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The HomePlug Powerline Alliance already wants to tether your entire household to the Internet, and it may soon extend its reach to your garage, as well. At Computex today, the company announced that Audi, BMW, Daimler, Porsche and Volkswagen  have all agreed to support its HomePlug Green PHY (GP) technology as their EV charging interface of choice. The networking specification would allow electric car owners to link their plug-ins to the Smart Grid via the same ports used to charge their batteries, opening up new, Powerline-based possibilities. Once your EV hooks up to the network, it may be able to conduct system checks in real-time, for instance, or provide instant feedback on performance or the condition of your battery. The low power GP spec will also be interoperable with HomePlug's forthcoming AV2 spec, though it's still not clear when we can expect to see Germany's automakers incorporate it into production. SlashGear

It looks like Sony's long, PSN nightmare is finally coming to an end -- almost. Today, the company announced that it will restore PlayStation Network and Qriocity services in the Americas, Europe andmost of Asia by week's end. The only exceptions are Hong Kong, South Korea and Japan, where users will have to await further details before regaining full access. Speaking to the  Wall Street Journal , spokeswoman Yuki Kobayashi added that Sony is in the process of finalizing an agreement to protect credit card owners in these three countries, where authorities have taken a particularly cautiousapproach to the data breach. This means that the company won't see global restoration by the end of May, as previously hoped, but Kobayashi said the plans were delayed simply because Sony needed more time to fully secure its infrastructure (sound familiar?). PlayStation Blog Wall Street Journal

Europe's already extensive broadband coverage may be expanding even further, now that Eutelsat's Ka-Sat satellite has officially gone into service. The new craft, which launched from Kazakhstan in late December, uses spotbeam technology to generate areas of connectivity that are about 250 kilometers wide, with each beam carrying a total capacity of 900Mbps. Unlike the Hylas 1, its reach will extend far across the continent, providing Tooway's high-bandwidth services to 13 million households in remote locations. Subscribers will have download speeds of up to 10Mbps and upload rates of 4Mbps, though they'll still have to put up with latency on the order of 250ms, making life even more difficult for Eastern European OnLive gamers. Of course, this access won't come for free, but Ka-Sat's 82-beam network structure significantly lowers its operating costs, allowing Eutelsat to offer prices that are on par with market rates. According to company CEO Michel de Ros...

RSA SecureID dongles add a layer of protection to everything from office pilates class schedules to corporate email accounts, with banks, tech companies, and even U.S. defense contractors using hardware security tokens to protect their networks. Following a breach at RSA in March, however, the company urged clients to boost other security methods, such as passwords and PIN codes, theoretically protecting networks from hackers that may have gained the ability to duplicate those critical SecureIDs. Now, Lockheed Martin is claiming that its network has come under attack, prompting RSA to issue 90,000 replacement tokens to Lockheed employees. The DoD contractor isn't detailing what data hackers may have accessed, but a SecureID bypass should clearly be taken very seriously, especially when that little keychain dongle is helping to protect our national security. If last month's Sony breachdidn't already convince you to beef up your own computer security, ...

Good news, Asia -- the PlayStation Network is finally coming back. Today, Sony announced that it will restore its gaming network across the continent, more than a month after falling prey to a crippling data breach. The company's PSN services are already up and running across other parts of the world and, beginning tomorrow, will light up once again in Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and even Japan, which had been harboring serious reservations about the network's security. Gamers in South Korea and Hong Kong, meanwhile, will have to wait a little longer before returning to normalcy, though Sony is hoping to completely resolve the issue by the end of the month. The company certainly seems eager to put this saga to bed, and for understandable reasons. The incident has already cost Sony an estimated $171 million in revenue -- not to mention the untold numbers of suddenly wary consumers. Bloomberg

Cox Communications had some grand designs on the cellular market, but they're not panning out quite as the company planned --  FierceWireless  reports that though Cox already poured cash into rolling out 3G equipment, it's going to scrap the whole thing, in favor of continuing to pay Sprint for borrowed airtime. Cellular service in the original three launch markets will reportedly continue, though a quick peek at Cox's website shows the current phone selection is getting a bit stagnant. While we've yet to hear any particular reasons why Cox would want to stick it out as an MVNO, we imagine that mandatory roaming agreements make it a tad easier to offer those "Unbelievably Fair" contracts. There's also the possibility that with all the 4G fervor, Cox has decided there's no point in moving forward with CDMA equipment whenLTE is ripe for the picking -- and when Cox has $304 million worth of 700MHz spectrum waiting for such a network.   F...

AT&T announced last fall that it would begin its LTE rollout in mid-2011, and it's now finally delivered a few more details. The carrier has just confirmed that five markets -- Dallas, Houston, Chicago, Atlanta and San Antonio -- will be getting LTE sometime "this summer," with ten more as-yet-unnamed cities set to join them in the second half of the year. All told, AT&T says that should cover about 70 million Americans by year's end. Of course, an LTE network needs some devices, but AT&T unfortunately isn't providing much in the way of details about those just yet -- it's only saying that it plans to add 20 4G devices to its portfolio this year, and that "some of those" will be LTE capable.

