. But Firefox ended 2004 as a...

Java bug could hit PC operating systems17:51 24 November 04NewScientist.com news service The discovery of a serious software bug has simultaneously opened a variety of desktop computers to potential attack. The flaw has been found in Java, which works on a variety of computer operating systems – from Microsoft’s Windows to free software Linux – which means any worm which exploits it could hit a variety of computer platforms. The flaw is rated "highly critical" by the computer security firm Secunia and some experts believe it could lead to the development of a cross-platform computer worm. The bug was...

Navy battle software unsafe <"Peter G. Neumann" <Redacted for his sake...GS>> Tue, 12 Oct 2004 09:02:47 -0400 [Source: Article by Neil Mackay, Investigations Editor, *Sunday Herald* (Scotland), 10 Oct 2004] The Royal Navy's new, state-of-the-art destroyer has been fitted with combat management software that can be hacked into, crashes easily and is vulnerable to viruses, according to one of the system's designers who was fired after raising his concerns. Gerald Wilson, who has 25 years' experience designing naval software, worked for Alenia Marconi Systems (AMS) in a joint venture with Bae Systems and the Italian company Finmeccanica on the combat...

When the Bush administration took over the Pentagon's beleaguered inspector general office in 2002, officials found something startling: The director's office, at some point, had been electronically bugged.     Sorting out why the listening device was inside the walls of the office, with a cord leading to another office, is just one issue that had to be addressed by Joseph E. Schmitz, President Bush's pick three years ago to be the Defense Department's top cop.     A Naval Academy graduate and civil litigation lawyer, Mr. Schmitz was tapped to run the office responsible for investigating million-dollar fraud in the far-flung defense industry...

BOSTON - Popular Microsoft Corp. products may be vulnerable to a security vulnerability that is similar to one patched for the Mozilla Web browsers last week.

Koch: Moore's propaganda film cheapens debate, polarizes nation By Ed Koch SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM Monday, June 28, 2004 It is shocking to me that Americans in a time of war, and we literally are at war with Americans being deliberately killed in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere by Islamic terrorists, will attack their own country, sapping its strength and making its enemies stronger. I am not a supporter of the xenophobic slogan “My country right or wrong.” But I do believe, when seeking to make it right if it is wrong, that none of us should endanger the country, our...

Two new vulnerabilities have been discovered in Internet Explorer which allow a complete bypass of security and provide system access to a computer, including the installation of files on someone's hard disk without their knowledge, through a single click. Worse, the holes have been discovered from analysis of an existing link on the Internet and a fully functional demonstration of the exploit have been produced and been shown to affect even fully patched versions of Explorer. It has been rated "extremely critical" by security company Secunia, and the only advice is to disable Active Scripting support for all but trusted...

Microsoft warns of 3 "critical" flaws Tue 13 April, 2004 21:36 By Reed Stevenson SEATTLE (Reuters) - Microsoft has warned that three "critical"-rated flaws in the Windows operating system and other programs could allow hackers to sneak into personal computers and snoop on sensitive data. The security warning was announced with another software vulnerability rated "important" as part of Microsoft's monthly security bulletin. The warning was issued with a software patch that fixes the problem on Windows operating systems dating back to Windows 98, as well as software that is part of Internet Explorer and the Outlook express e-mail program....

April 8 ? Sonny Ramaswamy is trying to walk a very fine line. He doesn't want to be seen as an alarmist, but he thinks people ought to know about the thought that keeps haunting him these days. Ramaswamy, who chairs the department of entomology at Kansas State University, is concerned that the tiny little insects he has spent a lifetime studying could become implements of international terrorism. It's possible, he says, that even a stable fly, or something as tiny as an aphid, could be used to distribute deadly pathogens over a wide geographical area in a surprisingly...

'This goes no further...'By Brian Wheeler BBC News Online Magazine Following revelations about bugging at the United Nations, is there any way of ensuring that your private conversations stay that way? News that Kofi Annan and other senior UN figures may have been routinely bugged by US or British security services has caused a huge political row around the world. But it will also have caused alarm among other people in the public eye who deal with sensitive information - or anyone, indeed, who values their privacy. If the secretary general of the United Nations cannot prevent his private conversations...

Colossians 2:8 Beware lest any man cheat you by philosophy and vain deceit: according to the tradition of men according to the elements of the world and not according to Christ. Annibale Bugnini.Up until the turbulent 1960s, Catholic Liturgy and the mass we celebrated had been the result of centuries of divine inspiration, historic experience, wisdom, refinement, debate and the school of hard knocks. Those who developed our worship service, canon law and collective ethos throughout these centuries  (politely putting aside Jesus Himself for a moment) were church elders, wise-men and saints who had managed to build the greatest and...

