Latest Technology News

In anticipation of the coming annual Black Friday spending surge, analysts have come out of the woodwork to voice their predictions. This afternoon, we took some time to parse some of them.

ComScore has predicted that this holiday season will have the exact same average online holiday spending as last year: $29.2 billion dollars. Though it is the same amount for this period as last year, it marks a decrease when compared to the whole year. Last year, consumer spending from January to October was $93.6 billion, and this year it has been $102.1 billion, a 9% increase overall.

A Google spokesperson confirmed to BetaNews today that the company's new voice search for iPhone violates the terms of Apple's SDK. But questions still linger around why the updated Google Mobile app still appears on Apple's App Store.

Apple's App Store might have rejected some smaller developers' applications for less, but Google confirmed to BetaNews late Wednesday that its newly updated Google Mobile app uses undocumented APIs in conducting voice searches.

A simple effort by an open source developer to make his iPod's data legible by a Linux-based program, could balloon into a test of copyright so important that the fate of global trade agreements could hang in the balance.

In the fall of 2007, as a way of protecting the link between its iPods and iPhones and the iTunes music store databases (iTunesDB) stored on those devices, Apple began employing a hashing algorithm. The result was that transactions between a device and the music store were masked, with a side benefit being that iPods could only conduct transactions through iTunes using only Apple's software -- which is a big problem for computer users with Linux.

To the joy of many computer manufacturers, the Department of Homeland Security has done some significant reworking of the "10+2" security regulations for imports, including computer components.

An interim Final Rule version of the Importer Security Filing and Additional Carrier Requirements clauses of the SAFE (Security and Accountability for Every Port) Act of 2006 was entered into the Federal Register on Thursday. Those clauses would go into effect 60 days later -- sort of -- assuming no further comments are received and deemed worthy of action.

After last month's launch of a set of cloud development tools, IBM this week rolled out new global "cloud validation" and consulting services for its cloud computing program, two new customers, and a cloud computing platform for China.

IBM this week bolstered its emerging cloud computing program with new business-oriented consulting services for enterprises, a validation program for third-party cloud providers, new cloud customers and partners, and Project Yun, a cloud computing platform for China.

Despite TiVo's recent SEC filing that showed it would be laying off employees to cut expenses during the economic downturn, TiVo posted another "best quarter ever," bringing it closer to its first profitable year ever.

The positive closure of the third quarter was almost entirely thanks to the $105 million patent settlement from EchoStar, which came after a long legal battle over the time-shifting technologies used in both companies' DVR products. According to TiVo's President and CEO, Tom Rogers, there could be yet more money coming from that suit soon enough.

The Google Maps interface has been redesigned, putting ever greater emphasis on the Street View tool.

The new Google Maps control bar on the left hand side of the window has been redesigned to look more like that of Google Earth, with a "peg man" key that switches between traditional map view and the new full-screen street view.

Serious issues evidently remain with recent builds of the latest edition of Firefox, leading developers to propose a new Beta 3 cycle, but with the aim of not delaying the new browser's final release.

With quality assurance tests now under way for Beta 2 of Mozilla's open source, cross-platform Web browser, the general public may see the latest fruits of developers' labor the second week of December, according to the findings of an organizational meeting yesterday. That's a few weeks later than originally anticipated, though delays of that short a period are not unprecedented.

The UK's Advertising Standards Authority determined today that an Apple TV ad's claims about its iPhone 3G's relative download speeds is misleading and exaggerative, and must be pulled.

The ASA received 17 complaints from television viewers who believed Apple's "So what's so great about 3G?" ad for the company's latest iPhone inaccurately portrayed the speed of the iPhone 3G. In the ad, Web pages are loaded in a fraction of a second with a voice-over stating (four times) that news, directions, and the Internet are each "really fast."

EBay's PayPal service wants users to take security more seriously. To that end, it's combining an old security concept with a device most of us don't associate with security at all. Has PayPal chosen wisely?

The newly recruited security device is the humble mobile phone -- assuming it has SMS service. The old concept is a one-time credential, re-generated every few seconds or minutes and valid for just one use, used in conjunction with one's "other," more permanent password and one's username. The combination of something you know and something you have -- since you "have" the second number, though it'll only be useful for a moment -- is in turn a form of two-factor (or "strong") authentication.

Rumors of 10,000 upcoming job layoffs at Google are false, according to an informed source. Although Google does plan to significantly reduce its contracting expenses, some contractors may be converted into full-time employees.

Reports this week of 10,000 impending layoffs at Google were refuted Tuesday. But Google does intend to trim costs by cutting its contracting budget, a source familiar with the situation told BetaNews Tuesday evening.

Long, thin and late to the holiday parties: Amazon's plan for the Kindle 2 is apparently to emulate a fashion model and hope for the best.

According to Amazon's site, there are no Kindles to be had for the holidays -- sorry, gift-givers. (And please stop asking why there's an ad running on the front page of the Amazon.com site for a product no one can buy.)

The launch two weeks ago of a new server park in the US gives graphical mobile browser users the promise of faster performance. Since that time, the makers of Opera have been finalizing their 4.2 edition for various smartphones.

Today, Opera's Web page officially recommends using version 4.0 with the BlackBerry 8830 we're using as a test system (still with BlackBerry OS v4.2, since v4.5 won't be ready until Q1), although we'd already been using version 4.1. Seeing that we could download the final edition 4.2 anyway, we gave it a shot.

Now that courts have awarded hundreds of millions of dollars in damages to both Facebook and MySpace, will more civil lawsuits start smacking spammers directly in their wallets?

In a ruling that looks likely to further the use of the federal CAN-SPAM Act in civil lawsuits, MySpace has been awarded $873 million in damages from a Canadian spammer accused of sending sexually explicit messages to members.

Monday night's earnings call with HP wasn't so bad compared to the mess that much of 2008 has proven to be, though even a no-worries report wasn't enough to cheer up the market Tuesday.

Fourth-quarter results for HP were not only within guidance but pretty decent, showing Q4 revenue of $33.6 billion representing 19% year-over-year growth.