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14th May 2002 Archive

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  • Crackers deface Ferrari

    Virtual spray paint protest against Austrian GP tactics

    Defacers turned motor sport fans yesterday in a protest against the controversial decision to gift Michael Schumacher victory at the Austrian Grand Prix. Ferrari-group.com was defaced by a group called S4t4n1c_Souls after the race with a profane message criticising Ferrari's management for ordering Rubens Barichello, who …

    Security 14 May 2002, 06:27

  • RealNames shutdown threatens Asian naming market

    Unicode bummer

    The closure of RealNames Corp yesterday threatens the ability of Chinese and Japanese speakers to easily address web sites in their own languages. Microsoft Corp's Asian units are said to be under pressure from local naming authorities to urge their parent to reconsider its position on RealNames' closure. RealNames said …

    e-Business 14 May 2002, 06:30

  • DRAM vendors face torrid summer

    Gluttons for punishment

    The DRAM industry in Asia is struggling to stabilize prices and launch them back on an upward trajectory even as observers predict no return to growth till the end of summer. Prices slumped last week, as the market responded to new that Hynix Semiconductor was set to be broken up. Hopes that the cash-strapped Korean vendor …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 06:33

  • Liberty to make new European move

    Swiss Fondue

    Liberty Media Corp is reported to be lining up a bid for NTL Inc's Swiss unit, Cablecom AG. The New York-based European cable operator, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last week, has pledged to begin the process of selling the Swiss cable operations after Cablecom's bankers had threatened to wreck NTL's restructuring …

    Telecoms 14 May 2002, 06:35

  • Nortel acts to avoid cash crunch

    In Securities

    Networking equipment maker Nortel Networks Corp is preparing to raise up to $2.5bn in cash through the issuing of securities in order to increase its liquidity and quell fears that it could fall into a funding gap. The Toronto, Canada-based company withdrew an SEC filing made eighteen months ago which registered a …

    Business 14 May 2002, 06:38

  • PSINet Europe sale gets US green light

    Just needs Euro thumbs-up

    The sale of PSINet Europe has been given the green light by a US bankruptcy court and is on course to be completed before the end of June. The deal still needs to be cleared by the European Union although it seems likely that it will get the thumbs-up it needs. Around 600 people work for PSINet Europe. At this stage it's too …

    Music and Media 14 May 2002, 06:44

  • Flame war after Klez worms onto Richer Sounds mailing list

    Inharmonious

    Consumer electronics retailer Richer Sounds has pledged to beef up its security after its mailing list became a conduit for the spread of the Klez worm. A copy of the worm (with the subject line: "Japanese lass' sexy pictures") found its way to all the subscribers on the megadeal-mailshots@lists.richersounds.com list on Sunday …

    Music and Media 14 May 2002, 06:44

  • Peregrine top two quit after $100m hole uncovered

    Irregularities

    A huge financial scandal has engulfed Peregrine Systems Inc after its auditors uncovered revenue recognition "irregularities" involving as much as $100m in the last two financial years. Chairman and CEO Steve Gardner and CFO Matt Glass quit the CRM and asset management software developer yesterday after the irregularities …

    Music and Media 14 May 2002, 06:44

  • McAfee.com launches SpamKiller

    Filters, lots of them

    McAfee.com Corp yesterday unveiled the latest in its lineup of managed security application services, SpamKiller, targeted at small and medium sized enterprises that are fed up with receiving unsolicited commercial email. "It's not really a security problem," said McAfee.com VP of worldwide marketing Atri Chatterjee, "but …

    Music and Media 14 May 2002, 06:44

  • Govt wants big media regulator, promises little stick

    Believe them? No, we didn't think so

    The UK Government said it will not try to regulate content on the Internet as it took yet another step forward to create a new all-encompassing single regulator for the media and telecoms industries. Publishing the draft Communications Bill today the Government said the legislation was designed to overhaul and simplify the …

    Business 14 May 2002, 06:45

  • Cisco has encouraging quarter

    But Chambers still cautious

    Cisco Systems Inc yesterday delivered a fiscal third quarter that saw its first year-on-year quarterly revenue rise for over 12 months, but CEO John Chambers was still wary of predicting an immediate upturn. For the three months to April 27, the company reported net income of $729m, compared to a $2.7bn loss a year ago, on …

