Global banking group HSBC (0005.HK) (HSBA.L) has admitted to losing a computer server holding transaction data of 159,000 account holders in a Hong Kong branch office. The bank said in a statement issued late on Wednesday that it lost track of the server during renovation work at a Kwun Tong district branch on April 26.

The data on the server includes account numbers, customer names, transaction amounts and transaction types, but does not contain any customer PINS, passwords or user IDs, the company statement said.

“The server is protected by multiple layers of security. The risk of data leakage and fraudulent transactions resulting from the loss of the server is deemed to be low,” it added.

Microsoft Corp gauged Facebook’s interest in a possible acquisition after the software giant’s failed takeover attempt of Yahoo Inc, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.

The newspaper reported on its Web site that Microsoft’s bankers put out subtle signals to Facebook, the social networking Web site, to see if it would be open to a full acquisition.

A Sony TV with novel display technology that has drawn rave reviews for image quality may actually last little more than half as long as the company claims, according to a test by a private research firm.

Sony’s XEL-1 is the first TV on the U.S. market that uses organic light-emitting diodes, which give a bright, colorful image while keeping power consumption low. The screen diagonal is just 11 inches, making it more of a conversation piece than the center of the living room, especially considering the price - $2,499.99.

DisplaySearch ran two XEL-1 units for 1,000 hours, and measured the drop in brightness. Extrapolating from that, they found it would take 17,000 hours for a display to lose half its brightness, a standard measure of display life.

Sony says the display lasts 30,000 hours, or 10 years of typical use. Spokesman Greg Belloni said that figure is based on years of tests and the company stands by it.

Adware pushers have found a new way to trick you into downloading their annoying products: fake MP3 files.

On Tuesday, security vendor McAfee reported that it’s seen a huge spike in fake MP3 files spreading on peer-to-peer networks. Although the files have names that make them look like audio recordings, they’re really Trojan horse programs that try to install a shoddy media player and adware on your computer, said Craig Schmugar, a researcher with McAfee.

“Once you run it, there is no content. You’re taken to this site to install this player which you don’t really need,” he said.

Fake file names include: preview-t-3545425-changing times earth wind.mp3 and t-3545425-just got lucky.mp3. Schmugar listed more filenames, as well as details on the adware, in a Tuesday blog posting.

Users are first asked to OK an end-user license agreement before the Trojan installs two programs, Mirar and NetNucleus, on their PCs.

Ironically, while the Mirar software tells users that it doesn’t display popups, NetNucleus does deliver popup ads, so users who do not realize that they are installing two programs might feel tricked, Schmugar said. “You have a Window telling you that there are no popups and right behind it is a popup.”

Although McAfee has seen some nasty software disguising itself as media files in the past, it has never seen anything on this scale, Schmugar said. Over the past 24 hours, nearly a third of the McAfee customers who reported data back to the security company have detected these files, he said.

Microsoft Tuesday released the third service pack for Windows XP to the Web after last week delaying its scheduled release because of an incompatibility with one of its other software applications. It also resumed automatic distribution of Windows Vista, Service Pack 1 (SP1), which had been halted because of a similar problem.

Windows XP SP3 is now available through Windows Update and also on the Microsoft Download Center. Microsoft had expected to release the software on April 29; however, it discovered it conflicted with an application called Microsoft Dynamics RMS. The problem also affected Windows Vista SP1. Dynamics RMS is a retail-chain-management software for small and midsized businesses.

Microsoft Corp said it will start offering television shows for its Zune portable media device, more than two years after Apple Inc introduced the feature for its iPod player.

Microsoft’s Zune has one thing that Apple’s market-defining iPod and accompanying iTunes store does not — TV programs from General Electric’s NBC Universal.

Those shows and more than 800 TV episodes including Comedy Central’s “South Park” and MTV’s “The Hills” will be available at the Zune store starting on Tuesday for the equivalent of $1.99 in Microsoft points that must be purchased in advance.

Yahoo Inc. and McAfee Inc. are joining to offer alerts about potentially dangerous Web sites alongside search results generated at Yahoo.com.

With the new security feature - slated to take effect Tuesday - people who search the Internet using Yahoo will see a red exclamation point and a warning next to links McAfee has identified as serving dangerous downloads or using visitors’ e-mail addresses to send out spam.

Dangerous downloads can include “adware,” which shows unwanted advertisements; “spyware,” which secretly tracks users’ keystrokes and other actions; and other malicious programs that can give criminals control over users’ computers.

Yahoo and McAfee hope the move will quell users’ anxiety about accidentally clicking on malicious links.