Japan intervenes in currency market to weaken yen

Japan's Finance Minister Jun Azumi, center, speaks after Japanese monetary authorities intervened in the currency market to weaken the yen, in Tokyo on Monday Oct. 31, 2011. The dollar has jumped against the yen after Monday's action which came after the Japanese currency had surged to a post-World War II high of 75.32 yen against the dollar earlier Monday. (AP Photo/Kyodo News) JAPAN OUT, MANDATORY CREDIT, NO LICENSING IN CHINA, FRANCE, HONG KONG, JAPAN AND SOUTH KOREA

Japan's Finance Minister Jun Azumi, center, speaks after Japanese monetary authorities intervened in the currency market to weaken the yen, in Tokyo on Monday Oct. 31, 2011. The dollar has jumped against the yen after Monday's action which came after the Japanese currency had surged to a post-World War II high of 75.32 yen against the dollar earlier Monday. (AP Photo/Kyodo News) JAPAN OUT, MANDATORY CREDIT, NO LICENSING IN CHINA, FRANCE, HONG KONG, JAPAN AND SOUTH KOREA

TOKYO (AP) ? The dollar jumped about 5 percent against the yen Monday after Japan intervened to weaken its currency, whose appreciation has threatened the country's tentative recovery from the tsunami disaster.

The dollar shot above 79 yen in late morning trading in Tokyo after earlier touching a post-World War II low of 75.32 yen ? a level that was battering Japan's vital exporters.

Finance Minister Jun Azumi said Japan was compelled to act because of the persistent "one-sided and speculative movement" in the yen's exchange rate, confirming he gave orders to sell yen and buy dollars at 10:25 a.m. local time.

"Whatever the market thinks, I will continue intervening thoroughly until I am satisfied," Azumi said. He declined to say the amount of yen the Japanese government had spent in the action.

The Japanese currency has steadily climbed this year because it has been viewed as a safe haven amid the European debt crisis. Its rise has been another blow to manufacturers as they struggle to recover from the March 11 tsunami, which damaged parts makers in the northern area of Tohoku. Recent floods in Thailand, where many Japanese exporters have set up factories, have also disrupted manufacturing.

In early afternoon trading in Tokyo, the dollar was holding steady at around 79.19 yen, but it remains to be seen how long an impact the intervention will have. The euro also got a boost, rising to nearly 110.85 yen from 107.15 yen earlier in the day.

Japan last intervened in August, but the effect was short-lived as traders continued to bid up the yen.

The intervention comes ahead of the Group of 20 summit in Cannes, France, on Thursday and Friday.

A strong yen erodes the overseas income of Japan's exporters such as Nintendo Co. and Toyota Corp.

Game maker Nintendo, which gets nearly 80 percent of its sales outside Japan, said last week that exchange rate losses totaled 52.4 billion yen ($689 million) during the half-year through September, and projected a net loss for the full year, partly because of the yen's appreciation.

Yuji Kameoka, director of the investment Information department at Daiwa Securities, predicted the intervention would be effective in keeping the dollar somewhere between 78 and 79 yen "for awhile."

___

Associated Press Writer Noriko Kitano contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2011-10-31-AS-Japan-Dollar/id-94031f7c436346bca651ca583462d0ef

urban meyer zodiac killer battlefield 3 review battlefield 3 review real housewives of new jersey coraline coraline

India shuts server linked to Duqu computer virus (Reuters)

REUTERS ? Indian authorities seized computer equipment from a data center in Mumbai as part of an investigation into the Duqu malicious software that some security experts warned could be the next big cyber threat.

Two workers at a web-hosting company called Web Werks told Reuters that officials from India's Department of Information Technology last week took several hard drives and other components from a server that security firm Symantec Corp told them was communicating with computers infected with Duqu.

News of Duqu first surfaced last week when Symantec said it had found a mysterious computer virus that contained code similar to Stuxnet, a piece of malware believed to have wreaked havoc on Iran's nuclear program.

Government and private investigators around the world are racing to unlock the secret of Duqu, with early analysis suggesting that it was developed by sophisticated hackers to help lay the groundwork for attacks on critical infrastructure such as power plants, oil refineries and pipelines.

The equipment seized from Web Werks, a privately held company in Mumbai with about 200 employees, might hold valuable data to help investigators determine who built Duqu and how it can be used. But putting the pieces together is a long and difficult process, experts said.

"This one is challenging," said Marty Edwards, director of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team. "It's a very complex piece of software."

He declined to comment on the investigation by authorities in India, but said that his agency was working with counterparts in other countries to learn more about Duqu.

Two employees at Web Werks said officials from India's Department of Information Technology came to their office last week to take hard drives and other parts from a server.

They said they did not know how the malware got on to Web Werks' server. "We couldn't track down this customer," said one of the two employees, who did not want to be identified for fear of losing their jobs.

An official in India's Department of Information Technology who investigates cyber attacks also declined to discuss the matter. "I am not able to comment on any investigations," said Gulshan Rai, director of the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team, or CERT-In.

UNLOCKING THE SECRET

Stuxnet is malicious software designed to target widely used industrial control systems built by Germany's Siemens. It is believed to have crippled centrifuges that Iran uses to enrich uranium for what the United States and some European nations have charged is a covert nuclear weapons program.

Duqu appears to be more narrowly targeted than Stuxnet as researchers estimate the new trojan virus has infected at most dozens of machines so far. By comparison, Stuxnet spread much more quickly, popping up on thousands of computer systems.

Security firms including Dell Inc's SecureWorks, Intel Corp's McAfee, Kaspersky Lab and Symantec say they found Duqu victims in Europe, Iran, Sudan and the United States. They declined to provide their identities.

