John Ribeiro, Author at NetworkingNexus.net

John Ribeiro

Author Archives: John Ribeiro

Microsoft said to plan more staff layoffs

Microsoft plans a new round of layoffs that could affect its hardware and smartphones businesses, besides other parts of the company, according to a newspaper report.The job cuts will be in addition to the 18,000 staff the company said it would let go about a year ago, The New York Times reported, quoting people briefed on the plans who requested anonymity. The announcement of the cuts could come as early as Wednesday, according to the report, which did not specify the number of staff that will be laid off. Microsoft had over 118,000 employees globally at the end of March, the report said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

New trial on damages ordered in Apple, Smartflash patent dispute

A federal court in Texas has ordered a new trial on damages in a patent infringement dispute between Apple and Smartflash that could modify an earlier US$533 million damages award to the patent-licensing company.District Judge Rodney Gilstrap of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Tyler division, ruled Tuesday that the earlier damages were set aside and vacated as the jury at trial may have not been properly instructed.Smartflash sued Apple in May 2013, alleging that iTunes software infringed on its patents related to serving data and managing access to data. A jury found in February that Apple infringed three Smartflash patents in order to produce and sell its iTunes software. It also found the three Smartflash patents to be valid. Smartflash had asked for $852 million in damages.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

FBI chief warns that terrorists hide behind encrypted communications

U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey has asked for a “robust debate” on encryption of communications, saying that the technology could come in the way of his doing his job to keep people safe.The recruitment and tasking of Americans by the group known as the Islamic State, or ISIL, is increasingly taking place “through mobile messaging apps that are end-to-end encrypted, communications that may not be intercepted, despite judicial orders under the Fourth Amendment.”“There is simply no doubt that bad people can communicate with impunity in a world of universal strong encryption,” he added. The op-ed in the Lawfare blog comes ahead of testimonies by Comey before the Senate intelligence and judiciary committees on Wednesday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Reddit sections go dark after exit of staffer

The exit of a key Reddit staffer, who apparently played an important role in the bustling AMA (Ask Me Anything) question-and-answer section, has created an uproar on the online discussion website.Many large communities, or subreddits in the parlance of the site, have been set to private, allowing only moderators or approved submitters to view the contents.Anger over the exit of Victoria Taylor, Reddit’s communications director, who assisted in AMAs with a variety of celebrities and other top personalities, appears to have mushroomed into a controversy over a lack of consultation between Reddit administrators and its volunteer moderators.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

After Uber ruling, pressure mounts on companies to reclassify contractors

The pressure on app-based companies to reclassify their contractors as employees is picking up, with more of them getting sued this week.The California Labor Commission ruled last month that a driver of Uber Technologies was an employee and not a contractor, when driving for the company, and was hence entitled to reimbursement on certain expenses. The ride-hailing company said it had appealed the decision.Postmates, Shyp, and Washio were sued by workers this week, arguing that they should be classified as employees and not independent contractors, according to Shannon Liss-Riordan who is an attorney in these cases. The actions against Shyp and Postmates were filed as “class action arbitration” demands in arbitration courts.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

OPM hit by class-action suit over breach of federal employee data

A federal employees union has filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, its leadership and a contractor, alleging that their negligence led to a data breach that compromised the personal information of millions of current, former and prospective government employees and contractors.Since at least 2007, the OPM has been warned by its Office of Inspector General of significant deficiencies in its cybersecurity protocol, according to the proposed class-action suit filed Monday by the American Federation of Government Employees in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.However, OPM failed to take measures to correct these issues, despite handling massive amounts of federal applicants’ private, sensitive and confidential information, it added. The data handled by the OPM included a 127-page form, called Standard Form 86, which requires applicants for security clearances to answer questions on their financial histories and investment records, children’s and relatives’ names, foreign trips and contacts with foreign nationals, past residences, and names of neighbors and close friends, according to the filing.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Facebook like Google makes scant progress in hiring blacks, women

