Internet

Comcast has unveiled what may be the fastest broadband service ever offered to home users: a maximum speed of 305 megabits per second (Mbps). It's a plan that will cost subscribers $300 a month. The new package is part of Comcast's program to ... increase the speed of its fastest packages, including Xfinity Blast at 50 Mbps, Xfinity Extreme at 105 Mbps, and the new Xfinity Platinum at 305 Mbps. The slightly odd number (305 Mbps) has clearly been chosen to beat out rival Verizon's premium package, which tops out at 300 Mbps. The Verizon service is cheaper -- $205 a month -- but requires a two-year ... (view more)

Firefox developers say they've now vastly improved the browser, in two ways: First, they've prevented Google search engine users from having their search data exposed to the wrong people. Second, they've found a way to ensure Firefox uses much less ... of a computer's memory. The Google change is available in the newly-released Firefox 14, automatically encrypting all data you send to and from Google during a search. At present, Firefox can do this only with Google. But Firefox developers hope to make similar arrangements with other search engines later on. (Source: mozilla.org ) Google Searches ... (view more)

A new bug in Microsoft's Skype video chat program reportedly causes instant messages to be sent to the wrong contact. It's a potentially harmful issue that could leave some of Skype's many users embarrassed, frustrated, and angry. The problem was ... initially reported late last week through Skype's user forum. According to reports, the bug affects Mac, Windows, Linux, and Windows Phone versions of Skype. Skype quickly admitted that instant messages can be sent to the wrong personal contact when the program suffers a crash in the middle of an instant messaging session. Last Instant Message Sent ... (view more)

Rumors of a rampant Android-based botnet that is spamming individuals around the world are now proving to be unfounded. Instead, experts have discovered that Yahoo Mail may have been compromised. Rumors of an Android-based botnet first began ... circulating last week. Reportedly, the botnet was sending out waves of pharmacy, penny stock, and e-card spam emails. Terry Zink, a program manager for Microsoft's Forefront security product team, added credibility to the rumors by claiming, "a spammer has control of a botnet that lives on Android devices. These devices login to user's Yahoo Mail account ... (view more)

Facebook may begin snooping on smartphone users in order to target them with more relevant advertisements. The strategy could prove a huge money-maker, but may be a step too far for some of the social network's users. The massive social network ... currently makes most of its revenue from advertising. However, it has struggled to cash in when people visit the site using a smartphone. In recent financial filings, Facebook admitted this could become a serious handicap as more and more people choose to access the social media site from their phones instead of their computers. Facebook had already ... (view more)

Twitter has released new figures showing government requests for information about its users. It's a report similar to the one produced by Google, though with some notable differences. For the past three years, Google has produced these kinds of ... statistics every six months. The idea is to show changes in government demands for specific user information. Twitter openly acknowledges it has copied Google's idea. It says releasing the figures will force governments to be more accountable about the information they demand. (Source: twitter.com ) Twitter's newly-published data covers all government ... (view more)

Several major websites were briefly knocked offline this past weekend by a quirk in the calendar: a 'leap second' -- the rare additional tick added worldwide to clocks that fixes a natural flaw in our time-keeping systems. The 'leap second' is used ... around the world on computerized time systems because a year on our clocks is slightly shorter than the actual the time it takes the Earth to go once around the sun. Nowadays, we take most of our time signals from an atomic clock, which measures the vibrations of atoms in a metal called cesium so accurately that a one second error is nearly as ... (view more)

After quietly changing the default email addresses of all its users to @facebook.com, on their profile pages, Facebook is now being blamed for causing multiple unwanted (and unwarranted) address book changes. The end result: an even fiercer backlash ... from Facebook's member base than we saw just a few days ago. It was bad enough when Facebook decided to overstep its boundaries and force an email change on all its users, whether or not they had agreed to sign on for the new email service. But further tensions arose when the company also decided to splash those new email addresses across each ... (view more)

Online travel agency Orbitz is reportedly offering more expensive hotels to Mac users than to people using a PC. The agency has made this adjustment intentionally, based on research showing that Mac users regularly pay more for Internet hotels ... bookings. According to reports, Orbitz examined data from past bookings and found that the average price PC users pay through the site for a night in a hotel is about $100. However, Mac users pay an average of $20 to $30 extra for the same bookings. Mac Users More Likely to Spend Big The data showed a consistent pattern: Mac users are 40 per cent more ... (view more)

That sneaky Facebook. For years, the social networking site tracked its users' online activity and sold the information to third-party advertisers. Now the company has decided to force a new @facebook.com email address on all its users, even those ... who have not signed on for the service. Worst yet, the social media company has plonked its new email address right onto its users' main Facebook page. According to reports, the email address now appears on everyone's main Facebook page and cannot be deleted. However, users can choose to hide the @facebook.com email address from public visitors, as ... (view more)