Your Web activity may be scrutinized a little more closely in coming days, and records of it are going to stick around for longer than in the past. The U.S. Justice Department has asked giants AOL, Google, and Microsoft to hold onto accounts of their users’ online actions for up to two years. The information is intended to help with investigations into terrorism and child pornography.
Google Search Records Leaving China
By moving Google.cn search records out of China, the company hopes to protect users their from government mischief.
Sale Of Sex.com Breaks Records
Sex.com, a domain that’s been passed around a bit in its checkered history, was sold to an anonymous group of business partners for a reported $12-14 million in cash and stock, making it one of the highest selling domains in history.
White House Seeks Google Records
A scenario long feared by privacy advocates over Google’s voluminous storage of millions of pieces of information on user searches arose as Department of Justice lawyers asked a federal court to compel Google’s cooperation with their requests.
Holiday Music Downloads Set Records
The week between Christmas and New Years Day saw 20 million songs downloaded, more than doubling the record set the week before Christmas, according Nielsen SoundScan and E-Commerce Times.
IRS Requests PayPal Customer Records
Some customers may be using offshore credit cards to evade paying income taxes and illegally transferring money out of the country.
Google Breaks Records In 2Q
Google, Inc., controlling 47% of all search queries to the tune of over 6 billion searches during the second quarter of 2005, also announced quadrupled returns. The world’s top search engine reported record revenue of $1.384 billion.
Oil Prices Hit Records and Are Expected To Get Higher
Oil prices reached record highs yesterday with crude going up $1.89, or 3.3%, to $58.47 a barrel. Futures reached $58.60 a barrel. The previous record was $58.28 in April.
Thousands of Financial Records May Have Been Stolen From Banks
Over 100,000 customers of Wachovia Bank and Bank of America have been notified by the banks that employees may have stolen their financial records.
Basic DNS: PTR Records and Why You Care
A PTR record is what lets someone do a “reverse” DNS lookup – that is, they have your IP address and want to know what your host/domain is. At any Unix/Linux command line, you can use “dig -x” to do a reverse lookup: