Computer Weekly articles from October 2008

Computer Weekly archives from October 2008

Business & Technology.
October 7, 2008... Few enterprises could bear a [pounds sterling]4bn loss caused by a "computer genius" avoiding company policies and controls. And for international bank Societe Generale, 21 January this year must have been a day of escalating horror, as the...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Politically motivated computer crime has been growing steadily since the late 1980s. The threat comes from both nation-states and individuals or groups with political agendas. Governments, businesses and individuals can all be affected by...

News.
October 7, 2008... Cyber-espionage and cyber-warfare are just expressions of a millenia old problem onto a new medium (cyber space). The general public in the UK should be concerned, and the UK government should be concerned, but only to the same extent that...

News.
October 7, 2008... In view what has been called the "cyber-warfare" dimension to the Russia-Georgia conflict, and the reported Chinese cyber-espionage ongoing against the west since c.2003 ('Titan Rain', and so on), how concerned should we in the UK be about...

News.
October 7, 2008... xxxxxxxxx As usual the Microsoft presentation hit a glitch. But at IP08, it wasn't Microsoft's fault. That you can blame on BT. The throngs were waiting for the word from MS CEO Steve Ballmer, which were to be piped in from Southbank...

Career Moves.
October 7, 2008... Monday There are essentially two kinds of ITers. There are those who always have the latest and flashiest technology and the real professionals, whose desks look like a cross between a museum and a scrap heap. Having the latest kit...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The internet and phone networks are now the vehicles for more than half of all fraud committed on UK bank accounts, the UK's payments industry association Apacs said today. The news comes after the government announced it would spend...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The Conservatives pledged to give talented IT apprentices scholarships to university at the annual conference yesterday. David Willetts, shadow minister for innovation, universities and skills, announced plans for bursaries for apprentices...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Network users can now run non-IP protocols using Ethernet over BT's 21CN IP network at speeds up to 1Gbit/s for around half the cost of BT Megastream connections. Neil Sutton, BT's proposition and capability director, said the Etherflow...

News.(British Telecommunications PLC)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... BT will kick off its public trial of the controversial Phorm ad-serving software tomorrow. The move comes days after the City of London police dropped an investigation into the legality of two previous secret trials. BT hopes to get...

News.(Microsoft Corp.)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Microsoft chief executive officer, Steve Ballmer, has revealed that the company will be developing a version of Windows for cloud computing. Due to be formally unveiled in four weeks time, the cloud operating system is part of a broad...

News.(Interview)
October 7, 2008... Microsoft today announced a new strategy to blur the distinction between software that runs on PCs and servers and applications that run on the internet cloud. In an interview with Computer Weekly, chief executive officer Steve Ballmer...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Barclays is hiring a further 1,500 staff in Singapore to run its growing technology centre there. The news comes as Barclays works on a programme to cut 2,000 technology staff in the UK to save money. Frits Seegers, chief executive of the...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Royal Mail is to give mobile computers to 25,000 postal delivery staff to record the progress of tracked packages. The move is part of Royal Mail's [pounds sterling]1.2bn modernisation programme. Royal Mail staff will use Intermec CN3...

News.(BT Openzone)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... BT Openzone Wi-Fi customers will no longer have access to wireless hotspots controlled by rival operator The Cloud. Their access to Cloud hotspots will be blocked from this Thursday after the two firms could not agree on an extended hotspot...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The NHS national programme for IT will be exposed to more supplier competition and less centralised under a Conservative government, the shadow secretary of state for health said at the party conference today. Andrew Lansley said the party...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The government is not thinking radically enough on how IT could improve public services, politicians at the Conservative Party Conference said yesterday. West Midlands MEP Malcolm Harbour said the UK's performance in technology areas,...

News.
October 7, 2008... IT departments should start challenging the high profit margins of IT security suppliers on commodity products, Gartner said today. "Business needs to become more aggressive with suppliers and demand more for less," Neil MacDonald, a...

News.
October 7, 2008... IT security is becoming a key business enabler in tougher economic times, according to IT services supplier CA. The ability to do business securely is at the heart of many successful organisations' strategy, Tim Dunn, vice-president of...

News.
October 7, 2008... The growth of IT in people's daily lives has made them more cynical about politics, the shadow secretary of state for culture, media and sport said yesterday. Jeremy Hunt, MP for south west Surrey, said the growth of technology has enabled...

News.(Information Commissioner's Office)(United Kingdom. Data Protection Act 1998)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The Information Commissioner's Office has found Virgin Media in breach of the Data Protection Act following the loss of an unencrypted CD containing the personal details of over 3,000 customers. The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO)...

