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Facebook’s Picks Sweden For First Data Center Outside U.S. | PCMag.com

October 27, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Facebook has tapped a Swedish town about 62 miles south of the Arctic Circle to be the home of its first data center outside of the U.S. Located in the northern town of Lulea, Facebook said the server site will improve performance for European users.

“Facebook has more users outside the U.S. than inside,” Facebook’s director of site operations Tom Furlong told the Associated Press. “It was time for us to expand in Europe.”

Facebook currently has servers in California, Virginia, and Oregon and is building another complex in North Carolina. The company chose Lulea for its first European site because of its chilly climate, necessary for keeping servers cool. In the winter the temperature stays far below freezing and in the summer, it rarely climbs above about 80 degrees.

Lulea was also selected for its proximity to sources of renewable energy. The town is near a river with hydropower stations that generate double the electricity yielded by the Hoover Dam, Facebook told the AP. Powering the servers will require 120 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 16,000 homes, according to the Telegraph.

The new site can run entirely on renewable energy, but Facebook has plans to build 14 backup diesel generators capable of producing 40 megawatts of electricity in case of a blackout, the AP said.

via Facebook’s Picks Sweden For First Data Center Outside U.S. | News & Opinion | PCMag.com.

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HP Planning ARM-Based Servers With Calxeda, Challenging Intel: eWeek.com

October 27, 2011 By Leave a Comment

HP reportedly will become the first major server maker to use ARM-based processors in some of its data center servers.

Hewlett-Packard reportedly will partner with chip-maker Calxeda to develop data center servers powered by low-power processors designed by ARM Holdings.

Quoting unnamed people close to the situation, Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal are reporting that HP will become the first major OEM to adopt ARM-based processors for some of its servers, a move that would heighten the growing competition between ARM and Intel, the world’s top chip maker.

Intel, which holds more than 80 percent of the overall global chip market and 90 percent of the $9 billion worldwide server chip space, has been aggressive in trying to break into the mobile device space, particularly smartphones and tablets, the bulk of which currently are powered by ARM chips manufactured by the likes of Texas Instruments, Samsung, Qualcomm and Nvidia.

At the same time, ARM executives have been vocal about their plans to move up the ladder and into PCs and low-power servers, and a number of manufacturers—including Calxeda, Marvell Technologies and Nvidia—are developing chips for the data center. Calxeda has a product-based event scheduled for Nov. 1, though the company has not yet said what the event will be about.

via HP Planning ARM-Based Servers With Calxeda, Challenging Intel: Reports – IT Infrastructure – News & Reviews – eWeek.com.

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No Friends In Ireland: Probe Begins Into Facebook Privacy Issues | Fox News

October 26, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Privacy watchdogs began an on-site investigation Tuesday of Facebook’s regional office in Ireland, FoxNews.com has learned, following sensational accusations that the company is creating extensive “shadow profiles” of non-users.

The eye-popping assertion came in a complaint filed in August by Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner, which alleges that users are encouraged to hand over the personal data of others. That includes “sensitive data such as political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, sexual orientation and so forth” — and Facebook is storing it all up in its databases.

Despite the company’s firm denials, the Data Protection Office began hunting for evidence on Tuesday, Oct. 25, to back up those claims.

“The on-site element started on Tuesday,” Lisa McGann, a spokeswoman for the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner, told FoxNews.com. The search will take a number of days, she said, but she could not address questions about what specifically the commissioner hoped to find or had already discovered.

In such investigations, the office has the power to inspect the building, question employees, and take away copies of any files stored on local computers, according to the Commissioner’s audit guidelines. The agency will then pore over that data for the next few weeks.

“It is the intention of the commissioner that the investigation will be completed by the end of the year,” McGann told FoxNews.com. The organization conducts few such reports each year; according to the Data Protection Commissioner’s 2010 annual report, the office opened 231 formal complaints under the Privacy in Electronic Communications Regulations act — but only conducted 32 “comprehensive privacy audits.”

via No Friends In Ireland: Probe Begins Into Facebook Privacy Issues | Fox News.

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RIM Faces Class Action Lawsuit Thanks To BlackBerry Outage | TechCrunch

October 26, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Sorry RIM, but it looks like the promise of free apps and tech support weren’t enough to assuage the masses. According to the Financial Post, RIM is preparing to deal with a class action lawsuit filed on behalf of users affected by the recent worldwide service outage.

Filed in Quebec Superior Court by the Consumer Law Group, the complaint seeks compensation for all of RIM’s customers that “were unable to access their email, BlackBerry Messenger service (BBM), and/or Internet for the period of October 11 to 14, 2011.” RIM hasn’t received the complaint yet, but company representatives have said that the company will “formally respond” to the matter soon.

