Opinion

This time, it’s personal: Government spying hits Google where it hurts

Google is truly mad over revelations about government spying on its networks. Finally, some good comes from Snowden's leaks?

4 ways open source protects you against software patents

Upon 8th anniversary of Open Invention Network, let's count the ways open source defends against patent aggression

Amazon’s expertise may save CIA cloud from HealthCare.gov’s fate

Now that IBM is out of the running for CIA contract, AWS has a real opportunity to change government IT forever

Can Samsung become Apple? Only if it executes well

The company has the resources and the consumer goodwill, but it also has struggled to get software and services right

2014 will be the year of data

Without question, data will dominate in 2014. Here's why.

Microsoft Office Web Apps takes great leap toward Office equality

Newest version of Office Web Apps boasts live collaborative editing, but still trails Office for Windows in other areas

TWITTER goes public, SQUARE may follow — Yammer & co-authoring added to OFFICE — MICROSOFT makes $2B annually on Droid patents — FACEBOOK likes open source

Application-centric networking? More like Cisco-centric networking

Cisco's software-defined networking solution seems to answer one question: How to sell more Cisco products to enterprises

Bill Gates: The true world-changer in selfish Silicon Valley

The tech industry talks big about fixing societal ills, but few are engaging — much less supporting — the outside world

2014 will be the year of data

If 2012 might've been the end of the world and 2013 saw the end of privacy, without question, data will dominate in 2014

Twitter’s transformation: Ugly duckling is now Internet swan

On eve of its IPO, it's easy to forget how far Twitter has come — and how much it's changed our dialog

Red Hat aims for enterprise OpenStack deployment dominance

Red Hat Enterprise Linux integration could ease OpenStack adoption, but complexity and cloud competition stand in the way

Amazon ushers in graphics as a service

Amazon clouds adds Nvidia-backed G2 instances, which Mozilla wants to use to stream apps everywhere via HTML5, JavaScript

MICROSOFT taking own sweet time in CEO pick — APPLE discloses gov’t data requests — BITCOIN smashes record — TCP Port 0 mystery — ADOBE’S password disaster

Deciphering Microsoft Security Advisory 2896666 on Word zero-day exploit

The straight story on Microsoft's uninformative, poorly worded security advisory about attacks delivered via a bug in the TIFF codec shipping with Office

Cloud audits often don’t mean what you think they do

Some cloud audits provide little actual assurance — demystifying SAS 70 (SSAE 16), SOC-1, SOC-2, and SOC-3 claims

Button it! A tiny detail snags a system setup

A tech team wishes it could hit the Reset button — in more ways than one — when a hasty system install doesn't go as planned

What’s new in Group Policy for Windows Server 2012 R2 and Windows 8.1

These subtle but interesting Group Policy changes shouldn't escape your attention

Video: Orwell’s ‘1984’ has nothing on the current surveillance state

Security researcher Mikko Hypponen's TEDx talk illustrates extent to which nearly entire online population is being spied on

Verizon attacks Net neutrality in D.C. court

Verizon lawsuit now being argued before judges in D.C. Circuit seeks to strike down Net neutrality provisions adopted by FCC

CEO quits foundering ACER — VALLEY underestimated NSA — DC court killing Net Neutrality — APPLE building super-glass plant in AZ — Bezos-Stone SMACKDOWN

Botched Windows USB driver patch KB 2862330 triggers BSOD 0x000000D1 or 0x000000CA

Last month MS13-081/KB 2862330 went down the automatic update chute, triggering blue screens and endless re-installs. It still isn't fixed

The truth about Samsung Knox for Android security

The higher-level security technology for select Android devices isn't really available yet, despite the hype

Why KitKat can’t help older Android hardware

Android 4.4's widely hyped smaller memory footprint won't bring Gingerbread devices into modern era on its own

Be sure to factor in the cost of cloud failure

Outages and other issues will happen, so you need to be sure to budget for those realities

