Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee has criticised the Equality and Human Rights Commission
for poor control of its computer costs. The errors cited include the department’s £9.3m spend on new equipment including computer terminals even though it had inherited equipment from its predecessor organisations.

A former US director of national intelligence has warned the Senate that the US would lose an online war if it were fought today. Mike McConnell, director of national intelligence from 2007 to 2009, told a Senate Committee last week that the US is unprepared to defend itself. “The federal government will spend more each year on missile defence than it does on cyber security, despite the fact that we are attacked thousands of times each day in cyberspace and are vulnerable to attacks of strategic significance,” he said.

Business advisory firm Deloitte is predicting that mobile search applications will become one of the five most-used smartphone applications by the end of 2010. According to Deloitte, mobile search revenue in 2010 is projected to be a modest $1bn-$2bn (£637m-£1.27bn), but by 2012, Deloitte predicts that smartphone shipments could pass the half-billion mark. In the same year, the firm believes that search could generate the bulk of the mobile advertising market.

BT has announced a three-year extension to an existing contract between its Global Services arm and the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). The contract extension, worth a minimum of £237m, will extend to units that include Jobcentre Plus, the Pensions, Disability and Carers Service, Northern Ireland Social Security Agency and the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission. The DWP's IP network and telephony systems regularly handle more than two million calls a day and sometimes three million at peak times, according to BT.

A report into the security of internet banking systems has found that a major problem is the reuse of log-in passwords on multiple sites. Online security firm Trusteer found that 73 per cent of internet banking customers used the same password for their online banking services as they did for other, less secure sites.

Some of BT's rivals have complained to Ofcom that they may be unable to plan some future investments effectively, owing to BT reneging on its original 21st Century Network (21CN) rollout plan by not moving all its customers from the analogue public switched telephone network to a full Internet Protocol (IP) system.

A new £12m scheme called Get Connected aims to give disabled and elderly people in care homes more access to IT and the internet. The scheme is being funded by the Department of Health and aims to benefit as many as 22,000 care providers in the UK.

Government plans to introduce scanning technology into UK airports remain vague despite its scheduled rollout in a matter of weeks, while privacy organisations and child protection agencies have raised questions about the legitimacy of the technology, which shows people as if they were naked.

 

One third of UK and US workers would steal data to help their friends find a job, according to a recent study from digital account management specialists Cyber Ark. Some 41 per cent of workers have already taken sensitive information from their employers and 57 per cent said it had become easier to take sensitive information from their bosses.

Transport for London (TfL) has awarded a supplier contract for the development and implementation of a new lost property system. IT services firm PDMS will carry out the work related to the platform, which is scheduled to go live in mid 2010.

 

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