    Business 14 May 2002, 06:45

  • Intel CEO denies plan to build China fab

    Politically charged

    Intel Corp CEO Craig Barrett has reiterated his company's position regarding investing in the People's Republic of China. "We have no immediate plans for a fabrication plant in China at this point," he said. Barrett made his remarks to the South China Morning Post during a flying visit to Taipei, Taiwan last week, having …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 06:46

  • SiS patent wins, Hercules job losses, Intel 533 MHz license fun

    HWRoundup And why does AMD supports Microsoft?

    What's going on at Hercules, the Guillemot graphics card brand, in North America, HardOCP's Kyle Bennett asks? ... " and now we have gotten word that they are laying off employees. We asked a contact of ours what was going on up there and for an official reply and this was the answer we got from Kelly Ramsay, Director of …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 06:46

  • Intel sleepwalks through Nvidia press release

    Gets down and dirty with ATI

    Nvidia today issued a press release confirming that mobos incorporating its GeForce 4 graphics chip work very well indeed with the new Intel/Rambus 533MHz FSB- supporting i850E chipset. And curious reading it makes too. The GeForce family "provide(s) the perfect companion to Intel* Corporation's newest i850E chipset for the …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 06:46

  • Dixons buys phone dealer for £31m

    Business push

    Dixons Stores Group is extending its reach into the business market for mobile phones with the acquisition of Direct Telephone Services Ltd for up to £31m (£2m is contingent upon performance, and the bulk is payable loan notes, presumably for tax planning reasons). Direct trades under the name Genesis Communications and targets …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 06:47

  • Job losses at Simply Computers

    Outsources PC building

    Systemax is restructuring its Simply Computers division, shutting down its warehouse ops in Walthamstow and focusing all logistics at Greenock. There's around 40 job losses. Last month, the company outsourced Simply's PC building business to UK Configuration Centre (UKCC)of Bishops Stortford. Both moves follow a strategic …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 06:47

  • EDS bans IM

    Big hammer, small nut

    EDS, the computer arm of the British government, has banned its staff from using Instant Messenger products in the workplace. It cites security concerns, especially over virus transmissions. A memo to staff from EDS' security compliance unit leaked to The Register describes "use of Instant Messenger (IM) products through the …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 06:48

  • Microsoft confirms Navision acquisition

    Ticket to Europe

    Microsoft Corp has confirmed its intention to acquire Danish mid-market business applications vendor Navision a/s. Navision will join the Microsoft Business Solutions division, which is already home to Microsoft's previous acquisition in the business applications area, Great Plains. The move will create a global business …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 06:48

  • MMS take-up could disappoint

    Where de handsets?

    With the leading handset manufacturer Nokia Corp stridently proclaiming 2002 as the year of Multimedia Messaging Services (MMS), and with forecasts from market research companies such as Ovum Ltd suggesting that the market for MMS will generate $70bn in revenue by 2007, it looks as though MMS is going to be the most …

    Mobile 14 May 2002, 06:48

  • McDonald's serves WLAN broadband in Japan

    Do you want fries with that?

    Fast-food diners in Japan could soon be able to get broadband with their burgers. According to reports, Internet investment outfit Softbank and McDonald's are to create almost 4,000 "hotspots" in McDonald's restaurants in Japan to give punters wireless broadband access to the Net. It would mean that diners chomping on a burger …

    Mobile 14 May 2002, 06:48

  • Compulsory Windows: for Macs, and people without PCs?

    Outstanding new MS educaiton (sic) initiatives...

    Microsoft has come up with another novel way to make its software compulsory - an annual subscription licensing system for schools where you have to pay for all of the computers you're using, even if you don't want them to run the Microsoft software you're licensing. This includes Macs, and although the Ts & Cs of the agreement …

    Mobile 14 May 2002, 06:48

  • E-government could cost 800,000 jobs, says e-envoy

    Thanks for getting your department online. Bye...

