Daily News Brief: Facebook Pulls an About-Face

Facebook to Address Privacy Concerns

Facebook went under fire from the social-networking community after it ratting out members about their shopping habits to those on their friends list. In response to the backlash, which includes a petition signed by 50,000 users, Facebook plans to change the Facebook Beacon feature, giving users the ability to control what information gets broadcast to other members.

XBox 360 Gets a Dash(ing) Update

XBox 360 fans can look for an updated Dashboard come early December, which will feature Inside XBox news feeds from XBox.com. Similar to the Playstation's Information Board, gamers can digest info on game releases, special events, and browse LIVE Marketplace offers. You can grab the update starting at 2am PST on December 4th.

PS3 Plods Ahead of Wii

For November, anyway. The Nintendo Wii has managed to outsell the competition on a consistent basis, flying off of store shelves just as soon as they land. But for the first time ever, Japan saw the Playstation 3 console jump ahead of the Wii, outselling the low priced competitor by roughly 24,000 units. That's in stark contrast to being outsold six-to-one last summer, but analysts have their doubts that the current sales trend will hold up.

Is a GeForce 9 in the Wings?

Flying high on the success of the 8000 series, INQuiring minds are left wondering how long until we see NVIDIA unveil a GeForce 9. With a solid hold on the market, conventional wisdom would dictate that there's not much motivation to rush out another release, but at least one site believes we'll see the next generation GPU in February, with a mid-range offering to follow in June 2008.

Linux Developer Accused of Murder

We usually stray away from such tabloid-esque stories, but this one warrants an exception. Hans Reiser, who developed ReiserFS, the default file system on Suse Linux/openSUSE, Slackware, Xandros, Yoper, Linspir, and Kurumin Linus, will stand trial accused of murdering his Russian mail-order bride. You can read the details here.

Botnet Ringleader Arrested

An international cyber-crime group is estimated to have infiltrated more than one million computers worldwide, taking in excess of one million dollars from people's bank accounts. New Zealand believes a teenager by the alias of Akill is the ring leader, who was questioned and then released. Still under investigation, the 18-year-old alleged hacker could face a maximum of 10 years in prision if convicted.