Baseline articles from July 2006

Baseline archives from July 2006

Opinion: Network Intrusion Prevention Isn't a This-Generation Technology.
July 5, 2006... The network perimeter at the typical enterprise is getting to be a crowded place. You've got firewalls and VPN concentrators at the very outside. You've got intrusion detection and prevention, virus scanners, e-mail security devices, and...

EMC Defends 'Strategic' Purchase of RSA.
July 5, 2006... While analysts have been all over the dartboard judging the value of data storage giant EMC's $2.1 billion cash purchase of RSA Security, investors at the New York Stock Exchange reacted very sharply, as EMC's stock price tumbled 7 percent the...

SCO's Case at an End?
July 5, 2006... Since Day One of The SCO Group's lawsuit against IBM on the grounds that the corporate giant had stolen its Unix intellectual property for the betterment of Linux, SCO's opponents have shouted that there is nothing to the company's accusations....

Google Vows to Sue to Keep 'Net Fees Fair.
July 5, 2006... SOFIA (Reuters)--Google warned on Tuesday it will not hesitate to file antitrust complaints in the United States if high-speed Internet providers abuse the market power they could receive from U.S. legislators. The U.S. Senate Commerce...

Microsoft WGA Attracts Copycat Worm and Second Lawsuit.
July 5, 2006... Security researchers have identified a worm virus masked to appear as Microsoft's Windows Genuine Advantage anti-piracy program, while end users have filed a second lawsuit against the software giant's use of the actual program. Workers at...

Enron Founder Ken Lay Dead of Heart Attack.
July 5, 2006... HOUSTON (Reuters)--Enron Corp. founder and former Chief Executive Ken Lay, who was convicted in May for his role in the Houston-based company's downfall, died after suffering a heart attack on Wednesday at his vacation home in Colorado. ...

A Browser Flaw a Day Keeps Hackers at Play.
July 5, 2006... A well-known hacker has stockpiled browser exploits and plans to release one flaw a day for the month of July to highlight the types of vulnerabilities affecting the world's most widely used Web browsers. HD Moore, co-founder of the...

ING Signs $1B Multisourcing Agreement.(ING Group N.V.)(Brief article)
July 5, 2006... Dutch financial institution ING and a group of outsourcing providers have agreed to a $1 billion, five-year deal covering workplace services for ING's banking and insurance operations in the Netherlands and Belgium. ING Group, based in...

Investors Sue Apple over Stock Option Grants.
July 5, 2006... LOS ANGELES (Reuters)--Apple Computer Inc. on Wednesday said two lawsuits have been filed against the company, one in federal district court and another in state court in northern California, over its awarding to stock option grants. The...

Orange to Team with T-Mobile for Enterprise Wi-Fi.
July 6, 2006... It may not be the World Cup, but in one way, at least, France and Germany are working together in the United States. Orange Business Services, the enterprise unit of Orange France, which in turn is the wireless division of France Telecom,...

Research Points to Faster Threat Development.
July 6, 2006... Security software maker McAfee contends that IT threats are growing in volume at a significantly faster pace than at any previous era through which it has tracked the propagation of malware code. McAfee's Avert Labs reported that it...

More Business-Friendly Features for Mac OS X 'Leopard'.
July 6, 2006... The feature list of Apple Computer's forthcoming Mac OS X 10.5, aka Leopard, may be considered a state secret down at the company's Infinite Loop headquarters. At the same time, eWEEK readers have a strong sense of what Apple could do in its...

EU Commissioner Says Microsoft Fine Is Inevitable.
July 6, 2006... BERLIN (Reuters)--The European Union's Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said on Thursday she could see no alternative to fining U.S. software giant Microsoft for breaching the bloc's antitrust rules. Asked whether Microsoft would be...

How Google Works.(Brief article)
July 6, 2006... Google's information management approach, which often goes unnoticed, is both highly effective and efficient. And may be the way other organizations deploy technology in the future. Here's why: Story Guide: * Google's Extreme...

Playing the Standards Game the Microsoft Way.
July 6, 2006... The headline reads, "Microsoft Bows to Pressure to Interoperate with ODF." Oh no, Microsoft isn't. The Redmond crew has an entirely different agenda for "supporting" the OpenDocument Format with its own Open XML Translator. It's not even...

RIM Unveils Hosted BlackBerry Offering For SMB.
July 6, 2006... BlackBerry maker Research in Motion (RIM), the top seller in the enterprise smartphone market, today announced a new software offering, the Hosted BlackBerry Enterprise Server, that will allow carriers and service providers to host RIM's mobile...

