Blog Posts by Chris Nichols

A group of hackers who say they're behind denial of service attacks against American banks are arguing that the existence on the Internet of a movie insulting to Islam should cost the financial institutions roughly $875 million.

The cyber offensive will only stop when the movie, "Innocence of Muslims," is completely removed from the web, the hackers say. The group, Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Cyber Fighters, published their demands on Pastebin, a text and code sharing site, on March 5 and followed with another post this week.

During what the group calls phase three of Operation Ababil, American banks should expect denial of service attacks on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. Distributed denial of service attacks are carried out when hackers intentionally overload targeted servers with traffic. If they create more traffic than the servers can handle, they can bring down a website and make it inaccessible temporarily.

The hackers indicated that they would launch the bank attacks for several

(Updated at 4:58 p.m. ET)

Despite the setbacks around the 787 Dreamliner, Boeing's (BA) stock is back at levels it hasn't seen in half a decade, with the latest step upward coming after a report that it could be close to announcing an $18 billion order, one of the biggest it's ever gotten.

The Chicago-based airplane maker was trading not just beyond a 52-week high Tuesday, as a cursory glance at a basic chart would show, but instead has returned to an area it last occupied in May 2008. At the close, the stock was up $1.22, or 1.5%, at $84.16.

Even though the 787 was grounded earlier this year owing to worries about the safety of the aircraft, shares of Boeing have gained 7.6% since the beginning of 2013. That's right in line with the 7.7% gain for the Dow Jones Industrial Average, of which it's a member, and ahead of the 6.4% advance for the S&P 500. Boeing's all-time closing high was $107.23 in July 2007, according to FactSet data.

The day's lift for Boeing was being influenced by a

McDonald's (MCD) said its comparable sales in February were negative for the third time in five months, extending a run of subpar showings for the fast-food chain going back to the second half of last year.

Even the adjusted results that exclude an extra day in 2012, which would haven given McDonald's a positive reading, aren't particularly impressive when viewed in the context of the past half-decade. During that time, sub-2% numbers were almost unheard of, until recently.

Last month, global same-store sales fell 1.5%, the second consecutive decline in a critical measure for the Oak Brook, Ill.-based burger and fries (and, of course, salads, shakes and Fish McBites) seller. The U.S. was down 3.3%, and Europe was off 0.5%. The Asia-Pacific, Middle East and Africa region saw comps fall 1.6%. The overall change was better than the consensus estimate of a 1.6% drop. As noted, the decrease was influenced by the comparison with a year ago. February in the prior year took place during a

The recent series of malicious hacks and network infiltrations at well-known news organizations and social networks has put cyber crime back in the headlines, though the prominent nature of the targets isn't the biggest worry.

According to one computer threat researcher, meddlesome man-made software -- which can be meant to do everything from cause a temporary minor annoyance up to looting extremely sensitive information -- isn't what it used to be, and the trouble for the good guys appears to be worsening.

"I do think it is a problem that is growing," says Ryan Sherstobitoff, senior security researcher with McAfee Labs, a part of Intel (INTC). "It's no longer something that is [only] a consumer issue or an average, everyday user issue. That's still the case in a lot of these situations, but it's now shifting toward highly targeted attacks against organizations and governments."

For instance, Sherstobitoff authored a paper released in January examining the Citadel Trojan. Citadel is

McDonald's (MCD) is set to post its February same-store sales Friday morning, providing a view on how the wide distribution of Fish McBites, along with other, non-promotional, non-seafood nugget menu items, have been performing in recent weeks.

It's still early in 2013, but the year got off to a slow start for McDonald's, continuing what's been a difficult stretch in terms of comparable sales. In January, total comps were negative for only the second month in almost 10 years -- the other time was in October. Sales rebounded and had an upbeat reading the next month, before going flat in December.

The Oak Brook, Ill.-based fast-food giant began 2012 on a high note, particularly in the U.S. Unfortunately for the Big Mac seller, as the year progressed comp sales charted an uneven, though generally lower, path. So the trend has been downward, and three of the last four months have failed to produce a positive showing in same-store sales. Here's the overall performance going back to the

Short-suffering Dell (DELL) shareholder Carl Icahn is not going to take this lying down -- this being what he says is a weak, unacceptable bid for the Round Rock, Texas, computer maker.

Where did he come from, you might ask? It turns out he now owns a large stake in Dell, and he's telling founder Michael Dell and Silver Lake Partners, who are trying to lead a buyout of the company, that it won't be happening the way they expect if he has anything to say about it.

Icahn, a billionaire investor, is claiming to have become one of the top outside investors in Dell recently, with his stake reported on CNBC as being around 6%. Rather than seeing the company acquired for $13.65 a share, or some $24 billion, Icahn says Dell needs to be prepared to pay a $9-a-share special dividend should shareholders vote the purchase down. When added to his view of the company's value at $13.81, that would make the stock worth $22.81. If the buyout group and the board don't want to change direction, Icahn

The Dow Jones Industrial Average hit a new all-time high Wednesday, prompting the let's-all-cheer and the who-cares camps to have at it in the headlines with a debate about whether any of it matters.

For the Dow, the new mark comes five and a half years after its previous record was set in October 2007. Since then, the economy has seen a deep recession, Wall Street and the housing market collapsed, unemployment has surged, and GDP has been generally unimpressive. We've had a fiscal cliff, a sequestration, a flash crash, near-constant brawling in Washington, a downgrade of the U.S. credit rating and serious questions about the financial health of a series of European economies.

And yet here we are. Blame or credit the Federal Reserve, view it as eternal human optimism or as something nefarious driven by computer programs, love it or hate it. Whichever way you choose to view it and however you think we got here, the Dow has reached a milestone.

The best stock since the prior all-time

Southeastern Asset Management, Dell's (DELL) biggest outside shareholder, is re-emphasizing its opposition to the $24 billion buyout of the computer maker, and now it's demanding a list of other investors so that it can take the case directly to them.

To this point, Southeastern, the holder of more than 8% of Dell's stock, hasn't been tremendously successful in getting the buyout group to see things the way it does. Southeastern was one of the early voices against the purchase, and it believes Dell is worth almost $24 a share. The takeover bid, led by company founder Michael Dell and Silver Lake Partners, is $13.65. Microsoft (MSFT) is contributing a loan.

On Wednesday, a day the 30-stock Dow Jones Industrial Average was hitting an all-time high and the Nasdaq added 1.2%, Round Rock, Texas-based Dell was gaining 9 cents to $14.09. Not exactly skyrocketing, but it is the best level the stock has seen in months and represents a post-deal announcement peak. Dell's 52-week high is $17.46.