Briefs
White House Issues Internet Crime Report
White House Issues Internet Crime Report
VeriSign to Acquire Network Solutions
Managing Security
ROAD RULES A big engineering firm is developing a vehicle detection system for futuristic highways - very Buck Rogers. Developers work night and day tuning communications between the on-the-street test site and the lab - very plain-vanilla IT. Beta goes in Friday. Works all weekend. Monday it stops communicating. Panic ensues. Bigwigs scream that the beta's a failure. Corporate presidents fume. All eyes turn to the developer, who finally figures out what's wrong. "Turns out the system was working fine," a pilot fish reports, "right up to the point when a car wiped out the communications cabinet on the side of the road."
Cisco Systems Inc. is buying Atlantech Technologies, a Glasgow-based company that makes software to help configure and monitor network hardware. San Jose-based Cisco said the stock deal, valued at about $180 million, will expand its offerings of network management products for integrated data, voice and video networks. Cisco held a 9.5 percent stake in the privately held Atlantech, which will become part of the Cisco Communications Software and Network Services Group.
H-1B Visas Going Fast
DoubleClick Does About-face on Privacy
Solaris Less Than NT?
NASD Regulation Inc., the regulatory arm of the National Association of Securities Dealers Inc., has charged eight online day-trading companies and individuals with violations ranging from misuse of customer funds to improper lending and using misleading advertising.
HACK OF THE MONTH
Encryption Program Ruled OK to Post
The U.S. Department of Commerce said its new encryption export policy permits University of Illinois professor Daniel Bernstein to post source code for his Snuffle encryption program.
BEA Systems Inc. in San Jose has unveiled WebLogic Commerce Server 2.0, a new component-based e-commerce transaction server and development environment. Based on the Java 2 Enterprise Edition standard, the server includes components for building online catalogs, shopping carts, order entry functions and inventory management services. WebLogic will be available in April for Windows NT and Solaris. Pricing starts at $40,000 per CPU.
Big Three to Team Up
Sun Microsystems Inc. and Microsoft Corp., known to be fierce rivals, separately announced $25 million investments in BroadBand Office Inc., a Falls Church, Va.-based start-up that's rolling out Internet access, Web hosting and communications services. Sun said BroadBand plans to use Sun hardware and software for some services. Microsoft said in a separate statement that BroadBand intends to deliver messaging, e-commerce and other services using Microsoft software.