Last week we noted, with a growing sense of disquiet, how China was busying itself with locking out VPN access within its borders and, seemingly, preventing people from using their Gmail accounts. Google has now given a public voice to those concerns, noting that “there is no issue on our side. We have checked extensively. This is a government blockage carefully designed to look like the problem is with Gmail.” Other Google tools, like the Person Finder for Japanese tsunami survivors, have also exhibited intermittent issues. China’s goal in these attacks is reportedly to stifle online revolutionary chatter inspired by Egypt’s successful democratic revolt, though the nation’s said to be taking a more clandestine approach than previously by making its alleged sabotage appear like a software problem instead. Guess it’s time to prepare ourselves for another battle of wits between these two.
Google and China clash again, this time over Gmail access originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 21 Mar 2011 05:51:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
We’ve been pretty excited for Firefox to go through a major update for a while, and earlier this year they started releasing betas for the new Firefox 4. After the first beta came out, we took a tour of the new look and features, including an interface overhaul and some cool new HTML5 support.
By far the most talked about Firefox extension this year was the privacy -invading Firesheep, which can steal usernames and passwords from Facebook, Twitter, and other accounts of the folks using open Wi-Fi networks. We showed off the extension and discussed a few ways you can keep yourself safe from it.
Oh, the politics of Facebook. If you suspect people are starting to unfriend you on your favorite social network, you can keep track of them with Firefox extension Unfriend Finder. Just install it, and it will notify you of everyone that unfriends you in the future.
While there was a lot of talk about Firefox 4 this year, Firefox 3.6 released in January and brought a bunch of nice new features to the browser as well, including faster performance, one-click themes, safer add-ons, and a bunch more.
One of Firefox’s most popular extensions, Adblock Plus, is useful for more than just blocking ads. We went through a way to use it for malware blocking too—showing why even if you don’t block ads (which we at Lifehacker thank you for, by the way), Adblock is still a great extension to have.
In their effort to continue taking over the internet this year, Facebook made a lot of people pretty unhappy. One of their 
If you find you have too many extensions and Firefox tweaks bogging down your browser—especially when some are used for tasks you’re not even working on—using another Firefox profile may be the answer. We went through how to set up Firefox with multiple profiles dedicated to specific work to keep you productive and organized.
We really liked the new look of Firefox 4, but if you aren’t into using the beta (the final version of which 
It’s hard to keep track of all your email, especially when you need to follow up on certain things at a later date. Firefox extension Boomerang schedule when you send and receive your emails so you don’t forget to do it later.
Despite all the toolbar hate we’ve formed over the years, Google’s toolbar actually has a few neat features. Instead of making you install a toolbar, though, we showed you how you can get all its coolest features in Firefox without taking up all that extra screen real estate.
One of Safari 5′s coolest new features is a Reader button that strips down and reformats articles for easy reading. It isn’t built into Firefox, but we showed you how to get that same functionality in your favorite browser with a simple add-on.
Gostai, a company specialized in Artificial Intelligence solutions, is launching Jazz, its telepresence robot that can be remotely operated via a web-based user interface. The robot can be used for video conferencing, visiting a place or telesurveillance. Jazz can effectively patrol at night, thanks to its infrared camera, laser system and a map of its surroundings. In case of a security alert, the remote operator can take control of the robot in real time using a regular web browser and check on the situation. Check the complete feature list in the full post.
Jazz Security features:
