In August, the elusive hacker movement known as Anonymous went after its most prominent target yet: the Vatican.The attack, albeit an unsuccessful one, provides a rare glimpse into the recruiting, reconnaissance and warfare tactics used by the shadowy hacking collective.
WikiLeaks has followed through on its promise and released confidential e-mails from global security analysis company Strategic Forecasting, or Stratfor. The organization says that it has 5,000 confidential Stratfor e-mails and will release them piecemeal over the coming days.
A German court said Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. can't enforce a sales ban on Apple Inc.'s iPad and iPhone devices in Germany for the time being, while Motorola would be infringing antitrust obligations if it demands Apple cease sales of the affected products. The Karlsruhe higher regional court's summary assessment is based on an appeal by Apple against a lower court's earlier injunction barring Apple from selling certain iPad and iPhone devices in Germany.
Now that it's pretty much an established maxim that you can get fired or arrested for saying something stupid on Facebook, people are getting savvier at managing their privacy on social networks. As part of its Internet and American Life Project, Pew has released a report that finds Internet users taking a more active role in managing and pruning their social networks.
When AT&T started slowing down the data service for his iPhone, Matt Spaccarelli, an unemployed truck driver and student, took the country's largest telecommunications company to small claims court. And won. His award: $850. Pro-tem Judge Russell Nadel found in favor of Spaccarelli in Ventura Superior Court in Simi Valley, saying it wasn't fair for the company to purposely slow down his iPhone, when it had sold him an "unlimited data" plan.
Apple has been forced to turn off its iCloud and MobileMe push e-mail services for users in Germany to comply with an injunction in a patent lawsuit brought by Motorola Mobility. Users of iOS devices in Germany will still receive e-mail, but only when they open the Mail app, or when the app is set to check for e-mail.
Proview Electronics, the firm trying to stop Apple Inc from using the iPad name in China, has a plausible claim over the unusual methods Apple used to conceal its identity when attempting to acquire Proview's trademarks, according to several legal experts. But Apple also has some strong defenses against a lawsuit Proview filed last week in California - including the argument that Proview cannot sue Apple, but can only sue the corporation that actually bought the trademarks, the experts said.
Proview Electronics Co. has taken its legal battles with Apple Inc. to a U.S. court, claiming the iPhone maker used deception in buying the iPad trademark and should not be allowed to keep it. The lawsuit, which was filed in the Superior Court of the State of California in Santa Clara County on Feb. 17, claimed that Apple had committed fraud when it used a subsidiary, called IP Application Development Ltd., to purchase the iPad trademark from Proview on December 23, 2009 for £35,000.
Analysts for a Department of Homeland Security program that monitors social networks like Twitter and Facebook have been instructed to produce reports on policy debates related to the department, a newly disclosed manual shows. The manual, a 2011 reference guide for analysts working with the department’s Media Monitoring Capability program, raises questions about recent claims by Homeland Security officials who portrayed the program as limited to gathering information that would help gain operational awareness about attacks, disasters or other emerging problems.
The Obama administration outlined a set of online privacy principles that officials said would help consumers control the use of their personal data gleaned from Internet searches. The framework for a new privacy code moves electronic commerce closer to a one-click, one-touch process by which users can tell Internet companies whether they want their online activity tracked.
While many developed countries have adjusted their laws and regulations to address cloud computing, the wide differences in those rules make it difficult for companies to invest in the technology, according to a new study by the Business Software Alliance.
The European Commission, facing opposition in city streets, on the Internet and in the halls of parliament, has suspended efforts to ratify a new international anti-counterfeiting agreement, and instead will refer it to Europe’s highest court to see whether it violates any fundamental EU rights. EU Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht asserted Wednesday that an opinion from the European Court of Justice would clear away the fog of misinformation surrounding the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, known as ACTA.
Nearly 12 million Americans were victims of identity theft in 2011, an increase of 13 percent over 2010, according to a report by the research firm Javelin Strategy & Research. The rise in the use of smartphones and social media by incautious consumers fueled the increase in identity fraud, and 2011 was a year of several big data breaches too, Javelin said.
Microsoft filed a complaint with European Union antitrust authorities accusing Google and Motorola Mobility, a smartphone company the Internet search giant plans to buy, of charging too much for use of its patents, marking a new stage in a long-running feud between Microsoft and Google. “We have taken this step because Motorola is attempting to block sales of Windows PCs, our Xbox game console and other products,” David A. Heiner, a senior Microsoft lawyer, wrote in a blog post.
Internet service providers need to work harder to prevent hacks, data theft and other fraud, including contacting customers whose infected computers have been hijacked by organized crime and helping them clean out viruses, the head of the Federal Communications Commission said. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said he sought "smart, practical, voluntary solutions" to the massive problem of Internet fraud and data theft.
HTC Corp. lost a patent-infringement claim against Apple Inc. at the U.S. International Trade Commission, the first of the Taiwanese handset maker’s cases targeting the iPhone. Apple didn’t violate an HTC patent for controlling how mobile phones manage power supply, the Washington-based commission said.
The Center for Digital Democracy (CDD) filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission claiming that Google's move to consolidate its dozens of privacy policies violates an agreement the company reached with the FTC to settle privacy complaints about the now defunct Google Buzz. The complaint -- similar to complaints brought by the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), the World Privacy Forum and Consumer Watchdog -- alleges that Google is misleading users about the "real reasons" for the privacy policy change, which are due to take effect March 1.
Research In Motion Ltd. reiterated that it can't access, or provide access to, emails sent through its BlackBerry corporate computer networks, following local media reports that the Canadian company has set up servers in India so that local security agencies can directly monitor the service. India fears that terrorists may use encrypted communication services such as those offered by Research In Motion and has long been demanding that providers of such services allow monitoring by security agencies.
California’s attorney general, Kamala D. Harris, said that the state had reached an agreement with Amazon.com, Apple, Google, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft and Research in Motion to strengthen privacy protections for smartphone owners who download mobile applications. The agreement will force developers to post conspicuous privacy policies detailing what personal information they plan to obtain and how they will use it.
The founder of the file-sharing website Megaupload was granted bail and released after a New Zealand judge determined that authorities have seized any funds he might have used to flee the country. Kim Dotcom, who U.S. authorities allege facilitated millions of illegal downloads through his company, has been in custody since his arrest Jan. 20.
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