InformationWeek Daily - Tuesday, Aug 14, 2007

Should Business Or Government Do Our Terrorist Screening? Ever since Sept. 11, 2001, there's been a question of how big a role businesses such as airlines and banks should play in helping to identify terrorists. The Department of Homeland Security's headed in the right direction in wanting to take passenger screening over from the airlines. Late last week, the Department of Homeland Security proposed that it begin doing the screening of passenger names against the government's terrorist watch list database. Today, DHS sends the watch list to airlines, and they do the screening. DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff, speaking at a press conference, suggested he wasn't satisfied that airlines are consistent enough in how they update their lists. "If they're slow, or if they do it once a day or more slowly than that, they're going to be more out of date," Chertoff said. "This gives us a much closer connection to the real-time information." This move is part of Chertoff's effort to implement DHS's Secure Flight program, a passenger screening project that's been marred by privacy mistakes and technical obstacles. He proposes the Transportation Security Administration start screening tests this fall using data from air carriers that volunteer to provide it. In another new regulation announced at the same time, DHS will require airlines provide the TSA with passenger data for all international flights in or out of the U.S. a half hour before a plane takes off. DHS will integrate that system into Secure Flight. It seems to me that Chertoff's heading in the right direction. Secure Flight's had its missteps, with privacy problems foremost among them. Chertoff says the data will be checked against the watch list and "disposed of." Those privacy concerns are a place to watch. And any CIO who has to meet data-sharing requirements with the government knows integration can be difficult, and costly. But ultimately it's the federal government, not the airlines, that should be combing passenger lists for terrorists. Chris Murphy Cjmurphy@cmp.com www.informationweek.com
"All great change in America begins at the dinner table." -- Ronald Reagan
Web Browsing Tricks Make Your Smartphone Act Like An iPhone If Web browsing stinks on your Smartphone and you can't get an iPhone, there are some things you can do to make what you've got work more like what you want. Oracle To Bolster Its PC Softphone With VoiceEngine Service providers can use the integrated product to build, deploy, and manage converged applications that combine SIP and other Web capabilities. Novell Acquires Senforce Technologies For Zenworks Before the acquisition, Novell offered the endpoint security software as an option to its Zenworks systems and resource management software. Intel Launches Two Xeon Processors For Virtualization The chips enable third-party virtualization software, such as VMware, to offload workload to the system hardware to boost performance. Hackers Deface U.N. Web Site, Leave Political Message Officials are investigating whether there was a data breach during the break in. Anti-Copyright Pirate Party Seeks Official Recognition The party, which formed about a year ago, is seeking statements of support starting in Utah. Qwest Goes Back To The Future With New CEO A veteran of the old Bell companies and most recently the CEO of Williams Sonoma, Edward Mueller will succeed Richard Notebaert, who retires this week. Beta Exam For Printing Available, Passing Grades Provide Certification CompTIA's Printing and Document Imaging credential will test and validate skills related to printer and document imaging installation, service, and support. ATK Grabs $1.8 Billion NASA Contract For Launch Vehicles Modifications to the rocket booster aim to increase performance and reliability of the Ares I and V launch vehicles. SCO Shares Plummet In Novell Ruling Aftermath The business software distributor is considering its options in light of a judge's ruling denying its ownership claims on the Unix operating system. New York To Examine Effectiveness Of E-Documents OpenDocument Format Alliance praises state legislature for taking steps toward openness and accessibility for government documents. Microsoft To Dispute FCC On Web-Device RF Interference Microsoft will reportedly dispute the agency's recent finding that prototype Internet devices caused radio-frequency interference to TV broadcasts. The Face Of Identity Theft Stolen TJX data has surfaced in two cases in Florida. All Our Latest News See InformationWeek's daily breaking news on your mobile device, visit wap.informationweek.com and sign up for daily SMS notifications.	