Skype plays down clone rumours
Skype has dismissed claims by a Chinese software company to have reverse-engineered the protocols that underlie the Internet telephony software used by millions. The news of a potential rival client able to use the Skype network was broken by VoIP blogger Charlie Paglee who posted a screenshot of the software on his site.
If true, this [...]
‘Skype clone’ surfaces in China
Chinese software developers have reportedly reverse engineered Skype’s internet telephony software to develop a clone. The unnamed company has developed a software client using the same protocol and encryption technology used by Skype. This software, which is still in the early stages of development, was used to call Charlie Paglee, co-founder of Voice over IP [...]
China sentences net writer to two years
China sentenced reporter Li Yuanlong to two years in jail on Thursday, adding to its list of writers imprisoned for expressing themselves through the country’s expanding but tightly censored internet.
Li, who worked on the Bijie Daily in the southwestern province of Guizhou, was detained in September and charged in February with issuing essays that “fabricated, [...]
Yahoo China Rifles Back Against IFPI Infringement Lawsuit
Yahoo China recently battled back against infringement charges related to its MP3 search service. Just last week, the IFPI indicated that it would pursue legal remedies against the destination unless a quick resolution could be reached.
In a statement to the media, Yahoo China majority owner Alibaba.com characterized itself as a “general portal that provides [...]
U.S. may slap China with suit in intellectual-property dispute
In a move that would have broad implications for software, movies, music and pharmaceuticals, the U.S. said Thursday it may sue China as early as this fall for failing to protect intellectual property as required by trade agreements.
The U.S. would bring a trade case against China at the World Trade Organization for violating intellectual-property rights [...]
Is China Rethinking it’s Stance on Piracy?
A few days ago a new Chinese law went into effect that establishes fines for those that distribute pirated copies of music, movies, and software over the internet. The fine, 100,000 yuan or $12,500 USD, is an interesting new attempt to finally give some semblance of teeth to it’s efforts to [...]
Academics break the Great Firewall of China
Computer experts from the University of Cambridge claim not only to have breached the Great Firewall of China, but have found a way to use the firewall to launch denial-of-service attacks against specific Internet Protocol addresses in the country.
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The firewall, which uses routers supplied by Cisco, works in part by inspecting Web [...]
Record companies ready suit against Yahoo China
Yahoo China, the country’s second-largest search engine, will be sued by record companies within “a few weeks,” according to a group representing labels including EMI Group and Universal Music Group.
“We’ve started the process, and as far as we’re concerned we’re on a track to litigation,” John Kennedy, chairman of the International Federation for the Phonographic [...]
China restricts Internet cafe access
China has launched a campaign to enforce curfews at Internet cafes before schools let students out on summer vacation, a news report said Monday.
The focus of the weeklong crackdown, launched Saturday, “is to prevent the entry of kids under the age of 18,” said a Culture Ministry official quoted by the China Daily newspaper.
It said [...]
Piracy hurting China’s own industries
Kingsoft Corp.’s English-Chinese dictionary program is used on most of China’s 60 million PCs. That’s the good news. The bad news: Kingsoft doesn’t make any money from it, because 90 percent of those copies are pirated.
One by one, the Beijing-based software maker has seen its sales of such popular products destroyed after black market producers [...]