Rockstar vs. Google and Samsung: The patent war goes to 11

Backed by Apple and Microsoft, Rockstar Consortium is latest patent troll on the block, with sights set on Android universe

Mobile browsers lag, so mobile HTML5 apps suffer

A Mozilla evangelist claims mobile browsers just aren't good enough for HTML5

Unwanted BLACKBERRY taken off block — COOK lobbies to protect gays in workplace — MAVERICKS eats external drive data — HealthCare.gov #FAIL deconstructed

Bye-bye, Big Red? Escaping Oracle’s not that easy

Open source databases PostgreSQL and MariaDB are making strides, but need more than technical edge or lower price to attract Oracle customers

Microsoft kills Skype third-party tools for the desktop

Skype has confirmed it's shutting down all third-party access to its desktop API at the end of the year

9 trends for 2014 and beyond

Who says enterprise IT is boring? Big ideas and bold new tech are shaking things up like never before, so it's time to consider the long-term implications

OS X Mavericks vs. Windows 8.1: Which is really free?

Apple's giving away OS X Mavericks for free has stirred the Mac vs. Windows kettle up once again

Secunia PSI freezes with ‘Stop running this script?’ errors in Windows 8.1

Fortunately there's a relatively easy workaround for getting the security software functioning again

Mobile browsers lag, so mobile HTML5 apps suffer

Hardware vendors are to blame for not updating older browsers to properly leverage HTML5, Mozilla's Christian Heilmann says

OS X Mavericks upgrade destroys data, reports Western Digital

Issues extend to external hard drives, as well as eSATA- or Thunderbolt-based peripherals from other vendors

BadBIOS: Next-gen malware or digital myth?

Security researcher's ongoing investigation into disturbingly stubborn malware infection inspires curiosity — and skepticism

Urine luck: Dells may smell, but don’t blame the Intercats

New Dell laptops may smell like Garfield's toilet, but it's just glue, not your puddy cat

FAA says don’t put it away — HARDWARE Friday: iPad Air, Nexus 5 on sale — Senate bill bolsters NSA — badBIOS: Mysterious Mac malware

MSXML, Java, and Adobe apps are the most unpatched Windows software

Secunia's quarterly report on which apps remain chronically unpatched on PCs shows Microsoft, Oracle, and Adobe have the most problematic products

Believe it: The cloud gives you a business edge

Early adopters are also seeing that even if they came for the savings, they stay for the business advantages

Open source needs to clean up its language

The licensing terms 'weak copyleft,' 'strong copyleft,' and 'permissive' are confusing. Here are my proposed alternatives

Bruised Apple: Buggy products and user censorship

The steady stream of problems with OS X Mavericks, iOS 7, Safari, and Retina MacBook Pros won't go away no matter how many forum comments Apple deletes

BYOD? Sure! BYOPC? Not so fast…

The forces that propelled use of employee-owned smartphones and tablets don't apply so much to PCs and Macs

Cloudera pitches Hadoop for everything. Really?

Hadoop has a ways to go before it can eclipse all other big data solutions

Email goes ‘Dark’ — encrypted, that is

Lavabit and Silent Circle are readying a new end-to-end email encryption system, but third parties must step up

Samsung updates mobile, TV, and gaming SDKs to attract more developers

The leading maker of smartphones is trying to create its own ecosystem à la Apple

Microsoft needs your help to nail the Windows 8.1 update 0xc1900101 Blue Screens

Two weeks into a vexing bug, people trying to upgrade to Windows 8.1 are still reporting Blue Screens

NSA taps Yahoo, Google data flows — SALESFORCE offers DIY app store — Kids flee FACEBOOK — SCHILLER: Goldman better than Google for grads

Apple censors Lawrence Lessig’s discussion of iOS 7 Wi-Fi problems

Creative Commons founder, whose comments in Apple's official support forums were squashed, is not taking it lying down

Windows 8.1’s ‘Hero’ ads — brought to you by stealthy snooping

Microsoft unleashed a new iteration of its Hero ads but somehow forgot to mention that they work by secretly snooping on your desktop