Swiss 3G auctions go sour

It's just not fair. Britain and Germany put their UMTS licences to auction and raise billions of pounds. Yet, when Italy finds its bidders have dropped to the same number of licences on offer it is left some $10bn short of expectations. ...more

Dutch join anti-iTunes campaign

The Netherlands' consumer protection agency has joined its French and German counterparts in backing the Norway-led coalition of countries that are trying to force Apple to remove DRM restrictions from the iTunes Store. The Dutch Consumentenbond has filed a complaint with the country's antitrust authority alleging that Apple's practice of supporting only its own iPod portable players is illegal. 'What we want from Apple is that they remove the limitations that prevent you from playing a song you download from iTunes on any player other than an iPod,' spokesman van Kouwen said. ...more

Study shows .info domain is a Net ghetto

The .info domain is the online equivalent of an unsafe neighbourhood, according to a new study. The latest SiteAdvisor report from anti-virus company McAfee found that registering at a site or downloading a file can be significantly more risky when done at certain domains. ...more

HP's erstwhile chairman brought to book

HP's erstwhile chairman Patricia Dunn has been formally booked under four counts of felony. Dunn resigned under the dark cloud of a spying scandal when it emerged that HP chiefs had hired companies that used legally dubious methods to spy on members of the media and its own board in order to track down a leak of confidential information. She appeared at a Santa Clara County court yesterday for a brief hearing before continuing to the sheriff's office to be booked. ...more

The Xbox revealed - the specs lowdown

Microsoft has finally lifted the lid on its much hyped games console at a press conference today in San Francisco. The little that has been known of the specs for the Xbox so far has suggested it's basically a PC in a console box. Today's announcement confirms the machine will sport a 733MHz processor along with an 8MB hard drive. ...more