May 26, 2005

Federal agents raided the operators of Elite Torrents, a popular BitTorrent peer-to-peer tracker for pirated software, music, and movies. In addition to shutting down the functionality of the site, the agents modified the front page to serve as a warning to others. The raids were prompted by Elite Torrents' illegal distribution of the "Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith" movie.

May 19, 2005

According to a new global software piracy study done by Business Software Alliance (BSA), more than one third of all software in use today is still pirated. Estimated software company revenue losses due to piracy in 2004 was $33 billion. The countries with the highest piracy rates were Vietnam (92%), Ukraine (91%), China (90%), Zimbabwe (90%) and Indonesia (87%). The countries with the lowest piracy rates were the United States (21%), New Zealand (23%), Austria (25%), Sweden (26%), and United Kingdom (27%).

May 6, 2005

In a major blow to the MPAA, a federal appeals court has thrown out FCC rules that required digital television equipment to enforce copy protection through the use of what is known as the "broadcast flag". The court said that those FCC regulations exceed the agency's authority because television receivers do not broadcast signals. Therefore, the only way to get the FCC to enforce such a regulation is to have a law passed specifically allowing such authority.

April 12, 2005

European data broker Reed Elsevier, operator of the LexisNexis system, today announced that 59 security breaches of its databases may have resulted in the theft of personal information on 310,000 U.S. citizens. This data included names, addresses, social security numbers, driver's license numbers, and other information easily used for identity theft and other kinds of fraud. Reed Elsevier has now begun sending notifications to those affected by the theft of their personal information from LexisNexis.

April 9, 2005

The U.S. ban on Internet gambling was dealt a blow this week, as the World Trade Organization ruled that certain aspects of the ban violated international trade agreements. The case was brought before the WTO by island nation of Antigua and Barbuda. The ruling forces the U.S. to make some changes to laws against Internet gambling in order to comply with the WTO decision.

April 9, 2005

One of the nation's biggest spammers has been sentenced to 9 years in prison. According to court records, his spamming operation was grossing about $750,000 per month by sending out at least 10 million e-mails a day. However, because the spammer was convicted under a new law, the judge delayed the start of the prison term while the case is appealed.

April 8, 2005

Manufacturers of digital video recorder (DVR) devices and software applications are now the targets of patent claims by Forgent Networks. The outcome may determine which features can continue to be available in your favorite DVR products.

April 7, 2005

The State of Florida is debating legislation that would regulate online dating sites by forcing them to disclose information about what kind of member screening measures are in force at each particular dating site. Other states looking into similar laws include California, Ohio, Virginia, Michigan and Texas.

April 3, 2005

TechNet Magazine has published a good article outlining the measures that need to be taken in response to a computer security breach. See how each of the steps including post-mortem, response, notification, security remediation, and follow-up need to be conducted in a calm and effective manner.

April 1, 2005

OFB sat down to talk with Richard M. Stallman, founder of the Free Software Foundation and author of the GPL open source license. Topics discussed included Linux, GPL, intellectual property, the Free BIOS project, and more.

March 28, 2005

On Tuesday, the highest court in the land will begin hearing arguments in the case of MGM Studios v. Grokster. This important case pits all the major movie studios and record labels against Grokster and StreamCast Networks, two operators of P2P file-sharing services. The court decision will certainly affect how people use entertainment content and share information on the Internet.

March 27, 2005

Mark Cuban, the dot-com billionaire who founded and sold Broadcast.com, has said that he will pay for Grokster's legal defense in the peer-to-peer lawsuit brought by MGM. This very important case will be argued in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday.

March 23, 2005

Neowin.net has posted an interview with the head developer of PyMusique, a program that lets user's buy songs from Apple's iTunes Music Store completely free of digital rights management (DRM).

March 20, 2005

Regulations like Sarbanes-Oxley, HIPAA, Gramm-Leach-Bliley, and Basel II are driving IT departments in corporate America crazy. InfoWorld and Silicon.com take a look at the software and tools that are helping IT keep up with the compliance madness.

March 19, 2005

According to federal and state law enforcement, criminals have begun using the unsecured Wi-Fi networks of unsuspecting consumers and businesses to cover their tracks. Incidents involving fraud, threats, and identity theft have already been traced to unsecured Wi-Fi hotspots. More than 10 million homes in the U.S. have Wi-Fi and a large percentage of those networks are unsecured.

March 19, 2005

A new free software program called PyMusique allows users to buy music from the iTunes Music Store without having DRM (digital rights management) attached to the files. We are sure that this does not make Apple and the RIAA too happy.

March 15, 2005

BitTorrent, more than any other P2P technology is being adopted by legitimate companies as a way to vastly improve the large file distribution process.

March 12, 2005

The Federal Trade Commission has gone after an anti-spyware software company that it claims is defrauding customers through fake spyware scans and ineffective software.

March 9, 2005

According to news sources, hackers have stolen personal information on 32,000 Americans from the Seisint subsidiary of Reed-Elsevier, a European data collection company. The stolen data includes names, addresses, Social Security and driver's license numbers.

March 8, 2005

A new Ohio law, effective May 2nd, requires residents to obtain a license and post a $50,000 bond in order to sell on eBay as part of a business. While occasional sellers are probably immune, it is unclear as to how much eBay activity is required before sellers need to comply.