FBI casts broad net in Anonymous crackdown
Dealing with civil unrest is a tricky business -- even more so when the civil unrest takes place online.
For nearly a year, the Anonymous movement -- and it's far more of a movement than the "group" that law enforcement keeps going on about -- has caused companies headaches while worldwide law enforcement agencies have appeared to do little.
Unrest with no consequences breeds more unrest. So it's no surprise that the LulzSec group formed to caused havoc earlier this year, using run-of-the-mill techniques to pick off easy targets such as Sony Pictures, PBS, and even a chapter of the public-private group, InfraGard. Following its 50 days of discord, LulzSec opted to retire, but its success could easily convince more people to form loose-knit hacktivist groups. Read more...
Update: Intel’s Q2 Atom revenue down with netbook demand
Intel's Atom microprocessor shipments declined during the second fiscal quarter of 2011, but the company reported strong profit growth even as it tried to diversify into the smartphone and tablet markets.
Revenue from the Atom microprocessor and chipset fell to $352 million, down 15 percent from last year's second quarter. Intel first started shipping low-power Atom chips for netbooks in 2008 and is now trying to attack tablets and smartphones with newer generations of power-efficient Atom chips.
Overall PC shipments slowed down during the second quarter as consumer spending slowed and tablets stole the spotlight from netbooks, IDC said earlier this month. Worldwide PC shipments totaled 84.4 million units during the second quarter, growing by just 2.6 percent compared to a year earlier, IDC said. Read more...
Baidu apes Google with Chinese Chrome
Chinese search giant Baidu has launched its own web browser, aping Google's Chrome with web applications and aspirations of becoming a desktop replacement.
The Baidu Browser only runs on Windows, but it does have its own application store for web apps (which run in a Webkit-based sandbox) and an extension framework very reminiscent of Chrome's. The browser also offers extensive customisation options for managing shortcuts, creating a screen layout more reminiscent of Apple's iPad than anything else. Read more...
Nokia ‘giving away phones at cost’
Nokia's financial results for the second quarter of 2011 are due tomorrow, and the company has already warned investors of very bad news coming. Yesterday, it issued a peek into just how tough things have got in 2011. Nokia said its smartphone profit margins were down to 6.2 per cent in Q1 2011, with margins of 16.4 per cent on basic phones.
In other words, Nokia's bargain basement models, sold to emerging markets and typically making use of very old technology, make it more money than its premium "flagship" models which boast its "state of the art" features.
"There are no very big cuts per model, but the scale – across the portfolio – is unseen for a very, very long time," Reuters quotes one unnamed source at a European operator as saying. Read more...
Google Labs to be shut down
Google has decided to close its Labs initiative as part of the company's efforts to streamline its product portfolio and focus its development efforts.
The Google Labs website hosts early stage product prototypes that end users can try out without guarantees that they'll work well or even exist in the near future.
"While we've learned a huge amount by launching very early prototypes in Labs, we believe that greater focus is crucial if we're to make the most of the extraordinary opportunities ahead," wrote Bill Coughran, senior vice president for Research and Systems Infrastructure, in a blog post.
During the company's most recent earnings conference call, co-founder Larry Page, who took over as CEO in April, said that the company was in the midst of trimming its broad palette of products and services, eliminating those that haven't proven popular and successful, like Google Health and Google PowerMeter, shut down in late June. Read more...
Symantec promises encryption viewer for iPhone and iPad users
More employees are using their iOS devices in the workplace. That's good from an employee morale standpoint, but not so good when it comes to the possibility of security breaches. Symantec says it will tackle the problem later this year by extending its encryption offerings to the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.
This week, the company announced Symantec PGP Viewer for iOS, a mobile offering that will make it possible for users to encrypt messages through the standard built-in Mail application on their devices. Symantec PGP Viewer users will also be able to view encrypted emails and attachments within Mail. Read more...
Top general says Defense Department IT in ‘Stone Age’
U.S. Marine Corps Gen. James "Hoss" Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was sharply critical Tuesday of the Defense Department's IT systems and said he sees much room for improvement.
Cartwright, who was speaking at the FOSE information technology conference here, said the DOD is sending increasing amounts of data, such as video, to soldiers on the battlefield, and it's beginning to build an architecture "that starts to take us where we need to be." But Cartwright quickly tempered that.
"Quite frankly, my feeling is -- at least being a never-satisfied person -- the department is pretty much in the Stone Age as far as IT is concerned," Cartwright said. Read more...
Mac OS X: The Lion roars
Apple's latest release of Mac OS, called OS X Lion, went on sale today in the Mac App Store. I had an opportunity to use Lion before today's release, and I can say that this major release is well worth the $29.99 upgrade fee.
When Apple brought out the current version of OS X, Snow Leopard, the changes were largely behind the scenes, and the most notable feature added was Microsoft Exchange support being integrated directly in the operating system. With Lion, most of the changes are upfront where users are better able to appreciate them. There are many new features, and the UI has been revamped.
One of the hallmarks of Lion is how Apple delivers evolutionary change that adds up to a revolutionary experience. It has taken many cues from iOS, the operating system used on the iPhone and iPad. Users of those two popular devices will feel very much at home with Lion. In fact, if you're partial to swiping to scroll and pinching to zoom in but you're a Mac desktop user, you might want to invest in an Apple Magic Trackpad to get the full Lion experience. Meanwhile, notebook users will discover that their trackpads have taken on new functionality. Read more...
Google may be willing to settle Oracle’s Android lawsuit
Google has offered the first public indication that it may be willing to settle Oracle's lawsuit against it over the alleged infringement of Java patents in Google's Android OS.
Google and Oracle filed legal papers Wednesday that provide the court with an update on the reexamination of Oracle's patents, and on whether they think the case should be "stayed," or put on hold, pending the outcome of that process.
Google argues in favor of a stay. It said the reexaminations are likely to narrow the scope of the case and the damages Oracle can claim against it. Narrowing the case would also make it "more likely that the parties could reach an informal resolution of the matter," Google's lawyers wrote. Read more...
BI: ‘Voice of the customer’ programs combine feedback in one place
About 18 months ago, Charming Shoppes launched a customer insights project to "deliver actionable customer and market research and analysis to the business," according to Jeffrey H. Liss, who headed up the initiative. Liss is now senior vice president of corporate strategy at the plus-size women's clothing retailer.
Before that time, the company collected and disseminated customer feedback in a less than organized way, Liss recalls. Various departments and brand groups received input from customer emails and online product reviews, and store personnel received verbal comments from shoppers. Anything deemed relevant was "passed up the command chain" to top executives via email distribution lists, Liss says. As a result, "We had a lot of anecdotal information floating around," and executives had no way to distinguish important data from rumor, he reports. Read more...