EU approves Telefonica's O2 bid

1. EU approves Telefonica's O2 bid

The European Union (EU) has approved Telefonica's £17.7bn ($31.6bn) takeover of UK mobile phone company O2 after the Spanish firm agreed competition terms.

For more on this:
- read full story from BBC News, Jan 10 2006


2. HK puts IT services deals back on track

The government is pursuing an expanded and aggressive new outsourcing plan after it was forced to terminate two information technology services contracts last year.

For more on this:
- read full story from scmp.com, Jan 10 2006


3. Dodgy anti-spyware firms to cough up $2m

Two dodgy anti-spyware operators have agreed to cough up $2m to settle charges brought by the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The US consumer watchdog alleged that Spyware Assassin and TrustSoft used email and pop-up ads to drive net users to their websites for a "free spyware scan".

For more on this:
- read full story from theregister.co.uk, Jan 10 2006


4. 'Annoying e-Mail' Law Stirs Blogosphere

A new law extending telephone harassment prohibitions and penalties to anonymous e-mails and Voice over IP (define) calls has raised nary a peep among civil liberty groups and the legal community.

For more on this:
- read full story from internetnews.com, Jan 10 2006


5. CRM and VoIP: The Beginning of a Beautiful Friendship

Internet telephony is merging with customer-relationship management (CRM) to give birth to a new generation of business tools. Specifically, the integration of CRM with Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP, is no longer conjecture.

For more on this:
- read full story from Yahoo! News, Jan 10 2006


6. AOL Acquires Video Search Startup Truveo

America Online Inc. is acquiring a video search startup that has built technology to more easily find the latest news, sports and other online video offerings.

For more on this:
- read full story from washingtonpost.com, Jan 10 2006


7. Oracle, Sun chiefs take the stage together

If there was one key message at a public summit meeting of sorts between the chief executives of Sun Microsystems and Oracle on Tuesday, it was that the companies have been and will continue to be partners.

For more on this:
- read full story from infoworld.com, Jan 10 2006


8. An Elixir for Outlook Users?

Lots of business people say they "live" in Outlook. Microsoft's Elixir is designed to make Siebel CRM seem homey to them. Microsoft's 17,000 employees using Siebel sales force automation make it one of the world's largest global deployments.

For more on this:
- read full story from internetnews.com, Jan 9 2006


9. Microsoft Plugs 'Critical' E-Mail Server Holes

Microsoft Corp. on Tuesday released two security bulletins to fix "critical" flaws in several widely deployed products, including one that presents a remote unauthenticated attack vector that could leave corporate e-mail servers open to a destructive network worm attack.

For more on this:
- read full story from eweek.com, Jan 10 2006


10. Instant messaging attacks rose in 2005

Security attacks over instant-messaging networks became more prevalent in 2005, according to a new study.

For more on this:
- read full story from CNET news.com, Jan 10 2006