14th January 2004 Archive

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Police given power to lock up your data

But only if there's a 'catastrophic incident'

UK firms have been warned to prepare for impending changes to national law that will give the police powers to deny staff access to offices and mission critical data in the event of a major incident. Under proposed amendments to the Civil Contingencies Bill, the police will be able to evacuate danger areas should a " …

Storage 14 Jan 2004, 08:41
Big Blue tempts Big Pharma with massive Opteron server sale

Taste 32-bits for free

Proving how closely it follows The Reg, IBM today announced its most significant Opteron server customer win to date by signing up Bristol-Myers Squibb to buy a number of systems. Just yesterday, we reported on some of the dangerous market conditions facing Intel's 64-bit Itanium processor and stated that IBM, along with Sun …

Servers 14 Jan 2004, 08:43
SCO targets Novell, steps into new legal trouble

Updated World awaits Utah revelations

Documents released by Novell show that The SCO Group is seeking to increase pressure on Novell, which recently acquired SuSE and Ximian, and whose 1995 contract with SCO goes to the heart of the current litigation. However, the path looks likely to give Novell enough cause to launch a suit for breach of contract, and a judgement …

Hardware 14 Jan 2004, 08:44
New: ADSL per minute

Back to the old days

The idea of ADSL is simple: offer high speed access at a fixed price so that users don't have to worry about a per minute charge as with traditional dial up access in Europe. But some companies are now turning that concept around. Internet provider Zon has started offering ADSL in the Benelux without a subscription. You pay per …

Telecoms 14 Jan 2004, 08:48
US Supreme Court refuses to hear Fax.com appeal

Fax of life

"We do more than just fax marketing," Fax.com claims on its web site. "We have assisted several missing children organizations, law enforcement agencies and individuals with fax poster alerts." Why is Fax.com playing the good guy card? That's obvious: the FTC recently fined the Aliso Viejo (California) company $5.4 million for …

Small Biz 14 Jan 2004, 08:57
No relief from Microsoft phishing bug

Avoid the hyperlinks!

Tuesday's edition of Microsoft's monthly bundle of security advisories features an omission that should keep online fraud artists and identity thieves happy: over one month after its discovery, there is no official patch available for a bug in Internet Explorer that lets swindlers pass off counterfeit websites as the real thing …

Security 14 Jan 2004, 09:40
CA and Linux

Filling in the gaps

There are two reasons why it is worth taking note of CA with respect to Linux, writes Robin Bloor of Bloor Research. The first is that CA believes, as I do, that Linux is going to become the standard OS. I know this because I heard Yogesh Gupta, the CTO of CA, say so at the last CA World. The second is that CA believes that it …

Servers 14 Jan 2004, 09:49
Larry Ellison marries romantic novelist

He had a head for business and an eye for beauty, but it was his heart he never trusted and no one could ever breach...

Larry Ellison (59), Oracle boss, has married for the fourth time. His new wife is long-time fiancee Melanie Craft, a 35 year-old romantic novelist. They confirmed that got hitched before Christmas, but that's all they are saying on the matter, according to reports. Melanie's published works include: Man Trouble and A Hard- …

Bootnotes 14 Jan 2004, 10:26
Falling prices hit Computacenter revenues

US dollar is double dipper

Hardware sales volumes are holding steady at Computacenter, Europe's biggest reseller. But product revenues have been hit by falling hardware prices, coupled with the declining US dollar, the firm said yesterday in a pre-close trading update. Service revenues have "grown steadily across our geographies, particularly in the UK …

Channel 14 Jan 2004, 11:16
Dixons records Christmas cracker

Sales up

Dixons Group is celebrating a cracker of a Christmas after reporting that sales shot up an encouraging 12 per cent - a far cry from the turkey it suffered last year. Group sales for the eight weeks ended January 10 were up five per cent on a like-for-like basis, with growth in the UK boosted by demand for new gadgets and gizmos …