Microsoft Bows to Pressure to Interoperate with ODF.
July 6, 2006... Microsoft is giving in to the unrelenting pressure to be more open, particularly with regard to its Office Open XML file format and interoperability with the Open Document Format alternative. The company will announce July 6 that it has set...

Base Technologies: Internal Development.(Google primarily relies on internally developed software )(Brief article)
July 6, 2006... Google primarily relies on its own internally developed software for data and network management and has a reputation for being skeptical of "not invented here" technologies, so relatively few vendors can claim it as a customer. ...

Britain Agrees to Extradite Hacker Suspect to U.S.
July 6, 2006... LONDON (Reuters)--Britain on Thursday approved the extradition of a computer expert accused by the United States of perpetrating the world's "biggest military hack of all time." Gary McKinnon was arrested in June last year following charges...

New Mac OS Feature Raises Privacy Concerns.
July 6, 2006... Is your Mac "phoning home"? That's the question some Apple users are asking after installing an updated version of the company's Mac OS X--Version 10.4.7--that aims to help authenticate desktop widgets. According to at least one blog,...

Microsoft's Open XML Project Deemed a Short-Term Fix.
July 6, 2006... Microsoft's move to set up an open-source project that will allow translation between its Office Open XML format and the OpenDocument Format is a welcome first step, but not a long-term solution to the problem, industry players said on July 6....

5 Dampers on IT Worker Confidence.
July 7, 2006... For the fourth month in a row, technology professionals have felt more confident in their jobs than the U.S. workforce at large, according to the Hudson Employment Index for IT Workers released July 5. With a base score of 100, the IT index...

Criminals Increasingly Blend IT Threats.
July 7, 2006... Security researchers at software maker MessageLabs contend that malware writers, hackers and other cyber-criminals are combining multiple forms of IT threats in an attempt to amplify their efforts. In the company's latest IT security...

The Sweetest BlackBerrys.(Research in Motion Ltd. launched BlackBerry 7100t )
July 7, 2006... For mobile e-mail, there's nothing like a BlackBerry. Research in Motion (RIM) perfected corporate e-mail a few years ago, and it went on to bring fast, easy e-mail phones to consumers starting with its BlackBerry 7100t for T-Mobile. They're...

Study: Security Breaches Afflict Most Enterprises, Governments.
July 7, 2006... In the past year, 84 percent of enterprises, as well as state and local governments, reported some type of security breaches, according to a new survey released by Computer Associates International. The survey also found that security...

Intel's 'Montecito' Finally on the Launch Pad.
July 7, 2006... Intel is preparing to launch its long-awaited dual-core Itanium 2 processor, dubbed "Montecito," in July, the latest attempt by the giant chip maker to re-establish its technological dominance in the server space. Intel will announce the...

eWEEK Daily News Podcast, July 7.
July 7, 2006... Britain will extradite hacker; HP will merge hundreds of facilities into a few central operations; AMD lowers earnings estimates; and Microsoft ODF translation effort derided. Click here [link omitted] to download eWEEK's Daily News...

Open-Source ERP Grows Up.
July 9, 2006... Wary of mounting acquisitions in the business applications sector harming his enterprise resource planning investment, John Rogelstad searched for an alternative that could carry his small cut-and-sew manufacturing company to the next level....

Microsoft Touts Vertical Apps.
July 9, 2006... At Microsoft's Worldwide Partner Conference in Boston July 11-13, the company again is hoping to go vertical via its massive Microsoft Business Solutions partner channel to become a bigger enterprise resource planning player. At the...

Source: EU to Cap Microsoft Daily Fine at $3.8 Million.
July 10, 2006... BRUSSELS, July 10 (Reuters)--The European Commission plans to raise the ceiling of future fines on Microsoft to 3 million euros ($3.8 million) a day if the company continues to defy an antitrust decision, a diplomatic source said on Monday. ...

IBM to Debut Lotus Notes on Linux.
July 10, 2006... Desktop collaboration software options for the Linux platform will get a boost when IBM releases its Lotus Notes on Linux product on July 24. Arthur Fontaine, IBM Lotus' senior offering manager, told eWEEK that this is the industry's first...

ADP Duped Into Disclosing Data.
July 10, 2006... In the latest in a string of high-profile data disclosures, the brokerage services group of Automatic Data Processing (ADP) last week said "an unauthorized party impersonated officers" at an undisclosed number of public companies to obtain...

Websense Mines for Malicious Code with Google.
July 10, 2006... Security researchers have a brand-new tool to use to go digging for malicious executables on the Web: The Google SOAP Search API. Malware hunters at Websense's Security Labs have figured out a way to use the freely available Google API to...

