Jobs takes medical leave again

Apple's Steve Jobs will take a medical leave of absence for the second time in two years, but will remain CEO of the company, involved in strategic decision-making, writes CNet.

COO Tim Cook will assume responsibility for the company's day-to-day operations, amid continuing investor concerns over Apple's plans for eventual transition in the corner office.

Jobs, a pancreatic cancer survivor, took leave in the first half of 2009 to deal with issues related to his medical treatments. Apple is scheduled to report its first-quarter fiscal 2011 earnings tomorrow.

The Stuxnet virus, which successfully attacked an Iranian nuclear power station, setting the country's nuclear programme back by several years, is alleged to have been the result of a combined effort from Israel and the US, reports Computing.co.uk.

These allegations come from a report in the New York Times (NYT) over the weekend. According to the report, US experts have worked with Israeli teams testing the Stuxnet code on the same centrifuge systems as those used in Iran.

"To check out the worm, you have to know the machines," said an American expert on nuclear intelligence, according to the NYT. "The reason the worm has been effective is that the Israelis tried it out."

The vast majority of hi-tech attacks described as acts of cyber war do not deserve the name, says a report, notes the BBC.

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development study is part of a series considering incidents that could cause global disruption. While pandemics and financial instability could cause problems, cyber attacks are unlikely to, it says.

Instead, trouble caused by cyber attacks is likely to be localised and short-lived. However, it warns that governments need to plan for how it could mitigate the effects of both accidental and deliberate events.

According to recently released figures from eMarketer, Facebook's revenue for advertising alone - which excludes revenue for virtual currencies and other sources - came to an astonishing $1.86 billion for all of last year, reveals Yahoo News.

As reported last month, Facebook was on track to reach the $2 billion mark for revenue in 2010. When other revenue streams are counted along with ad revenue, it's easy to imagine the $2 billion revenue was achieved and possibly exceeded in the past year.

As users spend more and more on Facebook Credits, which got an extensive rollout through online and brick-and-mortar retailers throughout 2010, the virtual currency is likely accounting for an increasing amount on Facebook's balance sheets.