The U.S. State Department is set to announce $28 million in grants to help Internet activists, particularly in countries where the governments restrict e-mail and social networks such as those offered by Facebook Inc., Twitter Inc. and Google Inc.
Protesters buoyed by the release of Wael Ghonim, a cyber activist and Google executive, are holding mass demonstrations against the rule of Hosni Mubarak for a 15th day in Cairo.
2010 was the year that removed all doubt that cybersecurity is now a geopolitical problem. We learned from diplomatic cables exposed by WikiLeaks that from Europe to the Middle East to China and beyond, Washington is having an even tougher time than we thought getting what it wants.
A senior Iranian cleric, Grand Ayatollah Bayat Zanjani, has discussed religious issues with his supporters on Facebook and Google Talk. A statement posted on the website of Ayatollah Bayat Zanjani, who has come under pressure from the Iranian authorities over his postelection stances, says the "unprecedented" online discussion took place on November 4 with a number of Internet users inside and outside of Iran.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt gave insight into the company’s burgeoning international policy on Wednesday night at a meeting at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) in New York City. Schmidt, who oversees the company’s technical and business strategy, spoke about the effects of technological democratization in the modern age and some of the challenges Google faces as it drafts its early forays into diplomacy.
The advent and power of connection technologies -- tools that connect people to vast amounts of information and to one another -- will make the twenty-first century all about surprises. Governments will be caught off-guard when large numbers of their citizens, armed with virtually nothing but cell phones, take part in mini-rebellions that challenge their authority.
The Dead Sea Scrolls, among the world's most important, mysterious and tightly restricted archaeological treasures, are about to get Googled. The technology giant and Israel announced Tuesday that they are teaming up to give researchers and the public the first comprehensive and searchable database of the scrolls - a 2,000-year-old collection of Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek documents that shed light on Judaism during biblical times and the origins of Christianity.
India has widened its security crackdown, asking all companies that provide encrypted communications - not just BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion - to install servers in the country to make it easier for the government to obtain users' data. That would likely affect digital giants like Google and Skype.