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Microsoft deal should vastly expand reach of Skype (AP) : Technet |
- Microsoft deal should vastly expand reach of Skype (AP)
- The guerilla roots of the Skype calling service (AP)
- Google braces to pay at least $500M in ad probe (AP)
- Zynga and Lady Gaga to found GagaVille, a virtual town stocked with new songs (Yahoo! News)
- Video: How to use selective syncing in Android (Yahoo! News)
- Google +1 for Websites Nears Launch (Mashable)
- US in new push to break China Internet firewall (AFP)
- Facebook may have leaked personal information: Symantec (Reuters)
- Skype's owners set to make $5 billion: source (Reuters)
- Cellphone alert system announced in NYC (AP)
- Facebook leaked keys to account data: Symantec (AFP)
- Senate panel grills Apple, Google on location data (AP)
- Old Apple vs. New Android…and the surprising winner (Appolicious)
- US alert system targets mobile phones (AFP)
- Pop queen Lady Gaga hits in online game 'FarmVille' (AFP)
- Rumor: Apple iPod Nano to Get Camera--Again (PC World)
- Best of Android packed into "Ice Cream Sandwich" (AFP)
- CommVault tops on services (Investor's Business Daily)
| Microsoft deal should vastly expand reach of Skype (AP) Posted: 10 May 2011 03:18 PM PDT SAN FRANCISCO – Imagine using your Xbox and switching from a game to a video chat with a faraway friend holding an iPad. Or going into your office email to invite Grandma to a virtual family reunion beamed on TV sets to relatives across the country. Microsoft's $8.5 billion purchase of Skype is supposed to make using the Internet for video phone calls as common as logging on to Facebook or instant messaging is today. If it wins regulatory approval, the deal announced Tuesday provides Microsoft, the world's largest software maker, with the means to sell more digital advertising and offer more popular conferencing tools to help businesses save money. Skype's services also span hot markets — online socializing, mobile phones and digital video — where Microsoft has been struggling to catch up with Facebook, Apple and Google. Analysts and investors couldn't seem to agree whether Microsoft is wasting its money on an unprofitable service or has pulled off a coup that will help it restore clout. Microsoft stock was virtually unchanged, falling 0.6 percent. About 170 million people worldwide who use Skype regularly for calls and chats. Microsoft believes it can attract hundreds of millions more by weaving Skype into its products. Not just Windows, which runs on eight of every 10 computers and servers on the planet, but also its Outlook email program, software for phones and the Xbox video game console. Microsoft already has a Skype-like service called Windows Live. But the real Skype is far more popular and bridges different computers and phones. Already, someone using the Skype application on an iPhone can talk to someone who has it installed on a Dell laptop. For businesses, Microsoft has separate communications software. Building Skype into it would make it easier for corporate users to conduct video chats with people at other companies, or from home, said Bern Elliott, an analyst at the research firm Gartner Inc. Skype allows users to make voice and video calls for free or pennies. Calls from one Skype account to another are free. Those to a landline or cellphone using the regular phone network cost money, but much less than going through the phone company. It has become a popular way to avoid large phone bills. Skype is the largest provider of international calling services in the world, surpassing any single phone company, according to research firm TeleGeography. Skype users made 207 billion minutes of voice and video calls last year — almost 400,000 years' worth. Most of that was free, which has made it difficult for Skype to make money. Only about 5 percent of active Skype users pay for it. Microsoft pledged to keep Skype in all the places it is currently available, including mobile devices that run of the software of two major rivals, Apple and Google. Skype users don't have to pay to install the software on Apple's iPhone, iPad computer tablet or devices running on Google's Android system. The new ownership probably means more advertising in Skype's video services along with potentially compelling new uses. Skype only recently began experimenting with ads. Microsoft, which has a much larger sales team, intends to expand them. The partnership would also bring Skype to the Xbox video game console and has sold 50 million copies, making it the world's No. 2 video game system behind the Nintendo Wii. Already, players using the Kinect motion-sensing controllers can videoconference with each other. The Microsoft-Skype partnership means a player could one day put a game aside and use the Xbox to call anyone else who has registered for a Skype account — a grandmother on her landline phone, a friend holding an Android phone, a coworker using Outlook email at work. It's also conceivable that Microsoft could expand Skype's video chatting services into Facebook, the social networking site that has more than 500 million users of its