Many banks miss Y2K deadline
More than 30 percent of the nation’s banks have missed a critical federal Y2K reporting deadline, according to Weiss Ratings, Inc., a Florida company that issues financial safety grades on financial institutions and insurance companies. According to the company, some 32 percent of the 909 banks and savings and loan institutions responding to a Weiss survey admitted missing the Dec. 31 federal deadline for completing remediation and resting of internal mission-critical systems.
According to Weiss, Inc. the survey findings contradict assurances from banking regulators that only 4 percent of banking institutions have been rated “unsatisfactory” or “needs improvement.”
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”I don’t understand how the authorities can give ‘satisfactory’ Y2K compliance ratings to institutions that have apparently missed a critical compliance piece,” said Martin Weiss, Ph.D., chairman of Weiss Ratings, Inc. “I personally believe the authorities are either using outdated information in their pronouncements or simply sugar-coating the truth. In the long run, I feel this can only damage their credibility and create the conditions for the very consumer panic everyone wants to avoid.”
Financing forum
The Rhode Island Technology Council and Brown University Venture Forum will focus on financing options for growing software companies at a Feb. 25 joint meeting of the council and forum. Panelists include Robert O’Connor, Jr., president and chief executive officer of SOFTRAX Corp., which has recently completed a multi-million dollar equity financing; Michael Shanahan, a general partner of Egan-Managed Capital; and Ralph B. Wagner, principal at Wagner Resources. The meeting will be held at 6 p.m. in Barus-Holley Building.
AAA establishes Y2K mediation process
The American Arbitration Association has established a new Y2K program to resolve disputes through mediation and arbitration, in an effort to avoid cluttering courtooms with Y2K cases. This program will resolve complex, technical disputes involving product failure or disruption of critical supply chains. To come to out-of-court resolutions the AAA established a National Technology Panel of 350 technical and legal experts who are trained and experienced arbitrators and mediators. With this program, parties may select to resolve their dispute through mediation, a non-binding process that allows each side to explore creative solutions and enhance the possibility of continuing their business relationship. If the mediation comes to an impasse the mediator can then become an arbitrator whose decision is legally binding.
Pentagon scrubs network of Internet sites
WASHINGTON (AP) — The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff looked on as Pentagon cyber-warriors clicked away at their laptops and showed how would-be terrorists could find his son’s home address. Army Gen. Henry Shelton then got a demonstration of how a skilled adversary might combine publicly available biographies and contractor information on military Web sites with a few well-placed phone calls to pin down the dates of highly classified nuclear exercises.
The classified briefing, held in Shelton’s Pentagon office, was then given to other generals and admirals as well as senior civilians, generating a momentum that has led the military to order a massive scrub of its vast network of Internet sites. Deputy Defense Secretary John Hamre said military Web sites offered adversaries “a potent instrument to obtain, correlate and evaluate an unprecedented volume of aggregated information” that could, when combined with other sources of information, “endanger Department of Defense personnel and their families.”
Instituted Dec. 7, the policy change has touched off a debate as some critics argue the Pentagon went too far in restricting the information it makes public on the Internet. In response, defense and national security officials have become more willing to discuss, on condition of not being identified by name, the nature of the risk their detailed review of military Web sites revealed.
Critics say Pentium III invades privacy
WASHINGTON (AP) — Days before the debut of the fastest ever computer processor from Intel Corp., the chip’s critics sought to widen their boycott and enlist the government in opposing the new technology, which they say will allow easy tracing of Internet users.
The organizers of the boycott, Junkbusters Corp. of Green Brook, N.J., and the Washington-based Electronic Privacy Information Center, sent letters to privacy and consumer groups, encouraging them to get the Federal Trade Commission involved.
Intel, the world’s largest computer chip-maker, announced last month that its upcoming Pentium III chip will be able to transmit a unique serial number internally and to Web sites that request it. This could be used to verify the identity of Web site users.
The company said the technology will help online merchants eliminate fraud, but some privacy groups contend it gives companies unprecedented ability to trace a consumer’s digital footprints as they wander the Web.
The Pentium III will be launched officially this Friday (Feb. 26).