According to a report by the  Wall Street Journal , Comcast will start testing a new video delivery system that is completely internet protocol based at the Massachussetts Institute of Technology in "the coming months." AT&T's U-verse uses IPTV already, while others use similar technology for video on-demand or some of the new initiatives that stream TV to the iPad. Comcast plans to let students watch by connecting TVs, computers or other devices to the campus network, followed by a test just for employees and eventually an all-IP service to run alongside -- but not replacing -- its traditional cable TV service. This could allow the company to deliver video to devices with no set-top box required and even potentially outside its current footprint. That however is unlikely given the headache just a move to multi-platform IP delivery might cause when it comes to negotiating broadcast rights. Being able to watch pay TV on whatever you want and potent...

There's been rumors of a Google-fied mobile payment system for some time, and now it looks like the Mountain View crew is teaming up with Sprint to finally make it happen. Last month, we heard that the Now Network would bring NFC payments to its customers this year, and  Bloomberg  reports that the partnership and payment system will make its debut on May 26th. Apparently, New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Washington D.C. are the first cities getting the service, which is a much broader initial footprint than its Isis mobile payment competition. The anonymous sources also say that Verifone and Vivotech are providing the hardware and software that will let you replace your credit card with a Nexus S -- because you  always  wanted to replace your credit card with your Nexus S. Update:  According to  All things D , the payment system will be put through its paces by none other than El Goog's Exec...

Although we usually prefer our computers to be perfect, logical, and psychologically fit, sometimes there's more to be learned from a schizophrenic one. A University of Texas experiment has doomed a computer with dementia praecox, saddling the silicon soul with symptoms that normally only afflict humans. By telling the machine's neural network to treat everything it learned as extremely important, the team hopes to aid clinical research in understanding the schizophrenic brain -- following a popular theory that suggests afflicted patients lose the ability to forget or ignore frivolous information, causing them to make illogical connections and paranoid jumps in reason. Sure enough, the machine lost it, and started spinning wild, delusional stories, eventually claiming responsibility for a terrorist attack. Yikes. We aren't hastening the robot apocalypse if we're programming machines to go mad  intentionally , right? Forbes University of Texas

Just when we're finally basking in the warmth of spring and picking May flowers, US Cellular finds a reason for us to look forward to the cold and dark winter to come. The carrier announced plans to deploy its own LTE network, intent on blanketing two dozen markets (representing 25 percent of its customer base) with blazing-fast 4G service in time for the holiday season. And the party ain't stopping just because the mistletoe comes down and the decorations are put away; the holiday deployment will only be the first phase, with US Cellular continuing its 4G expansion efforts through 2012. Full PR after the break. US Cellular

Why can't our refrigerator fire off an urgent email when the milk has gone lumpy? And the toilet paper dispenser warn us it's empty –  before  we sit down? And when will our microwaves run BitTorrent? EUREKA, the European R&D network, knows how badly you crave networked objects, and rather than mock you, it's moving to help. To that end, it has developed small, inexpensive, battery-powered sensors able to link everything from consumer electronics to environmental monitors to factory robots – creating the much-anticipated "Internet of Things." But unlike the over-hyped RFID, it's technology you'd actually use. Instead of knowing whether your keys are indeed on the RFID reader, the network could gently remind you that you left them in your car, which is now 100 miles away with someone else at the wheel, but, luckily for you, low on gas. Gaze into the so-called future of things with EUREKA's press release, conveniently embedded after the jump. Phy...

You can do quite a lot with a sufficiently large catalog of semi-popular footage, but original content is king, and today the Wall Street Journal is reporting that YouTube will sink $100 million into original programming. The idea, according to the usual anonymous sources, is that Google will reshape the home of Keyboard Cat into a television network of sorts -- with channels for different topics -- and a good number of them featuring "several hours of professionally produced original programming a week." That sounds like a drop in the bucket compared to the raft of footage that YouTube's amateurs put out, of course, and it wouldn't be the first time we've seen Google invest in original work, but we'd be lying if we said we wouldn't enjoy kicking back with even a smidgen of the pulse-pounding possibilities that some 4096-pixel-wide footage could offer. YouTube is reportedly attracting talent right now, say the WSJ 's spooks, and intends to eas...

If you dig the stylish look on the Linksys E4200 802.11n router but prefer something more wallet-friendly, then Cisco's latest range of home routers and switches will likely suit your taste. Gone are the curved grooves and blinking LEDs on the top, but these routers -- ranging from $59.99 to $159.99 -- still go about their usual wireless business at up to 300Mbps, with additional simultaneous dual-band support on the pricier E2500 and E3200. Like their predecessors, you'll also find a refreshed, feature-packed Cisco Connect software suite in the box, which promises to make installation and management a whole lot easier. Also notable is the upcoming virtual USB feature that connects printers and storage devices to the network -- the E3200 and E4200 are expected to receive this update in the summer. As for the switches, you have a choice of three new models going from $29.99 for five 10/100Mbps ports, all the way up to $74.99 for eight gigabit connections. All thes...