Europe's .eu net name gets green light

The body that assigns Internet domains has finally given the go-ahead for the .eu top-level domain. The decision by ICANN, the Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Numbers, brings near to an end a five-year campaign to get the domain recognised. ...more

Ofcom orders ceiling on local loop unbundling rental

Telecoms and media watchdog Ofcom has ordered that BT can charge competitors no more than ?81.85 rental per year for a totally unbundled local loop. However, BT had already pre-empted the move last month. ...more

RFID chips capable of transmitting viruses

A group of Dutch researchers have demonstrated that it is possible to insert malicious code into an RFID chip. Until now the prospect of viruses appearing on RFID units has been considered remote because of the tiny memory capacity in the devices and the possibility of transmitting remote code simply by scanning. RFID or Radio Frequency Identification chips are becoming increasingly common as a method of tracking or securing goods in transit. ...more

Amazon bags US patent on monitoring browsing history

Amazon has been granted a US patent on monitoring browsing history in order to suggest information or products which might be of interest. The online retailer can claim to have pioneered such technology with its 'people who bought this also bought' recommendations. Patent number 6,912,505, entitled 'Use of product viewing histories of users to identify related products', describes identifying a relationship between products that are frequently viewed and storing the relationship in data in a table that maps one product to another. ...more

Seagate ships record drives

Disk manufacturer Seagate announces record shipments for second quarter. Seagate says it has shipped a record 18.3 million for the second quarter ending 27 December. ...more