Bob Woods

A vulnerability in Microsoft’s Chat Control program can affect several popular messaging-related titles from the software giant, including the MSN Messenger and Exchange Instant Messenger IM programs. A malicious hacker taking advantage of the weakness can effectively take control of a user’s system — a situation Microsoft says is “high” in severity. It mainly affects […]

AOL Time Warner’s America Online unit still has a software problem with its AOL Instant Messenger (AIM), according to a security-research group. What’s more, the vulnerability — now being filtered by AOL and apparently no longer a threat — takes the same digital road as the one discovered last January, the group said. The non-profit […]

Communication infrastructure software and applications developer Openwave is teaming with IBM Corp. to combine messaging technologies like IM with Big Blue’s WebSphere software platform for e-business. Openwave’s messaging and mobile software includes e-mail, Mobile Instant Messaging (IM), unified messaging, multimedia messaging, downloading, browsing, provisioning and subscriber and services management. IBM components include WebSphere Portal, WebSphere […]

Some of America Online’s more-popular services are coming to a TiVo near you — one of the newer units, anyways — through a deal announced between the digital-video recorder (DVR) maker and the New York-based AOL Time Warner Inc. subsidiary. Terms of the pact call for San Jose, Calif.-based TiVo to integrate AOL features like […]

Users of America Online’s instant-messaging program and system were unwittingly connected to profanity and pornography last Saturday, according to an anti-AOL Web site. AOL Watch said that malicious hackers — more accurately known as “crackers” — inserted profane graffiti, X-rated photos and sound files throughout the “Entertainment” section in AIM Today. The AIM Today feature […]

Sprint Corp. is creating a bridge between verbal communication and the typed word with its new Sprint Enterprise IM offering. The new system is now available as either a managed hosting platform or a corporate IM solution wholly contained inside the firewall. Sprint also says its new Enterprise IM is the “first secure, end-to-end IM […]

Attention AOL AIM users — you’ve got a pushy program. The installation process of AIM on a PC covertly forces Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) browsers to accept “Welcome to America Online” at free.aol.com as a “Trusted site,” according to an article in Security Wire Digest. Automatically designating the free.aol.com site as a Trusted site allows […]

Telecommunications equipment maker Lucent Technologies Inc. saw its revenues fall and its net loss narrow in its second fiscal quarter, as it reported its eighth straight quarter of red ink while in a 16-month restructuring plan. The company also confirmed reports that it will cut about 6,000 more jobs, and said that its spin-off of […]

UPDATE: One of the next hot messaging technologies will involve … a pen and paper. Next Monday, four companies — Vodafone, Sony Ericsson, 3M and Esselte — will roll out the new Anoto technology that makes it possible to digitally transmit handwritten notes via e-mail, SMS, or fax. Users can also send a digital copy […]

Wireless data and network infrastructure/services provider MobileSys said it has launched a wireless enterprise alert and device management product for the enterprise. The solution is designed to “accurately deliver information to the right people at the right time on the right device,” company officials said. The new MobileSys Command Center also allows IT managers to […]

“Necessity is the mother of invention,” the old saying goes. It can be adapted to the entrepreneurial world, too: “Necessity is the generator of a new business.” Two young men, barely out of high school, decided to use their expertise in computer programming to create an instant messaging system. They decided to target the enterprise […]

Peer-to-peer (P2P) giant Groove Networks Inc. of Beverly, Mass., says its new version (2.0) of its collaboration and IM software package will include integration with Microsoft Office applications, new project and meeting management toolsets, and the introduction of customer-hosted management and system integration capabilities. The package, which will be released next Monday, includes “significant enhancements” […]