Tomorrow's online news. 08-03-2013 | Scie

The U.S. Department of Justice and 33 U.S. states and territories proposed those changes after U.S. District Judge Denise Cote in Manhattan last month found in a civil antitrust case that Apple played a "central role" in a conspiracy with the publishers to raise e-book prices.

Regulators also want Apple for two years to let retailers such as Amazon.com Inc and Barnes & Noble Inc provide links to make it easier for consumers to compare prices.

They also want Apple to use an outside monitor to ensure that its internal antitrust compliance policies are strong enough to catch illegal conduct before consumers are harmed. The proposed changes require Cote's approval.

"Under the department's proposed order, Apple's illegal conduct will cease, and Apple and its senior executives will be prevented from conspiring to thwart competition," said Bill Baer, head of the Justice Department's antitrust division.

Apple did not immediately respond to requests for comment. It has said it did not conspire to fix e-book prices and that it planned to appeal Cote's decision.

Regulators accused Apple of conspiring to undercut Amazon.com's e-book dominance, causing some prices to rise to $12.99 or $14.99 from the $9.99 that Amazon.com was charging.

They said the alleged collusion had begun in late 2009 and continued into early 2010, as Cupertino, California-based Apple was launching its popular iPad tablet.

The publishers included Lagardere SCA's Hachette Book Group Inc, News Corp's HarperCollins Publishers LLC, Pearson Plc's Penguin Group (USA) Inc, CBS Corp's Simon & Schuster Inc and Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH's Macmillan.

Only Apple went to trial, while the publishers agreed to pay more than $166 million for the benefit of consumers.

The new agreement includes a special dividend of 13 cents per share along with an offer increased by 10 cents per share to $13.75 per share, Dell's special board committee, set up to ensure shareholders are getting the best deal, said in a statement.

Dell shares were up about 5 percent at $13.61 in early Friday trading.

A vote on the buyout, held under a the new standard, has been rescheduled for September 12, while the record date, which determines which shareholders are entitled to vote, will be reset to August 13 from June 3.

The new deal and delay in the voting date boost the buyout consortium in several ways.

Abstentions under the previous voting system counted as "no" votes, and with an estimated quarter of eligible shares not having been voted either way, that was a substantial hurdle to overcome. Under the new deal, shares that are not voted will be excluded from the tally.

As with the previous deal, Michael Dell, who has a 15.7 percent stake in the company, will be excluded from the vote and his shares not counted in the tally.

A change in the record date by more than two months is also seen as enfranchising so-called arbitrage investors - hedge funds that bought Dell stock more recently to earn a few cents per share and would likely support the buyout.

Under the deal, Dell shareholders will also be entitled to three regular quarterly dividends of 8 cents per share totaling 24 cents, since the first deal with Michael Dell and private equity partner Silver Lake was announced on February 5.

The special dividend of 13 cents per share will be funded with excess equity resulting from Michael Dell's rolling over his shares in the deal at a lower price, subsidizing Silver Lake's returns, according to a person familiar with the matter.

He had previously agreed to roll over his shares at $13.36 per share, lower than the $13.65 per share original buyout offer.

Together with the 10 cent per share increase in the buyout offer, this results in an increase in the original $24.4 billion bid by about $350 million.

"If you have to go through these machinations to get these things through, it frankly is an excellent demonstration of why management buyouts are so problematic," said Charles Elson, director of the John L. Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at the University of Delaware.

Kerry made the announcement at the U.S. Embassy in London.

"When same-sex couples apply for a visa, the Department of State will consider that application in the same manner that it considers the application of opposite sex spouses," Kerry said shortly after his arrival in London.

"If you are the spouse of a U.S. citizen, your visa application will be treated equally. If you are the spouse of a non-citizen, your visa application will be treated equally. If you are in a country that doesn't recognize your same-sex marriage, then your visa application will still be treated equally at every single one of our 222 visa processing centers around the world," he added.

