Microsoft sues Samsung over Android

4 August 2014 Last updated at 13:25

Microsoft is suing Samsung in a dispute over Android patent fees.

Microsoft says the South Korean firm failed to pay it on schedule for the use of its inventions and has begun legal action in New York.

In a blog, the US firm said Samsung had used Microsoft's takeover of Nokia's handset unit "as an excuse to breach its contract".

Samsung has said: "We will review the complaint in detail and determine appropriate measures in response."

The case marks the first time that Microsoft has launched legal action against Samsung.

The two companies have a long-running partnership, due to the Asian manufacturer's sale of Windows PCs and Windows Phone handsets.

Nokia deal

Although Microsoft is best known for its own Windows operating system, it also claims ownership to hundreds of patents relating to Google's Android OS.

It has pursued many Android device-makers for related licence fees and to date has struck deals with more than 25 companies, including HTC, Acer, ZTE and Nikon.

Samsung agreed to Microsoft's demands in September 2011 and made its first year's payment the following year.

But a censored copy of court papers filed by Microsoft's lawyer, and posted online by news site Geekwire, indicate that Samsung blocked a second payment after learning of the Nokia deal in September 2013.

Although the documents state that Samsung later paid the fee in November 2013, Microsoft claims it is still owed money to cover the interest on the sum over the period it was not paid.

In addition the US company is unhappy that Samsung is reserving the right not to make future payments.

It also complains that Samsung has asked the Korean competition authorities to intervene to eliminate the need for future fees - a matter that Microsoft says would be outside the regulators' authority.

Furthermore, the papers suggest Samsung has threatened Microsoft with its own patent infringement claims relating to the Nokia takeover.

"Microsoft values and respects our partnership with Samsung and expects it to continue. We are simply asking the court to settle our disagreement, and we are confident the contract will be enforced," wrote David Howard, deputy general counsel for Microsoft, on the firm's blog.

Samsung declined to discuss any of the specific claims.

Microsoft has never disclosed how much it makes from its Android patents, but analysts have estimated the figure is between $1bn (£595m) to $2bn a year.

One company watcher said Microsoft would be keen to avoid a precedent that other firms might try to make use of to cancel their own payments.

"The fear would be that this case could develop into a revenue stream leakage that would be difficult to tap," said Windsor Holden, research director at Juniper Research.

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Sharp posts 55% rise in profit

1 August 2014 Last updated at 10:17

Japanese electronics maker Sharp has reported a 55% year-on-year increase in its operating profit for the April-to-June quarter, beating forecasts.

The results are due in part to healthy sales of the firm's liquid-crystal display (LCD) televisions in some countries including China.

The electronics giant posted $45.36m (4.67bn yen; £26.8m) in overall operating profit for the period.

Sharp is Japan's largest maker of LCD screens and its third-largest TV maker.

LCD screens are used in televisions, as well as some smartphones, including Apple's iPhone.

Some reports say the firm is already producing screens for Apple's next smartphone, the iPhone 6, which is due for release next month.

The electronics giant noted that Japan's economy had showed a moderate recovery during the quarter, "despite a partial downturn in personal consumption stemming from slow demand in the wake of the consumption tax hike".

Japan introduced its controversial new sales tax in April this year.

Other factors

Headquartered in Osaka, Sharp recently implemented a major restructuring programme as it struggled against slowing demand for its products, growing competition and a strong Japanese currency.

The restructure, which included job cuts, has had some impact on its performance in recent months.

As part of its growth plans, Sharp has said it is focused on establishing five areas of business, including healthcare and medical services, robotics and education among others.

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Wikipedia link 'hidden from Google'

4 August 2014 Last updated at 12:25 By Joe Miller Technology reporter

A Wikipedia entry has been removed from certain Google search results, under the new EU "right to be forgotten" law.

The landmark ruling, passed in May, allowed Europeans to ask for links to "irrelevant" and outdated personal data to be removed from search engines.

The Wikipedia incident, first reported in The Observer, marks the first time an entry on the online encyclopaedia has been targeted, the BBC understands.

Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales has expressed his opposition to the law.

