Computer Weekly articles from April 2008

Computer Weekly archives from April 2008

Opinion and Letters.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The latest PROMS-G spring school, entitled Making Projects Work, will offer attendees the chance to improve their project management skills. The world of IT has, at its heart, a huge numbers of individual projects. These projects are of...

News.
April 1, 2008... The US-based Centre for Democracy and Technology (CDT) has published a compendium of prevailing legislation in the US, UK and Europe on "sensitive" personal information, how it is collected, stored and used. The organisation aims to help...

News.
April 1, 2008... Compass, which helps users of outsourcing check whether they are paying market prices, is warning the government that public sector outsourcing is costing up to 75% over the market rate. The company has public sector clients among its...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Online spending in February reached a record high of more than [pounds sterling]4.2bn, equivalent to [pounds sterling]69 per person in the UK, according to figures from the IMRG Capgemini e-Retail Sales Index. The results showed an overall...

News.(United States. Federal Trade Commission)(TJX Companies Inc.)
April 1, 2008... US retailer TJX, from which wireless hackers stole the personal and banking details of 45 million customers, has settled its case with the Federal Trade Commission. The group, which owns the 226-store UK-based TK Maxx chain, will have to...

News.
April 1, 2008... Ian Grant ian.grant@rbi.co.uk Fred Olsen Cruise Lines has saved nearly [pounds sterling]40,000 installing e-mail security for its fleet and head office communications. Andrew Ericsson, the company's IT and network manager, said...

News.
April 1, 2008... Only one in 10 adults trusts the government with their personal information, but family, banks and employers are more trusted than friends, according to a survey. The online survey of 1,048 UK adults, commissioned by Data Encryption...

News.(Grand Prix)(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Within the next few weeks Grand Prix fans will have a more secure online experience when they buy their memorabilia from the Formula 1 website. The F1 site will bring to 12 the number of sports-related on-line shops hosted by Kitbag that...

News.(appoitment of Richard Jeavons)(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Exclusive (for the moment) Another senior executive quits NHS IT programme Richard Jeavons, senior responsible owner for service implementation in the NHS's [pounds sterling]12.4bn National Programme for IT [NPfIT] is leaving for a...

News.
April 1, 2008... The European Union is to spend [pounds sterling]7.8m on a three-year project to enhance users' privacy in social networks, virtual communities and other Web 2.0 technologies. IBM's Zurich Research Laboratory will lead 14 other partners in...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... High-street retailer J Sainsbury is on target to save [pounds sterling]440m in costs a year after bringing its IT back in-house, company chief executive Justin King said today. King said he was "delighted with the effect" of taking back...

News.
April 1, 2008... High-street retailer J Sainsbury is on target to save [pounds sterling]440m in costs a year after bringing its IT back in-house, company chief executive Justin King said today. King said he was "delighted with the effect" of taking back...

Career Moves.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... How do I get into database administration? I have been working in IT for six years, mainly in first-line technical support with various firms amounting to four years' experience and two years doing data administration. I recently...

Government rental database to turn spare rooms into lets.(News)(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The government is planning a [pounds sterling]3m programme to combat the housing shortage by opening up unused rooms in properties across the country for rental. It will be supported by an ambitious Linux-based IT project. The Department...

Business & Technology.(Survey)
April 1, 2008... There is only one thing worse than realising that you have left your laptop in the back of a taxi. That is the recollection that you have not encrypted any of the data on it - including all of your contact information, your sensitive e-mails,...

Business & Technology.
April 1, 2008... William Knight computer.weekly@rbi.co.uk Every 10 weeks or so, more than 1,400 physicians pay the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) a fee - typically [pounds sterling]800 - to take examinations, and most of them pay via the RCP's...

Business & Technology.
April 1, 2008... Two and a half years ago, Nikk Gilbert, head of security architecture at a multinational transport and energy firm, had the dream that staff could swipe a smartcard to enter a building, use that same card to pay for coffee in the canteen, then...

Business & Technology.(Microsoft Corp.)
April 1, 2008... Danny Bradbury computer.weekly@rbi.co.uk Steve Lipner is no stranger to the challenge of building software programs without security bugs. The director of security engineering strategy at Microsoft started trying to write secure...

Business & Technology.
April 1, 2008... The advent of virtualisation is changing the way we think about datacentres, servers and networks. Not only does virtualisation shrink the footprint of the server population, it also simplifies the physical network. However, there is a knock-on...