News.(Telecom Italia S.p.A.)
October 7, 2008... Telecom Italia expects to reduce the cost of maintaining its business applications by a factor of 10 after introducing secure coding techniques. The company has rolled out a set of guidelines and checklists for each programming language...

News.
October 7, 2008... Since its first election victory in 1997, the New Labour government has shown itself beglamoured by information and communications technology - naive about what it can and cannot do - and gulled by suppliers. At its recent party conference...

News.(Marionnaud Parfumeries S.A.)(Oracle Corp.)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Marionnaud, Europe's largest perfumery and cosmetics retail chain, has changed how it manages its supply chain and reports financial details following the implementation of Oracle Retail merchandising applications. Marionnaud, an existing...

News.(Microsoft Corp.)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Microsoft is launching a new enterprise software licensing programme tomorrow to enable firms to qualify for bigger software discounts, but it might cause some firms problems. The Select Plus programme, which was introduced to potential...

News.(Microsoft Corp.)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Microsoft has introduced a certification programme to train hundreds of thousands of IT professionals in virtualisation technologies. Speaking to Computer Weekly earlier today at the VM08 show at Earls Court, Zane Adam, senior director at...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... A security researcher has discovered a criminal database containing access details for 200,000 servers worldwide belonging to organisations including the BBC in the UK. The database was being used by at least two e-crime groups in Europe...

News.
October 7, 2008... The shortage of IT graduates is becoming an "alarming" problem for some employers and needs action by government, members of the Conservative Technology Forum said at a Conservative conference fringe meeting yesterday. Ericsson's chief...

News.(Tesco PLC)
October 7, 2008... Tesco, the UK's biggest grocer, is pushing for a billion pounds of profit from its high-tech businesses within the next few years, CEO Terry Leahy announced this morning. The businesses, principally Tesco Personal Finance, tesco.com, Tesco...

News.(Contactpoint)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Plans for a database containing information on every child in England would be dropped by a Conservative government, the party will announce at its annual conference tomorrow. Labelling the [pounds sterling]224m national Contactpoint...

News.(dismissal of Tony Goode from Marks and Spencer PLC)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Tony Goode, the database specialist sacked by Marks & Spencer for blowing the whistle on its plans to cap redundancy payments, will have to wait a fortnight for the result of his appeal against his sacking. M&S director of retail Steve...

News.(Whittington Hospital NHS Trust)
October 7, 2008... Whittington Hospital NHS Trust said it has "accounted for" four missing computer disks which contained the personal details of 17,990 health service staff and former employees. The trust alerted police, the information Commissioner's...

News.(eBay Inc.)
October 7, 2008... For 99p, an eBay buyer got access to a West Yorkshire council's network using a second-hand virtual private network (VPN) server. The server, previously used by Kirklees Council staff to allow secure and remote connections to the council's...

News.(Unilever Group)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Food manufacturer Unilever is tackling the human element of information security by introducing a global awareness programme across the organisation. The company has recognised that most data breaches are not caused by technology failure,...

News.
October 7, 2008... Starting the solving process on the top line, we see that two central numbers summing to 101 will be needed. This gives us a choice of 25-76, 26-75 or 37-64 from the list of possibilities. If we examine the 23-45 long diagonal, we see that only...

News.
October 7, 2008... This diagram shows the four corner numbers of a 4x4 magic square. What makes the square remarkable is the fact that not only is a constant of 242 generated when counting along each row, vertical column and long diagonal, but the same constant...

News.
October 7, 2008... Do you consider yourself business or technology-focused? Or are you a business and IT hybrid? It is now almost a truism to say that business and IT goals need to be aligned or synchronised. With this broad acceptance, the question that remains...

News.
October 7, 2008... Unjust cause and effect With the publication of the National Risk Assessment it is timely to consider what we need to be worried about and realise that natural incidents of Hollywood proportions do not have to take place to make life a...

Business & Technology.
October 7, 2008... Whatever their long-term view ought to be, many people see the premium on green goods as discretionary, and among the first thing to be cut when times get tough. To take just one example, UK organic food sales are estimated to have slumped by a...

Business & Technology.
October 7, 2008... The IT industry has had a love/hate relationship with the cloud. At the turn of the decade, businesses embraced it. Application service providers (ASPs) were going to change the world until they did not. Similarly, a brief flirtation with...

Business & Technology.
October 7, 2008... Data classification and identification is all about tagging your data so it can be found quickly and efficiently. But organisations can also gain from de-duplicating their information, which helps to cut storage and backup costs, whilst...

Business & Technology.
October 7, 2008... How much money has your organisation invested in storage systems and processes over the last decade? Chances are you have spent many millions of pounds storing information that needs to be kept safe for legal, financial and regulatory reasons....

