Business

Microsoft's August Patch Tuesday is approaching and once again the company has plans to fix serious security vulnerabilities affecting its Internet Explorer (IE) web browser. This month's Patch Tuesday includes eight security updates -- that's one ... more update than last month . However, August's Patch Tuesday includes just three security updates marked "critical," Microsoft's highest security rating. Last month there were seven of these updates. Two of this month's critical updates are attracting plenty of media attention. All Versions of Internet Explorer Vulnerable The first affects every ... (view more)

A new report says Microsoft's own digital distribution center, the Windows Store, contains roughly half of the world's most popular applications. It's more bad news for Microsoft, which continues its struggle to lure mobile consumers away from the ... iOS and Android platforms. The study was conducted by Nick Landry, a product manager and Microsoft expert at New Jersey development firm Infragistics. Landry, whose company builds user interface development tools, based his "must-have" list on the top 100 iOS apps. He then went to the Google Play and Windows Store digital outlets to see how many of ... (view more)

Google has announced it will begin highlighting the search results that best answer a user's query. It represents a whole new approach for the ubiquitous search firm. In recent years, Google has focused on trying to answer a user's query quickly ... rather than providing them with the website that best answers their question. (That was partly a response to Microsoft's launching of Bing, which that firm promoted as a "decision engine" rather than a search tool.) The best example of Google's focus on speed over quality: Google Knowledge Graph, the box that appears on the right of the results page ... (view more)

With the back-to-school shopping season upon us, Microsoft is dropping the price of its Surface Pro tablet computer. The $100 price drop is less substantial than the $150 the firm knocked off its Surface RT tablet, but it should arouse interest in a ... device that has received better reviews than its cheaper counterpart. The Surface Pro launched early this year and several months after the Surface RT. Unlike the Surface RT, which runs Windows RT, the Surface Pro runs a full-blown version of Windows 8. That means Surface Pro users -- unlike their Surface RT counterparts -- can download apps from ... (view more)

Google has unveiled a new tool that allows Android users to find and track a lost smartphone or tablet device. The utility can also be used to wipe a smartphone's hard drive if recovery is deemed unsafe or unlikely. Google is calling the service ... 'Android Device Manager'. The firm says the service should be available to most Android users by the end of August 2013. It's been a long time coming. Apple released a similar tool -- called 'Find My iPhone' -- several years ago. That service lets iPhone users narrow down their smartphone's location to a specific geographical area (such as an ... (view more)

Microsoft SkyDrive is no more. However, it's not a case of Microsoft phasing out its popular cloud storage service -- instead, the firm is simply being forced to rename it after losing a trademark case. British Sky Broadcasting (or BSkyB, as it's ... often called) originally filed suit against Microsoft in 2011. It argued that the "Sky" portion of its own name could easily be confused with Microsoft's SkyDrive . Therefore, BSkyB said Microsoft had infringed on its trademark. Microsoft fought the matter in the English High Court but lost the case in June 2013. Now, an appeal by the Redmond, ... (view more)

Microsoft has revealed it generated $853 million in revenue selling its Surface tablet computer. Embarrassingly, that's less than the amount it recently wrote off in stock it no longer expects to sell at full price. The revelations come just days ... after company chief executive officer Steve Ballmer reportedly told staff "we built a few more [Surface] devices than we could sell." That appears to be an understatement, to say the least. This is the first time Microsoft has publicly discussed Surface sales in any detail. The information was made available through a filing with the Securities and ... (view more)

According to security firm Symantec, the Google Play store is home to many potentially dangerous applications. The firm says it found approximately 1,200 suspicious apps on the store over a seven-month period. Google Play is Google's digital ... distribution center, and it's where most Android users turn for downloads (in effect, it's Google's version of Apple's App Store). More than 700,000 apps can be found on the Google Play store, which has played a central role in Android's rapid growth in the mobile market. Between February and April 2013 sales of Android devices accounted for more than ... (view more)

Google has unveiled a $35 plug-in device that brings online video to your television. It's intended to provide an alternative to expensive set-top boxes and video game consoles. The Chromecast works with a range of online services -- such as YouTube ... and Netflix -- but will also play any video you can access through a web browser. The device is only a couple of inches long and has no buttons. It plugs into an HDMI port on your television and has a small USB socket for supplying power. The Chromecast also has built-in WiFi that connects to your Internet router. You can then control it through ... (view more)

According to sources within Microsoft, the company's top executives are not happy with sales of devices running the firm's Windows 8 operating system. Recently, chief executive officer Steve Ballmer was very blunt in discussing problems affecting ... the Surface tablet computer. Two technology blogs -- The Verge and Neowin -- say they've learned from sources who attended a recent internal town hall event that Microsoft's top brass is very upset with sales of Windows 8-based devices. "We built a few more devices than we could sell," Ballmer reportedly said in reference to the Surface RT tablet ... (view more)