Cable Company Mistakely Empties Customers' E-Mail Accounts

ST. LOUIS — Charter Communications officials believe a software error during routine maintenance caused the company to delete the contents of 14,000 customer e-mail accounts.
There is no way to retrieve the messages, photos and other attachments that were erased from inboxes and archive folders across the country on Monday, said Anita Lamont, a spokeswoman for the suburban St. Louis-based company.

"We really are sincerely sorry for having had this happen and do apologize to all those folks who were affected by the error," Lamont said Thursday when the company announced the gaffe.

Charter, one of the nation's largest cable TV operators, also provides telephone and high-speed Internet service.

It has applied a $50 credit to the bill of each customer whose account was affected by the mistake, Lamont said.

Charter gives each new Internet user a free e-mail account, but some customers opt to use other accounts instead.So every three months the company deletes inactive accounts, Lamont said.

"During this maintenance we erroneously deleted active accounts along with the others," Lamont said. "It's never happened before. They are taking steps to make sure it never happens again."

Charter provides service in 29 states, and Lamont said the affected customers were scattered around the country.

All told, the company has about 2.6 million high-speed Internet subscribers.
Computer experts advise backing up all important e-mail.

RIM Upgrades Email For BlackBerry Users

By JESSICA E. VASCELLARO

Research In Motion Ltd. Tuesday unveiled features designed to make it easier for users of its BlackBerry device and service to manage their wireless email, hoping to stay ahead of a pack of new competitors trying to chip away at the company's popularity.

With the aim of making mobile emailing more like emailing from a desktop computer, RIM said BlackBerry users will soon be able to edit documents directly from the handheld device and to view messages in their original formatting.

The Waterloo, Ontario, company also said the changes will enable users to retrieve email messages that aren't stored on the device and to check the availability of a colleague before sending a meeting request. The company will also give corporate information-technology departments the ability to wirelessly update the device's software.

RIM says the new features, announced during International Business Machines Corp.'s Lotusphere conference in Orlando, Fla., will be phased into software releases during the first half of the year.

Some of the email features RIM is rolling out are already available through competing mobile-software services, such as Microsoft Corp.'s Windows Mobile. While RIM has withstood competition from rival wireless companies, it faces intensifying competitive challenges. Most significantly, Apple Inc. is trying to drive adoption of its iPhone among business users through advertising. Reinforcing that effort, AT&T Inc., the exclusive U.S. service provider for the iPhone, recently launched a service plan for business users.

In the third quarter of 2007, Apple captured 20% of all U.S. smartphone and cellular PDA shipments, according to research and advisory company Gartner Inc., second to RIM, which held 39%.

David Heit, director of Enterprise Product Management at RIM, says the appeal of the iPhone to business users is unproven. He adds that there is plenty of growth left in the business market as improvements in device memory and faster networks speeds allow the company to introduce features. "This is new territory for everyone," he says. "It is a very dynamic space."

RIM has focused most recently on broadening the appeal of its devices to non-business customers, adding features such as music players and cameras.

As of Dec. 1, 34% of RIM's roughly 12 million subscriber accounts were consumers or small-business users, up from 30% the previous quarter.

MySQL: Sun's Billion-Dollar Baby

Sun put its money where its mouth is Wednesday, with the announcement that it would buy open source database vendor MySQL for a whopping $1 billion.

If the price tag set tongues wagging, however, it was no more tantalizing than the question that immediately sprung to the minds of IT managers everywhere: Now that Sun owns MySQL, what on earth does it plan to do with it?

Sun has toyed with the idea of a database offering of its own for at least two years. But in a market where basic relational database functionality is increasingly considered a commodity, competing successfully is no mean feat, even when playing the open source card.

Certainly, Sun isn't the first to try it. In 2001, leading Linux vendor Red Hat launched its own branded version of the open source PostgreSQL database, only to scrap the project a year later after deciding that servicing and supporting a database was not its core competency. Similarly, Computer Associates opened the source of the Ingres database in hopes of becoming a one-stop shop for customers in need of an enterprise application stack, but had little luck winning market share away from the likes of IBM, Microsoft, and Oracle. CA spun Ingres off into its own company in 2005, where continues to nurture a small installed base.