The move comes after the Obama administration urged all U.S. agencies to review their polices after the U.S. Supreme Court in June struck down a key part of the federal law that defined marriage as between a man and a woman.

In January, Latvian Deniss Calovskis was named by the US as one of the creators of the Gozi virus.

Latvian courts have twice rejected US extradition requests and its foreign minister has now backed their stance.

In a statement, he said the potential jail term Mr Calovskis faced was too severe for the crimes he is alleged to have committed.

The US began its campaign to extradite two of the three men alleged to have used Gozi soon after publicly accusing the trio of infecting more than one million computers with the virus and stealing data that was then used to plunder bank accounts.

They ran a "modern-day bank robbery ring, that required neither a gun or a mask", said US attorney Preet Bharara in January.

Romanian Mihai Ionut Paunescu and Russian national Nikita Kuzmin were named as the co-creators of Gozi. Mr Kuzmin is already in jail in the US following his arrest in May 2011 on separate hacking and fraud charges. Extradition proceedings against Mr Paunescu are currently on hold pending an appeal.

In a message posted to the website of Latvia's Foreign Ministry, minister Edgars Rinkevics said Latvian law guaranteed that people who broke the law suffered only "proportionate punishment".

Mr Rinkevics said the US sought a jail term for Mr Calovskis that exceeded 60 years. While he could not take a view on whether Mr Calovskis broke the law or not, the jail term amounted to an effective life sentence, he wrote.

"In my view, such a penalty is disproportionate to the amount, and so far no-one has been able to conclusively dispel my fears that it might be otherwise," he said.

In addition, he said, there were questions over whether any of the crimes Mr Calovskis is alleged to have committed actually took place on US soil. The trans-national nature of much cyber crime would make it hard to prove his involvement, wrote Mr Rinkevics.

Finally, said the minister, if Mr Calovskis was found guilty there was no reason why he could not serve a sentence for his crimes in his native Latvia.

Security analyst Graham Cluley said Gozi was a very successful trojan that pilfered huge sums from bank accounts.

"If you caught a criminal who stole sums like that in traditional bank robberies, you would expect them to have the book thrown at them and wouldn't be surprised if they ended up with a serious criminal sentence," he said.

"It's important to see more co-operation internationally to bring internet criminals to justice, and a consistency in the treatment and sentencing of convicted hackers," he added.

During the flight, he fielded 21 questions on subjects ranging from scandals at the Vatican bank to women in the Church to why he carries his own briefcase. But perhaps the comments that revealed most about the type of Church he envisions came in response to a question about gays in the Vatican.

"If a person is gay and seeks God and has good will, who am I to judge?" he said, pointing out that the Church's Catechism says homosexuals should not be marginalized, and should be treated with respect and integrated into society.

It was the first time any pope had uttered the word 'gay' in public - using it five times - and was another sign that he has his ear closer to the ground than his predecessor Benedict, whom he succeeded as head of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics in March.

It also chimed with the Church precept of "loving the sinner and hating the sin", a notion not always evident in Benedict's pronouncements; a 2005 document he approved said homosexual tendencies were "objectively disordered", and in a 2010 book he described homosexuality as "one of the miseries" of the Church.

"'Who am I to judge' may end up being the most-quoted five words spoken by a modern pope," said John Thavis, author of the best-selling book The Vatican Diaries and who covered the Vatican for 30 years for the U.S.-based Catholic News Service.

"Pope Francis has realized the simple truth, that when the Church preaches on pelvic and political issues like birth control, abortion and same-sex marriage, many people stop listening. So instead of repeating the rules and revving up the 'culture of death' rhetoric, he's focusing on another essential side of Christianity, mercy and compassion. And of course, that's much more inviting," Thavis said.

Much the same point was made by a senior Vatican official, who asked not to be named.

"What is the benefit of hammering on about issues where the position is already well known, either embraced or not?" he said.

"Come on in, John," Obama shouted.

A red-faced McCain turned around and headed out to chuckles and then applause from the Democrats. "My mistake," McCain said.

