2001 - The top ten computing stories

It's time to look back and consider the top ten computing stories of the year. And the best controversial and off-beat ones, too. Windows XP rolls out XP gets its official launch today, with CEO Steve Ballmer the star attraction at the press event, later moving on to the Dixons store in Oxford Street to put the XP in Dixons: DiXPns. ...more

Microsoft and non-settling states sum up four years in court

Microsoft and the nine non-settling states have filed 500+ page documents that spell out their respective cases and proposed solutions at the end of two months of witness testimonies - bringing the four-year-old antitrust case to the final stages of its run. The documents will be considered by US District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, who will hear the closing arguments of both sides on 19 June and will then open her own remedy based on these and the findings of last year's appeals court ruling. The judge's final ruling is expected towards the end of the summer. ...more

EC sympathetic towards 3G licence debts

Have European telecom companies "bet the farm" on purchasing 3G mobile phone licences? And have they lost? Increasingly, concerns are being raised about the mountain of debt that has been incurred in anticipation of speculative returns. The bigger picture is certainly gloomy for operators, such as BT, that achieved the pyrrhic victory of obtaining costly national licences, but now the European Commission has become involved. The Financial Times reports that a Commission discussion paper will be released today that will outline possible escape routes for the telcos. ...more

Microsoft issues 'critical' security bulletin to Internet Explorer users

Microsoft has issued a security bulletin warning of three 'critical vulnerabilities found in recent versions of Internet Explorer. This bulletin is outside of the normal monthly security update issued by the company. The versions affected are Internet Explorer 5. ...more

Betfair issues DDoS rallying call

The gambling industry has warned that businesses must work more closely with ISPs to prevent hackers from launching successful distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks against websites. Rorie Devine, chief technology officer at online gambling group Betfair told delegates at a conference in London that businesses need to ensure co-operation with ISPs to successfully combat attacks designed to take websites offline. Most DDoS attacks are caused by hackers using botnets, large numbers of compromised computers used to send massive amounts of data to overwhelm a webserver. ...more