In his blog announcing the MySQL acquisition Wednesday, Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz remains characteristically effusive. "Until now, no platform vendor has assembled all the core elements of a completely open source operating system for the internet," he wrote. "No company has been able to deliver a comprehensive alternative to the leading proprietary OS."

Yet CA's and Red Hat's experiences seem to discredit the idea that a stem-to-stern platform offering from a single vendor is what customers really want. Not to mention the fact that Sun already offers enterprise support for PostgreSQL, a competing open source database that is widely perceived as being technologically superior to MySQL. Schwartz reaffirmed Sun's commitment to PostgreSQL in a conference call Wednesday, causing some analysts to speculate whether the MySQL acquisition was anything more than a billion-dollar PR stunt.

Good Will Worth the Money?

But there may be method to Sun's madness. The considerable goodwill that MySQL has cultivated among enterprise customers could have benefits for Sun that technology alone never could.

"I think the answer is simple: ubiquity," says Andy Astor, CEO of EnterpriseDB, which markets a high-performance, commercial database product based on PostgreSQL. "[Sun is] a big company; to move their needle, they need to see millions of potential users, which MySQL provides."
According to the company MySQL's own estimates, there are already some 11 million active installations of the MySQL database worldwide. What's more, MySQL is virtually the de facto standard relational database for rapid application development, particularly for the Web. In future, as these fledgling sites mature and their needs broaden, they will become natural customers for Sun's enterprise support offerings.

Sun's new role as steward of MySQL is sure to ruffle feathers in the software industry, as well -- particularly at Oracle, which, with its recent acquisitions, increasingly competes with Sun in the enterprise application platform arena. In 2005, Oracle bought Innobase, makers of a plug-in component that adds advanced features to MySQL, in what was widely perceived as a competitive swipe at the open source upstart.

For his part, MySQL CEO Mårten Mickos has repeatedly denied that his company's aim is to displace high-end databases such as Oracle's. And that's only appropriate; for those customers who demand Oracle's most advanced features, no other product will do. But Mickos's protestations verge on false modesty. On the low end, MySQL is an absolute pandemic, and it's already making headway into the mid-tier territory traditionally owned by the likes of Microsoft. That trend is only likely to accelerate with Sun's backing.

Licensing Issues

What is unclear, however, is whether Sun will take any steps to alter MySQL's license terms. Licensing and project governance have played key roles in MySQL's success, and as a result, MySQL's license policy is somewhat more restrictive than the one that Sun has used for the rest of its software portfolio.

Although all MySQL code is available under the Gnu GPL (General Public License), the product is developed primarily by full-time employees of MySQL. Furthermore, the MySQL company requests that community developers sign over copyright to their code contributions to the company before those changes become part of the main MySQL code base. This allows the MySQL company to offer a separate, commercial version of its database for enterprise customers who don't want to be bound by the terms of the GPL. Initially, this license structure was used mainly to allow companies to embed the MySQL database into their own products, but the MySQL company was criticized last year for making it more difficult for non-paying customers to download the enterprise version of the database.

By comparison, Sun has been freer with its own code, foregoing separate, commercial versions of its products in favor of a subscription-based enterprise support scheme. PostgreSQL is arguably even more free; it is governed in a much more distributed, community-based fashion than MySQL, and its permissive license even allows proprietary derivatives, such as EnterpriseDB.

Name Recognition Factor

Ironically, however, MySQL's stringent intellectual property policy may be precisely what makes it so appealing to Sun. Red Hat Database and Sun's own version of PostgreSQL were merely different retoolings of an existing open source software product, one that customers could just as easily download from elsewhere. To the enterprise IT community at large, however, there's really only one MySQL -- and from now on, that name will be indelibly associated with Sun. Remember, for all Sun's talk about open source, this is a company that banks so heavily on its trademarks that it had its stock ticker symbol changed to JAVA.