The "right to be forgotten" ruling has been the subject of much controversy since the decision by European Union Court of Justice (ECJ).

While the law has been welcomed by some privacy advocates, many groups have said it contravenes the right to free speech, with some even calling it censorship.

Last week, the Lords Home Affairs EU Sub-Committee said it was wrong to give search engines such as Google the job of deciding what should be removed, and called the law unreasonable.

More than 90,000 removal requests have been received by Google in the months since the law was imposed, and other search engines, such as Bing, have also implemented procedures to accept public requests.

In July, an article written by the BBC's Robert Peston was removed from Google search results, and links to articles on the Guardian, Telegraph and Independent news sites have also been taken down.

Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia, has long expressed his concerns about the "right to be forgotten".

Speaking on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme in July, Mr Wales said: "The law as it stands right now is quite confusing.

"We have this one ruling of the ECJ which is very open-ended and very hard to interpret.

"I would say the biggest problem we have is that the law seems to indicate Google needs to censor links to information that is clearly public - links to articles in legally published, truthful news stories.

"That is a very dangerous path to go down, and certainly if we want to go down a path where we are going to be censoring history, there is no way we should leave a private company like Google in charge of making those decisions."

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'Draconian' Russian net law enacted

1 August 2014 Last updated at 00:05

A new law imposing restrictions on users of social media has come into effect in Russia.

It means bloggers with more than 3,000 daily readers must register with the mass media regulator, Roskomnadzor, and conform to the regulations that govern the country's larger media outlets.

Internet companies will also be required to allow Russian authorities access to users' information.

One human rights group called the move "draconian".

Continue reading the main story

The internet is the last island of free expression in Russia"

End Quote Hugh Williamson, Human Rights Watch

The law was approved by Russia's upper house of parliament in April.

It includes measures to ensure that bloggers cannot remain anonymous, and states that social networks must maintain six months of data on its users.

The information must be stored on servers based in Russian territory, so that government authorities can gain access.

Critics see it as the latest in a series of recent moves to curb internet freedom.

'Free expression'

Hugh Williamson, of New York-based Human Rights Watch, has called the law "another milestone in Russia's relentless crackdown on free expression".

"The internet is the last island of free expression in Russia and these draconian regulations are clearly aimed at putting it under government control," he added.

Opposition figures have used the internet to air their views, with some gaining millions of followers.

Commentators opposing Vladimir Putin often face restrictions in broadcast outlets and newspapers.

Analysis: Famil Ismailov, news editor, BBCRussian.com

Russian bloggers are bracing themselves for the moment when Russia's new "information security law" comes into force on 1 August. Some already share advice on how to use proxy servers in order to access social media sites that, in their view, are under threat of being closed.

It is hard to see how the law will be enforced. The servers for most of the popular social media platforms that many Russians use are based outside Russia.

Many popular bloggers are already looking for, and apparently finding, ways to "cheat" the feature that counts page visits and keep their daily unique visitor numbers just under 3000, or to make sure that the statistics are hidden altogether.

Anton Nossik, who is considered Russia's "internet guru", wrote in his LiveJournal blog that the new law didn't threaten individual bloggers directly, but provided legal grounds to block popular social networks like Facebook, Twitter, LiveJournal and Google.

"The issue of banning all these platforms in Russia is a political one and it will be decided by only one person", Mr Nossik wrote, with a thinly veiled reference to President Vladimir Putin.

Critics blocked

Earlier in the year, Russia enacted a law that gave the government powers to block websites without explanation.

In March, Moscow blocked the blog of Mr Navalny, along with two news sites and a organisation run by Garry Kasparov - a vocal critic of the Russian government.

In a statement, Russia's prosecutor general's office said the blocks were imposed because of the sites' role in helping stage illegal protests.

Earlier this week, Twitter blocked access to an anti-Kremlin account that often publishes leaked government documents, following a request by Russia's federal communications agency Roskomnadzor.

'CIA project'

For many years, Russia had relatively lax internet laws.

However Moscow has recently changed its tune, with Mr Putin branding the internet an ongoing "CIA project".

He also claimed that the popular Russian search engine Yandex was controlled by foreign intelligence.