The lawsuit’s lead complainant was an avid user who used his BlackBerry to communicate with his friends across the western hemisphere. According to the formula laid out in the complaint, he will only be able to collect $1.25 in damages from RIM — not much, but the payouts could quickly add up if the lawsuit picks up steam. The amount of damages owed is calculated on a person by person basis, and accounts for how long a customer was left without service, so some users will net more than others.

via RIM Faces Class Action Lawsuit Thanks To BlackBerry Outage | TechCrunch.

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Get your house in order with Early Data Assessment: Part I – Inside Counsel

October 26, 2011 By Leave a Comment

If you build a house with a weak foundation, the building is sure to fall apart. The same holds true for e-discovery—if you don’t pay attention to the early stages and properly calculate from the beginning, you’re in for a world of pain down the line.

From information management to identification, preservation and collection, the left side of the industry standard Electronic Discovery Reference Model (EDRM) is truly the foundation of the electronic discovery process. Corporations face this challenge in litigation on a regular basis, and if the house falls down, the finger-pointing will begin.

Picture the EDRM turned 90 degrees to the left, so it stacks up vertically. From that angle, the data makeup of a legal matter’s possibly relevant Electronically Stored Information (ESI) forms the bedrock for successful data preservation, collection, analysis and review strategy. At this nascent stage, Early Data Assessment becomes important.

What is Early Data Assessment?

Early Data Assessment (EDA) has evolved recently as an integral part of the EDRM far-left side workflow. EDA involves preliminary evaluations of data early in the life of a matter. It can include examining the technology and data sources possibly involved in the specific legal matter, not to mention the metadata about that ESI.

The idea behind EDA is to determine the types of data to be potentially preserved, gathered and analyzed, maybe to identify gaps or overlaps in the data, and to begin developing a variety of lists that can be used to help scope the project. EDA also can entail working with the ESI to better understand its substantive content, construct and evaluate potential story lines, craft discovery strategies, and develop e-discovery cost estimates and litigation budgets.

The EDA process is not to be confused with Early Case Assessment which typically relates to assessing legal liability. By contrast, Early Case Assessment usually happens at the onset of a matter as inside or outside counsel assess the viability of a matter, compare it against similar past matters, determine whether insurance coverage may come into play, make decisions about what counsel to retain, and engage in other similar activities focusing on evaluating the entire case early.

via Get your house in order with Early Data Assessment: Part I.

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Telecoms Exec Receives Longest FCPA Sentence Ever – Corruption Currents – WSJ

October 26, 2011 By Leave a Comment

The former president of a telecommunications company was sentenced to 15 years in prison, the longest term ever handed down in a U.S. foreign bribery case.

Joel Esquenazi, the former president of Terra Telecommunications Corp., received the sentence Tuesday from U.S. District Judge Jose E Martinez in the Southern District of Florida. Carlos Rodriguez, the former vice president of Terra, received seven years in prison.

Both were convicted in August for their roles in a scheme to bribe officials at the Haiti state-owned telecoms company. They were found guilty of seven counts of violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, 12 counts of money laundering, one of money laundering conspiracy and one of conspiracy to violate the FCPA and wire fraud.

“This sentence ––the longest sentence ever imposed in an FCPA case — is a stark reminder to executives that bribing government officials to secure business advantages is a serious crime with serious consequences,” said Lanny Breuer, assistant attorney general, in a statement.

via Telecoms Exec Receives Longest FCPA Sentence Ever – Corruption Currents – WSJ.

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Airline E-mails Could Play a Big Part in Buffalo, NY Plane Crash Lawsuit « Above the Law

October 26, 2011 By Leave a Comment

I’ve been writing about electronic discovery for almost three years now. I’ve learned that most of the time, it’s not worth trying to interest non-attorneys in the subject. My friends’, family’s, and girlfriend’s eyes glaze over pretty quickly when I started mentioning the EDRM model or document review.

So when I saw the story early this morning about big e-discovery news in the litigation following a tragic plane crash, at first I thought I had misread something.

On February 12, 2009, Colgan Air Flight 3407 crashed near Buffalo Niagara International Airport in New York, killing 50 people. Later that year, authorities blamed pilot error for the crash. Unsurprisingly, families of the victims have sued the airline for failing to provide trained, capable, and rested pilots. This week, attorneys for the families released internal company e-mails that appear to show Colgan knew the pilot of the doomed flight was having serious problems.

