As Apple gears up for Instagram assault.
Apple has confirmed outages to its cloud platform iCloud for more than an hour on Monday, potentially affecting 15 million users worldwide.

The consumer electronics giant issued a status update on Monday morning in the US confirming that 12 percent of iCloud mail users “may have been unable to access iCloud mail"...

Formalise partnership after project works.
Predictive analytics software maker SAS has formalised a partnership with consultancy Capgemini aimed at tax and welfare fraud prevention for government agencies.
The two firms said they had worked on projects for Britain's HM Revenue & Customs and India's Maharashtra Sales Tax Department, and decided to come together more formally to jointly address fraud issues...

Plans content delivery, cloud nodes.

The first stage of Pacnet's new data centre was handed over to the company by building contractor...

Browser wars return.
Mozilla has accused Microsoft of crippling third-party browsers on tablets running some versions of Windows 8, in concerns linking Redmond with its European anti-trust settlement.

The Firefox maker's general counsel and spokesman both aired concerns this week that Windows 8 RT for ARM-based chips - those used in smartphones, tablets and some laptops - would effectively make Microsoft's own Internet Explorer the only fully functional browser on the platform...

Bids to return service to market.
Optus will appeal the full Federal Court decision that banned its TV Now free-to-air recording service last month.

The telco's chief executive Paul O'Sullivan told media this afternoon that the company would seek leave to appeal the decision to the High Court in a bid to overturn the decision holding back the service from public use...

First major system overhaul in six years.
Frozen pastries maker Patties Foods has upgraded its enterprise resource planning system for the first time in six years as it eyes business growth and embraces automation.
The food company - best known by its pie brand Four'N Twenty and frozen dessert brand Nanna's - has run a Lawson M3 ERP system on IBM server iron since early 2006 (pdf)...

Will version four reach schools before version five is ready?
The WA Department of Education will roll out the fourth version of its standard operating environment (SOE) to 228 schools by September, amid concerns over a lack of funds for the project...

Is ‘Oceania’ home to the most active female pirates in the world?
The Pirate Bay has issued public support for a Swedish university-led survey aimed at profiling file-sharing patterns across the world and expected to shed light on how Australians behave online with respect to copyright...

Users own tweets.
Twitter filed a motion in a New York criminal court on Tuesday seeking to quash a subpoena for Tweets and account records associated with Malcolm Harris, a Twitter user who was arrested last fall on the Brooklyn Bridge during an Occupy protest...

Government offers $30,000 in developer prizes.
The organisers of the annual GovHack are hoping to take the data mash-up event to the next level in 2012, upping prize money to $30,000 and hoping that code generated at the event will find its way into agency applications...

Construction firm embraces mobile age.
This story is from our new sister site BIT. Visit bit.com.au for more technical tips and tricks for Australian small to medium businesses.

Perth luxury house builder RiverStone has replaced a fleet of Vodafone BlackBerry devices with iPhones and iPads to meet the demands of its staff and reduce its reliance on paper...

But was it just 'fair use'?
A Northern California jury on Monday found that Google Inc infringed upon Oracle's copyrights on the structure of part of the Java software programming language, in a high stakes trial over smartphone technology...

Patches will send IT admins scrambling.
Microsoft will release three critical patches on Patch Tuesday tomorrow.
The patches would fix remote code execution flaws in Office, Windows, the .NET Framework and Silverlight.
Four other patches were rated important and would fix remote code execution flaws in Office and elevation of privilege vulnerabilities in Windows...

Critical bug could lead to system hijacking.
Adobe on Friday issued an emergency patch for a critical bug in its Flash Player software that is being used in targeted malware attacks.
Updating to Flash version 11.2.202.235 for Windows, Macintosh and Linux closes an "object confusion" vulnerability that, if exploited, could cause an application crash or, worse, lead to the takeover of a system, according to a bulletin...

Audit reveals privacy risks in legacy Access system.
Legacy database technology and processes at the Department of Veterans Affairs (DVA) could leave the department open to privacy breaches and reporting errors, an audit has found.
According to the Australian National Audit Office (ANAO), 53 percent of records in DVA's client feedbank management system (CFMS) contained errors such as inaccurate registration details and client satisfaction ratings...

Judge paves way for partial verdict.
A US judge urged jurors to resume deliberating Oracle's copyright claims against Google over the Android mobile platform, after they indicated there was unanimous agreement on all but one of the questions they must decide...

Computer science degree - error or deception?
Yahoo is facing possible legal action if it does not publicly disclose how it vetted recently-appointed chief Scott Thompson. 

Thompson and Yahoo came under fire last week after Dan Loeb from investment firm Third Point questioned the accuracy of a claim on Thompson’s bio and Yahoo’s regulatory filings that he had a degree in computer science, All Things Digital reported...

US authorities prepare case.
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) could fine Google US$10 million for circumventing privacy protections in Apple’s iPhone and iPad browser, Safari.

The regulator is preparing a case on the basis that Google deceived consumers, Bloomberg reported, citing a source familiar with the case...

Moves into web presentations off strong earnings growth.
Professional social network LinkedIn has acquired widely-used web presentation sharing platform SlideShare.

LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner announced the $118 million acquisition at its first quarter 2012 earnings call last week...

Analysis: Government 'price gouging' inquiry highlights price differences.
A federal inquiry into Australia's high technology prices could prompt changes in the IT supply chain, with benefits trickling down to consumers, small businesses and the enterprise...