Ah, but there's the rub. Sun open-sourced the Java platform in 2006, and while the move has been widely hailed by developers, not everyone in the business community was as thrilled with the idea of Sun giving away its crown jewels. As former Sun vice president Larry Singer put it, "We [at Sun] were spending all of our time and attention ... on things that were important from an intellectual standpoint, important from an innovative standpoint, [but it was] hard to understand how they were going to drive revenue for the company."

So far, MySQL has built a solid business selling open source database software. Whether Sun has the strategic acumen to take that success to the next level, however, remains to be seen. But stay tuned; after all, $1 billion gives Sun a hell of an incentive.

Microsoft Admits Vista Update Glitch

A patch to prepare for first service pack went to users of editions that didn't need the update.

A day after Microsoft Corp. accidentally sent a patch to some users running the Windows Vista operating system, the company updated the preview release of Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1) to a small group of testers, the company confirmed Thursday.

"Microsoft [has] released the latest prerelease build of SP1, Windows Vista SP1 RC Refresh, to approximately 15,000 beta testers," a spokeswoman said in an e-mail. "This group includes corporate customers, consumer enthusiasts, software and hardware vendors, and others. The code is not available for public download."

Four weeks ago, Microsoft made Vista SP1 Release Candidate available to the general public for the first time. The 15,000 testers, however, had earlier beta versions to work with, as well as this most recent update.
The company has slated Vista SP1 for final delivery this quarter, and on Thursday said it remained on track. "We are still on schedule to deliver SP1 RTM in Q1 [calendar year 2008]," said the spokeswoman.

In a separate issue, though, the company Wednesday admitted a snafu in a Windows Vista update it issued Tuesday to prep PCs for the later release of SP1.

The update, which is described in the support document KB935509, was one of three prerequisites for SP1 unveiled Tuesday, and was supposed to end up only on Vista Enterprise and Vista Ultimate machines, since it targeted BitLocker, the full-drive encryption technology bundled with those premium versions of the operating system. Instead, the update was also offered to PCs running Vista Home Basic and Home Premium.

"We had a small number of early customer reports, that in some cases, this update was being offered for installation on all Windows Vista editions versus just Ultimate and Enterprise," said an anonymous poster on the Microsoft company blog devoted to the Windows Update development team. "For systems set to download and install updates automatically, the update will not install even if it has already downloaded, so most people will not be affected by this," the post continued. "Customers who installed the initial release of the update on editions other than Ultimate or Enterprise should not be concerned as the update will have no negative impact on their systems."

Although some users on Microsoft's support forums wondered why they had seen the BitLocker patch when it didn't apply to their machines, no one running Home Basic or Home Premium had reported problems as of midday Thursday.

The remaining pair of prerequisites tweak Vista so that users will be able to roll back to the debut version of the operating system by uninstalling SP1 if they find that necessary.

This week's glitch was the latest in a series of Windows Updates snafus that include the September revelation that, contrary to users' instructions, Windows' update code had updated itself on their PCs, and charges in October that the company's OneCare security suite was also monkeying with users' update settings. Microsoft denied doing anything untoward with OneCare.

Table Touch Screen Terminals To Replace Waiters

High-Tech Interactive, Social Restaurant At Your Fingertips

From ATM's to pumping your own gas, grocery stores to airports, self-service has come a long way. With the world's technological advances taking enormous strides, what can possibly be next in the world of consumer-driven convenience?CBS 2 HD has learned a new trend will be found at your favorite restaurants, allowing customers to place their own orders without the need of servers.

Ever find yourself unable to get the attention of a waiter? It can be frustrating. But soon that may be a problem of the past thanks to new tableside touch screens."It's cooler placing your own order on the computer than having a waitress come up and do it," restaurant customer Amanda Rosengarten told CBS 2 HD.That's because the order goes directly from your fingertips to the kitchen or bar, eliminating the possibility of human error during the transaction process.