BEA to Update Java Application Server.
July 10, 2006... BEA Systems is expected to announce on July 12 the availability of WebLogic Server 9.2, the latest version of the company's Java application server. In addition, San Jose, Calif.-based BEA also will unveil new portal and development...

IT Operational Budgets at Highest Levels Since 1997.(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... IT operational budgets, as a percentage of company revenues, are at their highest levels since the late 1990s, but that increase comes as large enterprises continue to outsource IT work, according to a recent survey by research firm Computer...

Citigroup Says IT Center Will Bring Jobs.
July 10, 2006... Citigroup announced plans on July 10 to build a Information Technology and Consumer Innovation Training Center in Blue Ash, Ohio, that it said will eventually employ up to 1,000 IT professionals. The company intends to hire 400 tech...

July 2006 Online Extras.
July 11, 2006... BASELINE ONLINE Topic Centers IT Management Topic Center *News *Analysis *Opinion *Tools Compliance Topic Center *News *Analysis *Opinion *Tools P&G's End-to-End RFID Plan Consumer...

Microsoft Unveils Dynamics CRM Live.
July 11, 2006... BOSTON--Microsoft has announced--finally--its version of on-demand CRM software. For more than a year the software giant has nosed around the fact that it's working on customer relationship management as a service, but it wasn't until its...

Supervalu Bags Former Target CIO.
July 11, 2006... Grocery giant Supervalu has hired retail industry veteran Paul Singer as its chief information officer, to assist the company in digesting its recent $17.4 billion acquisition of the Albertsons grocery chain. Minneapolis-based Supervalu...

Mega Patch Day Includes 'Critical' Excel Update.
July 11, 2006... A mega update for the widely used Excel spreadsheet program is the highlight of the latest batch of security patches issued by Microsoft on July 11. One month after confirming that maliciously rigged Excel files were being used in targeted...

Study: Outsourcing Boom Is Over.
July 11, 2006... The outsourcing boom has passed and maturity is setting in, according to a new study from consulting firm DiamondCluster International in Chicago. The leveling off is due in part to experienced customers becoming more savvy and more picky...

FBI Reports a Surge in Online Job Scams.
July 11, 2006... According to a report issued by the FBI on July 5, individuals in the market for a new job have more to fear than rejection--online job scams are becoming prevalent as more individuals hunt for new employment opportunities online. In a...

Congress to Vote on Data Center Power Bill.
July 11, 2006... Congress is about to take up the issue of energy efficiency in federal and private data centers. The House of Representatives is expected to vote July 12 on a bill asking that the Environmental Protection Agency conduct a study on power...

Chicago, Boston Flaunt Largest IT Job Growth.
July 11, 2006... The Chicago and Boston metro areas have shown the biggest gains in IT job postings since the beginning of 2006, according to the monthly report released July 11 from Dice.com, a career site for tech professionals. Chicago and Boston have...

EU Fines Microsoft $357.3M for Defiance.
July 12, 2006... BRUSSELS--European Union regulators fined Microsoft 280.5 million euros ($357.3 million) on Wednesday for defying a 2004 antitrust ruling, and warned the company to comply or face bigger fines from next month. The tough new penalty is the...

Critical Excel Flaws Remain Unpatched.
July 12, 2006... A day after Microsoft shipped a mega-patch to cover eight Excel vulnerabilities, security researchers warn that at least two critical--and publicly discussed--flaws affecting users of the spreadsheet program remain unpatched. ...

Sun's Server Chief Promises Stable Rollouts, Despite Upheaval.(Interview)
July 12, 2006... Sun Microsystems is a company in a state of flux, undergoing an aggressive restructuring while continuing its rollout of new products, as the July 11 launch of three new Opteron-based servers--including a blade server and scalable rack-mount...

Microsoft Says on Track to Resolving EU Situation.
July 12, 2006... SEATTLE (Reuters)--Microsoft Corp. is on track to resolve this month its fight with European Union regulators over its compliance with a 2004 antitrust ruling, the software company's general counsel said on Wednesday. Earlier in the day,...

Secure Computing Buys Messaging-Security Specialist CipherTrust for $273M.
July 12, 2006... The July 11 merger of two medium-size enterprise data security companies into a formidable, $250 million-per-year corporation could create a new force in the enterprise gateway security market to compete head-on with such established players as...

MS, PASS Consortium to Offer Payments-as-a-Service Platform in Vista.
July 12, 2006... Boston--Software as a service has taken on a new meaning for small business owners that touch, in any way, the payments industry. Thanks to the combined forces of a software infrastructure from IP Commerce, the IP Payments Framework, and a...

