syntax error in wp-includes/default-widgets.php on line 1035?

I think this may have had something to do with the upgrade to 2.9, but maybe not. Almost all my word press sites, the sites of two other friends of mine (hosted on different hosting companies, with seprate accounts) are also experiencing the same basic problem.

There are two variations of the error:

1. Parse error: syntax error, unexpected ‘<‘ in /home/realconn/public_html/andrewjamesteam/wp-includes/default-widgets.php on line 1035

(this is most common)

2. Warning: session_start() [function.session-start]: Cannot send session cookie – headers already sent by (output started at /XXXXX/XXXXX/public_html/XXXXX/wp-includes/default-filters.php:215) in /home/XXXXX/public_html/XXXXX/wp-content/plugins/wordpress-automatic-upgrade/wordpress-automatic-upgrade.php on line 121

Warning: session_start() [function.session-start]: Cannot send session cache limiter – headers already sent (output started at /home/XXXXX/public_html/XXXXX/wp-includes/default-filters.php:215) in /home/realconn/public_html/XXXXX/wp-content/plugins/wordpress-automatic-upgrade/wordpress-automatic-upgrade.php on line 121

Parse error: syntax error, unexpected ‘<‘ in /home/XXXXX/public_html/XXXXX/wp-includes/default-widgets.php on line 1035

(this seems to be happening only on my sites with automatic upgrade installed.)

=> The strange thing is this didn’t happen to several other sites of ours. I am not sure if we were hacked, doesn’t seem likely considering the circumstances and number of different sites on different servers.

Any help would be great.

Andrew