Hillcrest Labs announced that it has filed a complaint for patent infringement with the U.S. International Trade Commission, as well as a separate patent infringement suit in a U.S. District Court in Maryland regarding Nintendo's video game console. Hillcrest is asking the ITC to stop the import of Wii consoles into the U.S., and is requesting that the U.S. District Court award unspecified monetary damages.
Google Seeks Support for Internet on TV Spectrum
Using YouTube videos and old-fashioned lobbying, Google launched a campaign to mobilize public support for opening up unused portions of the TV spectrum for unlicensed Internet devices and expanded broadband access. Google executives and community activists said the online campaign is designed to enlist consumers in what has been a largely technical debate, with billions of dollars at stake, over how to use valuable chunks of "white spaces" on the spectrum when TV broadcasting shifts entirely to digital in February.
Hacking Concerns Lead to Abandoned Voting Machines
The demise of touch-screen voting has produced a graveyard of expensive corpses: Warehouses stacked with thousands of carefully wrapped voting machines that have been shelved because of doubts about vanishing votes and vulnerability to hackers. What to do with this high-tech junkyard is a multimillion-dollar question.
Judge Lets Gag Order on Subway Hacking Expire
Three Massachusetts Institute of Technology students are free to spread the word about the Boston transit system's inadequacies after a judge lifted a gag order that prevented the trio from presenting their findings at the Defcon conference.
German Officials Seek Stronger Online Privacy Laws
German politicians called for tougher privacy laws after officials revealed personal and financial information on millions of Germans was readily available for cash on the Internet. The scandal over the illegal trading of bank account and phone data came just months after snooping cases at some major German corporations raised alarms.
Verizon CTO Defends Need to Control Traffic
Verizon's chief technologist took a swipe at Net neutrality advocates, saying the concept has become overly politicized and important engineering details have been overlooked in Washington debates. "We need to guard against turning technical and business decisions into political decisions," Verizon's Richard Lynch said at the Progress and Freedom Foundation's technology policy conference.
Woman Ordered to Pay Damages for Sharing Game Online
A British woman who put a game on a file-sharing network has been ordered to pay damages to the game's creator. Topware Interactive has won more than £16,000 following legal action against Isabella Barwinska of London, who shared a copy of Dream Pinball 3D.
Free Music Site Shuts Down Due to RIAA "Problem"
Free music mixtape service Muxtape has temporarily been shut down due to pressure from the Recording Industry Association of America.
Internet Security Experts Warn of Attack on U.S.
The next large-scale military or terrorist attack on the United States, if and when it happens, may not involve airplanes or bombs or even intruders breaching American borders. Instead, such an assault may be carried out in cyberspace by shadowy hackers half a world away.
IOC Retracts DMCA Takedown Notice to YouTube
The International Olympic Committee has retracted a Digital Millennium Copyright Act takedown request it sent to YouTube over a Tibetan protest video. According to Corynne McSherry, an attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the IOC requested that YouTube remove the video called "Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremony."
Pedophile Arrested in British Child Abuse Ring
A pedophile who acted as a "librarian" for a global Internet child abuse ring was jailed after one of the biggest undercover police investigations into online abuse in Britain. Unemployed Philip Thompson, 27, amassed nearly a quarter of a million indecent pictures of children, including thousands in the two most serious categories.
McCain Releases Details on Technology Platform
John McCain, the Republican presidential candidate, has released his technology platform. Among the highlights: antipiracy measures, tax credits, and a formal federal policy of avoiding "unnecessary regulation."
Google Services Violate Patents, Software Company Says
Software maker GraphOn has filed suit against search giant Google, alleging that Google's Base, AdWords, Blogger, Sites, and YouTube services violate GraphOn's patents. GraphOn, based in Santa Cruz, Calif., acquired the patents through its acquisition of Network Engineering Software, a privately held network software company, in 2005.
Princeton Review Exposes Personal Data Online
The Princeton Review, the test-preparatory firm, accidentally published the personal data and standardized test scores of tens of thousands of Florida students on its Web site, where they were available for seven weeks. A flaw in configuring the site allowed anyone to type in a relatively simple Web address and have unfettered access to hundreds of files on the company’s computer network, including educational materials and internal communications.
Man Gets Seven Years for Leading AOL Phishing Scheme
A West Haven, Conn., man has been sentenced to seven years in prison for masterminding a phishing scheme that targeted AOL users over a four-year period. Federal prosecutors had argued that he masterminded a scam in which he and five other men harvested thousands of AOL e-mail addresses and then infected victims' PCs with malicious software that would prevent them from logging on to AOL without entering their credit card numbers, bank account numbers and other personal information.
Online Drug Company Leader Pleads Guilty to Fraud
The president of Hi-Tech Pharmaceuticals pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge, ending a lengthy federal investigation into the illegal importation of knockoff prescription drugs from Central America. Jared Wheat, 36, pleaded guilty in federal court in Newnan to conspiring to commit mail fraud and wire fraud and to import and distribute adulterated and unapproved new drugs.
Italian Judge Orders ISPs to Bloack Access to Pirate Bay
An Italian judge has ordered the country's Internet service providers to block access to The Pirate Bay, a Swedish file-sharing Web site, as part of an investigation into copyright law violation, officials said. Italy's anti-fraud police have been informing providers they must heed the order of a judge in the northern city of Bergamo, a police colonel, Alessandro Nencini, said.
Website Encourages Copying, Sharing Magazines Online
The magazine industry, already facing a decline in newsstand sales and falling ad revenue, is being besieged by a new foe: digital piracy. A fledgling Web site called Mygazines.com encourages people to copy and upload popular magazines that are currently on newsstands.
Indian Company Sues Google to Disclose Blogger
A small Indian construction equipment company is demanding in court that Google Inc. disclose the name of a person who used its blogging service in a case that could change the way the Internet giant does business in India. Google's Indian subsidiary, Google India Private Ltd., is being sued for defamation in the Bombay High Court by the Mumbai-based Gremach Infrastructure Equipments & Projects Ltd., which runs a construction-equipment lending business.
Class-Action Suit Targets Beacon's Advertising Customers
A class-action lawsuit targets Facebook and eight of the participants in Beacon, its ill-fated advertising product that shared information about third-party site activity with the social network. Named as defendants are Facebook, as well as current or former Beacon participants Blockbuster, Fandango (owned by Comcast), Overstock.com, STA Travel, Zappos, Hotwire (owned by IAC/InterActiveCorp), and GameFly.