When you point to a hyperlink in Microsoft Internet Explorer, Microsoft Outlook Express, or Microsoft Outlook, the address of the Web site typically appears in the Status bar at the bottom of the window. After you click a link that opens in Internet Explorer, the address of the Web site typically appears in the Internet Explorer Address bar, and the title of the Web page typically appears in the Title bar of the window. However, a malicious user could create a link to a deceptive (spoofed) Web site that displays the address, or URL, to a legitimate Web site in...

Tourists and immigrants 'behind US bed bug plague' By Charles Laurence in New York (Filed: 21/12/2003) Bed bugs have invaded the United States for the first time in 50 years, munching their way through sleeping victims in an infestation described by pest controllers as being "out of control". European travellers and Third World immigrants are being blamed for bringing the bugs back to the US, with 28 American states reporting recent infestations. To their shame and horror, wealthy home owners and guests staying at expensive hotels have woken up covered in red, itchy welts, as well as people living in...

Posted on Thu, Nov. 13, 2003 Two Phila. union chiefs subpoenaed The federal grand jury investigating corruption summoned a Street ally and his son, a source said. By Nancy Phillips and Emilie Lounsberry Inquirer Staff Writers A Philadelphia union leader who is a major supporter of Mayor Street has been subpoenaed to appear before a federal grand jury that is investigating corruption in city government, according to a court-system source familiar with the labor official. Samuel Staten Sr., business manager of Local 332 of the Laborers' International Union of North America and a longtime Street ally, and his son, Samuel...

Posted on Fri, Oct. 24, 2003 Bug Didn't Incriminate Mayor By Mark Fazlollah, Joseph Tanfani, Emilie Lounsberry and Nathan Gorenstein Inquirer Staff Writers The bug planted in Mayor Street's City Hall office did not record any incriminating words from the mayor during its brief, two-week life, The Inquirer has learned. The discovery of the FBI listening device, found so soon after it was installed, set back the wide-ranging corruption investigation that is mainly focused on the awarding of city contracts in exchange for campaign contributions. It also ignited a public furor that has blotted out all other issues in the...

Posted on Thu, Oct. 23, 2003 U.S. officials: Bug not political By Joseph A. Slobodzian and Nancy Phillips Inquirer Staff Writers The extraordinary decision to bug Mayor Street's office was a necessary step in a continuing federal investigation and was not politically motivated, the region's top federal law enforcement officials said yesterday. U.S. Attorney Patrick L. Meehan and FBI Special Agent Jeffrey Lampinski said federal authorities never intended for the bug to be discovered weeks before a close election. "Certainly nobody wanted to have any negative impact on the election," Meehan said in the lobby of the Sheraton Society Hill...

Second Thoughts By: William W. Lawrence 10/14/2003 Urgent message to Mayor Street: Call David Novak -- just in case. Novak is an ex-con who wrote Downtime: A Guide to Federal Incarceration. He now makes an honest living by tutoring white-collar wrongdoers on how to spend their time in the slammer. Some Novak tips: Inmate etiquette dictates that you don't rat, don't cut in line, don't reach, don't ask, don't touch, don't whine and flush often. He says pack light: The only personal property permitted is one soft-covered religious text, a religious medallion worth less than $50, a pair of eyeglasses,...

Thursday, Oct 09, 2003 Posted on Thu, Oct. 09, 2003 MAYOR NO TARGET BUT FEW KNOW OR WILL SAY WHAT'S UP WITH BUG By DAVE DAVIES & CHRIS BRENNAN daviesd@phillynews.com Yong Kim / Daily News Mayor Street's office in City Hall, where listening device was found Tuesday after police conducted routine sweep. MAYOR STREET said last night that he's been assured he is not the target of the FBI investigation that led to the installation of an electronic bug in his City Hall office. But that doesn't necessarily mean Street is in the clear. Neither Street nor federal prosecutors would...

FBI Steps Up ProbeBy Emilie Lounsberry, Mark Fazlollah and Clea BensonInquirer Staff Writers A wide-ranging federal investigation of alleged corruption in City Hall broke into the open yesterday, as FBI agents seized records from people with political ties to Mayor Street.In several searches across the city, federal agents rushed to preserve possible evidence the day after Philadelphia police found a listening device that the FBI had planted in the ceiling of Street's City Hall office.Yesterday morning, agents raided a small financial firm run by two Street supporters, including one of Philadelphia's most prominent Muslim leaders. Under Street's administration, the firm...

