Tag: privacy-rights

Private investment firm buys out Sony Online Entertainment

In a surprise move announced this afternoon, investment management firm Columbus Nova announced it has purchased Sony Online Entertainment from its long-standing parent company, Sony Computer Entertainment. The studio behind MMOs like Everquest , DC Universe Online , Planetside 2 , and H1Z1 will now operate as an independent firm called Daybreak Game Company, according to a press release. Terms of the deal have not been disclosed. The announcement hints that the former SOE might be looking to take some of its properties to systems aside from the PC and PlayStation consoles they currently live on. “We will continue to focus on delivering exceptional games to players around the world, as well as bringing our portfolio to new platforms, fully embracing the multi-platform world in which we all live [emphasis added],” Daybreak president John Smedley said in a statement. Smedley was even more explicit about the company’s multi-platform future in a tweet following the announcement : “Can’t wait to make Xbox One games!” And in a post on the company’s official forums , the Daybreak team states outright that they will be developing for “PlayStation and Xbox, mobile and more!” Read 3 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Private investment firm buys out Sony Online Entertainment

Verizon reportedly selling off old wires to focus more on wireless

Verizon is reportedly close to selling off parts of its wireline network and some cell towers in a series of deals totaling more than $10 billion, helping the company fund spectrum license purchases that will boost its wireless business. The Wall Street Journal reported the deals today , saying they “will involve different buyers and could be announced as soon as later this week.” The report said Verizon will sell “a package of assets including cellphone towers and parts of its wireline business” but did not get any more specific. Presumably, Verizon would be selling off parts of its old copper telephone and DSL networks rather than its FiOS fiber-to-the-home assets. Given Verizon’s focus on its wireless business, the cell towers are probably surplus to requirements. Verizon’s wireless subsidiary just committed to purchasing $10.4 billion worth of wireless spectrum licenses. Verizon lost $2.23 billion in its most recent quarter. Besides funding that spectrum purchase, Verizon is trying to pay off debt, according to the  Journal report. The company “took on a massive debt load” last year when it spent $130 billion to buy out Vodafone’s 45 percent stake in Verizon Wireless, the report said. Verizon now owns 100 percent of Verizon Wireless. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Verizon reportedly selling off old wires to focus more on wireless

Dish used “small business” discount to save $3 billion at taxpayer expense

Dish took advantage of discounts intended for small businesses to save $3.3 billion in an auction of public airwaves, making a “mockery” of the small business program, according to a member of the Federal Communications Commission. Dish used companies it owns in order to place $13.3 billion worth of winning bids in an auction of wireless airwaves that can be used for cellular networks. Results of the auction were announced last week . But Dish only has to pay $10 billion because it didn’t place the bids directly. FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai called upon FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler “to immediately launch an investigation into these multi-billion dollar subsidies.” “[T]wo companies in which Dish Network has an 85 percent ownership stake claimed over $3 billion in taxpayer-funded discounts when purchasing spectrum in the AWS-3 auction,” Pai said in his call for an investigation today . “Those discounts came through the FCC’s designed entity (DE) program, which is intended to make it easier for small businesses to purchase spectrum and compete with large corporations. Dish, however, has annual revenues of almost $14 billion, a market capitalization of over $32 billion, and over 14 million customers. Its participation makes a mockery of the DE program.” Read 9 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Dish used “small business” discount to save $3 billion at taxpayer expense

What Windows as a Service and a “free upgrade” mean at home and at work

Windows licensing is more or less straightforward in the consumer sphere. Oh, sure, there are complications surrounding self-built systems, but compared to the world of enterprise licensing, the range of options is limited and the pricing simple. Corporate licensing, however, is a whole other matter. We’ve been saying for some time that the process of updating and upgrading Windows is going to change in Windows 10, and perhaps unsurprisingly, this is going to have implications for Windows licensing. The underlying theme is this: Microsoft does not want the Windows market to be split between a bunch of different versions. For a brief period, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 8.1 were all both extant and actively supported Windows versions. This is bad for more or less the entire Windows world. It’s bad for developers of Windows software because they’re forced to choose between the best functionality (found in Windows 8.1) or the widest compatibility (target Windows XP). It’s bad for Microsoft, because it has to support all these versions. It’s bad, in many ways, for end-users, too; using old versions means that they don’t get the latest features, and in the case of Windows XP, they don’t even receive security updates. Read 22 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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What Windows as a Service and a “free upgrade” mean at home and at work

CBS reporter’s “hack” caused by stuck backspace key, says US govt

According to a US Department of Justice Inspector General report released today, an investigation “was not able to substantiate the allegations that [Sharyl] Attkisson’s computers were subject to remote intrusion by the FBI, other government personnel, or otherwise.” The report was introduced into the Senate record at the confirmation hearing for Attorney General nominee Loretta Lynch. Attkisson, who has written a book about her experiences trying to cover the Obama White House which includes the allegation of hacking , has filed a lawsuit against the Department of Justice, outgoing Attorney General Eric Holder, and the Postmaster General for the alleged hacking of her home and work computers. Today, Attkisson testified at Lynch’s confirmation hearing. The report from the DoJ’s Office of the Inspector General casts a different light on Attkisson’s allegations: Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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CBS reporter’s “hack” caused by stuck backspace key, says US govt