Channel 14 Jan 2004, 11:22
Get connected abroad with NetAway

Site offer Big surfing savings

Any reader who has found himself in a hotel room abroad with a laptop and an urgent need to connect to the Internet will know that feeling of dread which comes with the prospect of being completely fleeced on the cost of the call. The ideal would be a pay-as-you-go roaming service which allows connection to the Internet using …

Site News 14 Jan 2004, 11:25
Lastminute.com reports ‘strong’ trading

Acquires First Option for £12m

Shares in online travel and leisure outfit, Lastminute.com, are up this morning after the company reported "strong" trading. In a statement the company said: "Trading in the first quarter, the seasonally weakest quarter, was strong with TTV (Total Transaction Value) by departure basis being ahead of expectations especially in …

Business 14 Jan 2004, 13:06
Stob: Why men buy blue pills

They’re for a friend

(Previously: Sam "The Spam" Osborne, the notorious spamillionaire, has improbably represented himself as a philanthropist.) Time for the interview proper. Did he admit spamming was immoral? "Spamming? Immoral?" He was amazed. "You’ve seen my operation. I’m providing a public service!" In what sense, I wondered, was it a …

Bootnotes 14 Jan 2004, 13:09
Multimedia vulns pose severe risk

This could get messy

Numerous VoIP and video conferencing products are subject to serious security vulnerabilities because of widespread flaws in the implementation of a key multimedia protocol, according to an advisory by security clearing house CERT published yesterday. The issue revolves around faulty implementations of H.323, the multimedia …

Security 14 Jan 2004, 15:11
Mobile phones safe – report

Even so, just be careful, OK?

Experts want more time to establish once and for all whether mobile phones really are safe. An independent advisory group has just published a report following a review of the evidence concerning the health effects posed by mobile phones. Their view is that, based on the available research, mobile phones and base stations don' …

Mobile 14 Jan 2004, 15:12
UK firms give online recruitment the boot

HR managers stay away from Internet in droves

The Internet is a dead loss when it comes to finding and recruiting staff: only five per cent of UK HR managers used online recruitment sites in 2003, IT services firm Parity claims. According to its research, the Internet has failed to win over UK firms as an effective recruitment tool. The poll, albeit from a relatively small …

Small Biz 14 Jan 2004, 15:37
ISS buys Cobion for €26m

Anti-spam play

Internet Security Systems today bought content filtering firm Cobion AG for €26 million in cash. The acquisition will enable ISS to deliver Cobion's content filtering and anti-spam technology either as a stand-alone product or as a component of ISS' Proventia all-in-one protection appliance. Content security will be added to …

Security 14 Jan 2004, 15:40
EU recycles Lexmark ink cartridge probe

Unfair rebates, rival claims

A new complaint against Lexmark could re-ignite the European Union's investigation into the company's policy regarding sale of replacement printer cartridges. According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, third party cartridge supplier Static Control Components (SCC) has complained that Lexmark's policy of offering rebates …

Personal 14 Jan 2004, 15:43
Booming CES marks death of Comdex

CES Roundup Michael Dell's pantiliners, Darl McBride goes shopping and more

- Whether you ask a cabbie, a stripper or a tech executive, the answer is the same these days. CES is now the big daddy show in Las Vegas, and Comdex is the kid bringing it a beer on Sunday. This year's CES show packed the hotels and the show floor with gadgeteers running as fast as they could from booth to booth - some even …

Personal 14 Jan 2004, 18:12
Anonymous TCP/IP to debut at CodeCon

The DIY conference is back

The latest installment of the CodeCon trilogy has been unveiled, as the coders DIY technical conference brings a mix of old hands and bedsit coders to San Francisco next month. Highlights of CodeCon 2004 include FunFS, a low latency, userspace file system; the in house source code management system that's been used by DEC/ …