NBC News has confirmed that it was federal investigators who placed an electronic device in Philadelphia mayor's John Street office. NBC News correspondent Pete Williams said that several sources confirmed to him that the device was placed in the office by the U.S. government. However, a law enforcement official cautioned that the presence of the bug there does not necessarily mean that the mayor, himself, is under investigation. Officials confirmed to NBC News it was put in place by federal investigators, though they won't say specifically whether it was the work of the FBI or another agency. Williams said it...

Posted on Wed, Oct. 08, 2003 Mayor Street's office buggedBy Thomas J. Gibbons Jr., Leonard N. Fleming and Craig R. McCoyInquirer Staff Writers A sophisticated electronic listening device with multiple microphones was found yesterday morning hidden in the ceiling of Mayor Street's City Hall office.Within hours, the FBI said that the eavesdropping device was not related to the mayor's race, but declined to explain how it knew that so quickly.Pressed whether federal investigators themselves might have planted the bug, FBI spokeswoman Linda Vizi said the agency "would not confirm or deny" whether that was the case.Street emerged from his...

Scientists have discovered the world's toughest life form. The single-celled microbe, called "strain 121" for the moment, can survive at a scorching 130C higher than the boiling point of water and nearly 20 degrees higher than the previous record holder. The discovery is announced today in the journal Science by Derek Lovley and Kazem Kashefi of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. It raises the possibility that life began on earth earlier than currently thought. "Our goal was not to break the temperature limit," said Prof Lovley. "As part of the general characterisation of any organism, you look at what...

Say goodbye to the love bug. The last original Volkswagen Beetle, the tiny car that became an icon of the flower-power generation, rolled off a Mexican assembly line yesterday. A mariachi band strummed as workers put the finishing touches on a baby-blue model marked No. 21,529,464 - the last of seven decades' worth of the beloved vehicles. "You didn't just participate in the construction of a car, but in the creation of a legend," Volkswagen executive Reinhard Jung told a crowd of workers. The last original bug will be shipped to a museum in Wolfsburg, Germany, home of Volkswagen's world...

JERUSALEM - An Israeli woman swallowed a cockroach and then a fork she used to try to remove the insect from her throat. The winged cockroach jumped into the 32-year-old woman's mouth as she was cleaning her home in a village in northern Israel this week. "It's a bit of a strange story," said Dr. Nikola Adid, who operated on the woman Tuesday to remove the fork from her stomach. "This is the first time I've ever encountered anything like this. None of my medical colleagues in this country have heard of anything similar either." An X-ray showed the fork,...

Curtain to Fall on VW Beetle, Icon of Flower Power Fri June 6, 2003 09:09 PM ET FRANKFURT, Germany (Reuters) - The original Volkswagen Beetle, the ubiquitous German car born in the Nazi drive for a "people's car" and later an icon of the hippie revolution, will roll off a production line for the last time this summer. Europe's largest auto maker Volkswagen said Friday the last of its factories still producing the bulky little car -- in Puebla, Mexico -- would close its assembly line after nearly 50 years. In the model's 70-year history, 22 million air-cooled Beetles were...

Excerpt from e-mail I received today. Check the link -- it did in fact crash IE when I tried it. Dunno how well-known this is. I'm writing this to you with my Mozilla browser, because IE justcrashed on the exploit of the bug at<http://vibrantlogic.com/new.html> whose entire page source is thesefive lines:       <html>      <form>      <input type crash>      </form>      </html> Details follow. -~^~-"Description:A vulnerability identified in a library included in Windows XP andInternet Explorer version 4.0 and newer can be exploited to cause aDoS (Denial of Service) on certain applications. The vulnerability is caused due to a NULL pointer dereference bug...

Microsoft has confirmed reports received by The Register that Windows 2000 PCs running a specific version of Office 2000 have been hit by sudden, unexpected requests to continually register the software with Microsoft. The glitch could leave thousands of Office users unable to continue using their software. The problem appears to centre on the Select Customer - ie. non-academic volume licence purchasers - version of the Office 2000 Service Release 1 (SR-1) running on Win2k. The Office 2000 Product Registration Wizard appears when any Office app is launched and invites the user to register. There's no way to get rid...

Microsoft has confirmed reports received by The Register that Windows 2000 PCs running a specific version of Office 2000 have been hit by sudden, unexpected requests to continually register the software with Microsoft. The glitch could leave thousands of Office users unable to continue using their software. The problem appears to centre on the Select Customer - ie. non-academic volume licence purchasers - version of the Office 2000 Service Release 1 (SR-1) running on Win2k. The Office 2000 Product Registration Wizard appears when any Office app is launched and invites the user to register. There's no way to get rid...