Two years ago, Russia enacted a law enabling authorities to blacklist and force certain websites offline without a trial.

The government said the legislation was designed to protect children from harmful internet content, such as pro-suicide or pornography websites.

On Thursday, lawyers for US intelligence officer Edward Snowden said the whistleblower had filed for refugee status in Russia.

Mr Snowden received temporary shelter in Russia last year.

He had evaded US authorities after he leaked classified government documents revealing mass surveillance programmes undertaken by the NSA in the US and GCHQ in the UK.

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Wearables tracked with Raspberry Pi

1 August 2014 Last updated at 11:30

People who use wearable gadgets to monitor their health or activity can be tracked with only $70 (£40) of hardware, research suggests.

The work, carried out by security firm Symantec, used a Raspberry Pi computer to grab data broadcast by the gadgets.

The snooping Pi was taken to parks and sporting events where it was able to pick out individuals in the crowds.

Symantec said makers of wearables need to do a better job of protecting privacy and handling data they gather.

'Serious breach'

The research team used a barebones Raspberry Pi computer to which they added a Bluetooth radio module to help sniff for signals. At no time did the device try to connect to any wearable. Rather, it just scooped up data being broadcast from gadgets close by.

Symantec said the eavesdropping was possible because most wearables were very simple devices that communicated with a smartphone or a laptop when passing on data they have collected.

The researchers, Mario Barcena, Candid Wueest and Hon Lau, took their Pi to busy public places in Switzerland and Ireland, including sporting events, to see what data they could grab.

"All the devices we encountered can be easily tracked using the unique hardware address they transmit," the team wrote in a blogpost.

Some of the devices picked up were also susceptible to being probed remotely to make them reveal serial numbers or other identifying information. It would be "trivial", said the researchers, for anyone with a modicum of computer and electronics knowledge to gather this information.

Trick databases

In addition, the research team looked at the apps associated with some activity monitors or which use a smartphone to gather data. About 20% of the apps Symantec looked at did nothing to obfuscate data being sent across the net even though it contained important ID information, such as name, passwords and birthdate.

"The lack of basic security at this level is a serious omission and raises serious questions about how these services handle information stored on their servers," said the Symantec team.

Further investigation revealed that many apps did not do enough to secure the passage of data from users back to central servers. In some cases it was possible to manipulate data to read information about other users or trick databases into executing commands sent by external agents.

"These are serious security lapses that could lead to a major breach of the user database," said the team.

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Uber taxi app 'competing unfairly'

1 August 2014 Last updated at 23:44

The Uber taxi app is "competing unfairly" with London's black cabs, senior Labour MP Margaret Hodge says.

She has written to Boris Johnson asking why Transport for London allows cars to take bookings through the app without a licence to operate in the capital.

Mrs Hodge claims the firm is "opting out of the UK tax regime" but Uber said it complied with "all applicable tax laws".

Thousands of taxi drivers protested against the app in June.

The smartphone app works out the cost of fares using GPS. Cab drivers say it is similar to using a taxi meter, which only they are legally entitled to do.

'Impact on livelihoods'

The app's Dutch operating company, Uber BV, does not pay tax in the UK - but Mrs Hodge said TfL could insist that it does so.

She said: "I am particularly concerned about the tax structure that Uber and others have apparently constructed and the impact this has both on the public purse and on the livelihoods of London cabbies and private hire drivers.

"This structure allows these new entrants to unfairly undercut London operators by opting out of the UK tax regime.

"TfL allows this to happen by failing to apply the appropriate regulations to Uber."

In the letter to Mr Johnson, the mayor of London, Mrs Hodge, who chairs the cross-party Commons Public Accounts Committee, added: "Surely TfL has a duty to enforce legislation that will ensure a fair and level playing field for all taxi and private hire operators?

"I would be grateful if you could set out the steps you will take to ensure that TfL does not inadvertently allow tax avoidance in London and that all taxi and private hire drivers receive a fair deal."

She has been backed by the Licensed Private Hire Car Association (LPHCA), which represents 20,000 cabbies.