What do the e-mails have to say?

The pilot, Marvin Renslow, was officially blamed for the crash. In late 2009, authorities said neither he nor his first officer realized the plane was slowing down too quickly, and that he also reacted improperly to warning signs that the plane was entering a stall.

Before starting work at the airline, Renslow failed a check flight, the flying equivalent to a driving test in a car. He failed two more while he worked at Colgan.

Despite that, in August 2009, Philip Trenary, president and CEO of Pinnacle Airlines, the parent company of Colgan Air, testified at a Senate hearing that they didn’t know enough to prevent Renslow from flying.

“Had we known what we know now, no, he would not have been in that (pilot’s) seat,” Trenary said.

via Airline E-mails Could Play a Big Part in Buffalo, NY Plane Crash Lawsuit « Above the Law: A Legal Web Site – News, Commentary, and Opinions on Law Firms, Lawyers, Law School, Law Suits, Judges and Courts.

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U.S. Requests for Google User Data Spike 29 Percent in Six Months | Threat Level | Wired.com

October 25, 2011 By Leave a Comment

The number of U.S. government requests for data on Google users for use in criminal investigations rose 29 percent in the last six months, according to data released by the search giant Monday.

U.S. government agencies sent Google 5,950 criminal investigation requests for data on Google users and services from Jan. 1 to June 30, 2011, an average of 31 a day. That’s compared to 4,601 requests from July 1 to Dec. 31, 2010, the company reported Tuesday in an update to its unique transparency tool.

Google says it complied in whole or part with 93% of such requests, which can include court orders, grand jury subpoenas and other legal instruments.

For the first time, Google’s transparency report includes the number of users and accounts affected by such requests — in this case, 11,057.

The search and software giant also received 92 requests to remove data from its services, including YouTube. The requests collectively asked for 757 individual pieces of content be removed. Google says it complied fully or partially with 63 percent of the requests. The company noted it received a request from law enforcement to take down a video showing police brutality and another for videos allegedly defaming law enforcement officials. Google did not comply with either.

via U.S. Requests for Google User Data Spike 29 Percent in Six Months | Threat Level | Wired.com.

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RIM hit with trademark suit over BBX operating system name | mobileburn.com

October 25, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Basis International, a company that offers products under the BBx name, has followed through on its threat to sue Research In Motion for its use of the name “BBX” for the company’s next generation BlackBerry smartphone and tablet operating system.

An excerpt from the complaint filed by Basis International follows:

“After RIM’s public announcement of its BBX operating system, BASIS began receiving inquiries from confused customers. In addition to the inevitable confusion created by RIM’s use of the mark BBX for related goods, customers and prospective customers are also likely to wrongly believe that software applications created using BASIS’ development tools are only compatible with RIM’s BBX operating system, thus impairing and destroying BASIS’ reputation for providing software development tools for cross-platform development.”

via RIM hit with trademark suit over BBX operating system name.

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eDiscoveryJournal Founders Officially Launch New Market Research Firm — eDJ Group, Inc. – MarketWatch

October 25, 2011 By Leave a Comment

The founders of eDiscoveryJournal (eDJ), a leading source of independent and unbiased perspectives on eDiscovery news, trends and best practices, today announced the launch of eDJ Group, Inc. The official formation of the legal industry’s newest market research and consulting firm integrates and showcases the demand for the services eDJ has been providing to its legal, IT and service provider clients since opening in 2009.

“eDJ Group’s ability to cover competitive market dynamics, best practices and trends — not only at the strategic level, but also at a very granular level — sets us apart from other firms,” said Barry Murphy, principal analyst and co-founder of the eDJ Group. “Our unique combination of market research, hands-on eDiscovery experience and IT acumen has established us as the market research leaders covering information governance and eDiscovery requirements.”

eDJ was co-founded in 2009 by Barry Murphy — who, while at Forrester Research, was one of the first analysts in the industry to cover the eDiscovery market — and Greg Buckles, one of the industry’s leading eDiscovery experts with more than 20 years’ experience working in consulting and leadership roles for legal service providers, corporate legal departments, law firms and IT/software development. Last May, eDJ added Jason Velasco as CEO to drive the rapid expansion of the firm’s research products, content and services.

“The expansion and growth of eDJ Group’s consulting and analyst services are being driven by the strong demand we’re seeing in the market today,” said Buckles. “Organizations — from the smallest law firm to the corporate clients — are coming to us for guidance and support because of our unique expertise.”

via eDiscoveryJournal Founders Officially Launch New Market Research Firm — eDJ Group, Inc. – MarketWatch.

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