Weeks after promising tabs in its upcoming IE 7 release, Microsoft made the long-awaited browsing feature available for IE 6 through its MSN toolbar.

With the version of MSN Search Toolbar made available Wednesday, IE 6 gains the ability to open numerous Web pages within a single window, each selectable by a small tab at the top of the window.

Source: News.com

Microsoft will release a version of its Windows operating system without the Media Player application on June 15 to comply with European Union anti-monopoly rules, the company said on Wednesday.

“These products will be made available to computer manufacturers on June 15 in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish, and will be available to other distribution channels including the retail and volume licensing channels on July 1,” the software giant said in a statement.

Source: Reuters

Symantec Corp. has turned the tables on browser toolbar startup Hotbar.com Inc., filing a lawsuit to retain the right to flag Hotbar products as a potential security risk for PC users.

Symantec’s suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, does not seek monetary damages. Instead, it is asking for a legal judgment supporting Symantec’s position that Hotbar program files “are indeed adware and can be treated as computer security risks.”

Ziff Davis Internet News has learned that the suit was a direct response to a cease-and-desist letter sent to Symantec demanding that the company stop classifying Hotbar programs as adware.

Source: eWeek

A British man suspected of hacking into 53 U.S. government computers is facing extradition.

Gary McKinnon, 39, also known as “Solo”, an unemployed man from north London, was arrested Tuesday night.

According to the warrant, McKinnon gained illegal access and made unauthorized modifications to 53 computers belonging to the U.S. government, including computers from the Department of Defense and the National Security Agency, between February 2001 and March 2002.

Among the charges, McKinnon is suspected of stealing administrator identities, deleting 1,300 user accounts and copying a file containing usernames and encrypted passwords.

If extradited and found guilty in the United States, he faces five years in prison for eight crimes he was indicted for in 2002.

Source: News.com

Japan’s Toshiba Corp. said Wednesday that it has developed the technology to mass-produce recordable high-definition DVDs.

Toshiba said the new technology, developed jointly with Mitsubishi Kagaku Media Co. and Hayashibara Biochemical Laboratories Inc., will enable the manufacture of single-recording HD-DVD disks with 15-gigabyte storage capacity.

Disc manufacturers, currently producing recordable DVD disks, will only have to make minor modifications to be able to produce the new higher-definition kind, Toshiba said.

Source: AP

Tired of playing second fiddle in Web hosting, Microsoft is revamping its server software in an attempt to snatch market share away from the popular Apache-Linux combination.

When the software giant releases Longhorn Server in 2007, it will introduce a re-architected edition of its Internet Information Services Web server, said Bob Muglia, senior vice president in charge of Windows Server development.

The changes will make IIS more modular, which will speed up performance for Web applications, he said.

Source: ZDNet

Seattle is now the most unwired city in America, according to Intel Corporation’s third annual “Most Unwired Cities” survey released today.

In a rapidly changing wireless landscape, Seattle narrowly unseated former top position holders San Francisco (2004’s Most Unwired City ) and Portland , Ore. (2003’s Most Unwired City ). Seattle-area residents can now stay connected, informed and entertained throughout the city, from the original Starbucks at Pike Place Market and the Bank of America Tower to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and the Space Needle.

“Wireless is becoming a fundamental part of how we live,” said Bert Sperling of Sperling’s Best Places, which conducted the surveys. “The ability to access information and entertainment when and where you want it is simply irresistible to business people seeking greater productivity and consumers who live an on-the-go lifestyle.”

Following the Seattle-Bellevue-Everett-Tacoma, Wash. area on the list of top 10 unwired regions are San Francisco-San Jose-Oakland, Calif. (No. 2); Austin, Texas (No. 3); Portland, Ore.-Vancouver, Wash. (No. 4); Toledo, Ohio (No. 5); Atlanta (No. 6); Denver (No. 7); Raleigh-Durham, N.C. (No.8); Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn. (No. 9) and Orange County, Calif. (No.10). Making the biggest jump over last year, Baton Rouge , La. climbed 67 spots to crack the top 20. The complete list of Intel’s “Most Unwired Cities” is available at www.intel.com/go/unwiredcities .