    The achievement of the UK government's target of putting all services online by 2005 could cost 800,000 public sector employees their jobs, according to e-envoy Andrew Pinder. And although that's a fifth of the public sector headcount, Pinder says that as half of the total are in jobs delivering services that can't easily be e- …

    e-Business 14 May 2002, 06:49

  • Don't talk and drive

    Govt targets mobile mobile phone users

    People who use a mobile phone while driving are four times more likely to have an accident. What's more, the UK Government is spending £250,000 on an ad campaign starting tomorrow in which it will tell you in no uncertain terms that using a mobile while driving is a strict no-no. According to the Government spin machine, …

    Mobile 14 May 2002, 06:49

  • VeriSign hit with slamming lawsuit

    'False advertising'

    VeriSign Inc's legal team is going to have its workload increased significantly over the coming months, Kevin Murphy writes. The company continues to be pounded by class-action shareholder lawsuits related to its recently slashed share price, and yesterday a domain name competitor, BulkRegister.com Inc, sued it over …

    e-Business 14 May 2002, 06:49

  • Cisco IDS gets faster

    Intrusion extrusion

    Cisco has boosted the speed and added better management capabilities to its line of intrusion detection products. Designed for high bandwidth networks, the Cisco IDS 4250 is the firm's first appliance which can work at Gigabit speeds. Along with the high end box, Cisco has introduced an appliance geared to the needs of medium …

    Data Networking 14 May 2002, 06:51

  • Sircampaq: The Winners and Losers

    SRCAM Day One HPQ swings axe

    We were in Cupertino today, as the "new Hewlett Packard" gave its first indications of which products will live and which will die under the newly merged monolith. And it's big. SRCAM is now the biggest PC company in the world, the biggest storage company in the world, the biggest Windows and UNIX server company. It also makes …

    Business 14 May 2002, 06:55

  • Firm runs down Dell battery dispute

    Friends again

    Dell has agreed terms over rechargeable battery technology owned by a company called UNOVA, which filed suit against the PC giant in February, 2000. The deal has not been made public, suffice to say, that Dell joins three other "major computer companies representing more than half of US production of laptop and portable …

    Personal 14 May 2002, 06:55

  • Uncertainty over HPQ clouds workstation market

    Sales slide

    The workstation market declined five per cent during the first quarter of this year, making it one of the hardest hit segments in the IT spending slowdown. That's according to the latest statistics from analysts Gartner Dataquest, which reports a preliminary figure for workstation shipments of 358,829 in Q1 2002, down 5.4 per …

    Hardware 14 May 2002, 06:55

  • Get a discounted classic from IT-minds

    Java guru offers personal recommendation

    There's much excitementat Vulture Central at the news that this week's featured title from El Reg affiliate www.it-minds.com comes with a personal recommendation from James Gosling (Fellow and Vice President, Sun Microsystems Inc, and inventor of the Java programming language). Remarkable. This is what the guru had to say about …

    Business 14 May 2002, 06:56

  • Undetectable ‘son of cookie’ system wins grant

    It knows where you're surfing, right now

    The developers of a 'son of cookie' web monitoring system have received a Proof of Concept grant from Scottish Enterprise to commercialise the system. Their non-cookie based web monitoring software does not (as indeed the name suggests) rely on cookies, but instead is intended to replace them with something far more powerful. …

    Music and Media 14 May 2002, 06:57

  • Today is Matrox sundog day

    Parhelia launches in Japan

    Today Matrox launches the Matrox Parhelia 512 next-gen graphics chip. For Japan, the 14th of May is nearly over, and the product has already been launched. You want some spec: OK, here is X-bitlabs' report. The first cards should hit the streets end of June, start of July and will retail at around $400. Hardware Zone's …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 07:08

  • Celeron price chops pave way for new models

    P4 core

    Intel shaved a few points off Celerons yesterday, paving the way for next week's widely touted launch of 1.7GHz and 1.8GHz Celerons, the first of the bargain basement CPU line to use a P4 core. At the same time, Intel should be releasing the 845G chipset - at last. This combination of powerful, cheap chip and cheap-ish …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 08:49

  • Campaigners reject naked DSL protest

    Write to MP instead

    Campaigners in Kent trying to get BT to upgrade their area to DSL have rejected plans to hold a naked demonstration at their local telephone exchange. That was just one of the suggestions put to Steve Boxley, who is trying to drum up support for broadband in the commuter town of Edenbridge. Asked whether he and his fellow …

    Telecoms 14 May 2002, 09:12

  • FTC probes Rambus

    Antitrust suit in offing?