'Corporate greed'

LPHCA chairman Steve Wright said: "London's taxi and private hire industries are being compromised by inconsistent licensing enforcement by TfL and the apparent ability for app-based operators like Uber to operate through an offshore tax regime.

"As well as the loss in revenue to the country, a whole industry that has a wonderful compliance record - unlike some of these new apps - is being undermined by foreign entities, working the UK tax system for corporate greed."

But an Uber spokesman said: "Uber complies with all applicable tax laws, and pays taxes in all jurisdictions, such as corporate income tax, payroll tax, sales and use tax, and VAT.

"Uber London Limited is a licensed private hire vehicle operator and recently passed the largest inspection of records ever conducted by TfL."

Chief operating officer at TfL Garrett Emmerson said he was "fully satisfied" the app was operating lawfully.

He added: "TfL's role is to licence and regulate the taxi and private hire industry in London. We do not have any powers in relation to an operator's corporate structure and how or where they pay tax."

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Police get cash to develop rural app

2 August 2014 Last updated at 08:24

Two Welsh police forces will develop an £837,000 app to send witness statements from remote locations.

The cash has come from a UK government innovation fund, which has seen Wales' four police forces awarded £1.2m.

The Gwent and South Wales Police app will allow officers to record and upload audio and visual statements from a crime scene to a shared system.

It will mean officers can be freed from having to return to base, and can spend more time on patrol.

The app will work on mobile phones and tablets and means statements can be uploaded directly to data systems.

It will allow the two forces to share information, give officers quick access to data and let the public monitor the progress of a criminal report and incidents of anti-social behaviour.

As well as funding for the statement app, the Home Office innovation fund has also awarded the Gwent force a further £234,500 for a Wales-wide project aimed at working with women who have been arrested.

Body cameras

The scheme will try to help rehabilitate female offenders, and divert them away from a life of crime. The pilot scheme will run until 2016.

Gwent Police and Crime Commissioner Ian Johnston said: "This funding is truly fantastic news and I would like to congratulate everyone who brought their new and innovative ideas to the table and who worked so hard on making these range of exciting bids a reality."

The innovation fund is offering police forces across Britain access to £50m in grants.

In the latest round, North Wales Police has been awarded £44,538, and the Dyfed-Powys force was given £95,500.

North Wales Police will spend the money on body-mounted video cameras for officers and the money given to Dyfed-Powys Police will be used for a system to exchange information with other organisations during ongoing incidents.

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GCHQ unveils 'cyber spy' degrees

2 August 2014 Last updated at 16:34

Intelligence agency GCHQ has accredited six UK universities to teach specialist master's degree courses to future internet security experts.

The degrees form part of the UK's cyber security strategy published in 2011.

The strategy recognised that education was key to improving defences against hackers and online fraud.

Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude said internet cyber security was a "crucial part" of the government's long-term plan for the British economy.

He said the courses would help to make the "UK one of the safest places in the world to do business online".

He said: "Through the excellent work of GCHQ, in partnership with other government departments, the private sector and academia, we are able to counter threats and ensure together we are stronger and more aware."

UK universities were invited to submit their master's degree courses for certification.

The universities now running GCHQ-approved programmes in cyber security are Edinburgh Napier University, Lancaster University, the University of Oxford and Royal Holloway, University of London.

GCHQ has also given provisional accreditation to Cranfield University's cyber defence and information assurance course, and the University of Surrey's information security course.

A spokesman for GCHQ said the universities "were judged to provide well-defined and appropriate content, delivered to the highest standard".

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Quick video games 'benefit children'

4 August 2014 Last updated at 05:16 By Smitha Mundasad Health reporter, BBC News

Playing video games for a short period each day could have a small but positive impact on child development, a study by Oxford University suggests.

Scientists found young people who spent less than an hour a day engaged in video games were better adjusted than those who did not play at all.

But children who used consoles for more than three hours reported lower satisfaction with their lives overall.

The research is published in the journal Pediatrics.

Experimental psychologist Dr Andrew Przybylski analysed British surveys involving 5,000 young people aged 10 to 15 years old.

Social interactions

Some 75% of those questioned said they played video games daily.

