20th September 2004 Archive

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UK police arrest Cisco source code suspect

PCs seized, suspect quizzed, inquiries ongoing

UK police have arrested a man on suspicion of stealing source code from networking giant Cisco. The 20 year-old was arrested following Metropolitan Police Computer Crime Unit raids in Manchester and Derbyshire on 3 September. He was questioned on suspicion of offences against the UK's Computer Misuse Act in connection with the …

Data Networking 20 Sep 2004, 08:51
C&W to throw £85m at LLU

'Uniquely positioned'

Cable & Wireless is to plough £55m-£85m into local loop unbundling (LLU) over the next couple of years as it ramps up its investment in broadband. It is to unbundle up to 400 exchanges in the second half of 2005 as it targets around a third of BT's exchanges. Last week's announcement follows C&W's recent acquisition of Bulldog …

Telecoms 20 Sep 2004, 08:59
Sloppy emailing is bad for business

Didn't you get the memo?

Email, often thought of as ultimate business tool, can actually slow decisions and be bad for business according to a new survey. The problem lies in a lack of email etiquette, a psychologist says. The poll, which was taken across a sample of 750 workers from across Europe, picked out seven unforgivable sins of emailing. These …

Music and Media 20 Sep 2004, 09:11
Oracle v. Peoplesoft: the joke is on...

Opinion Cash from chaos

I thought it was a joke when Oracle first announced that it was going to try to buy PeopleSoft; or, at best, a spoiling tactic over PeopleSoft's acquisition of JD Edwards. It turns out that I was wrong. I was also wrong to suppose that the anti-trust case brought by the US Department of Justice would be upheld - unless the DoJ …

Applications 20 Sep 2004, 09:49
Nokia exits ringtones

The bell doth toll for toll bells

Nokia has bowed out of the ringtone market following poor sales from its Club Nokia website. Its exit should also smooth relationships with mobile network operators which think that their hardware providers should not try to sell content to their customers.. The global ringtone market is worth between $1.5bn and $3.5bn a year, …

Mobile 20 Sep 2004, 09:49
Hynix guilty of accounting fraud

Punishment looms

Hynix is bracing itself for fines, and worse, after Korean regulators found it guilty of a $1.75bn accounting fraud. The Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) says the memory chip overstated results for 1999. Hynix has also been found guilty of breaking accounting regulations in 2002-2003 when it tried to tidy up the mess. The …

Channel 20 Sep 2004, 10:02
BT trials video-on-demand

One for the e-potatoes

BT is trialling TV-cum-video-on-demand over broadband. It is hooking up with Freeview, the UK's digital TV service which provides up to 30 free digital TV channels and more than 20 digital radio station. The "BT Freeview Plus" service will enable punters to watch these channels and to pay for video-on-demand content by using …

Telecoms 20 Sep 2004, 10:20
Microsoft opens up Office - to governments

Security sweetener

Microsoft is opening up the source code for its Office suite of products, but only for governments. The Government Security Programme (GSP) has already offered governments a quick peek at the source code behind the Windows operating system. The aim of the programme is to increase faith in Microsoft's security and counter the …

Applications 20 Sep 2004, 11:23
'Warez lawyer' had double agenda - claim

Charged with criminal conspiracy

More details have emerged on the arrest of a German lawyer and three businessmen who masterminded an international warez network and grossed €1m. A spokesman for German anti-piracy organisatin GVU told Berlin newspaper Tagesspiegel on Friday (17 Sept) that the crackdown may have been the biggest blow ever against internet …

Channel Register 20 Sep 2004, 11:23
AMD goes mobile at 90nm with Athlon 3000+

Destined for thin and light notebooks

AMD today launched its latest mobile processor, the Athlon 64 3000+, the first new processor manufactured on its 90nm process. You'll be surprised to hear that it goes faster than its immediate predecessor, without drawing more power. The Athlon 64 3000+ is destined to sit snugly inside many an Acer notebook. The Taiwanese …

Channel 20 Sep 2004, 13:09
EC names IST prizewinners

Shortlisted for three €200k Grand Prizes

The European Commission has announced the winners of the 2004 Information Society Technology prizes. Each winner is invited to exhibit their product at this November's IST 2004, where the three winners of the Grand Prizes - worth €200,000 - will be announced. Enterprise and Information Society commissioner Olli Rehn said the …

Science 20 Sep 2004, 13:10
Peoplesoft staff get golden goodbye

In the event of a takeover, please cash this cheque...