own. Microsoft owns a 1.6 percent stake in Facebook, and both have an interest in cutting into Google's power. Microsoft's pursuit of Skype may have even been motivated by a desire to make sure Google didn't buy it first, said technology analyst Rob Enderle. He believes Microsoft will plug Skype into Facebook. "Either Microsoft or Google could turn Skype into an international standard," Enderle said. "Microsoft didn't want to be at the other end of that — that's why it got as pricey as it did." The purchase is the most expensive in Microsoft's 36-year history, eclipsing its $6 billion acquisition of online ad service aQuantive in 2007. That deal has helped Microsoft sell more online ads, although analysts aren't convinced it was worth the money. The $8.5 billion is also more than three times what Skype was valued at 18 months ago when an earlier owner, eBay Inc., sold a two-thirds stake to a group of investors led by the private equity firm Silver Lake. When eBay bought Skype for $2.6 billion in 2005, it saw tremendous potential to bring together the millions of buyers and sellers in its online bazaar. But "Skyping" and shopping didn't fit together the way eBay envisioned, feeding the skepticism about whether Microsoft will be able to realize its ambitions. "The onus is on Microsoft to execute with this deal," said Morningstar analyst Sunit Gogia. "It's really hard ... for shareholders to be optimistic at this price point." Although it makes billions of dollars selling software for personal computers, Microsoft has struggled badly in its effort to become a bigger force on the Internet. In the past six years, Microsoft's online division has lost more than $7.2 billion. Skype has lost money consistently since its inception in 2003, mostly because it charges only a small fraction of its users. As a standalone company, Skype lost $7 million on revenue of $860 million last year. That did not deter Microsoft. We are a super-ambitious company," Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said. "This Skype acquisition is entirely consistent with our irrepressible, forward-looking nature." Skype was founded in 2003 by Scandinavian entrepreneurs Janus Friis and Niklas Zennstrom. They also created Kazaa, a file-sharing program that, along with Napster, roiled the music industry a decade ago. Skype, based in Luxembourg, will become a new business division of Microsoft. Skype's CEO, Tony Bates, will run it and report to Ballmer. The vast majority of paying Skype users are in Europe, where it's popular among people who want to avoid expensive charges for traditional country-to-country phone calls. In the U.S., calling state to state is comparatively cheap. Microsoft can easily afford the purchase. At the end of March, it had a cash hoard of $50.2 billion. Because Skype is based overseas, Microsoft plans to pay for the deal from the portion of cash that Microsoft holds overseas to avoid higher taxes in the U.S. The company hopes regulators will approve the Skype takeover before the end of the year. That's likely. MF Global analyst Paul Gallant said regulators might even view the deal as good for consumers by helping Microsoft compete with Google. ___ Svensson reported from New York and can be reached at http://twitter.com/petersvensson. AP Technology Writers Rachel Metz in San Francisco and Joelle Tessler in Washington contributed to this report. |
| The guerilla roots of the Skype calling service (AP) Posted: 10 May 2011 03:12 PM PDT NEW YORK – In buying Skype, Microsoft is getting one of the rare companies that has turned its name into a verb, like Xerox or Google. "Let's Skype" is a phrase understandable, with slight translation, in much of the world. For most people, it means sitting in front of your computer to talk, often for free. Four out of ten times, there are cameras involved too, turning the session into a video chat. The service has become popular for long, rambling chats with distant friends and relatives. Children too young to talk on the phone can still be entranced by the image of Grandma on the computer screen. "Skype really is that inner circle, that inner set of social experiences," CEO Tony Bates said Tuesday. Skype bypasses the traditional phone system by routing calls and video over the Internet, just like email and Web pages. The calls vault effortlessly over national borders, ignoring the fences that phone companies put up in the form of international calling charges. Usernames take the place of phone numbers. Calling from computer to computer is free. Skype charges for calls to phone numbers on the traditional phone network. It also charges for getting a phone number associated with your Skype username, so people can call you from regular phones. Skype wasn't the first to offer phone calls over the Internet when it launched in 2003, but the way it did it was unique and rebellious. It relied on a technology that had already disrupted the music industry — peer-to-peer file sharing, in which computers connect to share things directly, without an intermediary vulnerable to legal action. The founders, Niklas Zennstrom, a Swede, and Janus Friis, a Dane, had run a peer-to-peer