Spring IDF 2006: Wireless to go global

Intel has launched seamless networking at its spring developers' forum, which it hopes will make it easier for wireless users to roam between different wireless networks. Using the open International Roaming Access Protocols (IRAP), seamless roaming will use a single billing account and let users move from mobile to Wi-Fi networks (and WiMax when it's available) without having to re-authenticate with different usernames and passwords. 'For mere mortal users we have to make access to wireless easier,' said Kevin Kahn, director of Intel's communications labs. ...more

Phishing attacks from the US decline

A new report suggests that the number of phishing attacks originating from the US has fallen. The research, carried out by IT security company RSA, found that the number of attacks had fallen from 74 per cent in February to 55 per cent in March. But phishers have broadened the scope of their attacks with the number of brands targeted by criminals increasing from 153 in February to 202 in March. ...more

Wireless network equipment shortage worsening

Wireless network equipment makers in Taiwan, which supply nearly 80 per cent of global WLAN equipment, find themselves in a worsening situation for the supply of components, local IC distributors said. According to an earlier report, Taiwan-based networking equipment companies have already been troubled with 802.11b chipset shortages. ...more

Back to the future

.Net may conjure up futuristic images of Web services, but COBOL calls up a more mainframe way of computing. The two now come together with Fujitsu's NetCOBOL. Fujitsu has announced a new version of its NetCOBOL programming language (which was previously known as Fujitsu COBOL). ...more

Sony questions success of file sharing attacks

A Sony executive has conceded that the music industry is making little headway in curbing file sharing, despite its high-profile legal campaigns against alleged file sharers. Albhy Galuten, vice president, Digital Media Technology Strategy at Sony America, told the Digital Media Summit in Los Angeles that the industry is not 'winning the battle against pirating'. Galuten was taking part in a debate with legal experts to discuss whether the US record and movie industries' 'get tough' policies are effective against the scofflaws who use p2p networks to share music files without authorisation, a practice that the two industries regard as theft. ...more