Facebook and other tech companies aren’t changing the racial mix or the percentage of women in their workforce fast enough, which has become a matter of concern to civil rights activists.Blacks, for example, accounted for 2 percent of Facebook’s U.S. workforce as of May 31 this year, according to diversity data released by the company on Thursday. The corresponding figure for June last year was again 2 percent.The figure for Hispanics also remained at 4 percent of the U.S. workforce, while people of two or more races accounted for 3 percent.A positive but minute change was that the percentage of female employees increased from 31 percent in June 2014 to 32 percent in May 2015. The figures for participation by women are calculated by the company on a worldwide basis.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Louisiana governor vetoes license plate reader legislation

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal has vetoed legislation that would provide for the pilot use of automatic license plate readers by law enforcement to identify stolen vehicles and uninsured motorists.Like GPS trackers on vehicles and so-called Stingrays or “IMSI catchers” that track the location of mobile phones by mimicking cellphone towers, automatic license plate readers have become a controversial privacy issue, with many civil rights groups opposing their indiscriminate use.In a letter, explaining his decision to return the bill to the state Senate, Jindal said the personal information captured by the automatic license plate reader cameras, which includes a person’s vehicle location, would be retained in a central database and accessible to not only law enforcement agencies but also to private entities for a period of time, regardless of whether or not the system detects that a person is in violation of vehicle insurance rules.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Samsung wants court to review damages in patent fight with Apple

Samsung Electronics has asked that a full bench of an appeals court should review a damages award in a long-standing patent infringement dispute with arch-rival Apple.Apple sued Samsung in 2011 alleging that Samsung phones infringed on several iPhone patents. The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California awarded Apple damages of US$930 million after a jury found that Samsung infringed Apple’s design and utility patents and diluted its trade dresses, which relate to the overall look and packaging of a product.A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit agreed last month with the jury’s verdict on the design patent infringements, the validity of two utility patent claims, and the damages awarded for the design and utility patent infringements appealed by Samsung. But the appeals court reversed the jury’s findings that the asserted trade dresses are protectable, and vacated the damages relating to trade dress dilution.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

US wants to collect bulk call records for six more months

The U.S. Department of Justice has filed to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court for permission to continue the bulk collection of call records for another six months, as the new USA Freedom Act allows for this transition period.The filing, made public Monday, was submitted to the court last Tuesday, the same day President Barack Obama approved as law the USA Freedom Act, which puts curbs on the bulk collection of domestic telephone records by the National Security Agency.The new legislation was passed by the Senate following the expiry at midnight of May 31 of the authorization of the bulk collection under section 215 of the Patriot Act. It leaves the phone records database in the hands of the telecommunications operators, while allowing a targeted search of the data by the National Security Agency for investigations.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Jesse Jackson wants Google to invest in startups led by Blacks, Latinos

Civil rights leader Rev. Jesse Jackson asked Google to make an amendment to its governance byelaws to make a search for women and people of color a must before filling board positions, as part of his push to get higher representation for women and certain ethnic groups in tech companies.Addressing a Google shareholder meeting Wednesday, Jackson also asked the Internet giant if it would invest in early-stage Black and Latino-led tech startups.“Google reportedly has over $35 billion parked overseas,” Jackson said. “Would you consider repatriating some of this offshore money back to America to fund an Innovation Investment Development Bank? And in return, receive tax credits or a reduced tax rate on foreign profits?”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Dish Network, T-Mobile US reportedly in merger talks

Satellite TV service provider Dish Network and wireless carrier T-Mobile US are reportedly in talks for a merger, which could be the latest in a wave of consolidation in the media and communications industry.The two sides are said to have agreed that Dish CEO Charlie Ergen, will become the chairman of the merged entity, while T-Mobile CEO John Legere will be appointed as the CEO of the combined companies, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.The talks were described to the newspaper as in “the formative stage,” with no guarantee that a deal will be finally done. Key issues such as the purchase price and the mix of cash and stock that would be used to pay for the deal are still unresolved, people familiar with the matter told the newspaper.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Dish Network, T-Mobile US reportedly in merger talks