    Rambus yesterday confirmed that it was the subject of an Federal Trade Commission (FTC) investigation. Shares fell 5 per cent on the news in after-hours trading. Rambus says it is co-operating with the FTC, but then have you ever heard of a company which says it is not co-operating with the FTC, or the SEC? The FTC will not …

    Channel 14 May 2002, 09:42

  • Web community puts price on head of super highwayman VeriSign

    Domain transfer madness at Hoopla.com

    Domain registrar VeriSign has infuriated the Web community by wrongly transferring a New York writer's domain to an unchecked person in Germany. The transfer of Hoopla.com was the result of a faked fax request but even though VeriSign has admitted its error, it has refused to sort out the situation, prompting real owner Leslie …

    e-Business 14 May 2002, 10:07

  • Fun and games with the BBC search engine

    It's becoming a sport

    It looks like the glitch that has plagued the BBC's new "editorially independent" search engine appears to be still throwing up some rogue results. Type in the generic term "football" and the "editorially independent" search engine throws up the "BBCi recommended" BBC - Football homepage as its first choice. Tap in "rugby" and …

    Music and Media 14 May 2002, 12:09

  • UK firms drop standalone ebizzes

    More 'pragmatic' says CBI

    The number of UK companies with standalone ebusinesses has more than halved in the last 12 months, according to the latest figures from the Confederation of British Industry (CBI). It found that only 16 per cent of firms now have separate e-business operations, compared with 38 per cent of companies in 2001. Although this …

    Music and Media 14 May 2002, 12:10

  • EDS postpones instant message ban

    Oops - customers...

    EDS has postponed its proposed ban on instant messaging after staff told its techies that it was an important tool for communicating with clients. Last week, EDS told staff that IM products (such as AOL, ICQ and Yahoo!) would be blocked at its firewall from May 8. It cited security concerns, especially the fears that viruses …

    Music and Media 14 May 2002, 12:13

  • Marker pens, sticky tape crack music CD protection

    Next, how to rip CDs with an arc welder

    Music disc copyright protection schemes such a Cactus Data Shield 100/200 and KeyAudio can be circumvented using tools as basic as marker pens and electrical tape, crackers have discovered. The Blue Peter-style hack, which was first unearthed by a reader of chip.de works by covering up the outer ring of a copyright protected …

    Personal 14 May 2002, 13:09

  • Pipex gives away free ADSL modem

    ...to new punters

    Pipex is getting even more aggressive in the broadband marketplace with yet another tempting offer designed to get people to sign-up to its ADSL service. Until June 13 the broadband ISP is offering new customers a new Fujitsu FDX310 ADSL modem worth £94 in return for an old external dial-up modem. The old dial-up modems - …

    Music and Media 14 May 2002, 14:39

  • Cisco pushes for fault resilient IP networks

    Get a GRIP on yourself

    Cisco Systems unveiled plans today to make IP networks based on its technology more resilient from failure. Globally Resilient IP (GRIP), which is geared to assisting recovery in the shortest possible time from a network failure, consists of a series of enhanced features to Cisco's IOS software platform. Cisco is trying to …

    Data Networking 14 May 2002, 15:22

  • E-Envoy backtracks on 800,000 job loss claim

    The old 'out of context' gag...

    News junkies in the UK may have noticed the strangely slow-motion creeping barrage that's been engulfing E-Envoy Andrew Pinder over the past couple of weeks. At the Microsoft Government Leaders Conference in Seattle last month Pinder floated the notion of 800,000 civil servants losing their jobs as a consequence of e-government …

    Music and Media 14 May 2002, 16:33

  • “Humble” Jobs launches Apple server

    And one more thing... um, a RAID array?

    Apple has brought its customary attention to detail, and ease of use features to its first rack mount server, Xserve, launched in Cupertino today. But although racks are synonymous with ISPs and service providers, Apple will not be changing its emission statement to collar co-lo's. The target markets for Xserve remain education …

    Hardware 14 May 2002, 19:19