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A Trojan dubbed "Downloader.GK" caused the most damage to computers in 2004, marking the first time a worm hasn't occupied the top spot, according to Panda Software. This signifies an important change in the impact that malicious code is having on computers, the company concluded. Downloader.GK is b...

The much-hyped CAN-SPAM Act -- the first major stab at legislation in the U.S. aimed at cutting down the flood of unwanted commercial e-mail messages -- is seen largely failing to live up to its promise during its first year. The Act, which took effect at the start of 2004, was meant to curtail spam...

Blogs are becoming a key part of online culture, according to two surveys by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, but a majority of Americans still don't know what a blog is. Meanwhile, commercial entities are beginning to explore the power of the blog. Blogs -- the term is short for Web lo...

A spate of mergers and good consumer demographics have the wireless industry poised for a strong 2005, with brokerage house Merrill Lynch the latest to weigh in with a more bullish outlook on the sector. From improved outlooks for subscriber growth to next-generation broadband and emerging markets s...

Web analytics isn't what it used to be. A new breed of tools and technologies has led to a rebirth of analytical hopefuls, and well-known brands are hopping on board. Omniture is the largest stand-alone Web analytics application service provider. The company grew more than 150 percent in 2004, with ...

Governments at both the state and federal level in the U.S. are getting serious about addressing the void in the legal framework for fighting "spyware." To begin with, we need to define the term "spyware," due to the fact that this term has been used to describe everything from keystroke loggers, to...

Internet security firms are gearing up for an onslaught of new attacks that hackers will hurl at inboxes and against Web sites. As the computer industry awaits the release of Service Pack 2 of Microsoft's Windows XP -- which will feature improved security capabilities -- hackers are waiting too. The...

Your most critical business decisions often come down to prices: how much to charge and how much to pay. Prices have been driven down in the South Asian call center industry in the last two years, thanks to a flood of new entrants into the industry, a glut of low-end capacity, and improvements in te...

Consumers spent a whopping US$8.8 billion in online shopping purchases this holiday season, a 24 percent increase over the year-ago period from Thanksgiving through December 27, according to VeriSign. It's a record-breaking year, and analysts said the future of e-commerce looks bright. The average p...

In a crushing blow to Microsoft's bid to establish its Passport service as a standard for access across the Web, auction giant eBay has said it will drop support for the service, as well as a second Microsoft-built service that provides updates and alerts through the .NET platform. EBay announced th...

Samsung has announced that it will set aside US$100 million in case the U.S. government finds it guilty of fixing dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) prices. The U.S. Department of Justice has been looking into allegations of price fixing in the memory industry for more than two years. Infineon Tech...

A popular online community for selling goods and finding jobs and housing is diverting $50 million to $65 million annually in classified advertising from newspapers in the San Francisco Bay area, according to Classified Intelligence, a consulting firm in Altamonte Springs, Florida. The firm released...

The holiday shopping season data just keeps rolling in as analysts begin to decipher what it means for next year. The latest monitor to offer its data is Hitwise, reporting that shopping and classifieds Web sites accounted for 9.1 percent of all U.S. Internet visits between November 1 and December 2...

Entertainment and media giant Time Warner is reportedly in talks with Sprint on a deal that would allow it to add cell phone service to the growing menu of offerings it dangles before its cable customers. The potential deal would be significant because it would make Time Warner the first cable compa...

Dutch authorities have announced that country's first fines against spammers, including one person and two companies who sent unsolicited e-mails and mobile telephone text messages. This marks the first action against spammers since the Netherlands government agreed in May to officially ban unsolici...