Ed Oswald

A near-unanimous vote in the U.S. House of Representatives may soon make social networking sites and chat rooms inaccessible in public locations such as libraries and schools, however its broad wording may end up shuttering access to many sites that do not pose a threat to minors.

Called the Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA), the bill's supporters regularly mention MySpace in defense of it. Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick, a Republican from suburban Philadelphia and chief sponsor of the legislation, said the bill would give parents more control over what their kids are doing on the Internet when away from home.

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At its annual financial analysts meeting, Microsoft would not commit to shipping Vista in the January 2007 timeframe it had announced in March. The uncertainty caused the Redmond company's already lagging stock price to drop another two percent Thursday, although it had recouped some of those losses Friday.

Platforms & Services co-president Kevin Johnston, while saying there was nothing to prevent Vista from shipping in January, responded to questions of possible future delays by saying Microsoft was taking it "milestone by milestone." Seemingly echoing earlier comments by Bill Gates, Johnston told attendees "we will ship Windows Vista when it's ready."

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Google announced plans Thursday at the O'Reilly Open Source Convention in Portland, Ore. to provide hosting for open source projects. While the effort may seem to compete with offerings such as SourceForge.net, the search giant says its intentions are not to replace those services.

The project hosting service would be available through Google Code, the company's repository for various APIs and developer tools that can be used to add Google services to applications.

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Mozilla said Thursday that it had released Firefox 1.5.0.5, which includes several security fixes and stability improvements over previous versions. It is also expected to be the last version of Firefox before developers turn their attention to Firefox 2.0, due out September 26 according to the latest roadmap.

"Firefox 1.5.0.5 is a security update that is part of our ongoing program to provide a safe Internet experience for our customers," Mozilla said in its release notes for the new version. "We recommend that all users upgrade to this latest version." Users of Firefox 1.0 are also strongly urged to upgrade due to the security enhancements provided.

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Nokia said Thursday that it had begun a two-month trial of UMA technology in the city of Oulu in west central Finland. The company has recruited 50 families who will test out the technology using the Nokia 6136, a Wi-Fi-equipped phone. The device is one of the first by the company to support UMA.

UMA, short for unlicensed mobile access, allows the user to seamlessly hand off calls between Internet and GSM networks. When in range of a Wi-Fi or Bluetooth hotspot, calls would be placed over the Internet using VoIP. When the user moves out of range, the call hands off to the local GSM, GPRS or UMTS network.

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The European Commission said Thursday it was looking into the licensing procedures of next-generation DVD formats HD DVD and Blu-ray. While not accusing either side of any wrongdoing at this juncture, the regulatory agency wants to make sure no competition laws are being violated as a result.

A spokesperson for the EC confirmed that an inquiry was underway, but refused to provide further information. Additionally, it declined to say whether the letters of inquiry were sent to just the consortiums or the individual hardware manufacturers themselves.

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Time Warner is widely expected to announce in a news conference next Wednesday that it will drop charges for its AOL online service, a plan first disclosed in the Wall Street Journal early this month. While AOL would still charge for dial-up access, it will be free for those with broadband.

The move is expected to be a topic of discussion at a Time Warner board meeting Thursday in New York City. AOL has lost 30 percent of its user base in the last four years, and executives are hoping that a free service would lure lost users back and provide a boost in advertising revenue.

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Sharman Networks, owner of the Kazaa P2P program, said Thursday that it had reached a settlement with the record industry that would immediately drop all pending litigation against the company. Sharman will also pay the industry more than $100 million and immediately go legal as a result of the agreement.

Filtering technologies will be introduced on the P2P service that will make it impossible to share illicit files. Kazaa's P2P technology would now only be used to trade legal files, the two sides said. Record industry advocates hailed the agreement, while Sharman said the distribution deal was a long standing goal of the company.

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TiVo said Thursday that it had reached an agreement with BellSouth that would allow it to offer its Series2 digital video recorder to select DSL customers of the company. Starting this week, existing high-speed Internet customers would receive a discount on a TiVo DVR and service.

Special incentives would be offered to those who subscribe to both services; however, the companies did not specify what those would entail. Additionally, BellSouth and TiVo would leverage each other's marketing efforts across the southeastern U.S., where BellSouth offers its services.

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The $1.1 billion antitrust settlement between California businesses and consumers and Microsoft will now go forward, after a single class action member who held up final approval by objecting to certain terms within the settlement failed to file an appeal. The agreement was initially approved in July 2004.

The claimant's appeals were rejected by both the California Court of Appeals and the California Supreme Court, and he failed to file a complaint with the U.S. Supreme Court by the allotted deadline. With the legal objections out of the way, disbursement will begin in August.

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Security firm McAfee warned of a new trojan that installs itself as a Firefox extension on Tuesday, saying it had found Web sites linking to a virus known as FormSpy. Once loaded on the infected computer, the trojan begins sending personal information entered in the Web browser to a malicious site.

"This information can include, but is not limited to, credit numbers, passwords, e-banking pin numbers" and other sensitive information, McAfee warned. The firm said the application is also capable of sniffing passwords from ICQ, FTP, IMAP and POP3 traffic.

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Microsoft announced distribution plans for Internet Explorer 7 on Wednesday, saying it would make the next-generation browser available as a high-priority download via the Automatic Updates feature. However, the company would make available an option to 'opt out' of the update, including an application for enterprise users to block the update across their entire network.

When the new browser is released, those who have Automatic Updates will be greeted with a screen giving them an option to either install, ask later, or opt out of installing IE7 altogether. This would ensure customers are prepared to upgrade, Director of Internet Explorer Product Management Gary Schare told BetaNews.

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Microsoft is attempting to quash a shareholder movement to have it explain its net neutrality position, asking the Securities and Exchange Commission if it could legally remove the proposal from its proxy vote sheets without facing any kind of penalty. The company is arguing that the issue is part of its day to day business and can be excluded under securities laws.

The motion was brought forth by The Free Enterprise Action Fund. The fund claims that net neutrality is needless new government regulation, and said Microsoft owes its shareholders an explanation. The group says the company's focus should be on innovation rather than regulation.

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TiVo said Wednesday that it had created a new division within the company that would be tasked with providing advertisers with data on its DVR user's commercial-watching habits. The first clients of the service include Nissan and OMD NEXT, a group of 14 Omnicom Media Group clients interested in data on how news media platforms affect commercial viewing.

The data would provide advertisers with an idea of what commercials are most effective in TiVo households. Although many use the device to fast forward through breaks, in some cases users may be playing certain commercials. The data would help advertisers determine which commercials are the most effective.

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Security companies warned of two new exploits released for separate vulnerabilities that were patched by Microsoft earlier this month. Both the French Security Incident Response Team and Symantec warned of the issues in separate advisories on Monday.

The first deals with an issue in Windows DHCP client, with successful use of the exploit resulting in a potential system takeover risk. The second takes advantage of a hole in a Windows component known as "mailslot," however the exploit code may take advantage of a new variant, requiring Microsoft to update the patch.

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