IT PRO – Citizens need trust in e-gov for the future of IT
Public confidence in government web services is crucial for the development of IT in Europe, according to an EU parliament member. Dr. Silvia Adriana Ticau, speaking at ENISA’s annual security conference, said that the European public sector was the biggest buyer, biggest service provider and biggest employer when it came to IT.
IT PRO – Government appoints first ID commissioner
The government has appointed Sir Joseph Pilling as the first ever Identity Commissioner, keeping watch over the controversial ID card scheme and national registry. The Identity Commissioner role, which was announced last year to help soothe fears over the ID card plans, is modelled on the Information Commissioner position – an independent watchdog which has yet to be given much in the way of enforcement powers.
The Guardian – Filesharing crackdown divides UK music industry
A growing rift is developing in the music industry over proposals by business secretary Lord Mandelson to crack down on persistent filesharers by suspending their broadband connections.
ITVT – MTV Offers Twitter Visualization Tool, Interactive Video Feed and Other Enhancements for VMA’s
MTV offered a range of interactive and new media enhancements to complement its broadcast of the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards Sunday night.
V3 – Bartz bullish on Yahoo’s future
In a TV interview, Yahoo! CEO Carol Bartz admitted she would have taken Microsoft’s initial $47.5bn approach for the firm had she been in the job last year, saying: “Sure. You think I’m stupid?” However, she insisted the eventual tie-up can still prove transformative, saying: “We can take costs down and still take 80% of the revenues. And we can add focus to where we add value.”
The Guardian – Latest Google news service promises publishers money and readers
Google is launching Fast Flip, an experimental news service it claims will allow users to mimic the process of flicking through a newspaper’s pages. It has partnered with 40 mainly US titles, including the New York Times, and aims to boost newspapers’ revenues and readership. Google business product manager, Josh Cohen, said: “It’s really designed to be a news service to improve the way that people are reading their articles online, to create a more engaging experience for them so they consume more content. Ultimately, partners get more of their content read and make more money from it.”
BBC – Microsoft Bing adds visual search
Microsoft has introduced ‘visual search’ for its Bing search engine, letting users browse search results via images and not text. The BBC said this move further distanced the recently-introduced site from market leader Google. Microsoft’s senior vice president of online services, Yusuf Mehdi enthused: “The whole concept is that the world of search is going to change”. Explaining the benefits of the new service, Microsoft director of business development, Don Dodge, said: “Where visual search really helps is in areas like travel or e-commerce, shopping or even the movies. Your brain works faster on a picture than it does on text so a picture really is worth a thousand words.”
Independent – BT calls in temps as staff reject ‘flexible’ hours
A BT spokesman said the group was “disappointed” after Communication Workers Union members at its Openreach division rejected proposals for more flexible working. The group is understood to be finalising plans to bring in 500 temporary staff to cover routine engineering work during unsocial hours.
ComputerWorldUK – IT departments patch OSs but apps should be the priority
Corporations appear to be much slower in patching their applications than their operating systems — even though attackers are mainly targeting vulnerabilities in applications, according to a new report. “Now we know which vulnerabilities are being patched and which are not,” says Alan Paller, director of research at the SANS Institute.
ComputerWorldUK – More mainstream businesses turning down ERP upgrades
The post-Y2K priority of Tier I and Tier II ERP providers has been to go after the fertile sales grounds of the midmarket. These maturing companies need more ERP horsepower than what their QuickBooks or Excel spreadsheets have provided in the past. According to new research from Aberdeen Group, those vendors have succeeded in wooing the midmarket, though there’s plenty more marketshare to go after. But now, those ERP systems are getting a little long in the tooth and, perhaps due to the global recession, those ERP customers are opting to ignore new ERP suite releases and upgrades.
ComputerWorldUK – Apple’s new iPhone security feature not up to scratch
The iPhone’s new defence meant to prevent users from reaching phishing sites is inconsistent at best, a security researcher said today, with some users getting warnings about dangerous links, while others are allowed to blithely surf to criminal URLs. Apple quietly added an anti-fraud feature to the iPhone’s Safari browser with the update to iPhone 3.1, released Wednesday. But according to Michael Sutton, the vice president of security research at Zscaler, the new protection is “clearly having issues”.
Computing – Case study: The Salvation Army wins the fight against spam
The Salvation Army has turned to a cloud-based security service to tackle the problems caused by the fact that 90 per cent of its inbound email was spam. The charity opted for a hosted application from supplier Mimecast to support the London headquarters of its UK and Republic of Ireland arm, and the 18 divisions that make up the organisation.
FT.com – Google offers fast-flip option to newspapers
Google is holding out a helping hand to the embattled newspaper industry with a new way of browsing newspapers and magazines online.Eric Schmidt, chief executive, has criticised the formats of online editions of newspapers as slow and “pretty unpleasant to read.”
ComputerWorldUK – Google Launches the Data Liberation Front
As I wrote recently, cloud computing tends to minimise the role of the desktop operating system. At the same time, though, it makes data – and in particular data lock-in – a key issue. You might not have problems moving from one desktop operating system to another (because they’re largely irrelevant to the functioning of the cloud), but you will probably have great difficulty getting your data out of the cloud.
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IT PRO – Citizens need trust in e-gov for the future of IT
http://www.itpro.co.uk/615088/citizens-need-trust-in-e-gov-for-the-future-of-it
Public confidence in government web services is crucial for the development of IT in Europe, according to an EU parliament member. Dr. Silvia Adriana Ticau, speaking at ENISA’s annual security conference, said that the European public sector was the biggest buyer, biggest service provider and biggest employer when it came to IT.