Networks.
October 7, 2008... It all seemed so simple. Your network team had implemented a deperimeterisation plan. They had protected what they thought were their most valuable assets: the credit card database, the Active Directory server, and the accounting system. So why...

Networks.
October 7, 2008... When it comes to securing applications on a network, limiting privileges is the golden rule. Vulnerabilities that expose web applications start with the database and work outwards towards the application code itself. Users or application...

News.
October 7, 2008... UK business is concerned that funding for the Police Central e-crime Unit (PCeU) is inadequate to ensure it succeeds where its predecessor failed. After several delays, just over [pounds sterling]7m has been allocated to the unit, with...

News.
October 7, 2008... Bradford & Bingley's savings business will be the latest to be integrated into Banco Santander's global banking platform, Partenon, after the banking giant agreed a [pounds sterling]612m takeover. B&B will join UK financial services groups...

News.
October 7, 2008... Small companies using unlicensed Windows software are at greater risk of operational problems, according to a study commissioned by Microsoft. Microsoft commissioned the research from the Harrison Group to promote its Windows Genuine...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Hewlett-Packard has acquired LeftHand Networks to extend its storage and virtualisation offering in the SME and branch office market segments. LeftHand Networks is a provider of storage virtualisation and iSCSI storage area networks...

News.(appointment of Ken Harvey )(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... HSBC has combined the roles of chief information officer and chief operating officer, in a move designed to bring the bank's technology and customer services strategies closer together. CIO Ken Harvey will take on the new role of chief...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... HSBC has selected a Nortel unified communications system for its London headquarters at Canary Wharf as part of a global UC pilot. The system will support global HSBC collaboration, increasing the speed and efficiency of the bank's staff....

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... IBM has unveiled software to help midsize companies detect vulnerabilities that can lead to costly security breaches, to improve organisational productivity, and secure data while maintaining compliance. IBM's IBM Rational AppScan Express...

News.
October 7, 2008... IT security fears are stifling business innovation at 80% of firms worldwide, says research from analyst IDC. The global weighted estimate of fear is based on interviews with nearly 200 top business executives and security professionals at...

News.(British Telecommunications PLC. BT Wholesale)
October 7, 2008... Millions of UK households could potentially benefit from improved broadband performance, using a self-install filter developed by BT Wholesale. The patent pending innovation, called the "I-Plate" (meaning interstitial plate), filters out...

News.(London Stock Exchange PLC)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The London Stock Exchange is using a technology it bought last year to offer clearing services for UK-traded stock. The company has been considering alternative clearing systems since the Financial Services Authority (FSA) set a precedent...

News.(MI6)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... MI6 is investigating how one of its digital cameras containing sensitive terrorism pictures was sold on eBay. The images on the camera, sold on eBay to a Hertfordshire man, included pictures of terror suspects and details of computer...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Information stored on USB portable hard drives has been stolen from a high-security area at the base of the Service Personnel and Veterans Agency at RAF Innsworth, Gloucester. The agency provides support services for around 900,000 serving...

News.(Banco Santander S.A.)
October 7, 2008... Banco Santander has put IT at the heart of its acquisition strategy and is in a strong position as the turmoil in financial services serves up bargain acquisitions. The bank's [pounds sterling]612m acquisition of Bradford & Bingley's...

News.(Accenture Ltd.)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Consulting and outsourcing firm Accenture has posted strong full year results, and is confident about riding out the economic downturn. Annual sales increased 19% to [pounds sterling]13.75bn and operating profits jumped 21% to [pounds...

News.(Allianz Insurance Co.)(edge IPK)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Allianz Insurance has selected a new service oriented architecture (SOA) platform to deliver commercial SME insurance products to its brokers. The edgeConnect system from edge IPK will replace the existing Allianz Quick Quote online...

News.(Microsoft Corp.)
October 7, 2008... Cliff Saran asks Microsoft chief executive officer Steve Ballmer why he believes Microsoft's approach to cloud computing is right for IT departments. Microsoft is finally starting to address software as a service (Saas) and cloud...

News.(Byte Night)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The IT industry's annual Byte Night is aiming to raise [pounds sterling]500,000 this year to help homeless youngsters. Byte Night, which is celebrating its tenth anniversary, will see 500 top business and IT executives from leading...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... California governor ArnoldSchwarzenegger has signed a bill making it illegal to wirelessly hack a person's radio frequency identification technology smartcard without their consent. The Californian law comes after the state of Washington...

News.(Conservative Party (United Kingdom))(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Conservative leader David Cameron has told the Conservative Party Conference that IT and management consultants have undermined the national health service. He used his keynote speech in Birmingham to tell delegates: "Labour has taken our...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Contrasting views on cloud computing are creating confusion in the market place, says analyst Gartner. The term "cloud computing" is being loosely applied and defined differently, and it is creating a lot of confusion in the market, said...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The government has announced funding for a police unit dedicated to tackling cyber crime and clamping down on internet fraud. The Police Central e-crime Unit (PCeU) will receive [pounds sterling]3.5m government funding and [pounds...

