Computer Daily News

No. 2 carrier Optus says it has upgraded its Australia-wide wholesale fibre network to 100Gbps, hopefully bringing faster speeds and greater capacity to high-end corporate users in Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra, Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth, and Cairns.Optus’s wholesale optical network is claimed to provide business and government customers with high-speed connectivity. There’s no mention of better results for home and small-business users.

The future of the NSW Government’s controversial Opal contactless card fare-payment system is in some doubt, after Transport Minister Andrew Constance yesterday revealed plans to trial a rival system allowing passengers to use their bank credit cards on the State’s public transport network.The trials will begin next year and see passengers

able to make a journey with a simple tap of their credit cards.

However Constance warned that there is still a lot to be done before commuters

can throw away their Opal cards.

This would include” finalising partnerships, working with the finance and

contactless payments sector, developing the software and then in 2017,

undertaking a customer trial,” Constance said, announcing the trial at a

Future Transport Summit in Sydney

Queensland is also looking at taking its own Go Card e-ticketing system down

the same path, and is in the process of re-assessing its electronic

ticketing contract with technology company Cubic ahead of market developments.

Cubic has installed its contact-free card fare systems in NSW, Queensland and

London.

Technology stocks soared across the board as US stockmarkets rebounded overnight. The Nasdaq composite index leapt almost 12 percent, or 194.74 points, to close at 1844.25 at 7am, Sydney time. The Dow Jones industrial average was up 936 points, or 11 percent at 9387.61. All stocks in CDN’s page 4 listing carry a plus mark. Big gainers included Apple, up $13.46, or almost 14 percent, to $110.26, after a week below $100; and Google, which jumped $49.02, or 14.7pc, to close at $381.02.

Technology stocks soared across the board as US stockmarkets rebounded overnight. The Nasdaq composite index leapt almost 12 percent, or 194.74 points, to close at 1844.25 at 7am, Sydney time. The Dow Jones industrial average was up  936 points, or 11 percent at 9387.61. All stocks in CDN’s page 4 listing carry a plus mark. Big gainers included Apple, up $13.46, or almost 14 percent, to $110.26, after a week below $100; and Google, which jumped $49.02, or 14.7pc, to close at $381.02.

Industry bellwethers Hewlett Packard (up 12pc), Intel (11.8pc), Microsoft (18.6pc) and Oracle (13pc) all had heroic rises. Canada’s Research In Motion was up 15.5pc.

The US resurgence followed a good day for most Australian tech stocks on the ASX. Telstra was up 4.6pc at $4.09; while Oakton, Bravura and Technology One all recorded good rises.

 Intel kicks off earnings reports from technology companies today, US time. The microchip maker has seldom looked stronger ­ but fears about what could happen to technology demand have seldom loomed larger.

The Silicon Valley giant is riding one of its strongest product lineups in years. Intel microprocessors serve as the calculating engines for most PCs.
Now Intel is trying to expand by promoting netbooks and new pocket-sized devices.

The Wall Street meltdown has cut Intel’s market capitalisation by US$43 billion, or about one third, since the beginning of September. Intel’s numbers for the quarter ended September 30 might not be hurt but there is intense interest in what the chipmaker and other tech companies will say about the prospects for the current quarter ­ traditionally the busiest for electronics makers.

Australians spent a total of $18.3 billion online during the full 2014-15 financial year, with $9.3 billion in the six months to June 2015, up 21.7 percent on the same period last year.

SYDNEY – Almost eight in 10 Australians (79 percent) support monitoring publicly available information on social media to detect possible terrorist activity, and 68 percent support such monitoring to identify public issues according to a new Unisys survey.

Ho wever, 68 percent are not comfortable with organisations using social media monitoring to make targeted advertising or offers.The Unisys Security Insights report claims that a

majority of Australians support monitoring social media such as Twitter,

Facebook and YouTube to detect possible terrorist activity and to identify

public issues for the “the greater good” – but not if it is for commercial

gain.

“The use of social media by terrorists has been widely reported and has clearly

had an impact on the Australian public’s acceptance of the need for authorities

to monitor these channels for public safety and national security purposes,”

says John Kendall, security program director at Unisys Asia Pacific.

“However, Australians clearly take into account the objectives of such

monitoring to discern whether it is acceptable.

“There is moderate support to monitor social media to track an organisation’s

performance or to evaluate job candidates in positions of trust such as carers

or teachers. But there is very little support – only 27 percent approval – for

using this information for marketing.”

It’s official. In the biggest takeover deal ever in the technology sector, Dell founder Michael Dell has won his fight to acquire storage giant EMC for roughly US$67 billion in cash and stock.