IN THE PAPERS
In the papers 25 February
25-02-2010
by Sheila M Averbuch
Microsoft wins court approval to shut down botnet | Nortel Networks VoIP unit sale confirmed
All the papers report on Wednesday's news about the Google executives convicted in an Italian court of violating the privacy of an Italian boy, as reported by ENN on Wednesday.
The Irish Times reports on the Tyndall Institute's newly developed junctionless transistor, which measures just dozens of atoms across, as reported by ENN.
The Examiner reports on a priest who was fired following allegations he had posed in online advertisements offering sex for sale. Samuel Martin, 27, was dismissed after financial irregularities appeared in his parish in Toledo, Spain, where up to EUR17,000 from church donations was found missing. It is suspected that the funds were spent on telephone sex lines and internet pornography.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Microsoft has been granted a request to deactivate 277 domain names linked to a so-called botnet, a group of up to tens of thousands of PCs suspected of spreading spam and viruses. VeriSign, which oversees dot-com domain registrations, has been ordered to temporarily turn off the suspicious addresses, all of which show registration records with contact information in China.
The Financial Times reports that Deutsche Telekom has projected its EBITDA will be lower in 2010 than 2009, coming in at EUR20 billion compared to EUR20.67 billion last year. But the company said its net loss for the quarter ended 31 December 2009 was down to EUR3 million compared to a net loss of EUR730 million in the same quarter the year before. Sales during the quarter rose slightly, up 0.6 percent to EUR16.2 billion. The company vowed to reduce its costs even further, cutting another EUR4.2 billion by 2012, following savings of EUR5.9 billion already achieved since 2006.
Same paper reports that Telecom Italia will not release its 2009 results on Thursday as scheduled. The company's Sparkle unit is in the midst of a EUR2 billion money laundering probe and the unit has declined to approve its own books, the paper said. The results and an update of the company's business plan are expected on 25 March.
The same paper reports that Google has defended its search algorithms following the announcement of the European Commission's preliminary probe into the giant's search advertising business. Advertising executives, meanwhile, including Chief Executive Sir Martin Sorrell of the advertising group WPP, have welcomed the review, saying it will help make sure that "there is nothing going amiss" in the way Google conducts its business.
The Financial Times also reports that Nortel Networks is to sell its Carrier VoIP and Application Solutions Business to Genband, after abandoning attempts to sell the unit at auction. As announced in December, Genband of Texas will pay USD182 million to secure the unit, subject to court approval.
Caped Koala Studios has built a virtual world for kids, combining education and social networking 