Archive

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler on Tuesday announced a $2.25 billion plan to expand the federal Lifeline subsidy program to help low-income consumers afford broadband Internet service. Lifeline, which currently allows low-income consumers to buy mobile phone service at a discount, would let them buy standa...

The Obama administration is seeking $3.1 billion for a fund to update federal IT resources that need to be replaced with more efficient systems. The fund would bolster the government's annual spending on IT, which is set for a modest increase to $89.8 billion in the administration's fiscal 2017 budg...

Although the consumer implications of the Internet of Things have generated plenty of public attention, the real growth in the embryonic market is coming from less visible industrial environments and business applications. The early IoT advancements may come as a surprise to some, but in these indus...

With its reputation preceding it, Peeple on Monday launched on the iTunes App Store. The goal of the app is to help people better understand each other, according to the company. It was designed for people who need to display their reputation to others, including freelancers, business owners, employ...

Security researchers at Palo Alto Networks last week announced that they had found the first ransomware in the wild aimed at Macintosh computers, but Apple and one of its developers quickly neutered it. The ransomware was embedded in software for installing an OS X app for sharing files on BitTorren...

Google has been in talks with telecom service providers in India to bring its Project Loon to the subcontinent, Rajan Anandan, Google's managing director for Southeast Asia and India, said in an interview published Monday. The project would deliver Internet access via balloons floating thousands of ...

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday denied without comment Apple's petition for a review of a lower court ruling that it engaged in price-fixing of e-books. The company must comply with a $450 million settlement it reached with 33 states and territories and a private class of e-book purchasers that, to...

The disease management industry, which focuses on reducing or delaying the use of expensive treatments or costly procedures, has passed its prime as a unique approach to controlling escalating costs attributed to chronic conditions. It worked on the sickest of the sick, but as patient conditions pro...

Vivek Kundra, the former federal CIO, envisioned that 25 percent of the funds the federal government spends each year on information technology could productively be deployed through cloud-based systems. Two recent reports on the status of federal cloud procurement show that for government IT manage...

Google on Wednesday announced that it has begun testing an app dubbed "Hands Free," which allows Android and iOS smartphone users to make purchases via their devices without taking them out of their pockets or purses. Early adopters in Silicon Valley can use the payment system at a small number of M...

The German Cartel Office on Wednesday announced the launch of an investigation into Facebook over allegations that it abused its market position by infringing data protection rules, specifically in connection with the terms of service governing user data. The investigation is aimed at Facebook Inc. ...

There are two sides to every coin -- a good side and a bad side. One side helps you and the other side hurts you. The Internet is a great example: The good side lets you learn anything, about anything, anytime, any place. The bad side targets you with scams. They are running rampant, and there is no...

Apple General Counsel Bruce Sewell on Tuesday testified before the House Judiciary Committee that his company should not be required write new code for software that would weaken the security of the iPhone in the wake of the San Bernardino, California, terrorist attacks. The FBI wants Apple to take ...

FBI Director James Comey on Tuesday testified before the House Judiciary Committee that the government has the legal right to gain limited access to the iPhone of one of the San Bernardino, California, shooters and other suspected terrorists. Congress and the courts can create a mechanism to protect...

The European Commission on Monday released a draft of the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield agreement, which would replace the controversial Safe Harbor provisions that regulated U.S. access to the data of European residents. The legal texts aim to finalize the reform of EU data protection rules, which apply t...