The new technology is being used at uWink, the latest offering from the founder of Chuck E. Cheese. The company said the new system is providing faster service, fewer mistakes and fewer interruptions."Whenever you want ... that extra glass of wine or a dessert … bingo, it happens right away," said Nolan Bushnell of uWink."It seems a lot more immediate. If I happen to change my mind or need an additional dish, I can order it right away even if the server is busy doing something else," patron Julie Lightner said.

The National Restaurant Association has labeled self-service technology as one of the industry's top trends to watch, including fast-food restaurants to gourmet."Forty-six percent of all adults in America today indicate a likelihood of using these systems at a restaurant," said Hudson Riehle of the National Restaurant Association.Critics fear the trend will lead to less attentive waiters, but Riehle believes the opposite to be true."Many of these systems actually have controls in them which can summon the wait staff upon demand," Riehle said.Riehle also told CBS 2 HD some customers will always prefer a full service experience.

However, most diners who've used the touch screens are reporting positive feedback, especially, he said, when they're allowed to close their own bills, or play games while they wait."We've had people from all age groups, even seniors, which we didn't expect at all, come back over and over again, having a great time," Bushnell said.Many national fast-food chains are currently testing these self-service kiosks in some of their own restaurants and drive-thrus.

Bill Gates’s Farewell

Microsoft's founder offers up a celeb-studded video but few tech surprises at his last CES.

It's hard to remember a time when it seemed weird for Bill Gates to be speaking at the Consumer Electronics Show. But when he started doing keynotes in the early '90s, Microsoft was known as a software company, not a CES stalwart that made DVD players, TVs and car audio. Gates's taking center stage was then a sign that the PC was broadening its horizons into people's lifestyles, and Microsoft was positioning itself to lead the charge. Now, of course, after 11 appearances—eight on the eve of the show's formal opening—the Bill Gates keynote is a fixture here. Someone was quoted last week as saying that he's like the pope of the industry—which would make his regular Sunday-night presentation the benediction that blesses the orgy of commerce to follow. But this year's appearance marks an ending. Gates is leaving his full-time work at Microsoft this summer, and 2008 will be the last time he kicks off CES.

Not that I expected a weepy departure. Gates is unsentimental about stuff like this. For him a speech is all about the logistics of which Microsoft goodies to include, and the standard hope that the demos won't crash. This year's version was clearly in keeping with his tradition, a heaping helping of high-tech comfort food.

Over the years Gates keynotes have developed a reliable template. The speech is built around some overarching theme, usually some catch phrase that celebrates the wonderful things technology is going to do for us in the near future. In contrast to a Steve Jobs keynote, Gates's intent is not to unleash some unexpected new marvel on the world but to illustrate how Microsoft's direction in general is producing marvels. He does this by bringing on some of his employees to demo relatively new stuff. In recent years he has turned over a part of the talk to Robbie Bach, a Microsoft executive in charge of the parts of Microsoft that are most squarely in the consumer electronics realm (Xbox, Zune, video).

There's also some showmanship, within the bounds of Gates's somewhat stiff public persona. (One on one and in small groups he's much more charismatic.) Toward the beginning there's an elaborately concocted comic video, often a parody of some current cultural phenomenon and typically including some celebrity whose slickness contrasts with Gates's geeky personality. And you can expect a surprise in-person celebrity appearance onstage to close things out. (Guests in past years have included Conan O'Brien and the Rock.)

This year's keynote, held in a giant ballroom at the Venetian hotel, closely followed the pattern. Though Gates needs no introduction, he got one anyway, from Consumer Electronics Association head Gary Shapiro. Then he strolled out wearing a Gatesian outfit: a sweater (in a weird shade of lavender) and dress pants. This year, though, the huge screens behind him didn't display typical PowerPoint slides but showed larger photographic backdrops that made it seem as if he were acting against a blue screen.