To the far-right in the Republican Party, there is no mistake about it. In a party that generally brooks no compromise with Obama, McCain is the compromiser-in-chief. He's negotiating with the White House.

And he's in-their-face about it, having recently described as "wacko birds" two of the right's most uncompromising heroes, Senators Ted Cruz and Rand Paul.

A recent article in the conservative National Review described McCain as "Obama's secret weapon" and a "lethal threat" to a Republican victory in the budget battles this fall.

If Obama somehow wins an upcoming fiscal showdown with Republicans, the president may have McCain to thank.

The 2008 Republican presidential nominee, the man Obama beat, is now engaged in talks with a half-dozen fellow Senate Republicans and the White House aimed at trying to craft a bargain on critical fiscal issues to avoid a nasty standoff in the fall that could lead to a government shutdown or a government default, or both.

Obama already owes McCain for brokering the deal last month that allowed the president to overcome Republican objections and fill seven top administration jobs.

And McCain joined four Democrats and three Republicans in drafting the Senate's landmark bill to overhaul U.S. immigration laws, a top Obama priority.

So popular has the Arizona Republican become among Democrats that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid - who in 2008 said, "I can't stand John McCain" - now describes him as a "great senator," right up there with the late Ted Kennedy, the Democratic "lion of the Senate" who became a bridge between parties after his own presidential ambitions were crushed.

"He's become our go-to guy," a senior Democratic aide said of the 76-year-old white-haired senator.

That's an exaggeration. McCain remains a critic of Obama's handling of the deadly attack on a U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, last September and of what he considers the "disgrace" of Obama's non-intervention in Syria.

"He made a lot of friends here -- and great for him that those Americans who live here and found about his situation and were in touch with him," his Russian lawyer Anatoly Kucherena said.

Sought by American authorities, Snowden is putting high emphasis on his security now that he can roam freely in Russia, according to his lawyer. "He's concerned about life and health because he believes that people from the American intelligence service are chasing him," Kucherena said. "This is a superpower. And the statements made by the State Department recently are threatening to him."

Russia's awarding temporary asylum to Snowden -- he can legally stay in Russia for one year, his lawyer said -- has infuriated U.S. officials, so much so that they are reconsidering a planned meeting between President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin next month in Moscow before a G-20 gathering in St. Petersburg, Russia.

"We are evaluating the utility of a summit," White House spokesman Jay Carney said. The U.S. was not given a heads-up about Russia's decision, according to spokesmen from the White House and State Department. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said that U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul has previously discussed the United States' feelings on Snowden and reiterated those views Thursday.

In an interview with state-run Russia 24, Kucherena said that Russia "didn't have a choice" in granting his client asylum. "It was a humane decision because Edward couldn't come and buy himself tickets to Havana or any other countries since he had no passport," the attorney told the news outlet. "So Russia behaved very honest in this situation."

The lawyer added: "It's not right to implement any sanctions" against Russia. A former U.S. government contract employee, Snowden leaked to the media that the NSA had secretly collected and stored millions of phone records from accounts in the United States. The agency also collected information from U.S. companies on the Internet activity of overseas residents, he said.

This high-profile leak thrust Snowden to the center of the debate about government surveillance, privacy and leaking for almost two months, during which he's been in limbo at Moscow's airport.

Today, owned by retail giant Carrefour, it has tripled in size and offers 19,000 different products.

The store's growth mirrors Carrefour's global expansion, but the format - an out-of-town warehouse offering cheese, lawn mowers and almost everything in between - is shrinking as online vendors, convenience shops and discounters bulk up.

Some fear the decline could be terminal.

Not Carrefour, which pioneered the stores across the globe, making it the world's second largest retailer after Wal-Mart, but its attempts to revive the hypermarket in France have ended the tenure of a string of chief executives.

Not long ago, ballooning debts, falling profits and strategy U-turns such as a failed merger in Brazil led to concerns the company might be broken up. Now, with the French economy slowly crawling out of recession, it is trying again.

