It what is believed to be the first successful suit to seek damages against a spammer for sending junk mail, a British man has won monetary compensation for his troubles. The suits are allowed under new European laws that allow junk e-mailers to be sued for sending unwanted e-mails.

Nigel Roberts of the Channel Islands, a group of British-controlled isles off the north coast of France, sued Media Logistics UK, which is based in Stirlingshire, England. The company has agreed to pay Roberts 270 pounds (USD $465) to settle the case.

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A 21 year-old Oregon man has pled guilty to charges that he was behind attacks targeted at eBay and other online sites in 2003. Anthony Clark infected 20,000 computers with a worm and then used them to launch denial of service attacks. Clark could face up to ten years in prison with three years probation, along with fines of up to $250,000 when he is sentenced.

The worm allowed Clark and several accomplices to control infected machines from an IRC channel, where the group could send commands. Over a two-month period in July and August of 2003, Clark's group launched attacks on several Web sites. Denial of service attacks, while not aimed directly at shutting down a Web server, attempt to prevent legitimate users from accessing sites by clogging up available bandwidth. A sentencing hearing is scheduled for April 3.

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Think you can guess the date Windows Vista will officially debut next year? If so, you can win an all-expenses-paid trip to the launch event, or one of nine Xbox 360 consoles. The contest is being held as part of Microsoft Europe's new Beta Experience program, which is designed to keep users up to date with Vista and Office 12 news.

"As a member of the Beta Experience, you are one of the first to be informed of the new product features, long before the final version is released to the market," Microsoft says. Those 18 years of age and residing in Belgium, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Norway, Pakistan, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom may enter.

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Google has been selected as the default search for Opera Mobile and Opera Mini, the browser's developer said Thursday. The search giant and Opera Software have entered into a one-year agreement, which would make Google a "major part of the browsers home screen," Opera said in a statement.

The Norwegian company has so far failed to create significant buzz surrounding its now-free Opera Web Browser, although it has kept a consistent and loyal following. Recent browser share surveys place Opera around a half-percent, far behind market leaders Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. But Opera has been making inroads in the mobile space, establishing itself as the de-facto browser on cell phones and portable devices.

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For the second year, MSN Video will provide exclusive non-stop streaming coverage of the New Year's Eve festivities in New York City, Microsoft announced Thursday. The coverage will last for six hours, and include views of performances and celebrations around New York City.

The broadcast will have three live hosts, including Romeo, host of "Romeo on the Radio" on New York's Z100 who also hosted last year's broadcast; Angela LaGreca of "The View"; and Brandi Williams, entertainment reporter and host of "Ultimate Poker Challenge."

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Lawyers in a class action lawsuit filed against Sony BMG, First 4 Internet and SunnComm last month have submitted a preliminary settlement, which calls for Sony to stop manufacturing CDs with XCP and MediaMax DRM, provide replacement discs, and make cash payments to affected customers.

Lawsuits were filed on November 14 in New York and other states by Girard Gibs and Kamber & Associates, and class action status was granted December 1. The cases claimed that Sony's digital rights management, which attempts to stop computer users from copying a CD's audio tracks to a hard drive, is invasive and damaging to computer systems.

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For the folks at Google, 2005 will be remembered as the year which it transformed itself from a tech darling into an Internet powerhouse. Its moves were watched closely by the media and customers began to develop distrust in the search company. But will Google become the next Microsoft?

The year started out rocky for Google as researchers discovered a flaw in its popular Gmail service that could expose user data to attackers, including passwords. The search giant quickly responded, however, and the problem was fixed within days.

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Nissan and Microsoft have teamed up to create a concept car that includes a built-in Xbox 360 gaming console. While parked, the driver can play Project Gotham Racing using the car's actual steering wheel, gas and brake pedals. The game is displayed on a flip-down 7-inch LCD screen.

The car, named URGE, will be shown off at the Detroit auto show on January 9 as the first vehicle to fully integrate a gaming system. "A Nissan URGE driver can, for example, maneuver through the streets of New York, park the car and fire up the Xbox 360, then virtually race through the same streets," Microsoft said in the announcement.

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XM announced plans to broadcast two of its channels in high-definition surround sound in 2006, and extend the feature to select shows and live performances from the XM studios during the year. The technology that made the new feature possible comes from work done by digital sound processing company Neural Audio Corporation.

Beginning in March, XM's free form music channel Fine Tuning and classical pops channel XM Pops will broadcast in "XM HD Surround" 24 hours a day. Six discrete audio channels will be provided in the signal.

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Covad and Verizon settled their differences on Wednesday, with Covad announcing it would drop an antitrust suit against the company. The company also said it had reached a deal with MCI to become a preferred provider for MCI's DSL service. Verizon has also agreed to drop a countersuit against Covad.

The deal will expand Covad's line-sharing agreement with Verizon, which would allow the company to offer DSL over Verizon lines. In order to provide DSL service across the country, Covad has made similar deals with other telecommunications companies. Financial terms of the settlement were not disclosed.

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Microsoft is preparing to beta test the first service pack for Microsoft Update, the Redmond company's new all-in-one Web site for downloading updates to many of its products, including Windows and Office. The beta program will begin early next year, but little is known about what changes SP1 will bring.

"To recap, the Microsoft Update (MU) Beta Program ended earlier this year and the MU and Windows Update v6 (WU) sites are operational. Our heartfelt thanks to all of you who participated. Your feedback on troubleshooting, site usability and general fit and finish (to name a few) helped to deliver WU/MU on time and at high quality," beta coordinator Eric Brodish wrote in an e-mail to testers.

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A new exploit has been discovered in the wild that affects fully patched Windows XP SP2 systems, according to reports by security firms F-Secure and Sunbelt. The malicious code takes advantage of a vulnerability in the WMF graphics rendering engine to automatically download and install malware.

WMF, or Windows Metafile, is a vector based image format used by Microsoft's operating systems. SHIMGVW.DLL is loaded to render the images and contains a flaw that opens the door for a malformed WMF image to cause remote code execution and potentially allow for a full system compromise.

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The EU has launched the first of several dozen satellites aimed at providing navigational services to Europe, and an answer to the U.S.-controlled GPS system. The first satellite, "Giove A," launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan Wednesday.

Eventually, the Galileo system will be comprised of about 30 satellites, costing about 3.4 billion euros. Several non-EU nations have joined the project, including China, India, Israel, Morocco, Saudi Arabia and Ukraine, and discussions are underway with others.

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It will cost the U.S. Government $936 million to move the wireless communications of twelve government agencies to other frequencies in order to allow the FCC to auction them off to companies. The auctions are expected to take place as early as June of next year.

Revenue from the spectrum could bring in twice the moving costs, Reuters reported. In February, an auction of wireless spectrum raised nearly $2.3 billion.

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Its Phantom game console may remain vaporware, but Infinium Labs is promising to launch at least one component in the second quarter of 2006: the Lapboard. A wireless keyboard and mouse designed specifically for gamers, the Phantom Lapboard can rotate 360 degrees, and sports full size keys and an extended spacebar.

Infinium claims the Lapboard will be a stepping stone to the launch of its full Phantom game service "further down the line." The company raised $2 million to develop and launch the Lapboard, which is positioned for both consumer and OEM segments. Final pricing for the product has not yet been set.

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