file-sharing network called Kazaa. They sold it to an Australian company in 2002 after coming under intense legal pressure from the entertainment industry, which accused Kazaa of facilitating the theft of millions of copyright-protected songs and videos. The Australian company ended up fighting long battles in court, while Zennstrom and Friis walked away. The pair turned their efforts instead toward applying the peer-to-peer principle to communications. This was the genius of Skype: Thanks to peer-to-peer technology, it could get started with very little investment. The heavy lifting of running the network — figuring out how to find users and connecting their calls — was mostly done by the users' computers. With very low costs, Zennstrom and Friis could afford to give the software away, feeding its popularity. As Skype grew, eBay Inc. came calling. In 2005, it bought the company for $2.6 billion, with a plan to integrate it into its auction site. The synergies never materialized. Skype languished under eBay, with a rapid succession of CEOs. Despite low operating costs, revenue was small; just a few percent of active users paid any money to Skype. Those who did were mostly Europeans, as they made a lot more international calls. In the U.S., state-to-state calls are already cheap. In 2007, eBay had to write down much of Skype's value. Two years later, eBay sold two-thirds of Skype to an investor group that included Zennstrom and Friis for roughly $2 billion. Microsoft announced an agreement Tuesday to buy the company for $8.5 billion — three times what eBay had valued it at. Microsoft sees in Skype a way to support its own products. Skype still has room to grow on phones, including those running Microsoft's Windows software. Skype has been slow in getting onto cellphones, which have seen explosive growth since Skype was founded. Cellphone companies feared that allowing Skype on phones would hurt revenue by letting callers save their minutes. The phone companies came around slowly after U.S. regulators started to take an interest in Skype's complaints. AT&T said in late 2009 that it would allow Skype calls over its wireless network. Since then, the other major carriers have joined, figuring that Skype calls are a way to sell data plans. Another area Skype has a foothold but no dominance is the living room. TVs are increasingly connected to the Internet. Panasonic and Samsung TVs come with the capability to do Skype video chats, but no built-in cameras. "It's an area where we'd like it just to be easier," Bates said. Today, Skype's technology doesn't give it much of an advantage over competing services. Video-chatting software isn't hard to create. What Skype does have is a big user base — the roughly 170 million people who have the software installed, know how to use it and tell each other "to Skype." Competitors have to replicate that user base somehow because communications software is only as good as the number of people you can contact with it. Google Inc. is trying. Its Gmail service has more than 190 million users and serves as a springboard for voice and video chats. It can even be used to place calls to phone lines, just like Skype. Other competitors are piggybacking on the popularity of Facebook, which has more than 500 million active users. T-Mobile USA, the No. 4 cellphone company in the U.S., launched software that lets Facebook friends call one another. Facebook could adopt Skype itself, or launch its own calling service. In ten years, people might still say "Skype me," but the actual call might use some other software entirely. ___ Peter Svensson can be reached at http://twitter.com/petersvensson |
| Google braces to pay at least $500M in ad probe (AP) Posted: 10 May 2011 08:54 PM PDT SAN FRANCISCO – Google's lucrative online advertising system is facing a U.S. government investigation that is expected to cost the Internet search leader at least $500 million. The company disclosed the Justice Department probe in a regulatory filing Tuesday. The documents provided few details except that the investigation involved how some unnamed advertisers used Google's advertising network, which generated $8.3 billion in revenue during the first three months of the year. Google says it decided earlier this month to set aside $500 million to cover a possible settlement. That move resulted in a charge that lowered the first-quarter earnings that Google announced in mid-April. With the change, Google's net income fell from the previously reported $2.3 billion, or $7.04 per share, to $1.8 billion, or $5.51 per share. |
| Zynga and Lady Gaga to found GagaVille, a virtual town stocked with new songs (Yahoo! News) Posted: 10 May 2011 06:46 PM PDT
In a new deal with Zynga — the biggest name in casual games — the edgy pop starlet will appear in her very own hamlet within the Zynga universe. On May 17, you can virtually visit GagaVille, a digital farm that's decked out in Gaga's trademark outlandish vibe, which naturally means it will include "crystals, unicorns and sheep on motorcycles." The partnership is a Facebook-centric promotional tie-in for her upcoming album, Born This Way.