Children were asked to quantify how much time they spent gaming on a typical school day - using consoles or computers.

They then rated a number of factors, including:

Continue reading the main story

Being engaged in video games may give children a common language"

End Quote Dr Andrew Przybylski University of Oxford

• Satisfaction with their lives

• How well they got on with peers

• How likely they were to help people in difficulty

• Levels of hyperactivity and inattention

The answers were combined to assess levels of psychological and social adjustment.

When compared with all other groups, including those who played no video games at all, young people reporting under an hour of play each day were most likely to say they were satisfied with their lives and showed the highest levels of positive social interactions.

The group also had fewer problems with emotional issues and lower levels of hyperactivity.

According to the results, people who spent more than three hours playing games were the least well adjusted.

'Digital world'

Dr Przybylski says there may be numerous reasons behind this.

He told the BBC: "In a research environment that is often polarised between those who believe games have an extremely beneficial role and those who link them to violent acts, this research could provide a new, more nuanced standpoint.

"Being engaged in video games may give children a common language.

"And for someone who is not part of this conversation, this might end up cutting the young person off."

He argues that policies and guidelines that impose limits on the use of this technology need to take such evidence into account.

Dr Przybylski points out that though the effect of video games on children is statistically significant in this study, factors such as the strength of family relationships play a larger role.

Dr Iroise Dumontheil, of Birkbeck, University of London, who was not involved in the research, said: "Other studies have shown that playing first-person shooter games, but not other types, can lead to increased visuospatial processing and memory abilities.

"Further research would help to determine whether particular types of game help or hinder adolescents as they adjust to the changes they experience during development."

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Google 'reveals child porn user'

4 August 2014 Last updated at 15:19

Google has revealed the identity of a user after discovering child abuse imagery in the man's Gmail account in Houston, Texas, according to a local news report.

It alerted a child protection agency, which notified the police and the man was arrested, KHOU 11 News reported.

Google told the BBC it would not comment on individual accounts.

The arrest raises questions over the privacy of personal email and Google's role in policing the web.

Police in Houston told the local news station that Google detected explicit images of a young girl in an email being sent by John Henry Skillern. After the existence of the email was referred to them by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the police obtained a search warrant and arrested the man.

The 41-year-old is a convicted sex offender. He has been charged with possessing child pornography, it was reported.

"I can't see that information, I can't see that photo, but Google can," Detective David Nettles said.

Emma Carr, the acting director of privacy lobby group Big Brother Watch, told the BBC: "With the rate that Gmail messages are scanned, and the fact that all US companies are bound by US law to report suspected child abuse, it is hardly surprising that this individual has found themselves on the wrong side of the law.

"However, Gmail users will certainly be interested to know what action Google proactively takes to monitor and analyse Gmail messages for illegal content, including details of what sorts of illegal activity may be targeted. Google must also make themselves very clear about what procedures and safeguards are in place to ensure that people are not wrongly criminalised."

The BBC understands that Google does not search Gmail accounts for other forms of illegal activity, such as pirated content or hate speech.

'Proactively identifying'

David Drummond, the chief legal officer for Google, has previously said that Google helps fund the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), which is tasked with "proactively identifying child abuse images that Google can then remove from our search engine".

Google works with the IWF and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children extensively, he said, adding: "We have built technology that trawls other platforms for known images of child sex abuse. We can then quickly remove them and report their existence to the authorities."

Google automatically scans email accounts to provide ads within Gmail, which has more than 400 million users worldwide.

In April, Google updated its terms and conditions to say: "Our automated systems analyse your content (including emails) to provide you personally relevant product features, such as customised search results, tailored advertising, and spam and malware detection. This analysis occurs as the content is sent, received, and when it is stored."

This occurred after a class-action lawsuit against the company over email scanning was dismissed earlier this year. At the time, Google said that "a person has no legitimate expectation of privacy in information he voluntarily turns over to third parties".

In April Google also stopped scanning more than 30 million Gmail accounts linked to an educational scheme following reports that the scans might have breached a US privacy law.

Facebook has also faced a similar class-action lawsuit over message scanning.

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