28th June 2002 Archive

Browse by publication date, or search the site.

HP readying dual-core PA-8800

As Itanium 2 looms

Hewlett Packard Co may be Intel Corp's biggest cheerleader when it comes to the Itanium processors, particularly after its recent acquisition of Compaq Computer Corp, but that does not mean that the company is taking its foot off the pedal on the venerable PA-RISC line of processors. On the contrary, HP has just started …

Servers 28 Jun 2002, 06:05
Sun edges towards IBM and Microsoft on Web Services

Liberty Belle

Sun Microsystems Inc has thrown its weight behind a web services security specification co-developed by rivals IBM and Microsoft Corp. Palo Alto, California-based Sun will support submission of WS-Security to the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS). If adopted, WS-Security would …

e-Business 28 Jun 2002, 06:06
US cracks down hard on WorldCom

Send in the clowns

The US government declared its intention to haul WorldCom Inc company and its executives over the coals yesterday, with legislators issuing subpoenas against executives and the Securities and Exchange Commission charging the firm with fraud. The attacks from Washington followed the Clinton, Mississippi-based carrier's …

e-Business 28 Jun 2002, 06:07
Speedera seeks Akamai injunction

'False allegations'

Speedera Networks Inc yesterday asked a San Francisco Superior Court judge for a preliminary injunction preventing its rival Akamai Technologies Inc making disparaging comments about it in sales pitches. As we reported yesterday, the companies currently have four lawsuits pending - based on everything from false …

e-Business 28 Jun 2002, 06:10
Ransom Love out as Caldera CEO

Concentrating on UnitedLinux

The new Caldera CEO is Darl McBride, who was a Novell exec from 1988 to 1996 and has run a succession of smaller companies since then. From the information in this press release it looks like one of McBride's primary skills is getting hold of investment capital, and Caldera can certainly use some of that. During a conference …

Business 28 Jun 2002, 07:06
‘You have no idea the evil we do’ – MCI insiders break their silence

Meet the High Toll Dept.

A couple of years ago we were caught up in a MCI Group experience familiar to many American consumers, a practice telcos employ here called "random billing". We worked it into our vocabulary. This vast deregulated spiders web, a wholly owned subsidiary of Worldcom, employs many such consumer tactics, the most popular of which …

Letters 28 Jun 2002, 07:27
Ballmer to China: 'Steal all the software you want, so long as it's ours'

Your first dime bag is always free

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has signed a memorandum of understanding with China's State Development Planning Commission (SDPC) worth $750 million over three years, involving both software and services, Reuters reports. "We want the Chinese industry to grow. The success of Microsoft in every market, including China's, is highly …

Software 28 Jun 2002, 07:31
In May, iMac sales go away

Inventory goes over the top

Alarm bells are beginning to ring over Apple's recent sales performance. The first four months of the year saw enormous demand for Apple kit. But not now: this week ZDNET reported that Ingram Micro is sitting on 15 weeks worth of inventory in the US. And today we have an article piling up the gloom from Digitimes, the Taiwanese …

Mac Channel 28 Jun 2002, 08:49
BT buys Scoot

...or else

BT is to acquire the assets of business finder directory service - Scoot.com - for £8 million. The deal has the full backing of the Scoot board but if shareholders reject the offer then management has said it will pull the plug on the business. Scoot made a pre-tax loss of £35 million last year balanced against total assets of …

Business 28 Jun 2002, 08:51
MS Passport to escape European investigation?

UK rep feels it's 'essentially fair'

Microsoft's Passport may escape with a caution from the European Union, as opposed to a full-blown privacy investigation, next week. According to a Bloomberg report this morning, Iain Bourne, strategic policy manager for the UK's Office of the Information Commissioner, feels Passport is "essentially fair," but that Microsoft " …

Music and Media 28 Jun 2002, 09:16
Magnetic wood – the new mobile phone squelcher

Major plank

There's a huge market in Asia for mobile phone squelchers - in Hong Kong for example, people don't think twice about making and receiving calls in the cinema and theatre. Of course, mobile phone jamming is illegal in the UK because it can cause interference outside of the building it's covering. But now, a Japanese team of …

Mobile 28 Jun 2002, 10:01
Worldcom to shed 450 jobs in Europe and Asia

Tough times ahead

Some 450 jobs are to be axed in Europe and Asia following revelations that Worldcom was cooking the books to the tune of $3.8bn. Insiders have told The Register that 400 jobs will go in EMEA (Europe Middle East & Africa) with 50 being axed in Asia. It's not known how many jobs will go in the UK but some estimates suggest it …

Music and Media 28 Jun 2002, 10:09
Soon al-Qaeda will kill you on the Internet

Virtual box-cutters poised

The Business Software Alliance (BSA), known for kicking doors with dogs and brownshirts to sniff out expired licenses and for extorting vast sums of cash from non-compliant victims even more frightened of a visit from that federal Copyright-911 force also known as the FBI, has taken it upon itself to cobble up a survey which, in …

Security 28 Jun 2002, 10:17
Server memory – of course it's expensive

Peace of mind?