"I was happy when Georges Plassat took the helm at Carrefour, because he has no doubts the hypermarket has a future, so now at least two of us think that way," said Vincent Mignot, managing director for France of rival Auchan.

Plassat, who became CEO in May 2012, is streamlining an empire that sprawled from China to Brazil. He has sold assets in Colombia, Malaysia and Indonesia to reduce debt, and pledged to invest up to 2.3 billion euros to renovate or expand stores, mostly in France, which accounts for nearly half of group sales.

Plassat wants to offer shoppers low prices and simpler products, renovate aging stores and give managers more autonomy after decades of central planning.

Even one of its biggest investors, property tycoon Thomas Barrack, concedes that reviving the firm was "like moving an aircraft carrier".

THE CHALLENGE

Earlier this year, Carrefour for the first time lost its market lead in France, as Leclerc, a cooperative of independent store owners, took 19.9 percent in the four weeks to May 19, pipping Carrefour's 19.6 percent.

It was back on top in the period to July 14, but it has little wiggle room on margins to give shoppers the low prices they want when unemployment is at a 14-year high. In 2012, it made just 2.6 percent profit on sales, compared with 3.7 percent for smaller rival Casino and 4.7 percent for Britain's Tesco in its home market in 2012/13.

It follows a High Court ruling in June that the name infringed the broadcaster's trademark.

The judge had said there was evidence Skydrive's name had caused confusion among the public.

Microsoft had originally said it would appeal. The tech company said it has now agreed to change the name worldwide after a "transition period".

In a joint statement, Microsoft and BSkyB said: "The settlement of this case reflects the desire of both companies to focus on joint projects to benefit their customers."

UK owners of Microsoft's Xbox 360 can access Sky's channels via the games console and there have been reports that the two are in talks for a deeper tie-up with the forthcoming Xbox One.

Mistaken belief

Although BSkyB ended its Store & Share cloud storage service at the end of 2011, it had argued that Microsoft's use of the word "sky" in its brand posed a problem since it still ran other digital services including its Sky Broadband and Sky Go video streaming products.

In her ruling, the judge noted that customers having problems with Microsoft's product had ended up calling the broadcaster's helpline in the mistaken belief it was responsible for the service. It marks the second time in recent months that BSkyB has successfully defended its trademark against a tech company.

At the end of last year Livescribe - the US maker of products that record a digital version of their owner's handwriting - pulled its Sky pen from UK stores after receiving a legal challenge from the broadcaster.

In February it announced that it was rebranding the device as the "Livescribe wifi smartpen" and had agreed to recall stock using the old name.

Microsoft had to make another name change to one of its products recently.

It had originally called its Windows 8 tile-based user interface Metro to distinguish it from the more traditional desktop option.

However, last August it began calling it the "Windows 8-style UI" instead. There were reports that the German retailer Metro AG had objected to the name.

Russia's decision to help the American, and ignore U.S. requests to send him home to face trial for leaking details of government surveillance programs, is sure to anger Washington and increase doubts that a summit between presidents Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin will go ahead in Moscow in September.

After 39 days avoiding hordes of international reporters desperate for a glimpse of him, Snowden managed to give them the slip again, leaving the airport in a car.

"Over the past eight weeks we have seen the Obama administration show no respect for international or domestic law but in the end the law is winning," Snowden, whose first leaks were published two months ago, was quoted as saying by the WikiLeaks anti-secrecy group which has assisted him.

"I thank the Russian Federation for granting me asylum in accordance with its laws and international obligations."

Grainy images on state television showed the 30-year-old's document, which is similar to a Russian passport, and revealed that he had been granted asylum for a year from July 31.

A Russian lawyer said he had handed Snowden a document from Russia which enabled him to leave the airport for a safe location which would remain secret, and that he could now work and travel freely in the country of 142 million.