News.(Harlaxton College)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The British campus of a US university has deployed a next-generation IP network to cope with growing numbers of students. Harlaxton College, the British campus of the University of Evansville in Indiana, is based at the Grade 1-listed...

News.(Axon Group )(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The share prices in Indian outsourcers Infosys Technologies and HCL Technologies have been hit this morning, as they entered a bidding war for the purchase of British SAP consultancy Axon Group. The winner of the battle will be responsible...

News.(appointment of Laurent Allard in Logica PLC)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... IT services firm Logica has appointed the CIO of AXA Technology Services (ATS), Laurent Allard, as its CIO. Allard will join Logica on 15 October and will be responsible for Logica's internal IT and knowledge management, said Logica. ...

News.(Barclaycard Services Ltd.)(Office of Communications (United Kingdom))
October 7, 2008... Ofcom has fined Barclaycard [pounds sterling]50,000 - the maximum amount possible - for breaching its rules on silent and abandoned calls, and said it would have liked to have fined it more for its "serious and persistant" breach. Ofcom...

News.(Selkirk)(Financial report)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... A month before Selkirk in the Scottish borders becomes the first region in the UK to switch to an all digital service, the latest figures from Ofcom show that 88% of UK households have digital TV. The figures also reveal that there are more...

News.(Royal Brompton and Harefield NHS Trust)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The Royal Brompton & Harefield NHS Trust has deployed an Alcatel-Lucent wireless local area network (Wlan) to help transform clinical care and enable total mobility of its patient services. Alcatel-Lucent's wireless network, which was...

News.
October 7, 2008... Research reveals that more than 20% of second-hand mobiles and other mobile gadgets still contain sensitive information. Research from BT, the University of Glamorgan in Wales and Edith Cowan University in Australia discovered the amount of...

News.(Skype Technologies S.A.)
October 7, 2008... Skype has admitted a privacy breach among users in China, with its partner there archiving politically sensitive text chat messages. The stored messages have been kept on unsecured servers, and there are now fears among dissidents in the...

News.(Dominic Grieve)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Shadow home secretary Dominic Grieve has slammed the "creeping growth of a surveillance society" at this week's Conservative Party conference. Dopminic Grieve said the public was "fed up with the creeping growth of a surveillance society...

News.(Conservative Party (United Kingdom))
October 7, 2008... AConservative government would be more cautious about starting big IT projects because of the much publicised failings of some of the government's IT programmes. The party will also attempt to bring IT project management skills into...

News.
October 7, 2008... A Conservative government would be more cautious over embarking on big IT projects due to the much publicised failings of the current government's IT projects. The party will also attempt to bring IT project management skills into...

News.(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... The internet and phone networks are now the vehicles for more than half of all fraud committed on UK bank accounts, according to the UK's payments industry association Apacs. Payment card fraud losses rose 14% to [pounds sterling]302m in...

News.(Microsoft Corp.)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has acknowledged that Microsoft is facing increasing resistance from users to upgrade to the latest version of Windows. In spite of Vista sales in excess of 180 million units, corporate users have not bought the...

News.(Dominic Grieve)(Brief article)
October 7, 2008... Shadow home secretary Dominic Grieve slammed the government's growing "surveillance society" at the Conservative Party conference. "The public is fed up with the creeping growth of a surveillance society which intrudes into their private...

News.
October 7, 2008... USB portable hard drives have been stolen from a high-security area at the base of the Service Personnel and Veterans Agency at RAF Innsworth, Gloucester, which provides support services for around 900,000 serving and ex-service personnel. ...

Opinion and Letters.(Letter to the editor)
October 7, 2008... Having read the recent article on how the downturn could press banks to replace legacy systems (computerweekly.com/231506.htm), I was surprised to learn that these financial institutions are not interested in the hosted model. I have to agree...

Opinion and Letters.(Microsoft Corp.)(Viewpoint essay)
October 7, 2008... The popularity of internet computing, where applications are hosted in the so-called internet cloud, has made traditional software seem somewhat old-hat. Who wants to buy a full software licence to run an application, then spend time, effort...

Features.
October 7, 2008... In fairness, it's not as if the industry wasn't warned about what was to come. In November 2007, research firm Gartner advised chief information officers to create two IT budgets for 2008: the first to reflect the wishes of senior decision...

News.
October 14, 2008... Contents Executive summary A new enterprise role for social networking emerges A primer on Web 2.0 How does Web 2.0 impact the enterprise? Social networking in the enterprise Using social networks in the workplace ...