Ellen Pao will appeal ruling in sex discrimination case

Former venture capitalist Ellen Pao intends to file an appeal against a March decision in a sex discrimination lawsuit.A 12-person jury in a court in San Francisco had found that Pao’s lawsuit against former employer Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers failed on all four counts, including the main issue of whether gender had been a consideration in the decision by the venture capital firm not to promote her.The case has captured attention in the U.S. tech industry, where women are a minority. Pao had also charged with discrimination an old and reputed firm, which has invested in some key technology companies in the U.S. The lawsuit has emerged as a symbol of the struggle by women against alleged sexual discrimination in the workplace.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Uber revises privacy policy, wants more data from users

Uber Technologies is revising its privacy policy to allow it to access a rider’s location when its smartphone app is running in the background, and to send special offers to users’ friends and family.Users will be in control in either case, and will be able to choose whether to share that data with the ride-hailing company, wrote Katherine Tassi, managing counsel of data privacy at Uber in a blog post Thursday.The company has faced criticism in the past over how it handles sensitive information, particularly over its so-called ”God view” tool that apparently lets some Uber employees track the location of customers that have requested car service. U.S. Senator Al Franken wrote to Uber last year for information on its privacy policy, including on measures taken to limit access to the tool.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Amazon.com may be working on Etsy competitor

Amazon.com may be planning to set up a marketplace for craftsmen, a questionnaire posted on the company’s website suggests.A marketplace focused on artisan products, which seems likely to be called Handmade, would put the online retailer directly in competition with the Etsy forum, where 1.4 million active sellers push 32 million handmade items, vintage goods and craft supplies.Etsy sellers have received invites to sign up for the new section of the Amazon site, The Wall Street Journal reported.On Etsy forums, some users said they had received emails from Amazon that discussed the new marketplace for handcrafted products. Some Etsy sellers are already selling through the online retailer. Others appeared interested in the new marketplace proposed.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

BlackBerry cutting staff in smartphone unit

BlackBerry plans to lay off an unspecified number of staff in its devices unit, as it attempts to make that business profitable, while expanding in other areas.The smartphone company in Waterloo, Ontario, said in a statement over the weekend that it had decided to consolidate its device software, hardware and applications business, “impacting a number of employees around the world.”The company said that as it moves into the next stage of its turnaround, it aims to reallocate resources in ways that will “best enable us to capitalize on growth opportunities while driving toward sustainable profitability across all facets of our business.”The company had 6,225 full-time employees as of Feb. 28 this year, the end of its last fiscal year.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

BlackBerry cutting staff in smartphone unit

US Senate blocks NSA surveillance reform bill

The U.S. Senate voted early Saturday to block the USA Freedom Act, a legislation that aimed to put an end to the bulk collection of telephone records by the National Security Agency.It also voted down a bill that would extend to July 31 certain provisions of the Patriot Act, including Section 215, which provides the legal framework for the current NSA phone surveillance program.The Senate, which adjourned Saturday for the Memorial Day weekend, will reconvene on May 31, when it will try to hammer out a deal ahead of the June 1 deadline when the Patriot Act provisions expire, unless reauthorized in the same or modified form by legislation.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

RadioShack, US states reach agreement on sale of customer data

RadioShack has reached agreement with U.S. states over the sale of customer data, by consenting to limit the number of email addresses to be sold, and giving customers the opportunity to be removed from the list.A coalition of 38 U.S. states, led by Texas, objected to the sale of personally identifiable information by the bankrupt electronics retailer, citing its online and in-store privacy policies. The customer data, which was withdrawn from an earlier sale of assets that included RadioShack stores, was included in a second auction this month.The bulk of the consumer data will be destroyed, and no credit or debit card account numbers, social security numbers, dates of birth or phone numbers will be transferred to General Wireless Operations, the winner of both auctions, said Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in a statement Wednesday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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