Attorneys Approve Oracle's Patent-Troll Wrangling.
July 12, 2006... Patent attorneys are applauding Oracle's proactive pounce on EpicRealm, a company many consider to be acting like a patent troll. "Rather than sit back and wait to be sued, or watch as EpicRealm lines its litigation coffers by extracting...

Dell Takes On Pricing in Image Makeover.
July 12, 2006... PC makers are going back to the basics on pricing in an attempt to entice buyers. Dell, which has scheduled a news announcement for July 13, is expected to reveal a revised PC pricing strategy that will present SMBs (small and midsize...

Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 Is No Slam-Dunk.
July 12, 2006... The war of the browsers continues with a series of beta skirmishes, as Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 enters the fray. Maybe we should call this the prequel for the next battle for browser supremacy--"Browser Wars: Attack of the Betas." The latest...

Both Men and Women Report Pay Bias.
July 12, 2006... According to a gender pay survey released July 12, 35 percent of female workers say that they are paid less than men in their workplaces with similar experience and qualifications. This number has grown 4 percent since the company's 2003...

Most CFOs Harbor Security Concerns.
July 13, 2006... Chief financial officers continue to rank information security as their top priority as compliance auditors and the fear of public humiliation over data leaks drive new levels of IT security scrutiny, according to a new survey. The study,...

SOA: At the Forefront of Integrating Applications.
July 13, 2006... Find out how companies big and small are integrating applications and business processes to better interact with customers, suppliers and partners--and fueling what can be significant cost savings. Lead Story: In a Babel of Apps,...

Mumbai Bombings Shake Outsourcing Community.
July 13, 2006... The big fear of offshore outsourcing customers has become a reality: a major bombing attack in an outsourcing hub. On July 11, at least 200 commuters were killed by terrorist bombings in Mumbai, India, a key outsourcing locale. In the...

Report Blasts Veterans Affairs' Response to ID Theft.
July 13, 2006... A lack of oversight, personality conflicts and a serious underestimation of the scale of the information loss all played a significant role in the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs' response to the theft of millions of veterans' records...

Microsoft Confirms PowerPoint Zero-Day Attack.
July 13, 2006... First Word, then Excel, now PowerPoint. For the third time in two months, a zero-day vulnerability in a widely used Microsoft Office software application is being used in targeted hacker attacks. The latest attack exploits a previously...

Intel to Lay Off 1,000 Managers.
July 13, 2006... Intel is set to lay off about 1,000 managers worldwide in a bid to streamline its operations. The company began informing those managers affected by the cuts on July 13. The move comes as Intel, which has been under pressure from rival...

States to Sue Chip Makers over Price-Fixing.
July 14, 2006... SAN FRANCISCO/TOKYO (Reuters)--Global computer memory chip makers including Samsung Electronics Co. and Micron Technology Inc. were sued on Thursday by New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer for allegedly conspiring to raise memory chip...

Technology: Network Automation Software Improves Efficiency.
July 14, 2006... Drugstore.com, the $263 million, Bellevue, Wash.-based online pharmacy "has a lot of the same problems every other company has," says Don Allan, senior director of IT operations. "We're trying to manage the most equipment with the smallest...

Has the Skype Protocol Been Cracked?
July 14, 2006... A claim that a group of researchers in China has successfully cracked the Skype protocol has set the blogosphere alight, but the company says there is no evidence that the software has been reverse-engineered. "We have no evidence to...

Microsoft to Highlight Next-Gen Web Work at Research Summit.
July 14, 2006... Microsoft will show off some of its Windows Live search projects at the annual Microsoft Research Faculty Summit next week. On July 17 and 18, Microsoft researchers, product group engineers and architects and invited academic researchers...

IM Attacks and Image Spam Continue to Be Nuisances.
July 14, 2006... Attacks aimed at lightly protected instant messaging systems and spam that replaces text with images in an effort to dupe filtering software are growing in popularity, according to new research released by Postini. As indicated in...

Intel's Otellini Links Layoffs to Turnaround Plan.
July 14, 2006... Intel says its plan to lay off 1,000 managers worldwide is a bet on its future. The company began informing those managers affected by the job cuts--which could be the first such action resulting from a broad-based internal review of its...

Report: Tech Job Cuts at a 6-Year Low.
July 14, 2006... Showing a 26 percent reduction in job cuts, the second quarter of 2006 was a great one for the tech sector, according to a report issued July 13 by Challenger, Gray & Christmas, a Chicago-based global outplacement consultancy. The number...

McAfee Says it Unwittingly Fixed Software Loophole.
July 14, 2006... Software security provider McAfee revealed July 14 that it fixed a serious flaw in its enterprise security package Common Management Agent in January 2006 with a regular update (v3.5.5) and didn't even realize it. Common Management Agent...