Gaga fans who aren't prone to farming virtual crops take note: by visiting the virtual world of GagaVille you'll also get to sneak an early listen to unreleased tracks from the forthcoming album. From May 17 to May 19, GagaVillagers can unlock one streaming unreleased song each day, with even more to follow (including remixes) leading up to the album's May 23 release date. Gaga is no stranger to striking deals with the giants of the tech world. She recently appeared on Google's campus for a Q&A session and a costume contest, not to mention her show-stealing Polaroid sunglasses from this year's CES. But hey, even if you aren't a Gaga fan, you wouldn't want to miss your chance at FarmVille's exclusive in-game unicorn, would you? [Via: VentureBeat]
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| Video: How to use selective syncing in Android (Yahoo! News) Posted: 10 May 2011 06:25 PM PDT
This also marks the inaugural edition of the Just Show Me series on Tecca TV, joining its sister news show TechLife in the Tecca video lineup! We'll be running these short, 2-3 minute how to videos demonstrating frequently-asked questions on popular devices every weekday. Many of these will be oriented towards beginners with these devices, so if this how to is old hat to you, please consider forwarding it on to your less tech-savvy friends and family who would otherwise bug you for tech support! Thanks for watching! And if you have any requests for something you'd like Just Show Me to cover, please let us know in the comments! More from Tecca: |
| Google +1 for Websites Nears Launch (Mashable) Posted: 10 May 2011 04:28 PM PDT Google's answer to the Facebook Like Button will make its Google +1 button. It's very similar to Facebook's Like Button or the Twitter Tweet button -- it provides a way for website visitors to endorse and share an article or web page. [More from Mashable: Inside Google Music [PICS]] According to Search Engine Land, the buttons will be available in seven different shapes and sizes with and without counters. Publishers can create one of these +1 buttons from a simple form where they can generate the embed code. As you might expect, Google's +1 button also comes with a suite of analytics that look similar to the Google Analytics dashboard. Once enough people have used a website's +1 button, the data will be graphed. Demographic information such as age, gender and location are recorded. The analytics even include +1 data from Google search pages, which could prove useful for publishers that want to improve their presence on the world's largest search engine. [More from Mashable: Google I/O for Developers: New App Engine, Go Runtime & Eclipse Plugin] Google played coy with the exact launch date of the +1 button, but you can expect it to make its debut at the end of May or in early June. The company has a signup form if you want to get notified about the button's launch. This story originally published on Mashable here. |
| US in new push to break China Internet firewall (AFP) Posted: 10 May 2011 07:23 PM PDT WASHINGTON (AFP) – The United States plans to pump millions of dollars into new technology to break through Internet censorship overseas amid a heightened crackdown on dissent in China, officials have said. State Department officials said they would give $19 million to efforts to evade Internet controls in China, Iran and other authoritarian states which block online access to politically sensitive material. Michael Posner, the assistant secretary of state in charge of human rights, said funding would support cutting-edge technology that acts as a "slingshot" -- identifying material that countries are censoring and throwing it back at them. "We're responding with new tools. This is a cat-and-mouse game. We're trying to stay one step ahead of the cat," Posner said. The announcement came shortly after the United States and China wrapped up wide-ranging annual talks in which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton showed exasperation at Beijing's intensifying clampdown on domestic critics. China routinely blocks sites that present non-official viewpoints on topics such as Tibet's exiled leader the Dalai Lama, the banned Falungong spiritual movement and the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown on pro-democracy protesters. More recently, Chinese authorities blocked search results for "Hillary Clinton" after she gave a speech championing Internet freedom and for "Jasmine," an allusion to pro-democracy uprisings sweeping the Arab world. "In effect, we're going to be redirecting information back in that governments have initially blocked," Posner said. "This can be done through email or posting it on blogs or RSS feeds or websites that the government hasn't figured out how to block," he said. The funding comes out of $30 million which the US Congress allocated in the current fiscal year for Internet freedom. The failure until now to spend the money led lawmakers to accuse the State Department of kowtowing to China. A recent Senate committee report called for another government body to be put in charge of the funds. Falungong supporters developed the so-called Global Internet Freedom Consortium, a software to evade China's Internet firewall that was so effective that Iranians sought it out during 2009 protests against the clerical regime. Posner said that the State Department would not identify the recipients of funding due partly to "reasons of security." Another US official who requested anonymity said that the State Department received requests for funding totaling $180 million and that it chose which ones appeared most effective. The funding grants still need the green light from Congress, but the official voiced hope that it would happen quickly. Clothilde Le Coz, Washington director of the media rights group Reporters Without Borders, welcomed the news and its timing, saying that China is jailing 77 people due to their Internet activities. "It is a good news to know that more netizens will certainly be helped in getting their word out," she said. But she said that circumvention tools for the Internet were a "Band-Aid" as the larger issue was ensuring freedom of expression. In a speech in February, Clinton called the Internet "the public space of the 21st century" and pledged US efforts to ensure that it develops in a way that allows freedom of expression and association. However, she also criticized activist site WikiLeaks for publishing secret US cables. She accused WikiLeaks of "theft" and said the issue did not contradict the US commitment to an open Internet. |