Duqu -- so named because it creates files with "DQ" in the prefix -- was designed to steal secrets from the computers it infects, researchers said, such as design documents from makers of highly sophisticated valves, motors, pipes and switches.

Experts suspect that information is being gathered for use in developing future cyber weapons that would target the control systems of critical infrastructure.

The hackers behind Duqu are unknown, but their sophistication suggests they are backed by a government, researchers say.

"A cyber saboteur should understand the engineering specifications of every component that could be targeted for destruction in an operation," said John Bumgarner, chief technology officer for the U.S. Cyber Consequences Unit.

That is exactly what the authors of Stuxnet did when they built that cyber weapon, said Bumgarner, who is writing a paper on the development of Stuxnet.

"They studied the technical details of gas centrifuges and figured out how they could be destroyed," he said.

Such cyber reconnaissance missions are examples of an increasingly common phenomenon known as "blended" attacks, where elite hackers infiltrate one target to facilitate access to another.

Hackers who infiltrated Nasdaq's computer systems last year installed malware that allowed them to spy on the directors of publicly held companies.

In March, hackers stole digital security keys from EMC Corp's RSA Security division that they later used to breach the networks of defense contractor Lockheed Martin Corp.

Researchers said they are still trying to figure out what the next phase of Duqu attacks might be.

"We are a little bit behind in the game," said Don Jackson, a director of the Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit. "Knowing what these guys are doing, they are probably a step ahead."

(Reporting by Supantha Mukherjee in New York, Jim Finkle in Boston; Additional reporting by Henry Foy in Mumbai; Editing by Tiffany Wu)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/india/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111029/india_nm/india601846

october 21 2011 ohio ohio john beck john beck mariska hargitay gmcr

Reports: Prosecutions going up for war zone crime (Providence Journal)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories News, RSS Feeds and Widgets via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/155225190?client_source=feed&format=rss

van jones dark energy dark energy sherri shepherd sherri shepherd sean avery east river

Probable WWII submarine found off Papua New Guinea (AP)

CANBERRA, Australia ? Authorities are trying to determine the nationality of a submarine wreck found off the Papua New Guinea town of Rabaul, which was a major Japanese military base during World War II.

The Australian Defense Department says in a statement that the governments of Japan, the United States, Papua New Guinea and New Zealand have been informed of Thursday's find in Simpson Harbor on the South Pacific island nation's northeast coast.

The statement says the wreck is probably World War II vintage, but identification could take days.

The discovery was made by Australian and New Zealand warships involved in an operation to clear the Southwest Pacific of World War II-era explosives.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/africa/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111028/ap_on_re_as/as_papua_new_guinea_submarine

david nelson david nelson pat boone psn down rem playstation network down typhoon

A White Halloween (TIME)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories Stories, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/155171947?client_source=feed&format=rss

growing pains cupertino htc flyer review westboro stevejobs stevejobs steve jobs commencement speech

Video: Europe's Effect on the Markets

Sorry, Readability was unable to parse this page for content.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/45066664#45066664

jenna lyons jenna lyons stephen sondheim san francisco earthquake san francisco earthquake nextdoor premier fitness

Melanie Hick: The Best Day of Your Life (Huffington post)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories Stories, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/154943680?client_source=feed&format=rss

brian urlacher when does ios 5 come out when does ios 5 come out christopher columbus trina the green mile the green mile

Lern2Play

Deprecated: Assigning the return value of new by reference is deprecated in /home/lern2pla/public_html/external.php on line 524

Deprecated: Assigning the return value of new by reference is deprecated in /home/lern2pla/public_html/external.php on line 526

Deprecated: Assigning the return value of new by reference is deprecated in /home/lern2pla/public_html/external.php on line 619

Deprecated: Assigning the return value of new by reference is deprecated in /home/lern2pla/public_html/external.php on line 621

Deprecated: Assigning the return value of new by reference is deprecated in /home/lern2pla/public_html/external.php on line 652

Deprecated: Assigning the return value of new by reference is deprecated in /home/lern2pla/public_html/external.php on line 697
http://www.lern2play.com Lern2Play.com features a large MMORPG Forum with over 265,000 posts. Active MMORPG and MMO community and MMO Games Forums. Join now to talk about Lord of the Rings Online, World of Warcraft, Age of Conan, Star Wars Galaxies and more.enhttp://www.lern2play.com/images/lern2play/misc/rss.jpghttp://www.lern2play.com http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112503-revenge-of-the-electric-car-2011-dvd-eng-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112501-real-steel-2011-dvd-eng-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112499-rascals-2011-dvd-eng-dvdrip-1-link.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112497-puss-in-boots-2011-dvd-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112495-paranormal-activity-3-2011-dvd-eng-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112493-norman-2011-dvd-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112491-mural-hua-bi-2011-dvd-eng-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com Lern2Play.com features a large MMORPG Forum with over 265,000 posts. Active MMORPG and MMO community and MMO Games Forums. Join now to talk about Lord of the Rings Online, World of Warcraft, Age of Conan, Star Wars Galaxies and more.enhttp://www.lern2play.com/images/lern2play/misc/rss.jpghttp://www.lern2play.com http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112503-revenge-of-the-electric-car-2011-dvd-eng-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112501-real-steel-2011-dvd-eng-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112499-rascals-2011-dvd-eng-dvdrip-1-link.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112497-puss-in-boots-2011-dvd-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112495-paranormal-activity-3-2011-dvd-eng-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112493-norman-2011-dvd-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html http://www.lern2play.com/movies-tv-and-music/112491-mural-hua-bi-2011-dvd-eng-dvdrip-hq-1-link-no-rar.html