News.
April 1, 2008... Graduates looking to carve out a career in IT by starting out on a graduate training scheme are more likely to start out in London than any other region. Figures from online recruitment site the IT Job Board reveal that around half of all...

Features.(Survey)
April 1, 2008... The progressive retirement of the baby-boom generation means that IT departments will be forced to recruit more imaginatively to meet staffing shortfalls. If IT has traditionally been a stronghold of the white, middle-class male,...

Career Moves.(Product/service evaluation)
April 1, 2008... Nick Langley computer.weekly@rbi.co.uk What is it? Now that it has missed its own launch party, only the bravest would stake their reputations on when SQL Server 2008 will actually be with us. But even when it starts to ship,...

Get a grip on your assets.(Opinion and Letters)(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Licensing software should be simple. The IT department can keep track of IT assets such as desktop PCs, laptops and servers, so it should know what software is running. Unfortunately, the dynamics of business means software audits quickly go...

News.
April 1, 2008... Warwick Ashford warwick.ashford@rbi.co.uk Industry standards are often perceived as adding nothing but cost to business, but that does not appear to be true of the new British standard for business continuity. More and more...

News.(Survey)
April 1, 2008... Most organisations believe climate change will be a major threat to business in the next ten years, according to a survey by the organisers of Business Continuity Expo 2008. The survey of 150 UK and European companies revealed that 87% of...

News.
April 1, 2008... End-users tend to focus too heavily on data protection and do not make provision for rapid recovery of business-critical systems and processes, says continuity services provider Neverfail. Jim Battenberg, director product marketing at...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The new British standard for business continuity will help organisations protect their brand and reputation as well as helping them reduce risk, says the British Standards Institution (BSI). The BSI published the requirements for the BS...

News.
April 1, 2008... UK business is facing several key business continuity challenges, according to risk management consultancy company Deloitte. These include dealing with non-physical events, global operations, outsourcing, technology complexity and...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The new British standard (BS) for business continuity is set to become an international standard, driven by demand for supply chain security as global interdependencies increase, says IBM. "BS 25999 will be of value in terms of supply chain...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Thin client technology has reduced carbon emissions in Western Europe by 166,000 tons in 2007, according to the Fraunhofer Institute in Germany. Fraunhofer calculated the reduction by combining IDC figures for the number of thin clients...

News.
April 1, 2008... Dell has said that it has invented an automated deployment system that can simplify operating system migrations and reduce costs. The firm also said the new system will mitigate risk for clients. The Dell Client Migration Solution is...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Hampshire Council has announced it is the first county council and one of a few UK public sector organisations to achieve an internationally recognised accreditation for IT. The ISO 20000 accreditation recognises best practice in IT...

News.
April 1, 2008... You do not expect to get sued when you buy IBM software, but that is exactly what happened to one US customer. The story reported last week in Computer Weekly should ring alarm bells for IT managers. Internet retailer Harry and David...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The traditional IT department will disappear within five years as core computing services are increasingly delivered via the internet, according to software as a service (SaaS) firm Nasstar. Nasstar CEO Charles Black says that by 2013...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Interflora, the flower delivery company, will deploy a hosted network software service to manage customer queueing at its call centre. Interflora signed up to the QueueBuster service from Cable and Wireless after installing the software to...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Warwick Ashford warwick.ashford@rbi.co.uk Retailer JD Sports has signed a [pounds sterling]2m, five-year IT management outsourcing deal to enable compliance with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS). Supplier...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Lincolnshire County Council has automated the translation of is local government website from English into nine other languages. Lincolnshire is a largely agricultural county that has many European workers on its farms and in its factories....

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Microsoft warns of Word attack Microsoft Word users are vulnerable to an attack that could allow hackers to gain remote access to their computer. Organisations using Microsoft Word 2000 Service Pack 3, Microsoft Word 2002 Service Pack...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Motorola is to split into two companies, with one focusing on its struggling mobile phone business and the other on its more profitable mobile enterprise and broadband operations. The separation of the two businesses by 2009 follows last...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... NHS Scotland is rolling out document management and imaging software across 22 health boards to reduce manual data entry processes by 80%. The project is part of Scotland's efficient government initiative that is driving the setting up of...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... In-flight mobile calls get Ofcom go-ahead Ofcom has confirmed plans to allow passengers to use mobile phones on UK-registered aircraft. The plans, agreed jointly with other EU countries, will enable mobile phone use in European...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The Financial Services Authority (FSA) is using complex event processing (CEP) software to monitor transactions as it attempts to find the source of rumours that threatened HBOS last week. Rumours that HBOS was in financial trouble led to a...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... John-Paul Kamath john-paul.kamath@rbi.co.uk High-speed broadband could be made available to businesses sooner if the rest of the UK followed Scotland's example of targeting broadband blackspots, Scotland's enterprise minister said this...