This year's big theme was that a "New Digital Decade" was at hand—even though there was no clear thematic demarcation between that and the supposedly just completed first digital decade. The three things that defined this era, he said, were high-definition, connected services, and natural interfaces, such as touch and voice recognition. All of those things, of course, have been in progress for some time (Gates has been raving about voice recognition for at least 20 years). In any case, the conceit gave him a reason to bring out a couple of Microsoft functionaries to perform this year's demos, most of them of previously announced products, such as the Synch technology in Ford cars, multiple calendars on Windows Live, and features on the revamped Zune audio player. The most interesting piece of news was the announcement that NBC had chosen MSN as its partner for Internet video of the 2008 Olympics, with a plan to allow viewers to stream every single event.

Amazingly, all the demos worked, so Gates will get to quit CES while he's ahead.
Gates did explicitly acknowledge that this was the last time he'd be keynoting, and that served to introduce his video, one of the strongest yet. It was a mockumentary of his upcoming last day at Microsoft. The continuing joke was that Gates will have unlimited time to kill. After playing with "Star Wars" figures, bulking up with Matthew McConaughey as a personal trainer and honing his "Guitar Hero" skills, Gates decides to branch out into a new career. This allows for a cavalcade of celebrities trying to gracefully let Gates know that he couldn't cut it in their world. Bono has to tell him that he couldn't replace the Edge in U2. Jay-Z breaks the news to Gates that he isn't a rocker. Spielberg turns him down for the movies. And both Hillary and Obama nix him as a running mate. The audience, many of whom had waited in line as long as four hours for the keynote, loved it.

Next year, no lines. But maybe CES officials can convince him to do another video.

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Intel Unveils 'Menlow' Ultra Mobile Chips

Intel (NSDQ: INTC) on Monday introduced its first notebook processors built using the company's latest 45 nanometer manufacturing process, which delivers more powerful products that use equal or less energy than previous models.

Along with the five mobile chips, Intel unveiled four server processors, and seven desktop products. All the new processors were built using the same manufacturing process, and are lead and halogen free, making them more environmentally friendly.

The latest processors bring the number of 45nm products from Intel to 32, including desktop, laptop, and server processors. Intel said it delivers higher power-to-performance ratios by packing more transistors in a chip by shrinking their size to 45nm. The previous generation chips had 60nm transistors.

Intel unveiled the new products at the International Consumer Electronics show, where chief executive Paul Otellini is scheduled to give a keynote speech Monday night. Otellini is expected to also introduce Intel's hardware and software partners that have agreed to support Intel's upcoming platform, codenamed Menlow, for mobile Internet devices and the smallest of notebooks that trade power for longer battery life.

Intel is scheduled to start production of Menlow, which will include a new low-power 45nm processor packages codenamed Silverthorne, this quarter, Anand Chandrasekher, senior VP and general manager of Intel's ultra-mobility group, told InformationWeek. In addition, Intel is building processors and chipsets for set-top boxes and digital video recorders. The platform, scheduled to ship this year, will use Menlow technology, but will be marketed under other names.

Intel's latest mobile processors are available on the company's dual-core Centrino platform for notebooks, which include the Intel 965 Express chipset. Optional with the platform are a third-party decoder for better performance in playing high-definition content in either HD DVD or Blu-ray format and support for 802.11n wireless networks. The latter is a Wi-Fi standard capable of streaming video.

Standard with the Centrino platform is Intel's latest Deep Power Down Technology that greatly reduces the power consumption of individual cores of a multi-core processor when they're not in use. In addition, the platform uses Intel's new SSE4 instruction set, which leads to faster processing of workloads, such as high-definition video encoding and photo manipulation.
One manufacturer expected to take advantage of Intel's latest chips is Apple, which industry watchers say is likely to introduce a new MacBook or other handheld computer at the Macworld Conference & Expo Jan. 14-18 in San Francisco.

Intel's latest chips for the mainstream desktop will include three Core 2 quad-core processors and four Core 2 dual-core products. The processors will feature a range of clock speeds, and up to 6Mbytes of level two cache. The dual-core products begin shipping this month, and the quad-core processors are expected later in the quarter.

Also shipping later this quarter are the four 45nm Xeon processors for servers and workstations.