State television also showed a picture of him getting into a grey car at the airport driven by a young man in a baseball cap. Snowden wore a backpack and a blue button-up shirt.

"He is the most wanted man on planet Earth," Snowden's lawyer, Anatoly Kucherena, told Reuters. "He has to think about his personal security. I cannot tell you where he is going."

"He can live wherever he wants in Russia. It's his personal choice," he said.

OTHER OFFERS OF ASYLUM

Snowden, who had his U.S. passport revoked by Washington, fled to Moscow from Hong Kong on June 23 and had stayed at a hotel at the airport, Kucherena said, but was "psychologically exhausted".

"Imagine yourself daily (having to listen to) 'Dear passengers, the flight to New York, the flight to Washington, the flight from Rome'," the lawyer said.

Snowden, whose revelations have fuelled a debate in the United States about civil liberties and national security needs, was accompanied by Sarah Harrison, a WikiLeaks representative.

The United States made three-quarters of the 1,157 data requests during the six-month period, according to the San Francisco-based company's report. (Report: transparency.twitter.com/)

Governments usually want the emails or IP addresses tied to a Twitter account.

In one well-known case, a French court ordered Twitter in February to turn over information about an anonymous account that posted anti-Semitic tweets. Twitter, which had initially resisted by arguing that the data was stored beyond French jurisdiction in its California servers, ultimately complied in June.

Efforts to censor Twitter content have also risen sharply, the company said.

"Over the last six months, we have gone from withholding content in two countries to withholding content (ranging from hate speech to defamation) in seven countries," said Twitter legal policy manager Jeremy Kessel.

Twitter was censored the most in Brazil, where courts issued orders on nine occasions to remove a total of 39 defamatory tweets.

The report did not include secret information requests within the United Sates authorized under the Patriot Act, a law enacted after the September 11 attacks. U.S. companies are prohibited from acknowledging the existence of data requests made under those statutes.

Transparency reports such as the one published semi-annually by Twitter have been a particularly contentious issue in Silicon Valley in the wake of a series of leaks in June by former security contractor Edward Snowden, who alleged that major service providers including Google Inc, Facebook Inc and Microsoft Corp systematically pass along huge troves of user data to the National Security Agency.

The companies, which have denied the scope of Snowden's allegations, have asked the U.S. government for permission to reveal the precise number of national security requests they receive in order to publicly argue that their cooperation with the government has been relatively limited. The negotiations between the companies, which include Twitter, remain ongoing, but firms including Microsoft and Facebook released in June some approximate figures of how many users have been affected by the data dragnet cast by U.S. intelligence.

The update has been prepared in response to research that created malicious chargers that could upload code onto devices plugged into them.

The work by computer scientists at Georgia Tech in the US can compromise iOS devices in about 60 seconds.

Apple's pending update warns users to be sure they are using a trusted charging point when they plug in.

The custom built chargers include a small computer alongside the electronic components that pipe power into an Apple iOS device.

The tiny computer interrogates an iPhone or tablet and copies a unique ID number that identifies that phone.

This is then used on an Apple website to take advantage of an uploading tool usually used by developers to test their software on an iOS gadget.

Instead of uploading a program in development, the trio of researchers, Billy Lau, Yeongjin Jang, and Chengyu Song, managed to upload an application that stole data.

The malicious chargers and their associated data-stealing application were demonstrated at the Black Hat hacker conference currently under way in Las Vegas.

In the demo, the trio showed off a fake Facebook app that could grab screenshots of passwords and make calls on behalf of an attacker.

The limited nature of the attack, which requires phones to be unlocked and for attackers to be a registered developer with Apple, were noted by tech news site Ars Technica.

The researchers from Georgia Tech's Information Security Center gave some details about their attack in June and this prompted Apple to prepare an update for devices running version seven of its iOS operating system. The update is currently part of the beta release for iOS 7. The final version of iOS7 will be released in the Autumn.

The update asks users if they are sure they can trust the device they are using to charge their phone or tablet.