4chan founder Chris “moot” Poole steps down

On Wednesday, 4chan founder Christopher Poole, better known by the moniker “moot,” announced his retirement from running the site. moot started 4chan 11 and a half years ago when he was 15, and the image-based bulletin board has grown into a staunch supporter of anonymity for its posters since. That notoriety has drawn some of the best and also a lot of the very, very worst to its 63 boards. In his post today, moot explained the decision: 4chan has faced numerous challenges over the years, including how to continuously satisfy a community of millions, and ensure the site has the human, technical, and financial resources to continue operating. But the biggest hurdle it’s had to overcome is myself. As 4chan’s sole administrator, decision maker, and keeper of most of its institutional knowledge, I’ve come to represent an uncomfortably large single point of failure. moot continued to say that he has made sure the site will be financially secure in the foreseeable future and has delegated the tasks of running the site to “a few senior volunteers.” Read 3 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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4chan founder Chris “moot” Poole steps down

Hard disk reliability examined once more: HGST rules, Seagate is alarming

A year ago we got some insight into hard disk reliability when cloud backup provider Backblaze published its findings for the tens of thousands of disks that it operated. Backblaze uses regular consumer-grade disks in its storage because of the cheaper cost and good-enough reliability, but it also discovered that some kinds of disks fared extremely poorly when used 24/7. A year later on and the company has collected even more data , and drawn out even more differences between the different disks it uses. For a second year, the standout reliability leader was HGST. Now a wholly-owned subsidiary of Western Digital, HGST inherited the technology and designs from Hitachi (which itself bought IBM’s hard disk division). Across a range of models from 2 to 4 terabytes, the HGST models showed low failure rates; at worse, 2.3 percent failing a year. This includes some of the oldest disks among Backblaze’s collection; 2TB Desktop 7K2000 models are on average 3.9 years old, but still have a failure rate of just 1.1 percent. Read 4 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Hard disk reliability examined once more: HGST rules, Seagate is alarming

Google drops more Windows 0-days. Something’s gotta give

Google’s security researchers have published another pair of Windows security flaws that Microsoft hasn’t got a fix for, continuing the disagreement between the companies about when and how to disclose security bugs. The first bug affects Windows 7 only and results in minor information disclosure. Microsoft says, and Google agrees, that this does not meet the threshold for a fix. Windows 8 and up don’t suffer the same issue. The second bug is more significant. In certain situations, Windows doesn’t properly check the user identity when performing cryptographic operations, which results in certain shared data not being properly encrypted. Microsoft has developed a fix for this bug, and it was originally scheduled for release this past Tuesday. However, the company discovered a compatibility issue late in testing, and so the fix has been pushed to February. Read 7 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Google drops more Windows 0-days. Something’s gotta give

Silk Road stunner: Ulbricht admits founding the site, but says he isn’t DPR

Once they got the chance, it took prosecutors less than a minute to point the finger—literally—at Ross Ulbricht. The jury of six men and six women were assembled in Manhattan’s federal courthouse to hear a story about a “dark and secret part of the Internet,” government lawyer Timothy Howard explained. The story was about “a website called Silk Road, where anybody, anywhere could buy and sell dangerous drugs with the click of a mouse.” “That man,” Howard said, turning to look straight at Ulbricht and extending his arm towards him. “The defendant—Ross Ulbricht— he was the kingpin of this criminal empire.” Read 35 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Silk Road stunner: Ulbricht admits founding the site, but says he isn’t DPR

Only 25Mbps and up will qualify as broadband under new FCC definition

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler today is proposing to raise the definition of broadband from 4Mbps downstream and 1Mbps upstream to 25Mbps down and 3Mbps up. As part of the Annual Broadband Progress Report mandated by Congress , the Federal Communications Commission has to determine whether broadband “is being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion.” The FCC’s latest report, circulated by Wheeler in draft form to fellow commissioners, “finds that broadband is not being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion, especially in rural areas, on Tribal lands, and in US Territories,” according to a fact sheet the FCC provided to Ars. The FCC also gets to define what speeds qualify as broadband, or “advanced telecommunications capability,” as it’s called in policy documents. The FCC last updated that definition in 2010 , raising it from 200Kbps to the current 4/1 standard. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 said that advanced telecommunications capability must “enable users to originate and receive high-quality voice, data, graphics, and video telecommunications using any technology.” Wheeler’s proposed annual report says the 4/1 definition adopted in 2010 “is inadequate for evaluating whether broadband capable of supporting today’s high-quality voice, data, graphics, and video is being deployed to all Americans in a timely way.” (Despite the annual requirement, this would be the first such report since 2012 .) Read 6 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Only 25Mbps and up will qualify as broadband under new FCC definition