United

Censorship is a slippery slope. The United Kingdom: my home. Case in point.

Nearly five years ago, the U.K. flipped the Web censorship switch. Most U.K. residents didn't even notice. Designed by telecommunications giant British Telecom (BT), "Cleanfeed" was used to filter out child abuse imagery, and it did so with great success.

Users would not see a notice or a startling warning about the content they had inadvertently accessed or had tried to reach. The page just wouldn't load.

In 2007, Home Office minister Vernon Coaker ordered all U.K. ISPs to subscribe to Cleanfeed … Read more

We'll be frank: Quick Conversion is one of the ugliest programs we've seen. It's also fairly light on features. But if you're looking specifically for a program that can convert between both English and metric units of length, it can get the job done.

Quick Conversion's interface consists of a list of units of measurement: inches, feet, yards, fathoms, rods, furlongs, miles, and leagues, as well as millimeters, centimeters, decimeters, meters, decameters, hectometers, and kilometers. A drop-down menu lets you select the unit of measurement that you want to convert from and enter the number … Read more

European network providers that want the United Nations to consider a new Internet tax targeting Google, Facebook, Apple, and Netflix today defended their proposal, which was leaked earlier this week.

The idea of requiring content providers to pay fees based on usage is an "innovative" change to the way the Internet currently works and will create a more "fair" environment "where operators' revenues will not be disconnected from the investment needs made necessary by the rapid growth of Internet traffic," the providers said in a statement (PDF).

Last night, CNET reported that the European … Read more

The United Nations is considering a new Internet tax targeting the largest Web content providers, including Google, Facebook, Apple, and Netflix, that could cripple their ability to reach users in developing nations.

The European proposal, offered for debate at a December meeting of a U.N. agency called the International Telecommunication Union, would amend an existing telecommunications treaty by imposing heavy costs on popular Web sites and their network providers for the privilege of serving non-U.S. users, according to newly leaked documents.

The documents (No. 1 No. 2) punctuate warnings that the Obama administration and Republican members of Congress … Read more

The United Nations has seized on the appearance of the Flame worm, which targeted computers in the Middle East, to argue that it should have more authority to deal with cybersecurity threats on the Internet.

Last week, the United Nations' International Telecommunication Union circulated a statement about Flame saying the malware "reinforces the need for a coordinated response" that could come from "building a global coalition." It took credit for Flame's discovery, saying Kaspersky Lab identified it "following a technical analysis requested by the ITU." (See CNET's FAQ.)

ITU spokesman Paul Conneally … Read more

An important law that would protect California consumers from state-level regulation of VoIP and other IP-based services passed the California State Senate late last week on a bipartisan 30-6 vote.

The bill, SB 1161, now moves to the State Assembly, which has scheduled hearings for June 11.

SB 1161 is short and sweet. It prohibits the state's Public Utility Commission "from regulating Voice over Internet Protocol and Internet Protocol enabled service...except as required or delegated by federal law" or otherwise authorized by statute, until at least 2020.

Its goal is even more straight-forward. As the bill'… Read more

Democratic and Republican government officials warned this morning that a United Nations summit in December will lead to a virtual takeover of the Internet if proposals from China, Russia, Iran, and Saudi Arabia are adopted.

It was a rare point of bipartisan agreement during an election year: a proposal that Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin described last year as handing the U.N. "international control of the Internet" must be stopped.

"These are terrible ideas," Rep. Fred Upton, a Michigan Republican, said during a U.S. House of Representatives hearing. They could allow "governments to … Read more

The Flame virus recently found in Iran could be used to infect other countries, according to the International Telecommunications Union.

As the United Nations agency charged with helping members protect their data networks, the ITU plans to issue a warning about the danger of Flame.

"This is the most serious (cyber) warning we have ever put out," Marco Obiso, cyber security coordinator for the ITU, told Reuters. The warning will paint the virus as a "dangerous espionage tool that could potentially be used to attack critical infrastructure," Reuters added.

Flame was recently identified as a culprit … Read more

Facebook plans to open its first Middle East office in Dubai next week, according to the Associated Press. This United Arab Emirates city is considered the Silicon Valley of the region and so it makes sense that the social network would put its Persian Gulf hub here.

With 80 percent of users outside the U.S. and Canada and more than 70 languages being used on the social network, Facebook has a massive global presence. Besides several offices throughout the U.S., the company also has 18 international offices, from Auckland to Hyderabad to Tokyo. Its international headquarters are in … Read more