court

The U.S. Supreme Court's sweeping decision requiring police to obtain search warrants to plant GPS tracking devices on automobiles will broadly enhance Americans' electronic privacy rights, legal experts predicted today.

This morning's unanimous ruling (PDF) says the customary law enforcement practice of installing GPS trackers without judicial approval--which has become more common as prices have fallen--violates Americans' Fourth Amendment rights to be free from warrantless searches.

That reasoning suggests police also need to obtain warrants before tracking the locations of cell phones and mobile devices, another contentious topic currently before the courts, said Greg Nojeim, an … Read more

Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" and H.G. Wells' "Things to Come" may have first been published decades ago, and have long been in the public domain, but that doesn't mean they won't soon be under copyright once again.

That could be the result of a Supreme Court ruling today that Congress can re-copyright public domain works, Wired wrote.

With its 6-2 decision in Golan v. Holder (PDF), the top U.S. court held that Congress has the duty to comply with an international treaty known as the Berne Convention, which permits re-copyrighting works--books, musical … Read more

Quanta has sued Advanced Micro Devices over a defective chip used in an NEC laptop.

Quanta Computer, the world's largest contract manufacturer of laptop computers, sued AMD for breach of contract, alleging the chipmaker sold defective products, as first reported by Bloomberg.

The suit is centered on the ATI RS600ME, an integrated graphics solution, an AMD spokesperson told CNET. Integrated graphics chips include other circuitry and also act as a chipset, which supports the main central processing unit or CPU.

"AMD and its ATI Technologies Inc. unit sold chips that didn't meet heat tolerances and were unfit … Read more

Bradley Manning's attorney has suggested that the hundreds of megabytes of U.S. government data his client allegedly handed to WikiLeaks didn't really harm national security after all.

A new document filed in Manning's criminal case provides an early glimpse at the defense's legal strategy in advance of a preliminary hearing on December 16.

The filing, which defense attorney David Coombs made public today, requests a copy of a White House "report detailing the rather benign nature of the leaks and the lack of any real damage to national security" caused by WikiLeaks. It … Read more

HTC is feeling a little buyer's remorse.

The Taiwanese smartphone manufacturer said today that it would reconsider its planned acquisition of S3 Graphics, according to Bloomberg.

The value of S3 is debatable after the U.S. International Trade Commission ruled Apple did not violate its patents and terminated the investigation, dealing HTC a critical blow. HTC had intended for S3's patents to provide it with some legal cover in its ongoing court battle with Apple over intellectual property related to features found in touchscreen smartphones.

"We view this as a negative sign for HTC, which will now … Read more

Several U.S. Supreme Court justices hearing arguments in a case today suggested that allowing warrantless GPS tracking of citizens' cars could lead to a Big Brother scenario of constant computerized government surveillance.

"What is the question that I think people are driving at, at least as I understand it and certainly share the concern, is that if you win this case, then there is nothing to prevent the police or the government from monitoring 24 hours a day the public movement of every citizen of the United States," Justice Stephen Breyer told a Justice Department attorney. "… Read more

AT&T recorded a minor victory after Sprint Nextel was ordered to hand over internal documents to its rival.

The two companies continue to be bitterly locked over AT&T's proposed acquisition of Mobile USA, which Sprint has fiercely fought against. U.S. Special Master Richard Levie ruled yesterday that Sprint would have to hand over additional critical documents to AT&T that it hadn't already given to the U.S. Justice Department, Bloomberg BusinessWeek reported yesterday.

AT&T had originally sought even more documents, which give insight into Sprint's game plan and … Read more

Sprint Nextel lost out in a bid to obtain AT&T documents that would have provided the third-largest U.S. wireless carrier with additional ammunition in its battle to stop AT&T's acquisition of T-Mobile USA.

Reuters reported that U.S. District Judge Ellen Huvelle denied Sprint's request for the documents, which would have also given the company valuable insight into rival AT&T's operations. Huvelle also heard arguments by AT&T seeking to dismiss lawsuits filed by Sprint and regional carrier C Spire in an attempt to block the T-Mobile deal. She … Read more

Samsung is planning to launch updated versions of its Galaxy S, Galaxy S II, and Ace smartphones in the Netherlands to avoid seeing its handsets banned from sale later this month.

"We've fixed the technological problem and upgraded products to address the issue," a Samsung spokesman told Reuters in a statement published today. "They will be shortly available for sale."

Samsung's spokesman did not tell Reuters what changes were made or exactly when the smartphones will hit store shelves.

Samsung was forced to make updates to its handsets following a ruling by a Dutch court in August … Read more