News.
April 1, 2008... Heathrow's Terminal 5 is the first UK airport building to be designed around the technology that runs it. The difference, according to the owner, BAA, is space - where technology in other terminals has been crammed into old buildings,...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Insurance broker Towergate partnership is supporting 3,500 staff across 100 locations with IT service management software from Hornbill Systems. The company is using Hornbill's Supportworks ITSM to support its ITIL strategy and chose it...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Abbey customers say no to two-factor authentication According to research from high-street bank Abbey, just one in three of its customers want a two-factor authentication security device, and even fewer think staff should ask them security...

News.(Financial report)(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Accenture has reported strong growth in its consulting and outsourcing businesses in its latest financial results, which saw revenues leap as customers seek to prosper during tough economic conditions. In its results statement for the...

News.(appointment of Janice Bentley-Pearson at Association of Payment and Clearing Services)(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The Association of Payment and Clearing Services (Apacs) has named Janice Bentley-Pearson as its latest IT head, replacing Sue Yeo. The payments industry association has restructured management and promoted Bentley-Pearson from within the...

News.(Survey)(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Global banks are gearing up to share systems and processes across multiple business units after traditional cost-cutting strategies failed to reap the expected benefits, research reveals. A survey of 499 US financial services firms by the...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... A major report on children's use of technology has recommended the government to set up a child internet safety council that would draw up a strategy on keeping children safe online. The council would report to the prime minister and would...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Child court service gets shared IT services The Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) is spending [pounds sterling]25m to join a transformational government framework, which gives it a shared IT service. ...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire County Councils have selected Fujitsu Services to provide what is believed to be the first enterprise resource planning (ERP) shared service in local government. Cambridgeshire County Council cabinet...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Cardiff gives researchers supercomputer help Cardiff University has installed a supercomputer that will support its academic departments' research projects. Academics at Cardiff will now be able to use a high-performance computing...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Experts advocate Facebook ban at work Security experts are advising employers to ban social networking websites after the latest Facebook security breach, although some fear that the Web 2.0 culture is already too deeply ingrained to be...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Cliff Saran cliff.saran@rbi.co.uk Google, MySpace and Yahoo have given their backing to an internet standard designed to make it easier for users and commercial software companies to build social networking applications. The...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... A street-light replacement programme in the London borough of Hackney is being co-ordinated using software designed for street lighting services. The Mayrise street lighting system provides a single repository for all information relating...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Most consumers have no confidence in the way businesses, the government and banks handle their personal data, according to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO). Research published this week by the ICO showed 53% of consumers are...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Intel has released two quad-core processors for servers and workstations that run faster than older quad-core ones without using any more power. The company said that Quad-Core Intel Xeon L5400 processors are 25% faster and have a 50%...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Janet stymies spam with Sophos Janet, the organisation that operates the UK's education and research computer network, is to use a Sophos ES4000 e-mail appliance to try to stem the tide of spam, phishing and data leakage currently...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Retail group Kingfisher has created a centralised management structure to oversee IT for its regional retail brands, signalling a change from its traditional decentralised management strategy. Its retail businesses, such as B&Q in the UK,...

News.
April 1, 2008... A fifth of flights were cancelled from Heathrow terminal 5 today (28 March) after yesterday's technical problems with the baggage system. Airport owner BAA said the system's problems were "minor" and had now been resolved, but flight...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Coda to take care of Mothercare systems brood Mothercare is to implement Coda as its group-wide accounting system for integrating its disparate financial management systems as cohesively as possible. Mike Rainer, Mothercare's group...

News.
April 1, 2008... A solicitors firm has reduced its email and storage overheads and saved two days' work from the email backup, search and retrieval process using software from Waterford Technologies. O'Neill Patient solicitors bought the individual search...

