Grant Gross

A group of chief technology officers (CTOs) from major software vendors on Thursday called on U.S. President George Bush's administration to convene a national commission to address cybercrime and identification theft. The 15 CTOs, whose companies are members of the Business Software Alliance (BSA) trade group, met with congressional and White House leaders to discuss issues that concern them, including cybercrime, patent reform and more federal funding for research.

A U.S. district court judge on Wednesday praised Microsoft Corp. for efforts to improve technical documentation for its communications protocols, but questioned the effect in the marketplace of her final judgment in the U.S. government's antitrust case against the software giant. Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, said she saw progress in Microsoft's compliance with her November 2002 antitrust judgment, but she also asked lawyers at a compliance status hearing "what, if any, effect" the judgment has had on the software market. There's "no demonstrable change" in Microsoft's dominance of the operating system market, answered Renata Hesse, an antitrust lawyer at the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ). The open-source Firefox browser has cut into Microsoft Internet Explorer's market share, but it's difficult to tell how much of an impact the judgment has had, Hesse added.

Opening arguments in the securities fraud trial of former WorldCom Inc. chief executive Bernard Ebbers are scheduled to begin at about 2 p.m. EST Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. Ebbers, who resigned in April 2002 amid a federal probe into WorldCom's accounting practices, faces nine charges: one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud, one count of securities fraud and seven counts of false filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

A cybersecurity advocacy group on Tuesday called on U.S. President George Bush to focus more resources on computer issues and elevate the top IT security position at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to the assistant secretary level.

Participants at a U.S. government summit seemed divided about the potential of e-mail authentication that would establish DNS rules to allow e-mail recipients to receive e-mail only from trusted senders.

E-voting backers called the number of reported problems minor in the context of almost 50 million U.S. voters projected to use e-voting machines on Tuesday.

An estimated 30 per cent of the U.S. voting population in 27 states and the District of Columbia will use electronic voting machines in the election.

Procter & Gamble Co., for one, say it's using the small, antenna-equipped computer chips that can be integrated into paper or plastic labels to better track inventory and even gauge customer reaction to various products.