Facebook improves privacy
by Jan HarrisFacebook is changing its privacy settings to make it easier for users to be sure their personal content stays private. The social networking site has been criticised because it does not always make it clear if others are able to see content. A privacy control option, which was previously hidden behind menus, has now been [...]
July 8, 2011
Businesses told to wait for Google+
by Jan HarrisGoogle’s newly launched social network, Google+, which claims to provide ‘real-life sharing, rethought for the web’ is not for business users – well, not just yet anyway. Since the service was launched to invited users on 28 June it has been a stop start ride, with Google ‘throttling back’ the service the following day due [...]
July 5, 2011
Google favourite to snap up Hulu
by Jan HarrisGoogle is reported to be the favourite to buy video on demand firm Hulu, although Yahoo! is believed to have already made an offer. Microsoft is also said to be interested in a deal for the US-based service and several other companies are in early stage talks, according to Associated Press. A deal with Hulu [...]
June 30, 2011
News Corp offloads MySpace and takes BSkyB on board
by Jan HarrisRupert Murdoch’s media giant, News Corp, has agreed to sell social networking site MySpace to digital content specialist Specific Media for just $35m. News Corp acquired the ailing site for $580m in 2005 but it has floundered in recent year in the face of competition from Facebook. Specific Media now plans to take MySpace back [...]
June 14, 2011
Is ‘Facebook fatigue’ setting in?
by Jan HarrisNew data from Inside Facebook, which monitors the social networking site, shows that 100,000 UK users and six million US users stopped using their accounts in May. Although the site is still continuing to edge towards the 700 million mark, growth is slowing down. The number of active monthly users reached around 687 million by [...]
March 23, 2011
LinkedIn nets 100 million users
by Jan HarrisLinkedIn, the social networking site for business users, has broken the 100 million members barrier. The site is growing at a rate of one million members each week and over half of its members come from outside the US. It has taken the site eight years to reach this stage, but with the company planning [...]
January 12, 2011
Social network malware could be biggest mobile security threat
by Darren AllanSecurity firm BitDefender reckons that platform-independent malware which targets social networks is becoming as widely spread as the malware targeting PCs. And furthermore, payloads delivered via social networks could be the most pressing security threat when it comes to mobile devices. The outfit cites goo.gl statistics which show one of the URLs used to propagate [...]
August 17, 2010
McAfee says 55,000 new pieces of malware created every day
by Darren AllanSecurity specialist McAfee, a company that produces anti-malware software, has recently issued its second quarter threat report. And apparently malware activity has hit an all-time high, with six million malicious files uncovered by the company in the last three months. The most prevalent threats included fake anti-virus software and malware targeting social networks. World Cup [...]
August 12, 2010
Facebook costs businesses millions in lost time
by Jan HarrisTime wasted on social networks could be costing businesses millions of pounds according to research by MyJobGroup.co.uk Out of a survey of 1,000 workers in the UK, 6% spent over an hour a day on sites such as Facebook and Twitter, with obvious implications for productivity especially for SMEs. MyJobGroup.co.uk estimates that this lost time [...]
August 2, 2010
Yell boosts SME marketing with Facebook
by Jan HarrisYell has ventured into social networking in order to expand the marketing services it provides to SMEs through its netReach network. netReach offers around 70 sites on which SMEs can advertise their products and services. Yell’s partnership with Facebook will now allow netReach subscribers to benefit from targeted advertising on the social networking site. The [...]
May 18, 2010
Ofcom reports greater awareness of Internet security
by Jan HarrisResearch by Ofcom has found that people are becoming more careful about how they use the Internet. A survey, of 1,824 people aged 16 and over, found that people are more aware of the dangers of entering their personal details on social networking sites such as Facebook than they were in 2007, which is hardly [...]