Compromised Accounts - Are Hotmail, Yahoo and Gmail Seeing an Increase in Spam Sent Out?

Last week, I commented on the the Gmail/Hotmail/Yahoo username and password leak. The question we now ask is whether or not we are seeing an increased amount of spam from those services. On another blog, they were commenting that various experts were claiming that this is the case. more

How Open Cloud Could Have Saved Sidekick Users’ Skins

The cloud computing scandal of the week is looking like being the catastrophic loss of millions of Sidekick users' data. This is an unfortunate and completely avoidable event that Microsoft's Danger subsidiary and T-Mobile (along with the rest of the cloud computing community) will surely very soon come to regret. There's plenty of theories as to what went wrong -- the most credible being that a SAN upgrade was botched, possibly by a large outsourcing contractor, and that no backups were taken... more

Does Eolas Patent Infringement Case Against Microsoft, Apple and Others Have Web Implications?

Eolas, a technology company that was awarded $565 million in a patent infringement settlement against Microsoft in 2007 is embarking on another campaign against others under the same grounds of patent violation. The latest lawsuit alleges that Apple and 22 companies are in violation of U.S. Patent Nos. 5,838,906 and 7,599,985, which involve embedded Web applications within a browser. The list of infringers also include Google/Youtube, Yahoo, Adobe, Amazon, Blockbuster, Citigroup, eBay, Frito-Lay, Go Daddy, J.C. Penney, JPMorgan Chase, Office Depot, Perot Systems, Staples, Sun Microsystems, Texas Instruments even adult-oriented Playboy. more

Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail Compromised - But How?

One of the bigger news stories is that of 10,000 usernames and passwords of Hotmail users were posted this past week, victims of a phishing scam... It seems unlikely to me that this would be a hack where someone would break into Hotmail's servers and access the account information that way. It is much more likely that the spammers got the information by social engineering. Why is this more likely? For one, they'd have to get past all of the firewalls and security measures that Microsoft/Hotmail have to keep intruders out. more

ICANN’s Positive Affirmation: Good News for Africa and Emerging Markets

Sometimes you get what you are asking for. And this seems to be one of those occasions... and the US government can give itself a pat on the back for having listened to other stakeholder opinions. For years the world of Internet governance has been seen as its own special corner of the technosphere, full of arcane acronyms and quiet power deals. Despite efforts to make ICANN and the broader Internet community more transparent and user-friendly, many observers, including many African governments, still saw the stage as too much of an insider's game -- with the ultimate insider being the US Department of Commerce. more

Meeting with ITU Secretary General Dr Hamadoun Touré

During the ITU Conference I had the honour of a private meeting with Dr Hamadoun Touré, Secretary-General of the ITU since 2006... Dr Touré has a fascinating background. Born in Mali and educated in Russia, he has brought with him a distinctly fresh approach to the ITU. He has been Africa's Regional General Manager for ICO Global Communications and worked at various levels at the International Telecommunications Satellite Organization (INTELSAT). more

Is America Getting More Like China?

Since Obama became President -- and yes, I voted for him -- there has been a great deal of optimism and energy around the idea that the Internet can be used to improve or "reboot" our democracy. The Administration has hired some great people to work on making government more open and transparent. This is all great. But how much good will all of this nifty e-government do for American democracy if citizens' rights to privacy and free expression are not also fiercely defended? more

Securing a Domain: SSL vs. DNSSEC

There has been quite a bit of talk lately about the best way to secure a domain, mainly centered in two camps: using Secure Socket Layer (SSL), or using DNS Security Extensions (DNSSEC). The answer is quite simple -- you should use both. The reason for this is that they solve different problems, using different methods, and operate over different data. more

Post Delegation Dispute: A Once Supportable Concept Proposed by the IRT is Now Unsupportable

This comment is being presented in my personal capacity and does not represent the views of my employer (Neustar, Inc.) and its subsidiaries or affiliates, or the Implementation Recommendations Team. Ok. I admit it. I supported the concept of a post delegation dispute resolution process for generic Top-Level Domains (gTLD) Registries. I served as the only gTLD registry member of the Implementation Recommendation Team (IRT) appointed by the Intellectual Property Constituency of the Generic Names Supporting Organization of ICANN. I was one of the authors of the IRT Recommendation in favor of a Post Delegation Dispute Resolution Procedure. more

State of Broadband Infrastructure: Lagging or Leading?

I have found a disturbing lack of context in respect of some reports examining the state of Canada's telecommunications industry, especially those that have cited various OECD studies released over the past few months. It has become increasingly clear that the OECD's analysis is flawed. The failure by so many to analyse the data appears to confirm what President Barack Obama said recently in a newspaper interview... more