| Facebook may have leaked personal information: Symantec (Reuters) Posted: 10 May 2011 06:41 PM PDT (Reuters) – Facebook users' personal information could have been accidentally leaked to third parties, in particular advertisers, over the past few years, according to Symantec Corp's official web blog. Third-parties would have had access to personal information such as profiles, photographs and chat, and could have had the ability to post messages, Symantec's web blog said. "We estimate that as of April 2011, close to 100,000 applications were enabling this leakage," the blog post said. " ... Over the years, hundreds of thousands of applications may have inadvertently leaked millions of access tokens to third parties," posing a security threat, the blog said. The third-parties may not have realized their ability to access the information, the blog post said. Facebook was notified of this issue and has confirmed the leakage, the post said. The blog also said Facebook, the world's largest social networking website, has taken steps to resolve the issue. Facebook was not immediately available for comment. Facebook has more than 500 million users and is challenging Google Inc and Yahoo Inc for users' time online and for advertising dollars. (Reporting by Thyagaraju Adinarayan, editing by Bernard Orr) |
| Skype's owners set to make $5 billion: source (Reuters) Posted: 10 May 2011 07:44 PM PDT NEW YORK (Reuters) – Skype's owners, led by private equity firm Silver Lake, are set to earn more than three times their investment, for a total capital gain of more than $5 billion, on the sale of Skype to Microsoft Corp, a source familiar with the situation said. The gain is particularly large considering the short amount of time the investors have owned internet phone service Skype -- around 18 months -- since buying a majority stake from eBay. That is a short turnaround for private equity which typically invests with a time horizon of three to five years. The $8.5 billion price Skype is commanding from Microsoft reflects the premium being put on hot social media properties and the number of potential buyers. Microsoft's deal to acquire Skype was announced on Monday. Skype, which was considering an IPO, sparked interest from parties including Facebook and Google according to sources. Cisco also was interested, a source said. Cisco was not immediately available for comment. One concern Skype and its owners may have had was whether they were missing out on getting substantially more, giving escalating valuations put on companies such as Facebook and Groupon. That could explain the six weeks it took for Microsoft and Skype to reach a deal. Microsoft decided to make an unsolicited offer with the final price by April 18, it said. "It's not like the deal came together in five days, it came together over the course of the last few weeks," said one source familiar with the deal. "They had time to digest the price, they had time to understand the parameters of the contract and then ultimately figure out the final pieces." For Microsoft, the stakes were high. The world's largest software maker has been beset by a string of setbacks including the failed acquisition of Yahoo Inc and a halting start in the mobile phone arena now dominated by Google Inc and Apple Inc. It decided against hiring investment bankers to help them with the deal. Microsoft said it decided to appeal directly to Skype's ownership base with Silver Lake taking the lead. BUMPER RETURN The Silver Lake-led investor group bought a majority stake in Skype from eBay in 2009 -- during the credit crisis -- for $1.9 billion in cash and a $125 million note. EBay retained about a third of the company. "It took a lot of conviction to invest in the summer of 2009," said Egon Durban, managing director of Silver Lake. "We made the biggest investment in our firm's history and had the courage to invest. But I also believe Microsoft has a real shot at making this business worth three to four times more than even they've paid for it." Private equity firms can make high returns on investments if timed and executed right. Such returns can reap substantial rewards for private equity executives running the funds -- which typically take 20 percent of the profit. The internal rate of return for the Skype deal -- a key measure for private equity investors -- was 70 percent to 80 percent, the first source who spoke to Reuters said. That is far higher than a typical private equity return. EBay, which owns a minority stake in Skype, said that it made a total return of $1.4 billion on its original investment. Durban said that Skype fit at the "intersection of three very powerful macro trends" -- social, video and mobile communications. He said that over the past 18 months, Silver Lake and the other investors had made achievements such as acquiring the Skype intellectual property, resolving litigation with the company's founders, recruiting a new management team, and signing up strategic partnerships with companies such as Verizon, Citrix, Samsung, Panasonic, Sony and LG. "We always felt that Skype ... was misunderstood and underestimated by people through its whole life span," said Marc Andreessen, who heads venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz which is an investor in Skype. "I think it's great to see Microsoft taking it this seriously and really valuing it for what it is." The Skype investment is one of the largest capital gains made on a private equity investment, the first source said. (Additional reporting by Nadia Damouni and Phil Wahba; Editing by Derek Caney and Tim Dobbyn) |
