general internet news - 30 September

[David Goldstein <goldstein_david@yahoo.com.au>]

Germany Seeks Tougher Punishment for Child Porn
German officials called on Saturday for tougher sentences
for consumers of child pornography after police cracked a
huge global child porn network involving some 26,500
Internet users in 166 countries.

http://reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=internetNews&storyID=3518306
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3142080.stm

Britons held in global child porn swoop
A giant international child pornography ring involving
thousands of internet users from 166 countries, including
Britain, has been smashed, German police said yesterday.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/news/0,12597,1050820,00.html

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/crime/story.jsp?story=447450

U.S. Arrests Over 1,000 Child Predators Since July
The U.S. government has arrested more than 1,000 child
predators and sex offenders since the Department of
Homeland Security in July launched an operation to protect
children from pornographers, Internet predators and human
traffickers.
 http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?storyID=3515993

Sex offenders let off the hook
Thousands escape with cautions because police cannot cope
with the flood of child porn offences.
 
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,1051209,00.html

Looked at porn? The boss can't just fire you (if you're
Dutch)
Employees in the Netherlands can't be sacked for
downloading Internet pornography onto office computers
unless there is a clear code of conduct, according to the
Dutch legal trade magazine People Planet Profit, which
conducted research on the subject.
 http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/32975.html

OECD Global Forum on Information Systems and Network
Security: Towards a Global Culture of Security, Oslo, 13-14
October 2003
Jointly organised and hosted by the OECD and the Norwegian
Government, this forum will mark the completion of the
first year of the revised OECD Guidelines for the Security
of Information Systems and Networks, and will enable
stocktaking of the progress achieved in implementing the
Guidelines.

http://www.oecd.org/document/14/0,2340,en_2649_37409_8165070_1_1_1_37409,00.html

New OECD Study Shows ICT's Growth Potential Linked to
Regulatory Environment
Countries with high levels of product and labour market
regulation have had lower shares of investment in ICT in
recent years than countries where the regulatory
environment is lighter, according to a new OECD report, ICT
and Economic Growth. Evidence from OECD Countries,
Industries and Firms.

http://www.oecd.org/document/61/0,2340,en_2649_37409_6094269_1_1_1_37409,00.html

Net not to blame for tearaway kids
Kids in China are not turned into isolated, withdrawn
tearaways just because they use the Internet.
 http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/32974.html

Cliques, Clicks, Bullies And Blogs
The anonymous warning on the Internet bulletin board was
posted to a popular eighth-grader at an exclusive
Washington-area private school for girls. "I feel like
throwing up just thinking of you," the author wrote, in a
diatribe that soon degenerated into the frantic,
grammarless prose so characteristic of children's online
messaging. "Everything you do is just a ploy to raise your
popularity. . . .u slut. . . . You may think ur safe now,
but ur so gonna take a plunge down the popularity level, it
is inevitable. . . . Most of us realize what a [expletive]
loser you are, even if your few slaves don't."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8020-2003Sep26.html

Discord at digital divide talks
Sharp divisions over how to bridge the digital divide have
emerged ahead of December's UN summit on the issue.
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3148356.stm
 http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/33086.html

4TH WORLD FORUM ON E-DEMOCRACY AND POLITICSONLINE ANNOUNCE
THE 25 WHO ARE CHANGING THE WORLD OF INTERNET AND POLITICS
PoliticsOnline and the 4th World Forum on e- Democracy
announce the results of its second world wide survey
recognizing the top 25 individuals, organizations and
companies that are having the greatest impact on the way
the Internet is changing politics.

http://www.politicsonline.com/pol2000/specialreports/25Changing_2003/

Game blamed for murder, $100 million lawsuit likely
The family of a man shot by two boys emulating the action
of Grand Theft Auto, the popular but violent video game,
plans to sue the game's publishers and the family's lawyer
this week warned that it could become a class action suit.

http://www.out-law.com/php/page.php?page_id=gameblamedformurd1064577853

France's Minitel lives on
France's ageing Minitel network has been given a new lease
of life by hooking it up to the internet. Minitel may be an
ugly duckling, but it was a precocious one when it was
officially launched in 1983, intended to save money on
telephone directories.
  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3142862.stm

.uk - 'Spam' law ineffective
Powers announced yesterday by the Government to fine
companies sending junk emails and text messages are
ineffective and "empty rhetoric", said the internet
industry.

http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/connected/main.jhtml?xml=/connected/2003/09/24/ecnjunk19.xml&sSheet=/connected/2003/09/24/ixconnrite.html

.ca - Anti-spam laws junk, observers say
Governments around the world are trying to stem the
stampede of unwanted e-mail -- best known by the moniker
spam -- but numerous observers say new laws won't do
anything to fix the growing problem.