Microsoft Kills Off 'My Private Folder' App.
July 14, 2006... If you've heard of Microsoft Private Folder 1.0, forget it. As of 2:30 p.m. Pacific Time on Friday, it no longer exists. Microsoft quietly added the free encryption utility earlier this month, and then just as quietly deleted it. The...

Case Study: Continental Airline's Tech Strategy Takes Off.
July 14, 2006... When it comes to airline travel in a post-Sept. 11 world, you probably know what to expect: long lines to check luggage, pass through security and change seats; snarky airline employees who may or may not have just lost their pensions; a middle...

Chrysler MyGiG Hard Drive for Navigation, Music.
July 14, 2006... Chrysler raises the bar on in-car technology with the MyGiG: a 20GB hard drive embedded in the dashboard for ripping CDs and for storing navigation data. Included is a Gracenote lookup engine to provide artist, track, and title information;...

PolyServe Finds a Way to Work with Both Linux and Windows.
July 17, 2006... Editor's Note: This is the last in a series of articles that examines Microsoft's strategy of gaining market share and driving new solutions to market through its partner base. BOSTON--There can be enormous advantages for a company to build...

Baseline's Look Ahead, Week of July 17.
July 17, 2006... July 17: Hewlett-Packard announces a small wireless chip, called the Memory Spot, which the company says could be embedded onto virtually any surface--even a piece of paper. The chip, about the size of a grain of rice, has a...

Congress Eyes Data Center Cooling.
July 17, 2006... Congress is turning its attention to power and cooling in the data center, asking the federal Environmental Protection Agency to gather information on the subject. The House of Representatives on July 12 overwhelmingly passed Resolution...

eWEEK Daily News Podcast, July 17, 2006.
July 17, 2006... Click here [link omitted] to download eWEEK's Daily News Podcast for July 14 In this eWEEK Daily News Podcast: HP develops a tiny chip that could become a stickable data dot on paper documents and retail products; Intel prepares dual-core...

No Quick Fix for Government Data Security.
July 17, 2006... WASHINGTON (Reuters)--The White House has set an early August deadline for government agencies to encrypt sensitive data after the embarrassing theft of millions of veterans' personal information, but experts warn a quick technology fix will...

Study: Tech CEO Pay Doesn't Match Performance.
July 17, 2006... An analysis of the 100 largest information-technology companies finds that those with the highest-paid CEOs in 2005 had the worst returns. In the recent study, DolmatConnell & Partners, an executive compensation consulting firm based in...

Microsoft Still Gunning to Launch Vista and Office 2007 Together.
July 17, 2006... In spite of the vague public wording around its Windows Vista and Office 2007 release plans, Microsoft is continuing to tell its hardware and software partners that its goal is to release the two products simultaneously in January. In...

Intel Haifa Staff Tap Away in Wi-Fi Bomb Shelters.
July 17, 2006... JERUSALEM (Reuters)--Staff at Intel Corp's Haifa research center have been forced into bomb shelters as Hizbollah rockets rained on the northern Israeli city, but they are still working, thanks to wireless connections underground. The U.S....

Metasploit Creator Releases Malware Search Engine.
July 17, 2006... H.D. Moore, creator of the Metasploit hacking tool and the security researcher behind the MoBB (Month of Browser Bugs) project, has released a search engine that finds live malware samples through Google queries. The new Malware Search...

Private Equity Firms Sniff Around Verizon Unit.
July 17, 2006... NEW YORK/PHILADELPHIA (Reuters)--Private equity firms are weighing a bid to acquire Verizon Communications' directories business that Verizon plans to separate later this year, sources familiar with the matter said on Monday. Although the...

MS Advisory: Beware Unexpected PowerPoint Files.
July 17, 2006... In the midst of back-to-back zero-day attacks against select businesses in the Far East, Microsoft on July 17 released a security advisory with a terse message: Do not open or save unexpected Microsoft Office files, even if they come...

BMC Looks to Optimize Data Center.(BMC Software launched updated releases of data center management software)
July 17, 2006... BMC Software on July 17 turned its attention to data center optimization when it launched updated releases of several acquired tools now integrated with each other. BMC, which is based in Houston, updated BMC Virtualizer 2.5, BMC...

Technology: Can IT Help Utilities Lower Commercial Energy Costs?
July 17, 2006... You know there's an energy crisis when even the energy companies are turning to alternative energy. Xcel Energy Inc., a Minneapolis-based energy firm, runs a healthy business, with more than 3.3 million electricity and 1.8 natural gas...