More than one million website pages have been hit by a sophisticated hacking attack that injects code into sites that redirect users to a fraudulent software sales operation. The so-called "mass-injection" attack, which experts say is the largest of its kind ever seen, has managed to insert malicious code into websites by gaining access to the servers running the databases behind the Internet, according to the technology security company that discovered it.
For years now, big corporations and those with financial stakes in their Web presence have employed handlers to edit their online reputation -- often as part of the array of services offered by a large public relations firm, lawyers or image consultants. But as everyday people began living more of their lives online, whether it’s blogging about dinner or posting vacation photos on Facebook, the downside to oversharing online began to catch up.
News Corp.’s Fox Networks Group told Time Warner Cable Inc. to stop streaming cable channels including FX to its pay-TV subscribers’ iPads, saying such use isn’t authorized. The company sent a letter demanding the New York-based cable operator stop providing the channels, Scott Grogin, a Fox spokesman in Los Angeles, said today in an interview.
It began with a 7-year-old asking her mother to tie colorful “Jolly Rancher” candies to the ends of her braids, copying a hairstyle she had admired in a magazine, for school picture day. But the girl’s mother says a teacher posted pictures of the second grader on Facebook and then led online friends in mocking the hairdo. Now Chicago Public Schools says it’s investigating the incident.
JPMorgan Chase & Co., Kroger Co., Capital One Financial Corp. and TiVo Inc. said they were affected by a security breach that may have enabled an unauthorized person to see some customers' names and e-mail addresses. JPMorgan and Kroger disclosed the accessing of the data, which occurred at Epsilon, a Dallas-based provider of e-mail marketing services.
China's Baidu Inc. has reached a deal with a local music copyright association, in a step toward resolving years of tension with the music industry over the company's music-search service. The online search provider said it will begin to compensate songwriters belonging to the Music Copyright Society of China when users download or stream their songs from Baidu's website.
A lawsuit filed by H-W Technology claims Apple, Research in Motion, Google, and 29 other major technology companies are infringing on a patent it was granted in April of 2009. U.S. patent number 7,525,955, which had first been filed in March 2005, is described as an "Internet protocol (IP) phone with search and advertising capability."
Samsung has been cleared of false allegations lodged by a security specialist who claimed that keylogging software was installed on two of the company's laptops. It turns out that a misfiring antivirus program called VIPRE, made by the GFI Software company, falsely identified a Microsoft Windows directory as malicious software.
Chinese authorities found three companies linked to Google Inc. broke tax rules and are investigating possible tax avoidance, a Chinese state-run newspaper said, raising the risk of fresh pressure on the Internet search giant. Google, the world's largest Internet search company, confirmed the three companies were units, but denied the tax violations alleged in the Chinese-language Economic Daily.
Proposed changes to European rules on product returns could cost online retailers 10 billion euros ($14 billion) a year, denting growth and leading to higher prices for consumers, an industry body warned. IMRG, which represents internet retailers, said the cost of draft amendments to the European Union's (EU) Consumer Rights Directive, voted through last week, equated to 4 percent of the estimated value of Europe's e-commerce industry in 2012.
Microsoft plans to file a formal antitrust complaint in Brussels against Google, its first against another company. Microsoft hopes that the action may prod officials in Europe to take action and that the evidence gathered may also lead officials in the United States to do the same.
A panoply of big media giants sent a cease-and-desist letter to Zite, the Apple iPad news reader app. The Washington Post, AP, Gannett, Getty Images, Time, Dow Jones and many other media organizations were part of the action.
A security researcher says he discovered keylogging software installed on two brand-new Samsung laptops that could be used to monitor all activities on the computer remotely. Mohamed Hassan, founder of NetSec Consulting, discovered StarLogger software on Samsung laptops with model numbers R525 and 540 after running security scanning software on the systems when he bought them last month, he writes in a guest column in Network World.
Microsoft Corp. and Apple Inc. have both hired linguists to serve as experts in the tech titan's ongoing battle over whether or not the government can grant a trademark for the term "app store." Microsoft filed its latest argument with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which included the opinions of a linguistic expert who supported the Redmond, Wash.-based software giant's argument that the term "app store" was generic and shouldn't be trademarked by Apple.
Google settled with the Federal Trade Commission over charges of deceptive privacy practices in its introduction last year of Buzz, the social networking tool in Gmail. Under the settlement, Google agreed to start a privacy program and undergo privacy audits for 20 years; it faces $16,000 fines for future privacy misrepresentations.
A new Amazon.com Inc. service that lets customers store songs and play them on a variety of phones and computers is facing a backlash from the music industry that could ignite a legal battle. Amazon's Cloud Drive allows customers to store about 1,000 songs on the company's Web servers for free instead of their own hard drives and play them over an Internet connection directly from Web browsers and on phones running Google Inc.'s Android software.
After complaints by Israeli government officials and Jewish organizations in the United States, Facebook took down a page by Palestinian supporters that called for violence against Jews and an uprising against Israel. The page, entitled “Third Palestinian Intifada,” began earlier this month as a call for peaceful protests in the occupied Palestinian territories on May 15, one of more than a dozen Facebook pages that have been used in recent months to mobilize uprisings across the Middle East and North Africa.
Researchers disclosed on a public security e-mail list three vulnerabilities in the Web site of security firm McAfee, whose site has been found to have bugs several times before. The YGN Ethical Hacker Group told the Full Disclosure list that it had reported the problems to McAfee on February 10 and two days later the company said it was working to resolve them.
Nokia Oyj filed a second complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission over claims that Apple Inc.’s iPhone and other products copied its technology, less than a week after Apple won a ruling in a similar case. The new complaint involves seven patents that Nokia said Apple is using “to create key features in its products in the areas of multi-tasking operating systems, data synchronization, positioning, call quality and the use of Bluetooth accessories,” the Espoo, Finland-based handset maker said.
As Middle East regimes try to stifle dissent by censoring the Internet, the U.S. faces an uncomfortable reality: American companies provide much of the technology used to block websites. McAfee Inc., acquired last month by Intel Corp., has provided content-filtering software used by Internet-service providers in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, according to interviews with buyers and a regional reseller.
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The GigaLaw Firm helps companies of all sizes protect their brands online, using domain name dispute policies – such as the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) – and other legal tools available to copyright and trademark owners on the Internet.