Latest Technology News

A common but dangerous vulnerability spotted weeks ago on American Express's site was plugged this week after the hole gained blog and then press attention. But there may have been a faster, better way.

Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities are unfortunately quite common. An XSS hole allows an attacker to scarf up a legitimate customer's login info, in this case as he enters the site. In the case of the AmEx hole, that information could later be used by the attacker to snoop around the customer's personal information, or worse.

As we approach a Consumer Electronics Show taking place in a business climate unlike anything the tech industry's ever known, consider if you will the automotive-electronics wares -- this year practically an index of these strange days in our history.

Automotive electronics are a major part of most CES shows, but you wouldn't necessarily know that from mainstream tech-publication coverage. (You also wouldn't necessarily know that AVN, a major adult-entertainment show, "happens" to overlap with CES, but that's another article.) Still, the car and auto-aftermarket exhibits are a big draw for a lot of geeks who double as gearheads -- so shiny, so loud, so fun, just the way CES is alleged to be if you're not trudging around actually working the show.

To cut costs, Motorola is reducing the salaries of its co-CEOs and freezing the pension plans of all employees, while avoiding job layoffs at the moment.

In response to what Motorola calls "continuing global economic challenges," the company is making changes to employee benefits and executive compensation. Yet the cost reduction measures don't include any job losses right now. Many of Motorola's existing employees will not receive salaries in 2009, also under the plan.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs won't be delivering the keynote at next month's Macworld, a revelation that's sounding off new alarm bells about Jobs' health and Apple's succession plans.

After years of hotly anticipated Macworld speeches, in which Jobs typically announces new Apple products, he will break with tradition by skipping his appearance at the show.

Google Search Suggest, the predictive text dropdown gadget that suggests search terms, will soon provide direct links, information, and sponsored links.

Search Suggest has been a default feature on the Google home page since the end of August. Now, testing has begun on providing more than just a prediction of what the user is searching for based upon the most popular queries. A random selection of US-basedGoogle users have found that their suggested searches offer slightly different results.

Download Mozilla Firefox 3.0.5 for Windows from FileForum now.

Internet Explorer is apparently not the only browser this week that's the subject of preventative measures, as Mozilla revealed this morning that the real reason for issuing Firefox 3.0.5 was to prevent a possible wave of page hijacks.

At CES 2009, Intel reportedly plans to release its second lunchbox-style Classmate PC for kids. Meanwhile, the Classmate's chief architect at Intel has jumped ship for competing NComputing.

More details keep unfolding about the Convertible Classmate PC, Intel's second entry into the same classroom market also targeted by NComputing and the MIT-spawned One Laptop Per Child (OLPC).

Early this morning, Yahoo announced that it will be reducing its data retention period to 90 days, a dramatic drop from its prior 13-month limit on keeping user search data.

Yahoo's Vice President of Policy and Head of Privacy Anne Toth posted on the official Yahoo Blog this morning, "Our content and advertising customization will remain cutting-edge and relevant to your interests -- but the data we use to provide those services will only be kept for as long as we really need it."

Though it remains uncertain if anyone has actually been affected by an Internet Explorer browser flaw that has made national news headlines, Microsoft's tactic today is to treat it as though it's real, and respond the same way.

In a statement to BetaNews early this morning, the author of a Microsoft security vulnerability team blog post yesterday said his team is aware of exploit sites that are trying -- if not yet successful -- to discover the exploit for a problem that the company discovered in response to reports of an active exploit in the field.

Storage company Western Digital today joined the ranks of companies scaling back their workforces, announcing a cost restructuring that will involve a worldwide headcount reduction and closure of manufacturing facilities.

"We expect demand weakness to last well into the middle of the 2009 calendar year," John Coyne, president and CEO of WD said in a prepared statement. The company has seen increasingly competitive pricing from the likes of Hitachi and Seagate coupled with a decreased demand for hard drives overall. The projected revenue ceiling for the December quarter has dropped from $2.15 billion down to $1.8 billion.

The UK's Advertising Standards Authority has asked EA to cease broadcasting its commercial for Tiger Woods PGA Tour '09 for Wii. Although Woods himself "plays" the Wii, the graphics shown were from the Xbox 360.

In the commercial, professional golfer Tiger Woods is shown using the Wiimote to play his signature PGA Tour game, yet the corresponding game actions displayed behind him are from the Xbox 360 version. Though the message "Available on all formats" appears in the commercial, the ASA determined the implication was that a Wii game being played, augmented by the Wii logo at the end of the spot.

The software manufacturer reported record revenue for 4Q 2008 and a sixth consecutive year of double-digit growth, making Tuesday's earnings call much more upbeat than the announcement earlier this month of layoffs.

Adobe registered fourth-quarter revenue of $915.3 million, up $4.1 million from Q4 2007 and up $23.9 million from last quarter. Net revenue was $245.9 million, working out to 46 cents / share. Annual revenues were also record-breaking -- $3.580 billion, for 13% year-over-year growth. That's in line with the company's targets at the start of the year.

A Palm spokesperson today disputed published reports that the company is launching a brand new online software store. Less vigor, however, was devoted to rumors that Palm will introduce its long-planned Linux-based Foleo OS at CES.

Contrary to reports stating that Palm is following the lead of Apple and Google in launching a new applications store, Palm has actually been running an online store for quite some time, a company spokesperson told BetaNews today.

In a completely unexpected announcement today, Apple Inc. stated that next month's appearance at IDG's Macworld Expo will be the company's last, as it scales back its appearances at other presenters' trade shows worldwide.

Monday, January 5, will be Apple CEO Steve Jobs' final address to the Macworld Expo at Moscone Center in San Francisco, the company said in a prepared statement today. The company has released no details as to why, though it's likely that the company will continue to produce its own rollout events, probably at Moscone, at times and dates of its own choosing.

Hasbro on Friday dropped its lawsuit against Rajat and Jayant Agarwalla, creators of the wildly popular Scrabulous game. Now, please stop saying "Scrabulous."

Scrabulous, which the Agarwalla brothers launched as a Scrabble-style game with a superior interface to others they'd seen online, launched in July 2005 and immediately made a major splash among certain Facebook populations, even encouraging some to sign up for the service specifically to play against friends. The trademark-infringement