| Cellphone alert system announced in NYC (AP) Posted: 10 May 2011 06:57 PM PDT NEW YORK – The U.S. government and local authorities will soon be able to reach people directly on their cellphones to warn them of imminent danger or alert them about missing children — even in the middle of a widespread emergency that overloads communications systems as happened after the Sept. 11 attacks, officials said Tuesday. The emergency alert system will be used only for critical national messages from the president, information in life-threatening situations and Amber Alerts meant to widen the search for missing or abducted youngsters, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced Tuesday. He was accompanied by Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski and Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Craig Fugate. The system, set to launch by the end of the year in New York City and Washington, D.C., will spread to most if not all U.S. cellphones in the next few years as people replace their old phones with new devices containing a special chip that will enable them to receive the messages. They will receive the alerts free of charge. Every wireless carrier is expected to participate, Genachowski said at a press conference above the World Trade Center site, which was attended by representatives from AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon. While carriers may allow cellphone users to opt out of receiving notifications from local officials and about Amber Alerts, no one will be allowed to opt out of receiving presidential alerts. Even users who turn off the GPS locator technology on their phones will receive the alerts, which will be sent out to all users in range of one or more cellphone towers selected by authorities. Phones that are turned off or aren't getting any reception won't receive the messages. Responding to privacy concerns, Fugate said that no location or other information from the phones will be sent to authorities. The alert plan was approved by Congress in 2006 under the Warning Alert and Response Network Act. Private carriers worked with manufacturers to provide the phone chips. FEMA did not immediately respond to a request about whether there were any government costs beyond staff time. If it had been available, the alert system could have warned residents of two destructive tornadoes that hit Brooklyn and Queens last year, killing one woman and causing extensive property damage, Emergency Management Commissioner Joe Bruno said. Bloomberg said officials would have to be mindful of sending alerts in a way that would avoid mass panic. In New York City, riders on the subways — the target of speculation and multiple terrorist plots over the years — won't be able to receive the alerts, at least for now. A handful of stations are scheduled to receive cellphone reception this year as part of a pilot program and the rest will be put on the network over the next four years, said Metropolitan Transportation Authority spokesman Aaron Donovan. Until then, riders will have to rely on the public address systems at stations and on trains. That's a disappointment for Debbie Hayes, who said Tuesday she's been anxious on the subway ever since 9/11, and for a long time following the attacks would call her sons before entering the transit system. "Every morning I get out of the subway and I'm like, 'whew,'" said the 49-year-old nanny, who said she was thrilled with the idea of being able to get alerts on her phone when she's out and about the city with the 11-month-old she cares for. "It'll get to you faster than you see the news on TV," she said. "It'll be instant." Some recent phone models already have the required chips, and forthcoming software updates will activate them. A list of phones that have the technology will be posted on the FCC's website, Genachowski said. The Personal Localized Alerting Network, or PLAN, technology will allow the messages to take precedence over regular phone calls or text messages, so in an emergency in which the system's capacity is overloaded, the alerts will still get through, the officials said. Messages will show up on the phone's front screen, instead of the traditional text message inbox, and arrive with a distinct ring and likely a vibration. Gilberto Palma, a 62-year-old maintenance supervisor in the World Financial Center, a complex that was severely damaged in the 9/11 attacks, said he thought the alert system was a great idea. "Everybody's going to be happy, especially in this area," he said. "In this building, everybody's still on alert." ___ Associated Press writer Chris Hawley contributed to this report. |
| Facebook leaked keys to account data: Symantec (AFP) Posted: 10 May 2011 08:58 PM PDT SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) – US computer security firm Symantec has said that Facebook accidentally left a door open for advertisers to access profiles, pictures, chat and other private data at the social network. Facebook told AFP that there was no evidence anyone stepped through that door and swiped any information from the accounts of its more than 500 million members. Symantec discovered that certain Facebook applications leaked tokens that act essentially as "spare keys" for accessing profiles, reading messages, posting to walls or other actions. Facebook applications are Web software programs that are integrated onto the leading online social network's platform. Symantec said that 20 million Facebook applications, such as games, are installed every day. "We appreciate Symantec raising this issue and we worked with them to address it immediately," Facebook said in response to an AFP inquiry. The tokens were being leaked to third-party applications including advertisers and analytics platforms, allowing them to post messages or mine personal information from profiles, according to Nishant Doshi of Symantec. "Fortunately, these third-parties may not have realized their ability to access this information," Doshi said in a blog post. "We have reported this issue to Facebook, who has taken corrective action to help eliminate this issue." Symantec estimated that as of April, nearly 100,000 