Judge Allows Deposition of Steve Jobs in Antitrust Suit

Apple Inc. Chief Executive Steve Jobs, who is out on medical leave, has been ordered by a federal judge to answer questions from plaintiffs' lawyers in an antitrust lawsuit related to his company's iTunes business. Judge Howard Lloyd of U.S. District Court for Northern California ruled that lawyers representing the plaintiffs in the suit may question Jobs for a total of two hours.

German Court Calls Google Street View Legal

A Berlin court has ruled, according to Deutsche Welle, that it's legal for Google to take the street-level pictures, striking down a lawsuit brought on by a German woman who sued Google over Street View and cited privacy and property rights. The case is complicated, because the woman who sued did so out of the possibility that her privacy might be invaded -- e.g. if Google Street View happened to take photos of the front of her house, and that the camera on top of the Google Street View vehicle would see over the hedge in front of it.

Microsoft Files Patent Suit Over Nook E-Reader

Microsoft Corp. filed legal actions against Barnes & Noble Inc. and two device manufacturers for alleged patent infringement by their Android-based e-reader and tablet devices that are marketed under the bookseller's brand. The patents at issue cover "a range of functionality embodied in Android devices that are essential to the user experience," according to Microsoft.

Goldman Sachs Programmer Sentenced for Stealing Code

A former Goldman Sachs Group computer programer was sentenced to eight years in prison for stealing secret code used in the Wall Street bank's valuable high-frequency trading system. Sergey Aleynikov, was arrested by the FBI and charged in July 2009 with copying and removing trading code from Goldman before taking a new job at Teza Technologies LLC, a high-frequency trading startup firm in Chicago.

Japanese Disaster Prompts Warning of Online Scams

Security researchers say that hackers are using the unfolding disaster in Japan by appealing to people’s sense of altruism -- or, in some cases, voyeurism -- by sending spam email that contain links laden with malicious code. Some of the links are supposed to be of footage of the earthquake or tsunami, some purport to be from relief organizations, while others claim that recipients have inherited $12 million from victims in Japan.

Details of RSA Security Attack Remain Unclear

More than a day after RSA security posted an “urgent” alert warning that a sophisticated intruder might be able to initiate a “broad attack” on a password device used by millions of customers, the announcement and its meaning remain shrouded in mystery. RSA, a division of the data management company EMC Corporation, will not say how its system was compromised and what specific kinds of threats its customers are facing.

Microsoft, Law Enforcement Seize Equipment in Spam Raid

Microsoft Corp. and federal law enforcement agents seized computer equipment from Internet hosting facilities across the U.S. in a sweeping legal attack designed to cripple the leading source of junk email on the Internet. Microsoft launched the raids as part of a civil lawsuit filed in federal court in Seattle in early February against unnamed operators of the Rustock "botnet," a vast network of computers around the globe infected with malicious software that allows its masterminds to distribute enormous volumes of spam, peddling everything from counterfeit software to pharmaceuticals.

RSA Security Tokens Stolen in Cyberattack

Information about RSA's SecurID authentication tokens used by millions of people including government employees and banks was stolen during an "extremely sophisticated cyberattack," putting customers relying on them to secure their networks at risk, the company said. "Recently, our security systems identified an extremely sophisticated cyberattack in progress being mounted against RSA," Executive Chairman Art Coviello, wrote in an open letter to customers, which was posted on the company's Web site.

Retailers Back Effort to Change Sales Tax Laws

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Target Corp. and other large retailers are ratcheting up a political campaign to force Amazon.com Inc. to collect sales taxes, sensing opportunity in the budget crises gripping statehouses nationwide. The big-box stores are backing a coalition called the Alliance for Main Street Fairness, which is leading efforts to change sales-tax laws in more than a dozen states including Texas and California.

ICANN Board Expected to Approve .xxx Domain

The porn industry is about to get .xxx as its own .com -- and after years of protests by the Bush administration, the Obama administration is standing on the sidelines as it happens. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the non-profit California corporation that oversees the creation of top-level domain names like .com, .net and .biz, is expected to approve the .xxx domain.

Judge Lets Sony Subpoena Hacker's PayPal Account

A federal magistrate said Sony may subpoena the PayPal account of PlayStation 3 hacker George Hotz, as the gamemaker ratchets up its civil lawsuit against the man who released the first full-fledged PS3 jailbreak in the console’s four-year history. The order came two weeks after Magistrate Joseph Spero in San Francisco granted Sony the right to acquire the internet IP addresses of anybody who had visited Hotz’s website from January of 2009 onward.

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