Bill Would Clarify Rules on Data Breach Disclosures
A co-author of California's groundbreaking breach-disclosure law has filed a bill that calls for providing more information about incidents to both consumers and government agencies. Read more...

Microsoft-led privacy group backs off legislation

Privacy groups rip Google's targeted advertising plan

Opinion: In Windows 7, IE on-off option a win for users

EU extends Microsoft's antitrust deadline over IE

Google will let people choose how its ads target them

Broadband stimulus meeting short on answers

California bill spells out what companies have to say about data breaches

Microsoft Cut Some H-1B Workers but Will Hire More

2010 U.S. census will be 'most expensive' ever, officials say

More Legislation/Regulation Stories

Kundra takes leave, Google raises privacy flags
Well, at least the issue is not unpaid taxes this time -- but Vivek Kundra, the brand-new, first-ever federal CIO after just a few days on the job is already on a leave of absence after the office of the Washington, D.C., CTO was raided by federal agents. Kundra had been the District's CTO before President Barack Obama appointed him the nation's CIO. In other news, Google peeved privacy advocates by announcing a behavioral advertising program and separately saying it is testing a new service that will transcribe voice-mail messages and make them searchable.

People Search Engines: Slam the Door on Info
As we slowly put more and more pieces of ourselves online, specialized search engines are making it easier than ever to pull them together into a highly detailed (and potentially invasive) profile of our virtual lives.

People Search Engines: They Know Your Dark Secrets
[Editor's note: While researching this story, JR Raphael discovered the Coldplay radio station I created on Pandora on August 13, 2006; found that I had looked into purchasing a 4-foot iPod-compatible 3.5mm audio cable in October of 2007; and sleuthed out what my StumbleUpon user name is.Though only my musical taste was mildly incriminating, it was freaky to see what details popped up. (Do I want my hipster friends to know that I like Chris Martin and his melodic cohorts?) Read on to find out how deep these searches can go.]

New Zealand gets insane copyright law
Organized crime is everywhere. There's the Sicilian Cosa Nostra, the American Mafia and the Russian Mafia. There's also the Japanese Yakuza and, until they got so wealthy from their realty holdings and legitimate businesses they couldn't afford to be outside of the law, the Irish Sinn Fein.

Privacy: It's the databases, stupid
There are plenty of reasons to be outraged about the recent revelation that Alex Rodriguez tested positive for steroid use. But the one that gets me is this: Supposedly anonymous data, which was supposedly destroyed, has instead been splashed all over the newspapers.

FTC's behavioral ad regulations are underwhelming
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) recently published a somewhat tweaked set of self-regulation guidelines for companies collecting information on the actions of Internet users for the purpose of providing advertising to those users. I expect the FTC does not feel it has the authority to make any binding rules without Congressional action. But, even agreeing with that limitation, these principles are underwhelming and, as demonstrated by Google, are quite limited in usefulness even where companies claim to meet them.

Good IT salary news, plus scams, drugs and DTV
We're taking a break from (most) bad economic news this week. Among other things, a couple of new salary surveys struck encouraging notes.

Bulky trouble by the Bay
Few cities in the world owe as much to the Internet as San Francisco does. Both Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 helped to fund office construction, thousands of high-paying jobs, and soaring home prices in the city and across the whole Bay Area. The 'Net also owes a lot to San Francisco, the birthplace of Craigslist, Twitter, Blogger.com and countless other startups.

Digital TV delay bill dies in House
The Feb. 17 nationwide switch to digital television is still on, at least for now, after the House of Representatives failed to pass legislation that would have delayed the transition date to June 12.

How spyware nearly sent a teacher to prison
If there's a poster child for the dangers of spyware, it's Julie Amero, who was convicted of four felony charges after a classroom computer began showing inappropriate content in pop-ups when she was working as a substitute teacher.

Apple sent us a tricked-out version of its newly redesigned 17-in. MacBook Pro with 8GB of RAM, a 256GB solid-state drive and a blazing 2.93-GHz Core 2 Duo processor. Is it worth the high price? Google Earth 5.0 lets you fly anywhere on Earth for free, check out terrain and 3D buildings, plot your ideal vacation tour, explore the ocean floor and even see Mars up close. More than just useful or fun, these iPhone apps point the way toward the future -- of the iPhone and smartphones in general. This brand new ship, designed to operate in less than 20 feet of water, displays some eye-popping technological advancements. Take a video tour of the Navy's most technology-enhanced ship.

Get the latest news, reviews and more about Microsoft's newest desktop operating system

Find wage data for 50 IT job titles.

MarketVibe: The State of Data Governance in Enterprises Today (Source: IDG) In December 2008, Computerworld invited IT and line-of-business leaders to participate in a survey on data issues within their organizations. The goal of the survey was to gain a better understanding of the data issues that organizations are facing today, which groups have responsibility for maintaining the accuracy of this data, and the impact of these data issues on business initiatives. The survey was commissioned by Kalido, but data was gathered and tabulated independently by Computerworld and IDG Research Services. Sustainable Identity and Access Governance Business Data You Can Believe In The Metrics Driven Organization: Your Business in Challenging Times Identity and Security Management and Strong Information Technology Governance: Novell's Soultion Suite Automates the Approach to the Perfect Union Mitigate Risk with Novell Compliance Management Solutions Using Collaboration to Achieve Business Goals Multi-Dimensional Project Management Demonstrating Return on Investment with Enterprise-Class Identity and Access Management Technology Choosing a Reliable and Powerful IT Infrastructure at a Price You Can Afford Inventory Management Clustering System on JBoss Enterprise Middleware The Power of Mobility Mobility Security Worksheet Organizations Find Increasing Move Towards Universal Mobility Virtualization Sanity Check: Stopping the Sprawl with Complete IT Visibility A New Breed of Data Warehouse Increasing ROI and Reducing the Risks of Your Application Portfolio Best Practices for VMware Data Backup and Recovery Design Report: Independent Evaluation of Requirements Management Solutions Get Ready for Windows Vista® Best Practices: Safe and Secure Hardware Asset Recovery More White Papers

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"The whole sordid mess (if the allegations prove true) has very little to do with technology and a lot to..." Read more "At least one twitpic twitterer seems to have been standing outside the door when the raid took place...." Read more "The nominee to be the new federal CIO has had his former workplace raided by the FBI. And at least..." Read more More Government & Regulation Blogs See all Computerworld Blogs

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Columnist Bert Latamore digs deep to analyze the latest networking trends. Click here to read the latest column by Bert Latamore