Late last year, when SDRAM prices reached the end of a downward price spiral, you could easily pick up 1GB of PC memory for under £100. DRAM prices have since risen a little, but it remains inexpensive to upgrade a PC with a full complement of memory. Not so for servers. Prices may have come down too, but adding extra memory to …

Servers 28 Jun 2002, 10:24
MS Palladium protects IT vendors, not you – paper

Anderson gives us the FAQs

Ross Anderson of Cambridge University has published a lengthy and informative paper/FAQ on Palladium, the Trusted Computing Platform Alliance (TCPA), their relationship and their implications. His take is that Microsoft's Palladium, soft-announced by the company earlier this week, will be built on TCPA hardware, adding some …

Software 28 Jun 2002, 10:27
MS Media Player gives up your box

Don't worry, they fixed it before you were rooted

If there's one thing that occasionally tempts me to miss Windows, it's the mediocre multimedia support in Linux. But then again, my media player doesn't allow remote attackers to own my box. It's a trade-off, I'll allow. Yesterday MS 'fessed up to three new holes in WMP, the most serious of which allows remote evildoers to run …

Software 28 Jun 2002, 10:48
Should bosses read our email? EU asks citizens

Goodie, a vox pop...

'What's he on about?' we wondered when EDS Chief Security and Privacy exec Paul Clark lashed out over European privacy legislation in a release on Wednesday. "EDS welcomes the recognition that privacy is a business as well as a legislative issue," he'd apparently told a meeting of privacy officers in Stuttgart last week: " …

Music and Media 28 Jun 2002, 11:19
AT&T ‘pulls plans’ to buy KPNQwest

Carrier to be broken up

AT&T has ditched plans to buy KPNQwest leaving those running the collapsed company little option but to break-up the pan-European telecom network, according to the FT. The paper claims the break-up and sale of KPNQwest could begin as early as this weekend. AT&T's decision to call the whole thing off was blamed on the …

Business 28 Jun 2002, 11:58
Acequote trio form Boffin breakaway

Let the marketplace decide

A trio of execs from Acequote, the B2B marketplace, has broken away to form a rival company. Called Boffin (url thisisboffin.com), the service matches IT buyers and resellers and goes live on Monday, July 1. It differs from Acequote in that it allows resellers to distribute marketing material direct to the end-user companies, 2 …

e-Business 28 Jun 2002, 12:39
GamesSpy and KaZaA infected by viruses

A plague on both their houses

Nimda has found its way onto online gaming site GameSpy.com. In an email to users, GameSpy admitted that its GameSpy Arcade Installer had become infected with the Nimda-E virus. It has now replaced the infected file with a virus-free version of the installer. Nimda found it way on GameSpy.com servers to infect the installer …

Anti-Virus 28 Jun 2002, 13:15
‘Nokia’ loses nokia.me.uk cybersquatting case

What's in a name

Phone company Nokia has won the first case against a cybersquatter regarding .me.uk domains. The Finnish phone company wrote to the domain name holder from London asking him to hand over nokia.me.uk. However, he wrote back claiming that he had registered the domain name in question because his nickname was "Nokia". Fair …

Music and Media 28 Jun 2002, 13:17
Nvidia trio form Code Mafia breakaway

Developers for the games industry

Richard Huddy, Nvidia's European Developer group lead, has jumped ship to form his own company. Called The Code Mafia, two Nvidia colleagues are also joining him, leaving only one member of the European Developer team. A bit of a hole to fill, then. But the team isleaving with Nvidia's blessing. The Code Mafia will apply skills …

Software 28 Jun 2002, 14:08
NTL's Knapp keeps his job

'Right man to lead company' apparently

Barclay Knapp has pulled off a shock surprise and retained his place at the head of UK cableco NTL. Weekend press reports named Philip Jansen, a former executive at Telewest, as being lined up to replace Knapp following speculation that NTL's CEO would be forced out as part of a deal to rescue the cableco, which filed for …

Business 28 Jun 2002, 14:30
My dad's server's bigger than yours

Benchmarketing season

Earlier this week IBM released benchmarks, which it claimed, showed how its Intel servers outperformed Dell servers, now Hewlett-Packard is quoting rival benchmarks which show how its kit surpasses IBM's. HP said that tests demonstrate superior performance by its ProLiant servers in multiple categories of MMB2, TPC-C and TPC-H …

Servers 28 Jun 2002, 14:55
Fortress IT: foreign contractors swamp UK fears

Come on guys, get a grip

The government is planning to relax work permit restrictions, allowing agencies to apply for fast track visas for skilled workers from overseas. Currently, only employers can ask for permits for staff, which is a little anomalous in the day of short-term, temporary IT projects. So, good news, one would have thought. Especially …

Business 28 Jun 2002, 15:53
Xerox fluffs numbers

What's a few billion between auditors?

Copier company - Xerox has jangled the nerves of corporate America over concerns about its financial results. Xerox has a history of funny bookkeeping, which is why in April, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) reckoned that the copier company had fluffed its numbers to the tune of $3 billion from 1997 to 2000 and …

Business 28 Jun 2002, 15:57