Intel started shipping 45nm processors late last year, giving it a jump on rival Advanced Micro Devices. AMD is expected to deliver 45nm products later this quarter. Codenamed Shanghai, AMD (NYSE: AMD)'s quad-core microprocessor is expected to be a server product under the Opteron brand.

Gates To Kick Off CES, And Big Push By Microsoft

Linux, Yahoo, AOL, and other companies and technologies will compete for attention at the annual display of consumer electronics.

By J. Nicholas Hoover

When Bill Gates takes the stage this weekend at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, it will be one of his last big appearances as chairman of Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT). His presence as the opening keynote speaker makes clear that the consumer electronics industry, once focused on the latest gadgets and gizmos, increasingly relies on software.

Gates' keynotes is likely to set the tone for the entire show, and judging by the volume of expected announcements next week, it's likely that mobility will be a major topic of conversation. Microsoft's Windows Mobile, Smart Personal Objects Technology, and automotive business units also will be at the show. Windows Mobile 6.1 is expected to be released sometime early this year.

Meanwhile, some companies are using Microsoft software to power their own software and hardware, like Ricavision, which is coupling Bluetooth with Windows Vista's SideShow capability to display e-mail notifications and other information on a remote control.

As usual, Microsoft will have a strong presence at CES. The company unveiled Windows Home Server at last year's CES, and that team is back again this year after the product's release last summer. Microsoft's also bringing along teams representing Xbox, Windows Live, its Surface multi-touch computing group, Windows Vista, the Silverlight browser plug-in, automotive technology like Ford's new Sync software, and a Smart Personal Objects Technology group that includes things like Microsoft-powered watch software.

Microsoft will have competition from Linux at this year's CES as well. OpenMoko is showing its Linux-based smart phone, while a start-up that's already gotten its software packaged into cheap PCs at Wal-Mart will be releasing the latest version of its operating system at CES. Good OS' Ubuntu-based Rocket makes heavy use of built-in links to Web apps to bolster its functionality.

The Web won't be left out either. Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO) will be at CES in full force, including a keynote by CEO Jerry Yang and "several announcements centering on the company's mobile strategy." Google (NSDQ: GOOG) is nowhere to be seen, but several companies have built Google software and services into their systems, including Thompson's new GE-branded DECT 6.0 phones, which have a built-in "auto-dial GOOG-411 button" for free directory assistance. AOL will be there as well, continuing its reinvention into a portal player.

A British start-up named Invu will be exhibiting an interesting take on Web search at CES with .NET-based downloadable search software called Ergo. The software does desktop or Web searches and then clusters results. For example, a search on "baseball" might bring back clusters labeled "baseball players" and "baseball cards," among others. Ergo aggregates results from several different search engines and has a social aspect to it: users can annotate and share search results with one another.

RealNetworks will also be announcing new technology at the show. The multimedia software maker is participating in CES Unveiled, the pre-CES press preview, on Saturday. Last year, the company announced a series of partnerships with companies like Tivo. Other multimedia software companies in attendance include Cyberlink Corp., ArcSoft, Nero, and Corel, all of which are showcasing their latest wares.

Gaming software will also have a showing, though CES isn't known as a mecca for gamers. LucasArts will unveil new games, and Microsoft and Sony may have something up their own sleeves. Sony has already announced on its CES Web site that the voice-over IP service Skype will soon be available on Sony's PlayStation Portable gaming system.

The real software story this year, at least in preview, should be Microsoft. The company's massive presence plus a valedictory address from its chairman shows an intention to put on a full court press with its consumer-facing applications at the show.

Record Number Of Data Breaches Reported In 2007

Researchers with the Identity Theft Resource Center cited 443 breaches in the U.S. in 2007 in their annual report, compared to the 315 they identified in 2006.

By Thomas Claburn InformationWeek

The number of publicly reported data breaches in the U.S. rose by more than 40% in 2007, compared to the previous year, according to statistics compiled by the Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC), a consumer rights advocacy group.

