Skype's acquisition by Microsoft should speed up some long-needed security measures and help the company rise above the social networking risk level. Skype users faced an increasing onslaught of spammers and would-be fraudsters, while left with less-than-friendly means of setting privacy filters.
I'm a light Skype User too, but I certainly receive messages asking me to click things or subscribe to things. So far, they have been far too weird and off-the-wall for me to have been suckered by any of them. Good advice, though.
I'm not much of a Skype user, but I've heard stories from friends about the random and inappropriate requests they get on the service, so I do hope that this acquisition will mean better security and protections. As you say, though, the first mistake people make is trusting anything that comes through services like Facebook or Skype, so users should still not get too comfortable with the idea that Microsoft's ownership of Skype means we can all rest easy.
It wouldn't be the first time, but a group of Chinese engineers has proposed a means by which the Internet's root could be split, enabling secondary, independent networks that could be government-controlled. The Internet's root security committee is taking such proposals seriously.
ICANN is now offering refunds to new applicants for its top-level domain initiative, 10 years in the making, because the application system was taken offline due to a "glitch." ICANN has collected over $350 million in application fees, but we don't know what that number might be after refunds. Is this any way to run the Domain Name System?
Blackhole 1.2.3, the latest version of the most popular black-market exploit kit, apparently has already been used by Brazilian fraudsters to try to perpetrate a scam. The new kit, released at the end of March, can bypass sandboxes in Java, and the Brazilians used it to try to convince accountants they were about to lose licenses.
A problem with ICANN's application software has delayed the "big reveal" of new domain names for two weeks. What the organization calls a "glitch" allowed some domain applicants to see the data of others – not exactly inspiring confidence in ICANN's ability to bring potentially hundreds of new names online.
US counterterrorism expert Richard Clarke, who came to prominence with his prescient warnings before the 9/11 attacks, tells Smithsonian Magazine the US was responsible for the Stuxnet supersmart worm that attacked parts of nuclear reactors in Iran – and in the process, has given away one of the world's most sophisticated cyberweapons.
ICANN is in a crisis. But if it goes away, so will its unique "multistakeholder model," which allows Internet users to participate alongside business, government, and industry.
As ICANN's former board chairman grabs a plum job with a domain seller, we're left to wonder just how many new registrations are "defensive," claimed by companies worried about protecting their brands.
The board of ICANN, the international non-profit that administers the domain name system, announced CEO Rod Beckstrom would be leaving at the end of his term next summer. It's time for consumers and business to tell the organization what kind of person they want to lead it – and what priorities to set.
Free wireless is like tap water in Europe and Asia. Why is the US so far behind? Because of a near-religious commitment to non-government interference in markets, America lacks basic wireless infrastructure and will pay the price competitively.
Only a few new domain name applications have been given the go-ahead, so be wary of offers for "pre-registration" of the .suffix of your choice. Most likely, the registrars making such offers don't have the authority.
What can users today do to protect their online privacy? The simplest and most obvious option is to not use the Internet – at all. However, once all digital information is consolidated over the Internet, trying to protect digital identity by simply unplugging from the Internet becomes impossible – a fact that has manifest implications for civil liberties, Saunders says.
By 2011 the number of Internet-connected sensors will exceed 1 trillion, making your chances of doing anything or going anywhere unnoticed pretty much zero. Saunders talks about how the 'sensortization' of the Internet is eliminating the traditional divide between online and offline populations.
The 20th Century Internet was characterized by the ability to interact with other people and information on the Internet largely without anyone knowing who you were. The Internet of this century, conversely, will be defined by identity. Saunders explains how Internet users are unwittingly contributing to the demise of the anonymous Internet.
It is 20 years since the invention of the World Wide Web, and the Internet has changed beyond recognition since then. Steve Saunders peers into the future to predict what the Web will look like in another 20 years time – and he doesn’t like what he sees.
Companies are still getting their feet wet with social networking and what employees should and shouldn't broadcast. But they don't always involve HR and PR. Here's why they should, and what they risk when they don't.
The US government is funding controversial projects to collect daily Internet activity, including Web searches, Twitter messages, Facebook and blog posts, and the digital location trails generated by billions of cellphones. Its goal is to map these interactions to predict social behavior, such as protests.
Our online communications and privacy are being threatened by governments and corporations. Eben Moglen believes it's time for a People's Internet, made possible by "Freedom Boxes."
WikiLeaks' founder says that Facebook is an instrument for government spying. Whether that's true or not, we're sharing too much, and we’re on the edge of compromising the notion of identity, and with it of privacy and commercial protection.
Ushering in a new era of cognitive computing systems, IBM announced today the IBM Watson Engagement Advisor, a technology breakthrough that allows brands to crunch big data in record time to transform the way they engage clients in key functions such as customer service, marketing, and sales.
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