Roy Mark

Nearly one out of every 63 smartphones running the Symbian operating system is infected with some form of spyware, virus, worm or Trojan, as well as hundreds of unlicensed software programs installed on the handsets, according to a study conducted by SMobile Systems. A comparison of the statistics with the worldwide smartphone population places the […]

The Obama administration is considering reversing a nine-year ban on the use of tracking cookies on federal Websites. In a July 27 Federal Register notice, the White House Office of Management and Budget said the administration is considering a three-tiered approach to the use of tracking cookies.“The goal of this review is for the federal […]

The consolidation pace in the prepaid wireless market stepped up July 28 with Sprint Nextel announcing a $483 million deal to acquire Virgin Mobile USA. Under the terms of the agreement, Virgin Mobile USA stockholders will receive shares of Sprint common stock based on a 10-day average closing price equivalent to $5.50 per Virgin Mobile […]

Sending text messages should be banned in moving vehicles for all drivers to avoid an epidemic of traffic crashes, according to a study conducted by the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute. VTTI’s large-scale, naturalistic driving study (PDF) purports to be one of the clearest studies yet of driver distraction and cell phone use under real-world driving […]

The Space Shuttle Endeavour successfully undocked from the International Space Station July 28 and began the trek back to Earth. During the 11-day stay at the ISS, the seven-person Endeavour crew combined with the six-person permanent ISS crew to complete a major build-out at the station over five spacewalks. Endeavour undocked from the ISS at […]

Spacewalkers Chris Cassidy and Tom Marshburn completed their final mission tasks July 27 as the Space Shuttle Endeavour prepares to leave the International Space Station July 28 for a return trip to Earth. Cassidy and Marshburn’s spacewalk was the fifth and final spacewalk of the 16-day mission to work on the build-out of the ISS.“Most […]

Cancer Treatment Centers of America, a national network of hospitals, has upgraded its entire technological infrastructure to HP ProLiant servers. The technology upgrade is expected to increase system performance, uptime and reliability. The hospitals depend on such infrastructure in order to operate electronic health records, specialized clinical programs, CRM and ERP applications. “The growth of […]

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., rolled out legislation July 22 that would establish national standards for data breach notifications to consumers. The bill would also require companies and organizations that maintain personal data to establish internal policies to protect the personal data of Americans.The Personal Data Privacy and Security Act also calls for […]

CEO Randall Stephenson admitted July 23 that AT&T’s partnership with Apple as the exclusive provider of the iPhone will inevitably end and network quality will ultimately be the differentiator for wireless carriers. AT&T’s deal with Apple-originally signed in 2007-is rumored to end next year.AT&T added nearly 7 million subscribers in 2008, many of them seeking […]

Nokia said July 24 it has acquired Cellity, a German social networking software company that specializes in consolidating address management from different sources such as a cell phone address book, Outlook, and Twitter and other social networking services. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.The deal is expected to close in the third quarter.After the […]

Construction on the International Space Station continued July 24 as the Space Shuttle Endeavour crew engaged in a marathon 7.5-hour spacewalk to swap out batteries for the ISS’ oldest set of solar arrays. The batteries store power collected by the solar wings and cost $3.6 million each.The 16-day mission’s fourth of five spacewalks was longer […]

With lawmakers and federal regulators showing an interest in additional wireless industry regulations, Verizon Wireless July 21 proposed new conditions for offering roaming connectivity to small carriers. Under the proposal, Verizon says it is willing to offer two-year roaming deals on its networks to other carriers, including those that hold spectrum licenses but don’t offer […]