In its December 24 report, the ITRC said that there were publicly reported 443 breaches in the U.S. in 2007. In 2006, the ITRC identified 315 publicized breaches.

Some 127 million data records were exposed during 2007. In 2006, nearly 20 million records were exposed. In 2005, there were 158 breaches reported involving about 65 million records.
The ITRC will have to update its list to reflect breaches reported during the last seven days of the year, something organization founder Linda Foley said would happen next week.

On Friday, the Tennessean.com reported that someone broke into a Davidson County election office over the Christmas holiday and stole laptops believed to contain the Social Security numbers and other personal information for more than 337,000 registered voters in the Tennessee county.

That same day, the Pioneer Press in Minnesota reported that a laptop containing the personal information of 219 Minnesotans had been stolen from a Pennsylvania vendor doing business with the Minnesota State Commerce Department.

Also on Friday, television station WSFA in Montgomery, Alabama reported that the U.S. Air Force had sent letters to current and former service members whose Social Security numbers, birth dates, addresses, and telephone numbers were on a laptop that was stolen from the home of an Air Force band member based at Bolling Air Force Base in Washington D.C. The station subsequently reported that the missing laptop contained the personal information of 10,501 individuals.

The rise in reported breaches may not be exclusively a reflection of rising data thievery. The ITRC speculates that in addition to an increase in data theft, more data breaches are being reported to the public. And it remains to be seen whether 2007 proves to be a high water mark for data loss, given that the T.J. Maxx breach accounted for 94 million of the 127 million exposed customer records.

Foley reluctantly characterized 2007 as the worst on record from a statistical perspective, but cautioned that the T.J. Maxx breach skews the statistics. "I don't know whether we're seeing more breaches because there's mandatory reporting or because there are more," she said, adding that 39 states and the District of Columbia now require organizations to report data breaches.

But even if 2007 proves to be an aberration, the costs associated with data breaches appear to be rising. According to a study released in November by the Ponemon Institute, an information practices consultancy, data breaches cost businesses an average of $197 per customer record in 2007, up from $182 in 2006.

And that perhaps explains why Cisco (NSDQ: CSCO), Google (NSDQ: GOOG), Raytheon, Symantec (NSDQ: SYMC), Trend Micro, and Websense have all made acquisitions in the past year or so to strengthen their data loss protection offerings. A Gartner report in May estimated that the $50 million data leak protection market measured in 2006 would as much as triple by the end of 2007.

Foley nonetheless expressed optimism, noting that in regulated industries like finance and healthcare, there are far fewer breaches than in other areas of business. "Both are highly regulated industries with a number of government agencies looking over their shoulders," she said. "[But] a lot of the businesses still have not learned how to handle information correctly."
As an example, she points to the fact that only 13 of the data breaches out of 443 reported to date this year involved encrypted data, which is far less vulnerable to unauthorized access or misuse.

While 2007 could fairly be called the year of the data breach, Foley prefers to think of it as the year of data breach awareness. "I think there is a greater awareness this year that is going to have a ripple effect over the next couple of years," she said. "And hopefully that is going to bring the number of breaches down."

Programmed for love - Sex with Robots

Author sees hard-wired sex in the future - and apparently it's all good - especially if you like robots

By FRITZ LANHAM

If you're younger than 35, you'll probably live long enough to put David Levy's prediction to the test. Levy says that by 2050 we'll be creating robots so lifelike, so imbued with human-seeming intelligence and emotions, as to be nearly indistinguishable from real people. And we'll have sex with these robots. Some of us will even marry them. And it will all be good.

Levy lays out his vision of a Brave New Carnal World in Love and Sex With Robots: The Evolution of Human-Robot Relationships, which, despite its extended riffs on sex toys through the ages, is a snigger-free book. Levy's no Al Goldstein. Rather he's a 62-year-old British chess master turned artificial-intelligence expert persuaded that robot sex can brighten the lives of many, many unhappy people. "Great sex on tap for everyone, 24/7,'' he writes on the final page of the book. What's not to like? >more

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