Top 10: Obama takes charge, Ballmer lays it on the line

Barack Obama became the 44th, and first African-American, president of the U.S. on an Inauguration Day that captured the world's attention and provided a flurry of technology-related headlines. The post-inaugural buzz ended quickly, though, with dismal economic news being rife (again) this week. On a happier note, Apple did well with its quarterly financials and celebrated the 25th birthday of the Mac.

1. The Obama Administration tech watch: Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th U.S. president Tuesday, with Inauguration Day coverage blanketing the Web, including sites that typically do not have much to do with political news. There were any number of tech-related stories pegged to the big day, including how mobile-phone networks and the Internet held up. A tech-savvy president -- Obama publicly declared he was not going to give up his BlackBerry despite security issues -- will undoubtedly mean more emphasis on tech policy and legislation.

2. Ballmer provides grim outlook as economy 'resets': Leave it to Steve Ballmer to cut to the chase -- the economic recession will drag out for a year or two, leading to a "reset" of the economy from which there will not be a "bounce" that leads to the previous levels of prosperity. He delivered his grim assessment, which he did tinge with some notes of optimism about IT in general and Microsoft specifically, on the heels of news that his company's quarterly net income took a dive and that 5,000 employees are being laid off. Microsoft wasn't the only bearer of lousy financial news this week, as noted in number six.

3. Heartland data breach could be bigger than TJX's and Heartland breach raises questions about PCI standard's effectiveness: Heartland Payment Systems, which provides credit- and debit-card processing services, disclosed a massive data breach that could rival that of TJX, though specific numbers were unclear. However, Heartland processes 100 million card transactions per month, so analysts suspect that the breach was huge. (The TJX breach compromised more than 45 million cards.) The Heartland breach has led to renewed concerns that the Payment Card Industry data security standard required by Visa and MasterCard is not up to the task of ensuring data safety.

Sign up for ITworld's Daily newsletter
Follow ITworld on Twitter @IT_world

• Email
• Print
• Share
  • Slashdot
  • Digg
  • Stumble
  • Reddit
  • Newsvine