activists

Syrian dissidents besieged by malware attacks

As the Syrian civil war continues to escalate, pro-government forces are allegedly carrying out a cyberwar against local dissidents.

Syrian activists, journalists, and government opposition groups are under a barrage of targeted malware attacks, according to the watchdog group Electronic Frontier Foundation. What this malware does is deceptively install surveillance software into a computer under the guise of protecting the computer from viruses. Its name is AntiHacker.

Once the malware is installed in the computer, with promises to "Auto-Protect & Auto-Detect & Security & Quick scan and analysing [sic]," it actually begins to spy on the user. Using … Read more

WikiLeaks supporters attack MasterCard site

Activists fighting on behalf of WikiLeaks brought down MasterCard's Web site today, according to the BBC and other sources.

The hacking group Anonymous is taking responsibility for a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack on the credit company's site in retaliation for MasterCard's decision on Monday to block donations and payments to WikiLeaks, which was first reported by CNET.

MasterCard's main site was at times either offline or extremely slow to load this morning. Ping requests to the site also timed out, an indication that the site was unreachable.

Early this morning, the Anonymous group, which … Read more

Chinese woman arrested on wedding day for retweet

One of the tech world's greatest lawyers told me the other day that he thought the retweet was the greatest way of saying something truly nasty about another person without having to write it yourself.

However, some authorities are, perhaps, becoming wise to this secondary insult market.

According to UPI, Cheng Jianping, a human rights activist in China, retweeted something written by her fiance on Twitter. His tweet was a slightly sarcastic note concerning supposed Chinese nationalists who had decided to smash up Japanese products because of a dispute between China and Japan over the East China Sea islands … Read more

Report: Time for next stage of sustainable business

BOSTON--Corporate America needs to track its use of energy and resources as closely as it does its hiring and cash flow if it wants to keep pace with social concern about climate change and other sustainability issues, an activist U.S. investor group argues in a new report.

Population growth and a rising standard of living across the world will bring opportunities--but also risks of higher energy costs, scarcer water, and other possible consequences of climate change, the Ceres coalition of socially concerned investors, companies and public interest groups said.

Over the next decade, investors and consumers will expect more … Read more

Sun's largest shareholder often wears a velvet glove

The investment firm gobbling up shares of Sun Microsystems might look tough, but it usually avoids playing hardball with executives.

Sun got a wake-up call last week from its largest single investor, Southeastern Asset Management, which added the hardware maker to its list of companies for which it has switched from being a passive investor to an active one, with regard to corporate governance, operations management, and increasing shareholder value. But while the road ahead may be bumpy with this activist shareholder, which had $34 billion in assets under management as of the end of September, it will likely be … Read more

Sun's largest investor ups stake, seeks active role

Sun Microsystems' largest shareholder, Southeastern Asset Management, has upped its stake and taken a more aggressive attitude toward its investment, indicating that it will take an active role in maximizing shareholder value through talks with management and third parties, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday.

Southeastern, an investment advisory service and self-described value investor in large-cap, mid-cap, and small-cap companies, increased its stake to 21.2 percent from its previous investment in September of 17.3 percent.

In noting the increased stake and change in its status as a passive investor to … Read more

Will the U.S. recycle nuclear materials for fuel?

The U.S. does not recycle nuclear waste from power plants because it could be used for weapons, but that might change.

Pete Domenici, the Republican Senator from New Mexico, said the country should start to examine the benefits of recycling fuel, according to the Las Vegas Sun.

France and most other nuclear energy-producing countries recycle fuel. Doing so cuts down the amount of fuel that needs to be mined, as well as the amount of nuclear waste that needs to get buried. Recycling, however, leads to byproducts that can be used to build bombs.

Domenici also said he wants … Read more

Icahn sues for access to Motorola documents

Updated 8:10 a.m. Pacific time to include Motorola's offer to Icahn of two board seats.

Carl Icahn is still dogging Motorola. On Monday, the billionaire investor said his investment company, the Icahn Group, filed a lawsuit intended to force Motorola to hand over documents related to its mobile devices business and use of corporate aircraft by senior managers, board members, and their families, Reuters and other news agencies reported.

Saying the information will help him determine what Motorola's board should have done to help the company right its ailing handset business, Icahn added that he intends … Read more

Carl Icahn prepares for a blogging debut

Carl Icahn has been called many things: corporate raider, shareholder activist, private equity investor, according to Wikipedia.

And, maybe soon, we may add billionaire blogger to the list.

It appears the prolific writer of shareholder activist letters may want to apply his writing skills to a blog on his Icahn Report Web site.

While the Icahn Report home page notes "blog coming soon," the site has already posted its privacy policy and terms of use.

Icahn, who is making a second run at Motorola's board, is considering using the blog to highlight reports that either he or … Read more