Articles by Jay Lyman

Despite an expected spike in the amount of IT services outsourcing to offshore firms, the impact likely will be mitigated by solid services-industry growth in the United States, researcher IDC said in reporting the results of a recent survey. While offshore hiring likely will spread across a wider range of IT services going forward, an economic up...

In a move described by at least one industry observer as something the Baby Bell had to do, SBC Communications has introduced Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) -- a technology that will let customers conduct conversations using the Internet rather than telephone systems SBC said the "powerful new service options" are just the beginning of its IP ...

AMD has announced groundbreaking on a new manufacturing facility in Dresden, Germany, that will help the company keep up with what it claims is growing demand for 64-bit chips The Sunnyvale, California-based chipmaker, which announced a significant deal to put its 64-bit Opteron processors in Sun servers earlier this week, said the fabrication faci...

SCO chief executive Darl McBride's explanation and defense of his software company's legal strategy has brought on a flurry of activity in the open-source software community. Among the more significant developments, SCO indicated it is poised to bring legal action against at least one of the companies that declined its offer to license Linux, whic...

Continuing to dispel uncertainty over its dedication to open source, software maker Novell has released a road map for the Mono development project -- an open-source effort to write Linux and Unix applications for Microsoft's .NET framework Novell -- which purchased Linux desktop maker Ximian last August and earlier this month announced its acquisi...

In an effort to turn the tables on computer worms that can clog and confound corporate networks, Cisco has teamed with three major antivirus vendors to make networks smarter -- and therefore safer -- with trusted agents that can cut off infected or compromised nodes while keeping the overall network up and running Acknowledging that the collaborati...

Marking a trend in which large security players are among the last to the party, Internet Security Systems released the first of its new Proventia G Series intrusion-prevention appliances this week, promising proactive protection and ease of use Atlanta-based ISS said the G200 -- the first device in its intrusion-prevention line, which is expected ...

Hoping to shift industry focus to the company's new "kindler, gentler" business approach, Microsoft has announced the availability of royalty-free licensing of its Office 2003 XML reference schemas and documentation Long resented for its closed, proprietary software and facing increased competition from Linux and other open-source alternatives, Mic...

In its first move since being acquired by Novell, SuSE announced that its enterprise Linux software will be sold and supported by Gateway in a partnership aimed at seizing more of the U.S. server market, particularly among small- to medium-size businesses Novell's purchase of SuSE Linux earlier this month has sparked varied speculation about how --...

With more than mere reputation on the line, virus writers are using the MiMail worm as the basis for more advanced attacks aimed at identity theft Security experts said the latest MiMail-I variant --which spoofs official PayPal correspondence -- began to spread early Fridaymorning, and while it is not considered a particularlydangerous outbreak, it...

Looking to head off the kind of communications crowding and interference that has disrupted emergency services in times of crisis -- and to make room for the continued growth of 802.11 WiFi and other wireless devices, networks and services -- the Federal Communications Commission opened up a large chunk of unlicensed spectrum this week The commissi...

With the discovery of a new property in commonly used plastics, researchers from Princeton University and Hewlett-Packard said they have invented a combination of materials that could lower the cost and boost the density of electronic memory The research, detailed in this month's issue of Nature, involves a previously unrecognized property in a wid...

The Liberty Alliance has locked up an open standard for federated identity management with new specifications that let companies share login and other information as they deploy and use Web services Touting accompanying policy recommendations in a "best practices" guide, the alliance -- a consortium founded by Sun Microsystems and consisting of mor...

Mobile phone giant Nokia said it is investigating and responding to a security breach that allows users to play games for its recently released N-Gage handheld on other mobile devices, including at least one device from another manufacturer The Finnish company made the announcement following the Internet circulation of techniques to crack the copy-...

The desktop may be the final frontier for Linux, but one company is using a combination of Windows interface strategy, Wal-Mart sales and a wide selection of software to try to match the inroads Linux has made in the corporate datacenter. That company is Lindows.com Novell's acquisition of SuSE Linux, Big Blue's commitment to the open-source operat...

Electronics and music giant Sony is rolling out a new CD copy-protection technology that will let the company sell music on multiformat CDs with additional content that can be accessed through PCs The company said that in response to the digital piracy caused by copying or "ripping" CDs into digital form for Internet redistribution, it is introduci...

Eastern Ontario voters today were allowed to vote by Internet or telephone -- but not by paper ballot -- in what is being called the first all-electronic election of North America Despite e-voting security issues in the United States that have pitted some researchers, publishers and ISPs against Diebold Election Systems, the Linux-based voting syst...

Continuing a stream of activity surrounding newer, simpler security for remote access to corporate networks, Cisco announced it would support Secure Socket Layer (SSL) Virtual Private Network (VPN) technology in its widely used VPN 3000 Series concentrators Cisco's announcement that it will include the clientless VPN capabilities in addition to the...

Virus writers reportedly are talking tough about Microsoft's bounty offered in exchange for information leading to the arrest and conviction of major malware authors, downplaying its effectiveness and calling it just a publicity stunt Security experts differed on the likely effectiveness of Microsoft's plan, which has put a quarter-million-dollar p...

In a technology-industry version of the battle of the bands, Apple has come out swinging against a reborn, legitimate Napster, boasting that the iTunes Music Store has sold five times the number of songs Napster did in the challenger's first week of business The original, free Napster song-swapping service sparked the peer-to-peer (P2P) file-tradin...