PeopleSoft staff will get bigger and better severance packages in a move the company insists is to reward people for work put in, not an attempt to stop people jumping ship in the future. The deal would likely increase the cost of any takeover by Oracle. Staff are now entitled to 12 weeks pay and health coverage, compared to …

Financial News 20 Sep 2004, 13:12
Trouble in Paradise

HP source is litigious of course

BDO Stoy Hayward has been appointed administrator of Paradise Computers. As revealed by El Reg last week the firm got into difficulties following a dispute with HP over trademark infringement and grey importing. In August HP issued a £2.2m High Court writ against the reseller, it has promised to take tougher action over grey …

Channel 20 Sep 2004, 13:14
Your Communications seeks buyer

'Get in the hole!'

United Utilities - the FTSE 100 energy and water outfit - has reacted coolly to a weekend report that it is seeking a buyer for its B2B telco Your Communications. The Sunday Telegraph reports that Ernst & Young has been hired for the sale after United Utilities ruled out floating the company. Instead, it seems that United …

Telecoms 20 Sep 2004, 13:34
Rise of the Botnets

Get in touch with your inner zombie

The first half of 2004 saw a huge increase in zombie PCs. Also called bots, their average numbers monitored by security firm Symantec rose between January and June from under 2,000 to more than 30,000 per day - peaking at 75,000 on one day. Botnets are computers infected by worms or Trojans and taken over surreptitiously by …

Anti-Virus 20 Sep 2004, 13:47
IBM talks up US pensions with ornery old-timers

Settlement looms

IBM is in talks which could resolve the case brought by 140,000 older pension holders in the US who believe they were discriminated against by changes made to the company pension scheme in the 1999. In February, a judge ruled in favour of the pensioners and was due to announce damages soon. IBM asked the judge to postpone any …

IT Director 20 Sep 2004, 14:52
IT vendors lose that loving feeling

Big brands not loved by great unwashed

IT buyers have little love or loyalty for the IT brands they purchase. The survey looked at computer software, networking equipment, servers and workstations, storage systems and IT services. Some 44 per cent of respondees said they feel loyalty to the majority of their suppliers. But 30 per cent feel "trapped" by some vendors …

Channel Register 20 Sep 2004, 14:54
HP spends $1.3bn on its own shares

'Attractive investment'

Ink giant HP has spent $1.3bn on buying its own shares. The accelerated share repurchase scheme was carried out through Merrill Lynch - in effect HP buys the shares now and the investment bank buys them from the open market over the next few months. HP's board of directors has set aside another $3bn "repurchase shares …

Financial News 20 Sep 2004, 15:07
ESA tests microgravity with orbiting pail of water

Jack and Jill on notice for retrieval

After Beagle II went missing on Mars, the European Space Agency could be forgiven for scaling down its ambitions. But, no. For its next trick, the ESA is sending a bucket of water into orbit in the beautifully named Sloshsat-FLEVO mission. (FLEVO stands for Facility for Liquid Experimentation and Verification in Orbit.) It is a …

Science 20 Sep 2004, 15:34
Reg road tests the Wi-Fi pub

Ale + internet = recipe for success?

The battle-hardened hacks at El Reg need little encouragement to partake of a foaming pint of ale, so it was with much cheering that we recently reported on Kent brewer Shepherd Neame's decision to kit out some of its hostelries with Wi-Fi hotspots. Among the pubs slated for connection was The Sun in Faversham, Kent (pictured …

Wireless 20 Sep 2004, 16:19
Sasser author gets IT security job

'Second chance'

Sven Jaschan, self-confessed creator of the destructive NetSky and Sasser worms, has been hired by German security company Securepoint. He's been offered work as a trainee software developer working on security products, such as firewalls, even though he may go to prison for creating one of the most destructive computer viruses …

Anti-Virus 20 Sep 2004, 16:30
Microsoft launches mini-attack on data back-up market

Storage Decisions File server help

Microsoft's storage ambitions are expanding with the vendor today announcing plans to release new data backup software. Microsoft is looking to compete at the low-end of the data backup market by releasing a product dubbed Data Protection Server (DPS). The first iteration of this software will handle basic backup tasks for …

Storage 20 Sep 2004, 16:51
VMware creates PC software condom

ACE software container

Not satisfied with its prominent position on servers and workstations, VMware has charged the desktop with a new software package that creates "containers" of applications that can be centrally managed by an administrator. VMware today has put out a beta of its ACE product - a sophisticated type of software that lets customers …

Applications 20 Sep 2004, 18:30