Chipmakers fined for price-fixing

Nine chipmakers have been fined 331 million euros by European Union regulators for illegally fixing prices, says the BBC.

The companies involved are Samsung, Hynix, Infineon, NEC, Hitachi, Mitsubishi, Toshiba, Elpida and Nanya.

A 10th chipmaker, Micron, was also part of the price-fixing cartel, but escaped a fine in return for alerting the competition authorities.

An underground cyber crime forum has been hacked, with once walled-off information uploaded onto file-sharing networks, reveals The Register.

The attack on German e-crime site Carders.cc has led to the wider disclosure of stolen credit card details and passwords from victims, along with data on the forum's criminal denizens.

A database file containing communication exchanges between 5 000 members and a file containing the contact details of forum members and data on members' IP addresses have been uploaded in three separate files onto the Rapidshare P2P network.

Google kicked off its annual developer conference on Wednesday with a series of announcements and demonstrations that highlighted what's becoming possible online, writes SF Gate.

Speakers during the opening keynote at Google I/O explained how the shift to cloud computing, better Web browsers and more sophisticated applications are enabling Internet tools and experiences that were once reserved for desktop applications and dedicated devices.

"The Web is the most important platform of our generation," said Vic Gundotra, Google VP of engineering. "Working collaboratively, we can move that Web forward."

According to a Bill approved by the US House of Representatives, millions of Americans arrested for, but not convicted of, crimes will likely have their DNA forcibly extracted and added to a national database, reports CNet.

By a 357 to 32 vote, the House approved legislation that will pay state governments to require DNA samples, which could mean drawing blood with a needle, from adults "arrested for" certain serious crimes.

"We should allow law enforcement to use all the technology available to them... to reduce expensive and unjust false convictions, bring closure to victims by solving cold cases, better identify criminals, and keep those who commit violent crime from walking the streets," says Harry Teague, the New Mexico Democrat who sponsored the Bill.