Messenger 6 public beta

Microsoft has made available a public beta of its latest Messenger instant messaging system - version 6. The beta adds a range of new features seen in the likes of Yahoo! messenger and AIM, such as the ability to participate in games (although this feature wasn't available when we tried the beta), and the ability to add an animated icon. More personalisation is available in the form of more than 30 new emoticons and the chance to choose and create background images. ...more

Our chips will be even faster than your chips

Intel has announced that it has built the world's fastest and smallest CMOS transistor. The claim means that if the current trend continues over the next ten years, the company will be able to produce chips that are 10 times faster than the ones we have now. Intel's fastest chip at the moment, the Pentium 4, has 42 million transistors to aid it process millions of calculations but future chips could contain 100 times more transistors. ...more

Chinese online censorship 'the most sophisticated in the world'

China's Internet filtering regime is 'the most sophisticated effort of its kind in the world' according to a new report by the Open Net Initiative. The OpenNet Initiative is a partnership of universities, including Cambridge University, that seeks to test and evaluate the methods and extent of censorship of electronic media throughout the world. During the examination of Chinese repression, the ONI tested China's Internet filtering of web content, blog postings, and email correspondences. ...more

Synchronising to more places than the desktop

The SyncML 1.0 specification was launched in London yesterday with the promise of providing "tomorrow's synchronization technology for today's mobile solutions". What it could mean is that today's desktop-centric model of synchronising data becomes increasingly outmoded The idea is that SyncML-enabled devices should be able to synchronize personal data and provide interoperability among any SyncML-compliant services. ...more

EU sets up cyber crime unit

The EU has agreed to assemble a European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA) to provide a co-ordinated front against security threats to Europe's online infrastructure. Erkki Liikanen, European Commissioner for Enterprise and the Information Society said of the decision: 'I'm very pleased that both Parliament and Member States have seen the urgency to get this agency in place and have been able to reach an agreement on the first reading of the proposal. All parties involved in the issues of network and information security have been advocating closer co-operation and the ENISA delivers the infrastructure for this. ...more