IT PRO – Government appoints first ID commissioner
http://www.itpro.co.uk/615103/government-appoints-first-id-commissioner
The government has appointed Sir Joseph Pilling as the first ever Identity Commissioner, keeping watch over the controversial ID card scheme and national registry. The Identity Commissioner role, which was announced last year to help soothe fears over the ID card plans, is modelled on the Information Commissioner position – an independent watchdog which has yet to be given much in the way of enforcement powers.
The Guardian – Filesharing crackdown divides UK music industry
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/sep/13/filesharing-crackdown-rift
A growing rift is developing in the music industry over proposals by business secretary Lord Mandelson to crack down on persistent filesharers by suspending their broadband connections.
Wall St Journal – Avaya has agreed a $900m deal to acquire bankrupt Canadian group Nortel Networks’ enterprise systems division.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125292350335808267.html
Avaya Inc. won an auction for a Nortel Networks Corp. unit that makes phone systems for businesses, offering about $900 million for the operation, plus an additional $15 million for an employee-retention program.
V3 – Bartz bullish on Yahoo’s future
http://www.v3.co.uk/v3/news/2249347/bartz-bullish-yahoo-future
In a TV interview, Yahoo! CEO Carol Bartz admitted she would have taken Microsoft’s initial $47.5bn approach for the firm had she been in the job last year, saying: “Sure. You think I’m stupid?” However, she insisted the eventual tie-up can still prove transformative, saying: “We can take costs down and still take 80% of the revenues. And we can add focus to where we add value.”
The Guardian – Latest Google news service promises publishers money and readers
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/sep/15/google-news-service-experiment
Google is launching Fast Flip, an experimental news service it claims will allow users to mimic the process of flicking through a newspaper’s pages. It has partnered with 40 mainly US titles, including the New York Times, and aims to boost newspapers’ revenues and readership. Google business product manager, Josh Cohen, said: “It’s really designed to be a news service to improve the way that people are reading their articles online, to create a more engaging experience for them so they consume more content. Ultimately, partners get more of their content read and make more money from it.”
BBC – Microsoft Bing adds visual search
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8256046.stm
Microsoft has introduced ‘visual search’ for its Bing search engine, letting users browse search results via images and not text. The BBC said this move further distanced the recently-introduced site from market leader Google. Microsoft’s senior vice president of online services, Yusuf Mehdi enthused: “The whole concept is that the world of search is going to change”. Explaining the benefits of the new service, Microsoft director of business development, Don Dodge, said: “Where visual search really helps is in areas like travel or e-commerce, shopping or even the movies. Your brain works faster on a picture than it does on text so a picture really is worth a thousand words.”
Independent – // BT calls in temps as staff reject ‘flexible’ hours
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/bt-calls-in-temps-as-staff-reject-flexible-hours-1787423.html
A BT spokesman said the group was “disappointed” after Communication Workers Union members at its Openreach division rejected proposals for more flexible working. The group is understood to be finalising plans to bring in 500 temporary staff to cover routine engineering work during unsocial hours.
ComputerWorldUK – IT departments patch OSs but apps should be the priority
http://www.computerworlduk.com/management/security/cybercrime/news/index.cfm?RSS&newsid=16564
Corporations appear to be much slower in patching their applications than their operating systems — even though attackers are mainly targeting vulnerabilities in applications, according to a new report. “Now we know which vulnerabilities are being patched and which are not,” says Alan Paller, director of research at the SANS Institute.
ComputerWorldUK – More mainstream businesses turning down ERP upgrades
http://www.computerworlduk.com/management/it-business/sme/in-depth/index.cfm?RSS&articleid=2503
The post-Y2K priority of Tier I and Tier II ERP providers has been to go after the fertile sales grounds of the midmarket. These maturing companies need more ERP horsepower than what their QuickBooks or Excel spreadsheets have provided in the past. According to new research from Aberdeen Group, those vendors have succeeded in wooing the midmarket, though there’s plenty more marketshare to go after. But now, those ERP systems are getting a little long in the tooth and, perhaps due to the global recession, those ERP customers are opting to ignore new ERP suite releases and upgrades.
Apple’s new iPhone security feature not up to scratch
The iPhone’s new defence meant to prevent users from reaching phishing sites is inconsistent at best, a security researcher said today, with some users getting warnings about dangerous links, while others are allowed to blithely surf to criminal URLs. Apple quietly added an anti-fraud feature to the iPhone’s Safari browser with the update to iPhone 3.1, released Wednesday. But according to Michael Sutton, the vice president of security research at Zscaler, the new protection is “clearly having issues”.
Computing – Case study: The Salvation Army wins the fight against spam
http://www.computing.co.uk/computing/analysis/2249330/salvation-army-fights-fight
The Salvation Army has turned to a cloud-based security service to tackle the problems caused by the fact that 90 per cent of its inbound email was spam. The charity opted for a hosted application from supplier Mimecast to support the London headquarters of its UK and Republic of Ireland arm, and the 18 divisions that make up the organisation.
FT.com – Google offers fast-flip option to newspapers
Google is holding out a helping hand to the embattled newspaper industry with a new way of browsing newspapers and magazines online.
Eric Schmidt, chief executive, has criticised the formats of online editions of newspapers as slow and “pretty unpleasant to read.”
ComputerWorldUK – Google Launches the Data Liberation Front
As I wrote recently, cloud computing tends to minimise the role of the desktop operating system. At the same time, though, it makes data – and in particular data lock-in – a key issue. You might not have problems moving from one desktop operating system to another (because they’re largely irrelevant to the functioning of the cloud), but you will probably have great difficulty getting your data out of the cloud.
