EFF fights US gov over flight passenger data

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has filed suit against the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) over the gathering of data on passengers taking flights between Europe and the US. The civil rights body had asked the DHS for records on how the process is handled, including how the data is maintained, used, disclosed, and secured, under the Freedom of Information Act. However, the DHS failed to respond to the request. ...more

Judge decides Microsoft is complying with settlement

Concerns voiced by the US Department of Justice that Microsoft was dilly-dallying in its efforts to comply with the terms of the antitrust settlement have been allayed, according to District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly. At the beginning of July, the DoJ report recommended 'further steps may need to be taken.. ...more

GNU servers hacked

The GNU Project has admitted that its FTP servers have been hacked. The organisation says that the servers were compromised as far back as March but only came to light at the end of July. The Free Software Foundation which is the sponsor of GNU says that a root compromise and a Trojan were found on gnuftp. ...more

No more idolisation of cyber criminals

The figure of the havoc-wreaking hacker is receiving the attention of the US Justice Department and the FBI. First port of call for a new Cybercitizen Awareness Program is the classroom, where the proto-cyber-criminals start to cut their teeth. Essentially, the program is targeted at kids and young adults to generate a sense of cyber responsibility and an awareness of the consequences of computer crime. ...more

ANALYSIS: Bad credit record

It's both the Internet's biggest burden and its biggest source of unwanted publicity, but attitudes towards the Web's role in supporting networks of paedophiles could be changing. High-profile arrests of well-known celebrities linked with paedophilic material are no longer followed by media witch-hunts blaming new technology for the spread of these abhorrent crimes. Rather, the police's investigating practices send out a message to anyone misusing the Web - if their credit card details have been passed across the Net, the cops could come knocking. ...more