VIRUS ALERT: Winur-D attacks the caring, sharing user

Sophos has issued a warning about Winur-D, a virus that tries to delete AV programs and spreads through file-sharing networks, such as Morpheus and KaZaA. The W32 worm targets users on BearShare, Morpheus, eDonkey2000, Gnucleus, KaZaA, KaZaA Lite and LimeWire peer-to-peer filesharing networks and also exploits the file-sharing capabilites of the ICQ instant messaging system. It copies itself to these programs' folders and sets registry entries to allow sharing through these networks. ...more

Sun to open-source Java

Newly minted as CEO, Sun's Jonathan Schwartz took to the floor for his first appearance at his company's JavaOne Developer Conference in San Francisco to detail a new strategy to open-source Java and point it at SOA (Service Oriented Architectures). To date, Java has been popular for applications on mobile phones and websites, and is just a part of the systems giant's mammoth portfolio. But by open-sourcing Java, Schwartz seems to be painting it as the glue to unite its wide-ranging offerings as business adopts open-source technologies and moves to an SOA environment. ...more

British hacker faces US extradition

A British man accused of causing hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage to US military computer systems has been granted bail prior to extradition hearings. Gary McKinnon, 39, an unemployed computer systems administrator from Wood Green in North London was arrested on Tuesday. He appeared in court yesterday following a request by the American authorities that he should be extradited to the United States to face charges of hacking into Pentagon computers. ...more

Regulating the Internet drives out jobs - Euro business groups

Attempts by the EU to regulate Internet content will drive out jobs, according to European business groups. Seven organisations have come together to warn the European Commission that its Television Without Frontiers proposals will stifle the development of digital content and services by applying rules designed for traditional broadcasters to all online audio-visual content, the Financial Times reports. As a consequence, media companies will move their Internet operations out of the EU. ...more

Sony and Apple to reconcile iTMS differences

Sony and Apple appear ready to put aside their differences and give Japanese iPod owners access to paid-for downloads from Sony's roster of musicians. Apple launched its iTunes Music Store in Japan last month without Sony on-board and promptly sold more than one million songs in four days. Sony appears to have decided that taking its share of iTunes sales is more important than the prospect of further boosting Apple's leadership of both the download and portable player markets. ...more