Web Browsing Tricks Make Your Smartphone Act Like An iPhone Oracle To Bolster Its PC Softphone With VoiceEngine Novell Acquires Senforce Technologies For Zenworks Intel Launches Two Xeon Processors For Virtualization Hackers Deface U.N. Web Site, Leave Political Message Anti-Copyright Pirate Party Seeks Official Recognition Virtualization At The Desktop? Examine how more than 250 companies plan to adopt server virtualization technology in this recent InformationWeek Research report, Server Virtualization. The BI Explosion Examine the business intelligence strategies of 500 companies, including deployment drivers and challenges, spending plans, and vendor selection, in this recent InformationWeek Research report. Why No 'Intel Inside' Stickers On Macs? It seemed like a stupid question -- one which deservedly got a heaping helping of ridicule from Mac bloggers: Why doesn't Apple participate in the "Intel Inside" marketing program, earning the company big wads of cash just for putting a tiny little sticker on Macs? Will Google Kill Its Enterprise Apps If The Business Doesn't Pan Out? Techdirt today commented on Google's decision to kill its paid video service. The move effectively eliminates access to content Google users paid for. Mike Masnick is spinning the move as another strike against DRM -- and I don't fault his argument there. But, I see another issue this decision reveals. iPhone As Video Conferencing Tool? Two Mac-hacking brothers set out to create an application for this year's C-4 Developer Conference Iron Coder competition. What did they come up with? A video conferencing program for the iPhone. Mobile Data Usage Continues To Grow In U.S. Analyst Chetan Sharma cobbled together some new statistics about mobile data usage. The results show that data services make up an increasingly bigger chunk of wireless network operators' revenues. In all, we spent $5.85 billion on data in the second quarter of 2007. Novell's Victory Over SCO Could Have Downside For Linux Users The free software world spent the weekend celebrating after a judge nixed SCO's ownership claims over Unix and, by extension, Linux. But the ruling did not specifically address SCO's charge that Linux is a Unix knock off--and a case that could have settled that question for good may now fade away as a result of Friday's decision. Should Business Or Government Do Our Terrorist Screening? Ever since Sept. 11, 2001, there?s been a question of how big a role businesses such as airlines and banks should play in helping to identify terrorists. The Department of Homeland Security's headed in the right direction in wanting to take passenger screening over from the airlines. Groklaw's Pamela Jones On The SCO Decision By now, everyone knows that the upcoming SCO vs. Novell trial is mostly moot, because Judge Dale Kimball has ruled that Novell owns the Unix copyrights. While the decision marks a welcome end to the three-year-long legal saga, it spotlights the wimpy nature of pundits and many in the computer industry, who cowered on the sidelines, fearful of recommending or adopting Linux while the litigation proceeded, lest SCO sue them, too. Will Google Be Destroyed By Open Source Search Engines? Could open source kill the golden egg that laid Google? If Wikia has its way, it just might. Thumbs Surgically Altered For iPhone? Think Again It's been a long week. More layoffs at Sun, Sprint Nextel's earnings down (again), the wheels finally coming off the municipal wireless bus, AT&T censoring Pearl Jam's anti-Bush lyrics (and then claiming it was unintentional), etc. etc. So when we saw this story, the editorial team at IW rejoiced. Texting While Driving Redux As a follow up to the story I wrote the other day about texting while driving, I decided to conduct a highly unscientific little experiment. I took a stroll around my New Jersey neighborhood and looked in each car as it zoomed past. You'd be surprised to learn how many people weren't paying attention to the road. How to Succeed with Offshore Software Testing When Almost Everyone Else Fails Offshore software testing projects fail at a greater rate than most other types of offshore projects. Most of the research into this problem points to very generic reasons. This paper identifies why offshore software testing projects fail, quantifies the impact of a failure and gives a list of actions that can prevent failure from happening. Business Technology Marketing Benchmarks 2007-2008 PDF Slides Find out what 1,038 B2B marketers revealed about what works for lead generation and nurturing tactics. Invite your entire team to view this free Webcast and learn about B2B email, search marketing and surprising Webcast and white paper marketing statistics. Apparel Manufacturer Improves Business Processes Using Everest Software Managing business for menswear manufacturer Kenneth David Apparel was a difficult process. With Everest's ability to analyze and automate everything from e-commerce to point-of-sale functions, Kenneth David Apparel has been given unprecedented visibility into their business and is now able to easily track important factors like profitability. 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