Software 14 Jan 2004, 21:17
IBM releases C++, Fortran for Mac OS X

Beta code

Adding to the choice of development tools for Apple Macintosh range, IBM is privately making two compilers available to its customers in beta form this week, The Register has learned. Big Blue released the XL Fortran Advanced Edition yesterday with support for Mac OS X. XL had previously only been available for AIX and Linux …

Software 14 Jan 2004, 21:17
MP probes British tech ‘sweat shop’ death

No inquest for Chinese immigrant

A north-eastern MP has taken up the case of a Chinese immigrant who died in a UK component factory two years ago from apparent exhaustion. The Guardian reports that Zhang Guo Hua, 40, from Heilongjiang in north-eastern China, died of a brain haemorrhage in October 2001 shortly after working a 24 hour continuous shift in the …

Business 14 Jan 2004, 21:19
Net activism and the future of domains

Opinion What’s the Beef.com?

Just when you thought it had all been done before and the last great tales of Net derring-do were a thing of the past, up pops another marvellous example of how the Web is continually changing itself and our world. It probably hasn’t passed many readers by that the US reported its first case of BSE aka Mad Cow Disease recently …

Music and Media 14 Jan 2004, 21:35
Intel rethinking RFID?

New bar-code standard

Intel is working on a new bar-code standard that supports wireless technologies including RFID tags. Large volume orders for RFID tags from retail giants such as Gillette should push the unit price down sufficiently to allow for widespread adoption. Intel [INTC] may now be rethinking its position in this market after stating …

Channel 14 Jan 2004, 21:36
BT works broadband miracle

West Norfolk gets wireless broadband after all

BT has performed a minor miracle after wiring up a rival community broadband scheme more than three months ahead of schedule. The monster telco has already apologised to West Norfolk Community Broadband (WNCB) for delays in delivering its private circuits, claiming that "capacity problems" on the network had held up …

Telecoms 14 Jan 2004, 21:37
Haiti kisses ICANN ring, rewarded with control over own domain

.ht redelegation reveals rot at heart of Internet

In Geneva recently, the world’s governments got together in the first ever meeting dedicated to discussing the effect of the Internet on the world. It very nearly fell apart after a huge split over who should be running the Net - the semi-autonomous private Californian company still beholden to the US government, ICANN, or the …

Music and Media 14 Jan 2004, 21:52
US players to shake up Europe's pricey WiFi scene

Hurry up, then!

A fierce battle is looming to win the hearts, minds and wallets of the burgeoning army of European corporate WiFi road warriors. Although wireless roaming is still in its infancy, existing high service tariffs are likely to fall as competition heats up from North American market entrants, the latest report from London-based …

Wireless 14 Jan 2004, 22:02
Apple quality control mars bullish results

iPod, G5s boom

Apple's quality woes tarnished an excellent set of quarterly results for the Cupertino-based systems company. For the first time, Apple acknowledged the "white spots" issue that has plagued owners of the 15 inch PowerBook, and which was painfully evident on the show floor at MacWorld Expo last week. Discussing the quarterly …

Mac Channel 14 Jan 2004, 23:04
Intel sets revenue record in Q4

Server chips drive growth

Intel's trusty microprocessor business carried the company to a record fourth quarter, as losses in other businesses narrowed and boosted revenue as well. Intel reported revenue of $8.74 billion for the quarter - a 22 percent year-on-year rise. This total just beats out the previous record $8.73 billion posted in the third …

Business 14 Jan 2004, 23:31
Cingular eyes AT&T Wireless for mobile mega merger

But good for who, exactly?

Cingular looks set to beat T-Mobile to merge with AT&T Wireless, according to the Wall Street Journal, which reports that the two are in an advanced stage of negotiations. The merged company would become the No.1 mobile phone network in the US, with 45 million subscribers, pushing Verizon out of the top spot. AT&T, T-Mobile and …

Mobile 14 Jan 2004, 23:31