http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20030925/TWSPAM25/TPTechnology

http://www.nationalpost.com/financialpost/story.html?id=F170D6E0-A16B-4A03-8FD6-0D05524116AE

Browser holes lead to AIM attacks
Security holes in Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser
have been exploited by hackers to hijack AOL instant
messaging accounts and force unsuspecting Web surfers to
run up massive phone bills, computer experts caution.

http://edition.cnn.com/2003/TECH/internet/09/27/microsoft.browser.reut/index.html

Congress overrules court on Do-Not-Call Registry
The US Congress and Senate moved swiftly yesterday in
reaction to a court that said the FTC had no authority to
run a national Do-Not-Call Registry, due in force from 1st
October, similar to the UK's Telephone Preference Service.

http://www.out-law.com/php/page.php?page_id=congressoverrulesc1064577878

.au - Cybercrime Code of Practice for ISPs (registration
req'd)
Following 18 months of development the Australian Internet
Industry Association (IIA) released a draft Cybercrime Code
of Practice (Code) in relation to cybercrime on Monday, 21
July 2003.
http://www.mondaq.com/article_preview.asp?a=22115&p=5&c=11399&e=on

.us - Marketing violent entertainment to children: a
workshop on industry self-regulation
On October 29, 2003, the Federal Trade Commission will host
a one-day public workshop to examine issues relating to the
marketing of violent entertainment to children. The
workshop will provide a forum for discussing the state of
self-regulation in the entertainment industry and, in
particular, children’s access to products that have been
rated as potentially inappropriate for them or have been
labeled with a parental advisory. The workshop will be held
from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. on October 29, 2003 at the FTC
Conference Center located at 601 New Jersey Avenue, N.W.,
Washington, D.C. It is open to the public and there is no
attendance fee.
 http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/workshops/violence/

MSN's Smart Move on Anonymous Chat
Sorry, critics. Microsoft's decision to limit its service
to paying customers makes sense both legally and
economically

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/sep2003/tc20030926_5813_tc078.htm

Chatroom closure: what they didn't tell you
The fact that Microsoft is closing its chatrooms in all but
five countries just a day before it locks down its MSN
Messenger network appears to have escaped many people.

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/09/29/1064687708060.html

http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/connected/main.jhtml?xml=/connected/2003/09/24/ecnmicr24.xml&sSheet=/connected/2003/09/24/ixconnrite.html

Dangers of chatroom shutdown
SEVEN years ago, parents in Britain woke up to the dangers
of the internet when Patrick Green, 33, from
Buckinghamshire, was sentenced to jail for having sex with
a 13-year-old he met in a Yahoo! chatroom. It was the first
case of its kind, but it was soon followed by others. At
least 26 cases in the UK where children have been raped or
abducted by paedophiles are linked to chatrooms, according
to the National Children’s Home and Charities Coalition for
internet Safety.
 http://www.news.scotsman.com/scitech.cfm?id=1061652003

Microsoft Chat Rooms Ban to Hit Namibians
MICROSOFT will be closing its chat rooms to southern
African users in an attempt to prevent them being used by
paedophiles to pick up and abuse children.
 http://allafrica.com/stories/200309260264.html

Librarians to P2P critics: Shhh!
In a hotly contested lawsuit before a federal appeals
court, two peer-to-peer companies are about to gain a vast
army of allies: America's librarians.
 http://news.com.com/2100-1032_3-5082684.html

Africa Launches Online Drug Combat
IN waging the war against illicit drugs Africa plans to
start web-sites to expose dealers and traffickers, says a
recent report of the African Union(AU).
 http://allafrica.com/stories/200309260367.html

Thai schools reject Microsoft
Thailand's schools are switching to open-source software
because of concerns about costs and intellectual property
rights.

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/windows/0,39020396,39116703,00.htm

Standards wrangle threatens Ultrawideband
Analysts worry that continuing delays UWB standard-making
could slow adoption. Meanwhile, Intel says it might bypass
the approval process altogether.

http://www.zdnet.com.au/newstech/enterprise/story/0,2000048640,20279080,00.htm
 http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/5/33075.html

Tablet PCs Starting to Take Off After Slow Start
After a slow start, tablet personal computers are starting
to take off, fueled by Microsoft Corp.'s release of its
operating system Windows XP Tablet PC and manufacturers
rolling out a wider variety of easier-to-use devices.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=technologyNews&storyID=3519985



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=====
David Goldstein
 address: 2/4 Dundas Street
             COOGEE NSW 2034
             AUSTRALIA
 email: Goldstein_David@yahoo.com.au
 phone: +61 418 228 605 - mobile; +61 2 9665 0015 - home

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