News

Qualcomm maneuvers around court’s chip set ban

New wireless Qualcomm chip sets that do not infringe on a video encoding patent held by competitor Broadcom should ship by April

IT pay: The best and worst of times

IBM buys Israeli storage startup

Storage vendor XIV's Nextra storage system will give IBM technology to address high-performance storage for digital archives, digital media, and Web 2.0 apps

Holiday electronics sales strong, says SIA

November chip sales rose 2.3 percent year-on-year, but it will take a stronger than expected December to reach the 3.8 percent growth goal the SIA forecast earlier this year

Federal judge orders stop to Qualcomm chip sales

Judge prohibits Qualcomm from making certain 3G chip sets, used to provide Internet access to mobile phones, saying they infringe on three patents held by rival Broadcom

Q&A: McAfee, Symantec CEOs talk security

McAfee CEO David DeWalt and Symantec CEO John Thompson answer tough questions about data protection, consolidation, and the IT security market

Researcher says Sears downloads spyware

Sears and Kmart customers who sign up for the My SHC marketing program could, in essence, be stuck with spyware without notification, a Harvard professor says

Motorola settles patent dispute with Metrologic

Metrologic had been squabbling with Symbol Technologies, which Motorola acquired in 2006, when Symbol claimed Metrologic had not paid proper royalties

One-fifth of Windows apps go unpatched

Secunia's patch-detection utility finds that more than 20 percent of all apps on users' PCs have known security flaws

Vonage, Nortel settle patent dispute for no cash

Cross-licensing agreement with Nortel is a minor victory for Vonage, which has settled or reached tentative agreements in three other patent disputes related to VoIP

Highlighting the hidden gems of 2007

Microsoft narrows scope of Home Server bug

Data corruption bug in Windows Home Server occurs only when the system is under an 'extreme load,' Microsoft claims

Chinese chip-equipment maker faces U.S. lawsuit

Chinese startup AMEC has been sued by Applied Materials for allegedly misappropriating trade secrets

LG.Philips to unveil 52-inch multi-touch LCD at CES

LG.Philips says its 52-inch multi-touch LCD is the largest display of its type in the world

OLPC CTO quits nonprofit effort

One Laptop Per Child's first employee, CTO Mary Lou Jepsen, is quitting the organization to start a for-profit company to commercialize technology she invented with OLPC

Baidu CFO killed in holiday accident

Chief financial officer Shawn Wang, who helped guide the China's Baidu through its 2005 initial public offering on the Nasdaq, dies in an accident

U.S. bans spare lithium batteries from checked bags

New rules banning spare spare lithium batteries in checked baggage are designed to reduce the risk of fires in aircraft

Blog comments getting DOSed

SCO bumped off Nasdaq

Due to its bankruptcy filing, The SCO Group has been delisted by Nasdaq, which has also suspended trading of the company's shares

AOL to end support for Netscape browser

After February 1, 2008, AOL will no longer provide updates and support for Netscape, which is often considered the first true mass-market browser

Malware honeypots wait for ’08

The Web Application Security Consortium's Distributed Open Proxy Honeypot Project to track malware distributors will be relaunched in January

Saudi blogger arrested, held without charges

Blogger whose writing has criticized religious extremism has been detained in Saudi Arabia, human-rights groups say

WordPerfect’s defeat: Re-visiting an historic gripe

Warner to offer music via Amazon without DRM

Amazon's music service challenges iTunes, adding songs from Warner to the range it sells as MP3 files without DRM; Sony BMG is the only major music company still insisting on DRM

IT’s greenest year yet

Scorecard: what came true, what didn’t in 2007

CES 2008 is only days away and the competition to get noticed is fierce; this look back at the class of 2007 sees whether their predictions were spot-on or not

Firmware issues delay release of Optimus Maximus keyboard

Release date for the $1,564 Optimus Maximus keyboard, with customizable OLED screens on each key, has been pushed back to late February

Group warns of sites offering unlicensed music

The Center for Democracy and Technology has released a list of sites selling unlicensed music, leaving users vulnerable to lawsuits

Update: U.S. court of appeals hands Google a patent setback

Appeals court rules Google's AdSense is in the clear, but its AutoLink browser tool is back in court on patent infringement charges

China’s SMIC licenses 45nm process technology from IBM

Licensing agreement gives SMIC rights to use IBM's 45nm bulk CMOS process technology to produce sophisticated communication chips

Report: Panasonic preparing 150-inch PDP screen

Panasonic is preparing to unveil at CES the largest flat-panel screen manufactured to date, according to reports

One last Windows Christmas wish

Samsung hits back at Sharp with U.S., Japan complaints

Samsung alleges that Sharp's LCD products infringe upon its patents.

EMC will buy Document Sciences for $85M

Acquisition of Document Sciences' software for personalizing mailshots and other communications will allow EMC to extend its offering in transactional content management

Report: Apple to offer Fox movie rentals

Under Apple and News Corp.'s pact to offer Fox movies for rent through iTunes, Twentieth Century Fox will use Apple's FairPlay DRM technology in future DVDs

Herd intelligence benefits IT security

In response to the growing threat of customized malware, security vendors are starting to utilize customers' computers as information collectors

STMicroelectronics, Intel delay launch of joint venture

Citing turmoil in debt capital markets, the two companies are delaying the launch of Numonyx, their Flash memory project, until March 28

NetSuite IPO generates $185 million

SaaS provider sold 6.2 million shares at $26 per share

The best and worst of ’07

British monarchy makes YouTube debut

Queen delivers Christmas message online for the first time

Year end: 2007’s coolest gadgets

Digital camera that records video tailored for YouTube, OLED TVs, and NEC's Lui PC round out the list

Tracking AMD’s road to recovery

Chipmaker must reach several milestones to get back on track

iPhone and me: A love story

Reporter looks back on four months of being unexpectedly smitten and how the 'loyal and faithful companion' drastically changed her daily life

Hitachi, Canon, Panasonic tie in flat-panel displays

Canon, Panasonic take stake in Hitachi

Cisco green plan looks beyond routers

Cisco would like to have server and storage vendors use open standards to collect and share information related to power consumption and send it to Cisco routers

comScore: Last week saw strong online shopping

Last-minute holiday shopping online surged this year as last week's sales grew 25 percent over the same period last year

IBM dishes five predictions for the future

IBM's last installment of its annual 'Next Five in Five' list looks forward to intelligent traffic systems and energy grids, more organic food, and better technology for doctors

Google replies to lawmaker on privacy

Search engine repeats call for Congress to pass national law to create uniform privacy framework

Microsoft sues domain name registrar for typosquatting

Software giant alleges that Red Register profits from 125 domain names 'confusingly similar' to ones Microsoft Marks

Hacking for a good cause

Brad Willman turns remote access software into Trojan for tracking down child-porn activities