Enron yet to leave Irish energy market behind: In the last few weeks a range of overseas energy companies have departed or declared their intention to leave the Irish energy market.
RWE is reported to be no longer interested in developing an electricity or gas service for Irish households and German giant Eon is also expected to sell its peat burning power station in Edenderry. Meanwhile Norwegian energy giant Statoil has sold its share of the Synergen power plant in Ringsend, Dublin.
None of this is good for the Government and the Commission for Energy Regulation (CER), which is trying to bring new entrants into the market with the aim of ultimately reducing prices. But surely there is somebody out there to fill the gap?
Well, flicking through the CER's list of licensed energy suppliers would not fill one with confidence. Stuck in the middle of the list is one Enron Direct Limited.
While the CER and the Government are desperate to attract new players, Enron may not quite fit the bill. As the company's somewhat slimmed-down website now says: "Enron is in the midst of restructuring various businesses for distribution as ongoing companies to its creditors and liquidating its remaining operations".
Chadwick buys himself some medieval history
Grafton chairman Michael Chadwick's latest investment definitely has a bit of pedigree. He recently paid €2.19 million for a 17 per cent stake in Wellington Market Company plc, which proudly states that it can trace its roots back to 1244, making it almost as old as the Magna Carta (which was signed in 1215).
In those days, English monarchs still spoke French or Latin. Henry III, one of the Plantagenets, was on the throne and people were more concerned with chain mail than e-mail.
The Irish building materials and DIY businesses were radically different as well. In fact, if you didn't do it yourself, nobody else would do it for you. Most people built their own homes from scratch, using mud and wattle. These materials were readily available, so there was no real need for any trips to Atlantic Homecare.
There were a couple of innovations, though. Stone castles were coming into vogue. The original Blarney Castle was built around 50 years earlier. These structures were designed to keep out people who lived in mud and wattle homes.
Not even these structures would have provided many opportunities for builders' merchants, as the stone was normally quarried locally. However, that would have been good news for CRH's ancestors.
More tunnel troubles
As if the Dublin Port Tunnel didn't have enough ongoing woes, it now also has a Trojan horse. Or, rather, it comes bearing gifts - a Trojan computer virus, that is. How does it work? Well, someone who apparently thinks lots of people will want information on the port tunnel has set up a spoof website designed to look as if it offers such information, but actually contains hidden code that tries to infect your computer as soon as you view the home page.
The Trojan is a so-called "iframe exploit", which uses a known weakness in Internet Explorer web browsers to send you an e-mail with an attachment that contains malicious code. Once you receive the e-mail, the hacker who sent it can activate the code. This might enable the hacker to do a number of things - access files, control your computer to use it to stage attacks on websites, or send the virus out again surreptitiously through your e-mail.
So what is the website? Well, first promise NOT to go there unless you have all the security updates installed on your Windows PC, and a virus program running (if you use the Firefox browser, a Mac or Linux you are, of course, safe). Ready? It is www.dublinporttnnl.e2in.info.
Another check shows that e2in.info is a registered domain but the personal information required on the registration is spoofed. All the links on the site - ranging from "duck hunts" to "early pregnancy symptoms", all resolving to the e2in.info domain - are also spoofed pages with the same Trojan.
Perhaps one hint to the origin of the hacker is that a web address for a vaguely pornographic dating site based in Poland is embedded in the source code for the page.How fitting.
