Countries negotiating a deal to curb trade in fake and pirated goods are close to reaching an agreement in talks that have raised concerns among digital rights advocates, U.S. trade officials said. Digital rights advocates have feared the proposed Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement could allow customs agents to confiscate laptop and music devices if they contain illegal downloads, while other groups have worried it could restrict trade in low-price generic drugs.
The Israeli Communications Ministry directed the customs authority to confiscate all iPads coming into the country -- effectively instituting a ban on Apple's newest device. The announcement "follows the refusal of the ministry's engineering staff to compromise on testing the device's suitability and compliance with Israeli wireless networks," reports Israeli newspaper Haaretz.
A computer security researcher has released a new browser-based tool that can be used to experiment with next-generation "clickjacking" attacks along with details of the four new techniques. Clickjacking is a style of attack where a user is tricked into clicking on certain parts of a Web page with hidden buttons that perform malicious actions.
Some big marketers, including Sprint and eBay, are turning to small start-ups to help them tap social-networking data to find would-be clients among the friends and acquaintances of existing customers, to the dismay of some privacy advocates. EBay, for instance, used online tracking technologies to identify customers who browsed or shopped for products in the clothing, shoes and accessories section of its site.
A new type of malware infects PCs using file-share sites and publishes the user's net history on a public website before demanding a fee for its removal. The Japanese trojan virus installs itself on computers using a popular file-share service called Winni, used by up to 200 million people.
The main focus of the U.S. Department of Defense's new Cyber Command will be protecting military networks, not engaging in cyberwarfare, the nominee to head the organization said. Army Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander, faced with questions about the U.S. Cyber Command's role during a Senate hearing, said the Cyber Command would work with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to defend private networks, but his primary role would be to defend the U.S. military's corner of cyberspace.
Viacom says newly released documents in its copyright fight with Google over its YouTube subsidiary help prove its case against the search engine. Viacom said in a statement that the newly released documents show Google "made a deliberate, calculated business decision not only to profit from copyright infringement, but also to use the threat of copyright infringement to try to coerce rights owners like Viacom into licensing their content on Google's terms."
Illegal drugs-on-demand operations in seven states and Puerto Rico that made use of the Internet and phony prescriptions have been broken up in a federal bust, authorities announced. The busts represent a major federal initiative against "pill mills" that illegally deal in prescription drugs, U.S. Attorney Steven Dettelbach said. He said the operations netted millions of dollars in profits and led to countless illegal drug buys.
The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission told a Congressional panel that a recent court ruling that the agency lacked authority to regulate the Internet should not prevent it from carrying out its plan to broadly expand the country’s high-speed Internet service. But the chairman refused to say if the commission would try to reclassify Internet service as a utility similar to telephone service to overcome the court decision, a move that some Democratic senators supported but that several Republican senators strongly warned against.
Financial news service Theflyonthewall.com has urged a Manhattan federal judge to lift a ban on its quickly reporting "hot news" about analyst research from three Wall Street banks, saying the ban has cost it subscribers and could threaten its survival. The company made its request to U.S. District Judge Denise Cote, who last month issued an injunction requiring it to wait two or more hours before publishing research from Bank of America Corp's Merrill Lynch unit, Barclays Plc and Morgan Stanley.
Adobe intends to sue Apple over the recent SDK change that bans iPhone and iPad applications translated from languages Steve Jobs doesn't like, according to a report citing sources close to Adobe. IT World reports that Adobe will sue Apple "within a few weeks," after the Jobsian cult not only barred native Flash from the iPhone and iPad, but also put the kibosh on Flash apps repackaged for use with Apple's APIs.
The Army intelligence officer nominated to lead the Pentagon’s new command devoted to warfare in cyberspace has warned Congress of a gap between the military’s technical capabilities and legal controls over digital combat. The officer, Lt. Gen. Keith B. Alexander, wrote to members of the Senate Armed Services Committee that computer network warfare is evolving so rapidly that there is a “mismatch between our technical capabilities to conduct operations and the governing laws and policies.”
An increasing number of politicians, concerned with shrinking budgets and eyeing continuing growth in e-commerce, want to force out-of-state retailers like Amazon.com, Overstock.com, and Blue Nile to tattle to tax collectors about how much in sales taxes their customers have avoided paying.
Google and an alliance of privacy groups have come to Yahoo's aid by helping the Web portal fend off broad requests from the U.S. Department of Justice for e-mail messages. In a brief, the coalition says a search warrant signed by a judge is necessary before the FBI or other police agencies can read the contents of Yahoo Mail messages -- a position that puts those companies directly at odds with the Obama administration.
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski will soon have to make a wonky but controversial decision that could have a profound impact on how much consumers pay for broadband, how fast their services will be -- and possibly whether millions of people will be able to get it at all.
Facebook is unveiling a revamped internal site designed to help people stay safe while surfing online. Facebook's "Safety Center," which features new tools for parents, teachers, teens and law enforcement, is the first major endeavor from the social networking site and its four-month-old global safety advisory board.
A milkman has criticized Google's Street View website, claiming burglars targeted his garage three times after spotting its door open online. Gordon Rayner said he believed criminals could have been using the service after he was alerted to the image, which clearly shows him standing next to his house in front of an open garage door.
An Italian judge convicted three Google employees in February of violating privacy laws because the Internet company had sought to profit from a video of an autistic boy being bullied by classmates, according to a judicial reasoning in the case. That verdict was the first to hold the company’s employees criminally responsible for content posted on its system.
In a 32-page report, the Government Accountability Office said that most of the published information, anecdotal evidence and records show that piracy is a drag on the U.S. economy, tax revenue and in some cases potentially threatens national security and public health. But the problem is, according to the GAO, the data used to quantify piracy isn't reliable.
Facebook executives are due to meet the head of a British child protection agency in Washington to discuss safety measures on the social networking site. It has been criticized by the Child Exploitation and Online Protection (CEOP) center for not installing "panic buttons" on every page.
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