applications were giving away keys to Facebook profiles. "We estimate that over the years, hundreds of thousands of applications may have inadvertently leaked millions of access tokens to third parties," Doshi said. Facebook confirmed the problem, which was discovered by Doshi and Symantec colleague Candid Wueest, according to the computer security firm. But Facebook said the Symantec report had a few "inaccuracies." There was no evidence that the problem resulted in private information being gleaned from Facebook members' accounts, according to the California-based social networking service. "In addition, this report ignores the contractual obligations of advertisers and developers which prohibit them from obtaining or sharing user information in a way that violates our policies," Facebook said. There was no reliable estimate of how many tokens have been leaked since the release of Facebook applications in 2007. Despite whatever fix Facebook has put in place, token data may still be stored in files on third-party computers, Symantec warned. "Concerned Facebook users can change their Facebook passwords to invalidate leaked access tokens," Doshi said. "Changing the password invalidates these tokens and is equivalent to 'changing the lock' on your Facebook profile." |
| Senate panel grills Apple, Google on location data (AP) Posted: 10 May 2011 07:41 PM PDT WASHINGTON – Executives from Apple and Google told lawmakers Tuesday that users have control over information used to pinpoint the location of iPhones and smartphones running Google's Android software. Guy "Bud" Tribble, vice president of software technology for Apple Inc., told a Senate Judiciary panel Tuesday that Apple gives users the ability to turn off all location-based functionality in its mobile devices with a single on/off switch, as well as the ability to block individual applications from accessing location information. The company also requires iPhone apps to obtain user consent to access location data, Tribble said. Alan Davidson, Google Inc.'s director of public policy, told lawmakers that the company does not collect any location information unless a user specifically agrees to share it, and allows users to turn off location sharing later even after initially allowing it. Google, too, requires apps for its Android operating system to get user permission in order to collect location data, Davidson said. Tuesday's hearing by the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law follows Apple's recent admission that its popular iPhone stores data used to help the device locate itself for up to a year. Apple also said that a software bug has caused iPhones to continue to send anonymous location data to the company's servers even when location services on the device were turned off. Faced with an uproar among privacy watchdogs and lawmakers after two researchers revealed the iPhone location tracking practices, Apple has said it will no longer store the data on phones for more than seven days, will encrypt the data and will stop backing up the files to user computers. It also has fixed the bug with a free software update. Google, too, recently acknowledged that phones running its Android software store some GPS location data for a short time. Tuesday's hearing comes at a time when location-based mobile services — from turn-by-turn driving directions to friend-finder applications to local business listings — are exploding in popularity. Device makers like Apple, software developers like Google and third-party apps developers generally rely on GPS technology, cell tower triangulation and databases of Wi-Fi hot spots to track a user's location in order to provide such services. Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., who chairs the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law, said that while location-based services offer consumers enormous benefits, they also raise serious concerns since location data can be very sensitive and very dangerous if it falls into the wrong hands. He noted that the Minnesota Coalition for Battered Women in his home state has warned that location-tracking technology can be misused by stalkers and abusive spouses. "This is a problem... And I think that's something the American people should be aware of," Franken said. He added: "I just want to be clear that the answer to this problem is not ending location-based services. No one up here wants to stop Apple or Google from producing their products." Franken challenged executives from both companies to require all outside apps developers that make programs for their mobile platforms to adopt formal privacy policies. Tribble said Apple believes that privacy policies alone are not enough. He explained that privacy needs to be baked into products — for instance, in the form of clear on-screen disclosures that notify users how their personal data is collected and tools to control that data collection. Davidson said he would bring the suggestion back to Google's top executives. |
| Old Apple vs. New Android…and the surprising winner (Appolicious) Posted: 10 May 2011 04:00 PM PDT |
| US alert system targets mobile phones (AFP) Posted: 10 May 2011 06:21 PM PDT NEW YORK (AFP) – Plans were unveiled for a nationwide system that will deliver text-like emergency messages from President Barack Obama and key government agencies to mobile phone users. The free service, called the Personal Localized Alerting Network or "PLAN," is scheduled to be available in New York by the end of this year and throughout the United States by April 2012. Urgent messages about terrorist threats, natural disasters, and other emergency events will be sent through participating carriers AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon, to enabled mobile devices. "PLAN could make a tremendous difference during disasters like the recent tornadoes in Alabama where minutes -- or even seconds -- of extra warning could make the difference between life and death," Julius Genachowski, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, said in a statement. Messages will be sent to enabled devices in targeted geographic areas -- rather than to all registered users. Smartphones are currently the only cell phones that have the technological capability of receiving the messages. The announcement Tuesday was made at the World Trade Center, scene of the September 11 terrorist attacks in 2001. The alerts will be text-like messages of 90 characters or less. There will be three types of alerts: issued by the US president; involving imminent threats to safety; and Amber alerts for kidnappings. Participating carriers may allow subscribers to block all but presidential alerts, according to the FCC announcement. Genachowski said more carriers will be participating by next year. |
