Moving and Storage Business News

The News Review:

- Another way, another bay
- P2P Threats Call In The Copyright Cops
- The Winchester Star
- Clean winners

Another way, another bay
The Age – Jan 26, 2008
Despite a $100 million, 15,000-page environmental study, debaterages around the environmental safety of the project, especiallythe dredging of 2 million tonnes of toxic sediment — a150-year-old mess of zinc, mercury, lead, DDT and dieldrin —from the mouth of the Yarra. The movement of this toxic cocktail,and its storage in the middle of the bay off Mordialloc, bringswith it unknown risks to the marine ecology and the reputation ofthis city. All agree Port Phillip Bay is simply not deep enough for the newbreed of mega-cargo ships. It is a port for the 19th or 20thcenturies not the 21st. Many international cities have faced thesame problems and resolved them with bold, difficult decisions thatcreated major opportunities along the way…
Professor Bill Russell, director ofMelbourne University’s Australasian transport centre, backs the Foxproposal and the speeding up of Hastings as an important move. Fox’s vision is to make Hastings the premier port and to developlarge, rail-linked depots at Dandenong, Somerton and Laverton asdistribution points into the suburbs and regions. Where Fox andRussell part company somewhat is in Fox’s belief that the rail,road and distribution network is already in place to achievethis. Russell — who has advised the Government on a wide range ofmatters including port strategy — says the infrastructure is”half way there”, pointing out that to move containers out ofHastings the only existing rail option is via the Frankston linethat runs to platform 10 at Flinders Street. To move containersefficiently they have to be double stacked and, says Russell,double-stacked containers simply will not fit under FederationSquare. He says linking Hastings to the city’s rail network and to outersuburban distribution points needs careful thought and planning;various options are possible. To get Hastings moving, says Russell,detailed planning work should be done now as part of Sir RodEddington’s current inquiry into east-west transport needs.

P2P Threats Call In The Copyright Cops
InformationWeek – Jan 26, 2008
The product starts at $19,995. Audible Magic ups the ante by finding copyrighted material based on digital fingerprints. The company says its CopySense technology won’t be fooled by compression or distortion as it scans the contents of a file rather than looking for metadata or telltale watermarks or embedded tags. In addition to the education market, Audible Magic has a number of municipal customers protecting large-scale public Wi-Fi deployments. The company also hosts an enormous content registry–the CopySense appliance relies on a growing database of more than 6 million copyrighted works to validate music, video, and software. We see Audible Magic as holding the most promise for accuracy and limiting false positives, but we haven’t tested the platform in our lab. Our biggest concern would be efficacy versus encrypted data streams…
Packeteer and other bandwidth shapers offer granular control and analysis at the packet level to sift TCP and UDP flows. All of these vendors continually update their signature files and detection methodologies as new P2P variants emerge. If there’s no room in the budget for specialized software, established strategies, such as locking down the desktop, stateful traffic monitoring, storage analysis, and gateway filtering, still make sense. Often, the functionality exists in your existing security infrastructure to block P2P. Heck, even basic virtual LAN ACLs may minimize illicit internal file sharing without impacting access to legitimate resources. There are legitimate uses for peer-to-peer traffic and distribution of media files. To paraphrase, P2P apps don’t pirate music, people pirate music using P2P apps.

The Winchester Star
Winchester Star – Jan 26, 2008
USIS, based in Falls Church, is now in the process of filling 100 slots for research analyst and investigator positions. About 50 employees have already been hired and are moving into the area, said Damon Hudson, a district manager for USIS’ investigative services division. Meanwhile, company officials are looking to hire more employees locally. While USIS is setting up operations in the Winchester area, Hudson said he can’t reveal the location or details about the new contract…
11 North near Stephenson. The FBI will be also centralize its records storage operations in a new office complex just north of the FEMA building in 2010. "Those are two good examples of how [federal agencies] will be moving westward," said Hudson, who’s office is based in Fairfax. Hudson, said he’s excited about his role in helping USIS bring jobs into his hometown, and that the company will be holding job fairs as local operations continue to expand. "We’re looking for a specific profile when hiring locally, and you have to have top secret clearance," he said. Included in that profile is a minimum of a bachelor’s degree and the ability to work independently.

Clean winners
The Age – Jan 26, 2008
If you have ever wondered about how effectively (or otherwise)hygiene is maintained in those important, behind-the-scenes areason cruiseliners, such as food preparation and storage zones,there’s now a way to find out before you buy your fare. The US Government’s Centres for Disease Control and Prevention(CDC) has a Vessel Sanitation Program that monitors all cruiseships visiting US ports, and this includes most of the shipsvisiting Australia. Ships are subject to two surprise inspections a year, with CDCofficers checking areas including galleys, restaurants,self-service buffets, laundry areas, room-service operations,children’s play areas and medical centres. Points are awarded forcleanliness in each area, with 100 points the maximum possiblescore. The inspections are making news this month after the CDC awardedperfect scores to MSC Cruises liner Lirica and SeaDream YachtClub’s SeaDream I from inspections in December…
THE CLEANEST SHIPSMSC LiricaSeaDream IDiamond PrincessEmerald PrincessNoordam HollandNorwegian DreamNorwegian DawnSeven Seas MarinerSummitLiberty of the SeasAdventure of the SeasPacific PrincessCoral PrincessSapphire PrincessCaribbean PrincessGolden PrincessCarnival PrideStar PrincessMillenniumEach ship received a perfect cleanliness score of 100 fromCentres for Disease Control and Prevention. Discs a hit at seaFall ill on some cruise ships and the doctor could spend moretime looking at a CD than your body. Crystal Cruises has struck adeal with a technologycompany that allows cruise passengers to store their medical anddental records on a disc the size of a credit card. Passengers pay a fee of $US149 ($169) and authorise the companyto gather relevant data from doctors and dentists and store it on adisc. Crystal spokesman Thomas Mazloum says the service gives“incredible security and peace of mind” to people with specifichealth issues who are far from home. Crystal is one of the world’s top-rated cruise lines. One of itsships, Crystal Serenity, will be in Australian waters nextmonth.