Government

As a tropical storm and possible hurricane bears down on the Gulf Coast of the U.S., the National Weather Service's website was churning out weather alerts Friday, despite a partial U.S. government shutdown that has affected citizens' access to other online resources.

The Internet service and telco provider to all the European Union’s official institutions was subjected to a malware attack that “no single company or authority could withstand on its own” admitted the company’s secretary general on Thursday.

The U.S. government demanded from email service provider Lavabit access to all user communications and a copy of the encryption keys used to secure web, instant message and email traffic for its investigation into several Lavabit user accounts, according to a post on the Facebook page of founder Ladar Levison.

The U.S. Department of Justice has opposed requests by Facebook, Google, Microsoft and other companies to publish the number of surveillance requests they receive from the U.S. National Security Agency and other agencies.

The partial U.S. government shutdown that began Tuesday morning counts the National Science Foundation websites and applications, and those who would use them, as victims.

The U.S. National Security Agency's efforts to defeat encryption will backfire by eroding trust in U.S.-based Internet services and in the agency's own efforts to aid U.S. companies with cybersecurity, a group of privacy advocates said Tuesday.

Would-be insurance customers in the U.S. ran into early problems today accessing the new federally run healthcare exchange as well as several state-run exchanges.

The Indian government has stepped up its squabble with Nokia over taxes and has frozen some of its assets in the country until the issue is resolved.

The U.S. Congress must act quickly on legislation that would make electronic data collection efforts by the U.S. National Security Agency more public, a group of tech firms, civil liberties groups and other organizations said Monday.

The health insurance marketplaces mandated by the Obama administration's Affordable Care Act are scheduled to open for business in four days. Yet even before the sites launch, tech problems are emerging.

Employees of the U.S. National Security Agency spied on "unfaithful" husbands, boyfriends and girlfriends using surveillance technology of the agency, according to a letter from the NSA to a U.S. Senator.

Mobile operators would have to tell the public what percentage of their cell sites were working during and after major disasters if the FCC adopts a rule it is proposing in the wake of Hurricane Sandy.