| Pop queen Lady Gaga hits in online game 'FarmVille' (AFP) Posted: 10 May 2011 06:14 PM PDT SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) – Online social game star Zynga on Tuesday said music from pop queen Lady Gaga will be appearing on "FarmVille." Cuts from Lady Gaga's upcoming "Born This Way" album will make their world debuts on her in-game "GagaVille" farm beginning May 17. "I want to celebrate and share 'Born This Way' with my little monsters in a special way that's never been done before," Lady Gaga said. "Zynga has created a magical place in 'FarmVille' where my fans can come play, and be the first to listen to the album." Unicorns, crystals, and sheep on motorcycles were among the promised features in "GagaVille", which was only slated to last until the end of the day on May 26. A download of "Born This Way" will be bundled as a free download with the purchase of special $25 Zynga cards for in-game transactions. Zynga will also feature contests to win concert tickets and other Lady Gaga-related goodies. "We're focused on creating cool new ways to entertain and surprise our players," said Owen Van Natta, executive vice president of business at San Francisco-based Zynga. "We want to thank Lady Gaga for working with us on this truly great surprise." |
| Rumor: Apple iPod Nano to Get Camera--Again (PC World) Posted: 10 May 2011 02:45 PM PDT The iPod nano may not sell like it used to, but that doesn't mean Apple has stopped tinkering with its tiny music player. A new photo allegedly shows a next-generation iPod nano with a rear-facing camera. The picture on the Taiwanese blog Apple.pro shows what may be the next (7th-generation) iPod nano with a camera, which has a low-resolution, 1.3-megapixel lens, the site claims. Assuming the photo is real, the new iPod nano would retain the wristwatch-like dimensions of the 6th-gen model, but lose its predecessor's handy built-in clip. According to Apple Insider, Apple.pro has a good track record when it comes to leaking information about unreleased iPod nanos. In 2010, for instance, the blog posted photos of a small touchscreen that later became the multi-touch display of the 6th-gen nano. If the latest rumor is true, hopefully the new iPod nano's camera will be a significant improvement the one that came with the 5th-gen model. Macword's Dan Frakes, in his September 2010 review of the 6th-gen nano, had this to say about the earlier player's camera: "I know I don't speak for all iPod nano owners, by in my experience both as a user and in talking with other iPod users, the 5G nano's video capabilities-both recording and watching-went unused (or at least underused) by many people. The screen was small for watching video, the camera's quality was mediocre, and the overall experience could be summed up as 'OK in a pinch.'" In its fiscal 2011 second quarter that ended March 26, Apple sold just over 9 million iPods, a 17 percent decline from the same quarter a year ago. Contact Jeff Bertolucci via Twitter (@jbertolucci ) or at jbertolucci.blogspot.com . |
| Best of Android packed into "Ice Cream Sandwich" (AFP) Posted: 10 May 2011 04:22 PM PDT SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) – Google on Tuesday said it is packing the best of its Honeycomb tablet computer software into a new "Ice Cream Sandwich" version of Android for mobile devices. The California-based Internet titan planned to release Ice Cream Sandwich by the end of the year and promised that it is being designed to run smartphones, tablets, and any other Android gadgets. "Our top priority for Ice Cream Sandwich will be one operating system that runs everywhere," Android engineering team chief Mike Claron said at a Google developers conference in San Francisco. "We are taking all the good stuff we added to Honeycomb for tablets and making it available everywhere." Google crafted Honeycomb from the ground up to power tablet computers being rushed to market to compete with Apple's hot-selling iPads. Android software is free and Google was concerned that tablet makers would resort to using a prior version of the open-source operating system geared for smartphones but not optimal for tablets. Ice Cream Sandwich features shown off at the conference included compatibility with major videogame console controllers and the ability of Web cameras to recognize who is speaking at given moments. "With Ice Cream Sandwich we will make consumers really happy," Cleron promised a room packed with thousands of software developers. "It will work on phones in every size and shape, tablets in every size...even tablets that transform to laptops." |
| CommVault tops on services (Investor's Business Daily) Posted: 10 May 2011 03:30 PM PDT The data storage and management company's Q4 EPS rose 19% to 25 cents, beating by 2 cents, helped by more enterprise software deals and growing services demand. Revenue grew 22% to $89.6 mil, topping forecasts for $84.4 mil, with software sales up 20% and services revenue up 24%. CommVault (NASDAQ:CVLT - News), which counts Dell (NASDAQ:DELL - News) among its top customers, is seen benefiting from higher IT spending as businesses seek to manage and protect their data. Shares leapt 7% to 39.24. |
Lady Gaga will be making a surprisingly rural stop on her world tour. That's right — the pop tour de force known for her uncompromising style and hordes of loyal followers will make a cameo on 
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