Business

Most electronics consumers had never heard of rootkits before last year's Sony BMG debacle. Now, rootkits have the attention of the U.S. public -- and the U.S. government. The Department of Homeland Security on Thursday suggested that a measure outlawing the controversial software may be in order. A...

So much has been written of late about emerging foreign markets. Most of us realize that, by and large, these markets are located in the Far East. For example, Japan has been an economic powerhouse for quite a while now, followed in time by South Korea and China. Recently, India has been making grea...

Amazon is getting ready to sell the one consumer product it doesn't already offer: digital music. The company is said to be in advanced talks with four major music companies to set up a digital music service that could rival iTunes. Amazon reportedly is negotiating with Vivendi's Universal Music Gro...

Microsoft rolled out a beta version of Office Live, the first step in what is seen as an important foray for the company into the Web-delivered services and software arena. The beta version of Office Live is aimed at small businesses and includes tools for building and maintaining Web sites, for bac...

Internet companies doing business in countries that suppress civil liberties need a code of conduct to soften the controversy they're fueling by doing business with authoritarian regimes. In an open letter sent to Republican Sen. Gordon H. Smith, whose Congressional subcommittee held hearings Wednes...

Several major U.S.-based Internet firms were called before Congress to discuss their role in censoring Web content in China, a key growth market for the companies, which say they have to abide by local rules. Representatives from Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and Cisco Systems were among those that testi...

Leading mobile phone handset maker Nokia said it would create a joint venture with Japanese consumer electronics producer Sanyo in a bid to better reach key markets, especially the United States. Nokia and Sanyo said the yet-unnamed joint venture would be largely separate and have offices in San Die...

Microsoft said Monday that it has purchased a French firm that makes mobile search technology as the software giant makes a strong push to build a search infrastructure that will work across multiple devices. The company did not disclose what it paid for MotionBridge, which is based in Paris and sel...

A published report outlining a scenario in which high-flying Google could see as much as half of its market value eroded by increased competition sent the stock tumbling Monday. Google shares fell below the US$350 level for the first time since October, when it began a strong surge that had it tradi...

The company behind the console that helped launch the video game industry nearly 30 years ago may be facing a game-over situation. Atari this week reported significant quarterly losses and the departure of a top executive that together paint a bleak picture for the future of the firm. Atari posted a...

Microsoft plans to speed up the expansion of the Redmond, Wash., campus it has called home for most of its 31-year history by spending approximately US$1 billion over the next three years. By 2009, the software giant will build out approximately half of a 20-year plan to grow the facility by more th...

Research In Motion has alleviated -- just a little -- the worries of 2 million or so BlackBerry users who would be affected if the U.S. District Court in Richmond, Va., should levy an injunction against the service later this month. RIM said on Thursday that it has developed and tested software wor...

Gateway CEO Wayne Inouye -- who took the helm at the company following its merger with eMachines and led it back to profitability -- resigned just days after announcing results that missed profit targets. The company said Inouye intends to "pursue other interests" after almost two years as chief exe...

In another sign of the maturation of the Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) industry, Vonage filed Wednesday to stage a long-awaited US$250 million initial public offering and also installed a new CEO to guide the company. If it pulls off the IPO, Vonage Holdings Corp. would become the first publi...

Nortel said it has reached an agreement in principle to pay US$2.4 billion to settle shareholder lawsuits stemming from accounting misstatements at the telecom gear maker, moving the beleaguered company one step closer to ending a dark chapter in its history. The settlement would avoid at least one ...