US govt retains Internet control

The US government has announced it will not hand over control of the Internet to any other organisation, reports News.Com.

The announcement means the US government maintains control of the Internet`s "root" or master file that lists what top-level domains are authorised, despite indications in the past that it would transfer that responsibility to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).

The report says the announcement is an indication that the Bush administration would like to keep ICANN on a short lease, but is also effectively a snub to a United Nations process aimed at giving poorer nations more say in the way the Internet is operated.

Sprint and Motorola will work together to develop technology for next-generation high-speed wireless technology broadly known as WiMax.

The New York Times reports the joint WiMax service is expected to allow people with laptops, personal digital assistants and other portable devices to connect to the Internet at higher speeds.

Sprint will work with Motorola and Intel to develop the chips, base stations, handsets and other equipment needed to run the service.

Although a standard for point-to-point WiMax services has been approved, there is no standard for WiMax services that allow people to connect to the Internet while on the move. Sprint expects agreement on a mobile WiMax standard by the end of the year and plans to make the new service available in 2008.

iTunes customers have subscribed to more than one million Podcasts through the iTunes Podcast Directory in only two days, says Apple.

According to PodCastingNews, iTunes has propelled Podcasting into the mainstream by enabling users to find and subscribe to Podcasts easily and quickly.

The PodShow Podcast Network says with the release of iTunes 4.9, subscriptions have dramatically increased and it is predicting that within months iTunes will introduce tens of millions of new listeners to the world of Podcasting.

Microsoft has confirmed that malicious hackers could potentially exploit a security flaw in its Internet Explorer (IE) browser to take complete control of the affected system, reports eWeek.

The company has released a security advisory acknowledging the vulnerability and recommends that IE users set Internet and local intranet security zone settings to "High" before running ActiveX controls in these zones.

Microsoft says it is not aware of any attacks attempting to use the reported vulnerability or customer impact and promises a patch will be made available once an investigation is completed.

The company says an attacker could exploit the flaw only by creating a malicious Web page and persuading the user to visit the page.

Online identity theft, or phishing attacks, increased by more than 200% in May, says IBM.

IBM attributes the increase in phishing scams to networks of compromised computers known as "botnets" and an increase in the percentage of e-mail messages that carry viruses, reports PC Mag.

IBM`s phishing statistics were taken from e-mail processed by IBM partner and e-mail security company MessageLabs.