Caron Carlson

Gearing up for next years midterm elections and looming federal compliance deadlines, state election officials are racing to test electronic ballot machines and implement safeguards against problems that have cast clouds over recent vote counts. Diebold Inc., the countrys largest provider of electronic voting equipment, came under particular scrutiny in California and North Carolina, where […]

The same week that a North Carolina judge refused to shield Diebold Inc. from criminal liability if it fails to comply with a new electronic voting system requirement, the states elections board certified Diebold to continue selling its machines in the state. The North Carolina State Board of Elections on Thursday also certified Election Systems […]

The American Civil Liberties Union today joined an expanding group of organizations filing lawsuits against a new rule that increases the FBIs power to conduct surveillance on the Internet. The rule being challenged is one the Federal Communications Commission adopted in September, granting an FBI request to expand wiretapping authority to online communications. The commission […]

Internet users can be spared up to 95 percent of the spam sent their way if their ISPs use anti-spam filters, according to a report released today by the Federal Trade Commission. In a five-week study, the FTC created 150 covert e-mail addresses and assigned 100 of them to two ISPs that use spam filters […]

Forging further into telecom territory, Microsoft Corp. this week will launch a new version of its Solution for Hosted Messaging and Collaboration to give small and midsize businesses a way to get enterprise-class e-mail service, mobile device data access and other functions without having to invest in infrastructure. Version 3.5 of the hosted messaging software […]

To hasten the telephone industrys migration to IP infrastructure, IBM is heralding a new line of Internet Protocol Multimedia Subsystems-based offerings. The IMS products and services aim to speed the migration from legacy telephone facilities to converged infrastructure by using open standards to integrate components from the two environments, according to company officials in Armonk, […]

Before leaving for the Thanksgiving holiday, Senate panels approved bills on two data privacy issues that were debated all year—data breach notification and anti-spyware regulation—teeing them up for action next year. Data breaches have been foremost on the mind of this Congress following the high-profile disclosures from ChoicePoint Inc. and LexisNexis early in the year. […]

Starting next year, adware and software providers that want to continue placing ads on such prominent Web sites as AOL and Yahoo will have to obtain the consent of users before their applications are downloaded. Under the Trusted Download Program, TRUSTe will create a list of certified downloadable applications. The program is sponsored by TRUSTe, […]

The course that congressional leaders followed last week to extend controversial domestic spying powers of the USA Patriot Act was never animated on “Schoolhouse Rock” or taught in high school civics classes. A considerable stretch of the Patriot Act IIs path to law lay behind closed doors among a small group of lawmakers accompanied by […]

Before leaving for the Thanksgiving holiday, Senate panels approved bills on two data privacy issues that were debated all year—data breach notification and anti-spyware regulation—teeing them up for action next year. Data breaches have been foremost on the mind of this Congress following the high-profile disclosures earlier this year from ChoicePoint Inc. and LexisNexis, a […]

To hasten the telephone industrys migration to IP infrastructure, IBM today is heralding a new line of IMS-based offerings. The Internet Protocol Multimedia Subsystems products and services aim to speed the migration from legacy telephone facilities to converged infrastructure by using open standards to integrate components from the two environments, according to officials at the […]

The governments stance on VOIP is creating uncertainty for many network providers heading into 2006. Protesting that new federal wiretapping rules will stifle innovation and require the re-engineering of private IP networks at a huge expense, universities, ISPs, libraries and privacy organizations, along with Sun Microsystems Inc., are going to court to overturn the rules. […]