News.(Financial report)(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Oracle has said that corporate customers have delayed investing in new software owing to the turmoil in the financial markets, which led to revenue growth lower than expected, according to a Financial Times report. The company reported...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The number of phishing attacks on financial services customers has increased dramatically this year, with fraudsters focusing on three banks whose customers they have judged to be particularly vulnerable, says a security report. Financial...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Recruitment agency Reed is using Windows Server 2008 to support the growth of its website. The company said that Server 2008, which it described as "more stable" than the 2003 package, would allow it to offer more services over the web ...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Architect Scott Brownrigg has replaced its IPSEC virtual private network (VPN) with a secure remote access system from AppGate Network Security. The system replaces the VPN as the means for staff to access the company's network while out...

News.
April 1, 2008... Cliff Saran cliff.saran@rbi.co.uk FTSE 250 firm Speedy Hire expects to save [pounds sterling]2m over the next six years after rationalising the way it licenses Microsoft software. The company has merged 10 IT procurement teams...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The opening of Heathrow Airport's Terminal 5 this morning (27 March) was overshadowed by technical problems with the baggage system. A spokeswoman for airport owner BAA said British Airways ground-handling staff were experiencing problems...

News.
April 1, 2008... Heathrow Airport owners BAA are pulling a biometric fingerprint system at the new Terminal 5 the day before the building opens to the public, after the Information Commissioner's Office raised concerns about the system. The system would...

News.
April 1, 2008... According to a study by WebCredible, improvements in website usability are needed across the travel and airline industries, which must harness Web 2.0 technology. The report examined the websites of 20 of the UK's online travel agents and...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Xerox launches business carbon calculator Two companies have launched carbon footprint meters that can tell companies how green their business activities are. Xerox has launched a sustainability calculator program that measures the...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The third service pack of Windows XP, which is expected to be available for download next month, will include some of the features now available in Windows Vista, but users will be unable to run Internet Explorer 7.0 unless they upgrade to...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... UK entertainment retail chain Zavvi has boosted its online sales by 70% since implementing e-commerce software from Hybris. Zavvi, formerly Virgin Megastores, said its large product catalogue made it essential to strengthen its ability to...

PC deal could save public sector billions.(News)
April 1, 2008... A deal struck by government CIO John Suffolk and the Cabinet Office could save the public sector billions of pounds by supplying networked, supported PCs for around half the typical price. Suffolk said the Cabinet Office had cut the total...

Radar.
April 1, 2008... John-Paul Kamath john-paul.kamath@rbi.co.uk His beard and eyebrows are caked in ice, and the beads of sweat around his nose look like frozen tears. His eyes are narrowed slits and he has a bruise on his nose, but the small patch of...

News.(contracts)(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... Antony Savvas computer.weekly@rbi.co.uk The Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) has signed a [pounds sterling]25m deal with Fujitsu to join the Flex transformational government framework. Under Flex,...

News.(Brief article)
April 1, 2008... The Seven Pernicious Kingdoms These seven attack vectors for software were formulated by Gary McGraw, CTO at secure code development consultancy Cigital, in conjunction with security experts Katrina Tsipenyuk and Brian Chess. Input...

News.(letter by Richard Thomas)
April 8, 2008... The following is a letter by the information commissioner, Richard Thomas, published in the Independent newspaper on 2 April 2008 Sir: Donald Trelford's piece "If this Bill is passed, it could mean the end of investigative journalism"...

Opinion and Letters.(mobile phone's software security)
April 8, 2008... The modern mobile phone comes in two basic varieties. The more secure version is a stripped down 2G phone with very little data functionality. There are still some issues related to 2G confidentiality. First is the possibility that someone will...

Opinion and Letters.(Infosecurity Europe)(Brief article)
April 8, 2008... Infosecurity Europe is Europe's number one dedicated information security event and yields a comprehensive convergence of information security professionals. It addresses today's strategic and technical issues in an education programme, and...

Opinion and Letters.(British Computer Society to sponsor 4th Data Centres Europe 2008)(Brief article)
April 8, 2008... The BCS is the organisation sponsor for this year's 4th Data Centres Europe 2008 conference, which will be held 10 to 11 April, in London. Attendees will gain insight into the market growth of datacentres occurring across Europe. The event...

News.(emergency coordination initiatives appealed to business by Bruce Mann)
April 8, 2008... Government has appealed to business to help expand its emergency co-ordination initiatives beyond utilities into the corporate world. Bruce Mann, director of the Civil Contingencies Secretariat, made the call at the opening session of the...

News.(Business Continuity Institute released series of training films )(Brief article)
April 8, 2008... The Business Continuity Institute (BCI) has released the first in a series of training films designed to help business continuity practitioners improve their performance. The film, which was launched at this week's Business Continuity Expo...